"ness and humility of a Child!" Thus do all her words end in love; and her adoration, praise, and thanksgiving, when she expresses them in her Canticles, get transformed into love. Christians! let us imitate our Mother, and give our hearts to our Emmanuel. The Shepherds offer him their simple gifts, the Magi bring him their rich presents, and no one must appear before the Divine Infant, without something worthy his acceptance. Know, then, that nothing will please him, but that which he came to seek-our love. It was for this that he came down from heaven. Hard indeed is that heart which can say, He shall not have my love! These, then, are the duties we owe to our Divine Master in this his first Coming, which, as St. Bernard says, is in the flesh and in weakness, and is for the salvation, not for the judgment, of the world. As regards that other Coming, which is to be in majesty and power on the Last Day, we have meditated upon it during Advent. The fear of the Wrath to come should have roused our souls from their lethargy, and have prepared them, by humility of heart, to receive the visit of Jesus in that secret Coming, which he makes to the soul of man. It is the ineffable mystery of this intermediate Coming that we are now going to explain. We have shown, elsewhere, how the time of Advent belongs to that period of the spiritual life, which is called, in Mystic Theology, the Purgative Life, and during which the soul cleanses herself from sin and the occasions of sin, by the fear of God's judgments, and by combating against evil concupiscence. We are taking it for granted, that every faithful soul has journeyed through these rugged paths, and which must be gone through, before she could be admitted to the Feast, to which the Church invited all mankind, saying to them, on the Saturday of the Second Week of Advent, those words of the Prophet Isaias: Lo! this is our God: we have waited for him; and he will save us. We have patiently waited for him, and we shall rejoice and be joyful in his Salvation! As in the house of our heavenly Father there are many mansions,2 so likewise, on the grand Solemnity of Christmas, when those words of Isaias are realised, the Church sees, amongst the countless throng who receive the Bread of Life, a great variety of sentiments and dispositions. Some were dead, and the graces, given during the holy Season of Advent, have restored them to life: others, whose spiritual life had long been healthy, have so spent their Advent, that its holy exercises have redoubled their love of their Lord, and their entrance into Bethlehem has been to them a renewal of their soul's life. Now, every soul that has been admitted to Bethlehem, that is to say, into the House of Bread, and has been united with Him, who is the Light of the World that soul no longer walks in darkness. The mystery of Christmas is one of Illumination; and the grace it produces in the soul that corresponds with it, places her in the second stage of the Mystic Life, which is called the Illuminative Life. Henceforward, then, we need no longer weary ourselves watching for our Saviour's arrival; he has come, he has shone upon us, and we are resolved to keep up the light, nay, to cherish its growth within us, in proportion as the Liturgical Year unfolds its successive seasons of mysteries and graces. God grant that we may reflect in our souls the Church's progressive development of this divine Light; and be led by its brightness to that Union, which crowns both the year of the Church, and the faithful soul which has spent the year under the Church's guidance! But, in the mystery of Christmastide, this Light is given to us, so to speak, softened down; our weakness required that it should be so. It is, indeed, the Divine Word, the Wisdom of the Father, that we are invited to know and imitate; but this Word, this Wisdom, are shown us under the appearance of a Child. Let nothing keep us from approaching him. We might fear were he seated on a throne in his palace; but he is lying on a crib in a stable! Were it the time of his Fatigues, his Bloody Sweat, his Cross, his Burial, or even of his Glory and his Victory, we might say we had not courage enough but, what courage is needed to go near him in Bethlehem, where all is sweetness, and silence, and a simple Little Babe! Come to him, says the Psalmist, and be enlightened!1 Where shall we find an interpreter of this twofold mystery, which is wrought at this holy season-the mystery of the Infancy of Jesus in the soul of man, and the mystery of the infancy of man's soul in his Jesus? None of the Holy Fathers has so admirably spoken upon it as St. Leo: let us listen to his grand words. Although that Childhood, which the majesty of "the Son of God did not disdain to assume, has developed, by growth of age, into the fulness of the "perfect man, and, the triumph of his Passion and "Resurrection having been achieved, all the humilia"tions he submitted to, for our sakes, are passed; "nevertheless, the Feast we are now keeping brings "back to us the sacred Birth of the Virgin Mary's "Child, Jesus our Lord. So that, whilst adoring his Birth, we are, in truth, celebrating our own commencement of life; for the Generation of Christ, is "the origin of the Christian people, and the Birth "Day of him that is our Head, is the Birth Day 1 Ps. xxxiii. 6. "of us that are his Body. It is true, that each Christian has his own rank, and the children of the "Church are born each in their respective times; yet the whole mass of the Faithful, once having been "regenerated in the font of Baptism, are born, on "this Day of Christmas, together with Christ; just as they are crucified together with him in his Passion, and have risen together with his Resur"rection, and in his Ascension are placed at the right hand of the Father. For, every believer, no "matter in what part of the world he may be living, "is born again in Christ; his birth according to "nature is not taken into account; he becomes a new man by his second birth; neither is he any 'longer called of the family of his father in the flesh, "but of the family of our Redeemer, who unto this was made a Son of Man, that we might become the Sons of God."1 Yes, this is the Mystery achieved in us by the holy Season of Christmas! It is expressed in those words of the passage from St. John's Gospel, which the Church has chosen for the third Mass of the great Feast: As many as received Him, he gave them power to be made the Sons of God, to them that believe in his name; who are born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God. So that, all they, who-having purified their souls, freed themselves from the slavery of flesh and blood, and renounced everything which is of man inasmuch as man means sinner-wish now to open their hearts to the Divine Word, that is, to the LIGHT which shineth in darkness, and which darkness did not comprehend, these, I say, are born with Jesus; they are born of God; they begin a new life, as did the Son of God himself, in this mystery of his Birth in Bethlehem. 1 Sixth Sermon On the Nativity of our Lord. Ch. 2. How beautiful are these first beginnings of the Christian Life! How great is the glory of Bethlehem, that is, of our holy Mother the Church, the true House of Bread! for, in her midst, there is produced, during these days of Christmas, and everywhere throughout the world, a countless number of sons of God. Oh! the unceasing vitality of our mysteries! As the Lamb, who was slain from the beginning of the world,1 sacrifices himself, without ceasing, ever since his real sacrifice; so also, once born of the Holy Virgin his Mother, he makes it a part of his glory to be ceaselessly born in the souls of men. We are not, therefore, to think, for a moment, that the dignity of Mary's divine Maternity is lessened, or that our souls enjoy the same grand honour which was granted to her: far from that, "let us," as Venerable Bede says, "raise our voice from amid the crowd, as did the "woman in the Gospel, and say to our Saviour, with "the Catholic Church, of which that woman was the "type: Blessed is the Womb that bore thee, and the "Breasts that gave thee suck!"2 Mary's prerogative is indeed incommunicable, and it makes her the Mother of God, and the Mother of men. But, we must also remember the answer made by our Saviour to the woman, who spoke those words: Yea rather, said Jesus, blessed are they who hear the word of God, and keep it;3 "hereby declaring," continues Venerable Bede, "that not only is She blessed, who "merited to conceive in the flesh the Word of God, "but they, also, who endeavour to conceive this same "Word spiritually, by the hearing of faith, and to "give him birth and nourish him, by keeping and doing what is good, either in their own or their neighbour's heart. For the Mother of God herself was Blessed in that she was made, for a time, the .3 1 Apoc. xiii. 8. 2 Commentary on St. Luke, Bk. 4, Ch. 49. |