His Light Dispels Darkness and Gloom

A mother is struggling with self-image. She feels she is fat and ugly. It takes her hours to find a dress to put on since she feels fat and ugly in any she puts on. Her 5-year-old daughter has been noticing this for so long. One day, she sneaked into her mom’s room as her mother was trying on dresses. She put one on and her daughter smiled, hugged her, and said: “Mommy, you look so beautiful.” The mother could not believe what she heard. She looked into the eyes of her little girl and saw and felt something totally from out of this world. “Mommy, you are beautiful”! She held her daughter and started crying. This time, the tears were tears of redemption; tears of new life, for those words were like a strong shaft of light that went through her, dispelling the darkness and gloom in which she had lived for so long. “Mommy, you are beautiful.” Powerful words of healing that she would repeat within herself for the rest of her life. From that moment, she did not have to spend hours trying on many clothes; she would pick the one appropriate for the occasion of she was going. No more second-guessing herself.

That encounter between mother and daughter is divinely orchestrated. The light of Jesus, the creative power of divine love, always shines so powerfully to dispel the darkness and gloom that often surround our existence. At that instance, heaven touches the earth and recreates that which is dying in sorrow and anguish; enkindles hope in that which is drowned in disappointment and hopelessness; heals that which is sick and sickly. It is our heritage as Christians. May this light of Christ shine upon you this day, as it shone on Naphtali and Zebulun so that you will begin to see and experience the divine beauty and love that are in and all around you. Amen

~Fr. Cornelius Okeke