30 DECEMBER – SIXTH DAY IN THE OCTAVE OF CHRISTMAS

Dom Prosper Guéranger:

On this the sixth day since the Birth of our Emmanuel, let us consider how the Divine Infant lies in the crib of a stable, and is warmed by the breath of the ox and the ass, as Isaias had foretold: “The ox knows his owner, and the ass his master’s crib; but Israel has not known me (Isaias i. 3). Thus does the great God enter that world which his own Hands have created! The dwellings of men are refused Him, for man has a hard heart for His God, and an indifference which is a real contempt. The only shelter He can find to be born in is a stable, and that necessitates His coming into the world in the company of poor dumb brutes.

At all events, these animals are His own work. When He created the irrational world of living things, He subjected it, as the inferior part of creation, to Man. And Man was to ennoble it by referring it to the Creator. When Adam sinned, this subjection, this harmony, was broken. The Apostle teaches us that the brute creation is not insensible to the degradation thus forced upon it by sinful man (Romans viii. 19, 20). It obeys him with reluctance. It not infrequently rebels against and deservedly punishes him, and on the day of judgement, it will take the side of its Creator and avenge itself of that wickedness of which man has made it the unwilling instrument (Wisdom v. 21).

In the mystery of His Birth, the Son of God visits this part of His creation. Men refused to receive Him and He accepts the hospitality of the dwelling of brutes. It is from their dwelling that He begins the divine career of the Three-and-Thirty years. The first human beings He invites into the company of His blessed Mother and His dear Saint Joseph, the first He admits into the stable to see and adore Himself are shepherds who were busy watching their flocks and whose simple hearts have not been corrupted by the atmosphere of cities.

The Ox — which, as we learn from Ezechiel (Ezechiel i. 10) and Saint John (Apocalypse iv. 7) is one of the symbolic creatures standing round God’s throne — is the figure of the sacrifices of the Old Law. The blood of oxen has flowed in torrents on the altar of the Temple: it was the imperfect and material offering prescribed to be made to God until He should send the True Victim. The Infant Jesus who lies in the crib is that Victim, and Saint Paul tells us what he says to His Eternal Father: “Sacrifices and oblations and holocausts for sin, you would not have, neither are they pleasing to you; behold, I come! (Hebrews x. 8, 9).

The Prophet Zachary (Zacharias ix. 9), foretelling the peaceful triumph of the Meek King, says that He will make His entry into Sion riding on an Ass. We will assist, further on in the year, at the accomplishment of this prophecy. Now that we are at Bethlehem in our Christmas mystery, let us observe how the heavenly Father places His Divine Son between the instrument of His peaceful triumph and the symbol of His Sacrifice on Calvary.

Ah dear Jesus! Creator of Heaven and Earth,how strange is this your entrance into your own world! The whole universe should have given you a welcome of love and adoration— and yet, what motionless indifference! Not one house to take you in! Men buried in sleep! And when Mary had placed you in the crib, your first sight was that of two poor animals, the slaves of him who proudly rejected you! Yet, this sight did not displease you, for you do not despise the work of your hands. What afflicts your loving Heart is the presence of sin in our souls, the sight of that enemy of yours which has so often caused you to suffer. Oh hateful sin I we renounce it, and wish, dear Jesus, to acknowledge you for our Lord and Master, as did the Ox and the Ass! We will unite in that hymn of of peace, which creation is ever sending up to you, by henceforth adding to it the homage of our adoration and gratitude. Nay, we will lend speech to nature, and give it soul, and sanctify it, by referring all creatures to your service.

On this day according to the ROMAN MARTYROLOGY:

At Spoleto, the birthday of the holy martyrs Sabinus, bishop, Exuperantius and Marcellus, deacons. Also of Venustian, governor, with his wife and sons, under the emperor Maximian. Marcellus and Exuperantius were first racked, then severely beaten with rods. Afterwards being mangled with iron hooks and burned in the sides, they terminated their martyrdom. Not long after, Venustian was put to the sword with his wife and sons. St. Sabinus, after having his hands cut off, and being a long time confined in prison, was scourged to death. The martyrdom of these saints is commemorated on the same day, although it occurred at different times.

At Alexandria, the holy martyrs Mansuetus, Severus, Appian, Donatus, Honorius and their companions.

At Thessalonica, St. Anysia, martyr.

In the same place, St. Anysius, bishop of that city.

At Milan, St. Eugene, bishop and confessor.

At Ravenna, St. Liberius, bishop.

At Aquila in Abruzzo, St. Rainerius, bishop.

And in other places, many other holy martyrs, confessors and virgins.

Thanks be to God.

29 DECEMBER – SAINT THOMAS BECKET (Bishop and Martyr)

Thomas was born in London, England. He succeeded Theobald as Bishop of Canterbury. He had previously acquitted himself with much honour as Chancellor, and was strenuous and unflinching in his duty as Bishop. When Henry II, King of England, in an assembly of the Bishops and Nobles of the realm, passed certain laws inconsistent with the interests and the honour of the Church, the Bishop withstood the King’s avarice so courageously that neither fair promises nor threats could draw him over to the King’s side and, being in danger of imprisonment, he privately withdrew. Not long after, all his relatives young and old, all his friends and household, were banished, and such of them as had attained the age of discretion were made to promise on oath that they would go to Thomas as perhaps he, who could not be made to swerve from his holy purpose by any personal consideration, might relent at the heart-rending spectacle of the sufferings of them who were dear to him. But he regarded not the demands of flesh and blood, neither did he permit the feelings of natural affection to weaken the firmness required of him as Bishop. He therefore repaired to Pope Alexander III from whom he met with a kind reception, and who commended him on his departure to the Cistercian Monks of Pontigny. As soon as Henry came to know this, he strove to have Thomas expelled from Pontigny and for this purpose sent threatening letters to the General Chapter of Citeaux. The holy man, fearing that the Cistercian Order should be made to suffer on his account, left the monastery of his own accord and went to the hospitable shelter to which he had been invited by Louis, King of France. There he remained until, by the intervention of the Pope and Louis the King, he was called home from his banishment to the joy of the whole kingdom.

While resuming the intrepid discharge of the duty of a good Shepherd, certain calumniators denounced him to King Henry as one that was plotting various things against the country and the public peace. The King was heard frequently complaining that there was only one priest in his kingdom with whom he could not be in peace. Certain wicked satellites concluded from this expression of the King that he would be pleased at their ridding him of Thomas. Accordingly they stealthily enter Canterbury, and finding the Bishop was in the church officiating at Vespers, they began their attack. The clergy were using means to prevent them from entering the church when the Saint coming to them forbade their opposition, and, opening the door, thus spoke to them: “The Church is not to be guarded like a citadel, and I am glad to die for God’s Church. Then turning to the soldiers, he said: I command you, in the name of God, that you hurt not any of them that are with me. After this he knelt down, and commending his Church and himself to God, to Blessed Mary, to Saint Denis, and to the other patron saints of his Cathedral with the same courage that he had shown in resisting the King’s execrable laws, he bowed down his head to the impious murderers on the Fourth of the Calends of January (December 29th), in 1171. His brains were scattered on the door of the entire Church. God having shown the holiness of his servant by many miracles, he was canonised by the same Pope, Alexander III.

Dom Prosper Guéranger:

Another martyr comes in today to take his place round the crib of our Jesus. He does not belong to the first ages of the Church. His name is not written in the Books of the New Testament like those of Stephen, John and the Innocents of Bethlehem. Yet does he stand most prominent in the ranks of that Martyr-Host which has been receiving fresh recruits in every age, and is one of those visible abiding proofs of the vitality of the Church, and of the undecaying energy infused into her by her divine Founder. This glorious Martyr did not shed his blood for the faith. He was not dragged before the tribunals of pagans or heretics, there to confess the Truths revealed by Christ and taught by the Church. He was slain by Christian hands. It was a Catholic King that condemned him to death. It was by the majority of his own brethren, and they his countrymen, that he was abandoned and blamed. How then could he be a Martyr? How did he gain a palm like Stephen’s? He was the Martyr for the Liberty of the Church.

Every Christian is obliged to lay down his life rather than deny any of the Articles of our holy Faith: it was the debt we contracted with Jesus Christ when He adopted us in Baptism as His brethren. All are not called to the honour of martyrdom, that is, all are not required to bear that testimony to the Truth which consists in shedding one’s blood for it: but all must so love their Faith as to be ready to die rather than deny it under pain of incurring the eternal death from which the grace of our Redeemer has already delivered us. The same obligation lies still more heavily on the Pastors of the Church. It is the pledge of the truth of their teachings.

