A Blessed Easter to all!

HE MADE US FREE

By Maurice Francis Egan

As flame streams upward, so my longing thought

Flies up with Thee,

Thou God and Saviour who hast truly wrought

Life out of death, and to us, loving, brought

A fresh, new world; and in Thy sweet chains caught.

And made us free!

 

As hyacinths make way from out the dark,

My soul awakes,

At thought of Thee, like sap beneath the bark;

As little violets in field and park

Rise to the trilling thrush and meadow-lark,

New hope it takes.

 

As thou goest upward through the nameless space

We call the sky,

Like jonquil perfume softly falls Thy grace;

It seems to touch and brighten every place;

Fresh flowers crown our wan and weary race,

O Thou on high.

 

Hadst Thou not risen, there would be no more joy

Upon earth’s sod;

Life would still be with us a wound or toy,

A cloud without the sun, — O Babe, O Boy,

A Man of Mother pure, with no alloy,

O risen God!

 

Thou, God and King, didst “mingle in the game,”

(Cease, all fears; cease!)

For love of us, — not to give Virgil’s fame

Or Croesus’ wealth, not to make well the lame,

Or save the sinner from deserved shame,

But for sweet Peace!

For peace, for joy, — not that the slave might lie in luxury,

Not that all woe from us should always fly,

Or golden crops with Syrian roses vie

In every field; but in Thy peace to die

And rise, — be free!

 

+Good Friday+

We all will be keeping Jesus company at the foot of the Cross this day, and so we end our quotes from Fr. Doyle below. May this day be for us one of solemn mourning and expressions of the most profound love for a man-God whose sacrifice on the Cross we can never repay.

Fr. Doyle’s Reflections on the Passion, Part 5

Gesthemani (cont’d):

As Christ ended His third prayer in the Garden of Gethsemani, He lay prostrate on the ground horribly shaken by the whole ordeal. The one thing He prayed for was not granted Him, but Holy Scripture relates that, “there appeared to him an angel from heaven to strengthen him” (Lk 22:43). It was an angel from heaven who announced to His mother Mary that she had been chosen to fulfill a creature’s greatest service to her God. When men refused the Son of God recognition on this earth, angels filled the skies to announce Him and sing His glories. When cruel men sought His life in infancy, an angel directed the Holy Family to the safety of Egypt. When He was tempted in the desert: “Behold angels came and ministered to him” (Mt. 4:11). Little wonder that when He was in agony in the Garden of Olives an angel should succor Him.

It is well to note that Christ’s prayer was not answered in the way he desired. He had prayed the first time that the chalice might pass from Him. It did not pass but His strength was increased. He prayed the second time for relief from His burden, but while the burden was increased His strength was augmented to match it. Christ prayed the third time, saying the selfsame words He had spoken on the two previous occasions. His agony did not cease but He found the courage “to pray the more earnestly” (Lk. 22:43). Learn from this that when God seems most deaf to our pleadings in prayer, He may prefer to make heroes of us. Be assured that in times of temptation, and trial, God’s angels will ever be at our side to comfort, encourage, and succor us.

Seize this occasion to bolster your devotion to the angels, and in a special way, to St. Michael. St. Alphonsus Liguori says: “Devotion to St. Michael is a sign of predestination.” In the year 1751, St. Michael appeared to an illustrious servant of God, Antonia d’Astonae, a Carmelite in Portugal. He expressed the wish that she should publish for his honor nine salutations corresponding to the nine choirs of angels. It was to consist of a Pater and three Aves in honor of each of the angelic hierarchies and then four Paters, the first in his honor, the second for the honor of St. Gabriel, the third for St. Raphael, and the last for the Guardian Angel. As a reward the glorious prince of the celestial court promised:

“Whoever would practice this devotion in his honor would have when approaching the Holy Table, an escort of nine angels chosen from each one of the nine choirs.” In addition, for the daily recital of these nine salutations he promised his “continual assistance and that of all the holy angels during life, and after death deliverance from purgatory for themselves and their relations.” In time of temptation call upon the holy angels and archangels to defend and protect you. Never let a day go by without a special petition to the heavenly choirs – especially your guardian angel.

