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Ortus Christi: Meditations for Advent
Ortus Christi: Meditations for Advent
PRAYERS
(Collect for the Annunciation, said at Mass every day during Advent.)
(Collect said at Office after the Salve Regina.)
(Little Office B. V. M. Vespers for Advent.)
PRAYER OF VEN. FATHER OLIER
(300 days, once a day, Pius IX, Oct. 14 1859.)
ORTUS CHRISTI
Advent Sunday
"Arise, be enlightened, … for thy light is come, and the glory of the Lord is risen upon thee… The Lord shall arise upon thee … the Gentiles shall walk in thy light, and kings in the brightness of thy rising" (ortus).
(Is. lx. 1-3).
1st Prelude. A picture of the first streaks of dawn.
2nd Prelude. Grace to arise because the Light has come.
Point I. The Rising of Christ
The Church begins her new liturgical year with the words: "Ad Te levavi animam meam" – To Thee have I lifted up my soul ("Introit" for to-day) – as though she were straining her eyes to try to see something on the horizon. She cannot see anything very definite yet, but she is full of hope. Deus meus, in Te confido, non erubescam– My God I trust in Thee, let me not be ashamed, do not let me lift up my eyes in vain, she cries; and she keeps on looking. This will be her attitude all through the season of Advent, an attitude of expectancy, of waiting, of hope, of trust, of prayer. We know for what she is waiting – the Ortus Christi– the Rising of Christ. "The Lord shall arise upon thee" is the promise. "To Thee have I lifted up my soul" is her response. What is in her mind when she sees those first streaks of light? They are to her an earnest of what is coming, an earnest of the Advent of her Lord. St. Bernard says that His Advent is threefold, that He comes in three different ways: (1) In the flesh and in weakness, (2) in the spirit and in power, (3) in glory and in majesty.
The Church knows how much these three Comings mean to her children, and so at the first sign of dawn she forgets the long weary night, and calls to each one: "Arise, be enlightened for thy light is come, and the glory of the Lord is risen upon thee." "Behold the Bridegroom cometh, go ye forth to meet Him."
Let us then begin our Advent in the spirit of the Church. Let us arise once more as she bids us, rouse ourselves that is, to look with her at the dawn, while we say to ourselves: "Behold He cometh leaping upon the mountains, skipping over the hills. Behold He standeth behind our wall, looking through the windows, looking through the lattices." As we look we hear the voice of our Beloved, He is speaking to His Church. What has He to say as soon as He comes in sight? "Arise, make haste, my love, my dove, my beautiful one, and come" (Cant. ii. 8-10). It is the same injunction: "Arise."
Point II. The Rising of the Church
If the Bridegroom is rising, it is evident that the Bride must do the same. He is rising to come to His Bride, she must rise to go to Him. How? By meditating on His Advents; by thanking Him once more for them; by asking herself what use she has made of them hitherto, what use she intends to make during this New Year that is beginning; by preparing herself for them; by remembering that as His Bride she has a very real share in each.
1. The past Coming, "in the flesh and in weakness." We shall think about this coming more especially at Christmas, for which the season of Advent is a preparation. "The bright and morning star" (Apoc. xxii. 16) will by then have risen in all its fulness. The Word will be made Flesh and once more we shall rise in the "quiet silence" of the night to worship our God "in the flesh and in weakness."
2. The present Coming, "in the spirit and in power" – His Coming in grace to the soul, to dwell with it by His Spirit. "In power" – because only He Who is omnipotent could work such a stupendous miracle as the miracle of grace. This miracle could never have been worked, had it not been for the first Coming. "The Word was made Flesh" that He might by His death redeem His people and restore to them the kingdom of grace which they had lost in Adam. This second Coming is to prepare us for the third.