Dom Prosper Guéranger:
Dom Prosper Guéranger:
Dom Prosper Guéranger:
This Sunday is, some years, the second of the dominical series which opened with the feast of Saint Laurence, and took its name (of Post Sancti Laurentii) from the solemnity of the great Deacon-Martyr. It is, also, sometimes called the Sunday of Humility, or, of the Pharisee and Publican, because of the Gospel of the day. The Greeks count it as the tenth of Saint Matthew, and they read on it the episode of the Lunatic, which is given in the 17th Chapter of that Evangelist.Epistle – 1 Corinthians xii. 2‒11
Brethren, you know that when you were heathens you went to dumb idols, according as you were led. Wherefore, I give you to understand that no man speaking by the Spirit of God says “Anathema” to Jesus. And no man can say “The Lord Jesus,” but by the Holy Ghost. Now there are diversities of graces, but the same Spirit. And there are diversities of ministries but the same Lord. And there are diversities of operations, but the same God, who works all in all. And the manifestation of the Spirit is given to every man unto profit. To one indeed, by the Spirit, is given the word of wisdom: and to another, the word of knowledge, according to the same Spirit: To another, faith in the same spirit: to another, the grace of healing in one Spirit: To another the working of miracles: to another, prophecy: to another, the discerning of spirits: to another, diverse kinds of tongues: to another, interpretation of speeches. But all these things, one and the same Spirit works, dividing to everyone according as He will.Thanks be to God.
Dom Prosper Guéranger:
The reading of our Epistle shows us that it is speaking of those absolutely gratuitous favours which, at the first commencement of the Church, were more or less enjoyed by every Christian assembly, and since then are imparted to a few privileged souls which, generally speaking though not necessarily, are being guided in the extraordinary paths of mystic Theology. If, in the immense majority of God’s faithful servants, we do not meet with these infused graces of prophecy, of supernatural knowledge, of the gift of tongues, or of miracles properly so called, yet the Lives of the Saints are always the common patrimony of the children of the Church and therefore they should not neglect to provide themselves with the lights needed for understanding and profiting by a reading which is so important and so interesting. In this season of the Liturgical Year which is so specially devoted to the celebration of the mysteries of divine Union, it is very necessary to have certain clear ideas without which we should be in danger of confounding what, in this higher Christian life, is the interior perfection of the soul and her real holiness, with those exterior, and intermittent, and varied phenomena which are but the radiation of the Spirit of love, who is Master to display His own operations in His own divine way.
These are the motives which induced the Church to select for today this passage from the Epistle of Saint Paul to the Corinthians. If we would fully enter into her design, we must not limit our attention to the few lines we have just been reading. The end of the chapter from which they are taken, as likewise the two subsequent chapters, are all one and the same piece of teaching, and must not be separated one from the other (1 Corinthians xii., xiii, xiv.) In this important passage, besides the summary of the principles which are unchangeable, we have also an instructive account of what the Church’s assemblies were in those early times when the omnipotence of the Holy Spirit everywhere opened and made to flow in abundance the double spring of miracle and holiness. The rapid conquest of the world which, from the very commencement was to give evidence to the catholicity of the Church, required a large effusion of power from on high: and in order that the promulgation of the New Testament might be made authoritatively among men, it was necessary that God should give it all possible solemnity and authenticity. And this He did, by accompanying it with signs and wonders, of which He alone could be the author. Hence in those early days the Holy Ghost took not possession of a soul by Baptism, without giving an external sign of His presence in that new Christian — without, that is, one of those manifestations which the Apostle here enumerates. Thus the Witness of the Word (John xv. 26) fulfilled the twofold mission he had received: he sanctified in truth the faithful of Christ (John xvii. 17) and he will convince of sin the world which would not receive the word of the heralds of the Gospel.
Saint Paul (Romans i. 4) mentions three proofs which were held out to the world as a sure guarantee of the divinity of Christ: these were His Resurrection from the grave, the holiness of those who became His disciples, and thirdly the innumerable miracles which accompanied the preaching of the Apostles and the conversion of the Gentiles. As to the first of these proofs, we will have it proposed to our consideration next Sunday. Passing then, to the second — the law given to the world by Jesus of Nazareth was abundantly proved to be of divine origin by the admirable change of this Earth of which, when He was born in it for our salvation, we might say in the language of the Scripture, all flesh had corrupted its way (Genesis vi. 12). For men that knew how to use their reasoning powers, no demonstration could be plainer or more cogent than this, which showed that, from the sinks of corruption, there were everywhere coming forth harvests worthy of Heaven, and that men, who had degraded themselves to the level of the brute by the indulgence of their evil passions, were now changed into angels of Earth by their saintly morals and heavenly aspirations. To change the odour of death into the good odour of Christ (2 Corinthians ii. 14‒16), that is, to live his life as did the Christians — was it not a revealing God to men by showing that the very life of God was lived by men in human flesh? (2 Corinthians iv. 10, 11).
