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Dear Parish Faithful,
This text of an Annunciation hymn "snuck out" before I could provide any context. As you know, we celebrate this Feast on March 25. This year, we will serve Great Vespers on Thursday evening at 7:00 p.m. and the Divine Liturgy on Friday morning at 9:30 a.m.
The rather long hymn below is from the Vespers service. It beautifully expresses the theology behind the Annunciation - basically and marvelously, that the eternal Son of God became, in time, the Son of the Virgin. Thus, the Incarnation is the feast of the Incarnation. Here is an excellent example of how our liturgical life expresses out understanding of the Gospel.
I hope to see many of you at the Great Vespers and/or the Liturgy!
Today the good tidings of joy are proclaimed,
today is the festival of the Virgin;
things below are joined together with things on high.
Adam is made new;
Eve is freed from the primal grief;
and by the deification of the human nature that the Lord assumed,
the tabernacle of our substance has become a temple of God.
Oh, what a mystery!
The manner of His emptying cannot be known;
the manner of His conception is beyond speech.
An angel ministers at the miracle; a virginal womb receives the Son;
the Holy Spirit is sent down; the Father on high is well pleased,
and according to their common counsel, a reconciliation is brought to pass
in which and through which we are saved.
For this reason let us unite our song with Gabriel’s,
crying aloud to the Virgin:
“Rejoice, O Lady Full of Grace, the Lord is with thee!
From thee is our salvation, Christ our God,
Who, by assuming our nature, has led us back to Himself.//
Humbly pray to Him for the salvation of our souls!”
