Sermons & Letters 40 part 2/2

so that the figure might be turned into truth, prophecy into manifestation, and law into Gospel. You have drawn all things to Yourself, O Lord, that what was performed in the one temple of Judea under shadowy signs, the devotion of all nations everywhere might celebrate with the full and open sacrament. For now both the order of the Levites is more illustrious, and the dignity of the elders greater, and the anointing of the priests more sacred: because Your cross is the fount of all blessings, the cause of all graces; through which there is given to believers strength out of weakness, glory out of shame, life out of death. Now also, the vanity of carnal sacrifices ceasing, the one oblation of Your body and blood fulfills all the differences of the victims:

since You are the true Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world (John 1:29); and so You perfect all mysteries in Yourself, that as there is one sacrifice for every victim, so from every nation there might be one kingdom. Let us therefore confess, dearly beloved, what the blessed teacher of the Gentiles, Paul the Apostle, confessed with glorious voice, saying: 'Faithful is the saying, and worthy of all acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into this world to save sinners' (1 Tim. 1:15). For hence the more wonderful is the mercy of God toward us, that Christ died not for the just, nor for the holy, but for the wicked and the impious (Rom. 5:6):

and since the nature of Deity could not receive the sting of death, yet by being born of us it took on that which it could offer for us. For of old the power of death threatened our death, saying through the prophet Hosea: 'O death, I will be thy death; I will be thy sting, O hell' (Hos. 13:14). For by dying He underwent the laws of hell, but by rising again He dissolved them; and so He cut short the perpetuity of death that He made it, from eternal, temporal. For as all die in Adam, so also in Christ shall all be made alive (1 Cor. 15:22). Let there be done, therefore, dearly beloved, what the Apostle Paul says: 'That they who live may now no longer live to themselves, but to Him who died for all and rose again' (2 Cor. 5:15);

and since the old things have passed away and all things are made new, let no one remain in the oldness of the carnal life, but let us all, advancing from day to day, be renewed through the increases of piety. For however much anyone has been justified, yet while he is in this life he has that whereby he can be more approved and better. But he who does not advance, falls back; and he who acquires nothing, loses something. We must therefore run with the steps of faith, with the works of mercy, with the love of justice, that celebrating the day of our redemption spiritually, we may not do so in the old leaven of malice and wickedness, but in the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth (1 Cor. 5:8),

that we may deserve to be partakers of the resurrection of Christ, who with the Father and the Holy Spirit lives and reigns forever and ever. Amen. The sacrament, dearly beloved, of the Lord's Passion, ordained for the salvation of the human race before times eternal, and announced through many signs to all past ages, we do not still await as to be manifested, but now adore as already fulfilled. As therefore both new and ancient testimonies concur to our instruction, while what the prophetic trumpet sang, evangelic history unfolds, and as it is written: 'Deep calls unto deep at the voice of Thy waterfalls' (Ps. 42:7);

since to the setting forth of the glory of God's grace the height of both Testaments responds with voices equal to each other; and what was deep under the veil of figures becomes clear by the revealed light. If, however, among those miracles of the Savior which were performed under the gaze of the peoples, few perceived the presence of the Truth, and the disciples themselves, troubled by the voluntary Passion of the Lord, did not escape the scandal of the cross without the temptation of dread; whence would our faith derive understanding, whence would conscience receive strength, unless we read foretold the things which we recognize as having been done?

The triumph of the Savior therefore being accomplished, dearly beloved, and the dispensations being consummated which all the utterances of the Old Testament announced, let the carnal Jew mourn, but let the spiritual Christian rejoice: and let the festival, which for them was turned into night, shine for us into light; since the cross of Christ is at once both the glory of believers and the punishment of unbelievers. For although the fury of the persecutors wrought nothing else upon the Lord of majesty than atrocious cruelty and savage punishment, yet for the redeemed there is, by this Passion of the Lord, a truer and juster ground for rejoicing than for grieving.