In the Transfiguration on Mount Tabor, our Blessed Lord’s body was bathed in light and His divinity burst through the frail human bonds that were united to it. In the Garden of Gethsemani, the human body of the Son of God was bathed in bloody sweat that rushed from every pore. Once the angel had strengthened our Lord, the transformation was amazing. From that moment on to the end of the Passion, we shall never see Him falter, for even one moment. He had strength for Himself and strength for all of those who came to Him or crossed His path.

Sleep now

The moment the third prayer was ended, Holy Scripture notes that Christ went to His disciples and said: “Sleep on now, and take your rest! It is enough; the hour has come” (Mk. 14:41). The time for watching was past. Christ had passed through His agony, and on his adorable face was the radiance of peace and the fire of zeal. No longer did He need the help or the sympathy which in vain He had sought in the darkness. He looked toward the city gate, and there was the traitor coming. There was neither need or use now for the disciples’ waking and watching, and they might as well sleep on. The lesson is plain. Whatever we do for our friends, we must do when they are in need of help. If one is sick, the time to show sympathy is while the illness continues. If we allow him to pass through this illness without showing him any attention, there is little use, when he is well again, for us to offer kindness.

When one of our friends is passing through some sore struggle with temptation, then is the time for us to come close to him and put the strength of our love under his weakness. Of what use is our help when the battle has been fought through to the end and won without us? Or suppose the friend was not victorious; that he failed – failed because no one came to help him, is there any use in our hurrying up to him then to offer assistance?

It was Ruskin who once wrote these words: “Such help as we can give to each other in this world is a debt we owe to each other; and the man who perceives superiority or a capacity in a subordinate, and neither confesses nor assists it, is not merely the withholder of kindness, but the committer of evil. If we are inclined to criticize the weakness of the Apostles in sleeping rather then comforting their Lord and their God in His hour of agony, do we not do a simulate deed when we withhold help and consolation from our neighbor. “As long as you did not do it for one of these least ones, you did not do it for me.” (Mt. 25:44). Let us always see Christ in our neighbor and this very day make a real effort to be a support, comfort, and defense of someone who needs our help – spiritual or temporal. Never let the sun set any day without having done one charitable act for a neighbor. Remember always these words of Holy Scripture: “that one’s neighbor should be loved as oneself is a greater thing than all the holocausts and sacrifices.

The ordeal of Gethsemani now over, our Blessed Lord walks with sort of a triumph toward His sleeping Apostles. Three times He had counseled them to pray, three times He had asked them to watch with Him and three times the Apostles had failed Him. Just anger had surged through Christ when He took a rope and drove the money-changers from the temple, because they dishonored His Father’s house. His closest friends who, a few short hours earlier, had received their first Holy Communion, had failed Him, and failed Him badly in His hour of need – surly He would have been justified had He upbraided them. But no. The gentle Christ walked over to where they took their rest, and simply said: “Rise, let us go” (Mk. 14:42). Oh, the hope springs up from those words!

Arise from sin

The disciples had failed sadly in one great duty – they had slept when the Master wanted them to watch with Him. They slept at their post. He had just told them that they might as well sleep on, so far as that service was concerned, for the time to render it was gone forever. Yet there were other duties before them, and Jesus calls them to arise and meet these. Because they had failed in one hour’s responsibility they must not sink down in despair. They must arouse themselves to meet the responsibilities that lay ahead of them.

What a consoling lesson for all of us. Because we have failed in one duty, or many duties, we must not give up in despair. Because a young man or woman has wasted youth, he or she must not therefore lose heart and think the loss of youth is irreparable. The golden years can never be recalled – the innocence, the beauty, the power may have slipped through our fingers – but why should we squander all because we squandered some? Because the morning has been thrown away, why should all the day be lost?

