He lies in swaddling clothes, but he reigns in heaven

At the time of his birth Christ, through whom every place was created, finds no place in the inn; and he who is Lord of all the world is born as though a foreigner, to enable us to be citizens whose homeland is heaven. He is wrapped in swaddling clothes in order to restore in his own Body the unity of the human race that had been rent asunder, and bring to the kingdom of heaven the garment of immortality whole and entire, resplendent with the purple color of his blood. He is born, brothers, in order to improve the very nature which the first human being had corrupted. He lies in swaddling clothes, but he reigns in heaven; he rests humbly in a cradle, but he thunders amid the clouds; he is placed in a manger, because it is evident that “all flesh is grass,” as Isaiah says. This is the grass, brothers, whose blossom is transformed into heavenly Bread, and by feasting on it we reach life eternal.

St. Peter Chrysologus, Sermon 140B, “On the Birth of the Lord”

See, the Spouse, the Christ, is coming;

See, the Spouse, the Christ, is coming;
— Virgins, be ye ready then!—
He whose advent brings rejoicings
Now and always, from all men.

He is coming to deliver
All those founders of mankind
Who, thro’ our first mother’s sinning,
Were by demons held confin’d.

Now behold the ‘second Adam’
(So the prophet did Him call)
Who, for us, has abrogated
All that stemm’d from Adam’s fall.

He was on the cross suspended
So that we should heav’n regain;
Being by Him liberated
From the Enemy of man.

He is coming as the Bridegroom,
He, whose sacrifice for us
Wash’d away our stains of evil
Through His death upon the cross.

– Sponsus, a medieval mystery play, c. 1050

Baptism draws death’s sting

Jesus sanctified baptism when He Himself was baptized. If the Son of God was baptized, can anyone who scorns baptism pretend to piety? Not that He was baptized to receive the remission of sins—for He was without sin—but being sinless, He was nevertheless baptized, that He might impart grace and dignity to those who receive the sacrament. For, “since the children share in flesh and blood, so he in like manner has shared in these,” that we, sharing His incarnate life, might also share His divine grace. So Jesus was baptized that we, in turn, herein also made partakers with Him, might receive not only salvation, but also the dignity. The dragon, according to Job, was in the water, he who received the Jordan in his maw. When, therefore, it was necessary to crush the heads of the dragon, descending into the water, He bound the strong one, that we might receive the “power to tread upon serpents and scorpions.” It was no ordinary beast, but a horrible monster. No fishing ship could last under a single scale of his tail; before him stalked Destruction, ravaging all in her path. But Life came running up, that the maw of Death might be stopped and all we who were saved might say: “O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?” Baptism draws death’s sting.

For you go down into the water bearing your sins, but the invocation of grace, placing a seal upon your soul, makes you proof against the dragon’s maw. Though dead in sin when you went down, you will come up vivified in justice. For, if you have been planted together in the likeness of the death of the Savior, you shall be counted worthy of His Resurrection also. For just as Jesus died, taking upon Himself the sins of the whole world, that by slaying sin He might rise again in righteousness, so you, also, after entering and being as it were buried in the water, as He was in the rock, are raised up again to walk in newness of life.

Then, after you have been vouchsafed the grace, He gives you the strength to struggle with the enemy powers. For just as He was tried for forty days after His baptism—not that He was unable to conquer sooner, but because He wished to accomplish all things in due order and sequence—so do you also, who before your baptism dared not close with your adversaries, from the moment of receiving the grace, trust henceforth in the armor of justice, do battle, and, if you will, preach the Gospel.

St. Cyril of Jerusalem, Catechetical Lectures III.11–13

What A Glorious Life

To live in the midst of the world without wishing its pleasures; to be a member of each family, yet belonging to none; to share all sufferings; to penetrate all secrets; to heal all wounds; to go from men to God and offer Him their prayers; to return from God to men to bring pardon and hope; to have a heart of fire for charity and a heart of bronze for chastity; to teach and to pardon, console and bless always—what a glorious life!

