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Synopsis.
He who is desirous of
drawing near to the gift of the holy baptism comes to the Church of God where he
is received by a duly appointed person —as there is a habit to register those
who draw near to baptism—who will question him about his mode of life. This rite
3 is performed for those who are baptised by the person called godfather.
The duly appointed person writes your name in the Church register together with
that of the one who is acting as your sponsor or guide in the town. The services
of the persons called exorcists have also been found indispensable, as it is
necessary that when a case is being heard in the judgment hall the litigant
should remain silent. You stand with outstretched arms in the posture of one who
prays, and you look downwards. This is the reason why you take off your outer
garment and stand barefooted, ands you stand also on sackcloth. You are ordered
in those days to meditate on the words of the faith.
I think that in past days I spoke sufficiently
to your love about the profession of faith which our blessed Fathers wrote
according to the teaching of our Lord, who through it wished us to be taught and
baptised in the name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. (I
spoke) in those days to you, who draw near to the gift of baptism, in order that
you might learn what to believe, and in the name of whom you are baptised so
that you might see that you are receiving instruction according to the teaching
of our Lord, and that you are being baptised in the name of the Father, and of
the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. I added to the above a discourse on prayer in
order that you might rightly know the teaching of good works consonant with the
way in which those who receive this great gift of baptism have to live. As,
however, the time of the sacrament has drawn near, and you are by the grace of
God about to participate in the holy baptism, it is right and necessary that we
should explain before you the power of the sacrament and of the ceremonies which
are accomplished in it, and the reason for which each of them is accomplished,
in order that when you have learnt what is the reason for all of them you may
receive the things that take place with great love.
Every sacrament consists in the representation
of unseen and unspeakable things through signs and emblems. Such things require
explanation and interpretation, for the sake of the person who draws near to the
sacrament, so that he might know its power. If it only consisted of the
(visible) elements themselves, words would have been useless, as sight itself
would have been able to show us one by one all the happenings that take place,
but since a sacrament contains the signs of things that take place or have
already taken place, words are needed to explain the power of signs and
mysteries. The Jews performed their service for the heavenly things as in signs
and shadows, because the law only contained the shadow of good things to come,
and not the very image of the things, as the blessed Paul said. A shadow implies
the proximity of a body, as it cannot exist without a body, but it does not
represent the body which it reflects in the same way as it happens in an image.
When we look at an image we recognise the person who is represented in it—if we
knew that person beforehand—on account of the accurately drawn picture, but we
are never able to recognise a man represented only by his shadow, as this shadow
has no likeness whatever to the real body from which it emanates. All things of
the law were similar to this. They were only a shadow of the heavenly things, as
the Apostle said. You must now learn the nature of this shadow:
According to what he had learnt in a Divine
vision the blessed Moses made two tabernacles, one of which they named holy, and
the other holy of holies. The first was the likeness of the life and sojourn on
the earth on which we now dwell, and the second, which they called holy of
holies, was the likeness of the regions which are above the visible heaven, to
which our Lord Christ, who was assumed for our salvation, ascended, in which He
now is, and to which He granted us to go in order to be there and dwell with
Him, as the blessed Paul said: "Whither the forerunner is for us entered,
Christ, who became a high priest for ever after the order of Melchizedec." He
said of Him that He became after the order of high priests because He was the
first to enter there, and through Him the favour of entering was promised to us.
The work of a high priest is indeed that he should draw near to God first, and
then after him and through him the rest should draw near; but because all these
things have not yet taken place but will take place at the end, the priests of
the law did not perform a single one of them through their service according to
the law, in the place called holy of holies, which indeed was never entered by
any one, as the high priest entered it once a year alone, and offered a
sacrifice before entering it, and had no right to enter it at all times. He
entered it once a year so that it might be made manifest that all those acts of
the law only embraced the mortal life on this earth, and had no relation of any
kind with the heavenly things; in the same way as we ourselves cannot enter
heaven as long as we remain mortal in our nature. Men would only have entered
heavenly places after a man from us had been assumed, and had died according to
the natural law of men, and risen in glory from the dead, and become immortal
and incorruptible by nature, and had ascended into heaven, and been constituted
a high priest to the rest of mankind and an earnest of the ascension into
heaven.
