Encanto: waiting on a miracle

Disney's Encanto (2021) made me cry the first time I watched it, and every time since. Mirabel Madrigal is the only member of her extraordinary family who didn't receive a magical gift. If you've walked the road of infertility, you know exactly what that feels like.

Young Mirabel approaches her magical door on the night she's supposed to receive her gift. Her family gathers. And then... nothing. The door disappears. She becomes the only Madrigal without a gift in a family where gifts define identity and value.

I remember my own "door ceremony", month after month of charting, timing everything perfectly. Each month, the door disappeared.

Stuck in the nursery

Because Mirabel never received her gift, she never got her own room. She remained in the nursery, the transitional space for children waiting to receive their gifts. While everyone else moved forward, Mirabel stayed stuck in the room of "not yet". 

Every night, she sleeps surrounded by reminders that she's still waiting for something that should have come years ago. When Antonio moves into his magnificent jungle room, Mirabel is left alone in perpetual anticipation.

I know this feeling. My husband and I have a room that was supposed to be a nursery. For seven years, it has existed in limbo. While friends moved from pregnancy to kindergarten, I'm still waiting. The nursery becomes a metaphor for being frozen in a space never meant to be permanent. There's shame in still being here, in not having "graduated" like everyone else. When people ask, "No kids yet?" the "yet" assumes you're just delayed. They don't understand that "yet" has lost all meaning.

Love alongside grief

Mirabel's family doesn't know what to do with her lack of a gift. Abuela views her as a threat. The family assumes she must be jealous. When you're the one without children, people make the same assumptions. They think you're bitter when you decline baby showers. But when Antonio receives his gift, Mirabel walks him to his door, holds his hand, and reassures him. She could be bitter, but instead, she nurtures him. This is carrying the cross with grace: attending baby showers with breaking hearts, holding newborns with aching arms, genuinely celebrating others' gifts while mourning our lack of a gift. It's not jealousy, it's love existing alongside grief.

Waiting on a miracle

Then comes the song that broke me. Mirabel stands alone during Antonio's celebration and sings about the invisible pain she can't control or heal. She names the isolation, how she walks through this alone while everyone else celebrates together. She admits she's always wanting something more, something everyone else seems to have. Here was someone putting words to the ache I'd carried for years.

What destroys me most is when she moves from patient waiting to exhaustion. She sings about needing just a change, just a chance, the simplicity of what she's asking for laid bare. Just the one thing that seems to come naturally to others. She's been patient, steadfast, steady. She's done everything right. And then comes the question that haunts every long wait: Am I too late? That fear that your window has somehow closed, that you've missed it, is devastating.

Mirabel's song doesn't pretend everything is fine. She admits complete disorientation: she doesn't know where to go next, or what step to take. She's sick of waiting, exhausted by the endless hoping. This is authentic faith in the valley of infertility. Not forced cheerfulness that denies reality, but an honest lament that says, "I'm hurting, I'm lost, I don't understand why, and I don't know how much longer I can do this." The Psalmist cried out. Hannah wept. Even Jesus in Gethsemane said, "Let this cup pass from me."

Waiting on a miracle doesn't mean pretending you're not in pain. It means staying present in the pain while still hoping, even when you're tired of waiting, even when you fear you're too late.

When worth equals gift

The real threat isn't Mirabel's lack of a gift; it's the lie that worth equals a gift. Each family member tries to earn love through their abilities. Luisa carries burdens until she's crushed. Isabela suffocates under pressure. Bruno was cast out when his gift became inconvenient. Pepa bottles up her emotions until she explodes into a storm. I recognize this theology, the same one that tells infertile women we must have children to be fruitful as a woman and wife. The enemy wants us to believe we're worthless without the gift everyone else has.

But Mirabel was never the problem. The cracks were caused by performance and conditional worth. When the house cracks apart and the magic dies, Abuela finally understands that she was so afraid to lose the miracle that she lost sight of who and what it was for. For many of us, there comes a moment when our house falls apart. When we stop treatments. When we realize we may never have biological children. The collapse feels like death. But in that terrible space, we can rebuild on a better foundation, not earning God's favor, but resting in His unconditional love.

The door that was always there

The movie ends with the community rebuilding the house together, no magic, just willing hands. When Mirabel places the doorknob, her door finally appears. But it's not a door to a personal room. It's the front door to the whole house. Her gift was always to hold the family together and bring healing through her lack of a gift. The door was always there. She just couldn't see it until everything else fell away.

I don't know if you'll receive the gift of biological motherhood or if you'll discover fruitfulness looks different from what you expected. What I do know: your lack doesn't make you worthless. It doesn't mean you're being punished or you've failed some test. Your cross of infertility, as heavy and unwanted as it is, may be the very thing that allows you to see clearly, love deeply, hold others in their pain, and rebuild broken places with wisdom earned through suffering.

You are not waiting to become enough. You already are. You are not invisible. You are seen by the One who made you. You are not without purpose. God is weaving your story into something beautiful.

As Mirabel sings: "I am ready. Come on, I'm ready. I've been patient, and steadfast, and steady. Bless me now.” 

The miracle may not be what we thought. Maybe it's that we can wait with grace. That we can nurture others' gifts while carrying our own longing for the gift we want most. That we can rebuild with faith.

Maybe you are the miracle, right now, exactly as you are.