The lesson Christ taught at the end of His agony in Gethsemani is for all who have failed in any way. Christ ever calls to hope. He bids us rise again from the worst defeats. With Christ there is always margin enough to start again and build a noble life. Right down to the doorway of death there is time. Paul persecuted the Church, but died for it. The door of opportunity opened to the penitent thief on the cross in his dying hour. So it is always. In this world, blessed by divine love and grace, there is never the need to despair. The call after every defeat or failure still is, and always will be, “Rise, let us go.” Strive every day to make acts of faith, hope, and charity. Today let us beg for an increase of the virtue of hope.

When our Lord was saying to His Apostles: “Rise, let us go,” He added these painful words: ”He who will betray me is at hand” (Mk. 14:43). St. John gives us a few more details for he writes: “Now Judas, who betrayed Him, also knew the place, since Jesus had often met there together with his disciples, Judas, then, taking his cohort, and the attendants from the chief priests and Pharisees, came there with lanterns, and torches, and weapons” (Jn. 18: 2-4).

Judas the betrayer

The story of Judas is perhaps the saddest in all of the Bible. The Evangelists seem fascinated with that name Judas and when they have occasion to pen it, they call him either “Judas, one of the twelve” or “the traitor” or as we have seen St. John do, in the quote above, “Judas, who betrayed Him.” The thought that one of their number could stoop to such a villainous act inflicts them with a personal shame. Any way you look at it, the story of the betrayal shows new evil each time you read it. Going out from the supper table, Judas had hastened to the priests and was quickly on his way with a band of soldiers. He probably hurried back to the upper room, where he had left Jesus: not finding Him there, he knew well with the Master had gone, and hastened to the sacred place of prayer – Gethsemani – where Jesus had often retired for prayer.

Then in the manner in which he left the officers know which of the company was Jesus shows the deepest blackness of all. Under the guise of close friendship – Judas kissed Christ – with feigned warmth and affection. It would be salutary for each of us to remember always how the treason in the heart of Judas grew. In the beginning, it was greed and money, then followed theft and falseness of life, ending at last, in the blackest crime this world has ever seen. The fact that such a fall as that of Judas began with small infidelities which grew and grew into a heinous crime should teach us the danger of committing venial sins. The Holy Ghost warns us that “he that contemneth little things, shall fall by little and little” (Eccles. 19:1).

Betrayal begins with venial sins

A picture in the royal gallery of Brussels represents Judas wandering about in the night after the betrayal. He comes by chance upon the workmen who have been making the cross upon which Christ shall be crucified the next day. A fire nearby throws its full light on the faces of the workmen, who are sleeping peacefully, while resting from their labors. Judas’ face is somewhat in the shade, but it is wonderfully expressive of awful remorse and agony as he catches sight of the cross and the tools used to make it – the cross which his treachery made possible. Judas did not fall into one great sin, he began with lesser sins, and they paved the way to his great disaster.

St. John Chrysostom said this of venial sins: ”I maintain that the small sins require to be avoided with more care then the more grievous ones, for the grievous ones of their very nature stir up our attention against them; whereas, the lesser sins from the fact of their being insignificant in comparison, are not noticed.” The devil is so cunning. He knows he could not induce a virtuous person to fall onto great sin because of the horror it inspires. What does he do? He proposes a venial offense: now one, now another until he gets the soul into an evil habit, for he knows the end result. Satan knows Scripture too, and can prove it from what he has been able to accomplish by making persons desire at first, venially sinful things. Scripture says: “He that is unjust in that which is little will be unjust in that which is great” (Eccles. 19:1).

Pray earnestly today for grace to avoid venial sins. Examine your conscience daily on your commission of venial sins and resolve to do your earnest to avoid them. The kiss of Judas will ever remain the ultimate in base treachery. The name Judas has such a special odium that no one in his right mind would give that name to an infant. It is reserved for the foulest deed one can perform against a friend, a family, a nation, or a society. The act of kissing performed by Judas on the greatest Friend mankind ever had, beggars man’s power of description. Oh, horrible perfidy!

