Monday, January 1 : Adam of Perseigne

The «Father of lights» (Jam 1,17) is inviting the children of light (Lk 16,18) to celebrate the feast of light: «Look to him that you may be radiant with joy» says the Psalm (34[33],6). In fact, he who «dwells in unapproachable light» (1Tm 6,16) has condescended to become approachable. He has come down in the cloud of his flesh that the weak and small might mount up to him. What a descent of mercy! «He inclined the heavens,» that is to say, the heights of his divinity, «and came down» by becoming present in the flesh, «with dark clouds under his feet» (Ps 18[17],10)… A necessary darkness to turn us to light! The true light was hidden beneath the cloud of his flesh (cf. Ex 13,21) – a dark cloud by reason of its «likeness to sinful flesh» (Rm 8,3)… Since the true Light has made flesh his hiding place let us, who are beings of flesh, draw near to the Word made flesh… that we may learn to pass by degrees to the spiritual flesh. Let us now draw near for today a new sun is shining even more than is its wont. Up till now he was enclosed in the narrowness of a crib in Bethlehem and was known by hardly anyone, but today, at Jerusalem, he is presented in front of a great number of people in the Temple of the Lord… Today the Sun breaks out to shine over the whole world… If only my soul could burn with the desire that inflamed Simeon’s heart that I, too, might be worthy of becoming the bearer of so great a light! But unless the soul has first of all been purified from its sins it cannot go «to meet Christ on the clouds» of true freedom (1Thes 4,17)… Only then will it be able to rejoice in the true light with Simeon and, like him, to depart in peace.

maronite readings – rosary,team