In another of the excerpts chosen for the first week of Advent, Houselander drives home her anti-Pelagian theme that we aren't the ones making our own spiritual progress. She notes that whatever good we do for others "we shall not [or should not!] do it in martyr spirit or with that worse spirit of self-congratulation." We should not allow ourselves to think "that we are making ourselves more perfect, more unselfish, more positively kind."
Instead, she encourages us to "let Christ serve through us, that our patience may bring Christ's patience back to the world" even as Jesus patiently developed in His mother's womb.
Houselander's emphasis on Jesus in Mary's womb reminds me of the depictions of the Visitation, with St. John the Baptist in St. Elizabeth's womb, leaping, as he recognizes Jesus in His Mother's womb, like this icon.
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