During this Advent season, once again we wait expectantly for Hope to be born. With our families we watch that small family travel the road to Bethlehem, and we ponder the mystery of the divine and unconditional Love that came to us as a child. We wait and wonder . . . and ponder.
Mary pondered. We are told that as the mother of Jesus she pondered things in her heart. It’s an old fashioned word and we don’t use it very much anymore. Please don’t bother to look it up in the dictionary because this century’s definition does not capture Mary’s pondering. Our culture takes that beautiful old word and makes it about thinking, an intellectual enterprise of considering something quietly and deeply. At least we have that last part right: quietly and deeply.
It is the geography that is all wrong. Mary’s map of her experience took her to her heart, not her head. The heart is the most sacred place to contemplate the mysteries and miracles, the joy of the unimaginable, the appearance of the angel who announced new life, the breathlessness of that first “yes” and the beauty and ache of everything that followed.
What are you pondering in your heart this season?
