10 December 2026 · Syro-Malabar Rite
Open in the Daily Word appAlso: Latin Rite · Syro-Malankara Rite · മലയാളം
“And blessed is she who believed that there would be a fulfillment of what was spoken to her by the Lord.” Luke 1:45
Having received the Word, Mary does not stay at home; she goes “with haste” into the hill country to serve her elderly cousin. When Elizabeth hears her greeting, the child John leaps in her womb and she is filled with the Holy Spirit: “Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb… And why has this happened to me, that the mother of my Lord comes to me?”
Paul's words describe Mary's visit: “Let love be genuine… love one another with mutual affection… rejoice with those who rejoice.” Faith that receives Christ becomes charity that carries him to others. The ark of the covenant once rested three months in the house of Obed-edom and brought blessing; Mary, the new ark, stays three months with Elizabeth.
Theme: “Blessed is she who believed.”
The Visitation: faith becomes charity; Mary carries Christ to Elizabeth.
“The ark of the LORD remained in the house of Obed-edom the Gittite three months; and the LORD blessed Obed-edom and all his household.” 2 Samuel 6:11
“In those days Mary set out and went with haste to a Judean town in the hill country.” Luke 1:39
Apply: Bring Christ's blessing to one home this week.
“The LORD, your God, is in your midst, a warrior who gives victory.” Zephaniah 3:17
“For as soon as I heard the sound of your greeting, the child in my womb leaped for joy.” Luke 1:44
Apply: Share your joy in Christ with someone today.
“O daughter, you are blessed by the Most High God above all other women on earth.” Judith 13:18
“And blessed is she who believed that there would be a fulfillment of what was spoken to her by the Lord.” Luke 1:45
Apply: Visit an elderly or lonely relative this week.
Faith that receives Christ carries him to others.
Let us visit, serve and rejoice.
Take-home resolution: Make one visit of charity before Christmas.
Dear friends, St Paul gives the Romans a list of what Christian love looks like in practice: let love be genuine; hate what is evil, hold fast to what is good; love one another with mutual affection; outdo one another in showing honour (Romans 12:9–10).
He continues: rejoice in hope, be patient in suffering, persevere in prayer; contribute to the needs of the saints; extend hospitality to strangers; bless those who persecute you; rejoice with those who rejoice, weep with those who weep (Romans 12:12–15). This is not a feeling; it is a way of life.
In the Gospel we see that love in action. Mary has just received the most astonishing news in history: she will be the mother of the Messiah. What does she do? She sets out and goes with haste to a Judean town in the hill country, to help her old cousin Elizabeth (Luke 1:39).
Mary does not stay at home to think about her own dignity. She travels many miles on foot to serve someone in need. Real grace always moves us outward, towards others.
When Mary greets Elizabeth, the child in Elizabeth's womb leaps for joy, and Elizabeth is filled with the Holy Spirit. She cries out: blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb; and blessed is she who believed (Luke 1:41–45). Jesus, hidden in Mary, brings joy and the Spirit into that home.
We too carry Christ when we visit others with love. A visit to a lonely grandmother, a sick neighbour, a family in grief, a new mother: these are little Visitations. Christ goes with us.
This Nombu, let us make one Visitation: someone who needs company, help or comfort. Go with haste, as Mary did. And let us be people who rejoice with those who rejoice and weep with those who weep. Amen.
Children, Mary hurried to help her cousin. Who can you help at home today without being asked?
Holy Mary, you hurried to serve Elizabeth and carried Jesus to her. Teach me to carry Christ to others with genuine love and joyful faith. Amen.
Paul's list of the works of love and Luke's scene of the Visitation explain each other. Paul says, “extend hospitality”, “rejoice with those who rejoice”, “associate with the lowly”. In Luke we see this lived: a pregnant young woman hurries to help an older relative, and two women rejoice together over what God has done. Love shows itself in going out to someone.
Setting.
Paul wrote to the Christians of Rome, a church he had not yet visited, probably from Corinth in about AD 57. After eleven chapters on God's mercy to Jews and Gentiles, he turns in chapter 12 to how the redeemed should live: “present your bodies as a living sacrifice” (12:1). Our passage is a chain of short commands, many without a main verb in the Greek, like the sayings of the wise. The Sermon on the Mount can be heard behind vv. 14 and 17.
Structure.
Key words.
Verse by verse.
“Let love be genuine; hate what is evil, hold fast to what is good;” (12:9)
Genuine love is not soft. It has a clear view of good and evil.
“Contribute to the needs of the saints; extend hospitality to strangers.” (12:13)
Travelling Christians depended on such welcome in those days. “Saints” means all the baptised, as in all Paul's letters.
“Rejoice with those who rejoice, weep with those who weep.” (12:15)
Sharing another's joy without envy may be the harder half of this verse.
How the Church reads it.
The Catechism names Romans 12–15 among the apostolic teachings that hand on the moral teaching of Christ, and quotes these verses (CCC 1971). St John Chrysostom, preaching on this letter, remarks that it takes more greatness of soul to rejoice with the one who rejoices than to weep with the one who weeps, for envy is overcome only with difficulty (in substance).
Setting.
Gabriel had given Mary a sign: Elizabeth, too old to bear, was in her sixth month (1:36). Mary goes at once. Nazareth in Galilee is several days' journey from the hill country of Judea. Luke does not name the town; a later Christian tradition places it at Ein Karem, near Jerusalem. Luke tells the meeting with echoes of the story of the ark in 2 Samuel 6.
Structure.
Key words.
Verse by verse.
“Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb.” (1:42)
Words like those said of Jael (Judges 5:24) and Judith (Judith 13:18), women through whom God saved his people. Here Mary's blessing and that of her child are spoken together. The Church repeats it in the Hail Mary (CCC 2676).
“And why has this happened to me, that the mother of my Lord comes to me?” (1:43)
Many commentators hear David's words: “How can the ark of the Lord come into my care?” (2 Samuel 6:9). In that story too there is a journey in the hills of Judah, leaping for joy, and a stay of three months (compare Luke 1:56). Mary carries the presence of God.
“And blessed is she who believed that there would be a fulfillment of what was spoken to her by the Lord.”” (1:45)
This is the first beatitude in Luke's Gospel, and it is about faith. Mary is blessed not only for what happened in her, but for how she received it (CCC 148).
How the Church reads it.
Lumen Gentium 57 sees here the union of Mother and Son in the work of salvation: Mary is called blessed for her faith, and the forerunner leaps in the womb. Elizabeth's “mother of my Lord” stands behind the title Theotokos that the Council of Ephesus confirmed in 431 (CCC 495). St Ambrose remarks that Elizabeth was first to hear the voice, but John was first to feel the grace (in substance).
Was John made holy before he was born?
Luke says that John would be filled with the Holy Spirit from his mother's womb (1:15), and the Catechism repeats this (CCC 523, 717). This is not the same as Mary's Immaculate Conception. John's leap is the first sign of that promise, and he leaps because of the presence of Jesus.