our responsibility to go to Jesus: but a double obstacle prevented it. For our eyes were blind, and he dwells in inaccessible Light. We were lying paralysed on our pallet, incapable of reaching the greatness of God.
That is why, in his immense goodness, our Saviour, the doctor of our souls, came down from his great height and tempered for our sick eyes the dazzling brightness of his glory. He clothed himself, as it were, with a lantern, with that luminous body, I mean, free from every stain, which he put on.
Wednesday after Advent 2
A Reading from a commentary on the psalms
by Augustine
God established a time for his promises and a time for their fulfilment. The time for promises was in the time of the prophets, until John the Baptist; from John until the end is the time of fulfilment.
God, who is faithful, put himself in our debt, not by receiving anything but by promising so much. A promise was not sufficient for him; he chose to commit himself in writing as well, as it were making a contract of his promises. He wanted us to be able to see the way in which his promises were redeemed when he began to discharge them. And so the time of the prophets was the foretelling of the promises.
He promised eternal salvation, everlasting happiness with the angels, an immortal inheritance, endless glory, the joyful vision of his face, his holy dwelling in heaven, and after resurrection from the dead, no fear of dying. This is as it were his final promise, the goal of all striving. When we reach it, we shall ask for nothing more. But as to the way in which we are to arrive at our final goal, he has revealed this also, by promise and prophecy.
He has promised humankind divinity, mortals immortality, sinners justification, the poor a rising to glory. But because God’s promises seemed impossible to human beings – equality with the angels in exchange for mortality, corruption, poverty, weakness, dust and ashes – God not only made a written contract with them to win their belief but also established a mediator of his good faith, not a prince or angel or archangel, but his only Son. He wanted, through his Son, to show us and give us the way he would lead us to the goal he has promised.
It was not enough for God to make his Son our guide to the way; he made him the way itself that we might travel with him as leader, and by him as the way.
Therefore, the only Son of God was to come among us, to take our human nature, and in this nature to be born as a man. He was to die, to rise again, to ascend into heaven, to sit at the right hand of the Father, and to fulfil his promises among the nations, and after that to come again, to exact now what he had asked for before, to separate those deserving anger from those deserving his mercy, to execute his threats against the wicked, and to reward the just as he had promised.
All this had therefore to be prophesied, foretold, and impressed on us as an event in the future, in order that we might wait for it in faith, and not find it in a sudden and dreadful reality.
Thursday after Advent 2
A Reading from a treatise On the Value of Patience by Cyprian of Carthage
Patience is a precept for salvation given us by our Lord and teacher: ‘Whoever endures to the end will be saved.’ And again, ‘If you persevere in my word, you will truly be my disciples; you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.’
We must, therefore, endure and persevere if we are to attain the truth and freedom we have been allowed to hope for; faith and hope are the very meaning of our being Christians, but if faith and hope are to bear their fruit, patience is necessary.
We do not seek glory now, in the present, but we look for future glory, as St Paul instructs us when he says: ‘By hope we were saved. Now hope which is seen is not hope: how can we hope for what is seen? But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it in patience.’ Patient waiting is necessary if we are to be perfected in what we have begun to be, and if we are to receive from God what we hope for and believe.
In another place the same apostle instructs and teaches the righteous, and those active in good works, and those who store up for themselves treasures in heaven through the reward God gives them. They are to be patient also, for he says: ‘Therefore while we have time, let us do good to all, but especially to those who are of the household of the faith. But let us not grow weary in doing good, for we shall reap our reward in due season.’
Paul warns us not to grow weary in good works through impatience, not to be distracted or overcome by temptations and so give up in the midst of our pilgrimage of praise and glory, and allow our past good deeds to count for nothing because what was begun falls short of completion.
Finally the apostle Paul, speaking of charity, unites it with endurance and patience. ‘Charity,’ he says, ‘is always patient and kind; it is not jealous, is not boastful, is not given to anger, does not think evil, loves all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.’ He shows that charity can be steadfast and persevering because it has learned how to endure all things.
And in another place he says: ‘Bear with one another lovingly, striving to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.’ He shows that neither unity nor peace can be maintained unless we cherish each other with mutual forbearance and preserve the bond of harmony by means of patience.
Friday after Advent 2
A Reading from the Proslogion of Anselm of Canterbury
O Lord my God,
teach my heart where and how to seek you,
where and how to find you.
Lord, if you are not here but absent,
where shall I seek you?
but you are everywhere, so you must be here,
why then do I not seek you?
Surely you dwell in light inaccessible –
where is it?
and how can I have access to light which is inaccessible?
Who will lead me and take me into it
so that I may see you there?
By what signs, under what forms, shall I seek you?
I have never seen you, O Lord my God,
I have never seen your face.
Most High Lord,
what shall an exile do
who is as far away from you as this?
What shall your servant do,
eager for your love, cast off far from your face?
He longs to see you,
but your countenance is too far away.
He wants to have access to you,
but your dwelling is inaccessible.
He longs to find you,
but he does not know where you are.
He
