Ortus Christi Part 11

_1st. Prelude._ JESUS hidden in Mary.

_2nd. Prelude._ Grace so to find Him that I may live the hidden life.

POINT I. "THOU ART A HIDDEN G.o.d."

He was hidden in the womb of His Mother; all through His life and death on earth, His Divinity was hidden except to a very few; in His Eucharistic life He will hide Himself to the end of time in the little Host. He seemed to love hiding when He was on earth and when He did reveal Himself, it was something like a child playing at hide and seek.

He hid Himself from the Samaritan woman till He had heard all her story and then said suddenly: "I am He (the Messias) Who am speaking with thee" (St. John IV. 26). The blind man whom He cured had not the least idea Who He was till JESUS, hearing that he had been reviled and cast out of the Synagogue, went and talked to him about the Son of G.o.d and then said in the middle of the conversation: "Thou hast both seen Him, and it is He that talketh with thee" (chap. IX. 37). From Mary Magdalen at the sepulchre He deliberately hid Himself under the form of a gardener that He might have the joy of suddenly surprising her with His presence. Perhaps the most touching story of all is that of the two disciples going to Emmaus; out of His very love for them, He blindfolded them and then made them look for Him, while He put them off the scent by pretending that He knew nothing about all the things that had been happening in Jerusalem; and then when His moment was come "their eyes were opened and they knew Him." (St. Luke XXIV. 31). He treats His children in the same way still, He constantly hides Himself from them, leaves them alone to fight and struggle in desolation, solitude and spiritual darkness, and then sometimes shows by His sudden presence how near He has been all the time.

Let me consider two questions:

1. _How does He hide Himself?_ (1) Behind obstacles that He makes: suffering, desolation, darkness, temptation, scruples, failure (spiritual as well as temporal), uncongenial people and surroundings--all those many forms of the cross which the true disciple knows so well. Let us remember that _He_ is hidden in them, it will make all the difference. (2) Behind obstacles that we ourselves make. This is not so consoling. He has every right to hide Himself from me, but I have no right to make His coming to me difficult by obstacles that I put in His path, and yet how often I do it! Self is the great obstacle. I am taken up with myself, with my own shortcomings and miseries and failures and weaknesses, with my imagination (how it runs away with me, away from Him!) and my fears, my introspection--uselessly looking into myself to see how I am advancing. What are all these but obstacles which keep G.o.d at a distance? The soul that attracts Him is the soul that is occupied with Him, not with self.

2. _Why does He hide Himself?_ Why does He deliberately set up obstacles which prevent the soul from seeing Him? Why does a mother hide from her child? Is it not for the joy of seeing it look for her and for the consolation she is going to give it in letting herself be found? It is the same with our G.o.d Who hides Himself. He wants to make us look for Him, He wants to increase our love, our desire and our merit, He wants to make us strong in faith and confidence, while acknowledging our helplessness and dependence and nothingness without Him.

POINT II. "YOUR LIFE IS HID WITH CHRIST IN G.o.d."

Though JESUS was hidden in Mary, He was never hidden from her. This was (1) because Mary never put any obstacle between herself and JESUS--her thoughts were all with Him and never with herself, and (2) because her faith and love and desire were so strong that she at once overcame all obstacles, which He in His love and desire for her merit put in her way as was the case during the three days' loss. JESUS and Mary are the models of my interior life. Like Mary I must try to surmount all obstacles, welcome every sword that pierces, leave self and seek Him.

Like JESUS in Mary I must strive to lead a hidden life.

How is it to be done? There is only one way--to have G.o.d always before my eyes, and self only there to be sacrificed. If I make this my rule, it will simplify my life and be the quick solution of many problems. Why this _dryness_ in prayer? To bring G.o.d to my mind and to give me an opportunity of sacrificing self with its love of spiritual consolation and sensible enjoyment. The very dryness makes me thirst after G.o.d: "As the hart panteth after the fountains of water, so my soul panteth after Thee, O G.o.d. My soul hath thirsted after the strong living G.o.d; when shall I come and appear before the face of G.o.d?" (Ps. XLI. 1-3). This is what G.o.d wants--to see the soul longing and thirsting for Him. That is why He puts the obstacle of dryness between Himself and the soul, and hides Himself behind it while He watches the soul struggling to forget itself and saying: "O my soul why dost thou disquiet me? Hope thou in G.o.d, for I will still give praise to Him" (verse 12). This is how the faithful soul overcomes the obstacles--not by praying to have them removed, but by a firm faith that G.o.d is in them. So with temptations--why these terrible temptations, when G.o.d could so easily remove them? Because He is the Master and He knows what is best. If the temptations were removed, the soul would soon be wrapped up in self-complacency and self-satisfaction. Temptations properly used keep the soul close to G.o.d, it sees G.o.d hidden in them and forgetting all about its treacherous self, it turns to Him Who alone can save it from falling, it keeps G.o.d only in view and makes the sacrifice of self. The same principle holds good for all the many obstacles behind which G.o.d hides. If they are properly used they are no longer obstacles, but stepping-stones by means of which we pa.s.s to Him. G.o.d everywhere and self nowhere! G.o.d everything and self nothing! G.o.d, not self, the object of all I do and think and plan! And that not because I can feel Him and see Him and enjoy Him, but because my faith tells me that though hidden _He is there_. This was the principle of Mary's life hidden with her Son. He was the cause, the direct cause, of all her troubles, of all the many swords that pierced her most pure heart, yet never was there a life hidden with Christ as was Mary's and the reason was that she forgot herself and saw JESUS only.

