Free from All Shadow of Self

“Meek among mankind” is how our Blessed Lady is described in the praises of her evening Office. Everything that Mary is comes from God and reflects God as in a mirror. And like us, she is a creature which should make her example compelling to meditate upon and deeply immerse ourselves in. Meekness is the topic of this Carthusian monk's reflection and is most appropriate for the season of Advent as well as for the Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception.

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Virgo singularis, inter omnes mitis (Virgin all excelling, meek among mankind) . . . It is thus that Mary is described in the hymn we say every day (Ave Maris Stella, Vespers of Our Lady), and it is concerning her meekness that I would meditate with you for a few moments.

The Gospel tells us that the meek shall inherit the earth; but it also reminds us that the Kingdom of heaven suffers violence, and that the violent shall bear it away (cf. Matthew 11:12). The paradox disappears when we realize that in this spiritual warfare we must be meek towards others, but violent in the unhesitating promptitude with which we answer the call of divine love. It is exactly the opposite of what the unspiritual man does. He is brutal towards others, but interiorly without any zeal for justice or passion for truth. The violence of the spiritual man is inseparable from his meekness, which is quickly lost if he does not know how to meet with a categorical refusal the lie which hides itself in all excuses or softness towards oneself. To dismiss all interior discussion with a Yes or No, that resoluteness which our Lord recommends to us, is the very first condition that must be fulfilled if the soul is to disentangle itself and be given the marvelous grace of meekness.

This virtue which distinguished our Blessed Lady among all women, cannot but be a most necessary virtue. Note first that Mary’s meekness is, as it were, a reflection of God’s. Mary is, indeed, a pure mirror, so free from all shadow of self, that the divine Essence finds its perfection fully reflected in her humility. That is why the Immaculate Virgin can be an object of contemplation, since her purity so mirrors that of God that we see Him, Who is Pure Act in her.

For meekness is a disposition truly divine. Violence proceeds from an authority conscious of its weakness. God has no need to break us in order to impose His will; His meekness is only another name for His all-powerfulness. Mary, on the other hand, is all-obedient, and it is in her total abandonment that she comes very close to God’s omnipotence. To abandon all pretensions to self-love without a struggle; to consent quietly to all that is asked of us: it is this that makes us resemble Mary, and allows us to partake of her graciousness and power. For God refuses us nothing – provided we abandon ourselves to Him with all our heart.

Meekness towards creatures is the result of patience and of respect for them. It has been said of meekness that it is the crown of the Christian virtues: indeed almost more than a virtue. It is, indeed, a unique grace, which penetrates one’s whole being, and influences one’s whole conduct; it even extends its influence to beings lower than man, to things inanimate. A meek person does even the simplest things in a different way from those who are not meek. Wisdom is meek; so too is understanding, since one must necessarily respect an object if one is to understand it. What is more, meekness implies sympathy; it wrests their secret from beings who would withdraw into themselves in face of impulsiveness as they would from violence. Meekness is both virginal and maternal; without it the approach to souls can never be deep or effective.

We have said that meekness is the fruit of patience and of respect – of patience above all. A soul will not be meek unless it is firmly resolved repeatedly to forgo its rights, and to suffer continuously, at times cruelly. On the other hand, it is true that meekness disarms our adversaries, and robs suffering of its venom. Our suffering, for the most part, comes from revolt, from a want of adaptability and abandonment.

It is true that we must do violence to ourselves if we would cease to be violent; but in a manner more general and profound, the respect and patience which, in imitation of Mary and even of God Himself, we must acquire in our relations with others, we have need of also towards ourselves. We need much patience with our own soul, to say nothing of the body. All the natural energy in the world will not enable us to change to any appreciable degree the character, unsatisfactory as it is in general, which our nature and upbringing have provided for us (cf. Matthew 6:27). But anyone who recognizes himself frankly for what he is, who by that fact alone is freed from the temptation to criticize others, and who in spite of his self-knowledge does not omit to renew his effort every day, keeping his eyes fixed on God, persevering for God’s sake alone and counting solely on His bounty – such a one, I say, does more than grow better; he leaves and abandons himself to God, to Whom such loving humility gives more glory than all success. Each one of us must respect his soul, remembering that it comes from God and belongs lovingly to Him; welcoming the action of the Holy Spirit in it, whatever form that action may take. The soul is so delicate that only God can handle it.

