April 21, 2014
Monday in the Octave of Easter
On the day of Pentecost, Peter stood up with the Eleven,
raised his voice, and proclaimed:
“You who are Jews, indeed all of you staying in Jerusalem.
Let this be known to you, and listen to my words.
“You who are children of Israel, hear these words.
Jesus the Nazorean was a man commended to you by God
with mighty deeds, wonders, and signs,
which God worked through him in your midst, as you yourselves know.
This man, delivered up by the set plan and foreknowledge of God,
you killed, using lawless men to crucify him.
But God raised him up, releasing him from the throes of death,
because it was impossible for him to be held by it.
For David says of him:
I saw the Lord ever before me,
with him at my right hand I shall not be disturbed.
Therefore my heart has been glad and my tongue has exulted;
my flesh, too, will dwell in hope,
because you will not abandon my soul to the nether world,
nor will you suffer your holy one to see corruption.
You have made known to me the paths of life;
you will fill me with joy in your presence.
My brothers, one can confidently say to you
about the patriarch David that he died and was buried,
and his tomb is in our midst to this day.
But since he was a prophet and knew that God had sworn an oath to him
that he would set one of his descendants upon his throne,
he foresaw and spoke of the resurrection of the Christ,
that neither was he abandoned to the netherworld
nor did his flesh see corruption.
God raised this Jesus;
of this we are all witnesses.
Exalted at the right hand of God,
he poured forth the promise of the Holy Spirit
that he received from the Father, as you both see and hear.”
R. (1) Keep me safe, O God; you are my hope.
or:
R. Alleluia.
Keep me, O God, for in you I take refuge;
I say to the LORD, “My Lord are you.”
O LORD, my allotted portion and my cup,
you it is who hold fast my lot.
R. Keep me safe, O God; you are my hope.
or:
R. Alleluia.
I bless the LORD who counsels me;
even in the night my heart exhorts me.
I set the LORD ever before me;
with him at my right hand I shall not be disturbed.
R. Keep me safe, O God; you are my hope.
or:
R. Alleluia.
Therefore my heart is glad and my soul rejoices,
my body, too, abides in confidence;
Because you will not abandon my soul to the nether world,
nor will you suffer your faithful one to undergo corruption.
R. Keep me safe, O God; you are my hope.
or:
R. Alleluia.
You will show me the path to life,
fullness of joys in your presence,
the delights at your right hand forever.
R. Keep me safe, O God; you are my hope.
or:
R. Alleluia.
Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went away quickly from the tomb,
fearful yet overjoyed,
and ran to announce the news to his disciples.
And behold, Jesus met them on their way and greeted them.
They approached, embraced his feet, and did him homage.
Then Jesus said to them, “Do not be afraid.
Go tell my brothers to go to Galilee,
and there they will see me.”
While they were going, some of the guard went into the city
and told the chief priests all that had happened.
The chief priests assembled with the elders and took counsel;
then they gave a large sum of money to the soldiers,
telling them, “You are to say,
‘His disciples came by night and stole him while we were asleep.’
And if this gets to the ears of the governor,
we will satisfy him and keep you out of trouble.”
The soldiers took the money and did as they were instructed.
And this story has circulated among the Jews to the present day.
Saint Anselm, Bishop & Doctor of the Church
Saint Anselm,
Bishop & Doctor of the Church
Optional Memorial
April 21st
Crowning of the Virgin with Saint Anselm and other saints .
Francesco Francia (v. 1450-1517/18)
Saint Anselm was born in Aosta, Italy, and died in England. He was in the Benedictine monastery of LeBec in Normandy for around thirty years. In 1093, he became the Archbishop of Canterbury and Primate of England. He is called the Father of Scholastic Theology. In his defense of the Church he suffered much, including exile. His doctrinal works are among the most noteworthy examples of theology and medieval mysticism.
Source: Daily Roman Missal, Edited by Rev. James Socías, Midwest Theological Forum, Chicago, Illinois ©2003
Collect:
O God, who led the Bishop Saint Anselm
to seek out and teach the depths of your wisdom,
grant, we pray,
that our faith in you may so aid our understanding,
that what we believe by your command
may give delight to our hearts.
Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son,
who lives and reigns wiht you in the unity of the Holy Spiri,
one God, for ever and ever. +Amen.
First Reading: Ephesians 3:14-19
For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named, that according to the riches of His glory He may grant you to be strengthened with might through His Spirit in the inner man, and that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may have power to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fulness of God.
Gospel Reading: Matthew 7:21-29
"Not every one who says to Me, 'Lord, Lord,' shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father who is in heaven. On that day many will say to Me, 'Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in Your name, and cast out demons in Your name, and do many mighty works in Your name?' And then will I declare to them, 'I never knew you; depart from Me, you evildoers.'
"Every one then who hears these words of Mine and does them will be like a wise man who built his house upon the rock; and the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat upon that house, but it did not fall, because it had been founded on the rock. And every one who hears these words of Mine and does not do them will be like a foolish man who built his house upon the sand; and the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell; and great was the fall of it."
And when Jesus finished these sayings, the crowds were astonished at His teaching, for He taught them as one who had authority, and not as their scribes.
COMMUNIUM RERUM, ENCYCLICAL OF POPE PIUS X ON ST. ANSELM OF AOSTA, Given at Rome at St. Peter's on the Feast of St. Anselm, April 21, 1909, in the eighth year of Our Pontificate.
BENEDICT XVI, GENERAL AUDIENCE, Paul VI Audience Hall, Wednesday, September 23, 2009
Saint Anselm
Dear Brothers and Sisters,
The Benedictine Abbey of Sant'Anselmo [St Anselm] is located on the Aventine Hill in Rome. As the headquarters of an academic institute of higher studies and of the Abbot Primate of the Confederated Benedictines it is a place that unites within it prayer, study and governance, the same three activities that were a feature of the life of the Saint to whom it is dedicated: Anselm of Aosta, the ninth anniversary of whose death occurs this year. The many initiatives promoted for this happy event, especially by the Diocese of Aosta, have highlighted the interest that this medieval thinker continues to rouse. He is also known as Anselm of Bec and Anselm of Canterbury because of the cities with which he was associated. Who is this figure to whom three places, distant from one another and located in three different nations Italy, France, England feel particularly bound? A monk with an intense spiritual life, an excellent teacher of the young, a theologian with an extraordinary capacity for speculation, a wise man of governance and an intransigent defender of libertas Ecclesiae, of the Church's freedom, Anselm is one of the eminent figures of the Middle Ages who was able to harmonize all these qualities, thanks to the profound mystical experience that always guided his thought and his action.
St Anselm was born in 1033 (or at the beginning of 1034) in Aosta, the first child of a noble family. His father was a coarse man dedicated to the pleasures of life who squandered his possessions. On the other hand, Anselm's mother was a profoundly religious woman of high moral standing (cf. Eadmer, Vita Sancti Anselmi, PL 159, col. 49). It was she, his mother, who saw to the first human and religious formation of her son whom she subsequently entrusted to the Benedictines at a priory in Aosta. Anselm, who since childhood as his biographer recounts imagined that the good Lord dwelled among the towering, snow-capped peaks of the Alps, dreamed one night that he had been invited to this splendid kingdom by God himself, who had a long and affable conversation with him and then gave him to eat "a very white bread roll" (ibid., col. 51). This dream left him with the conviction that he was called to carry out a lofty mission. At the age of 15, he asked to be admitted to the Benedictine Order but his father brought the full force of his authority to bear against him and did not even give way when his son, seriously ill and feeling close to death, begged for the religious habit as a supreme comfort. After his recovery and the premature death of his mother, Anselm went through a period of moral dissipation. He neglected his studies and, consumed by earthly passions, grew deaf to God's call. He left home and began to wander through France in search of new experiences. Three years later, having arrived in Normandy, he went to the Benedictine Abbey of Bec, attracted by the fame of Lanfranc of Pavia, the Prior. For him this was a providential meeting, crucial to the rest of his life. Under Lanfranc's guidance Anselm energetically resumed his studies and it was not long before he became not only the favourite pupil but also the teacher's confidante. His monastic vocation was rekindled and, after an attentive evaluation, at the age of 27 he entered the monastic order and was ordained a priest. Ascesis and study unfolded new horizons before him, enabling him to rediscover at a far higher level the same familiarity with God which he had had as a child.
