CONNECTION TO THE VIRGIN MARY - December 20, 2004

Homily for December 20, 2004

CONNECTION TO THE VIRGIN MARY

Today’s gospel narrative, taken from Lk. 1:26-38, tells about the angel Gabriel’s annunciation to the Virgin Mary. This gospel narrative will give us the fifth messianic connection, the connection of Jesus Christ to the Virgin Mary. This connection to the Virgin Mary is necessary in order to establish the claim of the Messiah, just as in the other earlier four connections, to her role in God’s plan of salvation.

So this gospel narrative begins with verses 26 to 28 which say the following:

“In the sixth month (of John’s conception), the angel Gabriel was sent by God to a town in Galilee called Nazareth, to a virgin betrothed to a man named Joseph, of the House of David; and the virgin’s name was Mary. He went in and said to her: ‘Rejoice, so highly favored! The Lord is with you!’”

         

          The parallel passage we get in the Sacred Scriptures for this foregoing passage is the one mentioned in Daniel 8:16, which says:

“I heard a man’s voice cry over the Ulai, ‘Gabriel, tell him the meaning of the vision!”

          This particular passage is further connected to two more passages in the book of Daniel: first in Daniel 9:21-23, which says:

“Still speaking, still at prayer, when Gabriel, the being I had originally seen in a vision, flew suddenly down to me at the hour of the evening sacrifice. He said to me, “Daniel, you see me; I have come down to teach you how to understand. When your pleading began, a word was uttered, and I have come to tell you what it is. You are a man specially chosen. Grasp the meaning of the word, understand the vision…”

and the second is in Daniel 10:10-11, which says:

“I felt a hand touching me, setting my knees and my hands trembling. He said, “Daniel, you are a man specially chosen; listen carefully to the words I am going to say; stand up; I have been sent to you and here I am.”

          What is common with all the above quoted passages is the name of the angel Gabriel. He was sent to bring message to Daniel and to the Virgin Mary. The practical connection between Luke’s narrative of the Annunciation and that of Daniel’s narrative of the angel Gabriel is that this scene in Daniel 9:21-23 was the one most preferred scene by some Medieval artists to portray the scene of Mary’s annunciation in the context of an evening prayer.

          Regarding the words of greeting used by the angel Gabriel, we find three parallels in the scriptures which use this same greeting, which are:

1.     Jg. 6:12 – “When the angel of Yahweh appeared to him and said, “Yahweh is with you, valiant warrior’”

2.     Rt. 2:4 – “Now Boaz, as it happened, had just come from Bethlehem. “Yahweh be with you!”, he said to the reapers. “Yahweh bless you!’, they replied.

3.     Ps. 129:7-8 – “Yahweh’s blessing on you!”

It seems that this was the greeting very commonly  used by both angels and men to bless and to wish God’s protection on each other.

          In verse 29, we have Mary’s reaction to the angel’s greeting, as recorded by Luke:

“She was deeply disturbed by these words and asked herself what this greeting could mean.”

          No parallel text whatsoever is cited.

          Verses 30 up to 33 consists of  four passages, which contains the first part of the angel’s message to Mary:

“But the angel said to her, ‘Mary, do not be afraid; you have win God’s favor. Listen! You are to conceive and bear a son, and you must name him Jesus. He will be great and will be called Son of the Most High. The Lord God will give him the throne of his ancestor David; he will rule over the House of Jacob forever and his reign will have no end.”

          Parallel passages of these verses consist of the following:

v Is 7:14+ - The Lord, therefore, will give you a sign. It is this: the maiden is with child and will soon give birth to a son whom she will call Immanuel.

v Is. 9:5-6 – For there is a child born for us, a son is given to us, and dominion is laid on his shoulders; and this is the name they give him: Wonder-Counselor, Mighty God, Eternal Father, Prince of Peace.

v Is. 11:1 – A shoot springs from the stock of Jesse, a scion thrusts from his roots: on him the Spirit of Yahweh rests.

v Lk. 2:21 – When the eight day came and the child was to be circumcised, they gave him the name Jesus, the name the angel had given him before his conception.

v Mt. 1:21+ - She will give birth to a son and you must name him Jesus, because he is the one who is to save his people from their sins.

v 2 S. 7:1+ - I will  preserve the offspring of your body after you and make his sovereignty secure. Your House and your sovereignty will always stand secure before me and your throne be established for ever.

v Dn. 2:44 – The God of heaven will set up his kingdom which shall never be destroyed, and this kingdom will not pass into the hands of any other race.

v Mi. 5:2 – But you (Bethlehem) Ephrathah, the least of the clans of Judah, out of you shall be born for me the one who is to rule over Israel: his origin goes back to the distant past, to the days of old.

