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Vigils Reading
November 8
HIS CROSS IS MY GLORY
From a homily by William of St-Thierry6
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It is to my crucified one that I turn. His cross is my glory: its mark is on my
brow; it gives joy to my mind, direction to my life, love even for death itself. May
they not despise me for this, O Lord, they who are worthy to behold you, seated
as you are on your throne, the exaltation of your godhead, filling all the earth
with your majesty. The mysteries of your dealings with men here and now fill
the temple of every mind, great and small. May your holy angels have the
honour that is their due in heaven: but may they sometimes also share their
grace and favours with us here on earth. For he loves us to make progress in our
lives: and their blessed perfection is sweet to him.
As the Apostle says: God’s many-splendoured wisdom has been
manifested to principalities and powers in heaven through his dealings with the
Church. Wherefore may they pardon us, Lord, even if your love should
sometimes so captivate us that we desire to see, with them, what with them we
already love: with a full heart we felicitate them, as they behold what we are not
yet worthy to behold.
May they blissfully contemplate your divine majesty residing in your
eternal wisdom: those things to be, seen before this our mortal wayfaring and
after it, everything that is, past and future, enfolding it all within his eternal
present: it reaches in its power and strength from one extremity to another. But
our temporal passage, belonging to your dealings with men as a whole, he has
strewn with his charity, disposing all things in sweetness, for the sake of the
daughters of Jerusalem, the devout but as yet infirm souls. They who have not
thus far their elevated gaze fixed on contemplating the sublime would fain
undergo hardship for your servants and be transformed so as to belong among
their fellows. Among these, O Lord, may my spirit some day be taught to adore
you, spirit as you are, in spirit and in truth, flesh no longer desiring what is
contrary to the spirit, nor yet holding it back.
But now that for the moment you are kept from boldly taking possession
of what is to be yours, make a proper disposition of what is his, with what grace
and harmony you best can, as befits him, the true owner. I have not yet risen
above the rough-hewn figures of my earthly imagination: but may you indulge
and be gracious to my feeble spirit, as it expresses its true nature in letting its
fancy play on your more humble creatures. Behold! the meager enfolding the
newly born, the holy child being adored; the footprints of the crucified one being
licked, as he hangs on the cross; his feet being held and kissed now that he is
risen; the hand, put in the place where the nails went; and then the exclamation
– My Lord and my God!