Patrick Comerford
Next Sunday, 19 December 2021, is the Fourth Sunday of Advent.
The readings in the Revised Common Lectionary as adapted for use in the Church of Ireland for next Sunday are:
The readings: Micah 5: 2-5a; the Canticle Magnificat (Luke 1: 46-55) or Psalm 80: 1-8; Hebrews 10: 5-10; Luke 1: 39-45 (46-55).
There is a link to the readings HERE.
Introduction to the Readings:
This has not been as short an Advent as in other years. Yet, once again, I got caught, thinking I had more time in Advent this year.
Now that Christmas Day is just around the corner, I have been caught again – I have been late in sending a number of Christmas cards, and now I realise they are probably not going to arrive in the post until well into the New Year.
I kept on ignoring all the advertising from An Post telling me that Christmas begins when I have sent the first card. But it sounds so ridiculous … as though Easter begins when I buy my first crème egg.
So often, we are so hyped up in the weeks before Christmas that we forget to take account of Advent, a time of waiting, a time of preparation, a time of anticipation.
Over these past three Sundays, that time of waiting, preparation and anticipation, we have been preparing ourselves in cathedrals and churches, with the liturgy and the music, with carol services and quiet days, with the Christmas Market and Santa’s grotto, with the Advent Wreath and the Crib.
The four candles in a ring around the white candle on the Advent wreath – three purple and one pink candle – have reminded us, week-after-week, of those who prepared us in the past for the Coming of the Christ Child: first the Patriarchs and Matriarchs, including Abraham and Sarah, Isaac and Jacob; then the prophets of the Old Testament; then it was Saint John the Baptist.
Then, next Sunday, the fourth and final candle reminds us of the Virgin Mary. The fourth and final candle which we light on the Advent Wreath this morning represents the Virgin Mary.
The Gospel reading tells the story of her visit to her cousin Saint Elizabeth, and the Canticle Magnificat is provided as either in the place of the Psalm or as the longer ending to the Gospel reading.
Micah 5: 2-5a:
Micah was the last of the 8th century BC prophets. He was from south-west Judah, near Hebron. He is independent of the political and religious leaders of his day, and his main concerns are social justice.
In his day, Assyria had captured Damascus and Samaria, Judah became a vassal state of Assyria and Jerusalem was under siege. Leaders were taking bribes, the rich were robbing the poor, merchants were cheating customers, priests and prophets simply pleased their audiences, and pagan gods were worshipped widely.
Micah’s home city, Moresheth, and the surrounding area are under threat.
Micah preaches about sin and punishment, but also promises hope for the future. He foresees a new Israel, whose leader will be a true shepherd and one who brings peace.
The time will come when a ruler will arise from Ephrathah, the area around Bethlehem, the home of David. When he is born, oppression will come to an end and the people will be reunited. He will be like a shepherd, feeding his people through the power and authority of God. He will bring an era of peace, and he will rule in Jerusalem.
The Canticle Magnificat:
The Canticle ‘Magnificat’ (Luke 1: 46-55) is normally appointed as a canticle for Evening Prayer in the Book of Common Prayer (2004), see pp 110-111. It is also found as Canticle 13 and 14 (see pp 128-129). Note, however, that the numbering of the verses of the Canticle differs from the numbering of the verses in the Bible.
The great German theologian and martyr, Dietrich Bonhoeffer (1906-1945), in an Advent sermon in London almost 90 years ago, on 17 December 1933, said the canticle Magnificat, the Song of the Virgin Mary, ‘is the oldest Advent hymn,’ and he spoke of how she knows better than anyone else what it means to wait for Christ’s coming:
‘She, of course, knows better than anyone else what it means to wait for Christ’s birth. Her waiting is different from that of any other human being. She expects him as his mother. He is closer to her than anyone else. She knows the secret of his coming, knows about the Spirit, who has a part in it, about the Almighty God, who has performed this miracle. In her own body she is experiencing the wonderful ways of God with humankind: that God does not arrange matters to suit our opinions and views, does not follow the path that humans would like to prescribe. God’s path is free and original beyond all our ability to understand or to prove.’
