23. December 18

Meditations no. 23 (unofficial computer-aided translation)

The hope and the need of Redemption.

Come, Leader of ancient Israel, giver of the Law of Moses on Sinai: rescue us with your mighty power.

Jesus Christ is born to redeem us. He comes to free us from the power of our enemies, to break the ties of sin, and ransom us from the devil’s bondage. The story is as old as mankind. It began with the fall of our first parents; then came the unending depravities which punctuate the behaviour of mankind down the ages; and finally, our own personal rebellions.

Adam’s offence had a kind of infinity about it, because of God’s infinite majesty. Through sin man opened up a bottomless pit for himself, separating himself from God. And this alienation from God brought in its wake a trail of wretchedness. Our wills are now drawn towards evil; our intellects are slow to discover the right path; and disorder reigns in our passions.

Mankind could do nothing to rise from its fallen state, to satisfy for sin, or to merit pardon. As the Psalm says: Sacrifice and offering thou dost not desire. Man’s position, as before God, was like that of the servant in the parable who was completely unable to pay his debts. Yet those who were upright in heart constantly pleaded: Come, Lord, and make no delay. Release your people from their sin. For only God could repair the damage caused by our faults.

It is very difficult to realize just how perverse sin is and to understand what our faith tells us. We should remember that even in the human context the scale of an offence is frequently determined by the importance of the injured party - his social standing, his qualities. But with sin man offends God, the creature repudiates his Creator.

The story of mankind repeats itself in our own life. And opposed to the wonderful workings of Redemption, our Father tells us, is man, pronus ad peccatum after the first fall, inclined towards evil; and there are all the passions of men, and all the workings of the devil. Therefore we should pray, full of hope and contrition: Lord, rescue us with your mighty power!

The Redemption is still being carried out.

Creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the sons of God; for the creation was subjected to futility, not of its own will but by the will of him who subjected it in hope; because the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to decay and obtain the glorious liberty of the children of God.

The presence of evil in all its forms is an anxious appeal, an implicit prayer for redemption. For centuries, the Chosen People centred its hopes on the coming of the Messiah, the Redeemer. Christ did come, and yet evil remains. He came to free us from evil, but he wants our free cooperation in shaking off its fetters. Therefore a hope that remains at the purely human level makes no sense. Each passing day asks us for a hope that is more divine and more theological; it also demands a purification of our faith, of our eagerness, and of our love, so as to set them on a more supernatural foundation.

I have told you, our Father said, that one day, while looking at a map of the world, a man who was not a bad-hearted fellow but who had no faith said to me, “Look, from north to south, and from east to west. Do you see?” “What is there to see?” “The failure of Christ,” he said. “For so many years he has been trying to open men’s hearts to his teaching, and you see the results. There are no Christians.”

At first I felt very sad. But that sentiment soon gave way to love and gratitude. For God our Lord, the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, has left men completely free. And moreover the Son himself has become man: semetipsum exinanivit formam servi accipiens (he emptied himself, taking the form of a servant). He took on our own wretched flesh: sinless, but flesh like ours. Let us look at Christ on the Cross, and his victory over death, his rising again. And the wonderful seed he sowed in the hearts of that group of holy men and women who worked alongside the first disciples.

But let us return to my unhappy friend’s assertion: the failure of Christ. You have heard me say so often that Christ has not failed, because the teaching of Christ enriches the world today. Nevertheless God has willed that men should be free. It is we men who are unwilling. The Redemption is taking place at this very moment. And you and I are co-redeemers.

Trusting in the Redemption which Jesus won for us.

The saying is sure and worthy of full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners. From the time that Jesus took on our human nature, the Father’s plan for the redemption of mankind has moved towards its perfect fulfilment. Since he was God, and since any action of his on our behalf was of infinite value, Christ was able to save us, breaking the bonds with which the devil had enslaved us. And since he was man, he could expiate for our sins in his own body: Taking a human nature he took our sins upon himself. Those sins can no longer cause us to despair. God himself has drawn near to us, and what we were incapable of doing on our own, Christ has done for us.

Listen to what Jesus tells us in St John’s Gospel: Ego in hoc natus sum et ad hoc veni in mundum, ut testimonium perhibeam veritati. For this I was born, for this I came into the world, to give testimony to the truth, to free mankind from the slavery of sin.

If difficulties sometimes make us weary, and tempt us to lose hope, let us remember that God, though Lord and architect of the whole world, who made and set in order each single thing that is, was something more than loving towards mankind; he was long-suffering as well. So he has always been, and is still, and shall ever be: merciful, kind, slow to anger, and true. There is none so good as he. God is always moved to pity at the sight of our wretchedness. Deus humilia respicit in coelo et in terra. God has a special love for what is humble in creation. This has consoled me, our Father writes. God looks on me with love, when I do what I can. He loves your defects, if you get up after every fall, if you fight, if he sees your good will, your efforts. Sanctity is nothing other than struggle, my children.

To ensure that our voice reaches Jesus above the noise caused by our many sins, let us go to Mary. God has made her the repository of his Mercy. Through her intercession we pray: All-powerful God, renew us by the coming feast of your Son and free us from our slavery to sin.