As you know, at the end of last summer Sister Elena and Sister MariaAnna, two Missionary Sisters of Saint Charles Borromeo, established a house here in Broomfield, Colorado. Over the last months I have looked at them more and more attentively and, in the simplicity of their presence here, they have become for me a discrete and solid witness of the presence of Jesus.

Two weeks ago they came back from a trip to the NYE and Washington. We had missed them for few days when they were out of town, and when I saw their smiling faces after Mass the day after they came back, my heart was at peace and full of gratitude for their presence. Driving home I could not help but sing the song "Fire of Time" (by David Ramirez) that I'm starting to love: "But you remind me who I was and who I want to be, You remind me that though not whole, I'm not empty".

Few days after they came back from their trip, Sister Elena and Sister MariaAnna came to our house with Sister Rachele, their mother superior that had come to visit them. We talked about many things, but there is one think that I really want to share because it is becoming very important for me. I was telling them that we are very grateful for their presence. Not only because of the many things they do or might be doing in the future, but because of their very presence. I told them that here in Broomfield, where we live, we have everything and that we can do many beautiful things, and that it is easy to be swallow up by the temptation of thinking that we need to be able to have as many beautiful things and opportunities, or to participate to as many beautiful experiences as possible, in order to be happy. We look here and there and live at times in this fear of missing out that Fr. José was talking about at the NYE; and this leaves us tired and agitated.

Looking at them instead I see beautiful young women, that are embracing their vocation. They clearly have to renounce many beautiful things and can not do everything they might want, but this does not diminish them in any way, and their life is a luminous witness of fullness and certainty.

At this point Sister Rachele told us: "Yes, this is the Incarnation: that the Infinite has come in one point, that the Infinite has entered the narrow space of our condition of life. So, to fulfill the infinite desire of my heart I do not need to collect an infinite number of opportunities or have an infinite number of beautiful options but, I can embrace one particular place, one particular narrow place, through which the infinite becomes present: this is the Incarnation. We see several young couples that get married and after few months or years ask for an annulment. After not so long the expectation that the other person can fulfill their infinite desire is disappointed. They look at each other as if they already know everything of the other, and what they see is not enough. So they get tired of each other and want to look for something different. Instead the other is always mystery and the Infinite has decided to pass through him/her."

So simple and so true.

I have been keeping these words in my heart for two weeks now, and I imagine they will stay with me for a long time. They explain many things I have lived and seen and are a treasure whose value I guess I will discover more and more with time. I look at my life and this is what I can say: really the Infinite has entered that narrow place that is my marriage, my family and the relationship with my friends and the people I meet. I do not think I can understand nor explain the Mystery of the Incarnation now, but I see it and I want to contemplate it as Mary and Joseph were contemplating that Baby born in that humble and probably stinky stable. Like them, it surprises me that in my "humble stable" I can find the Infinite, but yet I see He is here, and I'm learning to look at Him.

"Beauty became flash, Justice became flash, Truth became flash". I heard many times this quote by Fr Giussani, and now this encounter with Sister Elena, Sister MariaAnna and Sister Rachele had made me rediscover with clarity how this is and has been true in my own life. Beauty, Justice and Truth have entered the narrow space of the very particular condition of my life, my "stable". I'm surprised, grateful and moved, and I pray to Mary for the grace of a simple heart and of eyes open and fixed on the Infinite present.

Sister Elena and Sister Marianna, Colorado, USA