Psalm 80: 1-8:
Psalm 80 is a prayer for deliverance from Israel’s enemies, calling on God to ‘shine forth’ and to look favourably on his people. Throughout this psalm, the refrain is repeated:
Restore us, O God of hosts;
show the light of your countenance
and we will be saved. (see verses 3, 7 and 19)
Hebrews 10: 5-10:
This reading from the Letter to the Hebrews recalls the day ‘when Christ came into the world’ (verse 5). The author, quoting Psalm 40: 6-8 as if it were spoken by Christ himself, explains that God prefers obedience to sacrifices, and doing God’s will is what counts.
With Christ’s birth or coming into the world (verse 5), we have been made clean and been sanctified for all time.
Luke 1: 39-45 (46-55):
The Gospel reading on Sunday morning, Luke 1: 39-45 (46-55), tells the story of the Visitation of the Blessed Virgin Mary to her cousin, Saint Elizabeth, a story also recalled at the Feast of the Visitation, in the Church Calendar on 31 May.
When the Virgin Mary visits her cousin Saint Elizabeth, they are both pregnant – one with the Christ Child, the other with Saint John the Baptist.
Immediately after the Annunciation, the Virgin Mary leaves Nazareth and travels south to an unnamed ‘Judean town in the hill country,’ perhaps Hebron outside Jerusalem, to visit her cousin Elizabeth. When she arrives, although he is still in his mother’s womb, Saint John the Baptist is aware of the presence of Christ and the unborn child leaps for joy.
Saint Elizabeth too recognises that Christ is present, and declares to the her cousin Mary: with a loud cry: ‘Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb. And why has this happened to me, that the mother of my Lord comes to me? For as soon as I heard the sound of your greeting, the child in my womb leaped for joy’ (Luke 1: 42-44).
The Virgin Mary responds to Saint Elizabeth immediately with the words that we now know as the Magnificat, one of the best loved canticles.
So we see, side-by-side, two women, one seemingly too old to have a child, but destined to bear the last prophet of the Old Covenant, of the age that was passing away; and the other woman, seemingly too young to have a child, but about to give birth to him who is the beginning of the New Covenant, the age that would not pass away.
The Russian Orthodox Gorneye Convent in Jerusalem is said to stand on the traditional site of this meeting. At the suggestion of Father Antonin Kapustin, who was head of the Russian Orthodox Mission in Jerusalem in the late 19th century, Russian nuns built the Gorneye Convent in Jerusalem and began living there.
I find it is sad that the Virgin Mary can be divisive for those in the Protestant and Catholic traditions, in the wider church and within Anglicanism.
There are numerous cathedrals churches in the Church of Ireland and throughout the Anglican Communion dedicated to Saint Mary, including Saint Mary’s Cathedral, Limerick, and many Anglican cathedrals have Lady Chapels.
Article 2 of the 39 Articles is an affirmation of the Virgin Mary’s title as Theotokos, the God-bearer or Mother of God: ‘The Son, which is the Word of the Father, begotten from everlasting of the Father, the very and eternal God, and of one substance with the Father, took Man’s nature in the womb of the blessed Virgin, of her substance: so that two whole and perfect Natures, that is to say, the Godhead and Manhood, were joined together in one Person, never to be divided, whereof is one Christ, very God, and very Man …’ Any other interpretations quickly lead to Arianism, Nestorianism or Monophysitism.
The divisions among Anglicans over the place of the Virgin Mary are probably founded on perceptions of Mariology within the Roman Catholic tradition. On the other hand, many of my neighbours who come out with statements that reflect what they have been told since childhood – such as ‘You don’t believe in Mary’ – are surprised when they are told the canticle Magnificat is a traditional part of Anglican Evensong ever since the Reformation.
The Virgin Mary of the canticle Magnificat and of the Visitation, is a strong and revolutionary woman, unlike the Virgin Mary of the plaster-cast statues and the Rosary.
