On the Holy Annunciation

Whatever has taken place in the history of salvation – whatever was done by Christ, the Father, and the Holy Spirit – must also take place within me.  That’s what it means for me to participate in the life of God.  For example, to the extent that I have emptied myself (cf. Phil. 2.7), I experience what the Mother of God felt when she said to the angel: Let it be done to me according to your word.  I experience, in other words, her total self-surrender to that which was beyond her capacity to understand.  How shall this be? she asked;  How can I give birth, since I am a virgin and have not known a man?  Was there anything she could understand?  The angel replied: The Spirit will overshadow you and you will give birth (cf. Lk. 1.34-38). Did she understand anything? Nothing at all. That is what is meant by Let it be done to me according to your word, which means: ‘whatever you say, just as you said it. Even though I cannot understand it, let it happen just as you say.’  Elder Aimilianos

"Behold, I am the handmaid of the Lord; let it be to me according to your word," Luke 1:38...Thus was the knot of Eve's disobedience loosed by the obedience of Mary...As the human race fell into bondage to death by means of a virgin, so it is rescued by a virgin. Virginal disobedience was balnced in the opposite scale by virginal obedience.  In the same way, the sin of the first created man recives amendment by the First-begotten and the coming of the serpent is conquered by the harmlessness of the dove, unloosing those chains that had bound us to death.  St. Irenaeus of Lyons