Bernard to Monks

TWENTY -SEVENTH WEEK IN ORDINARY TIME - FRIDAY The Vigils Reading passes me past, and at the best, it is the readings from St. Bernard need more accessibility. Maybe it takes therapeutic reading and begins to yield to the full relish of Bernard. It is a basic contemplative spontaneity so completely amazing to the mind so immersed in the life of Bernard’s activities See here the BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH from the Lectionary for the following Reading. How did the monks listen to the Abbot in the Chapter while Bernard was also thinking about the so many public engagements in this brief reference? Bernard, Saint (1090-1153) Bernard entered the monastery of Citeaux with thirty companions in 1112. He received his monastic training under the abbot, Saint Stephen Harding, who sent him in 1115 to make a foundation at Clairvaux in France. Soon one of the most influential religious forces in Europe, Bernard was instrumental in founding the Knights Templar and in the election of Pope Innocent I in 1130.He was a strenuous opponent of writers such as Abelard, Gilbert de la Porree, and Henry of Lausanne.Above all, Bernard was a monk; his sermons and theological writings show an intimate knowledge of scripture, a fine eloquence, and an extraordinarily sublime mysticism Second Reading From a sermon by Saint Bernard Human beings experienced constant benefits but the benefactor was hidden from them. He reached indeed from end to end mightily, arranging all things pleasantly, but humankind did not perceive him. They enjoyed the Lord's blessings but were utterly ignorant of the Lord of Hosts because he ruled all things so silently. They were from him but not with him; they had life through him but did not live for him; they had understanding from him but did not know him, for they were estranged, ungrateful, foolish. In the end they attributed existence, life, and understanding not to the author of these but to nature or even, much more stupidly, to fortune; many also conceitedly claimed that much was the result of their own diligence and abilities. Think of all that seductive spirits arrogated to themselves, and all that was attributed to sun and moon or earth and water or even things made by mortal hands! Deference was paid to plants and trees and the tiniest most contemptible seeds as to divinities. Thus, alas, did men and women lose their true glory, exchanging him for the image of a bull that eats grass. But taking pity on them in their errors, God graciously came from his shaded, thickly wooded mountain and placed his tent in the sun. To those who knew only the flesh he offered his flesh that through it they might learn to perceive the spirit. For while in the flesh he did works through the flesh that were not of the flesh but of God: commanding nature, conquering fate, showing human wisdom to be folly, and vanquishing tyrannous demons. He openly showed himself to be the one through whom these things, whenever they occurred, had all been prepared at one and the same time. In the flesh and through the flesh he worked miracles openly and mightily, spoke a saving message, endured undeserved suffering, and made it clear that he is the one who mightily but invisibly created the world, rules it wisely, and safeguards it benevolently. Finally, when he preached the good news to the ungrateful, offered signs to unbelievers, and prayed for his crucifiers, did he not clearly show himself to be the one who with his Father daily makes his sun rise upon the good and the wicked and the rain fall on the just and the unjust? He himself said as much: If I do not do the works of my Father, do not believe me. .. Responsony - Ti 3:4; Mt 1:21 .When the kindness and generosity of God our Saviour dawned upon the world, it was not because of any good deeds of ours but from compassion that + he saved us through the cleansing water of rebirth and the renewing power of the Holy Spirit which he generously poured out on us through Jesus Christ our Saviour. V. You shall call him Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins. + He saved us ... . (The Lectionary, disappointingly, omits the reference to this writing).