I write a weekly letter for our community and this week I thought I would share this letter with a broader audience.

We celebrated the Feast of the Nativity of the Theotokos this week. Mary the Mother of God was born into a world full of oppression and confusion, yet she was able to become the Holy dwelling place of God.

We too, especially at this time of government restrictions and all of the heightened rhetoric of political campaigns—all too radicalized and spun by social media, news outlets, social prophets, and advertising—we too may feel that we are living in an increasingly oppressive and confusing world. While we are not suffering under the occupation of a foreign army, as was Israel during the lifetime of the Mother of God, still many of us are angry and stressed out by the restrictions being imposed on us, whether we agree with them or not.