TO BE A CHRISTIAN – V
“The bonny Damask-rose is known as Patience:” (King Jesus hath a garden)
Although
not numbered by the Catechism among the Seven Virtues, Patience is the
virtue, the foundation, or the well-prepared field, for many of the other
virtues.
Pati is a Latin verb meaning to suffer. Long-suffering is a word often used interchangeably with patience. Patience can be a prolonged suffering, borne largely in silence – if one does not count talking to God.
Jesus was patient. Yes, even when he cleansed his Father’s house of sellers and buyers. He only used a whip made of cord. Moses or Elijah might have chosen a more drastic method. But the truest example of Jesus’ patience began in Gethsemane and ended on Calvary. That was patience as the ultimate suffering, when everything is taken away. First he was stripped of his clothing, and with that of his dignity as a human being. Then he was stripped of his self-hood, what Kierkegaard calls his task*, which drew from him the terrible plaint, “my God, my God, why have You forsaken me?”
Yet, just before Jesus himself gave up his spirit to the Father, came that amazing exultant cry, the cry of the victorious athlete; of the artist who casts down pen, brush, or chisel required no more: “Tetelestai,” “it is accomplished.” “A worm, and no man,” said Isaiah of the Suffering Servant. Yet a triumphant one.
Patience through pain and loss of self-hood can bring about transformation into another self. Wheat grains ground up are turned into bread. Grapes are crushed to make wine. Jesus died and rose again, and thereafter ascended to his throne from which, “when peaceful silence lay over all, and night had run the half of her swift course” (Wisdom 18), he, the Word of God, had leaped. And as St Paul says
His state was divine,
yet he did not cling
to his equality with God
but emptied himself
to assume the condition of a slave,
and became as men are;
and being as all men are,
he was humbler yet,
even to accepting death,
death on a cross.
(Phil. 2:6-8)
Is it strange to recall the Crucifixion just before we celebrate the Nativity? In T. S. Eliot's play, Murder in the Cathedral, Thomas Becket does not think so. Eliot gives him a Christmas sermon founded on historical record of the text on which Becket had preached. The sermon is a wonderful setting out of Eliot’s vision of sanctity; of what is the true meaning of peace as Christ gives it. E’n la sua voluntate è nostra pace, in His will is our peace, as Dante expressed it.
“I wish only that you should ponder and meditate the deep meaning and mystery of our masses of Christmas Day. For whenever Mass is said, we re-enact the Passion and Death of Our Lord ; and on this Christmas Day we do this in celebration of His Birth. So that at the same moment we rejoice in His coming for the salvation of men, and offer again to God His Body and Blood in sacrifice, oblation and satisfaction for the sins of the whole world. It was in this same night that has just passed, that a multitude of the heavenly host appeared before the shepherds at Bethlehem, saying, 'Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men'; at this same time of all the year that we celebrate at once the Birth of Our Lord and His Passion and Death upon the Cross. Beloved, as the World sees, this is to behave in a strange fashion. For who in the World will both mourn and rejoice at once and for the same reason? For either joy will be overborne by mourning, or mourning will be cast out by joy; so it is only in these our Christian mysteries that we can rejoice and mourn at once for the same reason. But think for a while on the meaning of this word 'peace.' Does it seem strange to you that the angels should have announced Peace, when ceaselessly the world has been stricken with War and the fear of War? Does it seem to you that the angelic voices were mistaken, and that the promise was a disappointment and a cheat?
“Reflect now, how Our Lord Himself spoke of Peace. He said to His disciples 'My peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you.' Did He mean peace as we think of it...? Those men His disciples knew no such things: they went forth to journey afar, to suffer by land and sea, to know torture, imprisonment, disappointment, to suffer death by martyrdom. What then did He mean? If you ask that, remember then that He said also, 'Not as the world gives, give I unto you.' So then, He gave to His disciples peace, but not peace as the world gives.
