May the eyes of your hearts be enlightened, that you may know what is the hope that belongs to his call,
On retreat recently, I heard the words of Saint Clare as if for the first time, “Gaze upon Him.”
O most noble Queen, gaze upon Him, consider Him, contemplate Him, as you desire to imitate Him.If you suffer with Him, you shall reign with Him,
if you weep with Him, you shall rejoice with Him;if you die with Him on the cross of tribulation, you shall possess heavenly mansions in the splendor of the saints and, in the Book of Life, your name shall be called glorious among men.
I had not realized she was speaking quite literally of her own gazing on the Crucifix of San Damiano. During that same retreat I heard a lecture about that particular image; it is a visual study of the Passion narrative of Saint John, from the Last Supper to his Ascension to the right hand of God. There are all the images, including the rooster who crowed at Peter’s denial, the centurion, his Blessed Mother and Beloved Disciple, and so forth.
“Gaze upon him.”
Two weeks later, as I waited for the Transitus of Saint Francis to begin, I found myself gazing on another image of the Crucified. My eyes moved from his feet to his face, pausing now and again to rest on his hands, his knees, the loin cloth, his ribs and chest, and back to his bowed head.
Suddenly it made sense to me. I was not thinking about the crucified. I wasn’t even preparing a sermon, for once. But I was resting there in his presence, feeding from his wounds, drinking the blood and water that flowed from his side.
Since the Reformation and the Enlightenment, Christians have put a lot of stress on thinking, reasoning, explaining and defending the truths of our faith. Those are fine things to do. But eventually we must stop and gaze on him.
I keep running into the word gaze.
ReplyDeleteThis goes to the heart of things. All the discussion and intellectual activity can never take the place of slowing down to look closely at the Lord. Beautiful!
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