But, for men who seem incapable of reasoning, for men who cannot see beyond the present nor raise themselves above the senses — for so many beings who have become brutalised who, in virtue which scorns to share in their debaucheries, see nothing but a something to stare at and blaspheme (1 Peter iv. 4) — for all these the Holy Spirit had prepared a demonstration which was tangible and visible, and which all could take in —it was that exuberance of supernatural gifts, which were actively at work in every place where there was a church. The gift of Tongues, which had given such power to the preaching of the Apostles on the day of Pentecost (Acts ii. 6‒11), was multiplied with such frequency, when men came near the baptismal font, that the beholders were astonished, or, as the full force of the sacred text gives it, they were stupified (Acts x. 44‒48). It continued to be the sign, the wonder, whose influence on the unbeliever, after first exciting his surprise, went on gradually inclining both his thoughts and his heart towards the word of faith (1 Corinthians xiv. 22). But the work of his conversion received a still greater impulse when he was introduced into the assembly of the men of his own neighbourhood, whom hitherto he had only known in the simple intercourse of every day life. He then found them transformed into prophets who could see into the most hidden recesses of his unbelieving soul. All were his convincers, all were his judges — how was he to resist? No, he fell prostrate on the ground, he adored God, he could not but acknowledge that the Lord was indeed in such an assembly (1 Corinthians xiv. 24, 25).
The Corinthians to whom Saint Paul wrote that Epistle were rich in these spiritual favours. Nothing of this kind of grace was wanting to them, and the Apostle gave thanks to God for His having so abundantly endowed them, for thereby a strong testimony was given to the Christian religion (1 Corinthians i. 4‒7). But it would have been a great mistake if from this profusion bestowed on them by the Holy Spirit, a man had concluded that the Corinthians were perfect. Jealousies, vanity, obstinacy and other miseries earned for them the name of carnal, which was given to them by the same divine Spirit, and made the Apostle tell them that he was compelled to treat them as children incapable of receiving anything like sublime teaching (1 Corinthians ii. 1‒3). These privileged receivers of gratuitous graces pointed out very clearly, therefore, the difference between the value the Christian should attach to these exceptionally great but perhaps, to the possessor’s own soul, unproductive favours and between the value he should set on justifying and sanctifying grace which makes the soul pleasing to God.
This second — the regularly appointed result of the Sacraments which were instituted by our Lord’s munificence for the use of all men — this justifying, this sanctifying, grace is the necessary basis of salvation. It is also the one sole measure of future glory, for its development and increase depend on the merit of each individual possessor. Gratuitous Grace, on the contrary, is irregular and spontaneous both in its origin and its effects, and is quite independent of the recipient, be his dispositions or merits what they may. Like the authority given to one over the souls of others — like those several ministries mentioned in our Epistle — this Gratuitous Grace has for its aim, not so much the advantage of him who receives it, as the advantage of his fellow-men. And this aim is realised independently of the virtue or the imperfection of the one whom God has selected as His instrument. So that miracles or prophecy do not necessarily presuppose a certain amount of holiness in the thaumaturgus or the prophet. We have a proof of it in our Corinthians, and a still stronger in Balaam and Judas. God, who had His own designs which were not to be frustrated by their faults or sins, left them in possession of His own gifts just as He does in the Priest who may, perhaps, be anything but what he should be. and who nevertheless validly makes use of faculties and powers more divine than any of those others. We have it from our divine Master Himself: “Many,” says He, will say that day (of judgment) ‘Lord! Lord! Have we not prophesied in your name, and, in your name, cast out devils, and done many wonderful works in your name?’ And then will I profess to them, “I never knew you. Depart from me, you that work iniquity!” (Matthew vii. 22, 23).
