The photo used above was created by Ben Wildflower.

This week, we celebrated the fourth Sunday of Advent, and heard a powerful sermon from Ted on Mary’s revolutionary song, the Magnificat. It’s personally one of my favorite passages in the Bible, and this year, it’s hitting me in a particular way. While I generally take a lot of inspiration from Mary and Elizabeth’s calls for revolution, drawing a clear connection with powerful Biblical women like Miriam, Judith, Jael, Deborah, and Hannah, I cannot keep Gisèle Pelicot out of my mind. What does the Magnificat mean today, in light of the horrors of a woman drugged and raped by 83 men, all orchestrated by her husband?

Florence Welch, of Florence + the Machine, navigates this tension in the song above, talking about the roles women are “supposed” to fulfill, and the consequences for when they do not fit neatly into those boxes. In light of this tension, I resonate with Mary’s desire for a revolution centered on God’s justice that upends the current social order. May we all strive to live into Mary’s spirit, today and always.