When Lanfranc became Abbot of Caen in 1063, Anselm, after barely three years of monastic life, was named Prior of the Monastery of Bec and teacher of the cloister school, showing his gifts as a refined educator. He was not keen on authoritarian methods; he compared young people to small plants that develop better if they are not enclosed in greenhouses and granted them a "healthy" freedom. He was very demanding with himself and with others in monastic observance, but rather than imposing his discipline he strove to have it followed by persuasion. Upon the death of Abbot Herluin, the founder of the Abbey of Bec, Anselm was unanimously elected to succeed him; it was February 1079. In the meantime numerous monks had been summoned to Canterbury to bring to their brethren on the other side of the Channel the renewal that was being brought about on the continent. Their work was so well received that Lanfranc of Pavia, Abbot of Caen, became the new Archbishop of Canterbury. He asked Anselm to spend a certain period with him in order to instruct the monks and to help him in the difficult plight in which his ecclesiastical community had been left after the Norman conquest. Anselm's stay turned out to be very fruitful; he won such popularity and esteem that when Lanfranc died he was chosen to succeed him in the archiepiscopal See of Canterbury. He received his solemn episcopal consecration in December 1093.
Anselm immediately became involved in a strenuous struggle for the Church's freedom, valiantly supporting the independence of the spiritual power from the temporal. Anselm defended the Church from undue interference by political authorities, especially King William Rufus and Henry I, finding encouragement and support in the Roman Pontiff to whom he always showed courageous and cordial adherence. In 1103, this fidelity even cost him the bitterness of exile from his See of Canterbury. Moreover, it was only in 1106, when King Henry I renounced his right to the conferral of ecclesiastical offices, as well as to the collection of taxes and the confiscation of Church properties, that Anselm could return to England, where he was festively welcomed by the clergy and the people. Thus the long battle he had fought with the weapons of perseverance, pride and goodness ended happily. This holy Archbishop, who roused such deep admiration around him wherever he went, dedicated the last years of his life to the moral formation of the clergy and to intellectual research into theological topics. He died on 21 April 1109, accompanied by the words of the Gospel proclaimed in Holy Mass on that day: "You are those who have continued with me in my trials; as my Father appointed a kingdom for me, so do I appoint for you that you may eat and drink at my table in my kingdom..." (Lk 22: 28-30). So it was that the dream of the mysterious banquet he had had as a small boy, at the very beginning of his spiritual journey, found fulfilment. Jesus, who had invited him to sit at his table, welcomed Anselm upon his death into the eternal Kingdom of the Father.
"I pray, O God, to know you, to love you, that I may rejoice in you. And if I cannot attain to full joy in this life may I at least advance from day to day, until that joy shall come to the full" (Proslogion, chapter 14). This prayer enables us to understand the mystical soul of this great Saint of the Middle Ages, the founder of scholastic theology, to whom Christian tradition has given the title: "Magnificent Doctor", because he fostered an intense desire to deepen his knowledge of the divine Mysteries but in the full awareness that the quest for God is never ending, at least on this earth. The clarity and logical rigour of his thought always aimed at "raising the mind to contemplation of God" (ibid., Proemium). He states clearly that whoever intends to study theology cannot rely on his intelligence alone but must cultivate at the same time a profound experience of faith. The theologian's activity, according to St Anselm, thus develops in three stages: faith, a gift God freely offers, to be received with humility; experience, which consists in incarnating God's word in one's own daily life; and therefore true knowledge, which is never the fruit of ascetic reasoning but rather of contemplative intuition. In this regard his famous words remain more useful than ever, even today, for healthy theological research and for anyone who wishes to deepen his knowledge of the truths of faith: "I do not endeavour, O Lord, to penetrate your sublimity, for in no wise do I compare my understanding with that; but I long to understand in some degree your truth, which my heart believes and loves. For I do not seek to understand that I may believe, but I believe in order to understand. For this also I believe, that unless I believed, I should not understand" (ibid., 1).
