This year marks the 1,700th anniversary of the Nicene Creed. Week by week we recite: “He believes in Jesus Christ… who by the Holy Spirit was incarnate of the Virgin Mary, and became man.” Familiar words — but astonishing ones. That single clause bears a young woman’s voice, her agency, and a revolution sung into the world.
Tradition places Mary at perhaps fifteen: poor, Jewish, living under Roman occupation, unmarried and about to be pregnant in a culture where shame could kill. Into that world comes an angel and a call she cannot fully comprehend. Mary’s response is freely given: “Behold, the handmaid of the Lord: be it done unto me according to thy word.” We too easily hear this as passive submission. It is not. It is the first courageous fiat in Christian history — an act of consent, not capitulation. God does not impose; God invites. Salvation began not with conquest but with a conversation, and depended on the consent of one teenager.