The Mary I see as a role model for belief and discipleship is the Mary who sets off in a hurry and a flurry to visit her cousin Elizabeth, the Mary with a gob on her who speaks out of turn when she comes out with those wonderful words we hear in this Gospel reading, the Mary who sings the Canticle Magnificat.
What a contrasting pair these two cousins, Mary and Elizabeth, are!
How much they speak to so many of the dilemmas we have in Irish society today!
Elizabeth is the older woman. She has been married for years. Because of social and family pressures, she had started to become embarrassed that after all those years of marriage she has not become pregnant.
In those days, even in many places to this day, this was an embarrassing social stigma. She had no son to inherit her husband’s lands, his family position, the place of Zechariah as a priest in the Temple in Jerusalem.
She reminds us too of Sarah, who is so embarrassed at the thought of becoming pregnant in her old age that she laughs in the face of the three visitors, she laughs in the face of the living Triune God.
Today, a woman who became pregnant at her stage of life might not laugh. She might quake with fear. She might ask for amniocentesis or an amniotic fluid test.
And yet Elizabeth takes control of her situation. She turns a predicament into an opportunity, a crisis of a pregnancy so late in life into a blessing for us all.
She is so filled with joy when her cousin Mary arrives that as soon as she hears the knock on the door, as soon as she hears the sound of Mary on her doorstep, her joy is infectious, so infectious that even the child in her womb – the child who would grow up to be John the Baptist – leaps with joy in her womb.
Elizabeth’s action is radical. Life is tough enough for her. Her husband has been struck dumb. A dumb priest was unlikely to be able to continue to earn a liturgical living in the Temple in Jerusalem. How was she now going to provide for her child when he was born?
But Elizabeth’s action is even more radical than that.
How many women of her age, and her respectable background, would have been so quick to rush out and welcome her much younger, single and pregnant cousin?
How many women would have been worried: ‘What if she stays here and has the child here? Would we ever live with the shame?’
How many women might have suggested instead that Mary goes off and finds a home where they can find someone else to take care of her child when he is born?
Instead, Elizabeth welcomes Mary with open arms. Elizabeth’s joyful greeting, ‘Blessed are you among women …,’ echoes the greeting of the Archangel Gabriel (see Luke 1: 28), ‘Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb.’
It is almost as if Elizabeth is saying: ‘It doesn’t matter what others think of you. It doesn’t matter how other people are going to judge you. I love you.’
Which is precisely what God is saying in the Incarnation, in the precious gift of the Christmas: ‘It doesn’t matter what others think of you. It doesn’t matter how other people are going to judge you. I love you.’
Mary for her part is such a wonderful, feisty person. She is, what might be described in the red-top tabloid newspapers today as ‘a gymslip Mum.’ But, instead of hiding herself away from her family, from her cousins, from the woman in her family who is married to a priest, she rushes off to her immediately, to share her good news with her.
And she challenges so many of our prejudices and our values and our presumptions today. Not just about gymslip mums and unexpected or unplanned pregnancies, but about what the silent and the marginalised have to say about our values in society today.
And Mary declares:
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 for ever.’
It is almost like this is the programme or the agenda we can expect when the Christ Child is born.
Depicting the Visitation
One of my favourite depictions of the Visitation is Dinah Roe Kendall’s painting, Mary meets Elizabeth (1996), which is in acrylic on canvas.
Dinah Roe Kendall was born in Bakewell, Derbyshire, in 1923 into a family of professional artists. Her grandfather and great-grandfather were both well-known artists. Her great-grandmother was the daughter of a Victorian sculptor whose statue of Lord Nelson stands in Trafalgar Square, London.
Her father planned for her to proceed to full-time training, but World War II and his early death occurred before these hopes could be realised. After her wartime nursing, she attended Sheffield Art School and was then received an ex-service grant to enable her to study at the Slade School of Fine Art in London (1948 to 1952).
There Lucien Freud asked her to sit for him, Stanley Spencer’s daughter Unity was a fellow-student, and Dinah learned from Jacob Epstein, Stanley Spencer and many other artists.
