Among the many things that can be said about the Visitation of Blessed Mary, Mother of God (Theotokos) to Saint Elisabeth is that it was an act of love. I mean by Mary. She made a many-day journey to the hill country, to share the joy of the Gospel with her relatives, both Saint Elisabeth and Saint Zechariah. And among what is startling about this moment is that Saint Luke does not share with us what Mary said. He relates that she greeted Elisabeth, but he does not relate what the specific greeting was. But we know the effect of her greeting: her greeting caused Saint John to leap in the womb of Elisabeth, and caused Elisabeth to be filled with the Holy Ghost. And so from Mary’s act of love, both John and Elisabeth were fill with the joy of the Gospel, which had already filled Mary. But because Luke leaves out her greeting, it is the act of love itself yield this joy, and yields the understanding by Elisabeth and John that their Saviour is present. It is Mary’s presence that sings and speaks praises of Christ.
In fact this is reflected in our Collect in the words “O God, Who hast taught us to keep all Thy commandments by loving Thee and our neighbor.” In this we see the doctrine of the Church: that knowledge and love are all the same—that, for Christians, love itself is understanding (William of St Thierry, Exposition on the Song of Songs, 57.) To give love shows understanding, to receive love also shows understanding. This is why it is ancient doctrine of the Church Fathers that in the Liturgy, by the grace of the Holy Spirit, we become what we have received—we have received the Sacrament of Eucharist, and so we become sacrament, dismissed at the conclusion of Mass and sent into the world to bless the Lord that in doing so we bless others—kept in God’s peace, that we become God’s peace for those in the world we encounter.
And yet, just because we are sent to be sacraments of peace and joy, sacraments of the Gospel for the world, sent to imitate Mary and proclaim the Gospel by our presence and words, does not mean the world will necessarily receive us in that way. We see this in Ezekiel, chapter 2, and recapitulated by Jesus when He returned to His own country and His own kin in the sixth chapter of Saint Mark. Ezekiel, entered into by the Spirit, was set on his feet by the Spirit. (This foreshadows how God entered Mary). Ezekiel was sent to preach about God to a people that had transgressed against Him. “Thus says the Lord God” is a prophecy of judgment against infidelity to God, uttered by the Holy Ghost through those filled by the Holy Ghost—spoken through people chosen by God, because God chooses to work through people to make His will known. There are hints in the text that Ezekiel’s prophetic status was in doubt—twice saying “whether they hear or refuse to hear.” The people, these rebellious souls who oppose God, would not refuse to hear if they recognized the prophetic utterances as God speaking through Ezekiel, indeed, recognizing him as a sacramental presence. But they cannot do so. They are unable.
Likewise the kin-folk of Jesus are unable. They cannot see Him, who is the icon of the invisible God the Father, as Himself the true sacrament of God’s presence. They see Him as something unusual, spectacular, perhaps magical. They see him as people today might see professional magicians who seem to accomplish astonishing mighty works. And yet, they miss the message. The deepest truth of the identity of Jesus—that He is the primordial sacrament of God’s presence, that He is God become man, the Eternal Word become flesh, that He dwells among us—was lost on them, went right over their heads.
We are dismissed at the end of Mass to imitate Mary, to go confidently in the world to proclaim the Gospel with joy. The people around us in Volusia County might also miss the message of who we are, and what we mean to say. They might not see us as agents of peace—agents of peace that passes all understanding, agents of Gospel Joy. Our identity as sacramental persons dismissed from the Mass to be the living bread for the world—that we do what Jesus told the disciples to do, to go to the people and give them something to eat—might go over the heads of our brothers and sisters in the world we encounter. Is this what we would prefer? Surely not, because Jesus marveled because of His kinsfolk unbelief. Yet notice that despite being mocked, ignored, and misunderstood, Jesus was not deterred from His mission—He laid His hands upon a few sick people, and healed them. Let us be emboldened by the example of our loving and most compassionate Lord Jesus: we do not need to reach the everyone in the world, we ourselves do not need to convert in large numbers within the town we live. We might prefer it, we might wish it, our pride might demand it. But to follow the example of Jesus, let us be pleased to receive even but a few.
Let us go with joy to the poor among us (whether materially, intellectually, or spiritually)—laying our hands upon them by being with them, accompanying them, loving them. Let us, filled with the Holy Spirit, be for the poor living bread, that they are fed attention, fed with our compassionate presence, fed with the peace which passes all understanding. Let our joy which we receive here during the divine Liturgy – joy because we are fed and loved by Christ Himself present among us – let this joy be shared world, that through us, the Church, the world may know the Gospel, even Jesus Christ, Himself, Who lives and reigns with the Father and the Holy Ghost, ever one God, world without end. Amen.