An Igna­t­ian Con­tem­pla­tion: The Annunciation 

We have heard the sto­ry so many times over the years, it some­times fails to aston­ish us. The Annun­ci­a­tion.  An angel appear­ing to Mary to ask if she will become the moth­er of the Christ.

For cen­turies, artists have pic­tured Mary at this moment in a vari­ety of devout set­tings, sur­round­ed by angels, cov­ered in red vel­vet or stand­ing amid tapes­tries and sil­ver candles.

These paint­ings can have a lot of pow­er, and we can study the sym­bol­ism and love the artist lav­ished on them for a long time, being drawn even deep­er into the mys­tery.  But some­times we might feel that these beau­ti­ful paint­ings don’t let Mary be real.  We might imag­ine her as bare­foot, cook­ing her own food and hav­ing a dis­tinc­tive personality.

Although some of us may have once arro­gant­ly dis­missed her as “irrel­e­vant” to our faith, we might find that we now rely on her for prayers and as a place to mull over the chal­lenges of fam­i­ly and mar­riage.  Using our imag­i­na­tions, we might med­i­tate on her, pic­tur­ing her as a young woman of deep faith, long steeped in the Jew­ish tra­di­tion wait­ing for the Mes­si­ah.  She must have read the Isa­iah pas­sages many times and prayed over them as her heart filled with grat­i­tude and great dreams.

“O Lord, you are our father; 
we are the clay and you the pot­ter: 
we are all the work of your hands.”  Isa­iah 64:7

Her sim­ple life prob­a­bly includ­ed dreams of mar­riage, rais­ing a fam­i­ly, teach­ing chil­dren the Jew­ish laws and tra­di­tions. But per­haps it was big­ger than that.  We might imag­ine that Mary’s heart had grown in her humil­i­ty and gen­eros­i­ty to God. Now she would be asked for the ulti­mate sac­ri­fice.  It invites us to won­der what kind of woman Mary was.

We can envi­sion her dark hair and eyes, her love of peo­ple.  We can pic­ture a charis­mat­ic fig­ure, one who had, at any giv­en moment, a kitchen filled with peo­ple, enjoy­ing her well-known hos­pi­tal­i­ty. Her stove was always going, good smells fill­ing the air. With our imag­i­na­tions, we might see Mary as an enter­tain­er with a won­der­ful, bil­low­ing laugh cen­tered in her joy of life. And a sto­ry-teller.  Mary’s tales were famous around town, and in lat­er years, her son would make great use of the tal­ent he learned from his mother.

One morn­ing the young woman was alone in her kitchen at mid-morn­ing. A pot of soup bub­bled on the fire as she prayed over the ancient words of the scrip­tures. Then, as she so often did, she poured out her heart to God, ask­ing to be of ser­vice, to be open to any­thing he might ask.

“There­fore the Lord him­self will give you this sign: 
the vir­gin shall be with child, and bear a son, 
and shall name him Immanuel.”  Isa­iah 7:14

She longed for the Mes­si­ah as all Jew­ish peo­ple did. It was deep in her tra­di­tion, in the prayers and scrip­tures. She prayed as she stirred her soup.

She was­n’t fright­ened, but sud­den­ly she was aware of a young man stand­ing in her kitchen. She turned and looked toward him, nev­er tak­ing her hand off the spoon that stirred her soup.  His pres­ence was odd­ly com­fort­able until he dropped to one knee. “Hail, favored one. The Lord is with you.”

Favored one? She was unsure and a small fear crept into her heart. What was this?

“Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God. 
Behold, you will con­ceive in your womb and bear a son, 
and you shall name him Jesus.” Luke 1:30

Her first reac­tion was unex­pect­ed. “Oh, please no,” she whis­pers. What was this invi­ta­tion? She want­ed only a sim­ple life, to mar­ry Joseph, go to the Tem­ple each year, live in the town she knew so well.  Fear clung to her and knot­ted her stom­ach. “I can’t do this. I don’t know how. I’m not wor­thy. I know I said I would do any­thing, but God must have me con­fused with some­one else. Some­one more wor­thy.”

She stood in shock while the young man wait­ed for her answer. The emp­ty kitchen was silent, except for the con­stant sim­mer of the soup. She closed her eyes. Fear. Was­n’t that always what sent her to God?  She breathed deeply and prayed. Open my heart. Let me be your ser­vant. Lead me where you desire. You will be with me.

Then, she knew.  She turned back to the young man and nod­ded. I will do just as I have been asked, she said.

And deep in our own souls, we pray with the same heart, ask­ing for the fears to be eased, ask­ing to feel God walk­ing with us in this dai­ly path of life, not cer­tain that we can han­dle every­thing that is coming.

Mary, show us how. Teach us to trust in God as you have.
Let us do what some­times seems unthink­able in this world:
to be hum­ble and to accept with­out always under­stand­ing why or how.