"_Your_ life is hid with Christ in G.o.d." Are these words of St. Paul true about me? Let me read the whole verse and then I shall know: "For _you are dead_, and your life is hid with Christ in G.o.d." _When_ self is dead, then I shall be able to say _G.o.d only_, and till then, G.o.d be thanked, I can hide my miserable self in Him and tell Him that I want it to be sacrificed though I so seldom have the courage to do it.

_Colloquy_ with JESUS hidden in Mary.

_Resolution._ To see my hidden G.o.d everywhere and self nowhere.

_Spiritual Bouquet._ "Why hidest Thou Thy Face?" (Job XIII. 24).

THE INTERIOR LIFE. (5)

PRAYER.

"Behold I come that I should do Thy Will: O my G.o.d, I have desired it, and Thy law in the midst of my heart."

(Ps. x.x.xIX. 8, 9).

_1st. Prelude._ Vas spirituale. Vas insigne devotionis.

_2nd. Prelude._ Grace to "pray without ceasing." (1 Thess. V. 17).

POINT I. THE SPIRIT OF PRAYER.

Amongst all the lessons that JESUS living in Mary teaches us, that on prayer must ever hold a foremost place. What is Prayer? "The lifting up of the heart and mind to G.o.d," the Catechism tells us. To love G.o.d, then, and to think about Him is to pray. JESUS lived in Mary uniquely to do the Will of His Father. He and the Father were _one_--one heart, one mind. He took pleasure in all that concerned His Father: "Hallowed be Thy Name, Thy Kingdom come, Thy Will be done on earth as it is in Heaven." He taught us to pray in the same way, taking our thoughts away from ourselves to our Father, and when we do ask for something for ourselves, letting it be just a short prayer for mercy or for help, acknowledging our weakness and misery and nothingness, while we keep our eyes fixed on our Father--He G.o.d, I His creature; He everything, I nothing. "G.o.d be merciful to me a sinner," this prayer contains all we need.

O my little JESUS, Who didst think of me in Thy communion with Thy Father, for Thou didst come to do His Will, and His Will was that I should be saved, teach me to think of Thee and to love Thee so much that my life, too, may be one perpetual prayer, that is, that communion with G.o.d may be the att.i.tude of my soul.

POINT II. MARY'S SPIRIT OF PRAYER.

She was ever holding colloquies with her G.o.d within her, pondering things over in her heart, that is, talking them over with Him from Whom she had no secrets and between Whom and her soul she put no obstacles.

Her life was spent with Him; whatever her duties might be, everything was done with Him, that is prayer. If duties or conservation demanded all her attention for a while, did it matter? No, for He was there all the same. He, in her, carried on the blessed converse with His Father; there was never any separation between Mary and the Blessed Fruit of her womb, JESUS. She would come back to Him with all the more joy, and tell Him what she had been doing and saying. Oh, blessed life of union between JESUS and Mary! Teach me, my Mother, what prayer is. Thou didst understand it so well. It was prayer that made thy life interior for thou wast ever communing with Him Who was _within_ thee. "O Mother of the Word, despise not my words."

POINT III. "LEARN OF ME."

When we think of JESUS praying for nine months to His Father, when we think of Mary's nine months' colloquy with JESUS, we begin to think that there is something wrong about our methods of prayer, that they need re-modelling. Let us try to understand something of what His prayer was.

