Mary, walking, pregnant, filled with her own problems but attentive to the other, open to the needs of her cousin, goes out to the street alone, with its dangers and in her state, to serve.
The final stretch of our journey of this Advent invites us to fix our gaze on three prophetically announced things:
Bethlehem of Ephrata, so small to be among the villages of Judah, from you will come out the one who is to be the head of Israel, strong shepherd, our peace
1. smallness: love in concrete, one by one: in the small village and with its problems, but also in ours, in the family, in the community, small or big, better or worse, with health or without, with restlessness for the future or with the tranquility of having already completed the journey… in that smallness, but here
2. clarity: yes, in the sense of the promised head or strong shepherd, clear things, well established criteria…; unfortunately it is scary to write, knowing that it can be read by people who relentlessly seek a certain sense, restraint, reasons, logic… but I’m sorry (or not so) but our rock (leader, shepherd) is a clear light: he is a Child, a very concrete hope. Nobis datus, nobis natus …
3. peace: inside and outside our own soul.
Because smallness, clarity and peace will help us recognize a voice in the middle of the night that says:
“Behold, I come to do your will”
By now is announced a mystery of sanctification, a mystery of novelty, of good news, of depth, of a greater capacity to feel.
An attitude: the joy for the concrete that is about to happen, the joy to be able to wait, the joy of the promise: “Blessed is she who believes in the fulfillment of what the Lord has told her.”
