Guest post

Here is a guest post from Deacon Dave Regan:

“There is nothing more beautiful then a properly situated founding narrative.” I remember hearing those words from one of my favorite theologians, Fr. Jeremy Driscoll, OSB, many years ago. A good founding narrative for any culture, race, group, family or society enables the members to reflect and they, themselves, attribute meaning and make connections using bits and pieces of the narrative and applying them to daily life..
In our founding narrative, it is not something that we have found, or even something that we make the connections, but rather our founding narrative is something that finds us, shepherds us, feeds us and provides the context for each heartbeat and every breath we take.
Our founding narrative begins in a specific moment, at a specific time, with specific persons. The time was over 2000 years ago, in a cave-like dwelling, with a virgin betrothed to a man named Joseph, and an angel proclaiming good news. This is the Annunciation. Today I had the opportunity with my seminarian brothers, to visit Nazareth in the Holy Land. Most especially, we went to the spot where Our Lady, Queen of Heaven and Earth, Queen of all Saints, Queen of Angels, was invited to accept a plan and to be the one to open the to the first page in our founding narrative. As I looked at the very spot where the dialogue between the angel and Mary took place the only words that came to mind were “Lord, what is man that you are mindful of him?”
On this spot the virgin was approached, the virgin said yes, the virgin conceived in her womb, and since then you and I have never and will never be the same. Since then humanity has never and will never be the same. The history of the Jewish people is focused around the events surrounding the flight of the Chosen people out of Egypt. For us, it is not a movement, but rather a person, Jesus Christ. What Jesus Christ was going to do on Calvary was to focus all of history by a moment that would explode grace into past, present and future of humanity. But before that took place he had to be incarnated, he had to become man. The eternal Word, became flesh, the virgin gave flesh to the Word made flesh, carne to the Incarnation.
I was about 5 feet away from this spot today. As I stood there, and then knelt there, the only appropriate words were those of the Psalmist “O LORD, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth…When I consider your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have set in place, what is man that you are mindful of him…crowned him with glory and honor…you made him ruler over the works of your hands…” Through the Incarnation and subsequently the Paschal mystery God sees and loves in us what he sees and loves in his son. This story begins and so my story began, and our story began at the spot where I was today. The only appropriate response is to be like St. Augustine who after reflecting on the action of God states that “even now do I gasp for you.”
In standing, and kneeling in that place the profound humility of God become so present. His humility to share in our humanity so we can share in his divinity becomes clearer as the spot where he was incarnated is the most humble of conditions.
As I write this reflection, words in fact escape me. Maybe that should be the message of the day. Maybe the Holy Spirit does not want me to be able to articulate a thought or meditation but rather accept an invitation to be open to graces that can not be articulated, to blessings that words can not explain, consolation that is beyond any voice. Actually that is precisely what I think today was about. The Eternal Logos, the Word, is manifest and continues to manifest and this mystery is not about finding an answer or solving a problem but rather standing in salvation, giving our fiat and receiving all that God has planned for us. Let us give thanks to God for having sent the angel to the Virgin and inviting her to say yes and giving us the proper and appropriate way to receive him in every moment of our lives “let it be done.” “O LORD, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth!”