Verse 34 contains Mary’s sole query to the angel, which is as follows:

“But how can this come about, since I am a virgin?”

          No parallel passages are given to this verse, except a passage which mentions about a  “chaste virgin (being dedicated) to this one husband” in 2 Cor. 11:2.

          Verses 35 up to 37 contain the  angel’s reply to Mary’s query and constitute the second part of his message:

“The Holy Spirit will come upon you and the power of the Most High will cover you with its shadow. And so the child will be holy and will be called Son of God. Know that your kinswoman Elizabeth has, in her old age, herself conceived a son, and she whom people called barren is now in her sixth month, for nothing is impossible to God.”

The parallel texts for these verses are:

“Is anything too wonderful for Yahweh? At this time next year, I shall visit you again and Sarah will have a son.” (Gn. 18:14)

“See, I am Yahweh God of all mankind, is anything impossible to me?” (Jr. 32:27)

“For men this is impossible, for God everything is possible.” (Mt. 19:26)

“Convinced that God has power to do what he promised” (Rm. 4:21)

“To you nothing is impossible” (Jr. 32:17)

The last verse, 38, contains Mary’s response to the message of the angel:

“‘I am the handmaid of the Lord,’ said Mary, ‘Let what you have said be done to me.’ And the angel left her.”

          Regarding the ministry of angels, holy scriptures has the following to say:

 “The truth is they are all spirits whose work is service, sent to help those who will be the heirs of salvations.” (Heb. 1:14+)

“Tobias went out to look for a man who knew the way to go with him to Media. Outside he found Raphael the angel standing facing him (though he did not guess he was an angel of God)” (Tob. 5:4+)

“This time the prayer of each of them found favor before the glory of God, and Raphael was sent to bring remedy to them both.” (Tob. 3:17+)

“But the angel of the Lord came down into the  furnace beside Azariah and his companions; he drove the flames of the fire outwards.” (Dn. 3:49).

“My God sent his angels who sealed the lion’s jaws; they did me no harm” Dn. 6:23

The connection of the Messiah to the Virgin Mary, which constitutes Jesus Christ’s  claim to her role in God’s plan of salvation, is in the parallelism, or comparison, of the virginity of the Church, as “a chaste virgin (given away) to this one husband” (2 Cor. 11:2, Rev. 19:8-9, 21:2), who is Jesus Christ, and to the virgin Mary who is the mother of the Son of God, Jesus Christ. 

          Since the birth of Christ, in his human form (1 Tim. 3:16), required a virgin mother, Mary, who, because of her complete submission and acceptance of God’s will, made possible the realization of the plan of salvation in human history,  likewise, the birth of all those destined for salvation requires a similar virgin mother, which is the Church (Ep. 5:26-27).

          What the virgin Mary had underwent as the stages of her annunciation, conception, gestation and birth to the Son of God, the Messiah Savior, is comparable to the different stages of proclamation, conception, gestation and birth that the Church undergoes in giving birth to the children of God, the Christians. 

          All these works, whether of Mary or the Church,  is according to God’s plan of salvation wherein every one will “become true images of the Son, so that the Son might become the eldest of many brothers” (Rm. 8:29).

          In this work of salvation, the ministry of angels (the evangelists or catechists), as mentioned in Heb. 1:14, is very necessary and indispensable. The ministry of angels is to bring God’s proposal to the target, “those who are destined to be saved” (Ac. 2:47). Once the proposal is accepted, the Church gestates them in her womb for a period of formation until the image of God (1 Co. 11:7) is fully formed in them, and their birth to the new life in Jesus Christ comes along (Rm. 6:4).

In this  work of formation, the participation and cooperation of virgin and holy Mother Church is very indispensable, because she fulfills the work of the “woman” in the book of the Apocalypse, who flew to the desert on eagle’s wings with her male child in order to escape the fury of the dragon (Rev. 12: 13-17).

So, what is the connection of the Messiah, to the Virgin Mary, beside being her mother in the flesh? The Virgin Mary with the little child in her arms, is the figure, icon and image or the appropriate representation of the Church in her work of forming the Christians, the children of God today. The stages which she had undergone in her life, in order to bring forth the Christ, or Messiah Savior, to the then Judeo-Roman world, is the same stages that the Church undergoes in bringing forth the Christians (the saviors a la Jesus Christ) to the present world.

Tomorrow, we will discuss the sixth Messianic connection to cousin Elizabeth.