ST JOSEPH'S ABBEY, SPENCER MA

The incarnate Word is a sword of tender flesh, but a sword nonetheless. This is what Advent and Christmas reveal to us. This new liturgical year is ushered in by a gospel passage that contemplates the return of Christ at the end of history. The intense narrative comes to us from the very lips of the Lord of history and of the cosmos. Today Jesus wants to teach us to see Christmas—his first coming among us—as a reality closely intertwined with the Judgment of the world at his second coming. Scripture tells us that with the Incarnation of the Word the end of time already has begun. In Christ, God has uttered his last Word; there now only remains to see whether or not we want to hear it. God’s final Word comes at Christmas to walk the earth. But it is a radical Word, “sharper than any two-edged sword. [And] everything is naked and uncovered in the eyes of him to whom we must give an account”.  The interval of time between the historical Birth of Jesus of Nazareth and the Last Judgm...

  As monks we are meant to live in incessant desire for God, to become all longing and hunger for him. The season of Advent, its prayers, and readings speak to us of mutuality of desire. For indeed if we long to see the face of God, so God's desire to come to us outstrips our own desire and takes flesh in Christ Jesus our Lord. In Jesus God's face has been revealed. This revelation stokes our desire for a more intense experience of his presence and divine embrace. During Advent, we celebrate the emptiness that makes us totally available for all that God wants to give us in Christ. We are joyful in our neediness and longing, for God longs to fill us with God's own Self in Christ more than we dare imagine.  Amen. Come Lord Jesus and do not delay!

We remember our parents tugging at our sleeves when we were given a gift or a small treat and reminding us, “What do you say?” Recognizing all we have been given by God in his love and mercy, on this Thanksgiving Day we gather to pray and feast and remind one another what to say. Thank you, thank you Lord from the bottom of our hearts for all you have given so freely, so lavishly. Our hearts are full, filled to overflowing. What do we have that we have not received? Wonder, praise, gratitude become one as we realize that all is gift. And so fittingly, justly, jubilantly we celebrate Eucharist on this day. Eucharist means thanksgiving. God never stops giving God’s very Self to us. God is love. Love never ends. And even as we come to thank and praise God for all he has given us, it is he who is gathering us at this Eucharist to feed us once again with himself. Our thanksgiving overflows.

Take, Lord, and receive all my liberty, my memory, my understanding, and my entire will, All I have and call my own. You have given all to me. To you, Lord, I return it. Everything is yours; do with it what you will. Give me only your love and your grace, that is enough for me. These words of Saint Ignatius' prayer  The Suscipe , sum up most poignantly the self-offering of the Mexican martyr, Blessed Miguel Augustin Pro. as a young man ,  Miguel renounced everything and entered the Society of Jesus. After his ordination, he carried on  his priestly ministry  in spite of the grave religious persecution of the Church in Mexico in the early 20th century. O ften in disguise and continually foiling the best efforts of the Mexican secret police to arrest him, Miguel was eventually captured. On 23  November 1927, after forgiving his executioners, he extended his arms like his crucified Lord and was  shot by a firing squad as he proclaimed, "Hail, Christ the King!"...

  Today’s Feast of Christ the King wraps up the liturgical year by taking the long view forward to the final coming of Christ “amid the clouds at the end of time to receive everlasting dominion, glory and kingship from his Father.”  (So we just heard from the prophet Daniel and the Book of Revelation.) But we have to remember that in Christ “every end is a new beginning,” which means that his kingship isn’t something way off in the future but breaks in upon us now , at this very moment. The problem is that this “in-breaking” of his kingship is no more recognizable to us than it was to Pilate in this morning’s Gospel, who asks Jesus, “Are you the King of the Jews?” The ancient world knew more about kings than we moderns do. Where kings still exist today, they rarely are “absolute” monarchs, autocratic dictators, but mostly live and work within a carefully constructed framework as “constitutional” monarchs. They can bring only subtle pressure to bear on politicians and serve ma...

  Today we celebrate the memorial of Saint Mechtilde, a thirteenth-century Benedictine nun from the monastery of Helfta in Germany. Mechtilde had a tender devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, who opened His wounded side to her in love and gave her His Heart as a place of refuge and consolation. In one of her visions, Jesus told Mechtilde that His Heart was like a kitchen where we could go to get whatever we needed at any time. In another, He told her, "In the morning let your first act be to greet My Heart and to offer Me your own." Jesus continued, "Whoever breathes a sigh toward Me, draws Me to himself."  It only takes a sigh. Let us sigh quietly, insistently, confidently, and go quickly into the royal Kitchen that is His Sacred Heart for all that we need. Photograph by Brother Brian of a bas-relief crucifix by Suzanne Nicolas  in the Abbey church .

With her husband not far behind infuriated at her constant almsgiving, the young Saint Elizabeth of Hungary is saved when the bread she is cradling turns into roses. "Keep your deeds of mercy secret," recommends Our Lord. And in His providence, He accomplishes for Elizabeth, what His love has requested. Illustration by  Eleanor Fortescue Brickdale.