Hence we find in almost every page of the History of the Church the glorious names of saintly Bishops who laid down their lives for the Faith they had delivered to their people. It was the last and dearest pledge they could give of their devotedness to the Vineyard entrusted to them, and in which they had spent years of care and toil. The blood of their Martyrdom was more than a fertilising element: it was a guarantee, the highest that man can give, that the seed they had sown in the hearts of men was in very truth the revealed Word of God. But beyond the debt which every Christian has of shedding his blood rather than deny his Faith, that is, of allowing no threats orders to make him disown the sacred ties which unite him to the Church and, through her, to Jesus Christ — beyond this Pastors have another debt to pay which is that of defending the Liberty of the Church. To kings and rulers and, in general, to all diplomatists and politicians, there are few expressions so unwelcome as this of the Liberty of the Church. With them it means a sort of conspiracy. The world talks of it as being an unfortunate scandal originating in priestly ambition. Timid temporising Catholics regret that it can elicit any one’s zeal, and will endeavour to persuade us that we have no need to fear anything so long as our Faith is not attacked. Notwithstanding all this, the Church has put upon her altars the glorious Saint Thomas of Canterbury who was slain in his Cathedral in the twelfth century because he resisted a King’s infringements on the extrinsic rights of the Church. She sanctions the noble maxim of Saint Anselm, one of Saint Thomas’ predecessors in the See of Canterbury: “Nothing does God love so much in this world as the Liberty of His Church” and the Apostolic See declared by the mouth of Pius IX in the nineteenth century, the very same doctrine she would have taught by Saint Gregory VIII in the eleventh century: “The Church, the spotless Spouse of Jesus Christ the immaculate Lamb, is, by God’s appointment FREE and subject to no earthly power.”

But in what does this sacred Liberty consist? It consists in the Church’s absolute independence of every secular power in the ministry of the Word of God which she is bound to preach in season and out of season, as Saint Paul says, to all mankind, without distinction of nation, or race, or age, or sex: in the administration of the Sacraments, to which she must invite all men, without exception, in order to the world’s salvation: in the practice, free from all human control, of the counsels, as well as of the precepts, of the Gospel: in the unobstructed intercommunication of the several degrees of her sacred hierarchy: in the publication and application of her decrees and ordinances in matters of discipline: in the maintenance and development of the Institutions she has founded: in the holding and governing her temporal patrimony: and lastly, in the defence of those privileges which have been adjudged to her by the civil authority itself, in order that her ministry of peace and charity might be unembarrassed and respected.

Such is the Liberty of the Church. It is the bulwark of the Sanctuary. Every breach there, imperils the hierarchy and even the very Faith. A Bishop may not flee, as the hireling, nor hold his peace, like those dumb dogs of which the Prophet Isaias speaks, and which are not able to bark (Isaias lvi. 10). He is the Watchman of Israel: he is a traitor if he first lets the enemy enter the citadel and then, but only then, gives the alarm and risks his person and his life. The obligation of laying down his life for his flock begins to be in force at the enemy’s first attack upon the very out-posts of the city, which is only safe when they are strongly guarded. The consequence of the Pastor’s resistance may be of the most serious nature, in which event, we must remember a truth which has been admirably expressed by Bossuet in his magnificent Panegyric on Saint Thomas of Canterbury which we regret not being able to give from beginning to end. “It is an established law,” he says, “that every success the Church acquires costs her the life of some of her children, and that in order to secure her rights, she must shed her own blood. Her Divine Spouse redeemed her by the Blood He shed for her, and He wishes that she should purchase, on the same terms, the graces He bestows on her. It was by the blood of the Martyrs that she extended her conquests far beyond the limits of the Roman Empire. It was her blood that procured her, both the peace she enjoyed under the Christian, and the victory she gained over the pagan, Emperors. So that, as she had to shed her blood for the propagation of her teaching, she had also to bleed for the making her authority accepted. The Discipline, therefore, as well as the Faith, of the Church, was to have its Martyrs.”

Hence it was that Saint Thomas and the rest of the Martyrs for Ecclesiastical Liberty, never once stopped to consider how it was possible, with such weak means as were at theirs, to oppose the invaders of the rights of the Church. One great element of Martyrdom is simplicity united with courage, and this explains how there have been Martyrs among the lowest classes of the Faithful, and that young girls and even children, can show their rich palm-branch. God has put into the heart of a Christian a capability of humble and inflexible resistance which makes every opposition give way. What, then, must that fidelity be which the Holy Ghost has put into the souls of Bishops whom he has constituted the Spouses of His Church and the defenders of His beloved Jerusalem! “Saint Thomas,” says Bossuet, “yields not to injustice, under the pretext that it is armed with the sword, and that it is a King who commits it. On the contrary, seeing that its source is high up, he feels his obligation of resisting it to be the greater, just as men throw the embankments higher when the torrent swells.”

But, the Pastor may lose his life in the contest! Yes, it may be so — he may possibly have this glorious privilege. Our Lord came into this world to fight against it and conquer it — but He shed his blood in the contest, He died on a Cross. So likewise were the Martyrs put to death. Can the Church, then, that was founded by the Precious Blood of her Divine Master and was established by the blood of the Martyrs, can she ever do without the saving laver of blood which reanimates her with vigour and vests her with the rich crimson of her royalty? Saint Thomas understood this, and when we remember how he laboured to mortify his flesh by a life of penance, and how every sort of privation and adversity had taught him to crucify to this world every affection of his heart, we cannot be surprised at his possessing within his soul the qualities which fit a man for martyrdom — calmness of courage and a patience proof against every trial. In other words, he had received from God the Spirit of Fortitude, and he faithfully corresponded to it.

“In the language of the Church,” continues Bossuet, “fortitude has not the meaning it has in the language of the world. Fortitude, as the world understands it, is the undertaking great things. According to the Church, it goes not beyond the suffering every sort of trial, and there it stops. Listen to the words of Saint Paul:  Ye have not yet resisted unto blood,’ as though he would say: ‘You have not yet gone the whole length of your duty, because you have not resisted your enemies unto blood.’ He does not say, ‘You have not attacked your enemies and shed their blood’ but, ‘Your resistance to your enemies has not yet cost you your blood.’ These are the high principles of Saint Thomas, but see how he makes use of them. He arms himself with this sword of the Apostle’s teaching, not to make a parade of courage and gain a name for heroism, but simply because the Church is threatened and he must hold over her the shield of his resistance. The strength of the holy Archbishop lies not in any way either in the interference of sympathisers or in a plot ably conducted. He has but to publish the suffering he has so patiently borne and odium will fall on his persecutor: certain secret springs need only to be touched by such a man as this, and the people would be roused to indignation against the King! But the Saint scorns both plans. All he has on his side is the prayer of the poor, and the sighs of the widow and the orphan: these, as Saint Ambrose would say, these are the Bishop’s defenders, these his guard! These his army! He is powerful because he has a soul that knows not either how to fear or how to murmur. He can, in all truth, say to Henry, King of England, what Tertullian said in the name of the whole Church to a magistrate of the Roman Empire, who was a cruel persecutor of the Church: We neither frighten you, nor fear you: we Christians are neither dangerous men, nor cowards. Not dangerous, because we cannot cabal, and not cowards, because we fear not the sword.”

Our Panegyrist proceeds to describe the victory won for the Church by her intrepid Martyr of Canterbury. We can scarcely be surprised when we are told that during the very year in which he preached this eloquent Sermon, Bossuet was raised to the episcopal dignity. We need offer no apology for giving the following fine passage. “Christians! Give me your attention. If there ever were a Martyrdom which bore the resemblance to a Sacrifice, it was the one I have to describe to you. First of all, there is the preparation: the Bishop is in the Church with his Ministers and all are robed in the sacred vestments. And the victim? The victim is near at hand — the Bishop is the victim chosen by God, and he is ready. So that all is prepared for the Sacrifice, and they that are to strike the blow enter the Church. The holy man walks before them, as Jesus did before His enemies. He forbids his clergy to make the slightest resistance and all he asks of his enemies is that they injure none of them that are present: it is the close imitation of his Divine Master who said to them that apprehended Him: ‘If it be I whom you seek, suffer these to go their way.’ And when all this had been done and the moment for the sacrifice was come, Saint Thomas begins the ceremony. He is both victim and priest — he bows down his head and offers the prayer. Listen to the solemn prayer and the mystical words of the sacrifice: ‘I am ready to do for God, and for the claims of justice, and for the Liberty of the Church, if only she may gain peace and Liberty by this shedding of my blood!’ He prostrates himself before God and as in the Holy Sacrifice there is the invocation of the Saints our Intercessors, Thomas omits not so important a ceremony: he beseeches the Holy Martyrs and the Blessed Mary ever a Virgin to deliver the Church from oppression. He can pray for nothing but the Church. His heart beats but for the Church. His lips can speak nothing but the Church, and when the blow has been struck, his cold and lifeless tongue seems still to be saying: ‘The Church!’”