– Jean Baptiste Lacordaire

The Power of Faith is So Great

If we guard this faith, we shall be free from condemnation and be adorned with virtues of every kind. For the power of faith is so great that it even buoys up men walking upon the sea. Peter was a man like ourselves, composed of flesh and blood, and living on like foods. But when Jesus said: “Come,” believing, he walked upon the waters, having in his faith a support firmer than any natural ground, and upholding the weight of his body by the buoyancy of his faith. Now as long as he believed, he had firm footing upon the water, but when he doubted, then he began to sink; for as his faith gradually gave way, his body also was drawn down along with it. Realizing his predicament, Jesus, who cures our souls’ sicknesses, said: “O thou of little faith, why didst thou doubt?” Then, strengthened by Him who grasped his right hand, as soon as he had recovered his faith, led by the hand of the Master, he walked upon the waters as before. For the Gospel signifies this indirectly in the words: “And when they got into the boat.” For it does not say, swimming to the boat, Peter got into it, but it gives us to understand that, after retracing the distance he had traversed in going to Jesus, he re­entered the boat.

St. Cyril of Jerusalem, Catecheses, Catechesis V.7

Him who walks upon the waters

You have Him who walks upon the waters, who rebukes the winds, who holds sovereign sway over the ocean; who not only Himself walked on the sea as on a firm pavement but vouchsafed the like power to Peter. For when the night was black and the Light, though it was there, was not recognized (for Jesus, walking on the waters, passed unrecognized in face and features; it was the characteristic timbre of His voice that betrayed His presence), they, thinking they were seeing an apparition, were frightened until Jesus said to them, “It is I, do not be afraid.” Peter said to Him: “If it be Thou whom I know, or rather whom the Father revealed to me, bid me come to Thee over the waters”; and Christ, generously sharing what was His own, said: “Come.”
 

– St. Cyril of Jerusalem (c. 318–386), Sermon on the Paralytic at the Pool, par. 8

Ascension

Twas on a Holy Thursday their innocent faces clean
The children walking two & two in red & blue & green
Grey headed beadles walkd before, with wands as white as snow
Till into the high dome of Pauls they like Thames waters flow

O what a multitude they seemd these flowers of London town
Seated in companies they sit with radiance all their own
The hum of multitudes was there but multitudes of lambs
Thousands of little boys & girls raising their innocent hands

Now like a mighty wind they raise to heaven the voice of song
Or like harmonious thunderings the seats of heaven among
Beneath them sit the aged men wise guardians of the poor
Then cherish pity, lest you drive an angel from your door

William Blake

A path through which the daily traffic passes

First let us get the scene itself clearly before us. The path, which is spoken of here, is not intended to receive seed; its function is to enable people to walk upon it. It is beaten down and quite smooth. There are even asphalted paths and there are asphalted hearts too. They are smooth and often they look quite presentable. In human intercourse they play their part. Paths and streets also have names; you must know them if you want to get somewhere. And there are a great many people whom you must know—just as you must know these streets—if you want to get somewhere. They hold key positions, they are influential, and only through them will you get somewhere. This is good and quite in order. Nobody will blame a person for being influential. And nobody will blame a path for not being a field or for being hard. On the contrary! But that which is an advantage in one way can be a hindrance in another. The fact is that seed cannot very well take root on a much-traveled and smooth-beaten path.

A person who is only a path through which the daily traffic passes, who is no more than a busy street where people go rushing by hour after hour and where there is never a moment of rest, will hardly provide the soil in which the eternal seed can grow. People who are always on the go are the most in danger.

A person who can no longer be receptive “soil” for at least fifteen minutes each day, who never allows himself to be “plowed” and opened up, and never waits for what God drops into his furrow, that person has actually already lost the game at the crucial point. The rich and the great people of this world, whose names everybody knows, because they are always out where the traffic is thick, are often very poor people. It is so dangerously easy for them to think they are something great when the rushing, heavy traffic keeps constantly passing over them. And yet they are infinitely poorer than a poor, nameless furrow where fruit is springing up.

– Helmut Thielicke, The Waiting Father: Sermons on the Parables of Jesus, Chapter IV

The bread’s purer snow

They came over the snow to the bread’s
purer snow, fumbled it in their huge
hands, put their lips to it
like beasts, stared into the dark chalice
where the wine shone, felt it sharp
on their tongue, shivered as at a sin
remembered, and heard love cry
momentarily in their hearts’ manger.

They rose and went back to their poor
holdings, naked in the bleak light
of December. Their horizon contracted
to the one small, stone-riddled field
with its tree, where the weather was nailing
the appalled body that had asked to be born.

– R. S. Thomas (d. 2000), from Laboratories of the Spirit