Thus the law contained the shadow of the good
things to come, as those who lived under it had only a figure of the future
things. In this way they only performed their service as a sign and a shadow of
the heavenly things, because that service gave, by means of the tabernacle and
the things that took place in it, a kind of revelation, in figure, of the life
which is going to be in heaven, and which our Lord Christ showed to us by His
ascension into it, while He granted all of us to participate in an event which
was so much hidden from those who lived in that time that the Jews, in their
expectation of the resurrection, had only a base conception of it. They did not
think, as we do, that we shall be changed into an immortal life, but they
thought of it as a place in which we shall continue to eat, drink and marry.
This we consider a great shame if we are to believe the words of our Lord to the
effect that: "You do err, not knowing the scriptures nor the power of God, for
in the resurrection from the dead they neither marry nor are given in marriage,
but are as the angels," and "they are the children of God because they are the
children of the resurrection." In this He both reprimanded their error
concerning the resurrection and taught that we ought to believe that something
like a Divine life will come to those who will rise, as He clearly said that
they will be like angels.
The things that the ancients held as figures and
shadows came now into reality when our Lord Jesus Christ, who was assumed from
us and for us died according to the human law, and through His resurrection
became immortal, incorruptible and for ever immutable, and as such ascended into
heaven, as by His union with our nature He became to us an earnest of our own
participation in the event. In saying: "If Christ rose from the dead, how say
some among you that there is no resurrection of the dead," (the Apostle) clearly
showed that it was necessary for all to believe that there is a resurrection,
and in believing in it we had also to believe that we will equally clearly
participate in it. As we have a firm belief that things that have already
happened will happen to us, so [the things that happened at the resurrection of
our Lord]
4 we believe that they will happen to us. We perform, therefore, this
ineffable sacrament which contains the incomprehensible signs of the Economy of
Christ our Lord, as we believe that the things implied in it will happen to us.
It is indeed evident to us, according to the
words of the Apostle, that when we perform either baptism or the Eucharist we
perform them in remembrance of the death and resurrection of Christ, in order
that the hope of the latter may be strengthened in us. So far as the
resurrection is concerned he said: "So many of us as were baptised into Christ
Jesus, were buried with Him by baptism into death: that like as Christ was
raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also shall walk
in newness of life." He clearly taught here that we are baptised so that we
might imitate in ourselves the death and the resurrection of our Lord, and that
we might receive from our remembrance of the happenings that took place the
confirmation of our hope in future things. As for the communion of the holy
Sacrament he said: "As often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, you do
show the Lord's death till He come." Our Lord also said: "This is my body which
is broken for you, and this is my blood which is shed for many for the remission
of sins." From all this it is clear that both the service and the Communion are
in remembrance of the death and the resurrection of Christ, from which arose our
hope that we all expect communion with Him. And we sacramentally perform the
events that took place in connection with Christ our Lord, in order that—as we
have learnt by experience —our communion with Him may strengthen our hope. It
would be useful, therefore, to discuss before you the reason for all the
mysteries and signs.
Our Lord God made man from dust in His image and
honoured him with many other things. He especially honoured him by calling him
His image, from which man alone became worthy to be called God and Son of God;
and if he had been wise he would have remained with the One who was to him the
source of all good things, which he truly possessed, but he accepted and
completed the image of the Devil, who like a rebel had risen against God and
wished to usurp for himself the glory that was due to Him, and had striven to
detach man from God by all sorts of stratagems and appropriate God's honour, so
that he might insult Him by rivalry. He (the Rebel) assumed, therefore, the
attributes and the glory of a helper, and because man yielded to his words and
rejected the injunctions which God had imposed upon him and followed the Rebel
as his true helper, God inflicted upon him the punishment of reverting to the
dust from which he had been taken.
And from the above sin death entered, and this
death weakened (human) nature and generated in it a great inclination towards
sin. Both of these grew side by side, while the inexorable death strengthened
and multiplied sin, as the condition of mortality by weakening (human nature)
caused the perpetration of many sins. Even the commandments which God gave in
order to check them tended to multiply them, and those who infringed the
commandments strengthened the punishment by the frequency of the sins. From
these grew the ill will of the Rebel, who jubilated and rejoiced at the great
injury that he was inflicting on us, and at the state of our affairs which was
becoming daily more corrupt and iniquitous.