Thus did our glorious Martyr, the type of a Bishop of the Church, consummate his sacrifice. Thus did he win his victory, and his victory will produce the total abolition of the sinful laws which would have made the Church the creature of the State, and an object of contempt to the people. The tomb of the Saint will become an Altar and at the foot of that Altar there will one day kneel a penitent King, humbly praying for pardon and blessing. What has wrought this change? Has the death of Thomas of Canterbury stirred up the people to revolt? Has his Martyrdom found its avengers? No. It is the blood of one who died for Christ, producing its fruit. The world is hard to teach, else it would have long since learned this truth — that a Christian people can never see with indifference a Pastor put to death for fidelity to his charge, and that a Government that dares to make a Martyr will pay dearly for the crime. Modem diplomacy has learned the secret. Experience has given it the instinctive craft of waging war against the Liberty of the Church with less violence and more intrigue — the intrigue of enslaving her by political administration. It was this crafty diplomacy which forged the chains with which so many churches are now shackled, and which, be they ever so gilded, are insupportable.. There is but one way to unlink such fetters — to break them. He that breaks them will be great in the Church of Heaven and Earth, for he must be a Martyr: he will not have to fight with the sword or be a political agitator, but simply to resist the plotters against the Liberty of the Spouse of Christ, and suffer patiently whatever may be said or done against him.

Let us give ear once more to the sublime Panegyrist of our Saint Thomas: he is alluding to this patient resistance which made the Archbishop triumph over tyranny.

“My Brethren, see what manner of men the Church finds rising up to defend her in her weakness, and how truly she may say with the Apostle: ‘When I am weak, then am I powerful’ (2 Corinthians xii. 10). It is this blessed weakness which provides her with invincible power and which enlists in her cause the bravest soldiers and the mightiest conquerors this world has ever seen — I mean, the Martyrs. He that infringes on the authority of the Church, let him dread that precious blood of the Martyrs which consecrates and protects it.”

Now all this Fortitude, and the whole of this Victory, came from the crib of the Infant Jesus: therefore it is, that we find Saint Thomas standing near it in company with the Proto-Martyr Stephen. Any example of humility, and of what the world calls poverty and weakness, which had been less eloquent than this of the mystery of God made a little child, would have been insufficient to teach man what real power is. Up to that time man had no other idea of power than that which the sword can give, or of greatness than that which comes of riches, or of joy than such as triumph brings: but when God came into this world and showed Himself weak and poor and persecuted, every thing was changed. Men were found who loved the lowly crib of Jesus, with all its humiliations, better than the whole world besides: and from this mystery of the weakness of an Infant God they imbibed a greatness of soul which even the world could not help admiring. It is most just, therefore, that the two laurel wreaths of Saint Thomas and Saint Stephen should intertwine round the crib of the Babe of Bethlehem, for they are the two trophies of His two dear Martyrs.

As regards Saint Thomas, divine Providence marked out most clearly the place he was to occupy in the Cycle of the Christian Year by permitting his martyrdom to happen on the day following the Feast of the Holy Innocents so that the Church could have no hesitation in assigning the 29th of December as the day for celebrating the memory of the saintly Archbishop of Canterbury. As long as the world lasts, this day will be a Feast of dearest interest to the whole Church of God, and the name of Thomas of Canterbury will be, to the day of judgement, terrible to the enemies of the Liberty of the Church, and music breathing hope and consolation to hearts that love that Liberty which Jesus bought at the price of His Precious Blood.

Epistle – Hebrews v.

Brethren, every High Priest taken from among men is ordained for men in the things that appertain to God, that he may offer up gifts and sacrifices for sins: who can have compassion on them that are ignorant and that err: because he himself, also, is compassed with infirmity: and therefore he ought, as for the people, as also for himself, to offer for sins. Neither does any man take the honour to himself, but he that is called by God, as Aaron was. So, also, Christ did not glorify Himself that He might be made a High Priest: but He that said to Him: “You are my Son, this day have I begotten you.” As He says, also, in another place: “You are a Priest forever, according to the order of Melchisedech.”

Thanks be to God.

Dom Prosper Guéranger:

When we meet in the Annals of the Church with the names of those great Bishops who have been the glory of the Christian Pontificate, we are at once sure that these men, the true images of the great High Priest Jesus our Lord, did not intrude themselves uncalled into the dread honours of the Sanctuary. The history of their Lives shows us that they were called by God Himself, as Aaron was. And when we come to examine how it was that they were so great, we soon find that the source of their greatness was their humility that led them to refuse the honourable burden which others would put upon them. God assisted them in the day of trouble and trial, because their exaltation to the episcopacy had been His own work.

Thus was it with Saint Thomas who sat on his episcopal throne of Canterbury, the dignified and courageous Primate. He began by declining the high honour that was offered him. He boldly tells the King (as Saint Gregory VII, before ascending the Papal Throne, told the Emperor who fain would see him Pope) that, if forced to accept the proffered dignity, he is determined to oppose abuses. He thought by this to frighten men from putting him into the honours and responsibilities of the Pastoral charge, and hoped that they would no longer wish him to be a Bishop when they suspected that he would be a true one: but the decree of God had gone forth, and Thomas, called by God, was obliged to bow down his head and receive the holy anointing. And what a Bishop he, that begins by humility, and the determination to sacrifice his very life in the discharge of his duty! He is worthy to follow, and that to Calvary, the God-Man who, being called by His Father, to Priesthood and to Sacrifice, enters this world saying: “Behold! I come to do your will, O God!” (Hebrews x. 9)

Gospel – John x.

At that time Jesus said to the Pharisees: “I am the Good Shepherd. The good shepherd gives his life for the sheep. But the hireling, and he that is not the shepherd, whose own the sheep are not, sees the wolf coming and leaves the sheep, and flies: and the wolf catches and scatters the sheep. And the hireling flies because he is a hireling, and he has no care for the sheep. I am the Good Shepherd: and I know mine, and mine know me. As the Father knows me, and I know the Father. And I lay down my life for my sheep. And other sheep I have, that are not of this fold: them, also, I must bring, and they will hear my voice, and there will be one fold, and one Shepherd.

Praise be to you, O Christ.

Dom Prosper Guéranger:

All the strength of the Pontiffs and Pastors of the Church consists in their imitation of Jesus. It is not enough that they have in them the character of His Priesthood. They must also be ready, like Him, to lay down their lives for their sheep. The Shepherd who thinks more of his own life than of the salvation of his flock, is a hireling. He is not a shepherd: he loves himself, and not his sheep. His flock has a claim upon his shedding his blood for them and if he will not, he is no longer an image of the Good Shepherd, Jesus. See how calmly Saint Thomas lays down his life! He bows down his head to receive the blows of his executioners, as though he were simply acquitting himself of a duty, or paying a debt. After the example of Jesus, he gives his blood for the deliverance of his people, and no sooner has the sword done its work than the Church over which God had him, is set free: his blood has brought peace (Colossians i. 20). He withstood the wolf that threatened destruction to his flock. He vanquished him. The wolf himself was turned into a lamb, for the king visited the tomb of his victim and sought in prostrate supplication the Martyr’s blessing.

Thomas knew his sheep, that is, he loved them. It was a happiness to him, therefore, to die for them. He was made Pastor on the condition that he would die for them, just as our Emmanuel was made High Priest in order that He might offer Sacrifice in which, too, He was both Priest and Victim. Jesus’ sheep know their divine Shepherd: they know that He came in order to save them. Therefore is it that His birth at Bethlehem is so dear to them. The Shepherd of Canterbury, too, is also known by his sheep and therefore the Feast of his triumphant martyrdom is very dear to them, not only in the century when it happened, but even now, and so will it ever be, even to the end of time. In return for this love and devotion paid him by the Church on Earth, Thomas blesses her from Heaven. We cannot doubt it: the wonderful return to the ancient Faith which we are now witnessing in our dear England is due in no little measure to the powerful intercession of St. Thomas of Canterbury. And this intercession is the return, made by our glorious Martyr, for that fervent and filial devotion which is shown him, and which the faithful will ever show to him who was so heroically what only the true Church can produce — a true Pastor.

