Vigils Reading – 6th Sun ORD

Go First to be Reconciled to Your Brother

A Sermon by Aelred of Rievaulx

Let us prepare ourselves to take up the Lord…let us offer a pigeon and turtledove with his parents…The pigeon, which lacks gall, indicates a simplicity that we ought to have. The turtledove is a devotee of chastity… These two small birds express the model of our life. God’s creatures have been given to us not only for food, but also for example… In these birds the just find out what they should imitate, and sinners are shown what they do…

We ought to have no gall, so that every bitterness of hatred and rancor may be absent from our hearts. So the evil of vice is hatred; if it is held in the heart, then it deprives even martyrdom of its reward. For that reason the Apostle says, If I should give my body to be burned but I do not have charity, then it profits me nothing.
No offering is accepted by God if hatred is held in the heart. So the Lord says, If you present your offering at the altar, and there you remember that your brother has something against you, leave your offering there before the altar and go first to be reconciled to your brother. No forgiveness of sins is given if hatred is not expelled from the heart. As the gospel says, If you will not forgive the sins of other people, then neither will your Father who is in heaven forgive you your sins… Therefore let us imitate the pigeon in this so that we not be corrupted by any gall of hatred.

As the pigeon feeds on seed and chooses the better grains, so the just person should be nourished with the Lord’s word. As there are two substances in a person, that is, body and soul, so two foods are necessary: corporeal food, which nourishes the body, and the seed of God’s word, which restores the soul. We are on pilgrimage, and therefore we need provisions. So we ask for daily bread in the Lord’s Prayer, crying out to the Father, Give us this day our daily bread, that is, in the present life. The Lord grants this abundance of bread to whom he wills lest his

servants grow weak on the way… We ought to choose the better grains, as does the pigeon, so the spirit might always be attentive to the more important precepts of the Lord.

The pigeon stays beside streams so that when he sees the shadow of an approaching hawk, he avoids it. We have a spiritual enemy, flying through the air, who always goes about seeking whom he might devour. He does not dwell among us but is not very far from us either… He dwells in the air. That is why demons are called powers of the air… We see their shadow on the water because we are acquainted with the simile of their cunning in Scripture. Therefore let us flee to Scripture as often as we perceive a temptation suggested by our foe… If he suggests theft, then Scripture objects, You shall not steal. If he serves up anger, then Scripture says, Whoever is angry with his brother shall be subject to judgment. If he urges us to deceive, then Scripture proclaims the punishment: You will destroy all who speak lies. Let the faithful soul sit beside streams of this sort in order to foresee the arrival of our treacherous enemy.

The pigeon has a lament for a song. We who are sinners must imitate the pigeon…For blessed, as the Lord says, are you who weep, because you will laugh… Peter wept bitterly after his sin, and he merited a pardon. Tears, in the second place after baptism, wash away sins. Tears must be shed not only for ourselves, but also for our neighbors…

If we imitate the pigeon in all these, as was done figuratively in ancient time, then we spiritually fulfill it in the present