Why I like this play (besides the fact that the writing and charcaters are just really fun) is that it's one that questions why we (royal we) belive in God in the first place. Gabriel, despite being an angel, has never met God, and while he tries to appear confidient in their existance when speaking to the others, he himself has moments of doubt. "That they sent me is enough to make me disbelive." He believes that he is so unsuited for this momentus task that it must have been a mistake, there can't be any greater power that would make such a mistake as to depend on him, and so maybe there isn't a greater power at all. Satan, however, is very present. Known as "the man in grey", the actor is double-cast as all the roles who mean to stand in thpe way of Jesus' birth, giving the story a very literal sense. Satan taunts Gabriel, and wonders if there's something in him that makes him so special, ultimately dismissing the thought.

Of course, in the end, it's shown that Gabriel was chosen very knowingly for the role he had to play. When he must sacrifice himself, become a tree to offer his branches down to Joseph to prove that he is deserving of being the baby's father, it's clear that it had to be him. No one else would have cared so much and been willing to lay down everything for these people. As well as seeming unassuming likley got Satan off his back, everyone underestimated him. It makes him more friendly and approachable to Mary, and theoretically Joseph, though the man still hates him. But I love the similarities between the two, in the crux of the show both shouting "God? Give me a sign!", they are both just as lost and confused, and dealing with it in different ways. But Gabriel is told by the Tree and finally accepts that he's the one who has to step up and be the sign Joseph needs.

Joseph's character is the most interesting one here, an older man full of self-doubt and awful self-esteem which is only worstened by the idea that he must marry a woman knowing he will be forced to take care of (what he assumes is) another man's child. He doesn't see himself worthy of her love and attention, doesn't see himself as a competent head of the household, and is extremely insecure about the fact that the baby isn't his. Understandably, he doesn't believe the baby comes from God and questions Mary constantly on whose it might be, assuming it must be Gabriel's. I think almost inadvertantly Gibson has a very nice message about fatherhood here, you don't have to be the biological father of a child for that child to need you. And it doesn't make him any less deserving of that role.

Where the ending works well is that it leads the viewer to realize that the intention is to assure us that God has a plan, without directly prostheletizing. We never get any solid proof, which of course is how things work, isn't it? But it leaves things up for some interpretation, even if the confirmation of a higher power is likely what the writer intended. That despite what seems like a constant presence of unfair forces against you, and no matter how doubtful you are in your own abilities, you can inspire others to face their own doubts. That even "angels" aren't perfect creatures, so in a way there are no true angels, just each other.