Caryll Houselander (1901-1954) was a British artist with a fine sensitivity for the depths of the human soul. A life marked by suffering, but which did not extinguish her supernatural sense of life or her good humor, which can be traced in the book The Reed of God (Rialp, 2023), a meditation on the life of Saint Mary. It begins with the Let it be done in me according to your word, the beginning of the gestation and the time of waiting for the Virgin Mother until the birth of the Child in Bethlehem: “There is only one cure for fear: trust in God. Therefore, the beginning of the formation of Christ in us requires that we make the fiat (let it be) of Mary resonate in us, which is a surrender, a leaving everything in God’s hands”. It is easy to say that we are in God’s hands, but the crucial thing is to live knowing that we are in his hands. This was the first message transmitted by Saint John Paul II at the beginning of his pontificate: “Do not be afraid”. A courage that has its source in the Mother of God.
Nine months of gestation, a joyful wait, not without its difficulties. “We must let Christ grow in us as he did in Mary. And we must be aware that everything that grows in silence in us is Christ who grows. We must let our thoughts, words, and songs grow slowly and develop in us in the darkness. Some things refuse to be forced by haste. They require at least their own time of growth”. Patience has a lot of divine gift and is a good remedy for anxiety, haste, and dizziness. Everything in its own time, with the attitude of the gardener who prepares the ground, sows the seed and waits for the growth of the plant, its flowering and its fruits. Knowing how to treasure in the mind and in the heart the words, experiences, drafts of ideas so that in the right moment the light, the inspiration, the repentance, the purpose, the joys, the tears may flow.
The approach of Christmas – even with its commercial excesses – reveals the nostalgia for God and supernatural life that human beings seek. We run, we buy, we spend. Even, it can be blurred that that great joy of December 25th is for the birth of the Son of God, the Child of God. But when Christmas Eve arrives, the rush ceases and the joy of being with our loved ones settles in: it is the time of the family, participation in the life of the Holy Family.
Love becomes a Child and renews love in each one of us. Our author says: “Most people know the true wonder of what it means to fall in love. How not only everything that fits in heaven and earth is renewed, but the lover himself is also renewed. Literally, it is like the sap that, rising up the tree, generates new shoots of life. The capacity for joy is doubled, the perception of beauty is sharpened, the power to do and enjoy creative work is increased immeasurably. The heart expands, there is greater sympathy, more warmth than before”. A love close to the skin at Christmas and, likewise, a love for all seasons of the year, also for the winters of the soul. A heart in love, says Houselander, “will see the world with wonder and reverence, will be aware that deprivations, pain and fatigue of the body are prayer, but that there are also the pleasures and works of the body. Body and soul together glorify God. The greater the capacity to suffer and rejoice, the greater the sanctity”. Joys, sorrows make up the chiaroscuro of the human biography.
Christ in Bethlehem, Christ on the Cross, Christ Risen and his Most Holy Mother by his side in the humility of the manger, on the way of the Passion and in the Glory of his Son.
