Spiritual childhood is necessary to obtain eternal life

"Spiritual childhood is thus a necessary condition to obtain eternal life. What does that mean? Is it necessary to idealize childhood to the point of forgetting its defects and weaknesses? Is it necessary to become childish and lose the wisdom of adulthood? No, certainly not. On the contrary, we must put to work all of the faculties and aptitudes that God has given to us. It does not mean thinking, speaking, feeling and acting like a child. Saint Paul warns us about this: That henceforth we be no more children tossed to and fro, and carried about with every wind of doctrine... But doing the truth in charity, we may in all things grow up in Him who is the head, Christ (Eph. 4: 14-15). And again: Brethren, do not become children in sense: but in malice be children, and in sense be perfect (1 Cor. 14: 20). No matter how much the freshness of childhood moves us, we must not forget that its unfinished state calls for maturity. The emotional nature of the child is both tyrannical and selfish. The child seeks to control the beloved more than to give himself to the beloved, and thus does not offer a good example.

Our Lord desires something else when He asks us to become children again. The way of childhood, as Saint Theresa of the Child Jesus said, consists essentially "in a disposition of the heart, which makes us humble and small in the arms of God, conscious of our weakness, and confident even unto boldness in His fatherly goodness" (Novissima Verba). In the light of affirmations of the faith, it makes us conscious of reality: it is God alone who permits us to be, to love, to act, above all on the supernatural level. Our spiritual life cannot be an initiative on our part with respect to God: it can only be a placing of ourselves in the hands of Him who is infinitely good, who loves us freely, with a primary and creative love: For whosoever are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God (Rom. 8: 14).

This attitude recognizes a link of total dependence with respect to God, excludes the feeling of pride in oneself, the presumption of reaching a supernatural goal by human means, and the foolish wish of sufficing unto oneself at the time of peril and temptation. It makes us practice "humility, the kind and sincere humility of the heart, total fidelity to our duty of state, whatever it may be, in whatever sphere and at whatever level of the human hierarchy that God has placed us and called on us to work, a disposition to all sacrifices, confident abandonment in the hand and Heart of God, and above all true charity, the real love of God, true tenderness for Jesus Christ, answering to the tenderness that He Himself showed toward us, this charity that is benevolent, patient, always active and putting up with anything, prepared for self-sacrifice, even to give up one's life.... Spiritual childhood is accessible and necessary for everyone. As Saint Augustine observes, not everyone can preach and do great works. But who isn't capable of praying, of humbling oneself and of loving?" (Pius XI, February 11, 1923)."

--By Dom Antoine Marie, osb, Newsletter of 15 January, 1997

Reprinted with the kind permission of the monks at Clairval

Memorial of Bl Kuriakose Elias of the Holy Family

"Blessed Kuriakos Elias Chavara, co-founder and first prior general of the congregation of the Carmelites of Mary Immaculate, was born at Kainakary in Kerala, India, February 10, 1805. He entered the seminary in 1818, and was ordained priest in 1829. He made his religious profession in 1855, in the congregation he founded. In 1861 he was named vicar general for the Syro-Malabar church; in this capacity he defended ecclesial unity threatened by schism when Mar Tomas Rochos was sent from Mesopotamia to consecrate Nestorian bishops. Throughout his life he worked for the renovation of the church in Malabar. He was also co-founder in 1866 of the congregation of the Sisters of the Mother of Carmel. Above all, he was a man of prayer, zealous for the Eucharistic Lord and devoted to the Immaculate Virgin Mary. He died at Koonammavu in 1871. His body was transferred to Mannanam in 1889."

