Pondering the hidden life of Christ

Pondering the Hidden Life of Christ

We see Jesus grow up and when we want to find out what he did in those long eighteen years in Nazareth, we finally see that he prayed, he obeyed, and he worked; and not only he alone, but all three of them. They prayed; we can find their daily prayers, we can find out how they observed the Day of the Lord. They must have recited the hymns, prayers, and psalms contained in Holy Scriptures, and during many hours of their working day their thought dwelt on the hidden meaning of what their lips had recited. That’s what they did when they were pondering.

They obeyed: And Mary said, “Behold, I am the handmaid of the Lord; let it be to me according to your word” (Lk 1:38), and: Did you not know that I must be in my Father’s house? (Lk 2:49). These words uttered by Mary and Jesus give a deep insight into their life of constant obedience to the Father. From Joseph we know how promptly he reacted each time an angel came. Theirs was a family life of obedience to the will of God.

Books and books and books have been written on family life. Our magazines and newspapers are full of alarming articles on the danger of family life crumbling in our days. Psychiatrists, psychoanalysts, and psychologists are busy in research to answer the question “why.” Little do they seem to know that this question was answered two thousand years ago by a few words in the Gospel of Luke. There we see the Heavenly Father making this tremendous new foundation, the Christian family, when he sends his Son to the small home in Nazareth. It is absolutely impossible to meditate too much on the hidden life. Just watching Jesus, Mary, and Joseph in their daily routine will do something for us. There is our model, and there is our only remedy. As the saying from the old country has it: If there are more mothers like Mary and more fathers like Joseph, there will be more children like Jesus.

Maria von Trapp

La Sagrada Familia 2019

Dios tiene un gran proyecto: construir en el mundo una gran familia humana. Atraído por este proyecto, Jesús se dedica enteramente a que todos sientan a Dios como Padre y todos aprendan a vivir como hermanos y hermanas. Este es el camino que conduce a la salvación del género humano. ¿Cómo es una familia abierta al proyecto humanizador de Dios? ¿Qué rasgos podríamos destacar?
Un escritor contemporáneo, el P. Pagola, nos ofrece tres calves para contestar estas preguntas:

1- El AMOR ENTRE LOS ESPOSOS. El hogar está vivo cuando los padres saben quererse, apoyarse mutuamente, compartir penas y alegrías, perdonarse, dialogar y confiar el uno en el otro. La familia se empieza a deshumanizar cuando crece el egoísmo, las discusiones y malentendidos.

2- La RELACIÓN ENTRE PADRES E HIJOS. No basta el amor entre los esposos. Cuando padres e hijos viven enfrentados y sin apenas comunicación alguna, la vida familiar se hace imposible, la alegría desaparece, todos sufren. La familia necesita un clima de confianza mutua para pensar en el bien de todos.

3- La ATENCIÓN A LOS MÁS FRÁGILES. Todos han de encontrar en su hogar acogida, apoyo y comprensión.
Ahora bien, una  familia se hace más humana sobre todo, cuando en ella se cuida con amor y cariño a los más pequeños, cuando se quiere con respeto y paciencia a los mayores, cuando se atiende con solicitud a los enfermos o discapacitados, cuando no se abandona a quien lo está pasando mal.
Una familia trabaja por un mundo más humano, cuando no se encierra en sus problemas e intereses, sino que vive abierta a las necesidades de otras familias.  ¿TE ANIMAS A SER PARTE DE ESTE PROYECTO?
Obispo Rubén Gonzalez Ponce Puerto Rico

Holy Innocents Feast

Holy Innocence and the Holy Innocents

God is not only a Father; he is also an Eternal Child. I say this not because I adore the weakness and helplessness of the child. On the contrary, it is the child’s strength which enraptures me: his all-powerfulness. Over the cadavers of Nietzschean heroes and the slaughterhouses which they filled with martyrs before adding to them the corruption of their own bodies, the purity of the child stands firm and triumphs. Even in our own lives, no matter what they might have been, it is possible to discover that triumphant purity and to reawaken it….

