Where is God trying to interrupt us today?

A Reflection for the Solemnity of the Annunciation of the Lord

Find today’s readings here.

In preparing to write this reflection, I discovered that this is the third time I have been assigned to write on this set of readings for America. In 2021, I focused on today’s first reading and what it means to “ask for a sign”; in 2022, I took inspiration from the second reading and the promise of “a body you prepared for me.” 

So perhaps the third time is the charm and an occasion to focus more specifically on the Gospel for today’s solemnity, Luke’s account of the Annunciation. For me, I find that the Annunciation is one of those Gospel passages that I know so well—or think I know so well, at least—that I need to make a deliberate choice to sit down and read it, rather than just settling for my memory of already knowing it.

Part of that is because in the Spiritual Exercises, the famous meditation on the Incarnation also serves as an invitation to consider the Annunciation, and the Gospel has thus become one of the touchstone texts for Ignatian prayer. Also, of course, the Annunciation has been depicted so often and so beautifully in art that it is hard to read the Gospel without seeing the Fra Angelico scene, or whatever your own favorite is, in the mind’s eye.

The cover story of our December 2025 issue took a look at “Marian art in an age of distraction,” as Jonathan Malesic considered how Mary’s attention can be a model for our own. Considering images of the Madonna and child, he points out that “when Mary pays attention to her child, she is simultaneously contemplating the divine.” 

But images of the Annunciation, he suggests, point to a different kind of attention: “In scenes of the Annunciation, attention is not undivided concentration on the thing in front of you. It is inherently divided, and the task is not to focus but to be ready for something new to appear.”

So how does something new appear in this story that we have heard and prayed and contemplated a thousand times over?

For today, let me suggest that in addition to sitting down to read the Gospel, rather than just reminding yourself of it, you might also set aside 15 minutes to read Jonathan Malesic’s beautiful piece from the last December issue.

When I did that today, I found myself remembering another piece of Annunciation art, though not a painting. In her poem entitled “Annunciation,” Denise Levertov asks 

Aren’t there annunciations
of one sort or another
in most lives?

Indeed: Where might God be trying to interrupt us today, inviting us to notice and cooperate with his grace at work in us and in the world?

• Facebook
• X
• Mail