New Year. New You.
1 January 2018
Welcome to 2018! Today’s Gospel speaks of the moment that humanity was made into a new creation. This New Year, forget about your New Years resolutions and become a New You.
What are we talking about? We are talking about an encounter with love so profound that it re-orients our hearts and minds. St Paul speaks to us in 2 Corinthians:
“So if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has passed away; see, everything has become new!” (5:17)
In essence, Jesus speaks newness of life into creation. The New Year gives you a fresh start in faith – in finding your identity in Christ. This is not to say forget about your past, but to reassure you that God’s love for you is renewed continually; just as your love for God can be anew every moment of every day. This profoundly personal relationship with God and the newness of life that results may make some anxious, even a little frightened, but the Gospel shows us the great Promise that is on offer. All we need to do is look to the response of courage and trust of Mary to inspire us.
Jesus allows us the hope of the Word made flesh; God stepping out of heaven and into our humanity, taking on our fear, brokenness, and weight of our sin. Living in this hope allows us to follow Christ. The call to follow Christ, to experience God’s self-revelation as love, is not for the select few but for all creation. This incredible gift of God is what “Mary treasured… and pondered in her heart.”
Mary’s call to follow Christ is grounded in the most profound relationship imaginable. The relationship of pure love between Mary and her Son, so passionate and enduring, shows us how God wants to relate with His Church.
Every creation is a gift to this world. The Gospels tell us that we were created out of love, for love. This New Year is almost like a new creation, a year full of moments of hope, joy, and love awaits us. In this New Year, we will experience the Holy Spirit, the great symphony of love, coming alive in us in new and exciting ways. We are able to see the current of grace in every moment, every day through our lives.
The second reading explores how the Holy Spirit reunites us into a relationship of love with God, feeling in the depths of our hearts a yearn and cry for our ‘Abba, Father.’ Listen to this still, silent voice of God in prayer. May this New Year we offer our prayers for the hopes and dreams of ourselves and those we love.
This New Year, you can become a New Creation; a New You. Are you willing to say yes to the exciting adventure of faith the awaits?