THE HOLY NIGHT THAT SURPASSES EVEN CHRISTMAS

By Fr. CONRAD PEPLER, O.P.
EASTER unites in their highest perfection the liturgical and the mystical traditions of the Church.
These two sanctifying streams, so often regarded as separate if not actually conflicting in character, are seen to converge on the Paschal celebrations. And we may find them united in the words of the Psalmist: Nox illuminatio mem which are chanted by the deacon in blessing the Paschal Candle and at the same time form the theme song of St. John of the Cross at the head of' a whole army of great Christian contemplatives.
The recent permission from Rome to " experiment " with the return of the Holy Saturday ceremonies to the night preceddng Easter Day has added emphasis to the shining symbolism of the blessing of the new fire and of the great candle as the
light of the risen Christ.
it is the holy night " surpassing even Christmas, the "night " which
has overcome all the powers of darkness. " the night that shall be as light as the day."
So chants the
deacon in , the darkness, his book touched by the light of the new fire, the Lumen Christi. so that in this night he can still read the sacred words.
So, too, writes our own Walter Hilton-" 'I his is a good night and a light darkness "-as he begins " to feel the light of the love of Jesus" (Scale ii. 24); and Si. John of the Cross takes thesame theme for his greatest work-" Oh, night more lovely than the daion."
But we must be careful to state the paradox in its most two-edged manner, for otherwise the Christian may remain hidden in the terrifying darkness of Calvary.
,V 'l' the constant repetition of the theme of our Lord's passion and the wonderful multiplication of the figure of the Crucifix throughout the Catholic world, people sometimes gain the impression that theecentre of the liturgical cycle and the conclusion of Lent is Good Friday-a day so dark that it is even deprived of the Liturgy of the Sacrifice itself.
Similarly when they turn to the writings of those very deep authorities on spirituality they are left with the f ee lin g that the Christian life is a gloomy and austere existence in which pain and desolation play major parts. Every pleasure that offers itself is to be abandoned, every desire to be quashed-" Here cut, here burn "a joyless religion indeed.
If the liturgy is overshadowed by Good Friday, and the spiritual life by the hard asceticism of the " mystics," the Catholic religion has little attraction for those outside the fold.
It is only too easy to present them with a dreary aspect of the Christian ideal. concentrating on the sufferings of Calvary and the "nights" of purification and asceticism. At best it would seem to be a glorified type of Stoicism, and the only joy catered for appears as the joy of " offering' up.,,
Now this is most unfortunate at a tame when mankind is already plunged in the darkness of despair. And no one should pretend that this ape of despair is a pious exaggeration.
The absence of the theological virtue of hope typifies the age in which we live. The law of God regarding marriage and the family is rejected because men no longer trust God to make it possible for man and woman to live together without cleavage until death, or to rear the children that he sends.
The law of God regarding respect of innocent life and of property is set on one side by medical and military men and by the economists, because they do not trust God to bring to a fruitful conclusion His blessings on mankind to increase and multiply and to possess the land.
Forsaking hope, men have turned in the darkness of despair to the human " planners" and to the inevitability of war with its world destroying weapons.
And what does the Christian offer as an alternative ?
THE sign of salvation is the
crucifix, the memory of a man dying in darkness and seeming despair. "Lord why hast thou forsaken me?"
We say that the triumph over all these terrifying circumstances
may be found in the hope of men
and women who quell their every desire and refuse to taste the pleasures of life. We should not be surprised. then. if some of those who plan so despairingly believe that the Church offers a religion of death and the hope of the ending of existence in the gray,. But in truth we cannot see the sign of hope. the s;gn of the figure raised up on Calvary except the light of Easter Day shine behind it.
The cross does indeed cast its shadow upon our lives, but there can be no shadow without light; and the light which makes the purple lie across the forty days of Lent is the light of the Lumen Christi rising beyond the holy mount of Calvary.
And the offering of the High Priest, who cries out not only "Why hest thou forsaken me ?" but also "Into thy hands I commend my spirit." becomes the accepted and accomplished sacrifice when the great force of the new light thrusts hack the stone before the sepulchre and streams forth into the world.
The Christian's Mass is not consummated until the priest has received the sacrament of Love. 1 here indeed lies the secret also of the night of the mystic, for the purification that the Christian has to suffer as he takes up his cross daily behind the suffering servant is the purification of love.
The " night " in which he finds such solace is the night of faith and charity, together blossoming into the unseeing certainty of Hope.
These theological virtues which lie at the foundation of every Christian's life and which are simply brought to perfection in the experience of such holy men as St. John of the CP033, lack the clarity and the mechanical precision of the planner's aims and ideas because they rest in mystery, the greatest of mysteries, the inner life of the Trinity. And that resting is the tranquilness of love, the love of God for man shown mysteriously in the death of the Son and the love of man for God revealed in the new life of the Man who triumphs over death to lead mankind to the Father.
Charity holds to the concrete reality of God's presence and from that reality. too intensely bright for the intellect to see, comes the light which gives life to men.
OUR Lord standing in the
Temple when the Jews were lighting the great candelabra with something of the same ceremonial as the deacon blessing the Paschal Candle, cried out that he himself was the Light of the world, symbolised then by the candelabra and now by the Candle.
Hilton says that this night is so full of joy because Jesus is to he found therein. "Since this darkness ane this night is so good and so restful. . that stendeth only in desire and longing to the love of Jesus with a blind thinking on Him; how good then and how hlessed is it to feel his love and to be illumined with his blessed unseeable present light " (Scale ii, 25).
This is the dark ray which ravishes the soul of the saint and which pierces the gloom of the Church from the blessed paschal flame. This is the ray which reveals Calvary and the Christian's life of fasting and abstinence in their true perspective. Thie is the light which alone offers hope to the world.
We should therefore point always to the Easter sacraments of love when we speak of the sorrows of the
Passions. those sacraments which flowed from the pierced side of Christ. We W should look to the final graces of the mystical writers before beginning to stray "a despairingly in the darkness of their terrifying " war against nature" and their nights and purgation.
: P The Christian mersage lip an age of despair is a message of life and of hope, not of death and bf dark
ness. And that life springs from the pulsing depths of the heart of love. which ever beats in a hidden corner of man's frame.
" This indeed is the blessed night, the night which is become light as the day. the night which is my lightening in joy." Thia is Easter Night, the sum total of all Christian hope,