Mary shows us how to act when we have no way to know what tomorrow will look like, the Rev. John Lankeit of the Cathedral of Ss. Simon and Jude in Phoenix said in his sermon reflecting on the meaning of the Annunciation. 

Lankeit reminds us that, “It is human nature to think small...to be selfish.” We see that in the grocery stores, when people are grabbing all the toilet paper, he says. 

Our plans and desires have been upended. We are called on to accept God’s plan and abandon our own plans, he said. The angel appeared to Mary and asked her to upend her life.

“Here’s what Mary’s confidence in God led to—Mary said 'yes' and '...the Word became flesh," cf. John 1:14.

This was the moment of the Incarnation—the conception of Jesus Christ, the Son of God, in the flesh.”

The angel also told Mary that her cousin Elizabeth was pregnant. Before Mary had time to dwell on her own pregnancy, she was called to help her cousin, who had been thought too old to bear a child.

"And behold, Elizabeth, your relative, has also conceived a son in her old age, and this is the sixth month for her who was called barren; for nothing will be impossible for God," Luke 1:36-37.

“Mary began to think beyond herself very quickly. She could deal with her situation as it unfolded, but her cousin was in need now so she stopped thinking about herself, because she actually did believe that nothing—including the challenges that her new situation would pose— would be impossible for God to handle...even if she had no idea how that would play out,” the Rev. Lankeit said in his homily. 

Mary’s is the most beautiful example of Spiritual Communion on record, the Rev. Lankeit said.

“Before Mary received the Body and Blood, Soul and Divinity of the Son of God into her womb by the work of the Holy Spirit, she first received him in faith,” the Rev. Lankeit said in his homily.

The Rev. Lankeit asks us to modify slightly the angel’s response as follows:

And the angel [says to us] in reply, “The holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. Therefore the [Eucharist] to be [received in God’s perfect timing] will be called holy, the Son of God,” cf. Luke 1:35.

Mary had to wait nine months to be able to receive her Son’s body, the Rev. Lankeit says. “We, too, are called to wait for the proper time, but not without first conceiving his Body in our hearts and souls through daily Spiritual Communion.”

In the coronavirus quarantine, priests cannot say mass and give people communion. When we all deeply long for the Eucharist, the churches are closed and we cannot have what we want. 

“There is tremendous spiritual benefit from making Spiritual Communions when we cannot receive Holy Communion as usual,” the Rev. Lankeit said in his homily.

“The Lord is giving us this unprecedented situation a wake-up call to rethink Who we receive in the Holy Eucharist and most importantly how we receive him.”