*****

O glorious Martyr Thomas! Courageous defender of the Church of your divine Master! We come on this day of your Feast to do honour to the wonderful graces bestowed on you by God. As children of the Church, we look with delighted admiration on him who so loved her, and to whom the honour of this Spouse of Christ was so dear, that he gladly sacrificed his life in order to secure her independence and Liberty. Because you so loved the Church as to sacrifice your peace, your temporal happiness and your very life, for her: because, too, your sacrifice was for nothing of your own but for God alone, therefore have the tongues of sinners and cowards spoken ill of you, and heaped calumnies on you. O Martyr truly worthy of the name! for the testimony you rendered was against your own interests. O Pastor! who, after the example of Jesus the Good Shepherd, shed your blood for the deliverance of your flock! we venerate you because the enemies of the Church insulted you. We love thee because they hated you, and we humbly ask you to pardon them that have been ashamed of you and have wished that your Martyrdom had never been written in the History of the Church because they could not understand it!

How great is your glory, O faithful Pontiff, in being chosen together with Saint John and the Innocents to attend on the Infant Jesus in the stable of Bethlehem! You entered on the battlefield at the eleventh hour, and far from being on that account deprived of the reward granted to the earliest of your brother-combatants, you are great even amongst the Martyrs. How dear must you not be to the Divine Babe whose birthday we are keeping, and who came into the world that He might be the King of Martyrs! What will He refuse to His grand Martyr of Canterbury! Then, pray for us, and gain us admission into Bethlehem. Our ambition is to love the Church as you did — that dear Church for love of which Jesus has come down upon the Earth — that sweet Church our Mother who is now unfolding to us such heavenly consolations by the celebration of the great Mysteries of Christmas, with which your name is now inseparably associated. Get us, by your prayers, the grace of fortitude that so we may courageously go through any suffering, and make any sacrifice, rather than dishonour our proud title of Catholic.

Speak for us to the Infant Jesus — to Him that is to bear the Cross on His shoulders, as the insignia of His government (Isaias ix. 6) — and tell Him that we are resolved, by the assistance of His grace, never to be ashamed of His cause or its defenders: that, full of filial simple love for the Holy Church which He has given us to be our Mother, we will ever put her interests above all others for she alone has the words of eternal life, she alone has the power and the authority to lead men to that better world, which is our last end, and passes not away, as do the things of this world: for everything in this world is but vanity, illusion and, more frequently than not, obstacles to the only real happiness of mankind.

But, in order that this Holy Church of God may fulfil her mission and avoid the snares which are being laid for her along the whole road of her earthly pilgrimage has need, above all things else, of Pastors like you, O Holy Martyr of Chris ! Pray, therefore, the Lord of the vineyard, that He send her labourers who will not only plant and water what they plant, but will also defend her from those enemies that are at all times seeking to enter in and lay waste, and whose character is marked by the sacred Scripture, where she calls them, the wild boar (Psalm lxxix. 14) and the fox (Canticles ii. 15). May the voice of your blood cry out more suppliantly than ever to God, for, in these days of anarchy, the Church of Christ is treated in many lands as the creature and slave of the State.

Pray for your own dear England which [four] hundred years ago, made shipwreck of the faith through the apostasy of so many Prelates who submitted to those usurpations which you resisted even to blood. Now that the Faith is reviving in her midst, stretch out your helping hand to her and thus avenge the outrages offered to your venerable name by your country when she — the once fair Island of Saints — was sinking into the abyss of heresy. Pray also for the Church of France, for she harboured you in your exile and, in times past, was fervent in her devotion to you. Obtain for her Bishops the spirit that animated you. Arm them with episcopal courage and, like you, they will save the Liberty of the Church. Wherever, and in whatever way, this sacred Liberty is trampled on or threatened, be its deliverer and guardian and, by your prayers and your example, win victory for the Spouse of our Lord Jesus Christ.

*****

Our new-born King is five days old today! Let us contemplate Him seated on His throne. The Holy Scriptures tell us (Isaias xxxvii 16) that our God sits upon the Cherubim in Heaven and that, under the old and Figurative Law, He chose for His throne on Earth the Ark of the Covenant (Exodus xxv. 22). Blessed be His Name for thus revealing to us the mystery of His throne! But beyond this the Psalmist told us of another place where God rested. Adore, said he, the footstool of His feet (Psalm xcviii.5). The adoration here commanded to be paid, not to God Himself, but to the resting-place of His Divine Majesty, seems to contrast with so many other passages of the Sacred Volume in which God commands us to adore only Himself. But, as the Holy Fathers observe, the mystery is now explained. The Second Person of the Blessed Trinity, the Word, the Son of God, has assumed our human nature. He has united it, in unity of Person, to His Divine Nature: and He commands us to adore this His Humanity, this Body and Soul which are like our own, this throne of His Majesty, in a word, this ineffable holy foot-stool of His feet.

But this Humanity itself has its throne. The Blessed Mother, Mary, raises the Divine Infant from the crib. She presses Him to her heart. She places Him on her knees — it is our God, the Emmanuel, throned, but with such ·love and majesty! on the Ark of the New Covenant. How far is the glory of Mary above that of the other living throne formed to the Eternal Word by the trembling wings of Cherubim! And the Ark of Moses, made of corruptible wood, covered with plates of gold, holding within it the Manna and the Rod of Aaron and the very Tables of the Law — is it not a figure that pales in the presence of the holiness and the dignity of the Mother of God?

How adorable are you on this throne, O Jesus! And how amiable and easy of approach! Those tiny hands stretched out to sinners, and the smile of Mary, the living throne — both bid us go near. Oh the happiness of being subjects of a King, so great and yet so endearing! Mary is the Seat of Wisdom because you, O Wisdom of the Father, are reposing on her. Reign there forever, sweet Jesus! Be our King, and Lord, and rule us in your comeliness and beauty and meekness! We are your subjects and we offer you our adoring loyalty and love, and to Mary, the Queen you have given us, we promise the homage of our best devotion!

On this day according to the ROMAN MARTYROLOGY:

At Jerusalem, holy David, king and prophet.

At Arles, the birthday of St. Trophimus, mentioned by the blessed Apostle St. Paul in his Epistle to Timothy. Being consecrated bishop by that Apostle, he was the first sent to preach the Gospel of Christ in that city. From his preaching as from a fountain, according to the expression of Pope St. Zosimus, all Gaul received the waters of salvation.

At Rome, the holy martyrs Callistus, Felix and Boniface.

In Africa, the holy martyrs Dominic, Victor, Primian, Lybosus, Saturninus, Crescentius, Secundus and Honoratus.

At Vienne in France, St. Crescens, a disciple of the blessed Apostle St. Paul, and first bishop of that city.

At Constantinople, St. Marcellus, abbot.

In Normandy, St. Ebrulphus, abbot and confessor, in the time of king Childebert.

And in other places, many other holy martyrs, confessors and virgins.

Thanks be to God.

28 DECEMBER – SUNDAY WITHIN THE OCTAVE OF THE NATIVITY

Dom Prosper Guéranger:

This is the only day within the Christmas Octave which is not a Saint’s Feast. During the Octaves of the Epiphany, Easter and Pentecost the Church is so absorbed in the respective mysteries that she puts off everything that could share her attention, whereas during this of Christmas, there is only one day which does not celebrate the memory of some glorious Saint and our Infant Jesus is surrounded by a choir of heroes who loved and served Him. Thus, the Church, or, more correctly, God — for God is the first author of the Cycle of the Year — shows us how the Incarnate Word, who came to save mankind, desires to give mankind confidence by this His adorable familiarity.

We have already shown that the birth of our Lord took place on a Sunday, the day on which, in the beginning of the world, God created Light. We will find, later on, that His Resurrection also was on a Sunday. This, the first day of creation and the first of the week, was consecrated, by the old pagans to the Sun: with us Christians, it is most sacred and holy on account of the two risings of our divine Sun of Justice — His Birth and His Resurrection. While the solemnity of Easter is always kept on a Sunday, that of Christmas falls, by turns, on each of the days of the week — we have already had this difference explained to us by the Holy Fathers — but the mystery of Jesus’ birth is more aptly and strongly expressed when its anniversary falls on a Sunday. Other years, when the coincidence does not happen, the Faithful will at least be led by their Christian instincts to give special honour to the day within the Octave which falls on the Sunday.

Epistle – Galatians iv. 1‒7

Brethren, now I say, as long as the heir is a child, he differs nothing from a servant, though he be lord of all; but is under tutors and governors until the time appointed by the father: So we also, when we were children, were serving under the elements of the world. But when the fullness of the time was come, God sent His Son, made of a woman, made under the law: that He might redeem them who were under the law: that we might receive the adoption of sons. And because you are sons, God has sent the Spirit of His Son into your hearts, crying: “Abba, Father” Therefore now he is not a servant, but a son. And if a son, an heir also through God.

Thanks be to God.