In these days when such manifestations of supernatural power are no longer needed for the promulgation of the Gospel, and are therefore less frequent, it is generally the case that when they are found in a Christian they are an indication of a real and sanctifying Union existing between him and the Spirit of love. That Holy Spirit, who raises such a Christian above the ordinary paths, takes pleasure in His own divine work, and wishes to have it attract the attention either of all the faithful, or at least of some privileged souls who, being moved by these extraordinary signs, give thanks to God for the favours He has bestowed on that soul. And yet, even in such case it would be a mistake to measure the holiness of that favoured soul by the number or greatness of such exterior gifts. The development of charity by the exercise of the several virtues is the only thing that makes men be Saints. Divine Union, whether it be that degree of it which is attainable by all, or those grand heights of Mystic Theology which are reached by a few privileged ones — divine Union does not in any way depend on those brilliant phenomena. These, when they are bestowed on a servant of God, do not generally wait for his reaching perfection in divine love, though it is love alone will give him, if he be faithful, the perfection of true holiness.
The practical conclusion we are to draw from all this, is, what the Apostle makes the summary of his teaching on this subject: Have a great esteem for all these gifts. Look on them as the work of the Holy Ghost who thereby bestows manifold degrees of adornment on the whole body of the Church (1 Corinthians xii. 11‒30). Do not despise any of these (1 Corinthians xiv. 39), but when you see or hear of any of them count those as the most precious (1 Corinthians xii. 31) which produce most edification in the Church, and in souls (1 Corinthians xiv. 12). Let us, above all, hearken to what Saint Paul adds: “I have a way to show you more excellent than all these! (1 Corinthians xii. 31). If I should speak with the tongues of men and of angels; if I should have prophecy, and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge; if I should have all faith, so that I could remove mountains; if I have not charity, I am nothing, it profits me nothing. Prophecies will be made void, tongues will cease, knowledge will be destroyed” and be substituted by the vision beatific. But Charity will never fail, will never cease. Of all things, Charity is the greatest (1 Corinthians xiii. 1‒13).Gospel – Luke xviii. 9‒14
At that time Jesus spoke this parable to some who trusted in themselves as just and despised others: “Two men went up into the temple to pray: the one a Pharisee and the other a publican. The Pharisee standing, prayed thus with himself: ‘O God, I give you thanks that I am not as the rest of men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, as also is this publican. I fast twice in a week: I give tithes of all that I possess.’ And the publican, standing afar off, would not so much as lift up his eyes towards heaven; but struck his breast, saying: ‘O God, be merciful to me a sinner.’ I say to you, this man went down into his house justified rather than the other: because every one that exalts himself will be humbled: and he that humbles himself will be exalted.”Praise be to you, O Christ.
Dom Prosper Guéranger:
Commenting this passage of Saint Luke, Venerable Bede thus explains the mystery: “The Pharisee is the Jewish people, who boasts of the merits he had acquired to himself by observing the precepts of the law. The Publican is the Gentile who, being far off from God, confesses his sins. The Pharisee, by reason of his pride, has to depart in humiliation. The Publican, by his lamenting his miseries, merited to draw near to God, that is, to be exalted. It is of these two people, and of every man, who is proud or humble, that it is written: ‘The heart of a man is exalted before destruction, and it is humbled before he be glorified” (Proverbs xviii. 12).
In the whole Gospel, then, there was no teaching more appropriate, as a sequel to the history of Jerusalem’s fall. The children of the Church who in her early years saw her humbled in Sion and persecuted by the insulting arrogance of the Synagogue, now quite understand that word of the Wise Man: ‘Better is it to be humbled with the meek, than to divide spoils with the proud!’ (Proverbs xvi. 19). According to another Proverb, the tongue of the Jew — that tongue which abused the Publican and ran down the poor Gentile — is become, in his mouth, as a rod of pride (Proverbs xiv. 3), a rod which, in time, struck himself by bringing on his own destruction. But while adoring the justice of God’s vengeance and giving praise to His mercy, the Gentiles must take care not to go into the path in which was lost the unhappy people, whose place they now occupy. Israel’s offence, says Saint Paul, has brought about the salvation of the Gentiles. But his pride would be also their ruin, and whereas Israel is assured, by prophecy, of a return to God’s favour when the end of the world will be approaching (Romans xi. 25‒27), there is no such promise of a second call of mercy to the Gentiles should they ever apostatise after their baptism. If, at present, the power of Eternal Wisdom enables the Gentiles to produce fruits of glory and honour (Ecclesiasticus xxiv. 23), let them never forget how once they were vile barren trees: then humility, which alone can keep them right, as formerly it alone drew on them the eye of God’s mercy, humility will be an easy duty and, at the same time, they will understand the regard they should always entertain for the people of Israel in spite of all his sins.
