Monday, October 4 : Saint Bernard

It is only right, my brothers, to celebrate our Lord’s coming with all possible devotion, so greatly does his comfort gladden us… and his love burn within us. But do not just think about his first coming when he came “to seek and to save the lost” (Lk 19,10); think, too, of that other coming when he will come to take us with him. I should like to see you constantly occupied in meditating on these two comings…, “resting among the sheepfolds” (Ps 68[67],14), for they are the two arms of the Bridegroom in which the Bride of the Song of Songs took her rest: “His left arm is under my head and his right arm surrounds me” (2,6)… But there is a third coming between the two to which I have referred and those who know of it can rest in it for their greater happiness. The other two are visible but this one is not. In the first, “ the Lord has appeared on earth and has spoken to us” (Bar 3,38)…; in the last, “all mankind shall see the salvation of God” (Lk 3,6; Is 40,5)… But the one that comes between them is secret; it is that in which the elect alone see the Savior within themselves and their souls find salvation. In his first coming, Christ came in our flesh and in our weakness; in his coming in the midst of time, he comes in Spirit and power; in his final coming, he will come in his glory and majesty. But it is by the strength of the virtues that we attain to glory, as it is written: “The Lord, the king of armies, he is the king of glory” (Ps 24[23],10), and in the same book: “That I may see your power and your glory” (Ps 63[62],3). And so the second coming is like a road leading from the first to the last. In the first, Christ has been our redemption; in the last, he will appear as our life; in his coming between, he is our rest and our consolation.

maronite readings – rosary,team