Saturday, March 21 : Saint Augustine

The Pharisees said to him: “You testify on your own behalf, so your testimony cannot be verified”… Jesus answered them: “Even if I do testify on my own behalf, my testimony can be verified because I know where I came from and where I am going”. Light shows up the objects on which it shines and at the same time shows itself… “I know where I came from and where I am going.” He who stands there before you and who is speaking possesses that which he has not left…: in coming here to earth he has not left heaven, and in returning he does not abandon us… This is impossible to men, impossible to the sun itself: when it moves towards the west it leaves the east behind and, until its return to the east, it is no more. But our Lord Jesus Christ comes to earth and remains in heaven; he returns to heaven and stays on earth… Saint Peter writes: “We possess the prophetic message that is altogether reliable. You will do well to be attentive to it, as to a lamp shining in a dark place, until day dawns…” (2Pt 1,19). And so when our Lord comes, according to the apostle Paul’s words: “He will bring to light what is hidden in darkness” (1Cor 4,5)… Before such a light, torches are no longer necessary: we will no longer read the Prophets, no longer open the epistles of the apostles, no longer seek the testimony of John the Baptist, we won’t even need the Gospel. They will vanish, all those Scriptures that used to be alight for us like torches in this world’s midnight… What will we see?… “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God” (Jn 1,1). You will draw water from the well whose dew has has covered you, from which emanate those broken beams that came by a thousand winding ways into your darkened heart. You will openly see the light itself… “What we shall be has not yet been revealed. We know that when it is revealed we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is” (1Jn 3,2)… Now I am going to lay down this book…; it has been good for us to enjoy its light together…, but while leaving each other, we do not leave this light.

Roman Extraordinary (Tridentine) Daily Readings – rosary,team