freed from bleak midwinter

"A severe winter kills and destroys all the plants and flowers in the country... Sin, that sad and terrible winter of the soul, destroys all the holy works it finds there... (but) when sin is driven out, and the grace of Divine Love returns to the soul, not only the new affections which the return of this holy springtime produces bud forth into rich merits and blessings, but the works faded and withered under the harshness of the bygone winter of sin - as if freed from their mortal enemy - resume their strength and vigour and, as if raised from death, flourish anew and are fruitful in merits for eternal life."  (St. Francis de Sales)

(photo NS) 

The Glorious Interruption

After a month of concentration on Advent and Christmas, I’m finding it tough to get back to where I was with regard to “exploring the cloister.”  Don’t get me wrong:  I absolutely love Christmas.  I savor the days of Advent anticipation, I enjoy preparing gifts, and I love meditating upon the birth of Christ.  I’m thrilled to watch my grandchildren being told that at last they get to find out what has been waiting under the tree.  But when it comes to many activities, the Christmas season constitutes… well…..  an interruption. 

Today it hit me.  That is exactly what Christmas is.  That’s what Christmas has been since the instant of the Incarnation:  an interruption.  Please stay with me here, because our first reaction to the word “interruption” could be negative.  But interruptions are often quite positive, and this Interruption was the most positive of them all.

Think of it.  Mary was living a quiet, hidden life.   She was betrothed.  Then one day an angel appeared to her, and with that Holy Interruption Mary’s life was changed forever … as was Joseph’s, as was yours, as was mine. 

As we know, there was a Birth.  There were shepherds tending their flocks, and again an angel appeared.  A night of sheep-watching was interrupted.  While most of the world went on unaware, some men in the east also noticed something out of the ordinary.  A sign in the sky.  Something signaling, to them, a wondrous interruption – one so marvelous that they must drop any other plans they had and go in haste, and they must bring gifts.  These men were wise enough to know that somehow the world had changed, maybe even that the course of life on earth had been altered. 

The change was so shattering that mankind took notice;  calendars would later mark the divide.  God Himself had split the heavens.  We now measure time by the before and after of that Grand Interruption, in effect saying that yes, we see.  We may not understand, really, but we recognize the wonder and the mystery of it.  God interrupted the cycle of sin and death by breaking into our world (John 3:16).  Jesus broke into the flesh of man, shattering hopelessness with His power and mercy. 

With Jesus' arrival in the flesh, God interrupted our sin and misery.  He opened to us the path to salvation and interrupted our hatred and our lack of peace.   

With Jesus' arrival in the flesh, God ripped through the fabric of time.    

Text not in quotes © 2011 Nancy Shuman.  All Rights Reserved.
thecloisteredheart.org      

prayer power

  no prayer, no power. 

a little prayer, a little power.  

                            a lot of prayer, a lot of power!                                

  
(anonymous)

(public domain photo from Wikimedia Commons)

celebration waiting

The mystery of the Incarnation "is so exalted and so profound that we understand next to nothing about it.  All that we do know and understand is very beautiful indeed, but we believe that what we do not comprehend is even more so.  Finally, some day in Heaven above, we will grasp it fully.  There we will celebrate with an incomparable delight this great feast of Christmas, of the Incarnation."  (St. Francis de Sales)

is there room?

Sometimes, at this time of year, a question drifts into my mind.  It's always the same. 

"Is there room in Your heart for Me?" 

I immediately think of innkeepers.  I think of a house in Bethlehem where travelers once lodged, where no room was found when the time came for Jesus to be born.

As a cloistered heart, I have said that my primary "apostolate" is that of making my heart a refuge for Jesus in the midst of a world which does not, on the whole, love and honor Him.  Christ is in my heart; this I know.  But sometimes I wonder.  What sort of "refuge" am I offering to Him?  Am I providing a place of welcome and adoration?  Or could it be that I've allowed my heart to become cluttered with so many other things that I have little room in my life for Christ Himself.

The inn in Bethlehem was not filled with "bad" people on the night Mary and Joseph arrived seeking shelter.  It had no room for the holy family only because others had gotten there first.

Does Jesus find little space in some of my days simply because the hours fill up with everything else first?

Do I get up in the morning and put off prayer until I get one thing accomplished, and then one more thing - and do I ever find that the day has sped by without my spending any time at all in communication with God?  I am deeply ashamed to admit that more often than I care to mention, this has been the case.

My heart appears to me, today, somewhat like a cluttered desktop.  Or perhaps like a cluttered manger, in which there is no room for even a tiny Babe.

I am ashamed of the clutter in my heart.  I'm much more ashamed of this than of the clutter that accumulates, piece by piece, upon my desktop.  And so I come today to Jesus, asking HIM to clear out all the distractions and (especially) the sin.  I ask our Blessed Mother, who so tenderly prepared a place for Jesus, to help prepare my heart to be a fitting refuge for my Lord.  May she re-arrange my priorities as one might arrange pieces of straw in a manger.

As my Christmas gift this year, I ask that the same be done for you.  I ask that all our hearts be prepared as places of loving refuge for the King and Messiah Whose birth we are about to celebrate.  The world did not welcome Him when He came to earth as an infant; the world does not welcome Him still.  You and I have the opportunity of welcoming Him in a world which does not do so.  You and I have the opportunity (and I think we would fall on our faces if we could see the full reality of it) to lovingly embrace Him.

Let our hearts prepare Him room.

Text not in quotes © 2011 Nancy Shuman.  All Rights Reserved.
thecloisteredheart.org