When this state of our affairs became desperate,
our Lord God willed in His mercy to rectify it. With this end in view He assumed
a man from us, who was a faithful keeper of the Divine commandments, and was
found to be free from all sin with the exception of the punishment of death. The
Tyrant, however, who could do nothing else, brought an unjust death upon Him at
the hand of the Jews, his servants, but He willingly accepted it and sat in
judgment with him before God, the just judge, who pronounced Him not liable to
the punishment of death which had been wickedly and unjustly brought upon Him.
And He became for ever immune from death, and immortal and incorruptible by
nature. And as such He ascended into heaven and became for ever beyond the reach
of the harm and injury of Satan, who was thus unable to do any harm to a man who
was immortal, incorruptible and immutable, and who dwelt in heaven and possessed
a close union with the Divine nature. From the fact that the man who was assumed
from us had such a confidence (with God), He became a messenger on behalf of all
the (human) race so that the rest of mankind might participate with Him in His
great change, as the blessed Paul said: "Who shall lay anything to the charge of
God's elect? It is God who justifies; who is he that condemns? It is Christ who
died, yes rather, that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who
also makes intercession for us." He shows here that the benefits accruing to us
are immutable and unchangeable, since Christ who died for us, and who rose from
the dead and received close union with Divine nature, draws us, by His
intercession for us, to the participation in resurrection and in the good things
that emanate from it.
We draw near to the sacrament because we perform
in it the symbols of the freedom from calamities from which we were unexpectedly
delivered, and of our participation in these new and great benefits which had
their beginning in Christ our Lord. Indeed we expect to be partakers of these
benefits which are higher than our nature, while even the possibility of their
coming to us we had never expected.
We have spoken in this way so that our words
might be better understood; and it is time now to show you the reason for every
act (performed in the sacrament).
He who wishes to draw near to the gift of the
holy baptism comes to the Church of God, which Christ our Lord showed to be a
symbol of the heavenly things to the faithful in this world, when He said: "You
are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my Church, and the gates of hell
shall not prevail against it, and I will give to you the keys of the kingdom of
heaven, and whatever you shall bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and
whatever you shall loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven." He showed in this
that He granted to the Church the power that any one who becomes related to it
should also be related to the heavenly things, and any one who becomes a
stranger to it should also be clearly a stranger to the heavenly things.
Owing to the fact that to those who are at the
head of the Church is allotted the task of governing it, it is to them that He
referred in His saying to the blessed Peter that they have the keys of the
Kingdom of Heaven, and things that are bound by them on earth shall be bound in
heaven, and things that are loosed by them on earth shall be loosed in heaven;
not in the sense that they are masters of men in it, but in the sense that the
Church received power from God that those who are related to it and under the
care of those who are at its head, acquire by necessity a relationship with
heaven, inasmuch as those who are outside this have no association of any kind
with heavenly things.
Christ our Lord established a kingdom in heaven,
and established it there as a city in which He has His kingdom, which the
blessed Paul calls "Jerusalem which is above, free, and mother of us all," since
it is in it that we are expecting to dwell and abide. That city is full of
innumerable companies of angels and men who are all immortal and immutable.
Indeed the blessed Paul said: "You are come to Mount Zion, and to the city of
the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to an innumerable company of angels,
and to the Church of the firstborn, which are written in heaven." He calls the
firstborn those who are immortal and immutable, like those who are worthy of the
adoption of sons of whom our Lord said that "they are the children of God
because they are the children of the resurrection"; and they are enrolled in
heaven as its inhabitants.
These things will be seen so in reality in the
world to come, when, according to the words of the Apostle, "we are caught up in
the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, so that we may be ever with Him." He
will take us up and ascend into heaven where His Kingdom is seen and where all
of us shall be with Him, free and exempt from all troubles, in happiness and
pleasure, and enjoying to the full the benefits of that kingdom. Those who draw
near to Him in this world He wished them to be, through religion and faith, as
in the symbol of the heavenly things, and He so constituted the Church as to be
a symbol of the heavenly things; and He wished that those who believe in Him
should live in it. This is the reason why the blessed Paul also said: "that you
may know how you ought to behave yourself in the house of God, which is the
Church of the living God, the pillar and ground of the truth." Church "of the
living God" means that His name is for ever and ever, and this demonstrates that
the believers will enjoy life eternally, while the expression "pillar and ground
of the truth" denotes that life firm, solid, unshakeable and unchangeable in
which (the believer) will be seen and from which he will also receive his power.