I put myself on the side of childhood—on the side of the assassinated child Abel as well as on the side of the victorious child David; of the child Joseph who reigned in Egypt and of the Hebrew children who sang their joy in a furnace and were subjected to lions and flames. I am, above all, on the side of the Infant God who promised happiness to the meek. In the eyes of the world the strong man is the brute propelled by the power of his instincts…. But the Infant God…is the only one who is really all-powerful. He has within his fragile being the double torrent of two natures: The Word was made flesh. By analogy, and infinitely distant from this mystery of mysteries, carnal and sinful man is united to the incarnate love of this Child through the grace he received upon his entry into this world….

I will become a child to be near you, O God-Child. There is neither death nor old age for those who love you; otherwise how would they be saved? For if it is true that the Lord asks those who follow him to carry their cross, he does not enjoin them, except for a small number of saints, to be crucified as he was; on the other hand, he declares to all, whoever they might be, that they must become as little children to enter the Kingdom and that they must receive the Kingdom of God with the heart of a child. Unless you become as one of these little ones…. There is therefore no other means of salvation than to become like a child…. If the corruption of childhood is the worst kind, then the sanctity of childhood is what most resembles God. This is what must be redeemed in every human being.

François Mauriac

Enduring to the end

Enduring to the End

In the name of Jesus Christ crucified and of gentle Mary. I Caterina, slave of the servants of Jesus Christ, am writing to you in his precious blood. I long to see you bathed and drowned in that blood, which will make you strong enough to bear with true patience any trial or trouble, from whatever source it may come. It will give you perseverance to endure even to the point of death in true humility. For in that blood the eye of your understanding will be enlightened by truth. And the truth is that God wants nothing other than that we be made holy, for he loves us indescribably much. If he had not loved us so much, he would not have paid such a price for us.

Be content then—always, everywhere, and in all circumstances—because everything is a gift of love for you from the eternal Father. Rejoice in your troubles. Consider yourself unworthy to be sent by God along his Son’s way. In everything give praise and glory to his name. Be heartened in Christ gentle Jesus. I haven’t anything else to tell you. Keep living in God’s holy and tender love. Gentle Jesus! Jesus love!

Saint Catherine of Siena

Let us go to Bethlehem

“Let us go to Bethlehem”

Bethlehem is the turning point that alters the course of history. There God, in the house of bread, is born in a manger. It is as if he wanted to say: “Here I am, as your food.” He does not take, but gives us to eat; he does not give us a mere thing, but his very self…. To us, who from birth are used to taking and eating, Jesus begins to say: Take and eat. This is my body (Mt 26:26)…. Today too, on the altar, he becomes bread broken for us; he knocks at our door, to enter and eat with us. At Christmas, we on earth receive Jesus, the bread from heaven. It is a bread that never grows stale, but enables us even now to have a foretaste of eternal life….

After Bethlehem as the house of bread, let us reflect on Bethlehem as the city of David…. At Christmas, in the city of David, it was the shepherds who welcomed Jesus into the world. On that night, the Gospel tells us, they were filled with fear (Lk 2:9), but the angel said to them Be not afraid (v. 10). How many times do we hear this phrase in the Gospels: Be not afraid? It seems that God is constantly repeating it as he seeks us out. Because we, from the beginning, because of our sin, have been afraid of God; after sinning, Adam says: I was afraid and so I hid (Gn 3:10). Bethlehem is the remedy for this fear, because despite man’s repeated “no,” God constantly says “yes.” He will always be God-with-us. And lest his presence inspire fear, he makes himself a tender Child….

The shepherds of Bethlehem also tell us how to go forth to meet the Lord. They were keeping watch by night: they were not sleeping, but doing what Jesus often asks all of us to do, namely, be watchful. They remain alert and attentive in the darkness; and God’s light then shone around them (Lk 2:9). This is also the case for us. Our life can be marked by waiting, which amid the gloom of our problems hopes in the Lord and yearns for his coming; then we will receive his life…. So the shepherds immediately set out: we are told that they went with haste…. 