Let us, then, beg our Blessed Lady something of her meekness. It is she who shields us for God, and makes us chaste in the highest sense: that is to say, free from all resistance, awaiting the coming of our Spouse.

Sanctified by a Holy Desire

“Let your duty be in desire.” These wonderful words come to us from Saint Augustine whose Memorial the Church celebrates today. We cannot see what has been promised by our Lord therefore, “Tota vita Christiani boni sanctum desiderium est” – “The whole life of a good Christian is a holy desire.” Saint Augustine continues by telling us that the desire or longing for the promise to come to fruition makes us capable, so that when the promise is fulfilled and we are able to see it, then shall we be satisfied.

Recall the words of Saint Paul: “Eye has not seen, nor ear heard; neither has it entered into the heart of man what things God has prepared for them that love Him” (1 Corinthians 2:9). Thus, as Saint Augustine tells us, our lives as Christians must be driven by a desire to receive our Savior’s promises.

When adoring the Blessed Sacrament, faith tells us that what looks like a piece of bread is not a thing at all, but a Person – the Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Coupled with that faith, though, is a desire to be like Him and see Him as He is (cf. 1 John 2). This desire, as Saint John’s First Epistle continues, sanctifies us (ibid. verse 3).

Saint Augustine then teaches that by God’s delay in fulfilling our desire, the soul is expanded and its capacity increased. Of course, this would mean that there must be a complete commitment to serving our Lord; for how dangerous it would be to increase the soul’s capacity if our desire was to fill it with the things of this world. As Saint Augustine puts it: “Tantum autem nos exercet sanctum desiderium, quantum desideria nostra amputaverimus ab amore sæculi” – “But only are we exercised by holy desire, in as much as we cut off our longings for the love of the world.”

And so, the soul’s capacity is expanded by God when we cast out temporal desires and replace them with holy, eternal desires. For example, if we look at the vocation of Blessed Teresa of Calcutta, it’s hard to imagine that her very difficult living conditions were driven by a longing for this world’s goods. Of course not! It would be ridiculous to even entertain such thoughts. No, it was as she said: “Jesus is my God, Jesus is my Spouse, Jesus is my Life, Jesus is my only Love, Jesus is my All in all; Jesus is my Everything.”

Saint Augustine teaches us: “Extendamus nos in eum, ut, cum venerit, impleat” – “Let us stretch ourselves towards Him, that when He comes, He may fill us.”

When we pray, we stretch out ourselves towards our Lord in love. Saint Augustine said that a song is a thing of love. For those who pray the Liturgy of the Hours, do you ever sing it? Do you ever consider singing it? Even if one is completely unfamiliar with the various psalm tones, one can still sing it recto tono, that is, everything is sung on one or the same note. It is the Church's simplest form of chanting or singing.

Since our Lord's love has been poured into our hearts, it is not only our voices that we raise to God, but also as the liturgy commands us and hopefully we are compelled to do, "Sorsum corda" – "Lift up your hearts".  
Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI has been a great teacher on liturgy, and the importance of beauty in the liturgy. The tradition of the Church, as we are reminded by him, is that angels of God chant rather than speak. This is heightened conversation as everything in worship should be heightened. He wrote in his book, The Spirit of the Liturgy : "When man comes into contact with God, mere speech is not enough. Areas of his existence are awakened that spontaneously turn into song. The singing of the Church comes ultimately out of love. It is the utter depth of love that produces the singing. The Holy Spirit is Love, and it is He Who produces the singing. He is the Spirit of Christ, the Spirit Who draws us into love for Christ and so leads to the Father. In liturgical music, based as it is on biblical faith, there is, therefore, a clear dominance of the Word; this music is a higher form of proclamation. Ultimately, it rises up out of the love that responds to God's love made flesh in Christ, the love that for us went unto death. After the Resurrection, the Cross is by no means a thing of the past, and so this love is always marked by pain at the hiddenness of God, by the cry that rises up from the depths of anguish, Kyrie eleison, by hope and by supplication. But it also has the privilege, by anticipation, of experiencing the reality of the Resurrection, and so it brings with it the joy of being loved, that gladness of heart that Haydn said came upon him when he set liturgical texts to music. In the West, in the form of Gregorian chant, the inherited tradition of psalm-singing was developed to a new sublimity and purity, which set a permanent standard for sacred music, music for the liturgy of the Church. Polyphony developed in the late Middle Ages, and then instruments came back into divine worship - quite rightly, too, because, as we have seen, the Church not only continues the synagogue, but also takes up, in the light of Christ's Pasch, the reality represented by the Temple."