We think of Him, and quite rightly, as talking over with His Father all His plans for man's salvation, praying for each individual thing that would be connected with it through all time. We love to think that He prayed particularly for each one of us. But all this was not the _essence_ of His prayer, if it were, we might well be discouraged and feel that we could never copy such a model; our distractions and fatigues, our ignorance and want of memory, to say nothing of our times of dryness and distaste for prayer would make such prayers, except perhaps now and again in times of consolation, impossible for us. Am I to turn away sadly then from Mary this time, saying: It is too hard for me, I cannot copy thy Son here? No, rather let me ask what was the essence of His prayer? What was it which lay behind all? It was the _intention_. And what was that? We have meditated upon it many times: "_Behold I come to do Thy Will, O my G.o.d._" The essence of His prayer was: Thy Will be done and I am here to do it. Naturally there are many different ways of doing that Will, and many degrees in the perfection with which it is done; and that is why we are quite safe in picturing to ourselves JESUS in the womb of His Mother forgetting no single detail; or perhaps a truer picture would be a union with His Father so perfect that everything lay open before them both, and that there was no need to talk about what was so evident. Now let me apply all this to myself and I shall find that instead of being discouraging it is most encouraging, instead of making my prayers harder it will make them far easier. What is my intention in my prayers? Is it not to please G.o.d and to do His Will? What does my Morning Offering mean, but that the prayers, work and sufferings of the day are all offered to Him? I form then my _intention_ for the day, and as long as I do not deliberately take back that intention, it is there, even if I forget to renew it each morning. Now let me see how this works out in practice. I pay a Visit to our Lord, perhaps I am too tired to think about Him, I may even sleep in His presence; perhaps I am so busy that I find it impossible to keep away distracting thoughts; perhaps I am more taken up with the spiritual book I am reading than with Him--the time is up and I go, thinking, perhaps, what is the good of paying Him a Visit like that? There is great good even in that Visit which all the same might have been so much more perfect. What was my intention in paying it? Certainly to please Him.

Then I _have_ pleased Him. It was a pleasure to Him to see me come in and sit with Him, even though I was occupied with my own concerns most of the time. We are too much taken up with asking _how_ we say our prayers, but the important question is _why_ do we say them. To go and sit in His presence, because He is lonely or because I am tired and I would rather sit with Him than with anyone else is _prayer_, even if I say nothing. What G.o.d is doing for me is of far more importance to my soul than what I am doing for G.o.d; and all the time that I am there, whether I am thinking of Him or not, He is impressing His image on my soul, and this is true, if I am in the state of grace, not only of my stated times of prayer, but of all the day long and the night too. What G.o.d wants in our prayers is simplicity. To help us to understand what simplicity is, let us think of a little child with its mother. The mother gives it something to play with or something to do. Is she very much concerned about _what_ the child is doing or _how_ it is doing it?

Not at all, that is of no consequence; nothing it does can be of any real _service_ to the mother; but there is something that concerns her very much, and that is whether her child loves her, is happy to be with her, and wants to please her. We are only children and G.o.d is more tender than the tenderest mother. It makes very little difference to Him what we are doing while we are with Him or even how we do it (how can our little services make any difference to Him!); but whether or no we love Him, whether or no we care to be with Him, whether or no we want to please Him, these things make all the difference.

_Colloquy_ with JESUS and Mary about prayer.

_Resolution._ To try to live more in the spirit of prayer.

_Spiritual Bouquet._ "Let nothing hinder thee from praying _always_"

(Ecclus. XVIII. 22).

THE INTERIOR LIFE. (6)

ZEAL.

"Behold I come that I should do Thy Will. O my G.o.d, I have desired it, and Thy law in the midst of my heart."

(Ps. x.x.xIX. 8, 9).

_1st. Prelude._ JESUS living in and working through Mary.

_2nd. Prelude._ The grace of zeal according to His methods.

There is a very close connection between prayer and zeal; the more perfect the prayer, the greater necessarily will be the zeal. Why?

Because prayer is identifying oneself with the mind and Will of G.o.d, and doing everything with the unique intention of pleasing Him. What are the Will and pleasure of G.o.d? The salvation of the world for which He became incarnate--The closer we unite ourselves to G.o.d in prayer, the dearer will His intentions be to us. The best workers are those who pray best, those who enter most deeply into G.o.d's Will and plans. When we find our zeal flagging, it would be well to examine ourselves on our spirit of prayer.

POINT I. THE ZEAL OF JESUS LIVING IN MARY.

This zeal showed itself at once. No sooner had He become incarnate than He inspired His Mother to take a difficult journey into the "hill country" to visit her cousin Elizabeth. The zeal of JESUS showed itself first of all, as it naturally would, on His Mother and filled her spirit with the humility and charity and forgetfulness of self which were needed for the journey. It then effected Elizabeth and filled her with the Holy Ghost, but these were only the overflowings of His zeal on His way to make what Father Faber calls His "first convert." The soul of John the Baptist, His chosen Precursor, was very precious to Him and as yet it lay unconscious at a distance from G.o.d in darkness and the shadow of death. One of the first acts of G.o.d Incarnate was to deliver that soul from prison and let it see what great things He had in store for it. At the sound of the voice of the Mother with her Child, a change was wrought in that dark soul; it was set free from the curse of original sin, it was flooded with grace, it was brought nigh to G.o.d, the Holy Ghost with all His gifts took possession of it and as a consequence, it leapt in the womb in joy and grat.i.tude and adoration.