He, therefore, who is desirous of drawing near
to baptism comes to the Church of God through which he expects to reach that
life of the heavenly abode. He ought to think that he is coming to be the
citizen of a new and great city, and he should, therefore, show great care in
everything that is required of him before his enrolment in it. He comes to the
Church of God |25 where he is received by a duly appointed
person
5—as there is a habit to register those who draw near to baptism—who will
question him about his mode of life in order to find out whether it possesses
all the requisites of the citizenship of that great city. After he has abjured
all the evil found in this world and cast it completely out of his mind, he has
to show that he is worthy of the citizenship of the city and of his enrolment in
it. This is the reason why, as if he were a stranger to the city and to its
citizenship, a specially appointed person,6
who is from the city in which he is going to be enrolled and who is well versed
in its mode of life, conducts him to the registrar and testifies for him to the
effect that he is worthy of the city and of its citizenship and that, as he is
not versed in the life of the city or in the knowledge of how to behave in it,
he himself would be willing to act as a guide to his inexperience.
This rite is performed for those who are
baptised by the person called godfather, who, however, does not make himself
responsible for them in connection with future sins, as each one of us answers
for his own sins before God. He only bears witness to what the catechumen has
done and to the fact that he has prepared himself in the past to be worthy of
the city and of its citizenship. He is justly called a sponsor because by his
words (the catechumen) is deemed worthy to receive baptism. When in this world
there is an order of the Government for a census of countries and of people who
are in them, it is right for those who are registered in particular countries to
obtain a title which would assure for them the cultivation of the fields which
are registered in their name, and to pay readily the land taxes to the king. The
same thing is required of the one who is enrolled in the heavenly city and in
its citizenship, as "our conversation is in heaven." Indeed he ought to reject
all earthly things, as is suitable to the one who is inscribed in heaven, and to
do only the things that fit the life and conversation in heaven. He will also,
if he is wise, pay perpetual taxes to the king and live a life which is
consonant with baptism.
As the Romans—when they held Judea under their
domination—ordered that every one should be enrolled in his own city, and as
Joseph with the blessed Mary went to Bethlehem to be enrolled in it, because he
was from the house and the tribe of David, so also we, who believe in Christ,
have to do. Indeed He conquered, by right of war, all the enemies, delivered the
human race from the power of the demons, freed us from the servitude of the
captivity, and brought us under His dominion, as it is said: "He has ascended on
high and has led captivity captive." He showed the new world to come and the
wonderful dispensation of that which is called the heavenly Jerusalem, in which
Christ established His imperishable Kingdom. It is, therefore, incumbent on us
all, who are under the power of His Kingdom, to pray and desire that through
faith we might draw near to baptism and be worthy of being enrolled in heaven.
It is for this reason that as regards you also
who draw near to the gift of baptism, a duly appointed person
7 inscribes your name in the Church book, together with that of your
godfather, who answers for you and becomes your guide in the city and the leader
of your citizenship therein. This is done in order that you may know that you
are, long before the time and while still on the earth, enrolled in heaven, and
that your godfather who is in it is possessed of great diligence to teach you,
who are a stranger and a newcomer to that great city, all the things that
pertain to it and to its citizenship, so that you should be conversant with its
life without any trouble and anxiety.
You should learn now the reason for the
remaining events, as your enrolment is not effected to no purpose and
accidentally only, but after a great judgment had taken place on your behalf. It
was necessary for you, who have drawn near to Divine Providence, to have been
first delivered from the Tyrant who had attacked you so that, after having been
enabled to flee from all the harm of the enemies and avoid another servitude,
you might be in a position to enjoy to the full the happiness of this enrolment.