Let us go now to Bethlehem (Lk 2:15). With these words, the shepherds set out. We too, Lord, want to go up to Bethlehem…. I want to come to Bethlehem, Lord, because there you await me. I want to realize that you, lying in a manger, are the bread of my life. I need the tender fragrance of your love so that I, in turn, can be bread broken for the world. Take me upon your shoulders, Good Shepherd; loved by you, I will be able to love my brothers and sisters and to take them by the hand. Then it will be Christmas, when I can say to you: Lord, you know everything; you know that I love you (cf. Jn 21:17).

Pope Francis

The path of peace

The Path of Peace

Peace is Christ’s culminating gift. At his birth the angels’ song mingled with the first bleating of the Lamb of God, promising peace to God’s friends. On the night before he died his own promise comforted his Apostles; when he had risen from the dead his first words to them were Peace be upon you.

How is it then that peace is so rare, even in our soul? It may be because we lack the courage without which true peace is unattainable, and with or without which the pseudo-peace we have built up in our imagination is unattainable…. The condition of peace is courage, but the moments in which we most long for it are those when courage seems most difficult. When all that we want is to loosen our hold, to throw off responsibility, to rest. We want not a sword, but a lap big enough to bury our head on.

It is comforting then to realize that the courage peace demands is in fact to relax, to throw all our care into the lap of God. It means that we must take the risk of trusting God’s love, believing Christ’s word, loving one another…. A child knows no anxiety, if he knows himself to be loved, no mistrust or suspicion. His values are true. He loves things, but he loves them not for what they cost, but for what they are…. Poverty may come, the child knows his father will provide his happiness; pain may come, his mother’s hand will take it away. He is not worldly because he lives in a secret world of his own. No one can take his kingdom from him because it is not of this world….

Advent is closing and the longing of the Church for light and for the spring, the budding forth of the Savior, is culminating in the mystery of Christmas, and we can put aside our cares to make the house of our soul ready for the Child, with prayer as simple as a folk song, rocking the cradle of peace to the beating of the human heart.

Caryll Houselander

The Meaning of Christ Birth

The Meaning of Christ’s Birth

The story of every human life begins with birth and ends with death. In the Person of Christ, however, it was his death that was first and his life that was last. The Scripture describes him as the Lamb slain as it were, from the beginning of the world. He was slain in intention by the first sin and rebellion against God. It was not so much that his birth cast a shadow on his life and thus led to his death; it was rather that the cross was first, and cast its shadow back to his birth. His has been the only life in the world that was ever lived backward. As the flower in the crannied wall tells the poet of nature, and as the atom is the miniature of the solar system, so too, his birth tells the mystery of the gibbet. He went from the known to the known, from the reason of his coming manifested by his name “Jesus” or “Savior” to the fulfillment of his coming, namely, his death on the cross.

John gives us his eternal prehistory; Matthew, his temporal prehistory, by way of his genealogy. It is significant how much his temporal ancestry was connected with sinners and foreigners! These blots on the escutcheon of his human lineage suggest a pity for the sinful and for the strangers to the covenant. Both these aspects of his compassion would later on be hurled against him as accusations: “he is a friend of sinners”; “he is a Samaritan.” But the shadow of a stained past foretells his future love for the stained. Born of a woman, he was a man and could be one with all humanity; born of a Virgin, who was overshadowed by the Spirit and “full of grace,” he would also be outside that current of sin which infected all men.

Venerable Fulton J. Sheen

Archbishop Sheen († 1979) 

Gaudete Sunday

Gaudete Sunday

We want to meditate, to reflect, to immerse ourselves in the mystery of joy. All through the centuries, the philosophers have wrestled with this. If there is a good God, why is there all this pain, why is there this sorrow? But the joy is always in Domino. We don’t know, but he knows. What we do learn is that he is drawing us all, he is calling us to know that there is really nothing stable outside himself, and that in him and in him alone is the explanation of all things. Already as we ponder things in this way we begin to experience a serenity coming into our very pain, whatever it may be, that this is an all-loving God who is reminding us where we are all going. We are all moving steadily step by step each day, moving with each tick of the clock toward this terminus. This is what he wishes to say to us: in him alone all find their home. Something begins to come into our stricken hearts, that we are all going home. The more we are in Domino on this earth, the more we are already at home.

