Christmas Wood - A Musical Meditation

 

By Thy Crib and Thy Cross

 

O Little One
So small and fair
King though you are
No royal fanfare
Or regal trappings
Lying in a manger bare

I see Thee there
Poor and lone
Save the ass and ox
Aside Your throne
Of hay and cold
Yet such Light does shone

Ah, here lies a gift
Sublime and yet keen
All power and majesty
Lie in place so mean
Contained and swaddled
Unnoticed and unseen

No words do Thou speak
Silence is gold
For to the heart
Is Thou story told
The Word Made Flesh
The Love of God unfolds

The Glory of God
At rest in the cave
At one with man
So as to save
Those who had forsook
All that which He gave

I come before You
Oh Infant meek and mild
No fear and trembling
Before you, Almighty Child
For You came for me
Through Thy Mother undefiled

To save me, O Jesus
From the snare of sin
From the sadness of error
From the darkness and din
Of life without You
O Light, shine within

My lowly heart
I give to you, Sweet One
Make it beat sweetly
In rhythm with Thine Own
A song of peace and joy
For You, O Holy Son

Of Holy Mary
God and Man at One
Love shall reign
All sin and desolation gone
All through the Birth
Of He Who came
From Heaven Above

Soon to take His Cross
For the manger foretells
The Sorrow He shall bare
In full time,  it does  befell
The prick of the hay
Shadows the piercing of the nails

The Cross to carry
Is not a thing afar
In a distant time
The Sacred Flesh to mar
With You at Your Birth
Announced  Bethlehem’s Star

The Crib and the Cross
Made of the wood of the Tree
Fashioned by the hands of man
Guided by the Love of Thee
Nails to fasten, both cedar and flesh
Salvation is won triumphantly
Through Thou Love given
Do This in Memory of Me 

O Infant King
Sit upon Thy throne
In Crib, on Cross
O in Heaven above
Forevermore reign in my heart
Give to me Thy Love
Never again to sin
Never to leave Thee alone

To the Crib, to the Cross
To You do I cry
To you do I come
Hurriedly do I fly
To Bethlehem, to Calvary
Your Love do I seek
May it ever be so nigh

Oh my Jesus
Babe, God and man
I give you my heart
I place it Your Hand
In Your manger, I lay it down
On the Cross, as one can
I nail it with Thine.

To be Yours
In all things and ways
In all of my tomorrows
In days of yester and todays
I love Thee, Lord Jesus
Oh let me never stray. 
By Thy Crib and Thy Cross
Let me always stay.   

Christ in A Christmas Carol

We would like to have written this ourselves, but another has been so inspired and has done well.

So, on this 7th Day of Christmas, we present you with this from the Magis Center.

A blessed Christmas Season to you. 

Christian Themes in Dickens' A Christmas Carol

It's Not About Marriage

 

Again and again it is mentioned that blessings of sodomites does not affect the Church’s teaching on marriage.  What is ignored that it changes the teaching on Sin, and not limited to sins against the sixth commandment.

The absolute foundation of God's revelation is that:

(1) Creation was good at its inception. 

(2) Creation, including man’s nature and urges were corrupted by the fall.

(3) Man (and creation) is healed by denying man’s will and taking on God’s will as your own. 

Yes, we suffer from a rebellious urge to break the Commandments.  For some it is the commandment against sexual sin, for others it is the commandment against theft. For all it is the commandment to put God first.  

 

Nobody breaks all the commandments. Most people have one or two favorite sins. In that sense there is some good in the thief, adulterer, murderer, etc.  That is the whole point. Redemption is the denial, specifically, of the urges against God, not in taking comfort that you haven’t broken all the commandments.  The Church is about healing your wound, not about celebrating that one leg or arm was not injured in the blast.  The Church does not require perfection. It requires sincere repentance and determination to “deny oneself and take up your cross.”  God’s grace will make up whatever our feeble wills are unable to accomplish.  

 

The blessing of any unrepentant sinner, however informally, removes the principal means of salvation and itself is a grave sin.

 

The Christmas Wood

 

It is night and my eyes are open wide 

Though the light be dim, they see as clear as day

My mind travels far though time

In thoughts of tomorrow and yesterday

I go back to a time of old

To a night so dark and deep 

To the Infant Child who was foretold

The Promise of the Father to keep.

The babe of the manger, the man on the Cross

Born of the wood to save man lost

Man of Israel, God of Earth

Heaven and earth joined by his Birth

Little Babe, answer to man’s imploring

So many hungry, empty hearts to fill

Shepherds, angels and kings adoring  

Love Will reign, Sin be gone, Emmanuel.