-- From the Carmelite Proper
 
-o-
 
"Day and night he fought to arrest the spread of schism. Today, Tuesday, January, 3, 1871, at 7:15 in the morning, Fr. Cyriac (Kuriakose) Elias of the Holy Family, the first Prior, died after a life of great innocence... He could declare before his death he had never lost his baptismal innocence. He was exercising himself in the practice of virtues, especially in simplicity of heart, living faith, tender obedience, and devotion to the Most Blessed Sacrament, to the Blessed Virgin Mary and to St. Joseph. He has undergone immense hardships for the good of the Christians of Malabar, especially during the time of the schism of Rochos, when he, having been appointed vicar general of the Syrians, showed his extraordinary devotion to the Holy See. He fought day and night to arrest the spread of schism from which he would save no less than forty parishes. On this account the Holy Father Pope Pius IX sent him a letter expressing his great satisfaction. He was the founder and the first Prior of the Carmelites of Malabar. He founded also the convent of nuns after undergoing many hardships. On account of his endearing virtues, learning and profound knowledge of the Syriac language he enjoyed great influence on the Syrians of Malabar. He was always greatly loved by the Vicars Apostolic of Malabar, and even more by the people of Malabar, the gentiles and Nestorians not excluded. He endured his last illness for two years in a spirit of great resignation, nay with joy. He was detached from all disorderly affections for earthly things, which was all the more true in the last days of his life. Having received the last sacraments with extraordinary piety and devotion, in a heavenly joy, and amidst the tears of all who knew him, especially my own, who knew him even as myself, he breathed his last at the age of sixty-five and was buried in the church of St. Philomena at Koonammavu. O holy and beautiful soul, pray for me."

-- From a note written on the day of his death, by his spiritual director, Fr. Leopold Beccaro.

-o-

To learn more about the life of Bl Kuriakose, please visit this site.

Feast of the Most Holy Name of Jesus

"When the Holy Ghost maketh the Bride to say unto the Bridegroom: Thy Name is as ointment poured forth : he likeneth that Name to the oil of anointing; and his figure of speech is not an idle one. For, verily, oil giveth illumination, nourishment, and unction, in that it doth burn as fire, doth feed the flesh, and doth soothe pain. Thus, as oil is unto us as light, food, and healing, so also is the Name of the Bridegroom. For to preach the Name of Jesus, is to give light; to think on it, is to feed the soul; to call on it, is to win grace and unction. Let us consider this point by point. First, as to illumination, what (thinkest thou) hath made the light of the Faith so suddenly and so brightly to shine throughout the whole world but the preaching of the Name of Jesus? Is it not by the light of this Name that God hath called us into his own marvellous light? For in the light thereof we are enlightened; and in his light we do see the light, of which Paul speaketh, when he so truly saith of us: Ye were sometimes darkness, but now are ye light in the Lord.

This is the Name which the Apostle was commanded to bear before Gentiles and kings and the children of Israel, the Name which he bore as a light to enlighten his people, crying everywhere: The night is far spent, the day is at hand; let us therefore cast off the works of darkness, and let us put on the armour of light; let us walk honestly as in the day. To all men he pointed out this Name as a candle set upon a candlestick, preaching in every place Jesus and him crucified. Yea, that Name shone forth and dazzled every eye that beheld it. Did it not come like lightning out of the mouth of Peter to give bodily strength to the feet of the lame man, and to clear the sight of many a blind soul? Cast he not fire when he said: In the Name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, rise up and walk?

Secondly, the Name of Jesus is not a Name of light only, but is our meat also. Dost thou ever call it to mind, and remain unstrengthened? Is there anything like it to enrich the soul of him that thinketh on it? What is there like it to restore the fagged senses, to fortify strength, to give nurture unto good lives and pure affections? The soul is fed on husks if that whereon it feedeth lack seasoning with this Name, which is the very salt of the earth. If thou writest, thou hast no meaning for me except I read of Jesus there. If thou dost preach, or dispute, thou hast no meaning for me except I hear of Jesus there. The mention of Jesus is honey in the mouth, music in the ear, and gladness in the heart. So far we have been concerned with the Name of Jesus as our spiritual food: now thirdly, let us mention the same as the medicine of our healing. Is any sorrowful among us? Let the thought of Jesus come into his heart, and spring into his mouth. Behold, when the day of that Name beginneth to break, every cloud will flee away, and there will be a great calm. Doth any fall into sin? Doth any draw nigh to a hopeless death? And if he do but call on the life-giving Name of Jesus, will he not draw the breath of a new life again?"

-- From a Sermon by St Bernard the Abbot

The Circumcision of Our Lord

"Dearly beloved brethren, whosoever will keep this day's festival with true reverence and due honour, must neither think falsely of the Lord's Incarnation, nor meanly of the Godhead. For as there is danger of not realizing the truth of Christ's humanity, so is there no less danger of failing to recognize his equality in glory with his Father. Wherefore, when we try to contemplate the mystery of Christ's birth, wherein he was born of a Virgin Mother, we must soar above the clouds of earthly imagination, and with the eye of enlightened faith pierce through the fog of earthly wisdom.

