Reflections and affections on the passion of Jesus Christ - 02

The Apostle St. Paul said that he desired to know nothing but Jesus, and Jesus crucified; that is, the love that He has shown us on the Cross: I judged not myself to know anything among you but Jesus Christ, and him crucified. (1 Cor. 2). And, in truth, from what books can we better learn the Science of the Saints — that is, the Science of loving God than from Jesus crucified? That great servant of God, Brother Bernard of Corlione, the Capuchin, not being able to read, his brother Religious wanted to teach him, upon which he went to consult his Crucifix; but Jesus answered him from the Cross, "What is reading? What are books? Behold, I am the Book wherein thou mayest continually read the love I have borne thee." O great subject to be considered during our whole life and during all eternity! A God dead for the love of us! a God dead for the love of us! O wonderful subject!

St. Thomas Aquinas was one day paying a visit to St. Bonaventure, and asked him from what book he had drawn all the beautiful lessons he had written. St. Bonaventure showed him the image of the Crucified, which was completely blackened by all the kisses he had given it, and said, " This is my book, whence I receive everything that I write; and it has taught me whatever little I know." In short, all the Saints have learned the art of loving God from the study of the Crucifix. Brother John of Alvernia, every time that he beheld Jesus wounded, could not restrain his tears. Brother James of Tuderto, when he heard the Passion of our Redeemer read, not only wept bitterly, but broke out into loud sobs, overcame with the love with which he was inflamed towards his beloved Lord.

II. It was this sweet study of the Crucifix which made St. Francis become a great seraph. He wept so continually in meditating on the sufferings of Jesus Christ, that he almost entirely lost his sight. On one occasion, being found crying out and weeping, he was asked what was the matter with him. "What ails me?" replied the Saint. "I weep over the sorrows and insults inflicted on my Lord; and my sorrow is increased when I think on those ungrateful men who do not love Him, but live without any thought of Him." Every time that he heard the bleating of a lamb, he felt himself touched with compassion at the thought of the death of Jesus, the Immaculate Lamb, drained of every drop of Blood upon the Cross tor the sins of the world. And therefore this loving Saint could find no subject on which he exhorted his brethren with greater eagerness than the constant remembrance of the Passion of Jesus.

This, then, is the Book — Jesus crucified — which, if we constantly read it, will teach us on the one hand, to have a lively fear of sin, and, on the other hand, will inflame us with love for a God so full of love for us; while we read in these Wounds the great malice of sin, which reduced a God to suffer such a bitter death in order to satisfy the Divine justice, and the love which our Saviour has shown us in choosing to suffer so much in order to prove to us how much He loved us.

Let us beseech the Divine Mother Mary to obtain for us from her Son the grace that we also may enter into these furnaces of love, in which so many loving hearts are consumed, in order that, our earthly affections being there burnt away, we also may burn with those blessed flames, which render souls holy on earth and blessed in Heaven. Amen.