24/10/2015
SATURDAY OFFICE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY
Optional Reading for the Period between October 7 and Advent
A sermon of Saint Bernard*
"HAIL, full of grace,
the Lord is with you" (Lk 1,28). Notice how the angel did not say "the Lord is in you,"
but "the Lord is with you." For God, who by
the simplicity of his essence is equally and entirely everywhere
present, has nevertheless, by his influence and operation,
a presence in his rational creatures,
which -he has not in others, and among the former, a presence in the good different from that which he has in the wicked. He is truly present in irrational creatures,
yet without
being embraced by them. He is in his rational creatures in
such a manner
that they
all have the power to
embrace him by knowledge, yet only the good
can embrace him
by love. Consequently, of the good alone
it can be said that he is so in them as to be also with
them, because of the harmony of their wills with his.
For whilst they so conform their wills to the
law of justice that it is not unworthy of God
to will what they will, there is established
a concord between his will and theirs, and
thus they become specially united with him.
But although this is the case with every holy soul, it is particularly true of Mary. So closely did God unite himself to her,
that not only her will, but even her flesh was united
to God; and from
his own substance and the substance of the
Virgin he fashioned one Christ, or rather he
became one Christ who, although neither
wholly from God nor
wholly from Mary, yet belongs wholly to God and wholly to
Mary: nor are there two sons, but the one same Christ
is Son of both. The angel says,
therefore,
"Hail, full
of grace, the Lord is with you." But, 0 Mary,
the Lord with
you is not
the Son
alone whom you have clothed with your flesh: he
is also the
Holy Spirit, by
whom you
have conceived,
and he is also the
Father by whom from
eternity your
Child is begotten.
The Father, I say, is with you, who has given his Son
to be also yours. The Son is with you, who in a
marvelous way has entered your womb without
detriment to your virginity. The Holy Spirit is with you, he who, with the Father and the Son, has prepared
your virginal body to be the dwelling of the Word.
Therefore "the Lord is with you."
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* Homilia 3 super "Missus eet ," n.4. - PL 183, 72-73; Leale rcq , IV, p.38. Temporary version, based on Fr. Luddy's translation of the Seasonal Sermons, Vol. I, pp.97~99.
* Homilia 3 super "Missus eet ," n.4. - PL 183, 72-73; Leale rcq , IV, p.38. Temporary version, based on Fr. Luddy's translation of the Seasonal Sermons, Vol. I, pp.97~99.
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