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We are refreshed in our Lenten journey today by the feast of the Annunciation. Many of the brothers here at Gethsemani have made their final vows on this solemnity, participating in Mary's "Yes." May you all share with us the spirit of today's feast.

From Bernard of Clairvaux's third Sermon on the Feast of the Annunciation:

In te sola Rex ille dives et praedives exinanitus; excelsus, humiliatus; immensus, abbreviatus, et angelis minoratus est: verus denique Deus et Dei Filius incarnatus. Sed quo fructu? Nempe ut omnes ejus paupertate locupletemur, ejus humilitate sublevemur, ejus minoratione magnificemur, ejus incarnatione adhaerentes Deo, incipiamus unus esse spiritus cum eo.

In you alone has the King, wealthy, even wealthy beyond measure, "emptied himself" (Phil 2:7). The most high has been humbled, the immeasurable, contained, even made "less than the angels" (Heb 2:9). The Son of God, true God, has been made flesh. But for what fruit? So that by his poverty we might by enriched, by his humility we might be raised, by his diminishment we might be made greater, and, joined to God, by his incarnation we might begin to be one spirit with him (1 Cor 6:17).