Feast of the Visitation of the Blessed Virgin Mary

 Lectionary: 572

Shout for joy, O daughter Zion!
     Sing joyfully, O Israel!
Be glad and exult with all your heart,
     O daughter Jerusalem!
The LORD has removed the judgment against you,
     he has turned away your enemies;
The King of Israel, the LORD, is in your midst,
     you have no further misfortune to fear.

If devotion to the Mother of God seemed to ebb in the late 1960's and seventies, she never went away. The Vatican Council helped to reground our devotion to her in the Sacred Scriptures. Pope Paul VI encouraged us to pray the rosary with attention to the mysteries that were scripture based. He even suggested we might use more scripture, which spawned a mini-industry of "scripture rosaries." 

I was personally inspired by the encyclical, Mother of the Redeemer (Redemptoris Mater) by Pope John Paul II.  The Saint invited Protestant Christians to discover Mary through their devotion to the Bible. 

I heard recently of a small American town devastated by unemployment and drug abuse. The Catholic pastor invited his Protestant colleagues to join him in prayer and encouraged them to invoke the Virgin. He offered them printed prayers to Mary and Miraculous Medals, and each one grabbed a handful or more to distribute to their people. 

She has never gone away; she readily comes to us in our sorrow, grief, and disappointment. 

Mary speaks to us of God's intense, self-emptying love for us. Can a sovereign Lord of the Universe abandon the splendor, luxury, beauty, freedom, and power of Heaven to live in human squalor? From what I hear of the Game of Thrones, no one expects power-hungry men and women to ponder such a choice. 

But the Friend of Abraham, the Redeemer of Israel, has taken up residence within her body. As the Episcopal priest and poet John Donne said, 

Whom thou conceivest, conceived ; yea, thou art now

Thy Maker's maker, and thy Father's mother,

Thou hast light in dark, and shutt'st in little room

Immensity, cloister'd in thy dear womb.

Feminist theologians have also reflected deeply on her role in salvation. Gazing upon God and holding her hand, we set aside an unworthy fear to approach the Lord with a devout fear of the Lord. She reminds us that it is good to be human, despite the frailty and vulnerability of our nature. 

Today we remember the Virgin's visit to her expectant cousin, and the astonishing secret they shared. Even as armies march and emperors rule and kings wrestle for power, Mary and Elizabeth celebrate a mystery that will put an end to all that nonsense. They have heard God's battle cry, "Be still and know that I am God!" and they are quiet. 

Amid the frightening polarization of our times, as politicians exhort their zealots to fight for the putative rights to abort or to bear arms, Mary and Elizabeth invite us to gaze upon their frail fecundity and welcome the King of Heaven. In their presence we find the path to sanity and serenity. 

This world with its trouble is passing away. We can see that now. We know where we're going, and we know who's going with us.