Visitation of the Blessed Virgin Mary. Night Office Reading

May 31, 2011

Visitation of the Blessed Virgin Mary - Feast

FromThe Reed of God by Caryll Houselander (pages 32-34)

Sometimes it may seem to us that there is no purpose in our lives, that going day after day for years to this office or that school or factory is nothing else but waste and weariness. But it may be that God has sent us there because but for us Christ would not be there. If our being there means that Christ is there, that alone makes it worthwhile.

There is one exquisite incident in our Lady's advent in which this is clearly seen: the visitation.

And Mary rising up in those days went into the hill country with haste, into a city of Juda. Those days in which she rose on that impulse were the days in which Christ was being formed in her, the impulse was his impulse. Many women, if they were expecting a child, would refuse to hurry over the hills on a visit of pure kindness. They would say they had a duty to themselves and to their unborn child which came before anything or anyone else.

The Mother of God considered no such thing. Elizabeth was going to have a child, too, and although Mary's own child was God, she could not forget Elizabeth's need —almost incredible to us, but characteristic of her.

She greeted her cousin Elizabeth, and at the sound of her voice, John quickened in his mother's womb and leapt for joy. I am come, said Christ, that they may have life, and may have it more abundantly. Even before he was born his presence gave life.

. . .

If Christ is growing in us, if we are at peace, recollected, because we know that however insignificant our life seems to be, from it he is forming himself; if we go with eager wilt in haste, to wherever our circumstances compel us, because we believe that he desires to be in that place, we shall find that we are driven more and more to act on the impulse of his love. And the answer we shall get from others to those impulses will be an awakening into life, or the leap into joy of the already wakened life within them.

It is not necessary at this stage of our contemplation to speak to others of the mystery of life growing in us. It is only necessary to give ourselves to that life, all that we are, to pray without ceasing, not by a continual effort to concentrate our minds but by a growing awareness that Christ is being formed in our lives from what we are. We must trust him for this; because it is not a time to see his face, we must possess him secretly and in darkness, as the earth possesses the seed. We must not try to force Christ's growth in us, but with a deep gratitude for the light burning secretly in our darkness, we must fold our concentrated love upon him like earth, surrounding, holding, and nourishing the seed.

We must be swift to obey the winged impulses of his love, carrying him to wherever he longs to be: and those who recognize his presence will be stirred, like Elizabeth, with new life. They will know his presence, not by any special beauty or power shown by us, but in the way that the bud knows the presence of the light, by the unfolding in themselves, a putting forth of their own beauty.

Edit. Word in Season Santoral, Augustian Press 199 

http://nunraw.blogspot.com/2010/05/visitation-ein-karem.html

“Preamble to Paraclete” Jn 14:16

Eastertide Sixth Sunday

Gospel: John 14:15-21

“Preamble to Paraclete”

Ascension Thursday is near and Pentecost is coming.

The Gospel passage set the “Preamble to Paraclete”.

Joh 14:16 I shall ask the Father, and he will give you another Paraclete to be with you for ever,

There are four versions of the Holy Spirit, Counselor, Comforter, Helpr, Advocate but I prefer Paraclete.

On this text we heard a fine Commentary of the Night Office, by Chrysostom.

Year A

From the homilies on Saint John's Gospel

by Saint John Chrysostom (Horn. 75, 1 :PG 59, 403-405)

These homilies were preached about the year 391. The theme of this extract is Christ's promise to send the Spirit. The Spirit will encourage Christ's disciples after his own departure and will remain with them until his return.

If you love me, said Christ, keep my commandments. I have commanded you to love one another and to treat one another as I have treated you. To love me is to obey these commands, to submit to me your beloved. And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Counselor. This promise shows once again Christ's consideration. Because his disciples did not yet know who he was, it was likely that they would greatly miss his companionship, his teaching, his actual physical presence, and be completely disconsolate when he had gone. Therefore he said: I will ask the Father, and he will give another Counselor, meaning another like himself.

They received the Spirit after Christ had purified them by his sacrifice. The Spirit did not come down on them while Christ was still with them because this sacrifice had not yet been offered. But when sin had been blotted out and the disciples, sent out to face danger, were prepare themselves for the battle, they needed the Holy Spirit's coming to enc age them. If you ask why the Spirit did not come immediately after the resurrection, this was in order to increase their gratitude for receiving hill increasing their desire. They were troubled by nothing as long as Christ with them, but when his departure had left them desolate and very m afraid, they would be most eager to receive the Spirit.

He will remain with you, Christ said, meaning his presence with you' not be ended by death. But since there was a danger that hearing of Counselor might lead them to expect another incarnation and to think they would be able to see the Holy Spirit, he corrected this idea by saying: world cannot receive him because it does not see him. For he will not be with you in the same way as I am, but will dwell in your very souls, He will be in you.

Christ called him the Spirit of truth because the Spirit would help them understand the types of the old law. By He will be with you he meant, He will be with you as I am with you, but he also hinted at the difference between them, namely, that the Spirit would not suffer as he had done, nor would ever depart.

The world cannot receive him because it does not see him. Does this imply t] the Spirit is visible? By no means; Christ is speaking here of knowledge, j he adds: or know him. Sight being the sense by which we perceive thin most distinctly, he habitually used this sense to signify knowledge. By the world he means here the wicked, thus giving his disciples the consolation receiving a special gift. He said that the Spirit was another like himself, the would not leave them, that he would come to them just as he himself hi come, and that he would remain in them. Yet even this did not drive aw, their sadness, for they still wanted Christ himself and his companionship.

So to satisfy them he said: I will not leave you orphans; I will come back to you. Do not be afraid, for when I promised to send you another Counselor I did not mean that I was going to abandon you for ever, nor by saying that he would remain with you did I mean that I would not see you again. Of course I also will come to you; I will not leave you orphans.