The Church does not say, “No Gaudete Sunday this year,” but she says, “Rejoice in the Lord.” The world is in travail and in turmoil, but God says, “Rejoice in me, rejoice.” There is pain and suffering and there is the temptation to anxiety and there are the disappointments, but there is God saying, “In Domino is all joy.” Let us sing then with all our hearts, not just on Gaudete Sunday, but always; and let us dance under the wreath of eternity, that all joy is in God, and that when he disappoints us in the evanescence of ephemeral things, when he allows us to be disappointed in persons, when he allows us to experience such disappointment in ourselves, he is only saying what he told Paul to say to us: Gaudete in Domino.

Mother Mary Francis, p.c.c.

Why the Son of Man suffered

Why the Son of Man Suffered

“Beneath the apple tree:/ there I took you for my own,/ there I offered you my hand,/ and restored you,/ where your mother was corrupted.”

The Bridegroom explains to the soul in this stanza his admirable plan in redeeming and espousing her to himself through the very means by which human nature was corrupted and ruined, telling her that as human nature was ruined through Adam and corrupted by means of the forbidden tree in the Garden of Paradise, so on the tree of the cross it was redeemed and restored when he gave it there, through his Passion and Death, the hand of his favor and mercy, and broke down the barriers between God and humans that were built up through original sin.

That is: beneath the favor of the tree of the cross (referred to by the apple tree), where the Son of God redeemed human nature and consequently espoused it to himself, and then espoused each soul by giving it through the cross grace and pledges for this espousal….

“For human nature, your mother, was corrupted in your first parents under the tree, and you too under the tree of the cross were restored. If your mother, therefore, brought you death under the tree, I brought you life under the tree of the cross.” In such a way God manifests the decrees of his wisdom; he knows how to draw good from evil so wisely and beautifully, and to ordain to a greater good what was a cause of evil.

Saint John of the Cross

The wisdom to hear the song

The Wisdom to Hear the Song

The liturgy sings the birth of new life springing from Christ on the cross. Our experience, in him, becomes an experience of unity…. Because Christ brings all things together in personal communion, no aspect of our existence is left out. Everything has a meaning and comes to fruition in the victory of love. Life and death, pain and joy, fugitive time and the eternity that already dwells in us, failure and success, our sin and our repentance, all have their note to sing in the supreme liturgy of the eternal pasch. Through the Bible, we can follow the orchestral crescendo as it unfolds on the different levels of our experience…the variations and the whole orchestration of all human life.

This is why we can in all honesty say that the Christian experience, even now, is an experience of full perfection…. The first song rises from the fullness of man’s heart when he is set free (Ex 15); it is the pasch. The last song, the song that will last forever and be eternally a new song,will rise from the hearts of all men and all creation in the radiant newness of God, when he has become all things to all men. The Song of Moses will become the song of the Lamb (Rv 15:1-4), and this is the eternal covenant: They shall be his people, and he will be their God; his name is God-with-them. He will wipe away all tears from their eyes; there will be no more death, and no more mourning or sadness. The world of the past has gone…. Now I am making the whole of creation new (Rv 21:3-5).

Father Jean Corbon, o.p.

The four petal-flower

The Four-Petal Flower

In the image on Saint Juan Diego’s tilma, we easily recognize Mary as the woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet. But to understand how God’s presence is shown, we should look at the gold flowers over the Virgin’s tunic…. The four-petal jasmine flower…is unique among the image’s flowers. Placed over her womb, it is also central to understanding the woman in the image as not only a virgin, but, in her own words, the “mother of the one true God.” For the Indians, the design of this four-petal jasmine flower had many interrelated meanings in their religious thought…. Most importantly, this design symbolized the Indians’ highest deity, Ometéotl. The Virgin’s image speaks to the Indians profoundly of their basic desire for God.

