“Trust in the LORD forever! For the LORD is an eternal rock.” Isaiah 26 

“At times you will discover that God’s ways are not your ways and God’s thoughts are not your thoughts. When this happens, try to surrender yourself trustingly into the arms of your Parent God, who knows you, understands you, and loves you” (Fundamental Principles). Many XBSS schools have chosen to embody the value of “Trust” this year, and I cannot think of a more appropriate value to embrace as we begin this season of anticipation and hope. As a student, educator, and minister in three different Xaverian communities, I never fully comprehended how much I relied on trust and its power to open doors to contemplation. The word “con-templum,” con, with, and templum, an open space for observation, allows us to see God and the Xaverian Charism, with an open heart. We see God in the “common, ordinary, unspectacular flow of everyday life,” especially in the ordinary birth of an extraordinary God. Let us “trust in the Lord forever,” knowing that we will be rewarded with the coming of Jesus, the “meeting place of mind, heart, faith, and courage.”    

God of hope, who brought love into this world,  
be the love that dwells between us.  
God of hope, who brought peace into this world,  
be the peace that dwells between us.  
God of hope, who brought joy into this world,  
be the joy that dwells among us.  
God of hope, the rock we stand on,  
be the center of our lives always, 
particularly this Advent time. 
 

  Kevin Abdo 

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