When Christ appeared upon earth, after thousands of years of waiting and anguish, what was the first message that fell from heaven, the message wherein man could discover in advance the secret of the ineffable mystery of the Word Incarnate, and, as it were, the plan of all the work of Jesus? It was the message brought by the angels sent by God Himself to announce to the world the good tidings of the Birth of His Son : Glory be to God in the highest; and on earth peace to men of good will! The Word becomes incarnate to give all glory to His Father, and bring peace to the world. To seek His Father's glory is the supreme aspiration of Christ's Heart in regard to Him by Whom He is sent, and of Whom He is the Beloved Son; the gift of peace condenses in itself every good which the Saviour brings to the souls He comes to redeem. The terrestrial life of Christ has but this one aim. When that is attained, He looks upon His work as finished. In the presence and hearing of His Apostles, He says in that wonderful prayer to His Father when about to consummate His life by His sacrifice : " I have glorified Thee on the earth I have finished the work which Thou gavest Me to do": Ego te clarificavi super terram; opus consummavi quod dedisti mihi ut faciam 2. And at this same moment, what does He say to His disciples to show that in regard to them too, He has finished His work "? He leaves them peace, His own peace, not that which the world promises, but that which He alone can give3. It is the perfect gift He leaves to His Apostles, as to all souls redeemed and saved. This gift is so precious and so necessary for the preservation of every other gift that Jesus bids His disciples greet one another with this wish of peace as their salutation of rule 4. - All the letters 5 of St. Paul the herald of the mystery of Christ begin with this salutation : Grace to you and peace from God our Father, and from the Lord Jesus Christ" Gratia vobis et pax a Deo nostro et Domino Jesu Christo. The Apostle associates grace with peace, because grace is the primary condition of peace," without grace, says St. Thomas, "it is impossible to have true peace Sine gratia non potest esse vera pax®. " This peace, like other every good gift, comes from God the Father as being its first principle". This is why St. Paul 1. Luc. II, 14. 5. Except that to the by Paul's own hand. 2. -- Joann. xvII, 4.- " throughout his Epistles often designates the Heavenly Father as the God of peace 1." This peace comes, too, from Christ did He not gain it for us in giving, through His immolation, full satisfaction to Divine justice? Then, as says St. Paul, peace comes to us from the Holy Spirit: it is one of the fruits of the Spirit of Love, as much so as is joy. Peace is an essentially supernatural, an essentially Christian gift. We cannot then be astonished that the holy Lawgiver places it before us as a gift that we should eagerly seek after, and that the word "pax" has become one of our dearest mottoes. It adorns the front of our monasteries. Inscribed on the threshold of our cloisters, it ought above all to be engraved in the depths of our hearts and emanate from our whole being. It is the word that best sums up, even in the eyes of seculars, the characteristic harmony of our life. Peace, the supreme result of the practice of virtue in a heart given wholly to God, is the first good we wish to those who come to us; faithful to the Gospel precept and inheritor of the first ages of the Church, our Holy Father wills that the prior and brethren shall give the kiss of peace to all guests who arrive at the monastery4. But how can we truly wish this good to others if we do. not possess it in ourselves? Let us then see what this peace is, what are its characteristics, source whence it is to be derived. If we are to be worthy disciples of Christ and of St. Benedict we must seek this good as a great treasure. In the Prologue where he traces the broad outline of his institution, the holy Legislator recalls these words of the Psalmist 5: "Seek after peace, and pursue it": Inquire pacem et persequere eam. It is remarkable that he associates the seeking after peace with the seeking after God, as two ends which become but one. Indeed they who strive to find this peace for themselves and others are truly the children of God: He Who is the Infallible Truth tells us : Blessed are the peacemakers for they shall be called the children of God": " 1. Ps. xv, 53; XVI, 20; I Cor. xiv, 33 etc. 2. Gal. v, 22. 3. This is one of the reasons why Newman has characterised the monastic life as 'Virgilian. But the great Cardinal is totally mistaken in making what is poetical a sort of attribute and a dominating and almost exclusive attribute of the Patriarch of monks and Western monasticism. Newman's knowledge of St Benedict's character is incomplete and inexact; his psychology of the great Patriarch is fantastic; the idealogist, in Newman, has misled the psychologist and the historian. We see with what reservations The Mission of St Benedict (Historical Sketches II) must be read. 4. Rule, ch. Beati pacifici, quoniam filii Dei vocabuntur1. Our Holy Father who wishes, throughout his Rule, to bring us to God and make us perfect children of the Heavenly Father by the grace of Jesus, has ordained everything in the monastery in such a way that all the members may be at peace 2. With this conference on peace we shall therefore finish determining the characteristics that mark the physiognomy of the monk, the disciple of Christ. I. " What then is peace ? It is not here a question of exterior peace, that which results for us from solitude and silence. This peace is certainly a great thing, for silence and solitude help the faithful soul to be recollected, the better to turn to God. However, as we have said, this outward peace is profitless if the imagination is wandering and the soul is troubled and disquieted. It is of inward peace that I wish to speak to you. You know the definition that St. Augustine has given of this peace: "Peace is the tranquillity of order": Pax est tranquillitas ordinis 4. To understand the force of this sentence let us carry our minds back to the days of the creation of Adam. It is said that