What do we keep in our hearts? On today's Memorial of the Immaculate Heart of the Blessed Virgin Mary, we are invited to consider the state of our hearts. Do we tend to choose to only focus on the negative to the exclusion of the positive? Or do we prefer to take on rose-tinted views of life, suppressing and rejecting painful feelings?

In Luke's Gospel today, Our Blessed Mother was gripped with anxiety as she searched for Jesus. She was also perplexed by His abilities at the temple and His cryptic words, "Did you not know that I must be in my Father's house?" Although she experienced these difficult emotions, she still kept them in her heart, bringing them to prayer and nurturing her relationship with God in the process. There is an enormous space for the heart to keep gracious ponderings of a growing relationship. Mother Mary accepted both the trusting and challenging moments of life through her motherly accompaniment by telling Jesus, "we were anxious about You." There is no hiding of her anxiety as a responsible parent. However, this strengthened her heart to meet the ultimate challenge of watching the crucifixion of her only son and to hold to the truth of His glorious resurrection. Mary provides us an insight into trusting God's promises, beautifully illustrated in the first reading, a generation that is blessed by the Lord.