Dom Prosper Guéranger:

The child that is born of Mary and is couched in the crib at Bethlehem, raises His feeble voice to the Eternal Father and calls Him, My Father! He turns towards us and calls us, My Brethren! We, consequently, when we speak to His Father, may call Him, Our Father! This is the mystery of adoption revealed to us by the great event we are solemnising. All things are changed, both in Heaven and on Earth: God has not only one Son, He has many Sons. Henceforth, we stand before this our God, not merely creatures drawn out of nothing by His power, but children that He fondly loves. Heaven is now, not only the throne of His sovereign Majesty, it is become our inheritance in which we are joint-heirs with our brother Jesus, the Son of Mary, Son of Eve, Son of Adam, according to His Human Nature and (in the unity of Person) Son of God according to His Divine Nature. Let us turn our wondering and loving thoughts first to this sweet babe that has brought us all these blessings, and then to the blessings themselves, to the dear inheritance made ours by Him. Let our mind be seized with astonishment at creatures having such a destiny! And then, let our heart pour out its thanks for the incomprehensible gift!

Gospel – Luke ii. 33‒40

At that time, Joseph and Mary, the mother of Jesus, were wondering at those things which were spoken concerning Him. And Simeon blessed them, and said to Mary His mother: “Behold, this child is set for the fall, and for the resurrection of many in Israel, and for a sign which will be contradicted; and your own soul a sword will pierce, that out of many hearts thoughts may be revealed.” And there was one Anna, a prophetess, the daughter of Phanuel, of the tribe of Aser; she was far advanced in years, and had lived with her husband seven years from her virginity. And she was a widow until fourscore and four years; who departed not from the temple, by fastings and prayers serving night and day. Now she, at the same hour, coming in, confessed to the Lord; and spoke of Him to all that looked for the redemption of Israel. And after they had performed all things according to the law of the Lord, they returned into Galilee, to their city Nazareth. And the child grew, and waxed strong, full of wisdom; and the grace of God was in Him.

Praise be to you, O Christ.

Dom Prosper Guéranger:

The passage of the Gospel selected for this Mass, though bearing on the Divine Infancy, yet gives us, and we may almost say prematurely, the terrible prophecy of Simeon regarding the dear babe of Bethlehem. The heart of Mary, that was overflowing with joy at the miraculous birth of her child, is here made to feel the sword spoken of by the venerable Priest of the temple. Her Son, then, is to be but a sign that will he contradicted! The mystery of man’s being adopted by God is to cost this child of hers His life! We that are the Redeemed in His Blood, we may not yet dwell on the fatigues and the Passion and the Death of our Emmanuel. The time will come for that. At present we are forbidden to think of Him other than the sweet child that is born to us, and the source of all our happiness, by His having come among us. Let us catch up the words of Anna, who calls Him the Redemption of Israel. Let our eye delight in the sight of the Earth regenerated by the birth of its Saviour. Let us admire and study well this Jesus newly born among us, and adore, in humble love, the wisdom and grace that are in Him.

* * * * *

On this the sixth day since the birth of our Emmanuel, let us consider how the Divine Infant lies in the crib of a stable, and is warmed by the breath of the ox and the ass, as Isaias had foretold: “The ox knows his owner, and the ass his master’s crib; but Israel has not known me” (Isaias i. 3). Thus does the great God enter that world which His own hands have created! The dwellings of men are refused Him, for man has a hard heart for His God, and an indifference which is a real contempt. The only shelter He can find to be born in is a stable, and that necessitates His coming into the world in the company of poor dumb brutes.

At all events, these animals are His own. Work. When He created the irrational world of living things, He subjected it, as the inferior part of creation, to Man. And Man was to ennoble it by referring it to the Creator. When Adam sinned, this subjection, this harmony, was broken. The Apostle teaches us that the brute creation is not insensible to the degradation thus forced upon it by sinful man (Romans viii. 19, 20). It obeys him with reluctance. It not infrequently rebels against and deservedly punishes him. And on the day of judgement, it will take the side of its Creator and avenge itself of that wickedness of which man has made it the unwilling instrument (Wisdom v. 21). In the mystery of his birth the Son of God visits this part of His creation. Men refused to receive Him, and He accepts the hospitality of the dwelling of brutes. It is from their dwelling that He begins the divine career of the Three-and-Thirty years. The first human beings He invites into the company of His blessed Mother and His dear Saint Joseph, the first He admits into the stable to see and adore Himself, are shepherds who were busy watching their flocks, and whose simple hearts have not been corrupted by the atmosphere of cities.

The Ox — which, as we learn from Ezechiel (Ezechiel i. 10) and Saint John (Apocalypse iv. 7) is one of the symbolic creatures standing round God’s throne — is the figure of the sacrifices of the Old Law. The blood of oxen has flowed in torrents upon the altar of the Temple: it was the imperfect and material offering prescribed to be made to God until He should send the True Victim. The Infant Jesus who lies in the crib is that Victim, and Saint Paul tells us what He says to His Eternal Father: “Sacrifices, and Oblations, and Holocausts for sin, you would not have, neither are they pleasing to you. Behold! I come! (Hebrews x. 8, 9).

The Prophet Zachary (Zacharias ix, 9, quoted by Matthew xxi. 5) foretelling the peaceful triumph of the Meek King, says that He will make His entry into Sion riding upon an Ass. We will assist, further on in the year, at the accomplishment of this prophecy. Now that we are at Bethlehem in our Christmas mystery, let us observe how the heavenly Father places His Divine Son between the instrument of His peaceful triumph and the symbol of His Sacrifice on Calvary.

Ah dear Jesus! Creator of Heaven and Earth — how strange is this your entrance into your own world! The whole universe should have given you a welcome of love and adoration — and yet, what motionless indifference! Not one house to take you in! Men buried in sleep! And when Mary had placed you in the crib, your first sight was that of two poor animals, the slaves of him who proudly rejected you! Yet this sight did not displease you — for you do not despise the work of your hands. What afflicts your loving Heart is the presence of sin in our souls, the sight of that enemy of yours which has so often caused you to suffer. Oh hateful sin! We renounce it, and wish, dear Jesus, to acknowledge you for our Lord and Master, as did the Ox and the Ass. We will unite in that hymn of praise which creation is ever sending up to you by henceforth adding to it the homage of our adoration and gratitude. Nay, we will lend speech to nature, and give it soul, and sanctify it, by referring all creatures to your service.

28 DECEMBER – THE HOLY INNOCENTS

Dom Prosper Gueranger:

The feast of the beloved Disciple is followed by that of the Holy Innocents. The crib of Jesus, where we have already met and venerated the Prince of Martyrs and the Eagle of Patmos, has today standing round it a lovely choir of little children clad in snow-white robes and holding green branches in their hands. The Divine Babe smiles upon them. He is their King, and these Innocents are smiling upon the Church of God. Courage and fidelity first led us to the crib. Innocence now comes and bids us tarry there.

Herod intended to include the Son of God among the murdered babes of Bethlehem. The Daughters of Rachel wept over their little ones and the land streamed with blood, but the tyrant’s policy can do no more: it cannot reach Jesus, and its whole plot ends in recruiting an immense army of Martyrs for Heaven. These children were not capable of knowing what an honour it was for them to be made victims for the sake of the Saviour of the world. But the very first instant after their immolation and all was revealed to them: they had gone through this world without knowing it, and now that they know it, they possess an infinitely better. God showed here the riches of His mercy. He asks of them but a momentary suffering, and that over, they wake up in Abraham’s bosom: no further trial awaits them, they are in spotless innocence, and the glory due to a soldier who died to save the life of his Prince, belongs eternally to them.

They died for Jesus’ sake. Therefore, their death was a real Martyrdom, and the Church calls them by the beautiful name of The Flowers of the Martyrs, because of their tender age and their innocence. Justly, then, does the Ecclesiastical Cycle bring them before us today, immediately after the two valiant champions of Christ, Stephen and John. The connection of these three Feasts is thus admirably explained by Saint Bernard:

“In Saint Stephen we have both the act and the desire of Martyrdom. In Saint John we have but the desire. In the Holy Innocents we have but the act. Will anyone doubt whether a crown was given to these Innocents? If you ask me what merit could they have that God should crown them? Let me ask you what was the fault for which Herod slew them? What is the mercy of Jesus less than the cruelty of Herod? And while Herod could put these babes to death who had done him no injury, Jesus may not crown them for dying for Him? Stephen, therefore, is a Martyr, by a Martyrdom of which men can judge, for he gave this evident proof of his sufferings being felt and accepted that, at the very moment of his death, his solicitude both for his own soul and for those of his persecutors increased. The pangs of his bodily passion were less intense than the affection of his soul’s compassion which made him weep more for their sins than for his own wounds. John was a Martyr by a Martyrdom which only Angels could see, for the proofs of his sacrifice being spiritual, only spiritual creatures could see them. But the Innocents were Martyrs to none other eye save yours, O God! Man could find no merit. Angel could find no merit: the extraordinary prerogative of your grace is the more boldly brought out. From the mouth of the infants and the sucklings you have perfected praise (Psalm viii. 3). The praise the Angels give you is: Glory be to God in the highest, and peace on Earth to men of good will (Luke ii. 14). It is a magnificent praise, but I make bold to say, that it is not perfect till He comes who will say: Suffer little children to come to me, for of such is the kingdom of Heaven (Matthew xix. 14), and in the mystery of my mercy, there will be peace to men that cannot even use their will” (Sermon for the Feast of the Holy Innocents.)

