+ As the rubric found in the breviary after None tomorrow reminds us, Lent ends tomorrow afternoon. And then Passiontide begins.
Throughout this past week the Sacred Liturgy has already begun to taste the cup of the Lord’s Passion in Gospel readings that make no secret of the fact that the Christ is to suffer and to die, that the Temple of His Body would destroyed, and that it would be raised up in three days (cf. Gospel of Monday of the Fourth Week of Lent; Jn 2:13-25).
In the coming week, Passion week, the liturgical texts will immerse us further in the mystery of Christ’s suffering and death. Let us take care to renew our ascetical disciplines so as to facilitate an ever greater and more fruitful attention to that which we sing and to that which we hear in choir and at the altar in these days: the Benedictus and Magnificat antiphons, the poignant Gospel passages, the Epistles and the Patristic homilies at Matins are more than enough to sustain our contemplation each day. Indeed, we would do well not to attempt to digest too much. Please God we shall be given other Passiontides in which further to plumb these depths. Let us simply ensure that this year, each day, we do so a little more fully.
In these days the Church frequently places the laments of the psalmist on our lips, particularly in the proper chants of the Mass. On Tuesday the familiar words of psalm 42 “Discerne causam meam, Dominie: ab homine iniquo et doloso eripe me” (Judge my cause, O Lord: deliver me from the evil and treacherous foe) sung in the Gradual will become all that more poignant as we hear of the plotting of the Jews against Jesus chanted in the Gospel that follows.
Our Lord’s suffering was the suffering of an innocent man: he is the lamb without blemish sacrificed for our sins (cf. 1 Peter 1:19); it is easy to pray these words of Psalm 42 in respect of He.
But the psalmist who, as the instrument of God the Holy Ghost gave voice to this plea and first prayed thus in anguish, was not without blemish. Nor are we. And that is precisely why our Holy Mother the Church has us sing them (even though in Passiontide we do not pray them at the priest’s private preparation to ascend the altar).
For our suffering is often caught up in, or is a consequence of, our own weakness, foolishness, sin or evil. And sometimes it is not: there are evil people in the world who will do anything they can to destroy the good and to prevent people from living the conversion of their life and from making progress in virtue. There are people who betray our trust. There are others who hurt us deeply through their busy ignorance of our true needs. There is the suffering of underserved illness which arrives at moments and in ways that can weigh us down terribly. Whether we merit it or not, our life on this earth is lived under the shadow of the cross: it involves suffering: sometimes very great suffering.
Since its inception our monastery has adopted as its avatar the word “Pax” surrounded by the crown of thorns. The “pax inter spinas” is a thoroughly Benedictine motif: our vocation is aptly described as the seeking of peace amidst thorns – the thorns pressed down upon us by our moral lives, by others, by our world and even by the state in which Holy Mother Church finds herself in in any given age.
Our vocation is not, therefore, to live some facile form of peace subtly proffered by worldly pleasures, or to become sufficiently drugged by them, as it were, so as to pretend that suffering does not exist. No, our vocation it is to embrace suffering, to accept the thorns of persecution (from without or, more painfully, from within), to bear ridicule, to endure our own physical or moral frailty and that of others.
And our vocation is, amidst our suffering, no matter how painful the thorns surround us and pierce us are, to keep our eyes on He who is Peace. It is indeed to sing “Discerne causam meam, Dominie: ab homine iniquo et doloso eripe me” with the faith and sure knowledge that even if a worldly judge may find me utterly culpable, the tribunal of Christ’s mercy and sacrificial love in which the Lamb is victorious (cf. Rev. 5) will rescue me if I persevere faithfully in His Way.
On Wednesday the Solemn celebration of the feast of St Benedict will ‘interrupt’ Passion Week as it were. As is our custom, for this great feast we will place the numerous relics of Benedictine Saints and Beati of which our monastery is the privileged custodian on the altar for solemn Lauds, Mass and Vespers, including relics of our Holy Father St Benedict.
As we venerate these precious treasures let us remember these saints suffered. Sometimes very greatly indeed. There was a time before their own conversion. And even afterwards there were sometimes periods when their monastic hearts, rather than expanding, felt like lead. They struggled with their own infirmities of mind and character. Those of others sometimes cruelly beat them down. Their bodies knew great—indeed mortal—sickness. And yet amidst these thorns – indeed precisely by persevering even when they seemed only to increase and press more deeply– these, our elder brothers and sisters in the monastic vocation, found peace. On Wednesday – indeed every day, most particularly when we are oppressed – let us not fail to seek their fraternal intercession for our own perseverance.
