Fr Nivard's Blog 24 March 10

Monday 15th. March 2010

MEDITATION OF THE DAY John 4:43-54.

The royal official said to him, "Sir, come down before my child dies."

We are not alone in the hour of death; we have nothing to fear in the hour of death: because when th e time comes Christ identifies himself with us so closely that fear gives way to trust and anguish to peace. He has lived all of our lives, died all of our deaths; to all of us he has given his peace. It is in the hour of death that our fear, our anxiety, our loneliness, will end ...

Death is too big a thing for anyone of us to face alone. It separates us, for a time, from those we love on earth. It is difficult for us earthbound, rooted crea­tures to want heaven; it is impossible for us to realize what the glory of God will be to us. It is loving God, and that only, that can make heaven, heaven. Here imagination does not help us: we cannot really imagine ourselves loving the "Supreme Spirit" - we even want to cling to our human frailties and comforts, to our human weakness.

It is now that Christ takes over. He has died all our deaths on the cross; now we are going to die his; it is Christ in us who surrenders to God. It is not with our own heart and our own will that we can long for God, but with Christ's. And Christ has given his heart and will to us. In this is the supreme mercy that comes to us in the hour of death ...

Now I love God with Christ's will, with Christ's heart, with Christ's trust; and because he has taken whole possession of me, in the hour of my death I shall at last love my friends too with his love.

Caryll Houselander (+ 1954) was a British mystic, poet, and spiritual teacher.
Magnificat Missalette