Yes, God did for these Innocents, who were immolated on His Son’s account, what He is doing every moment now by the sacrament of regeneration in the case of children who die before coming to the use of reason. We, who have been baptised by water, should be all the more ready to honour these little ones who were baptised in their own blood and thereby associated to all the mysteries of the Divine Infancy. We ought, together with the Church, to congratulate them, for that a glorious and premature death secured them their innocence. They have lived upon our Earth, and yet it defiled them not! Truly these tender Lambs deserve to be forever with the Lamb of God! May this same Earth of ours, grown old in wickedness, draw down the divine mercy on itself by the love and honour it gives each year, to these sweet children of Bethlehem who, like the Dove of Noah’s Ark, could not find where to rest their feet.

In the midst of the joy which at this holy time fills both Heaven and Earth, the Holy Church of Rome forgets not the lamentations of the mothers who beheld their children cruelly butchered by Herod’s soldiers. She hears the wailing of Rachel and condoles with her and, unless it be a Sunday, she suspends on this Feast some of the manifestations of the joy which inundates her soul during the Octave of her Jesus’ birth. The red vestments of a Martyr’s Day would be too expressive of that stream of infant blood which forbids the mothers to be comforted, and joyous white would ill suit their poignant grief. She, therefore vests in purple, the symbol of mournfulness. The Gloria in excelsis, the Hymn she loves so passionately during these days, when Angels come down from Heaven to sing it — even that must be hushed today. And in the Holy-Sacrifice she sings no Alleluia. In this, as in everything she does, the Church acts with an exquisite delicacy of feeling. Her Liturgy is a school of refined Christian considerateness.

Lesson – Apocalypse xiv. 1‒5

In those days I beheld the Lamb standing on mount Sion, and with him a hundred forty-four thousand having His name, and the name of His Father, written on their foreheads. And I heard a voice from Heaven, as the noise of many waters, and as the voice of great thunder. And the voice which I heard was as the voice of harpers harping on their harps. And they sung as it were a new canticle before the throne and before the four living creatures and the ancients. And no man could say the canticle, but those hundred forty-four thousand who were purchased from the earth. These are they who were not defiled with women: for they are virgins. These follow the Lamb wherever he goes. These were purchased from among men, the first-fruits to God and to the Lamb: And in their mouth there was found no lie, for they are without spot before the throne of God.

Thanks be to God.

Dom Prosper Guéranger:

The Church shows us, by her choice of this mysterious passage of the Apocalypse, how great a value she sets on innocence, and what our own esteem of it ought to be. The Holy Innocents follow the Lamb because they are pure. Personal merits on Earth they could not have, but they went rapidly through this world, and its defilements never reached them. Their purity was not tried, as was Saint John’s, but it is beautified by the blood they shed for the Divine Lamb, and He is pleased with it and makes them His companions. Let the Christian, therefore, be ambitious for this innocence which is thus singularly honoured. If he has preserved it, let him keep and guard it as his most precious treasure. If he has lost it, let him repair the loss by repentance, and having done so, let him say with the Spouse in the Canticle: “I have washed my feet: how shall I defile them?” (Canticles v. 3).

Gospel – Matthew ii. 13‒18

At that time An Angel of the Lord appeared in sleep to Joseph, saying: “Arise, and take the child and his mother, and fly into Egypt: and be there until I will tell you. For it will come to pass that Herod will seek the child to destroy him.” Who arose, and took the child and his mother by night, and retired into Egypt: and he was there until the death of Herod: that it might be fulfilled which the Lord spoke by the prophet, saying: “Out of Egypt have I called my son.” Then Herod perceiving that he was deluded by the wise men, was exceeding angry, and sending killed all the men children that were in Bethlehem, and in all the borders thereof, from two years old and under, according to the time which he had diligently inquired of the wise men. Then was fulfilled that which was spoken by Jeremias the prophet, saying: “A voice in Rama was heard, lamentation and great mourning. Rachel bewailing her children, and would not be comforted, because they are not.”

Praise be to you, O Christ.

Dom Prosper Guéranger:

Thus does the Gospel in its sublime simplicity relate the Martyrdom of the Innocents. “Herod, sending, killed all the children!” The Earth paid no attention to the fell tyranny, which made so rich a harvest for Heaven: there was heard a voice in Rama, Rachel wailing her little ones. It went up to Heaven, and Bethlehem was still again, as though nothing had happened. But these favoured victims had been accepted by God, and they were to be the companions of His Son. Jesus looked at them from His crib and blessed them. Mary compassionated with them and their mothers. The Church, which Jesus had come to form, would for all future ages glorify these youthful Martyrs and place the greatest confidence in the patronage of these children, for she knows how powerful their intercession is with her heavenly Spouse.

*****

Blessed Babes! We celebrate your triumph and we congratulate you in your having been chosen as the companions of Jesus when in His crib. What a glad waking was yours from the darkness of unconscious infancy to the precious light of Abraham’s bosom where were congregated all the elect! How dear to you the sword that thus transformed you! What gratitude had you not for the God who thus chose you, out of millions of other children, to do honour to the birth of His Son by this sacrifice of your blood and lives! Too young to fight the battle, but did you win the crown. The martyr’s palm waved in those tiny hands which had not strength to pluck it. God would give proof of His munificence: He would teach us that he is Master of His gifts. And was it not fitting that the birth of the Son of this great King should be commemorated by largess such as this! Sweet Infant Martyrs! We give praise to our God for His having thus favoured you, and, with the whole Church, we rejoice in the privileges you have received.

Flowers of the Martyrs, we confide in your intercession and beseech you, by the reward so gratuitously conferred on you, to be mindful of us your brethren who are struggling amid the dangers of this sinful world, We, too, desire to receive those same palms and crowns which you have won, but with such innocence and simplicity that the Church says you played with them: whereas we have to fight hard and long for them, and are so often on the point of losing them forever! The God that has glorified you is our last end as truly as He is yours. In Him alone can our hearts find their rest. Pray for us that we may possess Him for all eternity. Pray for us that we may obtain child-like simplicity of heart from which comes that unreserved confidence in God which leads man to the perfect accomplishment of His holy will. May we bear the Cross with patience when He sends it, and desire nothing but His holy will. You gazed on the murderers who broke your gentle sleep, and you found nothing to make you fear. The bright sword they held over your cradle had but the look of a toy you asked to play with. Death stared you in the face and you smiled on him. May we imitate you and be meek and graceful in the trials that come to us, making them our martyrdom by the quiet endurance of our courage, and the conformity of our will with that of our Sovereign Lord and Master who only gives the cross that He may give the crown. May we never object to or hate the instruments He uses with which to try us. May no harshness nor injustice nor pain ever quench the fire of our charity, nor any event ever deprive us of that peace without which our souls live not to God.

And, lastly, O you Innocent Lambs slain for Jesus and following Him wherever He goes, because you are pure, pray for us to the Lamb of God that He will permit us to come to Him in Bethlehem and, like you, fix our dwelling there, for it is the abode of love and innocence. Speak for us to Mary, a Mother more compassionate than Rachel. Tell her that we are her children and your brethren. She that compassionated your momentary sufferings will pity us and help us in our long years of temptation, pain and sorrow.

*****

Three days have passed since the birth of Jesus. Let us visit Him in the stable and humbly adore our Emmanuel. Let us think on the Mercy which led Him to become a Little Child in order to bring us near to Himself: let us be filled with astonishment at seeing our God thus close to His creatures. “He,” says the holy Abbot Guerric, “He that in Heaven surpasses the sublime intellects of the Angels is here on Earth palpable to the dull sense of men. For, whereas God could not speak to us as spiritual beings — for we are carnal — His Word was made Flesh, that all flesh might not only hear, but might even see Him whom the mouth of the Lord had spoken (Isaias xl. 5). And whereas the world knew not the Wisdom of God in His wisdom, that same wisdom, by an ineffable condescension, made Himself foolishness (1 Corinthians i. 25). I give you praise, O Father, Lord of Heaven and Earth, for that you have hid this Wisdom from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed it to little ones (Matthew xi. 25). The haughtiness of the proud is exceedingly adverse to the humility of this Little One, and that which is high to men is an abomination before God (Luke xvi. 15). This Little One finds sympathy with none save with them that are little in heart, and He takes up His abode with none save with them that are humble and peaceful As, therefore, these little children sin, glorying in Him: A little child is born to us (Isaias viii. 18), so does He say of them: Behold Me and my children whom the Lord has given to me! (Isaias ix. 6). Thus it was that the glory of Martyrdom began with Innocent Babes, for the Father would give to His Son, the Infant Jesus, companions of His own tender age and hereby the Holy Ghost taught us that of such is the Kingdom of Heaven” (Matthew xix. 14).

