25 March, Annunciation: Isaiah 7:10-2, 8:10; Hebrews 10:4-10; Luke 1:26-38
We read of Mary’s Son in the First Chapter of Luke’s Gospel: …the Lord God will give him the throne of David his father, and he will rule over the house of Jacob forever, and of his Kingdom there will be no end.
In the Twenty-third Chapter of the same Gospel we read: Above him there was an inscription that read, “This is the King of the Jews.” And that inscription is over the cross upon which Mary’s Son is crucified.
The only suggestion that there is more to Jesus’ or his Kingdom, than an ironic accusation, comes from a thief executed with him, who requests, Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom. It is the dying Jesus himself who identifies that Kingdom as Paradise.
This is the paradoxical logic of Luke’s Gospel in which God choses powerlessness to take the part of mortal, fallible humanity and to weave us into the Divine Life. That transformation is posited by today’s Solemnity and moves towards the Paschal Mystery we will celebrate next month, only reaching its completion in the New Jerusalem.
But just as that Divine life began to quicken in Mary’s body, doesn’t the reality of that fullness already quicken this celebration, where the Risen Son of Mary and Son of God is our altar, sacrifice and priest?