The fathers of the Second Vatican Council spoke of the “seeds of the Word,” the glimpses of the truth about God found in various cultures…. In a special way, this harkens back to Saint Paul’s address at the Areopagus hill (cf. Acts 17:22-34), when he spoke to the Athenians about their worship of the “unknown God,” whom they detected but could not understand. As Saint Paul explained to them, this God is revealed fully in Christ as the one who created man and the natural order…. Of course, there are many differences between the God of Jesus Christ and Ometéotl, the god of the Aztecs. The tilma could have addressed a number of these differences. One of the fundamental differences addressed by the jasmine’s placement over her womb is a difference of love, presence, and care. Ometéotl was believed to be completely inaccessible, inhabiting the highest heavens and uninterested in the affairs of men. Through the symbols in her image, Our Lady of Guadalupe introduces the Indians to the true God in Jesus Christ. As the incarnate Word in her womb, God is shown neither as distant nor unconcerned. Rather, he chose to be born of a woman, granting immediate access to himself. Christ’s birth marks the beginning of his earthly mission to save mankind. 

In this way, Our Lady of Guadalupe becomes for us a model of evangelization perfectly adapted to a specific culture. She extracts the “seeds of the Word” from this religious culture and purifies the error, giving them fullness in her Son, Jesus Christ. Just as the jasmine’s design brings together elements of the Indians’ highest aspirations toward God, so too does the Guadalupan Virgin bring us to encounter the fullness of God’s truth and love. In this woman about to give birth, the future is no longer darkened by the destruction of the sun, but gains a new hope in her, pregnant with the true Sun of Justice, the Sun from on high (Lk 1:78). In the presence of the one God who lovingly encounters them—and us—everything is different.

Monsignor Eduardo Chávez Sánchez

Come to me

“Come to me’

Come to me, all you that labor, and are burdened, and I will refresh you (Mt 11:28). A touching summons, and a mysterious one, for it implies the acceptance of suffering, not flight from it. The very one who says Come and I will refresh you adds a commentary on this coming in the words: If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me (Mt 16:24). But he continues, thinking of the “pearl” he is offering in the jewel-case of the cross: Take up my yoke upon you…and you shall find rest for your souls. For my yoke is sweet and my burden light.

Come! Jesus must take the initiative; for we know not where our true refuge lies. Suffering repels us, whereas by embracing it with the cross we should make it sweet, a weapon of victory. When he cries out: Come to me, does not Jesus seem to be calling for help? Help me! Help me! In fact, he finds his peace in succoring us, apart from which an infinite torment consumes him. Who is capable of thus inviting all men, unless it be the Son of Man? Who has the heart to do so, except the universal Heart, living, boundless Love? Jesus can afford to call those who are afflicted and over-burdened; his own condition will bear comparison with theirs. He took all their cares upon himself before enabling them to bear them.

You that labor, and are burdened. By what burden? He does not specify. To do so would be to confine and limit. Have no misgivings! Whatever be your suffering, it has been foreseen; it is included in his aid. If you are willing, it is cured in advance. And I will refresh you. Jesus does not say: I will show you where there is refreshment, in which place you can find the healing balm. He says: I will refresh you; for the refreshment is himself. 

Father Antonin Gilbert Sertillanges, o.p.

That None May Go Astray

That None May Go Astray

Soul of Christ, sanctify them

Body of Christ, save them

Passion of Christ, strengthen them 

Within Thy Wounds, hide them

Never let them be separated from Thee. 

Precious Blood of Jesus, save souls.

In union with all the Masses being offered throughout 

the world, I offer Thee Jesus, for those in danger of 

dying without contrition.

Eternal Father, I offer Thee Jesus, Thy Beloved Son and 

with Him I offer Thee my heart—in Him, with Him, 

through Him—to the greater glory of Your Name and 

so to satiate the thirst of Jesus for love of souls.

