Luke 2: 41-51
Now every year Jesus’ parents went to Jerusalem for the festival of the Passover. And when he was twelve years old, they went up as usual for the festival. When the festival was ended and they started to return, the boy Jesus stayed behind in Jerusalem, but his parents did not know it. Assuming that he was in the group of travelers, they went a day’s journey. Then they started to look for him among their relatives and friends. When they did not find him, they returned to Jerusalem to search for him.
After three days they found him in the temple, sitting among the teachers, listening to them and asking them questions. And all who heard him were amazed at his understanding and his answers. When his parents saw him they were astonished; and his mother said to him, “Child, why have you treated us like this? Look, your father and I have been searching for you in great anxiety.” He said to them, “Why were you searching for me? Did you not know that I must be in my Father’s house?” But they did not understand what he said to them.
Then he went down with them and came to Nazareth, and was obedient to them. His mother treasured all these things in her heart.
New Revised Standard Version, copyright 1989, by the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved. USCCB approved.
Entrusting Our Restless Hearts to God
“His mother treasured all these things in her heart.” One could do an entire retreat or theology thesis on this verse alone! In today’s Gospel reading, Mary and Joseph experience fear, anxiety, astonishment, and confusion when the young Jesus goes missing for three days and they finally find him in the temple. Although her heart—unlike ours—was sinless, the emotions filling the Mother of God are not unlike the powerful currents moving in our own hearts today. But just like St. Mary, we too can entrust all the movements and memories of our hearts to God in faith, hope, and love.
Earlier this month, I attended a joy-filled celebration of Pope Leo XIV’s election held at Chicago’s Rate Field. In his video message to the young people of Chicago and the world, Pope Leo acknowledged the many questions living within our restless hearts. But he encouraged us, reminding us that “restlessness is not a bad thing, and we shouldn’t look for ways to put out the fire, to eliminate or even numb ourselves to the tensions that we feel, the difficulties that we experience. We should rather get in touch with our own hearts and recognize that God can work in our lives, through our lives, and through us reach out to other people.”
May Mary’s Immaculate Heart guide our hearts ever closer to Jesus’ own Sacred Heart burning with love for all humanity, and may Jesus and Mary both be our faithful companions on our homeward journey to the Father.
—Jonathan Jue-Wong, SJ, is a Jesuit scholastic and member of the Midwest Province, currently studying philosophy at Loyola University Chicago.
Prayer
Mother of God, here I stand now praying,
Before this icon of your radiant brightness,
Not praying to be saved from a battlefield,
Not giving thanks, nor seeking forgiveness
For the sins of my soul, nor for all the souls.
Numb, joyless and desolate on earth,
But for her alone, whom I wholly give you.
—Lyrics of “Mother of God, Here I Stand” by Sir John Tavener and Mikhail Lermontov
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Pray with the monthly prayer intentions of the pope.