With two thirds of the community currently hors de combat, the Solemnity of Mary the Mother of God and Octave Day of Christmas is being celebrated in rather low-key fashion: no choral liturgy (if you except the cacophony of coughs, sneezes and wheezes that resounds throughout the house); no fine festive fare (unless you consider a bowl of thin soup a gourmet delight); and no toasting of the feast and of the year with a glass of decent wine. But we did greet the midnight chimes, as always, with a Vigil of Prayer, held hermit-style in separate rooms, and the dissipation of Digitalnun, at least, extended to a cup of a well-known blackcurrant cordial afterwards (and, alas, enough antibiotics to make her rattle!).

How different all this was from what we had planned. It is good to begin a New Year with the realisation that we are not in charge, that "there's a divinity that shapes our ends/ rough-hew them how we will." For some that is a stumbling-block, something to be feared and rebelled against; for others, it is a freedom, a liberation from the tyranny of believing that we must do everything ourselves. Perhaps 2010 will be the year when we all finally learn that human pride and folly are destructive and undergo a change of heart, what Christians call "conversion". We none of us know what this year will hold; but the community here will be constant in prayer, please God; and prayer, as we know, can achieve great things.

May God grant you your heart's desire this year, and more important, His heart's desire for each one of you.

(Podcasts will resume when one of the community can manage a few words without splutters.)