The Feast of the Annunciation and the Unity of Humankind in Mary
Dr. Michel E. Abs
Secretary General of the Middle East Council of Churches
On the twenty-fourth of March every year, the Church celebrates the feast of the Annunciation, the Annunciation of our Lady, the Virgin Mary, the Mother of God, the Mother of Man, and the Mother of the Believers.
The act of the Annunciation in itself constitutes a unique event in the course of the Christian faith as well as in the course of human salvation, as the Lord chose His servant Mary from among all the women of the world to bear in her womb the child who will bear the sins of the world.
How great is the good news and how great were those moments, when the angel of the Lord came to Mary, and announced to her that she would be the mother of God, the mother of the Savior.
No mind and no words can describe the feelings that may have stirred in the heart and soul of Mary as she ascended the path of holiness.
She is the chosen one who will give the world what it has not tired of waiting for and this for many millennia.
How meek and wise are you O Mary, for the Lord to choose you as a mediator for the coming of the Savior into the world!
How beautiful you are, O Mary, O my Mother, O Mother of God, O Loving, O Lofty, O you Who wraps in her warmth the cold of the world!
Ever since time immemorial, generations have sanctified you, venerated you, and devoted themselves to your holy name!
You are the intercessor of tortured humanity, and more so the intercessor of the blood-stained Lebanon, which has been bleeding for decades.
You are the only symbol on which the Lebanese, who disagree on everything, did not disagree.
In your name, the Lebanese gather, they gather every year on the twenty-fifth day of March, the month of Spring, the month of the mother.
The Lebanese first turned this day into a national occasion, and then it became a national holiday, in which the institutions that revere and celebrate your feast, the feast of your glad tidings, about which they do not and will not disagree.
On this feast, the Lebanese, with their various religious affiliations, gather in places of worship, singing of Mary and her good news, the very beginning of the time of salvation.
In your name, O Mary, opposites, contradictions, and dissonances meet, in a state of unanimity of faith and patriotism, inevitably celebrating their faith in brotherhood for all.
You are the symbol that brings people together, harmonizes hearts, and makes brotherhood among people a matter of course.
You are the symbol of the mother, and you have summed up all the advantages and qualities that motherhood carries.
Hymns, and songs of praise designed by human creativity in order to describe your assets and qualities, have not yet fully met with their intent.
Everything that was said is scant, everything that was produced is barely sufficient, because your qualities fill the universe.
Your good news has become a symbol of every mother’s good news of every newborn that she brings into the world.
The promise that you made to the world with the coming of the Savior turned into a glad tiding brought by the advent of every new creature that comes into the world, because the Creator has created us in His image and likeness.
More importantly is the fact that every daughter who comes into the world identifies with Mary, with her example, patience, steadfastness, and dignity.
The promise that you brought about into the world is that society gives women their right, recognizes their status in the image of the Lady who gave birth to the Savior, and makes sure that she is the most important and primary partner in building society through its system of values, and that great women and greatness grow on her hands.
O Mother Mary, O Mary of the Annunciation, O Fountain of Love and Tenderness, You are the One who is able to unite man and dissuade him from any shortcoming that he in himself is tempted to fall into.
Blessed be your message of good tidings, through which you brought joy into the world!