Saint Teresa of Calcutta

Segundo Domingo de Adviento A

Juan era Hijo de Zacarías e Isabel, descendiente de sacerdotes; como tal pudo haber concentrado su vida y su predicación en la comodidad de la zona urbana de Jerusalén y de su templo. Sin embargo, asume la austeridad propia de algunos de los profetas del Antiguo Testamento, viviendo y vistiendo modestamente, al estilo del profeta Elías. Su lugar de predicación: las zonas desérticas cercanas a Jerusalén. El tema : la Conversión - un cambio de vida.
El desierto es lugar privilegiado para el encuentro con uno mismo, y a la vez con Dios. Ubicando a Juan en el desierto san Mateo relaciona la predicación de Juan con la profecía de Isaías: "Una voz grita en el desierto: preparen el camino del Señor, allanen sus senderos". En el Bautista, tambien nos expresa el cumplimiento de la llegada del esperado precursor del Mesías; de hecho sus vestiduras son similares a las descritas en el segundo libro de Los Reyes, como propias del profeta Elías, quien ya había sido señalado como el esperado precursor.
Muchos se acercaron a Juan, unos le creyeron e iban a confesar sus pecados y a bautizarse; otros iban por curiosidad, lo cierto es que su fama se extendió entre muchas personas que esperaban el liberador del pueblo judío. Su mensaje era de arrepentimiento; ante la inminente llegada del Señor: “hay que preparar el camino, convertirse y dar frutos de conversión. No obstante, él aclaraba que detrás de él venía el que podía más que él y que bautizaría con fuego y Espíritu Santo: se refería al Mesías esperado”.
En Adviento recordamos el tiempo anterior a la primera venida de Jesús hace más de dos mil años; también aguardamos su próxima venida que habrá de ser al final de los tiempos. Mientras tanto Jesús se sigue haciendo presente en los sacramentos y en el prójimo que se acerca. Este es un tiempo propicio para revisar nuestro interior y preparar nuestro corazón para recibir a Jesús con espíritu limpio y alegre, abandonando situaciones de pecado. Muchas actitudes son adecuadas para ser valoradas y procuradas en estos días: la reconciliación, el perdón, la caridad y el compartir.
Ya hemos sido liberados de la esclavitud con la salvación recibida mediante el sacrificio de Cristo; ahora esperamos su gloriosa manifestación en que seremos llevados por él al encuentro amoroso con el Padre. Mientras llega ese encuentro oremos confiadamente:¡Ven Señor, no tardes; ven que te esperamos; ven pronto, Jesús!

Obispo Rubén Gonzalez Ponce Puerto Rico

The One who is coming

The One Who Is Coming

Advent is a strange word. It means “coming.” An advent is something that is “arriving soon.” When we have something coming, when we expect an event, an ­advent, we are usually alert inside. We are listening. My family is coming for Christmas and I am in the country, and I am listening for the sound of a car. It is a special car, and I am filled with a special listening.

Advent is such a beautiful season. It is a time for renewal; it is especially a time for forgiveness because God brings his forgiveness to us in the shape of his Son. The Church year begins with Advent. And every time it comes around, my heart thrills anew….

The word “advent” has a double connotation. It means the arrival of a new liturgical season, the preparatory time for Christmas, for “the coming of Our Lord” as a Child on earth, for his Incarnation in time. But it also means that other advent—the parousia, the second coming of Christ, in glory, at the end of the world. That is an advent which Russian hearts long for and expect. They hope it will happen in their lifetime, but, even if it doesn’t, they rejoice that it will happen in someone else’s lifetime.

These two Advents blend in my soul, mind, and heart. They bring a hunger and a longing that beggars words, for they are the seasons of expectation. Expectation of what? Of whom? To me, of the Tremendous Lover, of the Lord, Christ.

Servant of God Catherine de Hueck Doherty

Catherine de Hueck Doherty († 1985) was born in Russia and was the foundress of Madonna House in Combermere, Canada.

The prayer of a laborer

The Prayer of a Laborer

God, creator of all things 

and ruler of the heavens, fitting

the day with beauteous light

and the night with the grace of sleep:

May rest restore our slackened limbs 

to the exercise of toil,

lighten our wearied minds,

and relieve our anxious preoccupations.

Now that the day is over and night has begun, 

we, your devotees, sing our hymn, 

offering thanks and begging

that you would help us in our sinfulness.

