In the entries which we will offer over the next while, we will begin to survey the rich texts composed for the votive Masses of the Blessed Virgin Mary. In this post we will give special attention to some of the splendid prayers for the Visitation. Although we already have the feast day – 31st May – the themes caught up in this celebration resonate throughout the liturgical year, and in them we see Mary held up as a meeting place for the Old and the New, the idea of first creation and redeemed creation, the first covenants and the definitive covenant, the hoped-for Messiah and the proclaimed Incarnate Word of God.
The internal dynamic of Luke’s account of annunciation and visitation (Luke 1:26-56) lies already within the framework of the story of John the Baptist – Luke asks us to consider the great “newness” about to take place, with the “oldness” of Zechariah, Elizabeth and the Baptist celebrated but overtaken. Within the encounter between Elizabeth and Mary all of this is distilled into a marvellous draught. And the prayers of the votive Mass seek to mirror and communicate this complex tapestry.
The Collect, or Opening Prayer, launches forth against the backdrop of “salvation and joy” being brought to Elizabeth’s home by the Virgin. This is not merely a matter of emotion but the radical gift of the Incarnate Word himself, carried in his mother’s womb, and present in this encounter, indeed the very heart, beginning and end of this meeting. Salvation is the person of Christ in all his mysteries, and joy is the first of the post-resurrection expressions of the reality of this salvation obtained.
But the Virgin is given now a title which can barely be exhausted – the ark of the New Covenant!
The Church recalls for us all those covenants of the Old Testament, which God again and again renewed with his chosen people, and which they abandoned – the covenant with Noah after the purifying waters of the flood had washed through creation; the marvellous covenant with Abraham, our father in faith, which was to promise God’s faithfulness to innumerable generations; and the covenant which surpasses all which went before, the Passover and deliverance from the slavery of Egypt to the promise of a new land, a new way of living, and an exodus which would culminate in the, Supper, Cross and Tomb of Jerusalem. The Virgin becomes the only fitting ark, surpassing the one of the Exodus, carrying now the One who will be, in his own flesh, the surpassing Covenant which will never need renewal.
The Blessed Virgin, in being made the ark of the New Covenant, becomes the icon sans pareil for the follower of Christ, the one who would really be Christ-Bearer. Moved by the Holy Spirit, who hovers over all of this new creation, the one who is sensitive to the Spirit’s presence and movement, carries Christ to others, proclaiming God’s “greatness by the praise of our lips and the holiness of our lives”.
As St Bernard of Clairvaux tells us:
Those who preach the Gospel carry Jesus as though in their wombs so that they give birth to him for others. Blessed Paul was of this type; he used to say, My little children, with whom I am in labour again until Christ is formed in you.
Yes, the true disciple, as one writer recently put it, realises that professing faith in a God whose Word became incarnate has to lead us to a faith embodied in history. Without ever ceasing to cultivate an intimate relationship with the Lord and living a faith always rooted in the experience of Jesus Christ, we have to realise that the authentically Christian interior life is not mere interiority. The God of Jesus Christ took flesh and lived among us, in this world. The joy of this meeting and moment of Christ’s overwhelming hidden yet manifest presence, is rounded out perfectly by the Post-Communion prayer of the Mass. The pouring out of the Holy Spirit – and we recall the ecstatic shout of the prophet Joel here (Joel 3:1-3) – finds ultimate expression in the proclamation of the message of joy to the whole world. Here is the grandeur of the word which goes forth from God’s mouth, accomplishing what it was sent to do (Isaiah 55:10-11); here is the urgency of the proclamation of the Kingdom, mirrored by Mary’s hastening to her cousin’s house; here is the Great Commission which ends the gospels of Mark and Matthew, and opens the missionary story of Acts of the Apostles. Here is Advent, Christmas, Passiontide and Paschaltide, and the whole economy of salvation, caught up in the silence of the Virgin’s womb and the once-uttered, sufficient in all ways, Word of God, Christ our Saviour!
Our Lady of Bethlehem Abbey, Portglenone 