9781644135945

The Easter Cycle
more frequently, in stripes above measure, in deaths often.” He was “in perils of robbers, in perils
from my own nation, in perils from the Gentiles, . . . in perils from false brethren; in labor and
painfulness, in much watching, in hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in cold and nakedness”
(Epistle). Thus, too, the Church must suffer. She is contradicted, slandered, misrepresented,
and persecuted by those outside her fold. She suffers much from her own children also. Many
of her priests prove unfaithful; her princes and her religious often fail her; her children are often
given to bitter and unjust criticism, to distrust and worldliness. We feel her suffering and grief
when she cries out to God today, “Arise, why sleepest Thou, O Lord? Arise and cast us not off
to the end. Why turnest Thou Thy face away and forgettest our trouble? Our belly hath cleaved
to the earth; arise, O Lord, help us and deliver us” (Introit). We cannot free ourselves or raise
ourselves from the earth because we are so weak and wayward and helpless.
“Thou hast moved the earth, O Lord, and hast troubled it. Heal Thou the breaches
thereof, for it has been moved” (Tract). These breaches are the sufferings and struggles of
the Church and her children on earth. These sufferings are part of the plan of God. They are
trials through which He purifies His Church. Through these sufferings, trials, temptations,
and humiliations, the earth (the Christian soul) is “moved” and troubled. God takes the soul
in His strong hands, shakes and moves it until it is prepared to admit its own helplessness
and worthlessness. Now it will recognize and declare its abject poverty and unworthiness.
Once it has made this acknowledgment, it is prepared to receive the good seed. From this
point on it attempts nothing of itself, but depends on God for grace and on the love of
Christ for everything. The seed that God sows in the humbled and troubled soul falls on
good ground. The souls that receive this seed “in a good and perfect heart . . . bring forth
fruit in patience” (Gospel). The strength of Christ is perfected through the weakness of
humanity. The soul is prepared for receiving the strength of Christ by the recognition of its
own weakness and unworthiness.
Having been humiliated by the hand of God through suffering and labor, the soul is exalted.
The more it is torn, and the more thorough and complete this humiliation, and the more docile
the soul is under the hand of God: the deeper the seed of grace sinks into it, and the more
fruitful it becomes. The Church and the truly Christian soul is therefore thankful for the trials
that come from the hand of God. The blood of martyrs is still the seed of the Church. Salvation
still comes through the cross. It is still true, as our Lord tells us, that “he that humbleth himself
shall be exalted” (Lk 14:11). St. Peter, too, urges us: “Be you humbled, therefore, under the
mighty hand of God, that He may exalt you in the time of visitation” (1 Pt 5:6). The secret of
the vigor and growth of the Church may be found in humiliations, sufferings, and trials which
God allows to overtake her. The more she is tried, the deeper she becomes rooted in Christ,
and the greater becomes her ability to triumph over all difficulties. What is true of the Church is
true of each individual soul. This is the teaching of the liturgy. “Every branch in Me that beareth
not fruit He will take away; and every one that beareth fruit He will purge it that it may bring
forth more fruit” ( Jn 15:2).
Christ comes to us in the Holy Sacrifice and at the time of Holy Communion. He sows His
seed in our soul. In the soil of the soul that has been prepared to receive it by humiliation and
suffering, the seed sown by Christ will bring forth rich fruit. “Power is made perfect in infirmity
(Epistle). But this is true only if the soul submits to the trials and sufferings that God sends it.
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