Part 10

It is a coincidence, if not something more, that puts the antiphon _O Oriens!_ on the same day as the Feast of St. Thomas. It was on account of St. Thomas' _doubt_ that the great principle was given to the Church: "Blessed are they that have not seen and yet have believed." It is on account of St. Thomas' _faith_ that countless Indulgences are granted every day to the faithful who make use of his words: "My Lord and my God" when their sight shows them nothing but a little Host elevated by a priest. It was St. Thomas' _zeal_ which made him go to the Indies and proclaim that the Orient had visited His people and that God had become incarnate for men. "Thou didst make all the Indies shine with much light" (Hymn of the Greek Church to St. Thomas), and that light was the light of faith in Him Whom they had not seen. It is St. Thomas who comes to-day to revive our flagging faith, to introduce us to the Babe of Bethlehem and tell us that He is indeed the Orient though He is hiding His light, to warn us to give no heed to temptations against the faith, to tell us that when we are contemplating the humility and nothingness of our God and the temptation comes to us, as it did to him to say: Unless I see for myself, "I will not believe," to remember the words of the Master: "Blessed are they that have not seen and yet have believed."

O blessed Saint Thomas! who art now in the land of light and vision, intercede for us that we may be as little children, believing all we are told and quietly waiting till the day dawn and the Orient arises in all His majesty and strength, _preparing_ as a giant to run His course, but for the moment hiding everything under the form of a helpless babe. We do not ask for sight but for the light which will lead us to Him, the light of faith, so that when we see Him wrapped in swaddling clothes and lying in a manger we may cry out with you: "My Lord and My God."

POINT III. THE WAY OF PEACE.

The Orient visited us not only "to enlighten them that sit in darkness and in the shadow of death," but also "to direct our feet into the way of peace" (St. Luke I. 79). And what is the way of peace but the way of _faith_, which He is coming to light up? Nothing can bring peace to this dark and sin-stricken world but faith. The Sun of Justice is rising with health in His Wings and that health is faith. It is the remedy for all ills. Men try every other remedy but they leave out God and His faith and the result is that the world remains in chaos. The Light has risen, the Orient has visited us, but men shut their eyes to the light and prefer the darkness, because their deeds are evil.

The _Way of Peace_ is made by the Prince of Peace, it is the Highway to the Heaven of Peace. Am I on it? Yes, for I am one of "the household of faith" and can never thank Him sufficiently for having directed my feet into the City of Peace. But this is not all. Many people, even those of the "household of faith" have very little real peace in their lives. They spend their time in complaints, regrets, criticisms, anxieties. Is this what the King of Peace intends? Oh no! He is ever there waiting to direct their feet towards the "green pastures" and "the still waters," but the Way of Peace is the way of faith, of trust and confidence. Until I can really trust Him, the peaceful pastures can never be mine, I can never lie down in them and rest. I am His sheep, but I do not wholly trust my Shepherd. If I did, I should believe that whatever He chose and arranged for me was the best; I could not _complain_ of what He had planned for me, however hard it might be. I could not criticize His arrangements and want to make my own. May my trust be so absolute this Christmas that it is apparent to everyone that I possess the peace which the Babe of Bethlehem comes to bring. O Orient come once more and direct my feet into the way of peace.

_Colloquy_ with the Orient.

_Resolution._ "Although He should kill me, I will trust in Him." (Job. XIII. 15).

_Spiritual Bouquet._ O Oriens!

O REX GENTIUM!

December 22nd.

"O King of nations and their desired One and the Corner-stone that makest both one, come and save man whom Thou didst form out of slime!"

(Gen. XLIX. 10, Agg. II. 8, Isaias XXVIII. 16, Gen. II. 7).

_1st. Prelude._ Mary and Joseph on the road to Bethlehem. "Behold thy King will come to thee.... He is poor and riding upon an ass." (Zach. IX. 9).

_2nd. Prelude._ Grace to welcome my King.

POINT I. "THE DESIRED OF ALL NATIONS SHALL COME."

