Charles Seagren, ocds: prepare your hearts

Readings: So 2: 8-14, Ps 33, Lk 1:39-45

There’s an old saying:
Have nothing in your house
which is not both beautiful and useful.

It’s good advice
for our hearts as well.

Today Jesus stands behind our wall,
looking through the windows,
peering through the lattices.
What does He see?
Are we ready to welcome Him
into our home?

He stands outside looking in
and now He calls us:
Arise, My beloved, my beautiful one,
and come.

As soon as we hear His voice
something stirs within us.
It’s the beauty that we are,
the beauty we forgot we are.
And the infant leaps in our womb,
the child of God that each of us is
leaps for joy
when we hear His voice.

Winter is past
and the time of pruning is here,
the time to prepare for the salvation of Christ.

He breaks down the walls that divide us.
He cleans the Temple of our heart
till nothing remains
but what is beautiful and useful,
the praise of His glory
and the good of our neighbor,
nothing remains but love.