Thought for the Day – 31 January – Meditations on the Hidden Life: From the 1906 Edition of The Heart of Jesus of Nazareth; it has the Imprimatur of Bishop John Baptist Butt, Diocese of Southwark, England, 5 February 1890. Author’s name known simply as Author of “The Voice of the Sacred Heart.”
(We return to Fr Clarke for February with his Meditations on The Great Truths.)
Meditation 7: PART ONE:
The Heart of Jesus in Prayer in the Hidden Life
Let us imagine we see Jesus kneeling in the little House of Nazareth, His Sacred Hands reverently clasped, His Eyes closed or raised to Heaven. We have before us the Incarnate God praying to His Eternal Father. It will then refresh our souls, to withdraw for a while, within the silence and solitude of the Holy House and, whilst we contemplate the scene with reverence, let us endeavour to penetrate the Heart of Him, Who is praying there.
So beautiful is the picture presented to our minds by the thought of Jesus in prayer, that truly it might suffice to rivet our inward eye and claim our adoring love, without the addition of any comment.
Let us regard Him as the Wisdom of the Father, the Eternal Son, kneeling there in silent contemplation of the Divine Majesty unveiled before Him, while He pours out the eternal love, the burning prayer which consumes His Sacred Heart.
The labour of the day is over and Jesus is now free to give Himself, unrestrainedly, to that holy exercise which has not ceased to be the occupation of His Soul amidst His daily toil. How profound is the mystery of that Divine communication which passes between the Eternal Father and the Eternal Son, between the human Heart of the Man-God and the Father, in Whose Bosom He had dweltB from all eternity.
Unchecked now by the external trammels to which, in His Incarnation He had made Himself subject, He could deliver Himself to the transports of His Love and taste, in His earthly exile, His old, His eternal delight of solitude with God.
But we must not forget that we are contemplating our Divine Model in prayer; for we are not to suppose, we have chosen One too exalted for our imitation. No, indeed, Jesus prays as one of us. It is in Him, a human Heart which throbs with love and desire and He teaches us eloquently how to pray and discloses qualities, with which our prayer should be endowed. He has formally constituted Himself our Master in prayer, as in all other things.
In His Public Life and in His Passion He has taught us even the very words in which we should present our petitions, or upon which they should be formed.
AnaStpaul 