King of nations He has always been, for He created them; in Him they live and move and are. (Acts XVII. 2). He has been in His earth ever since He created it, governing it, sustaining and preserving the life which He gave, co-operating always with His creatures. We must not think of Him as creating the world and then leaving it to do the best it could till the time came for Him to be incarnate. That is a false idea. His delights were _always_ to be with the children of men and though the Orient did not begin to dawn till the time of the Incarnation, the Light had been in the world all along; the Sun of Justice had existed from all eternity. "He was in the world and the world was made by Him and the world knew Him not." (St. John I. 10). But though it knew Him not, the world had enough light to desire Him. Ever since God at the time of man's fall had made His great promise concerning the Woman and her Seed, He that was to come had been to the nations "their desired One." That promise had been carefully cherished, handed on from father to son till Moses came and recorded it in the book of Genesis; and though of necessity one nation had to be selected to which the Woman and her Seed were to belong, yet the promise was given to all nations and all claimed their share in it. The chosen _nation_ through whom all the others were to be blessed was Abraham's. Through him and his seed the great promise was to be fulfilled (Gen. XII. 3). The _time_ was hinted at in the patriarch Jacob's blessing to Juda: "The sceptre shall not be taken away from Juda, nor a ruler from his thigh, till He come that is to be sent and He shall be the expectation of nations" (Gen. XLIX. 10). The house or _family_ which was to have the joy of realizing the promise was David's; the _place_ where the Woman was to bring forth her Seed was Bethlehem. Here "she that travaileth shall bring forth" and here "shall He come ... that is to be the Ruler in Israel" (Mich. V. 2-3). Each subsequent prophecy or promise developed and enlarged the original one given in Eden, but in that one the nations had all that they needed upon which to build up their hopes and nourish their desires--the Woman and her Seed, the "Child with His Mother"--and though the promise _belonged_ to the chosen nation (Rom. IX. 4), the first great promise had been handed down through the other nations and they knew enough to make them _desire_, enough to find the Light if they sought it as did the Wise Kings of the East.

O King of nations, as I look back through the ages and see the Child and His Mother so clearly set forth in promise and prophecy, in type and example, when I think of Thy plans for the redemption of the world, made from all eternity and gradually unfolding as the fulness of time approached, when I think of the nations all desiring Thy coming, when I think of the intense desire of Thy loving Heart, there is one thing that seems to jar and to be out of harmony with the rest, and that is the lamentable want of desire in my own heart! The time is very short now, the Child with His Mother are already on the way to Bethlehem. Oh! Let me multiply my Acts of Desire that my little King when He comes may be indeed _my_ "desired One" too. "I sat down under His shadow, Whom I desired." (Cant. II. 3).

POINT II. THE CORNER-STONE THAT MAKETH BOTH ONE.

"Behold I will lay a stone in the foundations of Sion, a tried stone, a corner-stone, a precious stone, founded in the foundations" (Isaias XXVIII. 16), "the stone which the builders rejected" (Ps. CXVII. 22).

This is one of the promises confided to the chosen nation. Our Blessed Lord claims it as applying to Himself (St. Matt. XXI. 42, St. Luke XX. 17), and St. Peter and St. Paul both speak of it as if it were well known. (Acts IV. 11, 1 Peter II. 6-8, Rom. IX. 33, Eph. II. 20).

He is the Corner-stone Who is coming to make both one (Eph. II. 14), both the Jews to whom belongs the promise (Rom. IX. 4) and the Gentiles who are "co-partners of His promise" (Eph. III. 6). He is coming to preach peace to them that are far off as well as to them that are nigh, coming to make "the strangers and foreigners" feel that they are "fellow-citizens with the saints and the domestics of God," coming to weld all together into one great building of which He Himself is to be the chief Corner-stone, binding together the two walls (Jews and Gentiles), supporting each stone and keeping each in its place, a holy temple in the Lord, "a habitation of God in the spirit." Such is the picture St. Paul draws for us (Eph. II), and such is the picture which the antiphon for to-day brings before our minds. "All one in Christ JESUS." He is the King of all nations, the Desired of all nations, the Corner-stone of the whole building; with Him there is neither Jew nor Gentile (Gal. III. 28).

Let me tell Him even now before He comes how I long to share in the great work so dear to His Sacred Heart, let me offer myself to co-operate with Him in His designs for the human race which He loves so well.