The authority on which we believe is the authority of God himself ; and the teaching which we follow is the very teaching of God himself. Therefore it is true, whether we lend an ear to the testimony of the Law, or to the sayings of the Prophets, or to the trumpet of the Gospel. This latter did John the Son of Thunder sound, when, filled with the Holy Ghost, he proclaimed : In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God ; the Same was in the beginning with God ; all things were made by him, and without him was not anything made. True also is the witness of John when he saith : The Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the Only-Begotten of the Father.

The Person of the Son of God therefore remaineth unchanged and one, though he hath two natures, keeping his own, and taking ours. He cometh on earth as man to be the restorer of man, but abideth all the while in his unchangeable Godhead. That Godhead which he shareth with the Father was not a whit the less almighty, nor did the form of a servant touch the form of God to derogate from it. The Most High and Everlasting Being, bending down for man's salvation, took the Manhood into his glory. Yet he ceased not to be that which he is from everlasting. Hence we see the only-begotten Son of God in one place confessing that the Father is greater than he, and in another declaring that he and the Father are One. This is an evident proof of the distinction of his two natures, and the unity of his Person. For he is inferior to the Father as touching his Manhood, and yet equal to the Father as touching his Godhead. Albeit, though he be God and Man, he is not two, but One Christ."

-- From a Sermon by St Leo the Pope

Memorial of St Sylvester

"Sylvester was a Roman by birth, and his father's name was Rufinus.  He was brought up from a very early age under a Priest named Cyrinus, of whose teaching and example he was a diligent learner.  During the fury of the persecutions, Sylvester hid himself upon Mount Soracte.  In his thirtieth year he was ordained Priest of the Holy Roman Church by Pope Marcellinus.  In the discharge of his duties he became a model for all the clergy, and, after the death of Melchiades, he succeeded him on the Papal throne, during the reign of Constantine, who had already by public decree proclaimed peace to the Church of Christ.  Hardly had he undertaken the government of the Church when he betook himself to stir up the Emperor to protect and propagate the religion of Christ.  Constantine was fresh from his victory over his enemy Maxentius, on the Eve whereof the sign of the Cross had been revealed to him limned in light upon the sky; and there was an old story in the Church of Rome that it was Sylvester who caused him to recognise the images of the Apostles, administered to him holy Baptism, and cleansed him from the leprosy of misbelief.


The godly Emperor had already granted to Christ's faithful people permission to build public churches, and by the advice of Sylvester he himself set them the example.  He built many Basilicas, and magnificently adorned them with holy images, and gifted them with gifts and endowments.  Among these there were, besides others, the Church of Christ the Saviour, hard by the Lateran Palace; that of St. Peter, upon the Vatican Mount; that of St. Paul, upon the Ostian Way; that of St. Lawrence in Agro Verano; that of the Holy Cross in Atro Sessoriano; that of St. Peter and St. Marcellinus, upon the Labican Way; and that of St. Agnes, upon the Nomentan Way.  Under this Pope was held the first Council of Nice, presided over by the Papal Legates, and in the Presence of Constantine, and three hundred and eighteen Bishops, where the holy and Catholick Faith was declared, and Arius and his followers condemned; which Council was finally confirmed by the Pope, at the request of all the assembled Fathers, in a synod held at Rome, where Arius was again condemned.  This Pope issued many useful ordinances for the Church of God.  He reserved to Bishops the right of consecrating the Holy Chrism; ordered Priests to anoint with Chrism the heads of the newly baptized; settled the offíciating dress of Deacons as a dalmatic and linen maniple; and forbade the consecration of the Sacrament of the Altar on anything but a linen corporal.


This Sylvester is likewise said to have ordained that all persons taking Holy Orders should remain a while in each grade  before being promoted to a higher; that laymen should not go to law against the clergy; and that the clergy themselves were not to plead before civil tribunals.  He decreed that the first and seventh days of the week should be called respectively the Lord's Day and the Sabbath, and the others, Second Day, Third Day, and so on.  In this he confirmed the use of the word Feria for the weekdays, the which use had already begun in the Church.  This word signifieth an holiday, and pointeth to the duty of the clergy ever to lay aside all worldly labour, and leave themselves free to do continually the work of the Lord.  The heavenly wisdom with which he ruled the Church of God, was joined in him to a singular holiness of life, and an inexhaustible tenderness towards the poor; in which matter he ordained that the wealthy clergy should each relieve a certain number of needy persons; and he also made arrangements for supplying the consecrated virgins with the necessaries of life.  He lived as Pope twenty-one years, ten months and one day, and was buried in the cemetery of Priscilla on the Salarian Way.  He held seven ordinations in the month of December, and made forty-two priests, twenty-five deacons, and sixty-five bishops of various sees."


