Today's Gospel

Friends, today’s Gospel portrays Mary, the world's quickest road-tripper. She hears Gabriel's cryptic pregnancy spoiler and bolts to the hill country, a woman on a divine mission, with that kind of fervor you only see in people who’ve misplaced their car keys.

Why the rush? Because somewhere between the angel's announcement and her cousin Elizabeth's front porch, Mary found herself in God's cosmic screenplay. We're all casting ourselves in our own ego-dramas, starring in our autobiographies where each of us is the misunderstood hero, the idiosyncratic auteur, the snappy dialogue writer.

But there's this larger play, the theo-drama, penned and directed by something far more spectacular. Mary’s hasty trek was her way of diving headfirst into God's storyboard, a script where each act aligns with universal mysteries and celestial puzzles you'd need a PhD in philosophy just to misunderstand.

Elizabeth, pregnant with her own miracle, is the co-star in this holy sitcom. Mary and Elizabeth, two characters pulled from a divine hat, finding their places among the spiritual lines and stage directions. They marvel together, not at their belly bumps, but at the script notes from the Almighty nudging them into climactic scenes.

So perhaps amidst our daily absurdities, between lost keys and found resolve, we too must discover our lines—and perhaps, our over-the-top stage presence—in God's grand, bewildering drama.