Let me be ready to labour, to suffer, to pray, to spend and be spent, if only I may thus bring Him a few stones for His Holy Temple. I was "sometime afar off" but now have been "made nigh by the Blood of Christ" (Eph. II. 13). "What shall I render?" (Ps. CXV. 12).

POINT III. COME AND SAVE MAN WHOM THOU DIDST FORM OUT OF THE DUST.

"Their desired One" Who has never been far from the hearts of His children, knows the need of the nations. He Who formed man out of the dust knows his need of a Saviour. What are the desires of the nations compared with His desire? From all eternity He has desired the time to come when by taking the nature of man He could fulfil their desires and be to them both a King and a Saviour. Very soon now will the Angels be telling the glad tidings to man: To you is born the Saviour. Very soon will the heavenly choirs be singing the praises of the new-born King, and the question will be asked even by distant nations: "Where is He that is born King?"

Oh! come, little King, come and fulfil the desires of all hearts. Thou hast given them and Thou also must satisfy them. Art Thou really the one desire of my heart, around which all my hopes centre? If Thou wert not there, I know that life would be nothing but a blank. Come and create a greater desire than ever after the perfection Thou wouldst have, and then show me how to follow after it. "In what place soever Thou shalt be, my Lord King ... there will Thy servant be" (2 Kings XV. 21). To-day then I will journey with Thy blessed Mother, for surely the closer I keep to her, the greater must be my desires.

_Colloquy_ with "the desired One."

_Resolution._ Grace to desire Him more ardently.

_Spiritual Bouquet._ O Rex Gentium!

O EMMANUEL!

December 23rd.

"O Emmanuel, our King and Lawgiver, the Expectation and Saviour of the nations! Come and save us, O Lord our God."

(Is. VII. 14, VIII. 8, XXXIII. 22, St. Jas. IV. 12).

_1st. Prelude._ Mary and Joseph in the temple at Jerusalem.

_2nd. Prelude._ Grace to worship with them.

POINT I. EMMANUEL, GOD WITH US.

On the way from Nazareth to Bethlehem lies Jerusalem and we may be quite sure that a happy event for Mary and Joseph on this long and tiring journey now nearing its end would be their visit to the Temple, near which Mary, and probably Joseph too, had spent most of her life. We may think, then, of Mary to-day taking her Son into His own Temple. We may think of the joy of the Angels as they lifted high the gates to let the hidden King come in. In the Holy of Holies of Solomon's Temple was the Ark of the Covenant, inside which were the Tables of God's law and upon which was manifested the presence of the All-Holy. But here kneeling in the Temple, in the women's court afar off, was the real Ark of the Covenant of which the other was only a type, hiding within her chaste womb the new Lawgiver Whose Presence was known only to the Angels who were worshipping round His Shrine, and to Mary and Joseph the only earthly worshippers in the Temple that day who understood.

Here was the Virgin with her Son, the prophecy was fulfilled--God with us. "His name shall be called _Emmanuel_."

Yet Mary and Joseph were not the only worshippers in the Temple that day--there was a Human Soul worshipping God as He had never been worshipped before. The Heart of Jesus now so near the end of the first stage of Its existence on earth was offering to God all Its homage and all Its love, offering to Him all the work that had been done during the nine months passed in the holy "Ark of the Covenant," all the humiliation and self-abasement, the silence and dependence, the suffering and patience, the satisfaction and merit. He had been doing all the time the things that pleased His Father, the things that He had made Himself man to be able to do. Now He is waiting--and the very waiting is another Act of worship--waiting for the moment to come when He can take the next step in His earthly journey, waiting with His Mother whose intense desire is only second to His Own.

O Emmanuel! God with us! I feel that I must go too to Thy Sacred Courts to-day and make one more worshipper before that Holy Shrine. Advent is nearly over, my time of preparation is well-nigh at an end. What have I to offer as I kneel in adoration? Feeble desires, broken resolutions, failure again in the thing I did so want not to fail in this Advent, good intentions, but little else. Dare I come and kneel there where all is so holy and so perfect? Yes, for He is _Emmanuel_, God incarnate for me. Let me hand Him through His Mother all my poverty and wretchedness and weakness and failure, together with my contrition and repentance and love, and in exchange He will hand me His forgiveness and the promise to offer my inadequate worship, together with His own Divine perfections, to His Father, Who will be satisfied. This is what _Emmanuel_ means.

