The Angel And The Virgin

Audivimus, fratres, angelum a Deo Patre ad Virginem missum, audivimus Virginem novo salutationis famine salutatam, et in ipsa salutatione, ut Evangelium loquitur, fuissse turbatam. Audivimus Gabrielem archangelum verbis consolatoriis, ne timeret allocutum, eo quod invenisset gratiam apud Dominum, deinde generaturam et parituram asseruit filium, quem praecepit ut vocaret Jesum. Hunc esse magnum et filium Altissimi, sedem David, et domum Jacob, et regnum sempiternum sine fine secundum humanitatem adepturum praedixit. Quod semper secundum divnitatem cum Deo Patre et Spiritu sancto aeternaliter, antequam mundus fieret, in aeterna sua scientia habuit et disposuit. Post consolationis officiosissima et jucundissima famina, Virgo santissima interrogando et potius in cunctando coepit inquire quomodo fieri posset quod angelus insolitam et inauditam rem tanta auctoritate nuntiare praesumeret; hujus rei factum, quod natura non habuit, quod exemplo caruit, Spiritu sancto superveniente et virtute Altissimi obumbrante angelus fieri posse perdocuit. O inauditum et admirabile singularis humilitatis exemplum! Ea quae se Dominum et Creatorem suum concepisse gaudebat et de se nasciturum non dubitabat, cum posset se cognoscere sine dispendio suae sincerissimae humilitatis omnium fidelium dominam, non distulit se vocare Domini sui ancillam, dicens: Ecce ancilla Domini, fiat mihi secundum verbum tuum Odilo Cluniacensis Abbas, Sermo IV, De Incarnatione Dominica Source: Migne PL 142.1002d-1003a

We have heard, brothers, that the angel was sent from God the Father to the Virgin, we have heard the Virgin was hailed by a new speech of greeting, and by that greeting, as the Gospel says, she was troubled. We have heard the archangel Gabriel speak words of comfort, lest she fear the rest, telling her that she had found grace with God, and then that she would conceive and give birth to the Son of God, which he commanded her to name Jesus. He foretells that He who is great and the Son of the Most High, the seat of David and the house of Jacob, and whose kingdom has no end, shall take up humanity. Because according to Divinity He is always with God the Father and the Holy Spirit, before the world was made, in His eternity wisdom arranged and disposed it. After this most dutiful and joyful speech of consolation, the most holy Virgin, questioning, or rather hesitating, began to ask how it was possible that an angel should presume to announce something so strange and unheard of with such authority. He taught that this deed, of which nature was not capable, which lacked all example, was able to come to be by the coming of the Holy Spirit and the overshadowing of the power of the Most High. O unheard and wondrous example of singular humility. She who rejoiced to conceive her Lord and Creator and did not doubt concerning His birth, she who is able to be known, without loss of her own humility, as the Lady of all the faithful, did not refuse to call herself the handmaid of her Lord, saying, 'Behold the handmaid of the Lord, be it done to my according to your word.' 1 Saint Odo of Cluny, from Sermon 4, On The Incarnation Of The Lord 1 Lk 1.38