Also on this day according to the ROMAN MARTYROLOGY:

At Ancyra in Galatia, the holy martyrs Eutychius, priest, and Domitian, deacon.

In Africa, the birthday of the holy martyrs Castor, Victor and Rogatian.

At Nicomedia, the holy martyrs Indes, eunuch, Domna, Agapes and Theophila, virgins, and their companions, who, after long combats, attained to the crown of martyrdom by various kinds of death during the persecution of Diocletian.

At Neocaesarea in Pontus, St. Troadius, martyr, in the persecution of Decius. During his combat St. Gregory Thaumaturgus appeared to him in spirit, and encouraged him to undergo martyrdom.

At Arabissus in Lower Armenia, St. Caesarius, a martyr who suffered under Galerius Maximian.

At Lyons in France, the birthday of St. Francis of Sales, bishop of Geneva, ranked among the saints by Pope Alexander VII because of his most ardent zeal for the conversion of heretics. His festival, by order of the same Pontiff, is kept on the twenty-ninth of January, when his sacred body was translated from Lyons to Annecy. Blessed Pius IX confirmed a decree of the Sacred Congregation of Rites, declaring him Doctor of the Universal Church.

At Rome, St. Domnion, priest.

In Egypt, St. Theodore, monk, a disciple of St. Pachomius.

In the monastery of Lerins, St. Anthony, a monk renowned for miracles.

And in other places, many other holy martyrs, confessors and virgins.

Thanks be to God.

27 DECEMBER – SAINT JOHN (Apostle and Evangelist)

Dom Prosper Guéranger:

Nearest to Jesus’ crib, after Stephen, stands John, the Apostle and Evangelist. It was only right that the first place should be assigned to him who so loved his God that he shed his blood in his service, for, as this God Himself declares, greater love than this has no man, that he lay down his life for his friends (John xv. 13), and Martyrdom has ever been counted by the Church as the greatest act of love, and as having, consequently, the power of remitting sins like a second Baptism. But next to the sacrifice of Blood, the noblest, the bravest and which most wins the heart of Him who is the Spouse of souls, is the sacrifice of virginity. Now just as Saint Stephen is looked upon as the type of Martyrs, Saint John is honoured as the Prince of Virgins. Martyrdom won for Stephen the crown and palm. Virginity merited for John most singular prerogatives which, while they show how dear to God is holy chastity, put this Disciple among those who by their dignity and influence are above the rest of men.

Saint John was of the family of David, as was our Blessed Lady. He was consequently a relation of Jesus. This same honour belonged to Saint James the Greater, his brother. As also to Saint James the Less, and Saint Jude, both Sons of Alpheus. When our Saint was in the prime of his youth, he left not only his boat and nets, not only his Father Zebedee, but even his betrothed, when everything was prepared for the marriage. He followed Jesus and never once looked back. Hence, the special love which our Lord bore him. Others were Disciples or Apostles, John was the Friend of Jesus. The cause of this our Lord’s partiality was, as the Church tells us in the Liturgy, that John had offered his virginity to the Man-God. Let us, on this his Feast, enumerate the graces and. privileges that came to Saint John from his being The Disciple whom Jesus loved.

This very expression of the Gospel, which the Evangelist repeats several times — “the Disciple whom Jesus loved” (John iii. 23; xi. 26; xxi. 7; xxi. 20) — says more than any commentary could do. Saint Peter, it is true, was chosen by our Divine Lord to be the Head of the Apostolic College and the Rock on which the Church was to be built: he, then, was honoured most. But Saint John was loved most. Peter was bid to love more than the rest loved, and he was able to say, in answer to Jesus’ thrice repeated question that he did love him in this highest way: and yet, notwithstanding, John was more loved by Jesus than was Peter himself, because his virginity deserved this special mark of honour.

Chastity of soul and body brings him who possesses it into a sacred nearness and intimacy with God. Hence it was that at the Last Supper — that Supper which was to be renewed on our Altars to the end of the world in order to cure our spiritual infirmities and give life to our souls — John was placed near to Jesus, nay, was permitted, as the tenderly loved Disciple, to lean his head upon the breast of the Man-God. Then it was that he was filled, and from their very Fountain, with Light and Love: it was both a recompense and a favour, and became the source of two signal graces which make Saint John an object of special reverence to the whole Church.

Divine wisdom wishing to make known to the world the Mystery of the Word and commit to Scripture those profound secrets which, so far, no pen of mortal had been permitted to write — the task was put upon John. Peter had been crucified, Paul had been beheaded and the rest of the Apostles had laid down their lives in testimony of the Truths they had been sent to preach to the world. John was the only one left in the Church. Heresy had already begun its blasphemies against the Apostolic Teachings. It refused to admit the Incarnate Word as the Son of God, Consubstantial to the Father. John was asked by the Churches to speak, and he did so in language heavenly above measure. His Divine Master had reserved to this his Virgin-Disciple the honour of writing those sublime Mysteries which the other Apostles had been commissioned only to teach —THE WORD WAS GOD, and this WORD WAS MADE FLESH for the salvation of mankind. Thus did our Evangelist soar like the Eagle up to the Divine Sun, and gaze upon Him with undazzled eye, because his heart and senses were pure, and therefore fitted for such vision of the uncreated Light.

If Moses, after having conversed with God in the cloud, came from the divine interview with rays of miraculous light encircling his head, how radiant must have been the face of Saint John which had rested on the very Heart of Jesus, “in whom are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge!” (colossians ii. 3). How sublime his writings! How divine his teaching! Hence the symbol of the Eagle shown to the Prophet Ezechiel (Ezechiel i. 10, x. 14) and to Saint John himself in his Revelations (Apocalypse iv. 7) has been assigned to him by the Church: and to this title of The Eagle has been added, by universal tradition, the other beautiful name of Theologian.

This Was the first recompense given by Jesus to His Beloved John — a profound penetration into divine Mysteries. The second was the imparting to him a most ardent charity, which was equally a grace consequent upon his angelic purity, for purity unburdens the soul from grovelling egotistic affections, and raises it to a chaste and generous love. John had treasured up in his heart the discourses of his Master: he made them known to the Church, and especially that divine one of the Last Supper in which Jesus had poured forth His whole soul to His own whom He had always tenderly loved, but most so at the end (John xiii. 1). He wrote his Epistles, and charity is his subject: God is charity — he that loves not, knows not God — perfect charity casts out fear —and so on throughout, always on love. During the rest of his life, even when so enfeebled by old age as not to be able to walk, he was for ever insisting upon all men loving each other, after the example of God, who had loved them and so loved them! Thus, he that had announced more clearly than the rest of the Apostles the divinity of the Incarnate Word, was by excellence the Apostle of that divine charity which Jesus came to kindle upon the Earth.

But, our Lord had a further gift to bestow, and it was sweetly appropriate to the Virgin-Disciple. When dying on His Cross, Jesus left Mary upon this Earth. Joseph had been dead now some years. Who, then, will watch over His Mother? Who is there worthy of the charge? Will Jesus send His Angels to protect and console her? For surely what man could ever merit to be to her as a second Joseph? Looking down, he sees the Virgin-Disciple standing at the foot of the Cross: we know the rest, John is to be Mary’s son — Mary is to be John’s mother. Oh wonderful chastity that wins from Jesus such an inheritance as this! Peter, says Saint Peter Damian, will have left to him the Church, the Mother of men, but John will receive Mary, the Mother of God, whom he will love as his own dearest treasure, and to whom he will stand in Jesus’ stead: whilst Mary will tenderly love John, her Jesus friend, as her son.

Can we be surprised after this that Saint John is looked upon by the Church as one of her greatest glories? He is a relative of Jesus in the flesh. He is an Apostle, a Virgin, the Friend of the Divine Spouse, the Eagle, the Theologian, the Son of Mary. He is an Evangelist by the history he has given of the Life of his Divine Master and Friend. He is a Sacred Writer by the three Epistles he wrote under the inspiration of the Holy Ghost. He is a Prophet by his mysterious Apocalypse in which are treasured the secrets of time and eternity. But is he a Martyr? Yes, for if he did not complete his sacrifice, he drank the chalice of Jesus (Matthew xx. 22) when, after being cruelly scourged, he was thrown into a cauldron of boiling oil before the Latin Gate at Rome. He was therefore a Martyr in desire and intention, though not in fact. If our Lord, wishing to prolong a life so dear to the Church, as well as to show how he loves and honours Virginity, miraculously stayed the effects of the frightful punishment, Saint John had on his part unreservedly accepted martyrdom.