POINT II. OUR LAWGIVER.

"The Lord is our Judge, the Lord is our Lawgiver, the Lord is our King He will save us." (Is. XXXIII. 22).

He is our King, therefore He has a right to make laws for us. And who could be a better Judge of how the laws are kept than He Who made them? Am I afraid at the sterner aspect which things seem to have taken? There is no need, for He is still our _Emmanuel_, but He can only be thus our Friend and Companion by being also the One Who has an absolute right to make laws for us and to expect our obedience. "You are My _friends_, if you do the things I command you" (St. John XV. 14). The reason for _all_ His titles is that He wills to _save_ us. He is first of all the Saviour and then, in order that our salvation may be accomplished, He makes Himself our King, our Lawgiver and finally our Judge. "If you love Me, keep My commandments." Such is our Lawgiver's appeal. Surely His commandments are not grievous. He Who did always the things which pleased His Father, asks us to try to do the same.

O my little Lawgiver, accomplishing so silently and so perfectly the Will of Thy Father, command me and I will obey, give Thy orders through whom Thou wilt; be they hard or easy, be they in accordance with my will or contrary to my whole nature! I will think of Thy perfect submission to Thy Father's Will during those nine months for me and will say: I, too, will do always the things which please Him no matter what they cost.

POINT III. THE EXPECTATION OF THE NATIONS.

JESUS is waiting, Mary is waiting, the Angels are waiting, all nations, all the earth, and Heaven too is waiting--waiting for our Emmanuel to come and save us. The empty manger speaks of the Church's expectation to-day. We can count the hours now, all things are ready. Oh! come and save us! Come and begin Thy blessed work over again, come and save the many who as yet know Thee not and who are expecting everything this Christmas _except_ a Saviour. May the sight of the empty crib remind me to look well into my preparations to-day to see that nothing is wanting in the welcome I am going to give to the King!

_Colloquy_ with our Emmanuel. At the Incarnation, at Thy birth, all through Thy life, Thou didst dwell _with us_; on every altar Thou hast promised to be _with us_ all days; in Holy Communion Thou hast said I will dwell _with them_; in the hour of death I will fear no evil for Thou wilt be _with me_; and Thou hast secured Heaven for me by Thy prayer: "Father, I will that those whom Thou hast given Me be _with Me_ where I am." "Emmanuel, _God with us_."

_Resolution._ Grace to expect Him to-day in all that I do.

_Spiritual Bouquet._ O Emmanuel!

CHRISTMAS EVE.

"This day you shall know that the Lord will come and save us: and in the morning you shall see His glory."

(Ex. XVI. "Introit" for Christmas Eve).

_1st. Prelude._ The stable and the manger waiting for JESUS.

_2nd. Prelude._ Grace to make my final preparations.

POINT I. MY PREPARATION--LAST TOUCHES.

To-day Mary and Joseph arrive at their journey's end. We think of them footsore, weary, homeless; we think of the discouragement and rebuffs that they meet with as they hear on all sides that there is no room for them; but do we think enough of the intense joy that reigned in Mary's heart, a joy communicated to her by her Son? He is rejoicing that His hour is come; the very refusals of His people to receive Him and His Mother are to Him a sign that His work has begun and is already being opposed. Mary shares His joy; she is absorbed by one thought--soon she will look upon His Face--and that thought is so great that there is scarcely room for any other in her heart. And Joseph? Can we imagine him anxious and disturbed and worried? No, it is impossible--he is with JESUS and Mary, he has lived his life close to them for nine months, he has imbibed their spirit. If his joy is not as intense as theirs, his _peace_ is unruffled; he has brought the Mother with her Child to Bethlehem as he was told to do, and he knows that God will take care of His own.

