Winter and Advent

My dear Friends

Here are some lines from a beautiful poem by George Herbert, the 17th Cenutry poet and Anglican priest:

'Who would have thought my heart would have recovered greenness?
It had gone quiet underground, like a mother root, full blown.'

This always reminds me of the coming of winter, and particularly Advent. Unknown to me at the time, when I was born into my Jewish family, my birthday would be in Advent! On 11th December, it usually falls in Chanukah too. So I was born in a particularly light-filled time.

The coming of Christ, buried in Mary's womb, is exciting and mysterious. We have to imagine what it was like all those years ago in Bethlehem, the shepherds in the fields to whom the Message was first made known. All the really cateclysmic events in life start in a hidden, humble way. I have time, in the warm solitude, to ponder these events and, as the years go by, to be more and more in awe of them. And intimate with them at the same time. Maybe I will share my thoughts with you as the weeks leading up to Christmas go by.

Until then, stay warm! Cambridge is bitterly cold and I have been spending my Shabbat mainly in bed with the heating on!

Shabbat Shalom!
Sister Gila