Such is the companion of Stephen at the crib in which lies our infant Jesus. If the Proto-Martyr dazzles us with the robes he wears of the bright scarlet of his own blood, is not the virginal whiteness of John’s vestment fairer than the untrod snow? The spotless beauty of the lilies of Mary’s adopted Son and the bright vermilion of Stephen’s roses — what is there more lovely than their union? Glory, then, be to our new-born King whose court is tapestried with such heaven-made colours as these! Yes, Bethlehem’s stable is a very Heaven on Earth, and we have seen its transformation. First, we saw Mary and Joseph alone there — they were adoring Jesus in His crib. Then, immediately, there descended a heavenly host of Angels singing the wonderful hymn. The shepherds soon followed, the humble, simple-hearted shepherds. After these entered Stephen the Crowned and and John the Beloved Disciple. And even before there enters the pageant of the devout Magi, we will have others coming in, and there will be, each day, grander glory in the cave, and gladder joy in our hearts. Oh this birth of our Jesus! Humble as it seems, yet, how divine! What King or Emperor ever received, in his gilded cradle, honours like these shown to the babe of Bethlehem? Let us unite our homage with that given Him by these the favoured inmates of his court. Yesterday, the sight of the palm in Stephen’s hand animated us, and we offered to our Jesus the promise of a stronger faith. Today the wreath that decks the brow of the Beloved Disciple breathes upon the Church the heavenly fragrance of virginity — an intenser love of purity must be our resolution, and our tribute to the Lamb.

Lesson – Ecclesiasticus xv.

He that fears God will do good. And he that possesses justice will lay hold on her, and she will meet him as an honourable mother. With the bread of life and understanding she will feed him and give him the water of wholesome wisdom to drink, and she will be made strong in him, and he will not be moved. And she will exalt him among his neighbours. And in the midst of the Church she will open his mouth, and will fill him with the spirit of wisdom and understanding, and will clothe him with the robe of glory. And will heap upon him a treasure of joy and gladness, and our Lord God will cause him to inherit an everlasting name.

Thanks be to God.

Dom Prosper Guéranger:

The Wisdom here spoken of is Jesus the Eternal Word who came to Saint John and called him to the Apostolate. The Bread of life with which she fed him is the divine Bread of the Last Supper, the Body and Blood of Jesus. The wholesome water is that promised by our Saviour to the Samaritan woman, and of which Saint John drank so abundantly from its very source when he rested his head on the Heart of Jesus. The immovable strength is the Saint’s close and resolute custody of the treasure of his virginity, and the courageous profession of the religion of Christ before the Proconsuls of Domitian. The Treasure which Wisdom heaped upon him is the magnificence of the prerogatives granted to him. Lastly, the everlasting name is that glorious title given him of John the Beloved Disciple.

Gospel – John xxi.

At that time Jesus said to Peter: “Follow me.” Peter turning about He saw that Disciple whom Jesus loved, following, who also leaned on his breast at supper and said: “Lord, who is he that will betray you? Him, therefore, when Peter had seen, he said to Jesus: “Lord, and what will this man do?” Jesus said to him: “So I will have him to remain till I come, what is it to thee? Follow thou me.” This saying, therefore, went abroad among the brethren, that that Disciple should not die. And Jesus did not say to him: “He should not die” but: “So I will have him to remain till I come, what is it to you?” This is that Disciple who gives testimony of these things, and has written these things; and we know that his testimony is true.

Praise be to you, O Christ.

Dom Prosper Guéranger:

This passage of the holy Gospel has been much commented on. Some of the Fathers and Commentators interpret it as signifying that Saint John was to be exempt from death, and that he is still living in the flesh, awaiting the coming of the Judge of the living and the dead. It is certain that this opinion regarding our Apostle has been entertained, and one of the arguments in its favour was this very passage. But, the general opinion of the Holy Fathers is that nothing further is implied by it than the difference between the two vocations of Saint Peter and Saint John. The former will follow his divine Master, by dying, like Him, on a cross. The latter will remain. He will live to a venerable old age and at length, Jesus will come and take him out of this world by sending him a sweet and peaceful death.

*****

Beloved Disciple of the Babe of Bethlehem! How great is your happiness!Hhow wonderful is the reward given to your love and your purity! In you was fulfilled that word of your Master: Blessed are the clean of heart; for they will see God. Not only didst you see this God-Man: you were His friend and on His bosom rested your head. John the Baptist trembles at having to bend the head of Jesus under the water of Jordan. Magdalene, though assured by His own lips that her pardon was perfect as her love, yet dares not raise her head, but keeps clinging to His feet. Thomas scarce presumes to obey Him when He bids him put his finger into His wounded Side. And you, in the presence of all the Apostles, sit close to Him, leaning your head on His breast! Nor is it only Jesus in His Humanity that you see and possess, but because your heart is pure you soar like an eagle up to the Sun of Justice, and fix your eye on Him in the light inaccessible in which He dwells eternally with the Father and the Holy Ghost.

Thus was rewarded the fidelity with which you kept intact for Jesus the precious treasure of your purity. And now, O worthy favourite of the great King, forget not us poor sinners. We believe and confess the Divinity of the Incarnate Word whom you have evangelised to us, but we desire to draw near to Him during this holy season, now that He shows Himself so desirous of our company, so humble, so full of love, so dear a child, and so poor! Alas! Our sins keep us back. Our heart is not pure like yours. We have need of a Patron to introduce us to our Master’s crib (Isaias i. 3). You, O Beloved Disciple of the Emmanuel, you must procure us this happiness. You have shown us the Divinity of the Word in the bosom of the Eternal Father. Lead us now to this same Word made flesh. Under your patronage Jesus will permit us to enter into the stable, to stand near His crib, to see with our eyes, and touch with our hands (1 John i. 1) this sweet Fruit of eternal Life. May it be granted us to contemplate the sweet face of Him that is our Saviour and your friend, to feel the throbs of that Heart which loves both you and us, and which you saw wounded by the spear on Calvary. It is good for us to fix ourselves here near the crib of our Jesus and share in the graces He there lavishes, and learn, as you did, the grand lesson of this child’s simplicity. Your prayers must get us all this.

Then too, as son and guardian of Mary, you have to present us to your own and our Mother. Ask her to give us somewhat of the tender love with which she watches over the crib of her Divine Son, to see in us the brothers of that child she bore, and to admit us to a share of the maternal affection she had for you, the favoured confidant of the secrets of her Jesus.

We also pray to you, O holy Apostle, for the Church of God. She was planted and watered by your labours, embalmed with the celestial fragrance of your virtues, and illumined by your sublime teachings. Pray now that these graces may bring forth their fruit, and that at the end of her pilgrimage faith may be firm, the love of Jesus fervent and Christian morals pure and holy. You tell us in your Gospel of a saying of your Divine Master: “I will not now call you my servants, but my friends” (John xv. 15). Pray, dear Saint, that there may come to this, from our hearts and lips, a response of love and courage telling our Emmanuel that, like yourself, we will follow Him wherever He leads us.

*****

Let us, on this second day after our Divine Infant’s birth, meditate upon the sleep He deigns to take. Let us consider how this God of all goodness, who has come down from Heaven to invite His creature man to come to Him and seek rest for his soul seeks rest Himself in our earthly home, and sanctifies by His own divine sleep, that rest which to us is a necessity. We have just been dwelling, with delighted devotion, on the thought of His offering His breast as a resting-place for the Beloved Disciple, and for all souls that imitate John in his love and devotedness. Now, let us look at this our God, sweetly sleeping in His humble crib, or on His Mother’s lap.

Also on this day according to the ROMAN MARTYROLOGY:

At Alexandria, St. Maximus, bishop, who became a renowned and distinguished confessor of the faith.

At Constantinople, the holy confessors Theodore and Theophanes, brothers, who were brought up from their childhood in the monastery of St. Sabbas. Afterwards, combating bravely for the worship of holy images against Leo the Armenian, they were scourged by his command and banished. After his death, they again firmly opposed the emperor Theophilus, who was imbued with the same impiety, and were scourged a second time and driven into exile, where Theodore expired in prison. Theophanes, after peace had at length been restored to the Church, was made bishop of Nicaea and rested in the Lord.

In the same city, St. Niceras, virgin, who was renowned for sanctity in the time of the emperor Arcadius.

And in other places, many other holy martyrs, confessors and virgins.

Thanks be to God.