My first lessons, then, for to-day are apparent. In the morning I shall see His glory; the point of Advent is reached, my preparation is nearly over. I was told to get ready for Him, I was told to come to Bethlehem, I have been trying to do so, trying to keep up with Mary and Joseph on their journey; often, I am obliged to admit it, it has been a following afar off, but still by God's grace, I _am_ following and I know that to-day He is coming to save us and that to-morrow I shall see His glory for He will come to me in Holy Communion. He will be born again in my heart and make me understand once more that He is incarnate for me. Are my joy and my peace so great that nothing has the power to touch them? There are many occupations that must of necessity claim my time and my attention to-day, as there were many coming and going on the roads that led to Bethlehem; there are many things to be thought about in my last preparations for Christmas--it was so with Mary and Joseph too. Almost certainly I shall have to-day, as they had, things that try and weary me, perhaps suffering, temptation, slights and even insults. Shall I receive them as last and most precious opportunities for adding the finishing touches to my preparation, for gaining a victory where I have perhaps so recently lost one, for making reparation to my King and for uniting myself more closely to Him and His Mother? Will the thought that He is coming be so absorbing that the difficulties of the way are hardly noticed or are welcome as a reminder that I too am journeying to Bethlehem? If I cannot aspire to the joy of JESUS and Mary, I can at least aim at the peace of St. Joseph.

POINT II. HIS PREPARATION.

_His_ preparation is coming to an end too. Let me go over in my mind once again all that He had to plan and to do by way of preparation before He could come to me in Holy Communion. It was for this that the Incarnation was a preparation. In order to feed me with His Flesh and Blood, He had to become incarnate. This is the point of Christmas, and it is the point of contact between JESUS and my soul. To-morrow Mary in an ecstasy of joy will look upon His Face and press Him to her heart; to-morrow Joseph, full of awe and wonder, will take Him in his arms; to-morrow the Angels will sing their _Glorias_ as they gaze upon their God incarnate; to-morrow the shepherds will adore and offer Him their gifts; and to-morrow I too shall touch Him very closely for I shall receive into my body and into my heart His Body and Blood, His Soul and His Divinity. He will be with me and I with Him. It is for this that I have been making my preparations and it is for this that He has been making His. How long has He been preparing? Not only during Advent, not only during the nine months, not only since the great promise was given in Eden, not only since the time when there was war among the Angels because of the Incarnation--I am getting beyond time already and farther back than that I cannot go for my mind is finite; but His is infinite and just because it is infinite there never was a time when the Incarnation was not in His mind, and there never was a time when I, His child, was not in His mind, and also there never was a time when He did not see the blest moments when He should bring the two into contact and make me understand personally what the point of the Incarnation is. These blest moments are my Communions and surely one of the most blest must be my Christmas Communion when He Who comes to me and Who feeds me with Himself is the Child Who was born at Bethlehem, He Who had been so long expected, the Seed of the Woman, the Orient from on high, the Star of the East, the Desired One of the nations, the Root of Jesse, the King of the Gentiles with His Key and His Sceptre, Emmanuel, God with us.

_Colloquy._ I kneel at the door of the empty stable and offer Thee my heart, O my little JESUS! I have tried to make room for Thee; I have made my poor little preparations with Thy blessed Mother; I have taken long journeys to get to Thee; but my body is not fit to be Thy temple and my heart is treacherous and faithless. I am ashamed to have so poor a shelter to offer Thee. If it were not that Thou didst ask for it, I dare not offer it. Oh! Thou Who didst not refuse the manger-bed, come to my heart, look at the contrition and the humiliation and the reparation and the aching longing to be what Thou dost want, and forget the faithlessness and the failures and the weakness. Come, my little King, incarnate for me, come and save me, if I were not a sinner I should not need a Saviour.

_Resolution._ To keep very near to Mary and Joseph to-day.

_Spiritual Bouquet._ "In the morning you shall see His glory."

* * * * *

BOKSTEL--HOLLAND ELECTRISCHE DRUKKERIJ WILHELM VAN EUPEN

* * * * *

Transcriber's Notes:

Obvious spelling and punctuation errors were repaired, but unusual period spellings and grammatical usages were retained.

Headings and scripture references were inconsistently formatted and have been standardized, but variations in book titles and abbreviations were retained.

Where punctuation in contents page entries and chapter headings in original did not agree, the contents page entries were corrected.

He, Him, His, etc. when referring to "Jesus" and "God" are capitalized throughout the original, and "Jesus" placed in small caps. The few exceptions have been changed to conform to the majority.