21. dezember
We had so many offers of places to spend Christmas, but in the end, through the advice of P. Jacques, we have accepted the invitation of the family of Maria-Elizabeth (the former missionary studying voice in Wien). We will spend Christmas in Hollabrunn, a little dorf (village) just a 45 minute drive outside of Wien. I am excited to get to know Maria-Elizabeth better and to thank her parents personally for the bed they donated to us, and of course to get a little taste of what a traditional Austrian Christmas is like. We intended to spend the weekend with them, but Crista called Alina this afternoon in dire need of help. Her husband, has suffered a knee injury and had to go to the hospital. With four young children, a crowded children’s Christmas mass to go to, and a Christmas Eve to celebrate, she is worried she can’t do everything alone.
The Austrian Heilige Abend (Christmas Eve) tradition, when the children of the family are still young, is that one parent takes the children out in the afternoon/evening to preoccupy them, while the other parent stays home to put up the Christmas tree, decorate it, and put out the presents. (or the Christmas tree and the presents are set up in another room of the house where the children are forbidden to enter before Christmas, and the parents never seen entering or leaving). The only decoration that is put up in the house before Christmas Eve is the Advent Wreath (very different from the American tradition of decorating for Christmas right after Thanksgiving). Then on Christmas Eve, the children await the coming of the Christkind (Christ-child) who, on His birthday, brings a tree with lights, candles, ornaments, and candies on it, as well as presents. Usually, the family gathers around the crèche scene to welcome the Christkind to the world with the traditional Austrian carol, Stille Nacht, and then, when they hear bells ringing, the children know the Christkind has come and they rush to see what he has left behind for them.
So with an apartment to small to set up the tree in another room, Crista and Anton must occupy the children outside the apartment while setting up the tree and presents, but with Anton in the hospital, Crista cannot do everything alone. And so, rather than spend the weekend with Maria-Elizabeth’s family, we will share Heilige Abend with Crista’s family, and then early Saturday morning train to Hollabrunn to celebrate Weihnachten, and return to Wien on Sunday after mass. We have only been in Vienna for 2 weeks and yet see how the Lord gives us to many hearts to be with!
I have such high hopes for all of you this Christmas, hopes so high because I know that nothing is impossible with God…what more did the account of both the annunciation and visitation call us to believe. Most of all, I hope for you all, and for myself as well, a greater understanding of what it means that the Desire of every human heart chooses to humble himself and take on the flesh of mankind as a child in a manger. The Fulfillment of all our desires is soon to be born to us…ever ancient and ever new…born ever long ago, but each day to be born anew in our hearts, so that each day we may bow down in adoration of the incarnation as if it were the first time our soul ever felt its true worth.
This past weekend we were on retreat for preparation for Christmas and the new foundation. Saturday was a wonderful day of silence and private prayer, but I’m so thankful that Monika broke our silence just in order to translate the homily given in mass that evening. It was stunning and I want to share it with you… (granted…it is me just writing the gist of what the priest said)
“Interesting that the Gospel is about the Apostles at the Ascension as it is the last Sunday before Christmas. But there is a sense to it. Why? Because Christ shows us the beginning and the end. They are the same. So they are both beginnings and endings; both times of newness and change.
Shepherds saw and heard Angels, as did the Apostles after Jesus ascended into Heaven. Both Shepherds and Apostles were filled with fear at what was happening…at the mystery before them…and then the Angels assured them that there was no need to fear…’Rejoice!’ The Angels didn’t explain to the Shepherds and the Apostles the mystery they feared and stood in awe of simultaneously. The Angels just explained enough to reassure them, to convince them to give up their fear of the mystery that lay before them; to instead fill that spot in their hearts with joy! And then the most glorious thing occurred. In awe before this mystery and the mission they were being given as a result of this mystery, they knelt and stared in wonder…
they adored.
How do you react to these moments when you stare before a mystery? The only appropriate response—no matter what the mystery may physically look like—a baby that is the promised Messiah, or an empty sky into which your resurrected Rabbi, the Son of God, just disappeared. Whether it be a miraculous gift for your life situation or the seeming disappearance of your guide in life…all in our lives is the same. Everything that lies in front of us is a mystery. We must kneel, bow, give praise with gratitude and trust, for only in adoration is God perfectly loved, only in adoration can you gain strength from the Lord needed to eradicate the fear, overflow your soul with joy and enter into the mystery.
every aspect of Jesus’ life called for Him to be adored
because all of Jesus’ life
then and now
was and remains
a mystery.
kneel and bow in awe and wonder.'
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| {rembrandt.adoration of the shepherds} |
In giving adoration to God, we receive the grace we need, not to survive life, but to live as we were created to live—to thrive. To live every moment with supernatural help that gives us strength, patience, overwhelming joy. Adrienne von Speyr writes, “When the Son chose the Mother, He placed in her all His love for men in order to receive it from her. He had her become a fruitful spring out of which he is always giving more of the grace that He gave her in the beginning, a grace that is Christian because it not only gives, but when received, can be given further.” And so, the nature of grace is not that it is to be given and received between two alone, but God bestows grace that be received and then yearns to be given further a hundred times over. You cannot keep this grace for yourself. In adoration we give our whole selves to Christ, who returns this gift with His superabundant grace. And thus empowers us and makes us desire to expand this gift to all we know. Just as Mary had the honor of bearing Jesus in her womb, we have the honor of bearing Jesus in our hearts. “The Lord answers every surrender of a heart with a fruitfulness in which His mother takes part. He chose ‘one’ mother for Himself in order to have all men as brothers. But as the Mother imparts her motherhood to others, Jesus’ brothers become mothers. It is the Mother’s ongoing, ever-living assent which made possible the Son’s saying that all who say “yes” and do the will of the Father become not only brothers and sisters but also mothers of the Lord.” (von Speyr). I pray for you and for the intercession of Mary for your life, especially throughout this Christmas season. If we know anything of prayer, readiness, openness, obedience, and surrender we owe it to Mary’s fiat. If we know anything of gratitude, adoration, praise and continual surrender we owe it to Mary’s ever-living motherhood. I pray that all the grace Christ bestows upon His mother, she showers upon you to fill, renew, and strengthen you—to prepare you to adore Christ at his birth and seek to be beside Him every moment of the new year. It is God’s grace that when received can be given further, and so when given to the Mother, she gives it to us, and when given to us, we can give further and further. Enjoy living the mystery.
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