Dear brothers and sisters, may the love of the truth and the constant thirst for God that marked St Anselm's entire existence be an incentive to every Christian to seek tirelessly an ever more intimate union with Christ, the Way, the Truth and the Life. In addition, may the zeal full of courage that distinguished his pastoral action and occasionally brought him misunderstanding, sorrow and even exile be an encouragement for Pastors, for consecrated people and for all the faithful to love Christ's Church, to pray, to work and to suffer for her, without ever abandoning or betraying her. May the Virgin Mother of God, for whom St Anselm had a tender, filial devotion, obtain this grace for us. "Mary, it is you whom my heart yearns to love", St Anselm wrote, "it is you whom my tongue ardently desires to praise".
Vultus Christi
Monday, 21 April 2014 07:03
Health, Life, and Resurrection
Today we continue our uninterrupted celebration of the Pasch in the Resurrection of the Lord. A number of motifs begin to emerge. On Maundy Thursday evening at the Mass of the Lord’s Supper, we recalled the promises of the Father that, since the First Sunday of Lent, we had carried in our hearts, promises that came into sharper focus for us as we sang that night in the Introit, of the health, life, resurrection, and deliverance that are ours in the glorious Cross of Jesus Christ.
The Cross and the Supper of the Lamb
Friday passed: the Word of the Cross reducing us to silence; the mystery of the Cross compelling us to place our faces in the dust from which we came. Saturday too passed: the great and solemn Sabbath of a silence holding fast the secret of our hope. It was in that silence that we began to hear, faintly at first, the call ad mensam, the call ad coenam, the call to the wedding feast of the Lamb in which every promise of the Father is fulfilled.
Instruction in Prayer
In the great and solemn Vigil, we sat in the dark like the catechumens of old assembled around their bishop awaiting full initiation into the holy mysteries. A God faithful to His promises revealed Himself in the long series of readings, psalms, and collects. This too was the Church’s own instruction of those about to be baptized, her final and urgent teaching in the way of Christian prayer. Again and again, with a patient pedagogy, the rhythm repeated itself — lectio, meditatio, oratio — until at length, it was time to go to the font, time to descend into the womb, time to come forth from the tomb.
The Most Holy Eucharist
The newborn came up, dripping with a holy wetness, shining with the brightness of new life. Clothed in white garments, and with lighted candles in their hands they were led to the bishop to be sealed with the gift of the Holy Spirit, the last station on the way to the sacrificial banquet to taste for the first time of the sweetness of the Lord. Here, ad mensam, in the adorable, awesome, and life-giving mystery of the Eucharist was the fulfillment of every promise made by the Father!
The Paschal Sacraments
The full sequence of the Paschal sacraments of initiation is really, if ever, experienced in a monastery. It is nonetheless, the very essence of the monastic life to remember, to dwell on, to plumb, to deepen, and to probe the paschal sacraments. There is no other pattern of holiness, no higher experience of all the promises of the Father fulfilled.
The ancient and ever-living practice of the Church is to begin the mystagogical catecheses almost immediately after the experience of the paschal sacraments. The neophytes have barely enough time to catch their breath when the mystagogical catecheses begin in earnest.
The mystagogical catecheses are the completion of the pre-baptismal catecheses that led up to the great Paschal Vigil. Everything was not explained before, and for good reason. The Church, in her wisdom, knows that, all too easily, rational knowledge about something is mistaken for experiential knowledge of it. When it comes to the mysteries of the faith, the distinction is crucial. The mysteries of the faith must be experienced in the power of Word and Sacrament before they can be proposed to the intelligence. For the Christian, salvation comes, not through gnosis (i.e. knowledge) but through experience. Again and again, the verb to taste is used in reference to gift of salvation. Once the sweetness of the Lord has been tasted, all the gifts of human intelligence and creativity are called into play to describe it, to reflect upon it, to bring into greater light.
Mystagogical Teaching
This then is the purpose of the mystagogical catechesis: to go back over the saving events of the Paschal Triduum, and especially the holy mysteries of the great Vigil, and to unfold their hidden meaning to the neophytes. This mystagogical teaching will shape and colour our prayer throughout the coming week.
