“A Mother’s Heart”, Luke 2:1-20
Twice in Luke’s gospel we hear the phrase “Mary treasured all these words and pondered them in her heart” — once upon the visitation of the shepherds at the birth of Jesus, and the other one at the end of the scene of the 12 year-old Jesus at the Temple. Mary was a very young woman when she became pregnant and gave birth to Jesus. We know the story well – the annunciation, the Magnificat, the extraordinary birth – but if we put ourselves into the place of a young girl, raised in the Palestinian countryside, probably uneducated, what must she have thought of all of this as it was unfolding. She was told she was most blessed and would become pregnant when the holy spirit came upon her – what did that mean? She was told she would give birth to the Messiah – how in the world would the Messiah emerge from her and her life? The young Mary stood before an impenetrable mystery deeper than our Christmas celebrations sometimes capture. Standing before that mystery she did what mothers do – she stored these words, these events, these experiences in her heart, trusting that she would understand them better as they unfolded at the pace of time.