The Babe, the gift of life bestowed

As infant, wrapped in clothes so gently

He came to reap what man had sowed

As man, we nailed you to the tree

The babe of the manger, the man on the Cross

Born of the wood to save man lost

Man of Israel, God of Earth

Heaven and earth joined by his Birth

The time is then, the time is now

God of love, Man of sorrowing

At whose name every knee shall bow

Jesus Christ, Savior and King.

You know my tears, you see my need

Man of Israel, God of Earth

Baby Jesus, upon my knee

I ask you for new birth

On this Christmas morn, heed my heart’s call

I pray that you will answer my plea

Today as yesterday, no time at all

Raise us all to heaven’s glory.

The babe of the manger, the man on the Cross

Born of the wood to save man lost

Man of Israel, God of Earth

Heaven and earth joined by his Birth

Laura Yunque

Words from the pit

Satan is a liar, but he is no fool.  His lies always have to be believable.  He lies by using words in a way that they can be misunderstood.  When you use vague words, words with multiple meanings, you leave your listener open to the lies of Satan.  

One such confusion of meaning arises from the use of "tradition".  Of course, traditions change. The tradition of Monday being wash-day was carried for centuries, until the advent of the Washing Machine, making washing far less than a day's worth of work.  This vague, general term "tradition" can mean all types of traditions.  So, when we hear prelates speaking about tradition "changing", "developing", and "reflecting the modern world", our minds automatically give assent. We have been snared in the confusion which Satan seeks.  

But we are not carrying on the habits, customs or traditions 19th Century America or of any particular region or culture.  Those can certainly change.  We aren't even carrying on the traditions of Catholic people.  We are called to carry on the "Apostolic Tradition".  The Apostolic Tradition consists of the customs, principles and practices used by the 11 Apostles and St. Paul to live the instructions they were given by Christ.  The Apostolic Tradition was closed when the last Apostle died.  There can be no more development of or change to Apostolic Tradition. 

Substitute "Apostolic Tradition" in any of the pronouncements we have head recently and clarity will ensue.  Cardinal Wilton Gregory (may God have mercy on his soul) said recently, "Tradition dies slowly and a bloody death."  Needless to say, that was not the case with Monday as Wash-day.  That tradition changed fairly rapidly and involved perhaps a bit of sweat to earn enough to pay for the applicance but no blood.  Did he mean to say, "Apostolic Tradition dies slowly and bloody death?"  If so, he has missed the mark in two ways.  There are many who have indeed shed their blood rather than surrender the Apostolic Tradition and it is Apostolic Tradition which will outlast Cardinal Gregory and withstand even the gates of Hell.  

It is useful to apply that same practice to other vague words:

• "Faith.": There are many "faith traditions" but only one "Apostolic Faith" which stands above all others.    

• "Church": There are many churches.  There are Protestant churches. There is a Conciliar church, a church of the new Advent and even an emerging Synodal church, but there is only one "Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church" which includes none of these. 

• "Magisterium": "Magister" simply means "teacher" in Latin and "Magisterium" is the collection of things taught.  The magisterium of history adds something new with each passing year and archeology can even change what is taught about the past.  The Apostolic Magisterium, by contrast, is the collection of things which the Apostles taught.  That is what the One Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church is responsible for preserving and passing on.  Any personal teaching of this pope or that may be amusing or annoying but if not Apostolic, it is of no importance.  

Each of us must listen carefully for those broad and ambiguous words.  It is the exactness in which truth lies.  That exactness can upend the conclusions based on broad and ambiguous words.  Never trust anyone who uses broad and ambiguous words.  If they lack the wit to speak clearly, you would be witless to listen to them.  If they chose to be vague and ambiguous, they are playing you for a fool.

The Practice of Advent

 

THE PRACTICE OF ADVENT

by Dom Gueranger, 1910

If our holy mother the Church spends the time of Advent in this solemn preparation for the threefold coming of Jesus Christ; if, after the example of the prudent virgins, she keeps her lamp lit ready for the coming of the Bridegroom; we, being her members and her children, ought to enter into her spirit, and apply to ourselves this warning of our Saviour: 'Let your loins be girt, and lamps burning in your hands, and ye yourselves be like unto men who wait for their Lord (St. Luke xii. 35, 36. )!' The Church and we have, in reality, the same hopes. Each one of us is, on the part of God, an object of mercy and care, as is the Church herself. If she is the temple of God, it is because she is built of living stones; if she is the bride, it is because she consists of all the souls which are invited to eternal union with God. If it is written that the Saviour hath purchased the Church with His own Blood (Acts xx. 28. ), may not each one of us say of himself those words of St. Paul, 'Christ hath loved me, and hath delivered Himself up for me (Gal. ii. 20.)'? Our destiny being the same, then, as that of the Church, we should endeavour during Advent, to enter into the spirit of preparation, which is, as we have seen, that of the Church herself.

