If we have a goal in life, work becomes like mountaineering. We have a view of the role we want to play: a vision of becoming a complete person, contributing both as an individual and one of humankind. One stands at the foot of the mountain and the climb seems easy; yet after the first few hours it becomes difficult, you get tired, you rest, then the path clears only to get difficult again before the summit — but what joy and what ecstasy on reaching the top where the canopy of Heaven is all-embracing.
It was Christ who chose the stable to be born in and who continues to choose unlikely places. In each of us, just beyond the noise of our outward life, there is some place of silence and darkness, an emptiness where, if we have courage enough, we are alone with ourselves. In this place of silence, we know that God alone can fill our emptiness, God alone can content us, God alone is our peace. And in this secret place of the soul, Christ wants to be born in us, that through us, God may live in this world again and make it new ... make it young and childlike ... make it true and pure. In this dark place of our heart, Christ wants the light of the world to begin to burn and from its burning to radiate, until it shines back from the face of humanity. Here it is that the light begins to shine in darkness and the life of the world begins again. It is easy to see that the world is wounded, hard to see that its healing begins in our own heart. Christ can be born in us only if we accept God in littleness, humility, silence -- hidden and small -- to be fostered and loved in us, cradled and clothed in us, that Christ may grow naturally in our lives to full stature.