Saint Augustine reiterated the words of Scripture: "Sing to the Lord a new song; let His praise be in the Church of the Saints." Consider singing the Liturgy of the Hours, even privately; but whether it’s the Mass or the Divine Office, bring your voice, bring your heart, and bring your whole self, body and soul, and lift it up to God in worship and angelic conversation.

Sancte Augustine, ora pro nobis!

Doctor Mellifluus

Today the Church celebrates the Memorial of Saint Bernard of Clairvaux, a French Abbot, Doctor of the Church, and a reformer of the Cistercian Order. Pope Pius XII wrote an encyclical on Saint Bernard titled, Doctor Mellifluus, which means "the Honey-flowing Doctor" - signifying that Saint Bernard's praise of Jesus flowed like sweet honey.   

His praise of Love Himself is found often in his vocabulary:

Amor per se sufficit; is per se placet - Love is self-sufficient; it is pleasing to itself.

Amo quia amo; amo ut amem - I love because I love; I love in order to love.

Magna res amor, si tamen ad suum recurrat principium, si suæ origini redditus, si refusus suo fonti - Love is a great thing, only if it returns to its beginning, if it returns to its origin, if it flows back to its fount.

Saint Bernard also wrote that love must always draw from that endless stream.

The greatness of love is true because it is caused by the greatness of God – Who is Love. God is the Beginning, the Origin, the Fount and Endless Stream of love. Saint Bernard said that love is the only adequate means by which the creature may respond to its Creator, although the weakness of the creature will always make that response inadequate.

This holy man of God asks: “Why should Love not be loved?” Saint Bernard talks about emptying ourselves, “renouncing all other affections” submitting all our “being to Love alone,” responding “to Love by giving love in return.”

This is a broken world we live in and we are a fallen nature. We will never be able to give back to God what He has given to us. And so, Saint Bernard asks the frightening question: “Can it be that all will perish . . . simply because it is futile to race against a Giant, or to contend with Honey in sweetness, with the Lamb in gentleness, with the Lily in whiteness, with the Sun in splendor, with Love in love?”

If justice always prevailed over mercy, then these examples from this Doctor of the Church would be a blood pressure raising thing to ponder for anyone with a conscience. But this saint and heavenly intercessor won’t let us go there. He offers the answer: “Even though the creature loves less than the Creator . . . nevertheless if he loves with all his being, he lacks nothing.”

There’s great hope in that statement but great conviction is required of the creature. God must be loved above all things; He must be the Center of our lives. Do we love with all our being? Does our love return to its Origin, to its Source, to Love Himself.

The Catechism of the Catholic Church teaches that the Eucharist is the Source and Summit of the Christian life (cf. CCC 1324). The document from the Synod of Bishops XI Ordinary General Assembly reads: “Receiving Communion means to enter into communion with the Lord and the saints of the Church, both in heaven and on earth. Thus, Communion and contemplation follow each other. We cannot receive sacramental Communion, without making it personal . . . it is the sacrament of infinite value.” The document also teaches that Communion and Adoration are inseparable. “Adoration of the Eucharist begins in Communion and leads to acts of Eucharistic piety, adoring God the Father, in Spirit and in Truth, in the risen and living Christ, truly present among us.”

If Communion and Adoration are inseparable, then our reception of the Eucharist at Mass does not end there. We are called to Eucharistic piety by also adoring our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament - in adoring the One we love with all our being - the One Who loved us first. During Eucharistic Adoration, consider keeping close to your heart these words of Saint Bernard of Clairvaux: “Lord Jesus, what has made You so small?  Love!” Jesus continues to suffer in the Blessed Sacrament, continues to make Himself vulnerable by permitting Himself to be contained in a Monstrance or in the Tabernacle. How deeply we must love, how small we must become when meditating on the words of Sacred Scripture, for example, the proclamation of Saint John the Baptist: “He must increase, but I must decrease” (John 3:30). We will never be able to compete with our Lord’s deliberate “smallness,” but if we love Him with all our being, we lack nothing.

Today in the liturgy the Church asks for that same spirit of Saint Bernard, which burned with zeal for the house of God, and enlightened others in the Church.   

Sancte Bernarde, ora pro nobis!