“Consider also one thing of which you have probably never thought. Not only do we at the feast of Christmas celebrate at once Our Lord's Birth and His Death: but on the next day we celebrate the martyrdom of His first martyr, the blessed Stephen. Is it an accident, do you think, that the day of the first martyr follows immediately the day of the Birth of Christ? By no means. Just as we rejoice and mourn at once, in the Birth and in the Passion of Our Lord; so also, in a smaller figure, we both rejoice and mourn in the death of martyrs. We mourn, for the sins of the world that has martyred them; we rejoice, that another soul is numbered among the Saints in Heaven, for the glory of God and for the salvation of men.
“Beloved, we do not think of a martyr simply as a good Christian who has been killed because he is a Christian: for that would be solely to mourn. We do not think of him simply as a good Christian who has been elevated to the company of the Saints: for that would be simply to rejoice: and neither our mourning nor our rejoicing is as the world's is. A Christian martyrdom is no accident. Saints are not made by accident. Still less is a Christian martyrdom the effect of a man's will to become a Saint, as a man by willing and contriving may become a ruler of men. A martyrdom is always the design of God, for His love of men, to warn them and to lead them, to bring them back to His ways. It is never the design of man; for the true martyr is he who has become the instrument of God, who has lost his will in the will of God, and who no longer desires anything for himself, not even the glory of being a martyr. So thus as on earth the Church mourns and rejoices at once, in a fashion that the world cannot understand; so in Heaven the Saints are most high, having made themselves most low, and are seen, not as we see them, but in the light of the Godhead from which they draw their being.” (Murder in the Cathedral by T. S. Eliot)
Pati is a Latin verb meaning to suffer. Long-suffering is a word often used interchangeably with patience. Patience can be a prolonged suffering, borne largely in silence – if one does not count talking to God.
Jesus was patient. Yes, even when he cleansed his Father’s house of sellers and buyers. He only used a whip made of cord. Moses or Elijah might have chosen a more drastic method. But the truest example of Jesus’ patience began in Gethsemane and ended on Calvary. That was patience as the ultimate suffering, when everything is taken away. First he was stripped of his clothing, and with that of his dignity as a human being. Then he was stripped of his self-hood, what Kierkegaard calls his task*, which drew from him the terrible plaint, “my God, my God, why have You forsaken me?”
Yet, just before Jesus himself gave up his spirit to the Father, came that amazing exultant cry, the cry of the victorious athlete; of the artist who casts down pen, brush, or chisel required no more: “Tetelestai,” “it is accomplished.” “A worm, and no man,” said Isaiah of the Suffering Servant. Yet a triumphant one.
Patience through pain and loss of self-hood can bring about transformation into another self. Wheat grains ground up are turned into bread. Grapes are crushed to make wine. Jesus died and rose again, and thereafter ascended to his throne from which, “when peaceful silence lay over all, and night had run the half of her swift course” (Wisdom 18), he, the Word of God, had leaped. And as St Paul says
His state was divine,
yet he did not cling
to his equality with God
but emptied himself
to assume the condition of a slave,
and became as men are;
and being as all men are,
he was humbler yet,
even to accepting death,
death on a cross.
(Phil. 2:6-8)
Is it strange to recall the Crucifixion just before we celebrate the Nativity? In T. S. Eliot's play, Murder in the Cathedral, Thomas Becket does not think so. Eliot gives him a Christmas sermon founded on historical record of the text on which Becket had preached. The sermon is a wonderful setting out of Eliot’s vision of sanctity; of what is the true meaning of peace as Christ gives it. E’n la sua voluntate è nostra pace, in His will is our peace, as Dante expressed it.