The nostalgic world of primitive painting is far removed from her vibrant Biblical scenes, placed in modern contexts and painted in modern materials. Although the influence of her teachers can be seen in her work, she has moved on from them, developing a style that is distinctly her own.
Her paintings are drenched in colour, reflecting five years of living in Cyprus and the influence of modern artists she has admired, including Peter Howson and Ana Maria Pacheco.
She usually paints in acrylic on board or canvas, mixing the paint with thickening media. Her angels wear robes built up of thick knife and brush strokes flecked with gold. She paints the cross as a visual sermon: no mere philosophical concept, but a hunk of wood along which, as Francis Schaeffer used to remark, one could have run a finger and got a splinter.
Despite changing fashions and much pressure to explore abstract art, she has always remained a figurative painter. Her biblical scenes are cast in modern contexts: Christ visits a school in Sheffield; Lazarus is raised from the dead in an alcove in a wall borrowed from Chatsworth House; Jairus’s daughter wakes up upstairs in a modern home, surrounded by modern neighbours as an abandoned teddy-bear on a chair in by the window watches on in amazement; the infant Christ presented in the Temple is looking right at the viewer; in the case of the Woman taken in Adultery, Christ’s finger writing in the dust points out of the canvas and at the viewer.
Her ‘Entry into Jerusalem’ is set in the playground of the Porter Croft School in Sheffield, where the painting now hangs, and the Baptism of Christ takes place in a swimming pool.
Her paintings constantly engage the viewer, but show intimacy too. At the ‘Supper at Emmaus,’ Christ sits at the head of a table, with two disciples whose hands reach out towards his. He is holding a loaf of bread; wine and glasses stand ready. His pose recalls Stanley Spencer’s 1939 painting of a lonely Christ in the Wilderness, cradling in his hands a scorpion.
There is social comment and humour too in her work: the Good Samaritan is a black man; ‘The Marriage at Cana in Galilee’ is a witty footnote to a famous painting by Breughel; and ‘Jesus visits Bethany’ is a delightful depiction of an off-duty Christ, even though the crowds are pressing in at the door. Inside the house in Bethany, Lazarus sits apart from the others in a curtained alcove as if the shadow of the tomb has not quite left him. His eyes are fixed not upon Christ but upon some faraway place, as if contemplating a landscape that only he has seen.
At the opening of an exhibition of her paintings in Winchester Cathedral some years ago, Dinah Roe Kendall said that she wants to show that meeting Christ is an unsettling and life-changing experience that could happen at any point in time.
This painting, Mary meets Elizabeth, is among her many paintings included in Allegories of Heaven: an artist explores the greatest story ever told (Carlisle: Piquant, 2002), drawing on texts from The Message text by Eugene Peterson.
The Revd Tom Devonshire Jones, Founder and Director Emeritus of ACE (Art and Christianity Enquiry), has commented: ‘Dinah Roe Kendall’s fresh, sassy and devout paintings are breathing new life into religious art at the start of the third millennium. Already receiving the grateful attention of worshipper and enquirer alike, they are finding a secure place in the world of faith and of art.’
Luke 1: 39-45 (46-55) (NRSVA):
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 leapt 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 leapt for joy. 45 And blessed is she who believed that there would be a fulfilment of what was spoken to her by the Lord.’
[46 And Mary said,
‘My soul magnifies the Lord,
and my spirit rejoices in God my Saviour,
for he has looked with favour on the lowliness of his servant.
Surely, from now on all generations will call me blessed;
for the Mighty One has done great things for me,
and holy is his name.
His mercy is for those who fear him
from generation to generation.
He has shown strength with his arm;
he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts.
He has brought down the powerful from their thrones,
and lifted up the lowly;
he has filled the hungry with good things,
and sent the rich away empty.
He has helped his servant Israel,
in remembrance of his mercy,
according to the promise he made to our ancestors,
to Abraham and to his descendants for ever.’]
Liturgical Resources:
Liturgical colour: Violet (Purple), Advent Year C.