The Psalter
Yesterday morning, with entrance chant Resurrexi, the neophytes, and we with them, were reminded that, for the Church, the psalter is indeed a sacrament of holy communion with the prayer of Christ to the Father. Through the liturgical and solitary prayer of the psalter, the Christian enters, by this communion under the species of human words, into the ineffable and eternal dialogue of the Son with the Father in the Holy Spirit. It is as if, in the day Mass of Pascha, the Church is saying: “Last night, beloved newborns, you were brought into the circle of Trinitarian life and love. Grow ever more deeply into that life and into that love by speaking to the Father in the very words prepared by the Holy Spirit in Israel for the Word made flesh.”
When the psalter, or the book of the Liturgy of the Hours is given to a monastic neophyte, a newly professed monk, on the day of his profession, it has the same significance. “Here, my son, is the very form and pattern of your prayer to the Father, with Christ, in the Holy Spirit.”
The Holy Altar
Although a monastery church has no font and no chapel of chrismation, it has the mensa sancta, the holy altar. The “Glorious Vespers” of Easter Day, with the procession from the font to the altar, serve to remind us that we have come, all of us, ad mensam –to the holy altar table of the sacrificial banquet– by way of the regenerating water of the font, and the sealing with the gift of the Holy Spirit in chrismation.
Today’s Introit
And so, we, sharing in the whole experience of the neophytes and reliving our own, come to today’s Holy Sacrifice. The Introit, appropriately drawn from the book of Exodus, is addressed first of all to the neophytes, without however excluding the older and more seasoned faithful. It is, in a fact, a discrete invitation on the part of the liturgy, to become, all of us, neophytes again. “Truly, I say to you, unless you turn and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven” (Mt 18:2).
Just as it is salutary for the seasoned veterans of the monastic struggle, the venerable fathers and mothers of thirty, forty, and fifty or more years of profession, to return in spirit to the day and hour of their profession, so too, does the Church want all of us to return, in spirit, to the day and the hour of our baptism, chrismation, and first taste of the precious, holy, and life-giving Body and Blood of Christ. And so, today’s Introit speaks to neophytes and “oldophytes” as well: “The Lord has led you forth into a land flowing with milk and honey, alleluia: so that the law of the Lord might be ever in your mouth, alleluia, alleluia” (Ex 13:5, 9).
Our New Moses Speaks
In the book of Exodus these words are spoken by Moses to the people; in the liturgy, they are spoken by our new Moses, our leader and true liberator, Christ. They hearken back to the events of the great Vigil. The passover, the cross-over, the transitus, the liberation has indeed taken place. The promised land flows with milk and honey! The milk is the Word of God by which the neophytes are to grow strong and solid in the faith. In the honey, they recognize an allusion to the psalm that, in the ancient Church, always accompanied the Communion procession, “O taste and see that the Lord is sweet” (Ps 33:8). Thus do we find, in today’s Introit, just as in the Gospel of Emmaus, the fundamental pattern of Christian worship: word (milk) and sacrament (honey).
Always in Your Mouth
But there is still more. Et ut lex Domini semper sit in ore vestro — “That the law of the Lord may be always in your mouth” (Ex 13:9). Something held in the mouth for a long time leaves its fragrance and its taste. On this second day of Pascha, the neophytes are told to hold the Word of God in their mouths, to savour it with the palate of the soul. The emphasis is clearly on using the spiritual sense of taste. The lex Domini, the law of the Lord, is fulfilled and perfected in Christ. Lest we forget too quickly the taste of his milk and honey, we are instructed in this mystagogical catechesis of the liturgy to hold them in our mouth, not just for a few moments or a few hours but, semper. Always. Is this not the essential work of the monastic life?
But it is time to go ad mensam! “I eat my honeycomb with my honey, I drink my wine with my milk. Eat, O friends, and drink: drink deeply, O lovers” (Ct 5:1). “Your lips distil nectar, my bride; honey and milk are under your tongue” (Ct 4:11).
8. And they departed quickly from the sepulcher with fear and great joy; and did run to bring his disciples word.
9. And as they went to tell his disciples, behold, Jesus met them, saying, All hail. And they came and held him by the feet, and worshipped him.
10. Then said Jesus to them, Be not afraid: go tell my brethren that they go into Galilee, and there shall they see me.
HILARY; The women having been comforted by the Angel, are straightway met by the Lord, that when they should proclaim His resurrection to the disciples, they should speak rasher from Christ's own mouth than from an Angel's.
