The Visitation of the Blessed Virgin Mary

After the angel Gabriel told Mary that she would be the mother of the Son of God, and that her elderly relative Elizabeth was also expecting a child, Mary "set out in haste" to a town in the hill country of Judah, traditionally identified as Ein Karem near Jerusalem. When she greeted Elizabeth, the child in Elizabeth's womb, John the Baptist, leaped for joy, and Elizabeth, filled with the Holy Spirit, cried out, "Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb."

Mary answered with the Magnificat, her great song of praise: "My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord." She stayed with Elizabeth about three months (Luke 1:39-56). The feast was spread by the Franciscans in the thirteenth century and extended to the whole Church by Pope Urban VI in 1389. It was kept on July 2 until 1969, when it was moved to May 31, between the Annunciation and the birth of John the Baptist.

The feast closes the month of Mary, and many parishes end May with a Marian procession, a May crowning or a Rosary by candlelight. The Visitation is the second Joyful Mystery of the Rosary, and the Magnificat is sung every evening in the Church's Vespers. In Ein Karem the Church of the Visitation displays the Magnificat in dozens of languages.