Immaculate Conception – Homily (2025)
The Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary
Genesis 3:9-15, 20
Psalm 98:1, 2-3ab, 3cd-4 (1)
Ephesians 1:3-6, 11-12
Luke 1:26-38
December 8, 2025
God has always had a complete plan for our salvation. He has always “destined us for adoption to himself through Jesus Christ.”
From our human viewpoint it didn’t start off well. God created Adam and Eve and put them in the Garden of Eden. It was paradise.
God gave them only one rule. They were told to never eat of the tree of forbidden fruit. It might seem simple but the devil complicated things.
Through his cunning, the serpent tricked Eve into eating the forbidden fruit. Eve then got Adam to eat the fruit too. The devil twisted God’s word to make them think the fruit was good for them. Even though God had told them not to, they did it. They sinned.
Adam and Eve had known no guilt or shame before this. Their sin changed that. When God came looking for them in the Garden, Adam hid. At least he thought he had hid. Can we really hide from God?
When God came to him, Adam said “I heard you in the garden, but I was afraid, because I was naked, so I hid myself.” After eating the forbidden fruit, Adam knew shame and guilt. That’s why he tried to hide from God.
In punishment for eating the forbidden fruit Adam and Eve were thrown out of the Garden.
So went the first sin. We call it Original Sin. It shows our human inclination towards sin. We seek what brings us pleasure even when it involves sin.
Eve became known as “the mother of all the living.” Like her, as human beings, we all have a tendency to sin. God knew this. He incorporated this into his plan.
We are about to celebrate an incredible turning point in God’s plan. We call this turning point Christmas. God had always known what would be needed to save his people. He would send his Son Jesus who is “holy and without blemish.”
Since we are sinners, God knew it would take the one who is without sin to save us. God sent his Son Jesus to become incarnate in the flesh. God’s plan was always for Jesus to become human “like us in all things except sin” (see Hebrews 4:15).
For Jesus, who is without sin, to be conceived in a woman’s womb to be born like us would require a woman who is without sin.
Did this put a stop to God’s plan for our salvation?
Of course not! God knew how Jesus was to be born of woman to make his Salvation known. He knew who the woman was who would be worthy to carry his Son Jesus in her womb.
At the proper time, God sent the angel Gabriel to Mary to reveal God’s plan for her.
The angel Gabriel said to Mary, “Hail, full of grace! The Lord is with you.”
To be “full of grace” is to be without sin. How could Mary be without sin? She is a woman just like us. For every other human being, that means Original Sin. Again, how could Mary be without sin?
Nothing is impossible for God!
When the angel Gabriel told Mary she had been chosen to be the mother of Jeus, she asked, “How can this be?” Mary did not doubt God’s message. Her question was one of faith seeking understanding. She had faith but could not understand how she could be pregnant as she had never had relations with a man.
The angel Gabriel told her that it would be through the Holy Spirit and God’s power that she would conceive. With faith, this was enough for Mary to say yes to being the mother of Jesus.
So, what about Original Sin in Mary?
We are limited by time. God is not. God always knew that Mary would say yes. Mary’s “yes” was always part of his plan. So, through prevenient grace, God sought to it that Mary was conceived without sin in her own mother’s womb. Mary was conceived immaculately by God’s power so that she would be worthy to carry Jesus in her womb.
Eve experienced sin and was the mother of all the living. Mary is a new Eve. Conceived without sin, she becomes the mother of Jesus. Then Jesus gives her to us as our mother.
Is your desire to follow Eve as your mother and sin or do you desire to follow Mary and say “yes” to God?