May the depths of our hearts magnify you, 

may our harmonious voices sound you, 

may our chaste affections love you, 

may our sober minds adore you.

Thus, when the deep gloom of night 

closes in upon the day,

our faith may not know darkness 

and the night may shine with faith.

Do not permit our minds to slumber; 

it is sinfulness that knows slumber. 

May faith, which refreshes the chaste, 

temper sleep’s embrace.

When the depths of our hearts have been stripped of unclean thoughts,

let them dream of you,

nor let worry, the stratagem of the envious foe, 

disturb us as we rest.

We beseech Christ and the Father,

and the Spirit of Christ and the Father,

who are one and omnipotent.

O Trinity, assist us who pray to you!

Saint Ambrose

He does not send us away hungry

He Does Not Send Us away Hungry

If heaven and earth, water and fire, and air and the whole universe of these were made perfect by the Word of the Lord, and this much-famed living being, too, which is man; if by his will God the Word himself became man and…caused the pure and undefiled blood of the blessed ever-Virgin to form a body for himself—if all this, then can he not make the bread his body and the wine and water his blood? 

In the beginning he said: Let the earth bring forth the green herb, and even until now, when the rain falls, the earth brings forth its own shoots under the ­influence and power of the divine command. God said: This is my body, and This is my blood, and This do in commemoration of me, and by his almighty command it is done…. And through the invocation the overshadowing power of the Holy Spirit becomes a rainfall for this new cultivation. For, just as all things whatsoever God made he made by the operation of the Holy Spirit, so also it is by the operation of the Spirit that these things are done which surpass nature and cannot be discerned except by faith alone. How shall this be done to me, asked the blessed Virgin, because I know not man? The Archangel Gabriel answered, The Holy Spirit shall come upon you and the power of the Most High shall overshadow you. And now you ask how the bread becomes the Body of Christ and the wine and water the Blood of Christ. And I tell you that the Holy Spirit comes down and works these things which are beyond description and understanding….

This is the body which is truly united to the Godhead, the same which is from the blessed Virgin. This is not because that body which was taken up to heaven comes down from heaven, but because the very bread and wine are changed into the Body and Blood of God…. Wherefore, in all fear and with a pure conscience and undoubting faith let us approach…and let us honor it with all purity of body and soul…. Let us approach it with burning desire. 

Saint John Damascene

Saint John Damascene (c. † 749) was the last of the Greek Fathers of the Church. 

As it was...so it will be

“As it was…so it will be”

Nothing in all the world’s literature is so full of joy as the prayers of the Church for Advent and for Christmas. Every nation has its heritage of beauty in art, poetry, and music: no matter what foreign tyrant takes over the government, the people will cling to this last greatest wealth of literature. But the liturgy of the Church is a vast storehouse of wealth from which all may draw who possess one Faith. National differences disappear as all the earth cries out, today as two thousand years ago: To thee have I lifted up my soul; in thee, O God, I put my trust…. Show, O Lord, thy ways to me and teach me thy paths….

There is a joy in the Advent prayers that nothing on earth can equal, because they are so perfectly in accord with the spirit of those who did receive the Redeemer. They might be the very words of Mary, or Joseph, or the shepherds. Following these prayers yearly, as the Church urges us to do, makes us one in spirit with the humble ones who saw him and understood. It makes the Incarnation a living thing, not an incident of the long ago but a tremendously important part of our lives which recurs again and again.

You and I were not at Bethlehem when his Mother wandered through the streets looking for a place where the Redeemer of the world could be born. We are ­present when he is born again each day in the Mass…. He comes to us in Holy Communion to bring us joy and strength and holiness and peace…. His Mother would teach us to be humble and obedient…. Perhaps we are too busy to answer her knock, or we have the uneasy feeling that it must be uncomfortable to be holy—and if there is anything this generation asks of life, it is to be comfortable.

Two thousand years are nothing in the eyes of God, who is eternal. Today we are as certainly given the opportunity of receiving or rejecting him as were the ­people of Bethlehem on a starry night long ago when the Word was made flesh, and came to dwell among us. 