“I wish only that you should ponder and meditate the deep meaning and mystery of our masses of Christmas Day. For whenever Mass is said, we re-enact the Passion and Death of Our Lord ; and on this Christmas Day we do this in celebration of His Birth. So that at the same moment we rejoice in His coming for the salvation of men, and offer again to God His Body and Blood in sacrifice, oblation and satisfaction for the sins of the whole world. It was in this same night that has just passed, that a multitude of the heavenly host appeared before the shepherds at Bethlehem, saying, 'Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men'; at this same time of all the year that we celebrate at once the Birth of Our Lord and His Passion and Death upon the Cross. Beloved, as the World sees, this is to behave in a strange fashion. For who in the World will both mourn and rejoice at once and for the same reason? For either joy will be overborne by mourning, or mourning will be cast out by joy; so it is only in these our Christian mysteries that we can rejoice and mourn at once for the same reason. But think for a while on the meaning of this word 'peace.' Does it seem strange to you that the angels should have announced Peace, when ceaselessly the world has been stricken with War and the fear of War? Does it seem to you that the angelic voices were mistaken, and that the promise was a disappointment and a cheat?
“Reflect now, how Our Lord Himself spoke of Peace. He said to His disciples 'My peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you.' Did He mean peace as we think of it...? Those men His disciples knew no such things: they went forth to journey afar, to suffer by land and sea, to know torture, imprisonment, disappointment, to suffer death by martyrdom. What then did He mean? If you ask that, remember then that He said also, 'Not as the world gives, give I unto you.' So then, He gave to His disciples peace, but not peace as the world gives.
“Consider also one thing of which you have probably never thought. Not only do we at the feast of Christmas celebrate at once Our Lord's Birth and His Death: but on the next day we celebrate the martyrdom of His first martyr, the blessed Stephen. Is it an accident, do you think, that the day of the first martyr follows immediately the day of the Birth of Christ? By no means. Just as we rejoice and mourn at once, in the Birth and in the Passion of Our Lord; so also, in a smaller figure, we both rejoice and mourn in the death of martyrs. We mourn, for the sins of the world that has martyred them; we rejoice, that another soul is numbered among the Saints in Heaven, for the glory of God and for the salvation of men.
“Beloved, we do not think of a martyr simply as a good Christian who has been killed because he is a Christian: for that would be solely to mourn. We do not think of him simply as a good Christian who has been elevated to the company of the Saints: for that would be simply to rejoice: and neither our mourning nor our rejoicing is as the world's is. A Christian martyrdom is no accident. Saints are not made by accident. Still less is a Christian martyrdom the effect of a man's will to become a Saint, as a man by willing and contriving may become a ruler of men. A martyrdom is always the design of God, for His love of men, to warn them and to lead them, to bring them back to His ways. It is never the design of man; for the true martyr is he who has become the instrument of God, who has lost his will in the will of God, and who no longer desires anything for himself, not even the glory of being a martyr. So thus as on earth the Church mourns and rejoices at once, in a fashion that the world cannot understand; so in Heaven the Saints are most high, having made themselves most low, and are seen, not as we see them, but in the light of the Godhead from which they draw their being.” (Murder in the Cathedral by T. S. Eliot)
***
*While the Saviour of the world sighs, “my God, my God, why have you abandoned me,” the repentant robber humbly understands, but still also as a relief, that it is not God who has abandoned him, but it is he who has abandoned God, and repenting, he says to the one crucified with him: Remember me when you come into your kingdom. It is a heavy human suffering to reach for God’s mercy in the anxiety of death and with belated repentance at the moment of despicable death, but yet the repentant robber finds relief when he compares his suffering with the superhuman suffering of being abandoned by God. To be abandoned by God, that indeed means to be without a task. It means to be deprived of the final task that every human being has, the task of patience, the task that has its ground in God’s not having abandoned the sufferer. Hence Christ’s suffering is superhuman and his patience superhuman, so that no human being can grasp either the one or the other. Although it is beneficial that we speak quite humanly of Christ’s suffering, if we speak of it merely as if he were the human being who has suffered the most, it is blasphemy, because although his suffering is human, it is also superhuman, and there is an eternal chasmic abyss between his suffering and the human being’s. ~ Soren Kierkegaard, 1847 Upbuilding Discourses in Various Spirits, Hong p. 280
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