When by order of the Government a census is taken in this world, and one comes
to establish his legal title to a land fertile in corn and rich in good things,
in which there is much happiness to those who are registered for it—if a person
who was previously his enemy learns this, and envying him for this happiness
which he was himself previously enjoying, because (the land) for a long time
belonged to him, goes and tells the one who is about to be registered that the
land belonged to him by right of succession and that he ought not to be
dispossessed of his right of ownership and be given the ownership of another
land—it is right for the one who is about to be registered, if he is endowed
with great zeal, to go to a magistrate and make use of the title which he
possesses, and show the supposed owner of the land, for which he wishes to be
registered, that he is desirous of bringing the matter before a judge.
In this same way God placed the kingdom of
heaven before men, and willed that all of them should be in it in an immortal
and immutable state, as is suitable to the dwellers in heaven, and granted to
the Church to be the symbol of heavenly things in this world, and we pray and
implore Him to draw us near through baptism to that heavenly city, and to make
us participate in its life; but it is necessary that a judgment should be given
for us against the Tyrant, who is fighting the case against us, that is to say
Satan, who is always envious of our deliverance and salvation. He shows here
also the same ill will towards us, and tries and endeavours to bring us to the
judgment hall as if we had no right to be outside his ownership. He pleads that
from ancient times and from the creation of the head of our race we belong to
him by right; he narrates the story of Adam, of how he listened to his words and
by his will rejected his Maker and preferred to serve him; of how this kindled
the wrath of God, who drove him out of Paradise, pronounced the death sentence
upon him and bound him to this world in saying: "In the sweat of your face shall
you eat bread," and: "Thorns and thistles shall it bring forth to you, for dust
you are and to dust shall you return." From these words which condemned him to
the servitude of this world, and from the fact that by his will he chose my
lordship he clearly appears to belong to me, as I am "the prince of the power of
the air, and work in the children of disobedience." How, then, is it possible
that this man, who from the beginning and from the time of his forefathers
belongs to me—as a just judgment was pronounced against him in this mortal
world, in which as long as he is I hold sway over him—should be taken away from
this world and from its life, and consequently from my lordship also, which he
himself chose willingly, and should become immortal, a thing which is higher
than his nature, and be seen in the life and citizenship of the abode of heaven,
a thing which does not pertain to men or to beings who have this (human) nature,
from which those who are endowed with a higher nature are different?
As, in our supposition, such things are now
pleaded and said by Satan, who was seen from the very beginning to fight
inimically against us, and at present envies us all the more because we expect
to receive this ineffable enrolment, which is high above all words and all human
mind, as: "eye has not seen nor ear heard, neither have entered the heart of man
the things which God has prepared for them that love him" —we must run with all
diligence to the judge and show and establish the title which we possess: that
we did not belong to Satan from the beginning and from the time of our
forefathers, but to God who created us while we were not and made us in His own
image, and that it was through the iniquity and wickedness of the Tyrant and
through our own negligence that we were driven towards evil, from which we lost
also the honour and greatness of our image, and because of our sinfulness we
further received the punishment of death. And the long time that intervened
strengthened the hold of Satan on us, and we on our part, owing to the fact that
we lived for a great length of time in this cruel and dire servitude, the wrong
and fearful acts of sin became sweet and pleasing to us, and with them we
strengthened the power of Satan over us.
While things were proceeding in this way, He who
is truly our Creator and our Lord, He who created us while we were not, and
formed our body of dust with His hands and breathed into it a soul which did not
previously exist, was pleased to make manifest a providence consonant with the
works which He himself had made and which were now perishing through the
wickedness of the Tyrant, in order that He might not permit him to harm us till
the end. He also abolished our sins and our transgression against Him, and
wished by His grace to straighten our affairs. For this He took one of us, and
in Him made the beginning of all our good things, and permitted Him to receive
the impact of all the trials of the wickedness of Satan, but showed Him also to
be high above his wickedness and his harm, and although He had allowed Him to be
even in His Death the victim of his stratagems, through which He had been drawn
to combat, He now receives, on our behalf and against Satan, the intercession of
the One who was assumed.
