As we enter into the final 3-day stretch until Christmas, we hear in today’s gospel all the words that are too familiar from St. Elizabeth. “Blessed are you among women and blessed is the fruit of your womb.”

Rejoice! We have made it halfway through this season of Advent, and now the Church has shifted her focus from the second coming of Christ to the first. We hear in the second reading from St. Paul writing to the Corinthians, “Rejoice in the Lord always. I shall say it again: rejoice!”

John of the Cross is a mystical doctor of the Church. As a “doctor,” his teaching has comprehensive and universal value. As a “mystic,” his life displays unspeakable secrets of union with God. As a mystical doctor, then, he uniquely teaches us what cannot be taught; he authoritatively speaks to us of what cannot be spoken.