SECOND WEEK OF ADVENT
Immaculate Conception
Mary leads the way for all the people who journey toward the Lord. Today the Church applies to Mary, the virgin conceived without sin, the words of the prophet: “I exult for joy in the Lord, my soul rejoices in my God.” Why this joy? Because Mary is like the garden of humankind in which God lets the good seed sprout. Because she is the servant of the Lord and the image of what the Church ought to be. God is faithful to his promises and through her he gave us our Savior. Mary is the first and the only one of all people who was kept from sin. She is paradise restored, where God and people encounter one another.
First Reading: Genesis 3:9-15,20
God called to the Man: “Where are you?”
He said, “I heard you in the garden and I was afraid because I was naked. And I hid.”
God said, “Who told you were naked? Did you eat from that tree I told you not to eat from?”
The Man said, “The Woman you gave me as a companion, she gave me fruit from the tree, and, yes, I ate it.”
God said to the Woman, “What is this that you’ve done?”
“The serpent seduced me,” she said, “and I ate.”
God told the serpent:
“Because you’ve done this, you’re cursed,
cursed beyond all cattle and wild animals,
Cursed to slink on your belly
and eat dirt all your life.
I’m declaring war between you and the Woman,
between your offspring and hers.
He’ll wound your head,
you’ll wound his heel.”
The Man, known as Adam, named his wife Eve because she was the mother of all the living.
Second Reading: Ephesians 1:3-6,11-12
How blessed is God! And what a blessing he is! He’s the Father of our Master, Jesus Christ, and takes us to the high places of blessing in him. Long before he laid down earth’s foundations, he had us in mind, had settled on us as the focus of his love, to be made whole and holy by his love. Long, long ago he decided to adopt us into his family through Jesus Christ. (What pleasure he took in planning this!) He wanted us to enter into the celebration of his lavish gift-giving by the hand of his beloved Son.
It’s in Christ that we find out who we are and what we are living for. Long before we first heard of Christ and got our hopes up, he had his eye on us, had designs on us for glorious living, part of the overall purpose he is working out in everything and everyone.
Gospel: Luke 1:26-38
In the sixth month of Elizabeth’s pregnancy, God sent the angel Gabriel to the Galilean village of Nazareth to a virgin engaged to be married to a man descended from David. His name was Joseph, and the virgin’s name, Mary. Upon entering, Gabriel greeted her:
Good morning!
You’re beautiful with God’s beauty,
Beautiful inside and out!
God be with you.
She was thoroughly shaken, wondering what was behind a greeting like that. But the angel assured her, “Mary, you have nothing to fear. God has a surprise for you: You will become pregnant and give birth to a son and call his name Jesus.
He will be great,
be called ‘Son of the Highest.’
The Lord God will give him
the throne of his father David;
He will rule Jacob’s house forever—
no end, ever, to his kingdom.”
Mary said to the angel, “But how? I’ve never slept with a man.”
The angel answered,
The Holy Spirit will come upon you,
the power of the Highest hover over you;
Therefore, the child you bring to birth
will be called Holy, Son of God.
“And did you know that your cousin Elizabeth conceived a son, old as she is? Everyone called her barren, and here she is six months pregnant! Nothing, you see, is impossible with God.”
And Mary said,
Yes, I see it all now:
I’m the Lord’s maid, ready to serve.
Let it be with me
just as you say.
Then the angel left her.
Prayer
God our Father,
we thank you for choosing Mary
as the Mother of your Son
and for preserving her from all sin
from the first moment of her life.
Let this sign of your boundless love
give us hope and strength
to overcome evil in all its forms.
May we respond to your loving goodness
with the eagerness of Mary,
by the power of the grace won for us
through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
Reflection:
Immaculate Conception
St. Paul in his letter to the Ephesians reminds the community there that God has filled us with every spiritual blessings in order that his Church be holy and blameless before him. What St. Paul describes as God’s gift to his Children, is similar to what Luke describes about Mary through the mouth of Angel Gabriel. “Hail… Full of grace.” On the solemnity of Immaculate Conception, the Word of God reminds us – Like Mary, we are called to be holy and blameless before the Lord.
Today’s feast offers us an opportunity to approach the authentic figure of Mary. She clearly shines in the Gospel accounts. To understand the dogma of the Immaculate Conception—defined by Pope Pius IX on December 8, 1854— we must re-read it in the light of biblical revelation.
The Mary of the Gospel is very close to us: What makes her different from us is, her willingness to surrender to the plans of God instead of pursuing her own plans. She was a particular person in whom God has found the full availability to realize his plan of salvation.
God bestows his gifts on Mary to give her a mission to carry out. She gladly accepted the Word and accomplished her difficult vocation. The Gospels remind us of her doubts, questions, and moving journey of faith. Like us, like her son, she has been tried, but at all times she has been able to always say, like Jesus (2 Cor 1:19), “yes” to God.
The feast of the Immaculate Conception is the day for us to celebrate the numerous gifts of God, that He “chose us before creating the world”. Let us not be confused about this one important message: This solemnity is not the feast of Mary’s virginity, and even less of her puerperal physiological purification. Instead, it is the feast of the virtue of fidelity, fidelity to the “permanent yes” to what God has initiated in us, and feast of “no” to the power of the serpent. This is the feast of our own fidelity to the “Yes” we have committed to the Lord since our baptism.