[caption id="attachment_3614" align="alignright" width="200"] Blog by Sr. Pat Connick, OP[/caption] This past Sunday began the new Church year!  HAPPY NEW YEAR! In Advent, we do the dance between waiting and activity, between what has been & what will be, between tradition and innovation.  How to know which will take the lead and for how long? Wisdom and openness—we pause, we ponder, we pray, we proceed. I would suggest during this time of Advent, we pause this first week: just slow down a bit. I know this will feel like going upstream in our Christmas-present-buying-crazed culture, but maybe it’s time simply to step out of the stream, at least a little bit each day! Next week when we’ve slowed ourselves down a bit, perhaps we can take in the view of ourselves and of our world around us.  You know, just like when you walk somewhere instead of driving.  I know I notice much more when I stroll then when I drive…. In the third week, then, we will have paused and pondered enough to know what is in our hearts.  Then we can offer it in prayer to God…all of it, the joys and sorrows, the triumphs and the defeats, the love and the loss, the unexpected surprises and the great disappointments. And then, eventually we’ll know how to proceed, but we will not be alone.  We will have caught up not only with God but with ourselves!   HAPPY ADVENT!   O come O wisdom, from on high,               PAUSE Who orders all things mightily,                   PONDER To us the path of knowledge show,          PRAY and teach us in her ways to go.                  PROCEED