Footprints in the Sand is a rather well-known story/poem. In a time of year when beach walks are common, it offers us some insight and encouragement in our own life journey. Whether this is familiar to you or not, I invite you to read and pray with it with fresh eyes and an open heart. How might God want to use it to speak to you at this time?

Over the month of January, many people have the opportunity to take a well-earned break and have some time to relax. One of my summer traditions is to spend time with my family at our holiday house about two hours south of Sydney. This year, I have particularly been looking forward to it as there was a long period of time when I thought the pandemic, closed borders and more might prevent this taking place.

Are you thinking about making any New Year’s Resolutions for 2021? Just thinking about it brings a wry smile to my face – because 2020 sure did not turn out the way any of us expected. Perhaps we have unfulfilled hopes, dreams and resolutions from 2020. There was much written during the year in 2020 about using it as a time to nurture our journey with God, and regardless of whether we were able to respond to those invitations or not, a new year always seems to bring a chance to make a fresh start. It can focus us and encourage us to consider where we are headed, and what we might want to put in place to help us to get there.

Today is a day of hope, peace, joy and love. It is a day for rejoicing in the gift of our salvation. It is a day for discovering anew what it means to live life to the full and for opening our hearts to receiving the gift of the baby born for us. Many people know the delight of welcoming a new baby into their families, and the beautiful and profound changes this brings as people come alive in fresh and new ways. Let’s allow this baby, Jesus, to make a difference to our lives in a new way today.

Once again, we reflect with Mary on her expereince of being the Mother of Jesus

As I wrap, you up my child

In cloths of love, soft and pure white,

I pick you up, I hold you close,

And I feel your heart beat with mine.

Christmas is a feast of love, a celebration of love, an invitation of love and to love, a reminder of the gift of love entering into the world like never before. Although it can never be simplified this much, reflecting on the readings on this 4^th Sunday of Advent brings to mind two central things. The first is the invitation to receive this love, and the second is the call to respond by sharing this love with others.

Today, Judy leads us in reflecting with the Shepherds....

Before that night I had a few stories to tell about my life as a shepherd: wolves, cliffs, ewes lambing, these were the stories we swapped among ourselves around the fires, in our families. But since that night, there is only one story that I tell.

The work of a shepherd is sometimes hard and often dull. Except for that night.

 It took me a while before I realised we can find happiness in the way we love and value ourselves. It is a great gift we can give ourselves and it is richly expressed in our psalm response today as we say, “my soul rejoices in my God!” The first reading from the prophet Isaiah confirms that our souls are filled with the Spirit – it is the joy within that allows us to bring good news to the poor and set captives free. Advent is a season of joy which invites us to explore ways we can find interior happiness.

Today we spend some time with Joseph - in what ways can he lead us more deeply into the mystery and gift of Christmas?

How could it be
This baby in my arms
Sleeping now, so peacefully
The Son of God, the angel said
How could it be?

Waiting sure has been a theme of my year – waiting to be allowed to travel more than 5km, waiting to be allowed to visit a friend, waiting for borders to open, waiting in lines at shops because there are already too many people inside or waiting for shops to reopen so I can actually go, waiting for mail to arrive that takes twice as long as usual, waiting to be able to return to Mass at my church, waiting, waiting, waiting, you get the idea. Waiting can be challenging, and I think Covid has emphasised this to us like never before.

Today we reflect with Mary - what was the experience of carrying Jesus in her womb?

“And he that made me rested in my tabernacle”

Within me he is alive

Within me, and with me.

                Holding me close, holding me near

                Embracing me always, holding me dear

Do you associate Advent with candles?  In my family, lighting the candles on the Advent wreath at family prayers each night was a sought-after role! 

I also associate candles with hope.  A single candle lit in the darkness brings not only a focus-point, but a lessening of the darkness around it.  Hope is like that.  If I have a reason to hope in the midst of situations of difficulty and even despair, it lessens the “darkness” surrounding me.

Regular readers of our blog would know that my main ministry is as a chaplain in Youth Justice. In these Covid-19 times, one of the processes in place there to prevent the spread has been that young people are in isolation for two weeks when they first enter. Two weeks of isolation means they are in their room for most of the day, only able to come out for short spaces of time. They do not have contact with other young people – and staff present with them wear full PPE.

In my own ordinary little way, I want to share how much I appreciate, love and continue to be inspired by the extraordinary example of St Therese of Lisieux, also known as the Little Flower. She is the saint for all missionaries and one of my mini personal missions in life is to spread God’s love through her. There is so much in her spirituality that I have been drawing from in my faith journey. Here are some of the highlights.

Part of my duties as the person in charge of the chapel is to melt down candles until the candle wick is visible. This is to prevent the candles ‘smoking’ once they are in use, because we have at least an hour or two of daily morning prayer and the candles burn for that long. As I was burning the candles down in a pan, the candle wax was melting to a form of thick oil.

I am bit of a lolly muncher, and whilst I have lots of favourites, it is pretty hard to go past refreshing, chewy yummy Minties. And what’s more, their advertising slogan ‘it’s moments like these you need Minties,’ is also rather memorable. (In case you are wondering I do not work for Allen’s, the company who make Minties, but simply want to use them as an analogy).

I know what it is like for life to get busy…. really busy. At times, I myself writing lists of all the things that I need and want to do. When there are many things pressing for our time, prayer can seem like the easiest thing to let go of in order to have more space in our lives. But paradoxically, as I read recently in a book by Sheila Cassidy, prayer really is the last thing to let go of, rather than the first. This is certainly a challenge, but I believe it to be true.

"Christ has no body now, but yours.

No hands, no feet on earth, but yours.

Yours are the eyes through which Christ looks compassion into the world.

Yours are the feet with which Christ walks to do good.

Yours are the hands with which Christ blesses the world."

Have you ever wondered what the great things are about consecrated life … here is a whole alphabet of reasons why I love life as an MGL Sister

ADORATION and many other ways to pray – the first great thing about being a sister is so much time for prayer. Whilst that was confronting at first (and sometimes still is) I have grown to love it more and recognise it as the thing that sustains me no matter what.

BUCKET LIST – far from stopping me from living and realising my dreams, I have had the opportunity to knock things off my bucket list – things like travelling to the 12 Apostles, going to my first AFL game and going to prison (for ministry that is)..

As a woman consecrated to God, living and probing the depths of the three vows of poverty, chastity and obedience is a mind-blowing reality.

In my novitiate I read a story about St. Francis of Assisi and a vision he had before receiving the stigmata. The Lord appeared to St. Francis and asked him to give a gift.  Perplexed by this request, Francis replied that he had given up everything for the sake of the Kingdom and that he had no further gift to offer.

Not so long ago, my sister posted a video of her two-year-old in our family Facebook chat. In it, Sebastian was searching the kitchen for his dad – who was actually at work. He looked in the cutlery drawer, the pantry, under the sink and even in the narrow gap between the fridge and the wall. Each time, he would say to himself, ‘in here’ before taking a look and then saying ‘no’ and calling out to his dad again.

Many people know the experience of dryness in the spiritual life, perhaps because in reality it will be a part of any authentic journey. If you experience dryness in the midst of discernment, it can seem discouraging,  but perhaps that is the moment to spend time with Ezekiel in the valley of the dry bones.

We may think that vocational discernment is about good decision making. Often discernment actually gives us a clearer sense not so much of what to do but about who we are meant to be.  

I think the silver lining to the cloud of COVID-19 could very well contain traces of technology. Thanks to platforms like Zoom, Facebook Live, Youtube Live, Skype, Facetime etc, we’ve been able to connect with each other online as I don’t think has happened in previous global pandemics.