Dream Come True

What do you think of when you hear the phrase “American Dream”? All of us here are immigrants, one way or another.... Some have been here for two or three hundred years - or more! I think some of mine came in the 17th century. What did your ancestors come here for? Was it for religious freedom, or economic opportunity? Or did they come as indentured servants or on the prison ships that first colonized Georgia? Did they come as refugees or adventurers or visionaries? Whatever your ancestors' reasons for coming here, as a nation we descend from a lot of dreamers. Even the ones who came against their will - prisoners, slaves, indentured servants, and the long-suffering wives of men with wanderlust, may have eventually caught the prevailing sense of possibility that permeated the very idea of America.

Nowadays it seems to me that the “American Dream” - at least when politicians use the phrase - means pretty much one thing, and that is economic success. Not that there`s anything wrong with economic success, mind you, but it’s a little narrower than the whole range of possibilities that the vast sweep of our history suggests. What about religious or political freedom? What about simply the idea of a new start on life? It’s not just con artists, ne'er-do wells, and misfits who occasionally need to change their names and move out of town. I consider it myself on a fairly regular basis! But our history, our beginnings, have left us a culture more accustomed to pulling up stakes and moving on to greener pastures than any other non-nomadic society in the world...

What’s your dream? What would it take for your dreams to come true? For some of us, the simplest things will be enough. Home, family, work that’s worth doing and pays enough to provide for all the basics and an occasional luxury, or adventure... What would it look like, if your dream came true?

Even today some dreams are simply beyond our reach. And, of course, in the past, color, gender, class, and ethnicity all eliminated a lot of options. And most people simply learn to live - even to dream - within what is possible.

But now narrow it down even further. Go back beyond the few hundred years when America and her possibilities beckoned to dreamers around the world. In the places our ancestors came from it was even harder to dream of a different life, a better life. And in first century Palestine, the choices for a teenage Jewish girl were more restricted than most of us can begin to imagine. Her only choices were to marry well or to marry badly. And even then, she hardly had a choice, because usually it would be the parents of the prospective couple who would make the arrangements. You could dream of a kind, handsome, and prosperous husband, you could dream of a houseful of healthy obedient children - mostly sons, of course - and you could even dream of moving to another village or even a city - if that’s where your husband’s business took him. You could dream, but there was almost nothing you could do to make it happen.

So Mary, like most of her friends, had no doubt learned to dream small long before her marriage to Joseph was arranged. We don’t know if they knew each other before the betrothal, in a small town no doubt he had seen her and she had at least heard of him, or even perhaps giggled and speculated with his sisters and cousins about what kind of husband he would be. But still, you never knew how it would turn out. God willing, she and Joseph would have a good life together, and children would come in time, and the simple round of feeding and clothing her family would fill her days. Nazareth was a small town, in an unimportant province, and Mary could hope that none of the political unrest would spill over on them. So perhaps her dream included the expectation that no Roman soldiers would be garrisoned there, no rabble-rousers would try to stir up trouble, no foreign armies would come sweeping through on their way to conquer a richer prize. This was possible. This could happen. It was safe to dream that dream.

But God had other ideas.

"The angel Gabriel was sent ... to a virgin engaged to a man whose name was Joseph ... [named] Mary. And he ... said, 'Greetings, favored one! The Lord is with you.' But she was much perplexed ... The angel said to her, 'Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God. And now, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you will name him Jesus. He will be great, and will be called the Son of the Most High, and... He will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom there will be no end.' Mary said to the angel, 'How can this be, since I am a virgin?' The angel said to her, 'The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; therefore the child to be born will be holy; he will be called Son of God.'" [Lk 1:26-35]