Sister Mary Jean Dorcy, o.p.

Sister Mary Jean († 1988) was a Dominican sister, and a prolific author and illustrator, especially of children’s literature. [From Our Lady’s Feasts. © 1999, New Hope Publications, New Hope, KY. 

“He saw two brothers “

“He saw two brothers”

What attracted Jesus to Peter and Andrew? The text at first appears to make the encounter quite fortuitous. Jesus was walking along, and happened to see these two. [But] Christ knows exactly what he is about. The scene by the Sea of Galilee is reminiscent of the Lord walking about the Garden of Eden looking for Adam and Eve after our first parents had sinned. As he begins his redemptive mission, Jesus appears to be on a search to undo the rebellion that had been perpetrated in Eden. Human beings had sinned then, it must be human beings who obey now. 

God loves primary realities, those solid foundations of the life of man in his relationship to nature that seem to have escaped the distortion of sin. Two brothers by the lakeside silently carrying on with their life as fishermen: something is right in this corner of the world, and the internal harmony, unselfconsciousness, dedication, and simplicity of the scene attract the Savior. To this he saw we could append the refrain of the opening chapter of Genesis: and it was good…. Jesus saw them clearly, profoundly—with divine clairvoyance—for what they were, and their unpretentiousness and dignity in carrying out a humble task…. Could Peter and Andrew have imagined with whom, on that particular day, they would be brought into contact on account of their simple fidelity to their profession, to their family, to their lake?

Erasmo Leiva-Merikakis 

Erasmo Leiva-Merikakis, now known as Father Simeon, is a Cistercian monk serving in Rome. He is the author of Fire of Mercy, Heart of the Word, a three-volume commentary on Matthew’s Gospel. 

What it’s all about the end

What It’s All About in the End

The ultimate goal of all prayer is the coming of the Kingdom of God, and hence first of all the sanctification of his name, so that, in a word, his will, his whole will and nothing but his will may be accomplished….

If God, if the knowledge of God, if, in a word, the love of God should interest us so strongly, it is not only because that is the way of salvation, for ourselves…and for the world. On the contrary, we should say that the salvation of the world and our own are only worthy of interest because God wishes to be known and loved, known and loved for himself.

In the last analysis, that is the great Christian revelation. For the Christian, for the Church, God is not just a “Good” to be revealed to people so that they can profit by it. God is Someone: Someone who loves each and every one of us, who expects us all to love him, above all who expects each of us, this very day, without waiting any longer, to recognize his love and surrender to it as completely as possible.

Father Louis Bouyer

Father Bouyer († 2004) was a French priest, theologian, author, and convert. He was a member of the Congregation of the Oratory of Jesus and Mary Immaculate

Así es el Adviento que necesitamos

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ASÍ ES EL ADVIENTO QUE NECESITAMOS

Written by Florentino Ulibarri

Como el viento que silba en plena noche,
como las luces que parpadean en el horizonte,
como el rocío que empapa la tierra de madrugada,
como el campo arado para acoger la simiente...

Como los resoles de mediodía que mantienen la vida,
como los relojes con sus horas y notas musicales,
como los visillos que desvelan y esconden interioridades,
como los atardeceres que se cuelan por ventanas y rendijas...

Como el silencio de la naturaleza que duerme y crece,
como los oteros que se yerguen siempre inmutables,
como los manantiales que crean corrientes y fuentes,
como los árboles que muestran sus yemas humildemente...

Como la semilla que cae, muere y renace,
como las estrellas que tiemblan y lucen,
como las sendas y caminos llenos de cruces y señales,
como la vida siempre a la intemperie...

Mensajeros que van y vienen,
vigías apostados en almenas y torres,
profetas cargados de promesas,
peregrinos en busca de destino...

Los sueños desbocados de nuestras ilusiones,
las esperanzas de los que nada tienen,
los surcos del Espíritu hechos historia,
Dios bailando en nuestro vientre...

Así es el Adviento que necesitamos
y que se nos ofrece gratis cada instante.