As we hear this Sunday’s Gospel (Luke 1, 39-45) we are presented with two unlikely people who were living at the margins of society. An aging, barren woman long dismissed by society, and a young girl not yet married and, therefore, having no identity at all, who lived in a little backwater of a town. They were powerless and seemingly insignificant to those who held power and had authority. Nonetheless, they speak to us today about how God works and how the Divine plan for the new creation will be made known.
Elizabeth, like Sarah in the Old Testament, did the work of hospitality. She welcomed Mary and her unborn child, and in all humility she declared that the child in her womb was secondary to the one Mary bore. Elizabeth became the first to proclaim faith in Jesus, calling Him “My Lord” before He was born. [Let’s not miss the way St. Luke uses the faith of women to make the major professions of faith!] “Blessed are you!” Elizabeth proclaimed, celebrating the grace that they both shared: “Blessed are you who believed.”
We will gather for Mass on the Fourth Sunday of Advent, just days before we celebrate the Incarnation once again; just days before we will be reminded again that God has consistently chosen the weak and the marginalized over people of influence. The Word of God speaks to us about how God works not to instruct, but to motivate and awaken us. God awakens us in Advent to the fact that it takes people like Elizabeth and Mary to make a difference! It takes people like you and me to allow God’s plan to be fulfilled.
All of this is to say that, in some ways, the story we proclaim on the Fourth Sunday of Advent is our story. It is the story about how God works through people like us, right here in North Portland or anywhere people are willing to listen the news brought by an angel. Like these women of faith, Elizabeth and Mary, we ought to risk believing that God’s promise is being fulfilled within us and for us. When we realize that God has chosen us, there will be peace, the kind of peace that comes by way of forgiveness, understanding, and love. It is then that we shall truly be “Blessed,” for we have believed that what was spoken to us by the Lord would be fulfilled.
Let us pray. “Pour forth, we ask you, O God, your peace into our hearts, so that we may be brought to a new hope and begin to live in a brand new way, faithful to your Son. Allow Elizabeth and Mary to intercede well for us and please hear us, for we pray in the name of Jesus, who lives and reigns with you forever and ever. Amen.”