AUG. They departed forth of the tomb, that is, from that spot of the garden which was before the tomb hewn in the rock.
JEROME; A twofold feeling possessed the minds of the women, fear and joy; fear, at the greatness of the miracle; joy, in their desire of Him that was risen; but both added speed to their women's steps, as it follows, And did run to bring his disciples word. They went to the Apostles, that through them might be spread abroad the seed of the faith. They who thus desired, and who thus ran, merited to have their rising Lord come to meet them; whence it follows, And, behold, Jesus met them, saying, All hail.
RABAN. Hereby He showed that He will meet with His help all those who begin the ways of virtue, and enable them to attain to e, everlasting salvation.
JEROME; The women ought first to hear this Hail, that the curse of the woman Eve may be removed in these women.
CHRYSOL. That in these women is contained a full figure c of the Church is shown hereby, that Christ convinces His disciples when in doubt concerning the Resurrection, and confirms them when in fear; and when He meets them He does not terrify them by His power, but prevents them with the ardor of love. And Christ in His Church salutes Himself, for He has taken it into His own Body.
AUG. We conclude that they had speech of Angels twice at the sepulcher; when they saw one Angel, of whom Matthew and Mark speak; and again when they saw two Angels, as Luke and John relate. And twice in like manner of the Lord; once at that time when Mary supposed Him to be the gardener, and now again when He met them in the way to confirm them by repetition, and to restore them from their faintness.
CHRYSOL. Then Mary was not suffered to touch Him; now she has permission not only to touch, but to hold Him altogether; they came and held him by the feet, and worshipped him.
RABAN. It was told above how He rose when the sepulcher was closed, to show that that body which had been shut up therein dead, was now become immortal. He now offers His feet to be held by the women, to show that He had real flesh, which can be touched by mortal creatures.
CHRYSOL. They hold Christ's feet, who in the Church present the type of Evangelic preaching, and merit this privilege by their running to Him; and by faith so detain their Savior's footsteps, that they may come to the honor of His perfect Godhead. She is deservedly bid to touch me not, who mourns her Lord upon earth, and so seeks Him dead in the tomb, as not to know that He reigns in heaven with the Father. This, that the same Mary, one while exalted to the summit of faith, touches Christ, and holds Him with entire and holy affection; and again, cast down in weakness of flesh, and womanly infirmity, doubts, undeserving to touch her Lord, causes us no difficulty. For that is of mystery, this of her sex; that is of divine grace, this of human nature. And so also we, when we have knowledge of divine things, live to God; when we are wise in human things, we are blinded so by our own selves.
ID. They held His feet to show that the head of Christ is the man, but that the woman is in Christ's feet, and that it was given to them through Christ, not to go before, but to follow the man. Christ also repeats what the Angel had said, that what an Angel had made sure, Christ might make yet more sure. It follows, Then said Jesus to them, Fear not.
JEROME; This may be always observed, both in the Old and New Testament, that when there is an appearance of any majestic person, the first thing done is to banish fear, that the mind being tranquilized may receive the things that are said.
HILARY; The same order as of old now followed in the reversal of our woe, that whereas death began from the female sex, the same should now first see the glory of the Resurrection, and be made the messenger thereof. Whence the Lord adds, Go tell my brethren that they go into Galilee, there shall they see me.
CHRYSOL. He calls them brethren whom He has made akin to His own body; brethren whom the generous Heir has made His co-heirs; brethren, whom He has adopted to be sons of His own Father.
AUG. That the Lord, both by His own mouth, and by the Angel, directs them to seek for Him, not in that place in which He was to show Himself first but in Galilee, makes every believer anxious to understand in what mystery it is spoken. Galilee is interpreted 'transmigration,' or 'revelation'. And according to the first interpretation what meaning offers itself, save this, that the grace of Christ was to pass from the people of Israel to the Gentiles, who would not believe when the Apostles should preach the Gospel to them, unless the Lord Himself should first make ready their way in the hearts of men. This is the signification of that, He shall go before you into Galilee. There shall you see him, means, there shall you find His members, there shall you perceive His living Body in such as shall receive you. According to the other interpretation, 'revelation,' it is to be understood, you shall see him no longer in the form of a servant, but in that in which He is equal with the Father. That revelation will be the true Galilee, when we shall be like him, and shall see him as he is. That will be the blessed passing from this world to that eternity.