Penitential Kyries:
Turn to us again, O God our Saviour,
and let your anger cease from us.
Lord, have mercy.
Lord, have mercy.
Show us your mercy, O Lord,
and grant us your salvation.
Christ, have mercy.
Christ, have mercy.
Your salvation is near for those that fear you,
that glory may dwell in our land.
Lord, have mercy.
Lord, have mercy.
The Collect:
God our redeemer,
who prepared the blessed Virgin Mary
to be the mother of your Son:
Grant that, as she looked for his coming as our saviour,
so we may be ready to greet him
when he comes again as our judge;
who is alive and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.
The Advent Collect:
This collect is said after the Collect of the day until Christmas Eve:
Almighty God,
Give us grace to cast away the works of darkness
and to put on the armour of light
now in the time of this mortal life
in which your Son Jesus Christ came to us in great humility;
that on the last day
when he shall come again in his glorious majesty
to judge the living and the dead,
we may rise to the life immortal;
through him who is alive and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.
The Collect of the Word
Almighty God,
you baptise us with your Spirit:
as we wait in joyful expectation
for the coming again of your Son
purify us so that we may be gathered
as wheat and not as chaff.
We ask this through Jesus Christ, our Lord,
who lives and reigns with you
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, for ever and ever.
Introduction to the Peace:
In the tender mercy of our God,
the dayspring from on high shall break upon us,
to give light to those who dwell in darkness
and in the shadow of death,
and to guide our feet into the way of peace. (Luke 1: 78, 79)
Preface:
Salvation is your gift
through the coming of your Son our Saviour Jesus Christ,
and by him you will make all things new
when he returns in glory to judge the world:
The Post-Communion Prayer:
Heavenly Father,
you have given us a pledge of eternal redemption.
Grant that we may always eagerly celebrate
the saving mystery of the incarnation of your Son.
We ask this through him whose coming is certain,
whose day draws near,
your Son Jesus Christ our Lord.
Blessing:
Christ the sun of righteousness shine upon you,
gladden your hearts
and scatter the darkness from before you:
The Advent Wreath:
The Anglican mission agency USPG (United Society Partners in the Gospel) offers this prayer for lighting the Fourth (Purple) candle on the Advent wreath:
Lord Jesus, your mother Mary
carried you with tender determination
on the dangerous road to Bethlehem.
May the same flame of love
that drove her on, now bring
courage and hope
to all who carry and nurture children today.
Suggested Hymns:
Micah 5: 2-5a:
194, Earth has many a noble city (verses 1, 2, 5)
158, God rest you merry, gentlemen
160, Hark! the herald–angels sing
431, Lord, enthroned in heavenly splendour
171, O Bethl’hem is a small place
174, O little town of Bethlehem
179, See amid the winter’s snow
197, Songs of thankfulness and praise (omit verse 4)
198, The first Nowell the angel did say (verses 1, 2, 4, 6)
The Canticle Magnificat (Luke 1: 47-55):
704, Mary sang a song, a song of love
712, Tell out, my soul, the greatness of the Lord
373, To God be the glory! Great things he has done!
Psalm 80: 1-8:
695, God of mercy, God of grace
614, Great Shepherd of your people, hear
Hebrews 10: 5-10:
400, And now, O Father, mindful of the love
431, Lord, enthroned in heavenly splendour
Luke 1: 39-45 (46-55):
146, A great and mighty wonder
119, Come, thou long–expected Jesus
470, Let God’s people join in worship
472, Sing we of the blessèd mother
185, Virgin–born, we bow before thee
186, What Adam’s disobedience cost
476, Ye watchers and ye holy ones
Scripture quotations are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible: Anglicised Edition copyright © 1989, 1995, National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide. http://nrsvbibles.org
The hymn suggestions are provided in Sing to the Word (2000), edited by Bishop Edward Darling. The hymn numbers refer to the Church of Ireland’s Church Hymnal (5th edition, Oxford: OUP, 2000)
Material from the Book of Common Prayer is copyright © 2004, Representative Body of the Church of Ireland.
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