Feast honors Mary’s role in salvation

Exactly nine months before the Nativity of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Orthodox Church celebrates the Feast of the Annunication.

This feast sets in motion the salvation of mankind and the renewal of creation.

It is on this day that we see the role the Holy Virgin Mary has in our salvation.

It is today that is, as written in the hymn of the feast, “the crown of our salvation and the mystery hidden from all eternity. The Son of God becomes the Son of a Virgin, and Gabriel announces the good tidings of grace.”

These good tidings are that mankind will be restored from the corruption of death.

As it is written about in the poetry of the Church, “Today the Son and Word of God, the Lord God, silently places Himself in the womb of the Virgin, desiring by his incarnation to deify man, the work of his hands, and to lead him back to the ancient paradise.”

It is with the cry of the Archangel Gabriel that we, too, greet the Virgin Mary.

For if not for her, all of this would not have taken place.

The mother of God is honored by the Orthodox Church because of her role in our salvation.

We ask her intercession in prayer because she is the mother of the King.

The hymn of the feast explains her place in the kingdom of heaven this way: “To you, O Birth-giver of God, victorious leader of triumphant hosts, we your servants offer hymns of thanksgiving, for you have delivered us from misfortune. In your invincible power, keep us from every peril, that we may cry to you: Rejoice, O Unwedded Bride!”

That Orthodox hymn is why we place such honor on the virgin. If it were not for her saying “yes” to God, our salvation my have not occurred.

This honor that we Orthodox Christians give to the mother of God has been lost in many other Christian churches.

Knowing her place in our salvation history, and pondering why others do not see her as such, prompted St. Cyril of Alexandria to write the following words: “I am amazed that there are some who are extremely doubtful whether the holy Virgin should be called the Mother of God, or not. For if our Lord Jesus Christ is God, then surely the holy Virgin who gave Him birth must be God’s mother.”

This feast is also a celebration of life for the virgin conceived Christ by the Holy Spirit.

The fact that this feast falls nine months to the day before the Nativity shows the perfect humanity of our Lord.

His time in the womb of his mother was not unlike that of any other child.

His birth was no different from our own.

Jesus was born in this manner so that, except for being without sin, his humanity would be perfect.

For if the incarnation took place in any other way, that perfect humanity would be lost.

It is at the moment of the Annunication that the Son of God begins the first movements of earthly life in the womb of the Virgin.

It is by this act that our salvation has begun and the privileges of God become clear.

So, as we celebrate this joyous feast in the middle of the Great Lenten fast, let us, too, call to her as did the Archangel Gabriel, “Blessed are you among women, and Blessed is the Fruit of your womb!” (Luke 1:24).

The Rev. Daniel Rohan is pastor of St. Mark Orthodox Church in Liberty.