JOSEPH: HIS LIFE, HIS VIRTUES, HIS PRIVILEGES, HIS POWER by Very Reverend Archdeacon Kinane (1884)

From the Gospel narrative it is clear that the Incarnation of the Eternal Word took place, not in the Temple, but in the Holy House at Nazareth, where Mary and Joseph lived after their Espousals. … How soon after the Espousals did the Incarnation of our Blessed Lord take place we know not for certain, as the Gospel and ancient writers are silent. According to Venerable Maria of Jesus of Agreda, the Espousals, as we have already said, took place on the 8th of September, that is, six months and seventeen days before the Incarnation, and when the Blessed Virgin was fourteen years, six months, and seventeen days of age, and her holy spouse St. Joseph thirty-three. … Immediately after the Conception the Blessed Virgin left Nazareth to visit her cousin St. Elizabeth.

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THE LOWLY LIFE AND BITTER PASSION OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST Vol 1 by Anne Catherine Emmerich

I saw the Blessed Virgin a short time after her marriage in the house of Nazareth. Joseph was not there. He was at that moment journeying with two beasts of burden on the road to Tiberias, whither he was going to get his tools. … Toward evening, they all prayed standing around a circular stool from which they afterward ate vegetables that had been served. Anne seemed to be very busy about the household affairs, and for a time she moved around here and there, while the Blessed Virgin ascended the steps to her room. … I saw her praying for a long time with intense fervor. She prayed for Redemption, for the promised King, and that her own supplications might have some influence upon His coming. She knelt long, as if in ecstasy, her face raised to Heaven; then she drooped her head upon her breast and thus continued her prayer. And now she glanced to the right and beheld a radiant youth with flowing, yellow hair. It was the archangel Gabriel. His feet did not touch the ground. In an oblique line and surrounded by an effulgence of light and glory, he came floating down to Mary. The lamp grew dim, for the whole room was lighted up by the glory.

The angel, with hands gently raised before his breast, spoke to Mary. I saw the words like letters of glittering light issuing from his lips. Mary replied, but without looking up. Then the angel again spoke and Mary, as if in obedience to his command, raised her veil a little, glanced at him, and said, “Behold the handmaid of the Lord. May it be done unto me according to thy word!” I saw her now in deeper ecstasy. The ceiling of the room vanished, and over the house appeared a luminous cloud with a pathway of light leading up from it to the opened heavens. Far up in the source of this light, I beheld a vision of the Most Holy Trinity. It was like a triangle of glory, and I thought that I saw therein the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost.

As Mary uttered the words: “May it be done unto me according to thy word!” I saw an apparition of the Holy Ghost. The countenance was human and the whole apparition environed by dazzling splendor, as if surrounded by wings. From the breast and hands, I saw issuing three streams of light. They penetrated the right side of the Blessed Virgin and united into one under her heart. At that instant Mary became perfectly transparent and luminous. It was as if opacity disappeared like darkness before that flood of light.

While the angel and with him the streams of glory vanished, I saw down the path of light that led up to Heaven, showers of half-blown roses and tiny green leaves falling upon Mary. She, entirely absorbed in self, saw in herself the Incarnate Son of God, a tiny, human form of light with all the members, even to the little fingers perfect. It was about midnight that I saw this mystery. …

An intuitive knowledge of what had taken place was conferred upon Anne. Mary knew that she had conceived the Redeemer, yes, her interior lay open before her, and so she already understood that her Son’s kingdom should be a supernatural one, and that the House of Jacob, the Church, would be the reunion of regenerate mankind. She knew that the Redeemer would be the King of His people, that He would purify them and render them victorious; but that in order to redeem them He must suffer and die.