God created man right," in perfect rectitude of nature Fecit Deus hominem rectum5. He had given him, moreover, sanctifying grace, original justice. All Adam's faculties were perfect and perfectly harmonised. In this virgin nature, come forth from the hands of God, there was a magnificent subordination of the inferior powers to reason, of reason to faith, and of the whole being to God; a harmony which was the divine radiation of original justice. The order was perfect in Adam, complete concord reigned between all the faculties, each of which rested in its object: hence was born unalterable peace. As St. Thomas says, it is from the union of the different appetites in man tending towards the same object that peace results": Unio autem horum motuum est quidem de ratione pacis. Sin came into the world: all this admirable order was overthrown; there was no longer union between man's different appetites; diverse and contrary tendencies, generally in conflict, are henceforward to be encountered in him; the flesh conspires against the spirit, and the spirit wars against the flesh". 1. Matth. v, 9. 2. Rule, ch. xxxiv. 3. See above p. 363 sq. De civitate Dei, L. xix, .ch. 13. P. L. 41; col. 640. — 5. Eccle. vII, 30. II-II, q. XXXIX, a. 1. - 7. Ibid. a. 1 and 2. To find peace again, the desires must be brought back to order and unity. Now this order consists in the senses being dominated by reason and the reason being subject to God: until such order is re-established, peace cannot exist in the heart. "Thou hast made us for Thyself, O Lord, and our hearts are ever restless until they rest in Thee 1.' " But how are we to rest in God if sin has made us His enemies? In consequence of sin — Adam's sin and our own far from being able to approach God, we are separated from Him by an abyss. Is man then for ever to be robbed of peace, is all his sighing after this lost possession to be in vain? No. Order is to be re-established, and peace restored; and you know in what an admirable manner. It is in Christ and through Christ that both order and peace are to be found again. "O God, we say in one of the prayers of the Mass, "Who in creating human nature, didst wonderfully dignify it; and hast still more wonderfully renewed it": Deus, qui humanae substantiae dignitatem mirabiliter condidisti, et mirabilius reformasti. A wonder that consists in the Word being made Man, in having taken our sin upon Himself in order to offer be fitting expiation to His Father, in having restored to us God's friendship and given us His own infinite merits whereby we may retain this friendship. " St. Paul wrote to the Ephesians: "Now in Christ Jesus, you, who some time were afar off, are made nigh by the Blood of Christ. For He is our peace 2. He says again : "God indeed was in Christ, reconciling the world to Himself, not imputing to them their sins 3. Christ is the holy Victim, perfectly pleasing to God and in Him God has forgiven us 4. As the Psalmist so well says, in Him, justice at length satisfied and peace at length restored have given each other the kiss of reconciliation: Justitia et pax osculatae sunt 5. Christ is "the Prince of peace": Princeps pacis. He has come to fight against the prince of darkness and snatch us from the power of the devil and to make peace between God and man. And this Prince of Peace is so magnificent in His victory that He gives us a share in all His merits in order that we may for ever keep this peace won by His Blood. When the Psalmist announces the coming of the Messias, he says, as characteristic of His visitation:" In His days shall justice spring up, and abundance of peace, till the 1. Confess. lib. I c. 1. P. L. 32, col. 661. -2. Eph. II, 13-14. 3. II Cor. v, 4. Cf. Eph. IV, 32. 5. Ps. LXXXIV, II. 6. Isa. Ix, 6. 19. moon be taken away": Orietur in diebus ejus et justitia abundantia pacis, donec auferatur luna1. In the weeks following His Resurrection, it is peace that Christ wishes to His Apostles each time He appears to them. His Passion expiated everything, paid off everything; therefore this salutation of peace, henceforward restored by His grace, falls continually from His Divine lips 2. Is it not remarkable that this same wish of peace should be heard at the two extremities of His earthly career : when the Angels announce the opening of His mission of salvation and when, this being accomplished, He enters into His glorious life? "Peace be with you": Pax vobis. Look at St. Paul. Tormented by the inward warfare of the flesh against the spirit, he cries out : Who shall deliver me from the body of this death? And what answer does he give to his own question ? The grace of God, by Jesus Christ Our Lord." For, he adds, Christ by His death has freed us from all condemnation; His grace has been given to us that we may live, not according to the desires of the flesh but according to those of the Spirit; and he concludes, the desires and affections of the flesh bring forth death, the desires and affections of the Spirit bring life and peace: Nam prudentia carnis mor, est: prudentia autem spiritus, vita et PAX3. It is then in the grace of Christ Jesus that the principle. of peace is to be found; this it is which makes us pleasing to God and gives us His friendship, which makes us see that other men are our brethren, which subdues perverse tendencies in us and makes us live according to the Divine Will. And this grace comes to us only through Christ. For such is the Divine order, the essential order: Christ Jesus has been established King over Sion. He is King by right of conquest, having delivered Himself up to death for the souls He wills to bring back to His Father; He is this peaceful King Who shows His magnificence in coming down from Heaven to bring us pardon: Magnificatus est rex pacificus *; the Father has given Him all power: Data est mihi omnis potestas in caelo et in terra5; in order that He may be our justice, our sanctification, our redemption, and hence, our peace : IPSE est pax nostra. " Such is the admirable order established by God Himself: . 1. Ps. LXXI, 7. — 2. Luc. xxiv, 37; Joan. xx, 19, 26. 25; VIII, 1-6. · 4. Antiphon for 1st Vespers at Christmas. 6. Eph. II, 14. 18. Christ, the Ideal of the Monk. |