My meditation follows the reading from the Gospel.
From the Lectionary for December 22, 2021:
Luke 1:39-56 (New Revised Standard Version)
Mary Visits Elizabeth
39 In those days Mary set out and went with haste to a Judean town in the hill country, 40 where she entered the house of Zechariah and greeted Elizabeth. 41 When Elizabeth heard Mary’s greeting, the child leaped in her womb. And Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit 42 and exclaimed with a loud cry, “Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb. 43 And why has this happened to me, that the mother of my Lord comes to me? 44 For as soon as I heard the sound of your greeting, the child in my womb leaped for joy. 45 And blessed is she who believed that there would be a fulfillment of what was spoken to her by the Lord.”
Mary’s Song of Praise
46 And Mary said,
“My soul magnifies the Lord,
47 and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior,
48 for he has looked with favor on the lowliness of his servant.
Surely, from now on all generations will call me blessed;
49 for the Mighty One has done great things for me,
and holy is his name.
50 His mercy is for those who fear him
from generation to generation.
51 He has shown strength with his arm;
he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts.
52 He has brought down the powerful from their thrones,
and lifted up the lowly;
53 he has filled the hungry with good things,
and sent the rich away empty.
54 He has helped his servant Israel,
in remembrance of his mercy,
55 according to the promise he made to our ancestors,
to Abraham and to his descendants forever.”
56 And Mary remained with her about three months and then returned to her home.
I came of age in the mid-1970’s, a few years past the initial wave of enthusiasm for encounter groups, but there was still enough of the 60’s in the air that I actually participated in some belated versions of these meetings. The basic idea involved sitting in circles (or occasionally, standing) and committing to earnest, candid, and vulnerable conversation. Such sincerity is easily mocked. Along the way, most adults learn the survival value of a kind of jovial guarded irony, a way to deflect the risks of encounter by making smart remarks and joking about kum-ba-ya. I do it too, especially if faculty colleagues are nearby (we’re typically an irony-dependent bunch).
But I remember the encounter groups that worked, the sincerity that took root deep within my being and blossomed into correspondence, into revelation. I still yearn for such encounters. A real meeting: not the office kind we have too many of, but an encounter in which my heart leaps up, challenged and transformed by the surprise of the other. A new piece of music. A movie I had almost skipped. The “unmet friend” who also yearns for earnest, candid, and vulnerable conversation, whose yearning, in a welcome surprise, sometimes exceeds my own.
The miraculous enwombed encounter of two new lives, one a prophet and one the Messiah, strengthens and comforts my yearning. Their faithfully expectant mothers greet each other, and their encounter fills them with the Holy Spirit. I imagine Elizabeth’s husband, Zechariah, standing nearby. His disbelief is entirely reasonable, but the angel who stops his tongue had greater things than irony to announce. And though he does not yet know it, Zechariah is even now preparing for the encounter he will one day welcome, sincere and open-hearted: when he meets his son and finds his speech restored, just in time to say his name.
By Unknown author – http://faq.macedonia.org/images/embrace.jpg, Public Domain
(For the story of Zechariah’s priestly skepticism, see Luke 1:5-23.)
Lovely.
Beautiful, thank you! & Merry Christmas!
Thanks Gardner. Merry Christmas!