A beautiful quote I'd hoped to post here in Advent...

That was the idea, but as you know, my Advent and Christmas weren't quite what I'd planned, what with multiple hospital stays for my parents and all.

So, I was sorting through my drafts of posts this morning and found this one, dated December 10, 2007. Funny thing is I have no recollection of where I ran across the quote below. So, if one of my blogger friends deserves a hat tip, please raise your hand and I will be happy to give credit where credit is due.

Oh! Oh, wait! I just remembered it! My brain is not completely fried, it's really not!

Anyway. The hat tip goes to a woman I've never met; she's an online friend who also is part of the review board for Love2Learn.net. So, thank you, Maria, for including this quote in an online discussion.

From C. Houselander' s "A Child in Winter":

It is part of God's plan for us that Christ shall come to us in everyone; it is in their particular role that we must learn to know Him. He may come as a little child, making enormous demands, giving enormous consolation. He may come as a stranger, so that we must give the hospitality to a stranger that we should like to give to Christ. He may come to us in His Passion, disfigured by our sins and all sin, asking the utmost courage of us, that we may not be scandalized and may believe. He may come to us as a servant and compel to the extreme of humility which accepts His service, as Peter had to do, when he washed His feet, and as the disciples did with unquestioning joy when He cooked their little meal on the seashore.

If we see everyone in our life as "another Christ" we shall treat everyone with the reverence and objectivity that must grow into love and, as a matter of sheer logic, we shall accept whatever they bring to us, in the way of joy or sorrow or responsibility, as coming from the hand of Christ; and because nothing comes from His hand that is not given for our ultimate happiness, we shall gradually learn that the things they do, the demands they make, are all part of God's plan for us. Once that is understood we can never again feel completely frustrated by anyone, or lose the serenity of our minds by nursing a grievance. Neither shall we ever again miss a joy that should have been ours through another person because we dared not give ourselves to it bravely.

The above reminds me of Mother Theresa's comment about "Christ in Distressing Disguise".

And this is lovely, too:

The story of Joseph's bewilderment when he realized that his future wife was going to have a baby is well known, and it is well known, too, that Our Lady did not explain. Her example here teaches us wisdom, when misunderstandings arise because of Christ conceived in us. There is little gained by trying to explain. At that time, at Advent time, God's voice is silent in us; it is simply our own heartbeat.

Love is more effective than words. The only thing to do is to go on loving, to be patient, to suffer the misunderstanding. Explanations even of what can be explained seldom heal...and there is so much that cannot be explained. Even the presence of Christ in us does not do away with our own clumsiness, blindness and stupidity; indeed, sometimes because of our limitations, His light is a blinding light to us and we become, for a time, more dense than before ..... Explanations, words, at this stage, may only wound, but love will be a bridge over which at last, in God's time, we shall cross to a better understanding.