As we live the Passion of Our Blessed Lord more intensely in Sacred Liturgy of these days, as we share in His sufferings more intensely at different moments in our own lives, let us never lose sight of the reality of that Peace who is Himeself the prize of those who persevere faithfully unto the end. For we must never forget that the even the blackest, the very darkest shadows of the cross are, of course, cast by nothing other than the light of Easter morn. +
Throughout this past week the Sacred Liturgy has already begun to taste the cup of the Lord’s Passion in Gospel readings that make no secret of the fact that the Christ is to suffer and to die, that the Temple of His Body would destroyed, and that it would be raised up in three days (cf. Gospel of Monday of the Fourth Week of Lent; Jn 2:13-25).
In the coming week, Passion week, the liturgical texts will immerse us further in the mystery of Christ’s suffering and death. Let us take care to renew our ascetical disciplines so as to facilitate an ever greater and more fruitful attention to that which we sing and to that which we hear in choir and at the altar in these days: the Benedictus and Magnificat antiphons, the poignant Gospel passages, the Epistles and the Patristic homilies at Matins are more than enough to sustain our contemplation each day. Indeed, we would do well not to attempt to digest too much. Please God we shall be given other Passiontides in which further to plumb these depths. Let us simply ensure that this year, each day, we do so a little more fully.
In these days the Church frequently places the laments of the psalmist on our lips, particularly in the proper chants of the Mass. On Tuesday the familiar words of psalm 42 “Discerne causam meam, Dominie: ab homine iniquo et doloso eripe me” (Judge my cause, O Lord: deliver me from the evil and treacherous foe) sung in the Gradual will become all that more poignant as we hear of the plotting of the Jews against Jesus chanted in the Gospel that follows.
Our Lord’s suffering was the suffering of an innocent man: he is the lamb without blemish sacrificed for our sins (cf. 1 Peter 1:19); it is easy to pray these words of Psalm 42 in respect of He.
But the psalmist who, as the instrument of God the Holy Ghost gave voice to this plea and first prayed thus in anguish, was not without blemish. Nor are we. And that is precisely why our Holy Mother the Church has us sing them (even though in Passiontide we do not pray them at the priest’s private preparation to ascend the altar).
For our suffering is often caught up in, or is a consequence of, our own weakness, foolishness, sin or evil. And sometimes it is not: there are evil people in the world who will do anything they can to destroy the good and to prevent people from living the conversion of their life and from making progress in virtue. There are people who betray our trust. There are others who hurt us deeply through their busy ignorance of our true needs. There is the suffering of underserved illness which arrives at moments and in ways that can weigh us down terribly. Whether we merit it or not, our life on this earth is lived under the shadow of the cross: it involves suffering: sometimes very great suffering.
Since its inception our monastery has adopted as its avatar the word “Pax” surrounded by the crown of thorns. The “pax inter spinas” is a thoroughly Benedictine motif: our vocation is aptly described as the seeking of peace amidst thorns – the thorns pressed down upon us by our moral lives, by others, by our world and even by the state in which Holy Mother Church finds herself in in any given age.
Our vocation is not, therefore, to live some facile form of peace subtly proffered by worldly pleasures, or to become sufficiently drugged by them, as it were, so as to pretend that suffering does not exist. No, our vocation it is to embrace suffering, to accept the thorns of persecution (from without or, more painfully, from within), to bear ridicule, to endure our own physical or moral frailty and that of others.
And our vocation is, amidst our suffering, no matter how painful the thorns surround us and pierce us are, to keep our eyes on He who is Peace. It is indeed to sing “Discerne causam meam, Dominie: ab homine iniquo et doloso eripe me” with the faith and sure knowledge that even if a worldly judge may find me utterly culpable, the tribunal of Christ’s mercy and sacrificial love in which the Lamb is victorious (cf. Rev. 5) will rescue me if I persevere faithfully in His Way.
On Wednesday the Solemn celebration of the feast of St Benedict will ‘interrupt’ Passion Week as it were. As is our custom, for this great feast we will place the numerous relics of Benedictine Saints and Beati of which our monastery is the privileged custodian on the altar for solemn Lauds, Mass and Vespers, including relics of our Holy Father St Benedict.
As we venerate these precious treasures let us remember these saints suffered. Sometimes very greatly indeed. There was a time before their own conversion. And even afterwards there were sometimes periods when their monastic hearts, rather than expanding, felt like lead. They struggled with their own infirmities of mind and character. Those of others sometimes cruelly beat them down. Their bodies knew great—indeed mortal—sickness. And yet amidst these thorns – indeed precisely by persevering even when they seemed only to increase and press more deeply– these, our elder brothers and sisters in the monastic vocation, found peace. On Wednesday – indeed every day, most particularly when we are oppressed – let us not fail to seek their fraternal intercession for our own perseverance.
As we live the Passion of Our Blessed Lord more intensely in Sacred Liturgy of these days, as we share in His sufferings more intensely at different moments in our own lives, let us never lose sight of the reality of that Peace who is Himeself the prize of those who persevere faithfully unto the end. For we must never forget that the even the blackest, the very darkest shadows of the cross are, of course, cast by nothing other than the light of Easter morn. +
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