9781644135945

The Time After Pentecost
also. “My flesh hath flourished again,” for it possesses the life of divine sonship, of Christian
virtue and union with God. “With my will I will give praise to Him” (Gradual). “In His holy
place, . . . He shall give power and strength to His people,” who live in the union of love within
the Church (Introit).
“In the abundance of Thy loving kindness [Thou] art wont to give beyond the deserts
and desires of those who humbly pray” (Collect). The Jews bring a deaf and dumb man
to the Lord, asking that He impose His hands upon him. The Lord does more than they
dare ask of Him. He puts His fingers into the poor man’s ears, and spitting, He touches
his tongue, saying, “Ephpheta, which is, Be thou opened” (Gospel). In this act He shows
the superabundance of His love. Soon after we were born, devoted hearts and hands
brought us to the Lord, imploring Him to deliver us from the power of sin. He received
us, washing us in the laver of regeneration that our soul might be free from sin. But that
was not enough for His love. He filled us with His life, the immortal life of the risen one,
planting in our soul, and even in our weak flesh, the seed of the resurrection to come and
preparing us for the blessed transfiguration of our eternal happiness with God. “My flesh
hath flourished again.” “I shall not die, but live” (Ps 117:17). “Eye hath not seen, nor ear
heard, neither hath it entered into the heart of man, what things God hath prepared for
them that love Him” (1 Cor 2:9). Already here on earth He gives a foretaste of this happiness
to them that love Him, and the fulfillment of it in the land of promise. “O God, . . .
in the abundance of Thy loving kindness [Thou] art wont to give beyond the deserts and
desires of those who humbly pray.”
The resurrection of our Lord is the central truth of our Christian faith. It is the source of the
supernatural life of the baptized, an inexhaustible fountain of grace. “I make known unto you
the gospel which I preached to you: . . . that Christ died for our sins, . . . and that He rose again
the third day” (Epistle).
The Church announces this message to us when she celebrates the Eucharistic sacrifice,
which is the representation of the death and resurrection of the Lord. If we share His death,
we shall also be partakers of His life. The Mass is the fountain from which we can draw that
strength which He has promised. Here we shall be healed and “feel supported in soul and body”
(Postcommunion).
When celebrating the Mass we honor the Lord with our gifts “and with the first of all [our]
fruits” (Communion): we offer to Him all we have, placing it all as a gift of sacrifice on the
altar. Thus sacrificing all we have without reserve, we die a sacred death indeed. But our “barns
shall be filled with abundance and [our] presses shall run over with wine” (Communion); for
Christ lives in us, and we also shall live because we have died with Him in the spirit of sacrifice,
renunciation, and love.
Prayer
O almighty and eternal God, who in the abundance of Thy loving kindness art wont to give
beyond the deserts and desires of those who humbly pray; pour down upon us Thy mercy,
forgiving us those things of which our conscience is afraid, and granting us those blessings
which we dare not presume to ask. Through Christ our Lord. Amen.
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