9781644135945

The Light of the World
prayers and good works during Lent. Every Christian should be like St. Prudentiana, bearing
always the vessel of mercy and fraternal charity.
Prayer
Hearken unto us, O almighty and merciful God, and favorably grant us the gifts of saving
self-denial.
Defend us, O Lord, with Thy protection and keep us forever from all iniquity. Through
Christ our Lord. Amen.
Wednesday
Today we stand at the tomb of the holy pope and martyr, St. Sixtus, and receive the Ten
Commandments, which in the early Church were given to the neophytes on this day that they
might learn them by heart and meditate on them.
In spirit we are on Mount Sinai. Peals of thunder and flashes of lightning and the glare of
the burning mountain announce the presence of Jahve. Like the Israelites, we are seized
with terror. “Thus saith the Lord God; Honor thy father and thy mother; . . . thou shalt
not kill. . . . You shall not make gods of silver. . . . You shall make an altar of earth unto me,”
and you shall offer sacrifice. The Ten Commandments, which we accepted when we were
baptized, are nothing but the expression of the will of God, holy, wise, and as immutable
as God Himself. These commandments result from the providence, wisdom, and holiness
of God. There can be nothing more reasonable, more important, more holy, than the will
of God as expressed in the Ten Commandments, which we vowed to keep at the moment
of our baptism, when we dedicated ourselves to the service of God. Today we renew this
dedication and renew our resolution to keep the Ten Commandments. In one way or another
they all concern themselves with the great commandment: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy
God, with thy whole heart and with thy whole soul and with all thy strength, . . . and thy
neighbor as thyself ” (Lk 10:27).
How have we observed the commandments of God? Let us hope that we have observed
them with more sincerity than had the Pharisees of today’s Gospel. They twist the meaning of
the immutable commandments so that they can fulfill them outwardly, yet accomplish their
own will in the end. They “transgress the commandments of God for your tradition” (Gospel).
They substitute human wisdom for the commandments of God. May such an observance of
the law of God be far from us who are baptized.
We should receive the commandments of God in reverence and in faith, because we
believe that they express the will of God. We keep them because we wish to conform our
wills to His; because we love God and our blessed Savior. We observe the commandments
because we believe their observance is pleasing to Him. The will of God is our joy. “My
meat is to do the will of Him that sent Me” ( Jn 4:34). In baptism we died to ourselves
and to the desires of the old man; we gave up our right to direct our own activities and
to live according to our own desires. We dedicated ourselves unconditionally to the will
of God and to a blind trust in His providence. “Thy will be done.” I was baptized “not to
do my own will, but the will of Him” who called me ( Jn 6:38). To do God’s will is the
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