December Monthly Devotion: The Divine Infancy

Advent is a season of joyful expectation, our hearts awaiting the coming of our Messiah, yet it is at the same time a purgative season by which we prepare our hearts for the coming of the Lord. We strive in ways little and large to make our hearts suitable dwellings for the King. Throughout this season He knocks at our hearts, asking admission to the house of our hearts. Dom Gueranger writes, ​The house indeed is His,

Prepare ye the way of the Lord!
​Let all, therefore, strive earnestly to make straight the path by which Jesus will enter into their souls.
 Dom Gueranger

for he built it and preserves it; yet He complains that His own refused to receive Him [John i. 11]; at least the greater number did. ‘But as many as received Him, He gave them power to be made the sons of God, born not or blood, nor of the flesh, but of God.’ [Ibid. 12, 13].

May we not be among the number who refuse Him admittance! Let us ask Him to stir up our souls in ardent longing for Him, that we might by His grace and our persevering efforts put aside any bad habits that we may have formed and mortify our senses, to enter heartily into the prayer of the Church this beautiful season.

He will be born, then, with more beauty and lustre and might than you have hitherto seen in Him, O ye faithful ones, who hold Him within you as your only treasure, and who have long lived no other life than His, shaping your thoughts and works on the model of His. You will feel the necessity of words to suit and express your love; such words as He delights to hear you speak to Him. You will find them in the holy liturgy, that when He comes He may not pass us by, but enter and dwell within.
​Dom Gueranger

Practical Practices to Honor the Divine Infancy

Look to Our Lady: She is already waiting at the crib, desiring to teach us to make our hearts a pleasant crib for the Christ Child to dwell in. Meditating on the Joyful Mysteries each day of Advent can allow us to enter into her spirit of joyful expectation.

Mary, Virgin Mother of God,
pray to Jesus for me!

Cultivate a spirit of prayer and attentiveness to His Presence by adopting aspirations suitable to the season, such as:

Divine Infant King Jesus, come down into our hearts!
​

​Lord Jesus, through Your infant cries when You were born for me in the manger; through Your tears when You died for me on the Cross; through Your love as You live for me in the tabernacle, have mercy on me and save me.

Set up a small shrine in expectation of His coming. This year, the Sisters' shrine has an empty crib to remind us to prepare for His coming, placed before an image of Our Lady of Guadalupe - who better to teach us how to prepare?

Oremus:

Most dear Lord Jesus Christ, who, being made an infant for us, wast willing to be born in a cave, to free us from the darkness of sin, to draw us to thyself, and to inflame us with thy holy love ; we adore Thee as our Creator and Redeemer we accept and choose Thee for our King and Lord, and for tribute we offer Thee all the affections of our poor hearts. Dear Jesus, our Lord and God, deign to accept this offering, and that it may be worthy of thine acceptance, pardon us our faults, enlighten us, and inflame us with that holy fire which Thou earnest to bring into the world and enkindle in men’s hearts. May our souls thus become a perpetual sacrifice in thy honor. Grant that we may ever seek thy greater glory here on earth, so that we may one day come to rejoice in thy infinite loveliness in Heaven. Amen.