It is related in Holy Scripture that one of the general in David’s army named Joab perpetrated a foul deed, in that upon meeting Anasa, who also commanded an army, he stooped forward to kiss him and at that very moment thrust a dagger into his side and killed him. Solomon, David’s famous son, when he succeeded to the throne, had Joab slain for his treachery. Note how much more evil was Judas’ act of treachery than was Joab’s. Joab with a treacherous kiss murdered a fellow man; Judas by his kiss paved the way for the death of the Son of God. Joab on the other hand dispatched his victim in one quick thrust; Judas by his awful deed set the stage for the torture and painful death of his Lord and God.

It is related that when the assassins of Julius Caesar fell upon him with their daggers, the great conqueror of men and nations stood motionless, displaying not the slightest sign of emotion or fear. When Brutus, whom Caesar loved with the affection of a father, also approached and drew his dagger to strike his great benefactor, that blow caused Caesar more pain then all the other wounds, and he could not refrain from uttering the now famous words: “Thou too, Brutus, my son!” If Caesar was pained by the baneful treachery of his friend Brutus, how must the Son of God felt when one of His own disciples betrayed Him to His enemies by a kiss. Might the Master not have said: “You too, Judas, My son! Is this what I have merited for My kindness to you? Did I not choose you to be My follower, disciple, and apostles? Did I not wash your feet? Did I not give you My Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity as a food? Oh thankless, heartless Judas!”

Look into your heart today and see if you have even betrayed your Master by mortal sin. Each time you prefer creatures to Christ you betray Him.. Each time you choose sin to Christ’s law, you betray Him. Spend some time today quietly thinking over the picture of Judas pressing his lips to those of the sinless Christ. If you identify yourself in Judas, throw yourself quickly into the arms of your God and beg His pardon.

We noted in our last consideration that daggers were used to murder Julius Caesar. The effect was just as tragic as if the murders had used swords. The smallness of the instrument did not lessen the effects. In like manner, it must be said of Judas that he did not lay violent hands on Christ when he met Him in the Garden of Olives. No, he did not seize or strike the Sacred Redeemer – he simply kissed Him, but that kiss was more tragic than if he had thrust a sword into the Sacred Heart of Christ.

Christ had been kissed before, but my, how different were the circumstances and results! First, there were the kisses of the Blessed Virgin Mary and St. Joseph. Who can number the fond caresses that Mary must have showered on the Infant Jesus as she nurtured and fondled Him in her pure maternal arms? How often must not St. Joseph have covered the Infant Countenance with tender paternal affection? Second, may we not conjecture that the Magi embraced the tiny Infant as Mary formally presented the Infant God to the first of the Gentiles who came to pay Him homage? Certainly, the act would be normal if not imperative.

Third, it can hardly be imagined that the Holy Simeon and Anna present at the presentation in the temple, could have held the adorable Child of promise in their arms and not pressed their holy lips to the pink little hands of the long-sought Messias. Fourth, we are certain from the text of Holy Scripture itself that the public sinner Mary Magdalen imprinted the kiss of contrite sorrow on the sacred feet of Christ, and arose from the encounter holier and greater then when she stooped to embrace her God.

Fifth, we are told that the great St. John the beloved disciple rested his youthful head on the breast of the Master at the Last Supper. There is a Persian fable of a piece clay made fragrant by lying on a rose: the perfume of the rose passed into the clay. So it was with John. He crept unto the bosom of the Master and his Master’s spirit of love and gentleness passed into his life and transformed it. Last, we have the awful picture of Judas pressing his lips to those of the Son of God, feigning friendship.

The lesson here is powerful. Those who approached Christ in love and veneration, in true penance and firm resolve, left His embrace renewed and strengthened. Those like Judas, whose hearts are turned toward evil, may be very near Christ and not be holy in character. Judas was three years with Christ, heard His words, lived in the atmosphere of His love and remained unchanged. An empty bottle, hermetically sealed, may lie long in the ocean and continue to be dry within. A heart sealed to Christ’s love may rest on His bosom for years and not be blessed. Only when pure or contrite heart is opened to receive His grace, does closeness to Him sanctify.