In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, Amen.

My Lord and my God, I firmly believe that you are here, that you see me, that you hear me.

I adore you with profound reverence. I ask you for pardon of my sins and grace

to make this time of prayer fruitful. My mother immaculate, St. Joseph, my father and Lord, my guardian angel, intercede for me.

Well, we begin our prayer today on this beautiful solemnity of Mary, the most holy mother of God.

Conscious that we're beginning a new calendar year as well.

It's a very special day.

And it's also the World Day of Prayer for Peace.

So what better day than the day of the motherhood of Mary to pray for peace

in communion with the whole church? You, Mary, or mother, you are in fact the queen of peace.

You bring to the world the prince of peace.

So we can begin our prayer in union with the Holy Father and his intentions today

for peace in the world, for peace in hearts, peace in our own souls, in our own families.

And we entrust this wonderful intention,

powerful intention to the intercession of Mary our mother. And perhaps we could begin our prayer by focusing on a scene, an event, an action in at the time of the birth of our Lord, which St. Luke recounts to us in his gospel.

She gave birth to her firstborn son and wrapped him in swaddling cloths laid him in a manger

because there was no room for them in the inn it seems like a banal action that of wrapping up the child

Jesus in swaddling cloths,

and yet it's good for us to look at it, as it were, in slow motion with our contemplative eye.

Look at the mother of God, look at Mary, wrapping the child Jesus in these cloths,

which she carefully brought with her from Nazareth to

Bethlehem. She foresaw this moment. And like so many things in the gospel, externally, it seems

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