He (Satan) brought forward all his subtle
arguments (against Him) and did not cease from inflicting injuries, from
beginning to end, and finally, in spite of the fact that he found not a single
just cause against Him, brought an unjust death upon Him. He further added (in
his brief) how he had cruelly harmed all our race from the beginning. God,
however, who was listening to all the story, after having heard the things that
were said by both sides, condemned the Tyrant for the ill will of which he had
made use against Christ and against all our race, and pronounced judgment
against him, while He raised Christ our Lord from the dead, and made Him
immortal and immutable, and took Him up to heaven. And He promised to all the
(human) race, while still on the earth, the joy of (His) gifts so that no room
might be left to Satan from which to inflict injuries on us. We are thus in a
virtuous nature and in a high dwelling, which is higher than all the trials
arising out of the wickedness of Satan, and absent and remote from all sin. Have
we not learnt also all this from the words of our Lord who said: "Now is the
judgment of this world: now shall the prince of this world be cast out, and I
when I am lifted up from the earth will draw all men to Me?"
We must believe now that all these things have
happened and taken place, and that in nothing shall we appear henceforth to
belong to the Devil. We have rightly reverted to our Lord to whom we belonged
before the wickedness of Satan, and we are, as we were at the beginning, in the
image of God. We had lost the honour of this image through our carelessness, but
by the grace of God we have retaken this honour, and because of this we have
become immortal and we will dwell in heaven. Indeed it is in this way that the
image of God ought to rejoice and acquire the honour that is due to the One who
by promise was to be called, and was to be, in His image. By His grace we
rightly left for ever the mortal world, moved to the heavenly abode and
citizenship, recognised our Lord, and are now hastening to go to our firstfruits
(i.e. Christ) which were picked on our behalf and through which the Maker and
the Lord of all gave us immortal life and a heavenly abode and conversation. We
rightly draw near now to the Church of God because of our deliverance from
tribulations and our delight in good things, and because we expect to be
enrolled in heaven through the gift of the holy baptism.
It is you who furnish the reason for this
question and for this examination as you clearly show that through the gift of
the holy baptism you are separating yourselves from the servitude of the Tyrant,
which all our fathers from the time of Adam downwards received, and in which
they lived. This, however, goads Satan to fight fiercely against us, so much so
that he did not even desist from fighting against our Lord because he believed
Him to be a mere man on account of His resemblance (to men), and thought that by
his stratagems and temptations he might detach Him from the love of God.
Because you are unable by yourselves to plead
against Satan and to fight against him, the services of the persons called
exorcists have been found indispensable, as they act as your surety for Divine
help. They ask in a loud and prolonged voice that our enemy should be punished
and by a verdict from the judge be ordered to retire and stand far, so that no
room and no entry of any kind might be left to him from which to inflict harm on
us, and so that we might be delivered for ever from his servitude, and allowed
to live in perfect freedom, and enjoy the happiness of our present enrolment.
You are doubtless aware of the fact that when a case is being judged before a
judge and when a litigant shouts that he is innocent, and complains of a dire
and cruel servitude in which he had lived, and contends that a powerful man had
forcibly and unjustly brought him under his rule, it is necessary that when the
case is being judged this same litigant should remain silent, so that he might
by his demeanour and behaviour induce the judge to have mercy upon him. Another
man, in the person of the advocate, will demonstrate to the judge the truth of
the complaint of those who contend that they are ill-treated, and will invoke
also the laws of the kingdom in order that through them he may redress the wrong
that was done.
In this same way when the words called the words
of exorcism are pronounced you stand perfectly quiet, as if you had no voice and
as if you were still in fear and dread of the Tyrant, not being in a position
even to look at him on account of the great injustice which he did to you and to
your fathers, in the fact that he led you into captivity, brought you into a
dire and cruel servitude, and inflicted upon you wounds that leave indelible
scars, through the punishment of death which he placed in your midst; and in the
fact that he has been for a long time the master of the servitude which you,
with your own hands, brought upon yourselves. You stand, therefore, with
outstretched arms in the posture of one who prays, and look downwards and remain
in that state in order to move the judge to mercy. And you take off your outer
garment and stand barefooted in order to show in yourself the state of the cruel
servitude in which you served the Devil for a long time, according to the rules
of captivity, and in which you did all his work for him according to his
requirements. Your aim in this posture is also to move the judge to mercy, and
it is this picture of captivity that is implied in the words of God who spoke
thus through the prophet Isaiah: "Like as my servant Isaiah has walked naked and
barefoot three years in order that he might become a sign for the Egyptians and
Ethiopians, so shall the king of Assyria lead away the Egyptians and Ethiopians
captives, young and old, naked and barefoot."
