“Today, we do not have one more year but one year less before Our Lord’s coming!”
St Teresa of Avila
These are the days in which we exchange best wishes for “A Happy New Year 2017” hoping for our deepest heart’s desire: serenity and happiness. However, it is already evident that, along with the fulfilment of many of our desires, 2017 will also inherit the same problems and worries as the year that has just passed. Therefore, it is right to question what exactly is this happiness that we hope for and wish for ourselves and others?
The response is rooted in the heart of man: “You have formed us for Yourself, and our hearts are restless till they find rest in You.” This celebrated affirmation, that initiates the Confessions of St Augustine, effectively expresses the irrepressible need that propels man to search for a happiness that finds its fulfilment in recognising the face of God.
Through the Liturgy the wisdom of the Church accompanies us in the search for that true happiness which springs from the desire to see God.
On the first day of the New Year, we celebrate the Solemnity of the Mother of God. She gave birth to the true Light, the Light of the eternal Word of God who appeared on that Bethlehem night and has remined with us ever since. This is the reason that we honour the Mother of God at the start of the new year.
At the conclusion of the year, we sing the Te Deum to thank and acclaim the Glory of the One and Triune God who is Father, Son and Holy Spirt. In the final words of the Te Deum, the Church turns to Our Lord Jesus who takes us by the hand and invites us to express the motive for our hope.
“Thou art the everlasting Son : of the Father. When thou tookest upon thee to deliver man: thou didst not abhor the Virgin’s womb…. When thou hadst overcome the sharpness of death; thou didst open the Kingdom of Heaven to all believers. O Lord, let thy mercy lighten upon us: as our trust is in thee. O Lord, in thee have I trusted: let me never be confounded.”
This is our true happiness. This is what our hearts, even unconsciously, desire for ourselves and others: to overcome death and to enter in the Kingdom of Heaven.
We hope that 2017 will be another occasion to rediscover our identity as Sons of God, called to have a renewed desire for sanctity and the will to translate that desire into real, vigorous and generous choices.
Have a holy and happy 2017
God Bless Us
And the Virgin Protect Us
The Missionaries of Divine Revelation