Prayer and mortification with Christ
"And having said the
hymn of thanksgiving, they left for the Mount of Olives." Although he had
talked about so many holy things during dinner with his Apostles, however, and
about to leave, he wanted to end it with a thanksgiving. Ah, how little we
resemble Christ, even though we bear his name and call ourselves Christians.
Our conversation at meals is not only foolish and superficial (even for this
negligence Christ warned that we must give an account), but it is also often
pernicious, and when we are full of food and drink we leave the table without
thinking of God and without giving him thank you for the goods you have
bestowed on us. A wise and pious man, who was an eminent investigator of sacred
subjects and Archbishop of Burgos, gives some
convincing arguments to show
that the hymn that Christ recited with the Apostles consisted of those six
psalms that the Hebrews call the "great hallelujah", that is, psalm
112 and the remaining five.
It is an ancient custom that
they have followed to give thanks at Easter and other important festivals. Even
today they continue to use this hymn for the same parties. As far as Christians
are concerned, although we used to say different hymns of benediction and
thanksgiving according to the
times of the year, each appropriate to its time, now we have allowed almost all
to be deprecated. We are so content saying two or three dirty words, whatever
they may be, and even these we whisper carelessly and yawning lazily.
They went out to the Mount of Olives, and not to bed. The prophet said, "In the middle of the night I arose to pay homage to you," but Christ did not even recline on the bed. I wish we could, at least, truly apply this other text: "I remembered you when I was resting on my bed." And it was not the summer time when Christ, after supper, headed towards the mountain. Because all this should not happen much later than the winter equinox, and that
The night must have been
cold, as shown by the fact that the servers warmed themselves by the coals in
the courtyard of the Supreme Pontiff. Nor was this the first time that Christ
did such a thing, as the Evangelist clearly attests when he writes secundum
consuetudinem, "according to his custom." He climbed a mountain to
pray, thus meaning that, when preparing to pray, we have to raise our minds
from the tumult of temporal things to the contemplation of divine things.
The Mount of Olives itself is
also not without mystery, planted as it was with olive trees.
The olive branch was
generally used as a symbol of peace, the one that Christ came to establish
again between God and man after such a long separation. The oil that is
extracted from the olive tree represents the anointing of the Spirit: Christ
came and returned to his Father with the purpose of sending the Holy Spirit on
the disciples, in such a way that his anointing could teach them everything
that they would not have been able to bear if they were. I would have said
before.
"He marched to the other
part of the Cedron torrent, to an orchard called Gethsemane." The Kidron
runs between the city of Jerusalem and the Mount of Olives, and the word
"Kedron" means "sadness" in the Hebrew language, while
"Gethsemane" means "very fertile valley" and also
"valley of olive trees." It should not be thought that the fact that
the Gospels so carefully remembered these names is a mere coincidence.
Otherwise, they would have considered it sufficient to indicate that he went to
the mount of
the Olive Trees, unless God
had hidden under these names some mysterious meanings that studious men, with
the help of the Holy Spirit, would try to discover, by the simple fact of being
mentioned. Since not a syllable can be considered vain or superfluous in a
writing inspired by the Holy Spirit while the Apostles were writing, and given
the fact that not even a bird falls to the ground outside the order willed by
God, it is impossible for me to think that the evangelists These names were
mentioned randomly, or else the Jews assigned them to places (whatever their
intention in doing so) without a hidden plan from the Holy Spirit, who kept a
storehouse of mysteries in such names for them to be unearthed later.
"Kedron" means both
"sadness" and "blackness or darkness", and gives its name
not only to the torrent mentioned by the evangelists, but also - as is clearly
stated - to the valley through which the torrent runs and which separates
Gethsemane from the city. Thus, all these names evoke to memory (unless our
sleepiness prevents us from seeing) the reality that while we are distant from
the Lord, as the Apostle says6, and before reaching the fruitful Mount of
Olives and the pleasant farm From Gethsemane -whose appearance is not sad and
harsh, but fertile in all kinds of joys-, we must cross the valley and the
Kidron stream. A valley of tears and a torrent of sadness, in whose waters the
dirt and blackness of our sins can be washed away. But if tired and overwhelmed
with pain and tears we perversely try to change this world, this place of work
and sacrifice, in a port of frivolous rest; if we seek paradise on earth, then
we turn away and flee forever from true happiness, and we will seek penance
when it is already too late, and we will also find ourselves involved in
intolerable and endless tribulations.
This is the salutary lesson
of which these names warn us, so opportunely chosen they are. And since the
words of Holy Scripture are not tied to one sense, but loaded with other
mysterious ones, these place names harmonize well with the story of the Passion
of Christ. It seems as if for this reason alone the eternal providence of God
took care that these places received such names, which would be, centuries
later, announcing signs of their
Passion. The fact that
"Kedron" means "blackened", does it not seem to want to
recall that prediction of the prophet about Christ, announcing that he would
enter his glory through an ignominious torture, and that he would remain
unknown by bruises and bruises, blood, spittle and dirt to such a degree that
"there is no form or beauty in his face"? And that the name of the
stream that he crossed not in vain means "sad" is something that
Christ himself attested when he said: "My soul is sad with sadness of
death." "And his disciples also followed him," that is, the
eleven who were left with him.
The devil had entered the
other Apostle after dinner, and he also marched outside, but not to follow the
teacher as a disciple, but to persecute him, as a traitor. Those words of
Christ were well fulfilled in him: "He who is not with me is against
me"8. In
He was certainly against
Christ because at that very moment he was plotting snares to catch him, while
the rest of the disciples followed him to pray. Let us follow Christ and plead
with Him to the Father. Let us not imitate the conduct of Judas, abandoning
Christ after having participated in His favors and having dined splendidly with
Him, so that that prophecy does not fall upon us: "If you saw the thief
you would you went with him."
"Judas, who betrayed
him, knew the place well because Jesus used to withdraw to it many times with
his disciples"'°. Once again the evangelists take advantage of the
occasion -by mentioning the traitor- to underline, and thus record in us, that
holy custom of Christ of withdrawing with his disciples to pray. If he had gone
there only sometimes and not frequently, the traitor would not have been as
sure as he was of finding the Lord there, to the point of taking the servants
of the high priest and the cohort of Roman soldiers, as if everything had been
agreed upon. beforehand. If they had seen that everything was not planned, they
would have judged that Judas was mocking them, and they would not have let him
go unpunished. And I wonder: where are those who think they are great men and
glorify themselves as if they did something extraordinary when, on the eve of
some important festivals, ¿they prolong their prayer a little longer at night
or get up early for morning prayer? Christ, our Saviour, used to spend entire
nights in prayer, without sleeping.
Where are those who called
him a glutton because he did not reject the invitation to the banquets of
publicans or despise sinners? Where are those who, judging his morality with
pharisaical rigidity, did not consider it better than the morality of the mob?
While sad and bitter the hypocrites prayed in the corners of the squares to be
seen by men, He, peaceful and kind, had lunch with sinners to help them change
their lives.
And besides, he used to spend
the night praying in the open, under the sky, while the hypocritical Pharisee
snored soundly in the softness of his bed. Would that those of us who, enslaved
in such a way by laziness, cannot imitate this example of our Saviour, would at
least have the desire to bring to mind - precisely while turning over in bed
half asleep - these their entire nights in prayer! I wish we would take
advantage of those moments while we wait for sleep to give thanks to God, to
ask him for more graces and to condemn our apathy and laziness. I am sure that
if we made the resolution to acquire the habit and try, even if it was only a
little, but with constancy, in a short time God would grant us to take a great
step and increase the fruit.
Source: Santo Tomas Moro.
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