For, at the time that the original defect of their birth made the Gentiles be as so many wild olive trees producing nothing but worthless fruits, the good, the genuine, the natural olive tree, through whose branches flowed the sap of grace, was growing and flourishing, sucking sanctification into its branches from the holy root of the Patriarchs, blessed of God (Romans xi. 16‒24). “We must remember that this tree of salvation is ever the same. Some of its branches fell off, it is true, and others were substituted. But this accession of the Gentiles, who were permitted by grace to graft their branches into the holy stock — this accession effected no change, either in the stock, or in its root. The God of the Gentiles is not another, but the same, as the God of Isaac and Jacob. The heavenly olive tree is one, and only one, and its roots rest in Abraham’s bosom: it is from the faith of this the just man by excellence (Romans iv. 11‒18) it is from the blessing promised to him (Genesis xii. 3) and to his divine Bud (Genesis xii. 18), the blessing which was to be imparted to all the nations of the earth, that flows the life-giving and rich sap which will transform the Gentile world in all future ages. When, therefore, Christian nations are boasting of their origin and descent, let them not forget the one which is above all the rest. The founders of earthly empires are not, in God’s way of counting, the true fathers of the people of those empires: in the order of supernatural, that is, of our best, interest, Abraham the Hebrew (Genesis xiv. 13), he that went forth from Chaldea at the call of God (Genesis xii. 1‒4) — he, by the fecundity of his faith is the truest father of nations (Genesis xvii. 4‒7).
Now we can understand those words of the Apostle: “Boast not, you wild olive tree that, contrary to nature, was grafted into the good olive tree, boast not against the original branches. But if you are tempted to boast, remember, you bear not the root but the root bears you. Therefore, be not high-minded, but fear” (Romans xi. 18, 20, 24). Humility, which produces within us this salutary fear, is the virtue that makes man know his right place, with regard both to God and his fellow-men. It rests on the deep-rooted conviction, put into our hearts by grace, of how God is everything in man, and of how we, by nature, are nothingness, no, less than nothingness, because we have degraded ourselves by sin. Reason is able, of herself alone, to convince anyone who takes the trouble to reflect, of the nothingness of a creature. But such conviction, if it remain a mere theoretical conclusion, is not Humility: it is a conviction which forces itself on the devil in Hell, whose vexation at such a truth is the chief source of the rage of that leader of the proud. As faith, which reveals to us what God is in the supernatural order, does not come from mere reason, nor remain confined to the intellect alone, so neither does humility, which teaches us what we ourselves are: that it may be true real virtue it must derive its light from above, and in the Holy Spirit, must move our will also. At the same time that this Holy Spirit fills our souls with the knowledge of their littleness and misery, he also sweetly leads them to the acceptance and love of this truth, which reason, if left entirely to herself, would be tempted to look on as a disagreeable thought.
And when this holy Spirit of truth (John xiv. 17) this divine witness of hearts (Wisdom i. 6) takes possession of a soul, what an incomparably stronger light is there in the humility which He imparts, than in that which mere human reason forces on a man! We are bewildered at seeing to what lengths this sentiment of their own misery led the Saints: it made them deem themselves inferior to every one. It drove them to act and speak in a way which in our flippant judgement, out-stepped the bounds of both truth and justice! But the Holy Ghost who guided and ruled them passed a very different judgement. And it is precisely because of His being the Spirit of all truth and all justice — in other words, because of His being the Sanctifying Spirit — that, as He willed to raise them to extraordinary holiness, He therefore gave them an extraordinary clear-sightedness, both as to what they themselves were, and what God is. Satan, the spirit of wickedness, makes his slaves act just the opposite to the divine way. The way he makes them take is the one he took for himself from the very beginning, and which our Lord thus expresses: “He stood not in the truth” (John viii. 44), he aimed at “being like the Most High” (Isaias xiv. 4). This pride of his succeeded in fixing him, for all eternity, in the hell of absurdity and lie. Therefore, Humility is Truth and as that same Jesus says: “The Truth will make you free” (John viii. 32, 34) by liberating us from the tyranny of the father of lies (John viii. 44) and then having made us free, it makes us holy. It sanctifies us (John xvii. 17) by uniting us to God, who is living and substantial Truth.