-- From the 1911 Breviary of St Pius X (1955 ed)

First word of the Child Jesus

The Word in your silence
has been said briefly and eternally
and it is mute in your maternal
lap...

She tells Him:
Am I to give, divine lips,
your first word?
Which one will I choose, my God,
to let lose your tongue?
Your first word
filled to the brim the star-filled skies,
by what will be filled my soul
your first word?
Will I tell it to say: Love?...
No, for saying it does not count:
It is saying in silence
with its joy and its sorrow!
Will I tell it to say: Mother?...
No, because the Father will be jealous.
Will I tell it to say: Father?
No, because the earth shudders...
I will tell it to say: Jesus,
which is the perfect word!
With which the Father smiles,
the earth is divinized,
and the Heart of his Mother
is fulfilled with eternal joy.

-- 100 sonetos de eternidad by Juan Alberto de los Cármenes, ocd
translated by ocdsister

** Fr Juan Alberto is very well known in the Spanish Carmels for his poetry. Born in Cuba, many of his poems are inspired by Carmelite writings, especially those of St Teresa of Avila and St John of the Cross.

Commemoration of St Thomas Becket

"Thomas was born at London in England, and succeeded Theobald in the Archbishopric of Canterbury. He had previously filled with great distinction the office of Lord Chancellor, and shewed an indomitable firmness in his duty as Primate. When Henry II, King of England, in an assembly of the Bishops and great men of his realm, endeavoured to pass laws detrimental to the advantage and dignity of the Church, he opposed himself so steadily to the king's wishes, that, neither promises, nor threats availing to shake him, he was about to be cast into prison, had he not made good his escape in time. The whole of his kinsfolk without regard to age or sex, his friends, and his advisers, were then banished the kingdom, and those who were able, were bound by an oath to make their way to the presence of Thomas, in the hope that though careless of his own sufferings, he might yield at the sight of their misery. But neither flesh nor blood, nor the pleadings of natural affection could make him swerve from the line of his pastoral duty.

He betook himself to Pope Alexander III, by whom he was graciously received, and who committed him to the care of the Cistercians at Pontigny. As soon as this came to the knowledge of King Henry, he sent threatening letters to the monks, in order to drive Thomas from this shelter. The saint was unwilling that the Cistercian Order should suffer on his account, and therefore voluntarily withdrew from Pontigny, and accepted the invitation of Louis VII, King of France, to go to his court. He remained here, until his banishment was recalled at the intercession of the Pope and of the King of France, and he returned to England amid great public joy. He was quietly continuing the work of a faithful shepherd of souls, when certain calumniators denounced him to the king as a plotter against the crown and the public peace. Henry, deceived by these libels, cried out that it was hard that one priest should never let him have quiet in his kingdom.

Some wicked servants of the king, hearing his words, and thinking to do him pleasure, betook themselves to Canterbury to rid him of the Archbishop. They entered the cathedral in the evening as Thomas was proceeding to assist at Evensong. The clergy in attendance on him, conscious of the attempt about to be made, wished to bolt the doors. But the saint caused them to be again opened , saying, The Church of God is not be made a castle of, and for the cause of God's Church I am willing to die. He then said to his murderers, I charge you in the Name of the Almighty God to hurt none of my people. With these words he fell on his knees, and commended himself to God, to the Blessed Virgin Mary, to St. Denis, and to the other holy Patrons of the Church of Canterbury. He presently offered his sacred head for the stroke of death, and received it from the swords of those wicked men with the same constancy with which he had withstood the commands of the unrighteous king. The murderers pulled out his brains and strewed them all about the floor of the church. He testified on the 29th day of December, in the year of our Lord 1170, and, being afterwards honoured with many miracles, was canonised by Pope Alexander III."

-- From the second nocturn for the commemoration of St Thomas of Canterbury (Becket)