Awake in Paradise
No motion picture script could match this derring-do plot. Picture an Achilles-like warrior marching out to battle for his kingdom, subduing a menacing foe, and freeing his suffering subjects. Now imagine, not a script, but reality. The Second Person of the Blessed Trinity marched forth from His eternal abode of glory in the bosom of the Trinity, to do battle for His kingdom. This kingdom was once populated by men and women made in His image and likeness, properly his subjects, destined for glory unending. But one day, a cataclysm erupted in a Garden and all were taken into a pitiless captivity by a foreign potentate whom that helmeted Word Incarnate named the Prince of this world (Jn 12:31). Once created for eternal bliss; now, citizens of the empire of sin.
The story continues. In a cosmic battle the Son of God heroically steps upon the battlefield, Calvary, and slays the Infernal Serpent with only five blows, the wounds He carried on Golgotha. Before taking His last breath he proclaims to heaven and earth His victory, “It is finished” (Jn 19:30). The Son’s assignment was complete. Fittingly, He wore a King’s crown, not of laurels, but of thorns, announcing to world that this was not an ordinary human triumph, but a divine one. As lasting proof of the valiant victory, the Divine Captain rose from the dead, generating tremors shaking the very depths of Hell. The first visitation of this Divine Warrior was, of course, to His Virgin Mother, then, to the pillars of His Catholic Church, the apostles. For forty days he instructed them on the mysteries of His triumph, and tutored them on the application of those fruits to mankind through His Holy Catholic Church.
When that fortieth day dawned, the Savior knew that He must return to His natural home where He would reign forever with His Father and Holy Spirit, and ascends before the eyes of His apostles. Seated at the right hand of His Father, He reigns with a double majesty: not only as Eternally Begotten Son, but as Divine Redeemer, dazzling in the raiment of his Sacred Humanity. That splendor, that grandeur, is captured in the moving images of the book of the Apocalypse. Artists have strained to depict this royal chamber, no one more famously than Jan van Eyck in his Ghent altarpiece. The Supper of the Lamb. Gazing upon it we see the New Jerusalem, replacing the Old Jerusalem. Now, all the promises made to Patriarchs and Prophets are fulfilled beyond imagination, not only of those ancients, but of any man. “Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God has prepared for them that love him.” (I Cor 2:9).
From the dogma of Christ’s Ascension, Holy Church learns the manner in which to house the Savior. Each church should mirror the splendor and majesty of Our Lord’s abode in Heaven, limned so stunningly in the book of the Apocalypse. Every Catholic Church is the New Jerusalem, reflecting the words of Our Savior in that inspired book, “Behold I make all things new.” (Rev. 21:5). Make no mistake, this ‘newness’ is not novelty. Novelty is arsenic to the Mystical Body of Christ. The ‘newness’ is the new standards of glory which now apply for a Reality hitherto never seen by angels or men: Christ with us in the Most Blessed Eucharist. And the blueprints are found in the book of the Apocalypse. Sample some of them: “merchandise of gold, and silver, and precious stones, and of pearls, and fine linen, and purple, and silk, and scarlet, and all thyione, and all manner vessels of ivory, and all manner vessels of most precious woods, and brass, and iron, and marble.” (Rev. 18:12); “And saying, Alas, alas, that great city, that was clothed in fine linen, and purple, and scarlet, and decked with gold and precious stones, and pearls!” (Rev. 18:16); “And the twelve gates were twelve pearls; every several gate was of one pearl, and the street of the city was pure gold, as it were transparent glass.” (Rev. 21:21). These lines should leave no doubt at how every Catholic Church as the Palace of the King should appear. In fact, St. John Henry Cardinal Newman delivered one his most impassioned sermons (sermon 19) commenting on Psalm 78, “He Built His sanctuary like high palaces, like the earth which He established forever.” So rich, it deserves to be cited at length:
Religious edifices are a Christian ordinance, though so very little is said about them in Scripture will also show that it is right and pious to make them enduring, and stately and magnificent, and ornamental: so that Our Savior’s declaration, when He foretold the destruction of the Temple at Jerusalem, was not that there should not be any other house built in His honor, but rather that there should be many houses; they should be built , not merely at Jerusalem, or at Gerizim, but everywhere…The glory of the Gospel is not the abolition of rites, but their dissemination; not their absence, but their living and efficacious presence through the grace of Christ…Rich and “exceedingly magnificent” was Solomon’s Temple…it is not presumptuous surely to say that Catholic Temples should as far surpass it in size, beauty and costliness….Stability and permanence are, perhaps, the especial ideas which a Catholic Church brings before the mind. It represents, indeed, the beauty, the loftiness, the calmness, the mystery and the sanctity of religion also, and that in many ways; still, I will say, more than all these, it represents to us eternity. It is the witness of Him Who is the beginning and the ending, the first and the last; ; it is the token and emblem of Jesus Christ, the same yesterday, today, and forever!; it is the pledge of One, who said, “I will never leave thee or forsake thee, but even to your old age I am He, and even to hoar hairs I will carry you”….Thus the Palaces of God are withal the mountains of His saints….Their simplicity, grandeur, solidity, elevation, grace, and exuberance of ornament, do but bring to remembrance the patience and purity, the courage, meekness and great charity, the heavenly affections, the activity in well-doing, the faith and resignation of men who did but worship their King.
At length as well, should be cited the famous words of Abbot Suger, the 12th century abbot of St. Denis, in his On His Abbatial Administration:
As for me…I confess that I took great pleasure in devoting all the costliest and most precious things I could find to the service and administration of the Most Holy Eucharist. If to fulfill an order from God manifested from the mouth of the prophets, golden chalices, vases and cups were used to receive the blood of goats, calves and the red cow of the expiation, how greater is our obligation to use, in order to receive the Blood of Jesus Christ, in perpetual service and with utmost devotion, vases of gold, gems and everything that is considered most precious. Surely not we or our worldly goods can suffice to serve such great mysteries. Even, in a new creation, our substances were changed into that of Cherubim and Seraphim, it would still be unworthy to serve the Ineffable Host…. Some, no doubt, would in contradiction, tell us that all that is necessary is to bring to the cult a pure heart, a holy soul and true intentions; we also think that these conditions are a prime necessity and have a very special importance. But we likewise affirm that the ornamentation of the sacred vessels used for the Holy Sacrifice should possess an outer magnificence, which, as far as possible, equals our inward purity.
All of these great writers and saints were inspired by the words of Genesis. “terrible is this place; it is the house of God and the gate of heaven; and it shall be called the court of God.” Similarly, “We are lost in wonder at all that you have done for us, mighty God.” (Rev 15:3)
Each time someone enters a Catholic Church it should seem strange because its splendor and majesty is unlike any other thing in the world. Familiarity collapses here; only awe remains.
So transfixed were the apostles at the sight of Our Lord ascending in ineffable majesty that an angel was sent to reprove them, “Ye men of Galilee, why stand you looking up to heaven?” As much as our Churches should leave us dumbfounded by their glory, it is not meant for us to remain staring, like immobilized spectators. The rapturous staring upon Mystery is granted by God as a privilege of grace, so that we may march into the world and accomplish the work of God in our families, our workplace, at our recreation, among our friends. Our Churches are glimpses of paradise, glances into the throne room of the King. But the last words of that King are the ones that should concern us, “…you shall be my witnesses…even to the uttermost parts of the earth.” Our King commands us to change the world, but first by changing ourselves. My friends, no hesitation! Our Lord waits.
[ Image credit: Jan van Eyck - Ghent Altarpiece - The Supper of the Lamb, 1432]
June 2020