In proportion as the human creature advances in the paths of divine Union, and draws nearer to this infinite ALL, this One who alone is by essence (Exodus iii. 14) — man, far from losing any of his own borrowed being, receives a marvellous increase of both light and heat. It would be more correct, perhaps, to say that, as by drawing nearer to God, he lives, not he, but Christ lives in him (Galatians ii. 20), so, together with that life of his own self, he is entirely losing the factitious light which used to accompany that diminished life of his and which, when he was far removed from the divine centre of light, may have seemed to him grand because it came from no source but his own poor Self! Yes, when he is in close union with the divine Light, all that flicker of his own is lost. And what a happy loss when it gives him such a gain! The stars which gravitate round the sun get more brilliant with his light, the nearer they approach him till, at last, they quite disappear under the immediate action of their glorious centre, whereas the brightness they have from him seems less dependent when in the isolation produced by distance. It seems all the more to be their own, the further they are from him.
There are men who, like Satan, have done all in their power to throw themselves out of the orbit of the divine sun. Rather than acknowledge that they owe all they have to the Most High God, they would sink back again into nothingness, if they could. To the heavenly treasures which the common Father opens out to all who own themselves to be
His children, they prefer the pleasure of keeping to natural good things, for then, so they talk, they owe what they get to their own cleverness and exertions. They are foolish men not to understand that, do what they please, they owe everything they have or get to this their forgotten God (1 Corinthians iv. 7). They are weak sickly minds, taking for principles which they may be proud of, these vapours of conceit in which their disordered brain finds delight. Their high-mindedness is but ignominy. Their independence leads but to slavery, for, though refusing to have God as their Father, they must by necessity have Him as their Master. And thus, not being His children, they must be His slaves. As slaves, they keep to the vile food which they themselves preferred to the pure delights with which Wisdom inebriates them that follow her. As slaves, they have acquired the right to the scourge and the fetter. They chose to be satisfied with what they had, and would have neither the throne that was prepared for them (Wisdom vi. 22), nor the nuptial robe (Ecclesiasticus vi. 32). Let them, if they will, prefer their prison and there deck themselves in the finery which moths will be soon making their food! But, during these short years of theirs, they are branding their bodies with a deeper slavery than ever red-hot iron stamped on vilest bondsman. All this comes because, with all the empty philosophy which was their boast, they would not listen to the Christian teaching — that real greatness consists in the Truth, and that Humility alone leads to it.
Not only does man not unman himself by humbling himself — for he thereby is but believing himself to be what he really is — but, according to the Gospel expression, the degree of that voluntary abasement is the measure of God’s exaltation of him. The Holy Ghost is, beyond measure, liberal in bestowing His gifts on one who is sure to refer all the glory of them to the divine Giver. It is to the little that the Lord of Heaven and Earth makes revelations which He hides from the proudly wise and prudent (Luke x. 21). More correctly, the truly wise, the perfect ones of whom Saint Paul speaks, who alone understand the mysteries of God’s infinite love (1 Corinthians ii. 6‒16) of which they have had experience even in this present life — are they not those little ones whom divine Wisdom calls to His banquet (Proverbs ix. 4), who are nothing in their own eyes (Wisdom ix. 5), 1 but whose confiding simplicity ravishes his heart (Wisdom viii.) and who find that all good things come to them together with this divine visitor? (Wisdom vii. 11). Verily, it is in them that among all the children of men He finds His delights (Proverbs viii. 31). It is just what the disciples could not understand when, after the words of our Lord which are given in today’s Gospel, they insisted, as Saint Luke tells us, on keeping back the little ones who wanted to get too near Him. But this Jesus of ours, this Wisdom Incarnate insisted on their being brought to Him, saying very much the same as He had already done in the Old Testament pages: “Suffer little children to come to me: do not forbid them! for, of such is the kingdom of God, and of them that are like them. Amen say to you: whoever will not receive the kingdom of God as a child, will not enter into it! (Luke xviii. 15‒17)
In that Heaven, that Kingdom of God, the humility of the Saints is far greater than it was while they were here on Earth because they now see the realities which then they could only faintly take in. Their happiness, yonder above, is to be gazing on and adoring that altitude of God of which they will never have an adequate knowledge, and the more they look up at that infinite perfection, the deeper do they plunge into their own original nothingness. Let us get these great truths well into us, and we will have no difficulty in understanding how it was that the greatest Saints were the humblest creatures here below, and how the same beautiful fact is still one great charm of Heaven. it must be so, for the light of the elect is in proportion to their glory. What, then, must all this exquisite truth be when we apply it to the great Mother of God? The nearest to the throne of her divine Son, she is precisely what she was in Nazareth (Luke i. 48), that is, she is the humblest of all creatures, because she is the most enlightened of all, and therefore understands better than even the Seraphim and Cherubim, the greatness of God and the nothingness of creatures.
