It’s funny how different I don’t feel. I’m having one of the most life-changing experiences a woman can have — I’ve become a mother. I’ve been longing, praying and preparing for this for a long time. And now it’s happened. Our child is living and growing inside me.

But, in a way, I have to take it on faith that he’s there. I can’t feel him yet. My emotions don’t spontaneously burst up in joy to tell me of my little one’s presence. I don’t even look much different right now. It’s hard to believe that a tiny human being, with his own body, his own soul, his own eternal destiny, is living inside me and growing at a fantastic rate.

But he is, and his presence is changing me. My body’s transformed already in ways I don’t feel as yet, making it a nurturing haven for the baby now, and preparing me to mother him when he’s born.

The experience has really reminded me of Christ’s presence in us — the presence he spoke of when he said “the kingdom of God is among you.” I don’t feel that Jesus is in me most of the time. I know by faith that God’s life is in my soul because of the sacraments, but it doesn’t usually seem like anything special is happening to me. Like pregnancy, there are signs, if you know how to look for them. But they don’t exactly hit you over the head.

Of course, grace is the most fabulous, life-changing thing that can happen to us. In baptism, the seed of “Christ-life” is planted in us. Jesus “grows” in us, transforming us more and more into himself. He does this most of all when we receive Communion, as we take him into ourselves more completely so that he may take us into himself. He makes us like himself, like God. It’s incredible, it’s wonderful — but it’s hidden, like my little unborn child right now.

Sometimes it feels like I never will see my baby, that my pregnancy will last forever. Nothing’s really changing, my emotions say. Nothing big is going on. But I know that our baby is there. He’s growing, changing, getting ready to enter the world. I just need to remember his presence and do the things that will nourish his life and growth.

I know, too, that Christ is inside me, transforming me, filling me with his life, making me so like him that I’ll be able to share his joy forever. Although my senses only respond casually to the pouring of water in baptism, or the plain white bread of the host, my mind knows that it is the Lord of all creation, the deepest desire of my being, whom I receive. And it tells me that, if I remember his presence, and foster the life he has given me, the time will come when my whole being (including my emotions) will see him clearly and rejoice.

It’s sometimes hard to believe these things will happen. It’s hard to wait for them when the imposing weight of everyday life seems much more present than the joy s of motherhood, or of God’s grace. But, in good time, I’ll hold in my arms the child I now carry under my heart. And in good time, God willing, the Christ-life in me will come to flower — and I’ll see the glorious face of the One who brings all joys.

Wendy-Irene Zepeda writes from

Colfax, California.