Happy New - Church - Year!

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I am grateful for beginnings - opportunities to start anew - to drop old baggage and trust the next step into the future. Advent has become a more important 'new year' beginning in my life than the one that comes in about a month on our ordinary calendar.

As the new church year approaches - as I assemble anew the parts of my eclectic Advent "wreath" - these words of Thomas Merton come back to me: " Advent is the beginning of the end of all in us that is not yet Christ."

Merton's words bring me hope both personally and as part of the human community. We are reminded that God's healing work of Love is actively engaged in our lives and in the world. Just as Mary received the child in her womb upon hearing and believing the Word of God proclaimed by the Angel Gabriel, so too do we experience God desire to advent in us.

Yes, God is "adventing!"  God is always "adventing" - starting something new - in our lives. May we respond by taking time to be still so that we just may experience the transforming gift of Christ who lives in the womb of our souls.
Roberta Popara, O.P.
North Palm Beach, Florida

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