VISITATIONS

On this final day of May, the month of Mary, we celebrate the feast of the Visitation. We contemplate this passage from Luke’s Gospel that comes immediately after the account of the Annunciation.

In those days Mary set out and went with haste to a Judean town in the hill country, where she entered the house of Zechariah and greeted Elizabeth. When Elizabeth heard Mary’s greeting, the child leaped in her womb. And Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit and exclaimed 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.  And blessed is she who believed that there would be a fulfillment of what was spoken to her by the Lord.” (Luke 1: 39-45)

I have emphasized some words in the passage to guide our thoughts.

Haste. Pope Francis noted earlier this year at one of his final audiences that Mary didn’t just “set out” for the hill country of Judea, she “went with haste.” The “push of love” came from the sacred within her to reach out to the aged, pregnant, Elizabeth. This was an urgent Spirit driven urge to commune with her kinswoman.

Greeted. Mary first greets Elizabeth and Elizabeth and John within her womb respond in a moment of sacred hospitality. It is this hospitality that echoes throughout Luke’s Gospel. Family hospitality becomes social hospitality becomes sacred hospitality.

Blessed. This word is used three times in this short passage as Elizabeth addresses Mary. The act of blessing consecrates hospitality so that it becomes more than just a warm welcome, it is an act of divine recognition. It is an act that we echo when we bless our children, our families and our community.

Joy. This brief account is the paradigm of a joy-filled Christian meeting. Joy is the great evangelical tool noted by Pope Francis in Evangelium Gaudium (The Joy of the Gospel). When we get it right, this joy marks our family gatherings, liturgy, lessons, and gatherings. This joy is Mary’s outward expression of the Christ within her.

Mary’s journey takes her upward into the Judean hill country. It is a map for our own pilgrimages of hope. It anticipates Blessed Pier Giorgio Frassati’s motto, “verso l’alto,” towards the heights. Our own pilgrimages may take us through cathedrals and shrines through various forms of Holy Doors. But they are always upward to the hills of Judea or the alps near Turin, symbols of our own perpetual climb toward holiness.

Pope Francis, in his Address for World Youth Day, 2022-2023, told us: “Mary becomes a temple of God, an image of the pilgrim Church, a Church that goes forth for service, a Church that brings the good news to all!”

Echoes of the Visitation occur again and again in our lives. Visitations in which we allow the Spirit to compel us toward sacred hospitality in encounters marked by blessings and joy.

As I write, my granddaughter is entertaining a younger friend upstairs. The house is alive with running and laughter. While no liturgical word is used between them, they give a taste of the joy that leads to deeper communion. A few years ago, I wondered what would happen if Luke was writing here in Canada. What form would the Visitation take? I placed this reflection next to a photo of another form of visitation. It was a photo of my mother’s hand in mine a couple of months before she succumbed to dementia. These three meetings are echoes of the Gospel. What echoes of the Visitation are resonating in your life?

Pearson Airport Visitation

A shaft of light shines down through Terminal 3 on a greying pregnant woman.

That same light shines on Mary as she picks up her bags at the luggage carousel.

Quickened with anticipation, she steps through those doors to arrivals.

A fleeting wave of apprehension – would her cousin scowl in judgment at her swelling belly?

Then a glimpse and a widening smile and a joyful laugh as eyes meet.

A rush into communion with arms wide.

In that moment, when the world came to Toronto, joy reigns.

And Elizabeth’s sacred welcome stretches wide beyond Mary

to the limping and aged and ragged and forlorn,

to the twinkling eyes of the grandmother and the excited eyes of the young boy,

to the newcomer and the jaded traveller.

You are with me and we belong to you in your divine hospitality.

And the sacred within leaps.

And the sacred in Elizabeth leaps in communion.

And this joy leads to gratitude which leads to blessing, and this blessing leads to song:

history turns again as old words clothe this holy longing for justice and hope.

Source: Northern Light: A Canadian Prayerbook (Novalis 2020).

Les Miller is a husband, dad, grandfather and catechist. He has served the Catholic education community for 40 years as teacher, chaplaincy team leader, Department Head. AQ Instructor, textbook writer, and Religious Education and Family Life Consultant. Les authored the 25 Questions Series, Words for the Journey and award-winners Catholic Teacher’s Companion and Northern Light. Currently, he is an instructor and advisor with the Archdiocese of Toronto’s online Catechist formation program and lead contributor to the St. Monica Institute’s series on praying with art, Abide in Beauty.