And firstly, it is our duty to join with the saints of the old Law in asking for the Messias, and thus pay the debt which the whole human race owes to the divine mercy. In order to fulfil this duty with fervour, let us go back in thought to those four thousand years, represented by the four weeks of Advent, and reflect on the darkness and crime which filled the world before our Saviour's coming. Let our hearts be filled with lively gratitude towards Him who saved His creature man from death, and who came down from heaven that He might know our miseries by Himself experiencing them, yes, all of them excepting sin. Let us cry to Him with confidence from the depths of our misery; for, notwithstanding His having saved the work of His hands, He still wishes us to beseech Him to save us. Let therefore our desires and our confidence have their free utterance in the ardent supplications of the ancient prophets, which the Church puts on our lips during these days of expectation; let us give our closest attention to the sentiments which they express.

This first duty complied with, we must next turn our minds to the coming which our Saviour wishes to accomplish in our own hearts. It is, as we have seen, a coming full of sweetness and mystery, and a consequence of the first; for the good Shepherd comes not only to visit the flock in general, but He extends His solicitude to each one of the sheep, even to the hundredth which is lost. Now, in order to appreciate the whole of this ineffable mystery, we must remember that, since we can be pleasing to our heavenly Father only inasmuch as He sees within us His Son Jesus Christ, this amiable Saviour deigns to come into each one of us, and transform us, if we will but consent, into Himself, so that henceforth we may live, not we, but He in us. This is, in reality, the one grand aim of the Christian religion, to make man divine through Jesus Christ: it is the task which God has given to His Church to do, and she says to the faithful what St. Paul said to his Galatians: 'My little children, of whom I am in labour again, until Christ be formed within you (Gal. iv. 19.)!'

But as, on His entering into this world, our divine Saviour first showed Himself under the form of a weak Babe, before attaining the fulness of the age of manhood, and this to the end that nothing might be wanting to His sacrifice, so does He intend to do in us; there is to be a progress in His growth within us. Now, it is at the feast of Christmas that He delights to be born in our souls, and that He pours out over the whole Church a grace of being born, to which, however, not all are faithful.

For this glorious solemnity, as often as it comes round, finds three classes of men. The first, and the smallest number, are those who live, in all its plenitude, the life of Jesus who is within them, and aspire incessantly after the increase of this life. The second class of souls is more numerous; they are living, it is true, because Jesus is in them; but they are sick and weakly, because they care not to grow in this divine life; their charity has become cold (Apoc. ii. 4.)! The rest of men make up the third division, and are they that have no part of this life in them, and are dead; for Christ has said : 'I am the Life (St. John xiv. 6.).'

Now, during the season of Advent, our Lord knocks at the door of all men's hearts, at one time so forcibly that they must needs notice Him; at another, so softly that it requires attention to know that Jesus is asking admission. He comes to ask them if they have room for Him, for He wishes to be born in their house. The house indeed is His, for he built it and preserves it; yet He complains that His own refused to receive Him (Ibid. i. 11. ); at least the greater number did. 'But as many as received Him, He gave them power to be made the sons of God, born not of blood, nor of the flesh, but of God (Ibid. 12, 13.).'

He will be born, then, with more beauty and lustre and might than you have hitherto seen in Him, O ye faithful ones, who hold Him within you as your only treasure, and who have long lived no other life than His, shaping your thoughts and works on the model of His. You will feel the necessity of words to suit and express your love; such words as He delights to hear you speak to Him. You will find them in the holy liturgy.

You, who have had Him within you without knowing Him, and have possessed Him without relishing the sweetness of His presence, open your hearts to welcome Him, this time, with more care and love. He repeats His visit of this year with an untiring tenderness; He has forgotten your past slights; He would 'that all things be new (Apoc. xxi. 5. ).' Make room for the divine Infant, for He desires to grow within your soul. The time of His coming is close at hand : let your heart, then, be on the watch; and lest you should slumber when He arrives, watch and pray, yea, sing. The words of the liturgy are intended also for your use : they speak of darkness, which only God can enlighten; of wounds, which only His mercy can heal; of a faintness, which can be braced only by His divine energy.

