choking on the mould,
the soft shroud’s folding.
He will come like the frost.
One morning when the shrinking earth
opens on mist, to find itself
arrested in the net
of alien, sword-set beauty.
He will come like dark.
One evening when the bursting red
December sun draws up the sheet
and penny-masks its eye to yield
the star-snowed fields of sky.
He will come, will come,
will come like crying in the night,
like blood, like breaking,
as the earth writhes to toss him free.
He will come like child.
Monday after Advent 1
A Reading from Le Milieu Divin by Pierre Teilhard de Chardin
We are sometimes inclined to think that the same things are monotonously repeated over and over again in the history of creation. That is because the season is too long by comparison with the brevity of our individual lives, and the transformation too vast and too inward by comparison with our superficial and restricted outlook, for us to see the progress of what is tirelessly taking place in and through all matter and all spirit. Let us believe in revelation, once again our faithful support in our most human forebodings. Under the commonplace envelope of things and of all our purified and salvaged efforts, a new earth is being slowly engendered.
One day, the gospel tells us, the tension gradually accumulating between humanity and God will touch the limits prescribed by the possibilities of the world. And then will come the end. Then the presence of Christ which has been silently accruing in things, will suddenly be revealed – like a flash of light from pole to pole. Breaking through all the barriers within which the veil of matter and the water-tightness of souls have seemingly kept it confined, it will invade the face of the earth. And, under the finally-liberated action of the true affinities of being, the spiritual atoms of the world will be borne along by a force generated by the powers of cohesion proper to the universe itself, and will occupy, whether within Christ or without Christ (but always under the influence of Christ), the place of happiness or pain designated for them by the living structure of the Pleroma. ‘As lightning comes from the East and shines as far as the West ... as the flood came and swept them all away... so will be the coming of the Son of Man.’ Like lightning, like a conflagration, like a flood, the attraction exerted by the Son of Man will lay hold of all the whirling elements in the universe so as to reunite them or subject them to his body. ‘Wherever the body is, there will the eagles be gathered together.’
Such will be the consummation of the divine milieu.
As the gospel warns us, it would be vain to speculate as to the hour and the modalities of this formidable event. But we have to expect it.
Expectation – anxious, collective and operative expectation of an end of the world, that is to say of an issue for the world – that is perhaps the supreme Christian function and the most distinctive characteristic of our religion.
Tuesday after Advent 1
A Reading from a sermon of John Henry Newman
Year passes after year, silently; Christ’s coming is ever nearer than it was. O that, as he comes nearer earth, we may approach nearer heaven!
O my brethren, pray him to give you the heart to seek him in sincerity. Pray him to make you in earnest. You have one work only, to bear your cross after him. Resolve in his strength to do so. Resolve to be no longer beguiled by ‘shadows of religion’, by words, or by disputings, or by notions, or by high professions, or by excuses, or by the world’s promises or threats. Pray him to give you what Scripture calls ‘an honest and good heart’, or ‘a perfect heart’, and, without waiting, begin at once to obey him with the best heart you have. Any obedience is better than none, – any profession which is disjoined from obedience, is a mere pretence and deceit. Any religion which does not bring you nearer to God is of the world. You have to seek his face; obedience is the only way of seeking him. All your duties are obediences.
If you are to believe the truths he has revealed, to regulate yourselves by his precepts, to be frequent in his ordinances, to adhere to his Church and people, why is it, except because he has bid you? And to do what he bids is to obey him, and to obey him is to approach him. Every act of obedience is an approach, an approach to him who is not far off; though he seems so, but close behind this visible screen of things which hides him from us. He is behind this material framework; earth and sky are but a veil going between him and us; the day will come when he will rend that veil, and show himself to us. And then, according as we have waited for him, will he recompense us. If we have forgotten him, he will not know us; but ‘Blessed are those servants whom the Lord, when he cometh, shall find watching. He shall gird himself, and make them sit down to meat, and will come forth and serve them. And if he shall come in the second watch, or come in the third watch, and find them so, blessed are those servants.’ May this be the portion of every one of us! It is hard to attain but it is woeful to fail.
Life is short; death is certain; and the world to come is everlasting.
Wednesday after Advent 1
A Reading from the Letter of Clement of Rome to the Church in Corinth
We should entreat the Creator of the universe with heartfelt prayer and supplication that the full sum of his elect, as it has been numbered throughout the world, may be preserved intact through his beloved child Jesus Christ. For through him he has called us out of darkness into light, from ignorance into the full knowledge of the glory of his name.
Teach us, Lord, to hope in that name which is the source and fount of all creation. Open the eyes of our hearts to know you, who alone are highest among the highest, forever holy among the holy. You bring to nothing the schemings of the proud, and frustrate the devices of the nations. You raise up the humble on high, and the lofty you cast down. Riches and poverty, death and life, are all in your hand; you alone are the discerner of every spirit, and the God of all flesh. Your eyes survey the depths and scrutinise our human achievements; you are the aid of those in danger, the Saviour of those that despair, the Creator and guardian of everything that has breath. By you the nations of the earth are increased; and from them you have chosen out such as love you through your dear child Jesus Christ, by whom you have taught us, made us holy and brought us to honour.
Grant us, Lord, we beseech you, your help and protection. Deliver the afflicted, pity the humble, raise up the fallen, reveal yourself to the needy, heal the sick, bring home your wandering people, feed the hungry, ransom the prisoners, support the weak, comfort the faint-hearted. Let all the nations of the earth know that you alone are God, that Jesus Christ is your child, and that we are your people and the sheep of your pasture.
Lord, you brought to light the eternal fabric of the universe, and created the world. From generation to generation you are faithful, righteous in judgement, glorious in might and majesty, wise in what you have created, prudent in what you have established. To look around us is to see your goodness everywhere; to trust in you is to know
