Page 280 - 聖母軍團員手冊（英文版，2014年5月-2022年1月更新版）

Legion HANDBOOK D10944_1 26/02/2014 15:53 Page 275

CHAPTER 39 CARDINAL POINTS OF THE LEGION APOSTOLATE 275
Likewise, the Annunciation shows her key-position. —
The culmination of the prophecies arrives ; the fruition of her
age-old destiny is now at hand.
Consider the awe-inspiring working out of the merciful
design of God. Attend in spirit the greatest Peace Conference
ever held. It is a Peace Conference between God and
mankind, and it is called the Annunciation. In that
Conference God was represented by one of his high Angels,
and mankind was represented by her whose name the Legion
is privileged to bear. She was but a gentle maiden, yet the fate
of all mankind hung upon her in that day. The angel came
with over whelming tidings. He proposed to her the
Incarnation. He did not merely notify it. Her liberty of choice
was not violated; so that for a while the fate of mankind
trembled in the balance. The Redemption was the ardent
desire of God. But in this, as in all matters minor to it, he
would not force the will of man. He would offer the priceless
boon, but it was for man to accept it, and man was at liberty
to refuse it. The moment had arrived to which all genera tions
had looked forward, just as ever since all generations have
looked back to it. It was the crisis of all time. There was a
pause. That maiden did not accept at once; she asked a
question, and the answer was given. There was another pause,
and then she spoke the words: “Let it be with me according to
your word” (Lk 1:38), those words that brought God down to
earth and signed the great Peace Pact of humanity.

The Father made redemption depend on her. — How few
realise all that follows from that consent of hers. Even
Catholics in the main do not realise the importance of the part
that Mary played. The Doctors of the Church say these things:
Supposing that maiden had refused the offer of motherhood
that was made to her, the Second Divine Person would not
have taken flesh in her. What a solemn thing that is! “What a
terrible thought to think that God has made the entrance of
the Redeemer dependent upon the ‘Let it be with me’ (Lk 1:38)
of the handmaid of Nazareth; that this saying should be the
termination of the old world, the beginning of the new, the
fulfilment of all prophecies, the turning-point of all time, the
first blaze of the morning star which is to announce the rising
of the sun of justice, which as far as human will was able to