You stand also on garments of sackcloth so that
from the fact that your feet are pricked and stung by the roughness of the cloth
you may remember your old sins and show penitence and repentance of the sins of
your fathers, because of which we have been driven to all this wretchedness of
iniquities, and so that you may call for mercy on the part of the judge and
rightly say: "You has put off my sackcloth and girded me with gladness."
As to the words of exorcism they have the power
to induce you, after having made up your mind to acquire such a great gain, not
to remain idle and without work. You are, therefore, ordered in those
intermediary days to meditate on the words of the profession of faith in order
that you may learn it, and they are put in your mouth in order that through a
continuous meditation you may strive to be in a position to recite them by
heart. It would indeed be strange that the Jews should have the law written in a
book hanging from their hands so that they might always remember the
commandments, and we did not impress indelibly in our memory the words of a
faith which is so much higher. Owing to the fact that immediately after having
received the Divine order Adam met the Demon and was easily overcome by him
because of his lack of meditation and contemplation of that order, it is
imperative that in all this time you should continually meditate on the words of
the Creed so that it may be strengthened in you and deeply fixed in your mind,
and so that you may love your religion without which you cannot receive the
Divine gift, or if you receive it, you cannot keep it and hold fast to it.
When the time for (the reception of) the
sacrament draws near and the judgment and fight with the Demon—for the sake of
which the words of exorcism have been used—are at an end; and when by God's
decision the Tyrant has submitted and yielded to the shouts of the exorcist and
been condemned, so that he is in nothing near to you and you are completely free
from any disturbance from him; and when you have possessed the happiness of this
enrolment without any hindrance —you are brought by duly appointed persons to
the priest, as it is before him that you have to make your engagements and
promises to God. These deal with the faith and the Creed, which by a solemn
asseveration you declare that you will keep steadfastly, and that you will not,
like Adam, the father of our race, reject the cause of all good things, but that
you will remain till the end in the doctrine of the Father, the Son and the Holy
Spirit, while thinking of the same Father, Son and Holy Spirit as one Divine
nature which is eternal and cause of everything, and to the discipleship of
which you have been admitted by faith. It is in their names that you receive the
happiness of this enrolment which consists in the participation in heavenly
benefits.
When a person wishes to enter the house of a man
of power in this world, with the intention of doing some work in it, he does not
go direct to the master of the house and make his engagement and his contract
with him—as it is unbecoming to the master of the house to condescend to such a
conversation —but goes to the majordomo and agrees with him about his work, and
through him agrees with the master of the house, to whom the house and all its
contents belong. In this same way you act, you who draw near to the house of
God, which is the Church of the living God, as the blessed Paul says, because
God is as much greater than we are as He is higher in His nature than we are,
and is for ever invisible, and dwells in a light which is ineffable, according
to the words of the blessed Paul. We approach, therefore, the majordomo of this
house, that is to say, of the Church, and this majordomo is the priest, who has
been found worthy to preside over the Church; and after we have recited our
profession of faith before him, we make with God, through him, our contract and
our engagements concerning the faith, and we solemnly declare that we will be
His servants, that we will work for Him and remain with Him till the end, and
that we will keep His love always and without a change. After we have, by our
profession of faith, made our contracts and engagements with God our Lord,
through the intermediary of the priest, we become worthy to enter His house and
enjoy its sight, its knowledge and its habitation, and to be also enrolled in
the city and its citizenship. We then become the owners of a great confidence.
As all this happens to us through the Sacrament,
to which we draw near after our profession of faith, it is necessary to say what
it is and how it is performed. It would indeed be strange to explain the reasons
for the ceremonies that precede the Sacrament and neglect the teaching of the
Sacrament itself. As, however, we have exceeded our usual time limits, and as
the things that have been, said are difficult to remember, we shall postpone
what we have to say to another day, and we shall put here an end to our speech
while glorifying God the Father, and His Only Begotten Son, and His Holy Spirit,
now, always and for ever and ever. Amen.
Here ends the second chapter. |
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