11. Now when they were going, behold, some of the watch came into the city, and showed to the Chief Priests all the things that were done.
12. And when they were assembled with the elders, and had taken counsel, they gave large money to the soldiers,
13. Saying, Say you, His disciples came by night, and stole him away while we slept.
14. And if this come to the governor's ears, we will persuade him, and secure you.
15. So they took the money, and did as they were taught: and this saying is commonly reported among the Jews until this day.
CHRYS. Of the signs which were shown around Christ, some were common to the whole world, as the darkness; some peculiar to the watch, as the wonderful apparition of Angels, and the earthquake, which were wrought for the soldiers' sake, that they might be stunned with amazement, and bear testimony to the truth. For when truth is proclaimed by its adversaries, it adds to its brightness. Which befell now; Some of the watch came into the city, and showed to the Chief Priests all the things that were done.
RABAN. Simple minds, and unlearned country-folk, often make manifest without guile the truth of a matter, as the thing is; but on the other hand, a crafty wickedness studies how to recommend falsehood by ing words.
JEROME; Thus the Chief Priests, who ought to have been by this turned to penitence, and to seek Jesus risen, persevere in their wickedness, and convert the money which was given for the use of the Temple to the purchase of a lie, as before they had given thirty pieces of silver to the traitor Judas.
CHRYSOL. Not content to have put the Master to death, they plot how they may destroy the disciples, and make the Master's power matter of charge against His disciples. The soldiers indeed lost Him, the Jews missed Him, but the disciples carried Him away, not by theft, but by faith; by virtue, and not by fraud; by holiness, and not by wickedness; alive, and not dead.
CHRYS. How should the disciples carry Him away by stealth, men poor, and of no station, and who scarcely dared to show themselves? They fled when afterwards they saw Christ alive, how, when He was dead, would they not have feared so great a multitude of soldiers? How were they to remove the door of the sepulcher? One might have done it unperceived by the guard. But a large stone was rolled to the mouth requiring many hands. And was not the seal thereon? And why did they not attempt it the first night, when there was none at the sepulcher? For it was on the Sabbath that they begged the body of Jesus.
Moreover, what mean these napkins which Peter sees laid here? Had the disciples stolen the Body, they would never have stripped it, both because it might so receive hurt, and cause unnecessary delay to themselves, and so expose them to be taken by the watch; especially since the Body and clothes were covered with myrrh, a glutinous spice, which would cause them to adhere. The allegation of the theft then is improbable. So that their endeavors to conceal the Resurrection do but make it more manifest. For when they say, His disciples stole the body, they confess that it is not in the sepulcher. And as they thus confess that they had not the Body, and as the watch, the sealing, and the fears of the disciples, make the theft improbable, there is seen evidence of the Resurrection not to be gainsaid.
REMIG. But if the guards slept, how saw they the theft? And if they saw it not, how could they witness thereto? So that what they desire to show, they cannot show.
GLOSS. That the fear of the Governor might not restrain them from this lie, they promise them impunity.
CHRYS. See how all are corrupted; Pilate persuaded; the people stirred up; the soldiers bribed; as it follows, And they took the money, and did as they were instructed. If money prevailed with a disciple so far as to make him become the betrayer of his Master, what wonder that the soldiers are overcome by it.
HILARY; The concealment of the Resurrection, and the false allegation of theft, is purchased by money; because by the honor of this world, which consists in money and desire, Christ's glory is denied.
RABAN. But as the guilt of His blood, which they imprecated upon themselves and their children, presses them down with a heavy weight of sin, so the purchase of the lie, by which they deny the truth of the Resurrection, charges this guilt upon them for ever; as it follows, And this saying is commonly reported among the Jews until this day.
CHRYSOL. Among the Jews, not among the Christians; what in Judea the Jew concealed by his gold, is by faith blazed abroad throughout the world.
JEROME; All who abuse to other purposes the money of the Temple, and the contributions for the use of the Church, purchasing with them their own pleasure, are like the Scribes and Priests who bought this lie, and the blood of the Savior.
Catena Aurea Matthew 28
