Advent with St John the Baptist
Rev Chris continues his Advent series with St John the Baptist, Eileen Grant on Painting the Immaculate Conception and Rory Lamb reminds us of one of Mary's titles; Rosa Mystica. Welcome!
We are moving into the second week of Advent and Rev Chris Doig continues his series on Advent with St John the Baptist. If you miss any scroll down to the bottom of the email and click on St Moluag’s Coracle which will take you to an archive of past newsletters.
Week 1: St John the Evangelist
Week 2: St John the Baptist
Week 3: St John Damascene
Week 4: St John Paul II
Each week will be based on the thought and spirituality of the saint while considering the meaning of Advent and the tradition and practices of the season.
The scene is now set for our journey: we are in the desert and moving onto our spiritual Bethlehem. We are trying to construct our own little tent or tabernacle where the Lord will dwell, to strengthen us and feed us as we move from one encampment to the other. The deeper we go into the desert, the more we begin to see; it is not an entirely empty desert. We can hear “the voice of one crying out in the wilderness (Jn 1:23).” The Church invites us to come and see who this is. It is John the Baptist. He has already set up his tent in the desert and is living in radical, eschatological hope for the coming of the Lord, “bearing witness to the light (Jn 1:8)” Anyone who goes out to see John is called to “prepare the way of the Lord, make his paths straight (Mk 1:3).”
In this season of Advent the Church presents John the Baptist as the model to imitate. When we go to see John, he will call us to repent “for the kingdom of heaven has come near (Mt 3:2)” and to “bear fruit worthy of repentance, (Mt 3:8)” in other words to take up the spiritual practices of prayer, fasting and almsgiving, and to cut down the trees in our life that do not bear fruit (Mt 3:10).
He wore camel skin and ate honey and locusts, a move which breaks away from the conventional eating practices of his time; he cut himself off from the hustle and bustle of the city and spent long periods of time in deep prayer over the Scriptures, probably chewing over the words of Isaiah that we just heard last Sunday: “shower, O heavens, from above, and let the skies rain down righteousness (Is 45:8).” He was also known for not eating and drinking; the Pharisees did not consider him a glutton or a drunkard but as possessed by demons (Mt 11:18). They thought he was mad. Just one glance at the forerunner should make us stop and reflect on how we are living out this eschatological moment as we wait for the Lord to come into the world (Jn 1:9).
Thankfully, we do not need to live in the desert for the next month as we prepare for Christmas. It is for us a spiritual reality and so we don’t even need to feed on locusts and wild honey; the honey we need in our spiritual journey is the Word of God, which is “honey from the rock, (Ps 81:16)” and is even “sweeter than honey from the comb (Ps119:103).” John’s life tells us to “taste and see that the Lord is good. (Ps34:8).” It is in spending more time with the Word of God that we come to experience how close He is to us. In his opening homily for Advent Pope Francis said it is the season for remembering the closesness of God who came down to dwell in our midst.”[1]
It does not require an extreme ascetism but a greater sobriety and vigilance than before. The best way to do this is take up some small but effective practices that will keep us spiritually prepared but also joyful as we long for the Lord to come in an ever deeper way at Christmas. One of the best practices we can take up in Advent is to create time and space for silence; it is the place where we can delight on the sweet honey of God’s Word which “gives us a greater joy than the abundance of corn and new wine(Ps 4:7)” and strengthens our own little tabernacle in the desert. God will be there. He will journey with us. He will lead us to Bethlehem. And He will be born in us in a more profound way than before.
May St. John the Baptist’s cry be a call for us to wake up, to be on guard (Mk 13:33) and be more attentive to the Scriptures that the Church provides us with in this rich and joyful season.
[1] https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/pope-francis-advent-is-the-season-for-remembering-the-closeness-of-god-77281
Painting By Francisco de Zurbarán
Painting the Immaculate Conception by Eileen Claire Grant
“A great portent appeared in heaven: a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars” (Apoc. 12:1).
The Immaculate Conception of Our Lady was depicted by most artists as “the Woman of the Apocalypse”, described above. Throughout the 17th century many paintings and statues portraying this image of the Virgin Mary were produced, especially in Spain where there was a strong devotion to this concept, long before it became official Church dogma in the 19th century. In the East, the feast of the Virgin’s Conception had been celebrated since the 7th century; in 1476, Pope Sixtus IV extended the feast to the entire Western Church. By the 17th century, therefore, as well as a theological doctrine, there was also an established pattern of depicting it in art.
The Rosa Mystica: Beauty the Opens our Hearts
On Tuesday we celebrate the Feast of the Immaculate Conception of the Virgin Mary. It is a fitting memorial to keep in Advent, for we see in God’s preservation of Our Lady from sin as the bearer of His Son a pointer to our own need to prepare our homes and hearts for Christ’s nativity. I want to reflect on the Immaculate Conception by exploring another of Our Lady’s titles, that of Rosa Mystica or ‘Mystical Rose’, which first appears in the Litany of Loreto, of 1587. For while her connection to roses is a common part of Catholic iconography and devotion – most obviously in the Holy Rosary – it is perhaps less clear why she is the ‘Mystical’ rose. The title is one most commonly heard during Advent and Christmas if you look out for it – particularly if you are familiar with medieval Christmas carols and artwork. To understand this topic, we must investigate the Christian symbolism of the rose flower and then explore the imagery used by Isaiah in his prophecy of the Root of Jesse. Finally, St John Henry Newman brings us full circle and offers a meditation which beautifully links the mystical rose with the Immaculate Conception.
Last Words: It was St Francis Xaviers Feast day on Thursday so here is one of his last letters he sent. Written in October 1552 to his friend in Malacca. He died of fever in December of that year on an island off the coast of China. Incidentally if you want to read more about the life of St Francis Xavier click here. Written by Henry James Coleridge S.J in 1881; The Life and Letters of St Francis Xavier, is now free online.
The Loreto Litanies: The Feast day of Our Lady of Loreto is on the 10th of December. Sister Anna Christi of Elgin presents a video on it from their online series; ‘Moments with Mary.
If you have missed any past Coracles you can click here. Most of our past articles are on the roughbounds website along with this years Highland Mens Conference. Please click on the button below. We would also like to announce that we are currently putting on the website most of Bishop Hugh Gilberts Catechetical talks. They are also on the RCDA site but he has allowed us to put them up on our site as well.
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