Mary’s politics of mercy

December 28, 2025 • First Sunday After Christmas
Scripture Lesson: Luke 1:39-55 (NRSV)
Rev. Dr. Hector Rivera, Guest Preacher

[You can view the full worship video recording at: https://youtu.be/O94o53G0aHI]

Contemporary celebrations of Christmas often lack genuine surprise, overshadowed by consumerism and material excess. Glen Wiberg observes that our gift-giving is driven by wants rather than needs, and even prayer has become influenced by a culture of self-attainment. Abraham Heschel reminds us that prayer should be a humble response to the mystery of life, not a means for personal gain.

I’m reminded of the scene in the classic movie, A Christmas Carol, in which Jacob Marley appears to Ebenezer Scrooge. During their dialogue, Ebenezer reminds Jacob that he spent all his life amassing material gain only because he was a good businessman. To which Jacob replied: “Humanity was my business.” Is humanity our business?

This pastoral meditation invites reflection on the element of surprise inherent in the biblical account of Jesus’ birth. The Gospel of Luke presents a narrative filled with unexpected events: Zechariah, a high priest, is astonished by the angel Gabriel’s promise that his elderly wife Elizabeth will bear a son. Mary, engaged but not yet married, is similarly surprised to learn she will give birth to the Son of God. The angel reassures her, emphasizing that “nothing will be impossible with God.”

Letty Russell suggests that no amount of preparation can fully ready us for Christ’s coming, which represents a profound reversal of societal norms. When Mary visits Elizabeth, Elizabeth is filled with the Holy Spirit, and Mary responds with a hymn of praise—the Magnificat. Isaacs Villegas presents in stunning fashion the implications of Mary’s song:

• Mary prophesies the joy of a reconstructed society, a world where she and her people will be released from oppression, freed from an abusive regime. I bet Mary would have joined our dancing and chanting in Raleigh, our flagrant rejoicing in the streets, under the malevolent gaze of ethno-nationalists. Drums and whistles accompanied our march as we flowed through downtown. A group of Arab women—keffiyehs covering their heads, scarves wrapped around their shoulders—were playing plastic kazoos with pictures of Disney princesses on them, as if they’d stopped at a toy store on the way and scoured the shelves for a suitable instrument to counter the slurs of militarized White supremacists. A cluster of young women in hijabs were seen dancing to the music. Children soon circled around to twirl and twist with fearless joy.

• Mary’s politics of mercy announces the remaking of this world so that women in keffiyehs can play their Disney kazoos and young people in hijabs can dance without men in military gear shouting lies about them. Her song calls upon God to expose the deception of the proud, to unseat the arrogant from power—for God to scatter the wealth accumulated by means of racial capitalism.

• And Mary rejoices at the downfall of oppressors. According to Yolanda Pierce, “During Advent, we must remember the Creator who radically sets aside the oligarchy—for it was the sounds, smells, and sights of a stable which greeted the newborn babe, not the splendor of a palace. No longer would princely wealth be the only marker of authority. Even a child born on the fringes of society could become God-With-Us.”

Mary’s song is not about personal prosperity but about becoming a blessing to others. Unfortunately, today many Christians see the idea of blessing as a mark of divine chosenness, leading many to see themselves as endowed with special divine favor. But according to M. Shawn Copeland,

Framing oneself as chosen enables and even entitles a person and/or society to live without limits. Distortions of chosenness in these ways are obstacles to building communities of justice… Important as the notion of chosenness is for a religious sensibility, election can also be found in cultural myth. One needs only to read the propaganda of fascist or white supremacist movements to detect chosenness in the larger culture. In these cases, one group understands itself as privileged, special, and almost divinely moved for power and greatness… Clearly this cultural display of election as privilege is a complete subversion of the religious roots of chosenness, which demand a charitable component of being in relationship with others. When in a relationship of election, we are chosen to be for the other; we are in it for others.

Mary acknowledges God’s actions in overturning earthly power structures, referencing rulers like Herod, who exploited the poor for personal gain. The Magnificat proclaims that God “has scattered those who are proud,” “brought down rulers,” and “sent the rich away empty.” These themes are rarely found in popular Christmas traditions, perhaps because they confront established social and economic hierarchies.

The famous 1863 “scourged back” photograph features an enslaved person, known only as Peter, whose body is heavily marked by keloids and scars, the physical remnants of punishment, abuse, and torture. The photo was widely circulated by abolitionists throughout the end of the 19th century, and later it made its way into the textbooks of my own education. During my first year in college, I remember seeing the photo for first time in my Introduction to American History textbook. The image has remained in my memory ever since.

The Department of the Interior ordered this photo removed from a national monument in September of this year. “It is as if by removing and erasing these tangible reminders of injustice,” says Yolanda Pierce, “we can pretend that the continuing legacy of these wounds no longer exists. We want to pretend that if the scars cannot be seen, then the pain was not really inflicted. It is a deliberate case of historical amnesia: how we are willing to selectively forget those aspects of our history that we cannot, or will not, reconcile with our current culture. By refusing to deal with the troubling and bitter parts of history, we are left telling only the most sanitized versions, the versions that make us comfortable.”

The song “Mary Did You Know” raises questions about Mary’s awareness of her child’s future impact. This song emphasizes Jesus’ healings, and miraculous deeds, but says nothing about the liberating message of the Magnificat. But Mary did know and she understood its broader implications: her child would embody justice, mercy, and compassion. God’s reversal upends conventional ideas of who is blessed, prioritizing the poor and marginalized.

In a world where strangers are despised and foreigners are unwelcome, Luke describes a God whose actions resonate with hope and liberation for countless millions who are victims of unspeakable hate and rejection. One of the most powerful demonstrations of resistance I ever came across was a scene in Europe that involved a group of Jewish people protecting a Mosque that was under siege. These men and women surrounded the temple grounds with their hands clasped together, in an astonishing show of solidarity, saying to the crowd of attackers, “If you want to get to them, you’re going to have to go through us.”

Yolanda Pierce asks: “What’s the most indelible image of the season, the one that should be seared in our memory as Christians? Maybe it’s not the beatific scene of the nativity, a sleeping infant cradled by an apparently well-rested mother and surrounded by reverent visitors. Perhaps images of refugees seeking sanctuary, of the unhoused searching for shelter, and of the outcast striving for recognition are more faithful to the story of a God who journeys with us through the most difficult moments of our personal and collective histories.”

It is to these communities that Mary’s Magnificat is dedicated to: “My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior, for God has looked with favor on the lowliness of God’s servant. Surely, from now on all generations will call me blessed; for the Mighty One has done great things for me; holy is God’s name. God’s mercy is for those who fear God from generation to generation. God has shown strength with God’s arm; God has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts. God has brought down the powerful from their thrones, and lifted up the lowly; God has filled the hungry with good things, and sent the rich away empty. God has helped his servant Israel, in remembrance of his mercy, according to the promise God made to our ancestors, to Abraham and to God’s descendants forever.”

As Douglas Ottati argues: “Christians today need to stress ultimate loyalty to God in Christ alone—along with our responsibilities to the vulnerable and especially to the stranger within our gates. Now is no time to be passive or silent. But we also need to do something more. We need to say how our theological vision of people—as children of God made in the divine image and as sinners graced with possibilities for good—illumines politics and the workings and organization of critical institutions. We need to tutor ourselves and anyone who will listen in a theologically informed civics lesson that sheds light on the ominous turn [of events we are witnessing today].”

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