And the Word Became Flesh

Today is the reason we have Christmas in December. Seriously.

There’s an ancient tradition that says that you will know the day of your death by the day of your conception, and vice versa. Christ was crucified on the 14th of Nisan – the only date we can fix with certainty in his life. When translated from the Jewish lunar calendar that day becomes the 25th of March on the Roman solar calendar.

So the second century Christians assumed that Christ was conceived on 25 March. Nine months later, we have Christmas. Simple.

Today, therefore, is the Solemnity of the Annunciation of the Lord. While this is good news for observant Catholics, who are not required to observe Lenten fasts or Friday abstention from meat on a Solemnity, I’d like to look a little deeper.

Saint Luke has the most complete account of the Annunciation, in Chapter 1, verses 26-38 of his Gospel.

The Archangel Gabriel appeared to a nice Jewish girl and told her she was “full of grace” and “blessed among women”. Naturally, she’s a wee bit confused. Terrified even. Here is the messenger of God, the angel who instructed the Prophet Daniel, and he’s not only greeting her (which would be terrifying enough, I think), but he has given her a title “Full of Grace”.

Now some modern Bible translations try to make light of this phrase, translating it as “highly favoured one” or something similar, but the translators are being a trifle disingenuous when they do that. The fact is that this sort of greeting is unprecedented in Biblical tradition. Here the angel of God is telling the young Mary that she is without sin.

How that’s possible, I’ll leave to actual theologians, who talk about the “prefigurement of Christ to his Mother” and such. God does transcend mere time, after all. For the moment, it’s enough to know that Mary is pretty discombobulated by the greeting.

But there’s more.

He tells her that she is the prophesied virgin who will bear a child. She will bear a son, the son of God, who will sit upon David’s throne.

Perhaps over her initial shock, Mary responds very reasonably by asking how that’s possible. She is, after all, a betrothed virgin.

The angel responds by telling her that the Holy Spirit of God will “overshadow” her. Now, that particular word only appears in one other place in all of scripture, when God overshadows the Ark of the Covenant, the vessel that bears the tablets of the Law, the very promise of the Covenant.

Essentially, the angel is telling her that she is the New Ark of the New Covenant. As the first Ark bore the Law, so she will bear the Saviour.

This was probably not the answer she was looking for.

There’s a great Jewish tradition of arguing or bargaining with God that goes clear back Abraham. Moses arguably perfected it.

But Mary does not argue, does not bargain, and that changes everything.

She declares herself the handmaid of the Lord. “Let it be done to me as you have said.” Fiat.

Mary becomes in that moment the perfect model of love and obedience to God, the perfect disciple, and the the worthy mother to her Son.

This is why even to this day, Catholics pray the “Hail Mary” – not only to honour the Mother of God, whom the Eastern Christians call Theotokos, or “God bearer”, but also to remind ourselves continually of the promises God makes to those who love Him. To remind ourselves that the Word became flesh. That the Son of God became the son of Mary. That He who transcends time was born into time.

Do we always remember this when we pray? Well, I don’t. Some days I’m tired or cranky or rushed. But the reminders are there, if I can allow the Grace of God to do its work.

I’d like to close with a beautiful Byzantine hymn for this day that sums it all up:

Today is the beginning of our salvation,
And the revelation of the eternal mystery!
The Son of God becomes the Son of the Virgin
As Gabriel announces the coming of Grace.
Together with him let us cry to the Theotokos:
“Rejoice, O Full of Grace, the Lord is with you!”

It turns out that the Annunciation was Good News for everybody. Happy feast day to you all!