The dread of the disciples might then have been excusable, nor did the apostolic grief incur the fault of distrust, when, the Jews and the rulers of the Jews rushing together to one crime, the proud swelling of fat bulls and the wanton insolence of calves raged; when, under the eyes of the sheep, the rabid fury of raging beasts sought the blood of the just Shepherd; when at last even He Himself, who had come to suffer, out of His fellowship with our nature said: 'My soul is sorrowful even unto death' (Matt. 26:38). But now, after the power of virtue was glorified through the assumption of weakness, the paschal solemnity is to be darkened by no sadness of the faithful:

nor is the order of what was done to be recalled with sadness, since the Lord so made use of the malice of the Jews that, from the intention of the crime, the will of the Merciful One was fulfilled. But if, at the departure of Israel from Egypt, the blood of the lamb was the restoration of liberty, and a most sacred festival was made which by the victim of a beast turned away the wrath of the destroyer; how great the joys to be conceived by Christian peoples, for whom the omnipotent Father spared not His only-begotten Son, but delivered Him up for us all (Rom. 8:32); so that in the slaying of Christ there might be the true Passover and the singular sacrifice, by which not one people is delivered from the dominion of Pharaoh, but the whole world from the captivity of the devil.

This therefore, dearly beloved, is that sacrament to which from the beginning all mysteries have been subservient. Now the blood of righteous Abel proclaims the death of the highest Shepherd, and in the parricide of the Jews the murderer Cain, the slayer of his brother, is recognized (Gen. 4:8). Now the flood and the ark of Noah (Gen. 7:17) make manifest what is renewal in baptism and what is salvation in the wood. Now Abraham, the father of nations, acquires the promised heirs; and in his seed, not the germ of the flesh, but the offspring of faith is blessed (Gen. 22:18; Rom. 4:1). Now for the feast foretold by all feasts shone forth the sacred month of the new fruits, so that in the same in which the world received its beginning, the Christian creation might have its origin.

Although therefore the raging Jews did to the Lord Jesus whatever they willed, and the divine power did not withdraw the truth of the assumed manhood from any of their assaults; yet the patience of the Lord fulfilled the office of His own counsel, and the obstinacy of sacrilegious cruelty advanced the work of the Savior: which neither the Scribes, nor the Pharisees, nor the chief priests understood; for 'if they had known, they would never have crucified the Lord of majesty' (1 Cor. 2:8). Nor therefore did the devil himself understand that, by raging against Christ, he was destroying his own dominion, since he would not have lost the rights of his ancient fraud had he refrained from the blood of the Lord Jesus. But malice, greedy to harm, while it rushes on, falls; while it takes, it is taken;

while it persecutes the mortal, it falls upon the Savior. It indeed found in that reckless daring a worthy fellow-worker and a worthy associate, when impious Judas chose rather to be the minister of the devil than the apostle of Christ—Judas, whom he deserted not through the disturbance of fear, but sold off through the greed of money. See, dearly beloved, and prudently observe what seeds and what fruits are born from the stock of avarice, which the Apostle rightly defined to be the root of all evils (1 Tim. 6:10); because no sin is committed without covetousness, and every unlawful appetite is the disease of that greed. To the love of money every affection is base, and a soul greedy of gain does not fear to perish even for a trifle;

nor is there any vestige of justice in that heart in which avarice has made itself a dwelling. Judas, intoxicated with this treacherous poison, while he thirsts for gain, arrives at the noose: and he was so foolishly impious that for thirty pieces of silver he sold both the Lord and the Master. But when the Son of God had offered Himself to receive the judgment of iniquity, the blessed Apostle Peter, whose faith burned with such devotion that he was ready both to suffer with and die with the Lord, terrified by the slanderous accusation of the priest's maidservant, out of weakness incurred the peril of denial: for this reason, as it appears, he was permitted to waver, that in the chief of the Church the remedy of penitence might be established; and that no one should dare to trust in his own virtue, when not even blessed Peter could escape the peril of mutability.

But the Lord Jesus, who within the pontifical council was held only in body, saw with a divine gaze the trembling of His disciple outside; and as soon as He looked upon the mind of the fearful one, He raised it up and stirred it to tears of repentance. Blessed, O holy Apostle, are your tears, which for the washing away of the guilt of denial had the power of holy baptism. For the right hand of the Lord Jesus Christ was present, which caught you as you were slipping, before you should be cast down, and you received firmness of standing in the very peril of falling. The Lord saw in you not faith conquered, not love turned away, but constancy disturbed. Weeping abounded where affection did not fail, and the fountain of charity washed away the words of dread:

nor was the remedy of pardon delayed, where there was no judgment of the will. Quickly therefore the rock returned to its own solidity, receiving such strength that what it had then dreaded in Christ's Passion, it feared not afterward in its own punishment. Through Jesus Christ our Lord, to whom be honor and glory forever and ever. Amen.