It was no place to find flowers, or anything of value.
There was just one small man who had nothing in this world, nothing but a love for a beauty and a goodness and a presence that he encountered on his path. A beauty that won his heart. A presence that he could not deny; that, indeed, found him even when he tried to hide from it.
That small man followed; He let himself be loved. He listened and obeyed and did things that appeared to be foolish and useless.
And he found flowers in December.
Blooming in the barren wastes. It was a wonder, a surprise.
But he had learned how to be surprised. So he picked these flowers and gathered them in his cloak. It was enough for him to know, in that moment, that he would be able to share some sign of the wonder he had seen, so that others too would be convinced and drawn by beauty and love.
And there was to be yet another surprise.
We can be surprised. Something new can happen, beyond our calculations. And then, new possibilities open, a path stretches before us, and there is communication where before there were only inadequate words and the failure to understand. Something new can happen.
It already has happened. It is forever new. Again and again, it surprises us.The night does not last forever.
At dawn comes the opening of the eyes, and a miracle is given to us.
One day, from a place where no one was looking, something happened... something that was a new beginning, a healing, a changing of hearts, and -- slowly -- a new culture that arose from out of the ruins of the old.
What happened on December 12, 1531 was a sign of the miracle that happens everyday, every moment: She brings Him to us.
This is why we must "never give up." Our hope for our salvation, and for our society, is Him.
Nothing less.
Him.
And He is here, right now.
