4th Week of Advent - The Visitation

Mary goes to visit her cousin Elizabeth.  Both have been touched by God’s power and grace and now both are miraculously with child.  The story is brief, but important.  Mary has learned through the angel Gabriel that her cousin Elizabeth is pregnant, even in her old age. In response to this news:

“Mary set out and traveled to the hill country in haste to a town of Judah, 

where she entered the house of Zechariah and greeted Elizabeth.”   

Elizabeth responds to Mary’s greeting by crying out in a loud voice: “Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb.”  At the close of their encounter Elizabeth’s words to Mary are a message to all believers:   

“Blessed are you who believed 

that what was spoken to you by the Lord would be fulfilled.” 

I love the idea that the great, earth shaking manifestation of God's love and mankind's destiny, the Incarnation, is first announced to the world  by two pregnant ‘housewives’ meeting. How earthy, how profoundly ordinary. Wishing all of you a beautiful, mysteriously holy and ordinary Christmas. 

Patricia