Archdiocese Of St. Louis

Today’s Jesse Tree reflection focuses on Elizabeth, mother of John the Baptist and cousin of Mary. Her symbol is that of a mother and child---something particularly important to our ministry at Good Shepherd and a wonderful reflection of the joyful hope of Advent. Pregnancy, like Advent, is a time of expectancy---of both longing and preparation, but it can also be a time of stress, fear and anxiety. I would love to have been a fly on the wall in the home of Elizabeth, six months pregnant, in the days that followed the arrival of her cousin, Mary, now pregnant with Jesus! After all, Elizabeth had been barren all her life and had miraculously conceived in old age, and Mary…a virgin, had just said yes to the most important unplanned pregnancy in history – one that would bring our Lord and Savior into the world. I can only imagine that it made for some colorful dinner conversation between these now sainted mothers to be. Assuredly, Mary and Elizabeth would have felt some of the same anxiety all of