A CHILD IS BORN

A SERMON FOR THE NATIVITY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY

Nine months ago today we celebrated that great feast of Our Lady, the Immaculate Conception, when the future Mother of Our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ was herself conceived in the womb of her own mother, St. Anne. Conceived as no child had ever before been conceived, since the creation of our very first mother, Eve, taken from the rib of Adam.  But this new child of God, Mary, was no Eve.  Eve had abused the gifts and graces God had given her to commit a grave sin, the very first sin, Original Sin.  For this crime God punished Eve and her offspring, who from that time forth would be brought forth in pain and sorrow.  And worse yet, they would be brought forth in sin.  But not Mary, who was conceived and delivered without the stain of Eve’s original sin.  A new Eve, who was full of grace.  “This is she,” says St. Augustine, “whose delivery changed the nature that we draw from our first parents, and cleansed away their offence.  At her that sorrowful sentence which was pronounced over Eve ended its course; to her it was never said: In sorrow thou shalt bring forth children.  She brought forth a Child, even the Lord, but she brought him forth, not in sorrow, but in joy.”

The conception of Our Lady by St. Anne was in itself something of a miracle. According to the Protoevangelium of St. James, which goes back to about 150 A.D., a rich and pious couple called Joachim and Anne lived in a town in Galilee called Nazareth, and they were childless.  When it was time for Joachim to present himself at the temple in Jerusalem to offer sacrifice, he was turned away by one of the Jewish elders, a man called Ruben, who claimed that men who had no offspring were not worthy to be admitted to the sacrifice.  Joachim was filled with shame and sorrow, and instead of going back to his wife in Nazareth, took a detour into the mountains where he could pray for consolation.  Here, an angel appeared to him in a dream, promising him a very special child.  Meanwhile, St. Anne was wondering what was taking her husband so long at the temple. She too prayed to God, asking him to deliver her from the curse of sterility, and promising that if she conceived, she would dedicate her child to the service of God.  Her  prayers were heard, and God sent his angel to St. Anne to announce the birth of the Blessed Virgin Mary.  “Anne,” declared the angel, “the Lord hath looked upon thy tears; thou shalt conceive and give birth, and the fruit of thy womb shall be called blessed by all the world.” On December 8^th, St. Anne conceived a child, bringing her into this world nine months later, on this Our Lady’s birth-day, September 8^th.  St. Anne has become the patron saint of women in labour, and what better patroness could they have than she who brought forth this day the future Mother of God, full of grace, the Blessed and Worshipful and Ever-Virgin Mary?

Only three births are celebrated in the Church’s yearly liturgical cycle. Most saints’ feastdays are celebrated on the anniversary of their death, or of some important event during their life. Only three actual birthdays do we celebrate.  Of course, we will never forget the birthday of Our Blessed Lord of course, that great and glorious feast of Christmas, filled with so many memorable events, so many glad tidings of great joy, the fulfillment of the expectation of the nations. The second Nativity we celebrate is that of St. John Baptist on Midsummer Day.  He who was sanctified in the womb of his mother, St. Elizabeth, at the approach of the Blessed Virgin Mary bearing the blessed fruit of her own womb.  Echoed by the words of the psalmist, “Abyssus abyssum invocat” – the deep calleth unto the deep, the very presence of Our Lord was enough to take away the stain of original sin from the soul of his cousin, St. John the Baptist.  His birth free from original sin is therefore the second Nativity that we celebrate in the Church’s year, and in years gone by it was done so with great solemnity, with lines of beacons crossing the land as bonfires were lit to welcome the anniversary of one born without original sin.

Our Lord himself said that “Among all the men that are born of women there is none greater than John the Baptist.”  But greater by far there was a woman.  A woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars.  Not only would she be bornwithout original sin, but to her would be given the even greater privilege of never having known sin, not even in her conception.  Today we celebrate the fruit of that conception, when St. Anne delivered to a silent and uncomprehending world a child who would eventually be crowned as Queen of the Angels.  For this is the birth-day of the Blessed Virgin Mary, to whom would be sent the Archangel Gabriel, she who was full of grace, over the depths of which the Holy Ghost would move as he had once moved over the face of the deep at Creation. She whom the power of the Most High would overshadow, who would bear within the confines of her holy womb him who is the great Creator of the starry skies and the round world and all that therein is.  This is the birth-day of Our Blessed Lady who would give birth to an only-begotten Son, sole-begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth, that Son who would have the nature of God taken from his Father in heaven, but who would also have a human nature, given to him by his earthly Mother Mary.  We celebrate today the Nativity of the woman who would crush the head of the serpent, sharing in the redemption of her Son at the foot of the Cross, and who would be assumed body and soul to heaven at the end of her life, so that Our Lord in heaven could share in her complete corporal and spiritual bliss for all eternity, crowning her Queen of heaven, Queen of the Angels, Queen of All Saints.  This is the day that the Lord hath made, let us rejoice and be glad therein.

For unto us is born this day a child who will henceforth grow in all virtue and grace, until she is “full” of grace.  And Almighty God, remembering his mercy to our forefathers, hath holpen his servant Israel.  He has set in motion a plan of redemption by which he would redeem Israel from all his iniquities.  And all this was accomplished through this simple girl of Nazareth, the seed of Abraham, the seed of David, whose nativity we keep in holy remembrance this day.  A humble infant she may be, but God regarded the lowliness of this his handmaiden, and he exalted the humble and meek, and he that is mighty did magnify her, so that from henceforth all generations shall call her blessed.