And you, Christians, for whom the good tidings are as things that are not, because you are dead in sin, lo! He who is very life is coming among you. Yes, whether this death of sin has held you as its slave for long years, or has but freshly inflicted on you the wound which made you its victim, Jesus, your Life, is coming: 'why, then, will you die? He desireth not the death of the sinner, but rather that he be converted and live (Ezechiel xviii. 31, 32. ).' The grand feast of His birth will be a day of mercy for the whole world; at least, for all who will give Him admission into their hearts: they will rise to life again in Him, their past life will be destroyed, and where sin abounded, there grace will more abound (Rom. v. 20.).

But, if the tenderness and the attractiveness of this mysterious coming make no impression on you, because your heart is too weighed down to be able to rise to confidence, and because, having so long drunk sin like water, you know not what it is to long with love for the caresses of a Father whom you have slighted--then turn your thoughts to that other coming, which is full of terror, and is to follow the silent one of grace that is now offered. Think within yourselves, how this earth of ours will tremble at the approach of the dread Judge; how the heavens will flee from before His face, and fold up as a book (Apoc. vi. 14. ); how man will wince under His angry look; how the creature will wither away with fear, as the two-edged sword, which comes from the mouth of his Creator (Ibid. i. 16. ), pierces him; and how sinners will cry out, 'Ye mountains, fall on us! ye rocks, cover us (St. Luke xxiii. 30.)!' Those unhappy souls who would not know the time of their visitation (Ibid. xix. 44. ), shall then vainly wish to hide themselves from the face of Jesus. They shut their hearts against this Man-God, who, in His excessive love for them, wept over them: therefore, on the day of judgment they will descend alive into those everlasting fires, whose flame devoureth the earth with her increase, and burneth the foundations of the mountains (Deut. xxxii. 22. ). The worm that never dieth (St. Mark ix. 43.), the useless eternal repentance, will gnaw them for ever.

Let those, then, who are not touched by the tidings of the coming of the heavenly Physician and the good Shepherd who giveth His life for His sheep, meditate during Advent on the awful yet certain truth, that so many render the redemption unavailable to themselves by refusing to co-operate in their own salvation. They may treat the Child who is to be born with disdain (Is. ix. 6.); but He is also the mighty God, and do they think they can withstand Him on that day, when He is to come, not to save, as now, but to judge? Would that they knew more of this divine Judge, before whom the very saints tremble! Let these, also, use the liturgy of this season, and they will there learn how much He is to be feared by sinners.

We would not imply by this that only sinners need to fear; no, every Christian ought to fear. Fear, when there is no nobler sentiment with it, makes man a slave; when it accompanies love, it is a feeling which fills the heart of a child who has offended his father, yet seeks for pardon; when, at length, love casteth out fear (St. John iv. 18. ), even then this holy fear will sometimes come, and, like a flash of lightning, pervade the deepest recesses of the soul. It does the soul good. She wakes up afresh to a keener sense of her own misery and of the unmerited mercy of her Redeemer. Let no one, therefore, think that he may safely pass his Advent without taking any share in the holy fear which animates the Church. She, though so beloved by God, prays to Him to give her this fear; and every day, in her Office of Sext, she thus cries out to Him: 'Pierce my flesh with Thy fear.' It is, however, to those who are beginning a good life, that this part of the Advent liturgy will be peculiarly serviceable.

It is evident, from what we have said, that Advent is a season specially devoted to the exercises of what is called the purgative life, which is implied in that expression of St. John, so continually repeated by the Church during this holy time: Prepare ye the way of the Lord! Let all, therefore, strive earnestly to make straight the path by which Jesus will enter into their souls. Let the just, agreeably to the teaching of the apostle, forget the things that are behind (Phil. iii. 13.), and labour to acquire fresh merit. Let sinners begin at once and break the chains which now enslave them. Let them give up those bad habits which they have contracted. Let them weaken the flesh, and enter upon the hard work of subjecting it to the spirit. Let them, above all things, pray with the Church. And when our Lord comes, they may hope that He will not pass them by, but that He will enter and dwell within them; for He spoke of all when He said these words: 'Behold I stand at the gate and knock: if any man shall hear My voice and open to Me the door, I will come in unto him (Apoc. iii. 20).'