This document summarizes passages from Matthew 1:18-25 that describe Joseph learning that Mary is pregnant before they were married. An angel appears to Joseph in a dream and tells him not to be afraid to take Mary as his wife because the child was conceived by the Holy Spirit. Joseph does as the angel commands and takes Mary as his wife, but does not consummate the marriage until after Jesus is born. The document also provides definitions of "consolation" and "desolation" from St. Ignatius of Loyola regarding spiritual experiences of closeness or distance from God.

3. How have you seen God?
How have you felt differently about your trust in God?

4. Matthew 1:18-19
This is how the birth of Jesus the Messiah
18
came about: His mother Mary was pledged
to be married to Joseph, but before they
came together, she was found to be
pregnant through the Holy Spirit. 19 Because
Joseph her husband was faithful to the law,
and yet did not want to expose her to public
disgrace, he had in mind to divorce her
quietly.

5. FEAR COURAGE

6. Evergreen Oaxaca team

7. Matthew 1:20-21
But after he had considered this, an angel
20
of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and
said, “Joseph son of David, do not be afraid
to take Mary home as your wife, because
what is conceived in her is from the Holy
Spirit. 21 She will give birth to a son, and you
are to give him the name Jesus, because he
will save his people from their sins.”

8. Matthew 1:24-25
W
24
hen Joseph woke up, he did what the
angel of the Lord had commanded him and
took Mary home as his wife. 25 But he did not
consummate their marriage until she gave
birth to a son. And he gave him the name
Jesus.

9. Small steps
of faith

10. Consolation
• “I call it consolation when an interior movement is aroused in the soul, by which it
is inflamed with love of its Creator and Lord, and as a consequence, can love no
creature on the face of the earth for its own sake, but only in the Creator of them
all. It is likewise consolation when one sheds tears that move to the love of God,
whether it be sorrow for sins, or because of the sufferings of Christ our Lord, or for
any other reason that is immediately directed to the praise and service of God.
Finally, I call consolation every increase of faith, hope, and love, and all interior joy
that invites and attracts to what is heavenly and to the salvation of one’s soul by
filling it with peace and quiet in its Creator and Lord.”

11. Desolation
• “I call desolation what is entirely the opposite of (consolation), as darkness of soul,
torment of spirit, inclination to what is low and earthly, restlessness rising from
many disturbances and temptations which lead to want of faith, want of hope,
want of love. The soul is wholly slothful, tepid, sad, and separated, as it were,
from its Creator and Lord.”

12. Spiritual direction
F if consolation has to do with whatever draws one near
or
to God (be the feeling of it painful or pleasurable), then
desolation has to do with whatever draws one away from
God, regardless of the subjective feeling.