My love for the devotional, The Magnificat, is well-known. For today’s reading of Luke 1:26-38, we are giving a reflection from Caryll Houselander, who tells us:
“For every mother the knowledge of God is the essential preparation for motherhood: to know him as a tender but infinitely powerful Father; then to pray for the descent of the Spirit, for the divine ray that illumines natural love and bestows all the qualities of the Spirit’s indwelling presence, which are the basic necessities in bringing up a child.”
Now this wisdom comes from a woman who never married, and did not have children of her own; but her words ring with such truth. Under the protection of a loving Father, along with all the Holy Spirit gives us through both gifts and fruits, we have all we need to be great parents – as long as we open the gifts and take part in the fruits!
Those fruits are love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control, (CCC 1832).
The gifts are wisdom, understanding, counsel, fortitude, knowledge, piety, and fear of the Lord (CCC 1285).
As we enter in these last days before the arrival of the greatest gift we ever received, perhaps we could ask the Baby Jesus to renew in us these fruits and gifts to help us be better parents in 2018!
