The Little Pentecost of the Visitation

The Visitation, Joseph Matar

Yesterday's Solemnity of Pentecost took precedence over the Feast of the Visitation, which the church customarily celebrates on May 31st. Pope Benedict XVI mentioned this blessed meeting of Mary and Elizabeth and the unborn children in their wombs twice yesterday, both in his homily at the Mass of Pentecost and in his Regina Caeli address. This event of the Visitation, the Holy Father said, "was also a little 'Pentecost,' bringing forth joy and praise from the hearts of Elizabeth and Mary – the one barren and the other a virgin – who both became mothers by an extraordinary divine intervention (cf. Luke 1:41-45).

It was by the intervention of the Holy Spirit that Virgin Mother became pregnant with the Divine Child, whom she bore in her womb "with love beyond all telling." The Spirit of Jesus so filled Mary's entire being that, having consented to give birth to the Son of God, she then immediately went in haste to visit her cousin Elizabeth. Upon Mary's arrival, Elizabeth also was filled with the Holy Spirit, as was the unborn child who leapt for joy within her womb, and thus she proclaimed with exaltation those glorious words that have been continuously repeated throughout the ages by those who love Our Lady: "Blessed art thou amongst women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb!"

The intervention of the Holy Spirit is always a cause for rejoicing! The Lord and Giver of Life, as we name the third Person of the Holy Trinity in the Nicene Creed, is also the source of charity. As the Holy Father pointed out yesterday, "The young Mary, who carried Jesus in her womb and, forgetting herself, goes to help her neighbor, is a stupendous icon of the Church in the perennial youth of the Spirit, of the missionary Church of the Incarnate Word, called to bring [this Word] to the world and to testify to him especially in the service of charity." For many of us, our greatest means of evangelizing the world is through the service of charity. May we accept the Holy Father's invitation " to let ourselves be inspired and taught by the Virgin Mary." May we learn from her, Mother of the Incarnate Word, how to surrender totally to the Holy Spirit so that we, too, can give birth to Jesus and bring Him to the world.

The Holy Father also gave an address Saturday evening, the vigil of Pentecost, in the Vatican Gardens at a traditional Marian celebration to conclude the month of May. In his talk, he reflected upon the relationship between the Holy Spirit and Mary, "a very close, privileged, indissoluble relationship." Pope Benedict XVI said that "Mary's heart, in perfect consonance with the divine Son, is the temple of the Spirit of truth, where every word and every event are kept in faith, hope and charity (cf. Luke 2:19, 51)." In closing, he expressed his hope that we "will always walk with Mary," in whose school we "learn to recognize the Holy Spirit's presence in our life, to listen to his inspirations and to follow them with docility."