Romano Guardini - Meditations on the Christ

Meditations on the Christ

Model of All Holiness

Romano Guardini

SOPHIA INSTITUTE PRESS
Manchester, New Hampshire

Other books by
Romano Guardini
available from Sophia Institute Press:

Eternal Life
The Art of Praying
The Rosary of Our Lady
And the Word Dwelt Among Us
Learning the Virtues That Lead You to God
Preparing Yourself for Mass
Living the Drama of Faith
The Lords Prayer
The Living God

Meditations on the Christ was published by Sophia Institute Press in 1998 under the title The Inner Life of Jesus: Pattern of All Holiness . The book was originally published in Germany in 1957 by Werkbund-Verlag, Wrzburg, under the title Jesus Christus: GeistlichesWort . In 1959, Henry Regnery Company published an English translation by Peter White entitled Jesus Christus: Meditations . This reprint of the 1998 edition by Sophia Institute Press uses the 1959 Henry Regnery translation, with minor editorial revisions throughout the text.

Copyright 1992 Publishing Partnership of Matthias-Grnewald, Mainz, and Ferdinand Schningh, Paderborn; second edition, 1992

All of the rights of the author are vested in the Catholic Academy in Bavaria.

English translation Copyright 1959 Regnery Publishing Reprinted by special permission of Regnery Publishing, Inc., Washington, DC.

All rights reserved

Cover design by Perceptions Design Studio
On the cover: Mosaic of Jesus Christ (78301483)
Paulius Bacinskas / Shutterstock.com

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form, or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except by a reviewer, who may quote brief passages in a review.

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Nihil obstat:
J. Gerald Kealy, D.D.,
Censor theol. deput.

Imprimatur:
Albert Gregory Meyer, S.T.D., S.S.L.
Archbishop of Chicago, June 15, 1959

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Guardini, Romano, 1885-1968.
[Jesus Christus, geistliches Wort. English]
Meditations on the Christ : model of all holiness / RomanoGuardini. pages cmPreviously published under title: The inner life of Jesus : pattern of all holiness, 1998.
ISBN 978-1-62282-222-5 (pbk. : alk. paper)
1. Jesus Christ Person and offices Sermons. 2. Catholic Church Sermons.
3. Sermons, German Translations into English. I. Title.BT203.G8313 2014
232 dc232014019300

Editors Note: except where otherwise noted, the biblical quotations in the following pages are from Msgr. Ronald Knoxs translation of the New Testament. Where applicable quotations have been cross-referenced with the differing numeration in the Revised Standard Version, using the following symbol: (RSV =).

Chapter One

The Key to Approaching the Mystery of Jesus

Blessed art thou who hast believed.
Luke 1:45

To attain a full understanding of a tree as it is, we must look into the earth, where its roots are, from which the sap rises into the trunk, twig, blossoms, and fruit. Similarly, we shall do well to consider now that earth from which the personage of our Lord arises: Mary, His mother.

We are told that she came of noble parentage, royal blood. Now, every man is unique, created but once, with an identity belonging to him alone. And in that which is peculiarly his own, in what he is when he stands face-to-face with himself and God, the particular circumstances which produced him are of no account. There is no why or wherefore here; there is neither Jew nor Greek; there is neither bond nor free. Quite true.

Yet in matters of great moment, and ultimately even in all the affairs of life, everything depends on whether a person is of noble quality or not. So it is here. In the simple generosity of Marys answer to the Angel of the Annunciation, a most noble quality came to light, royal in character.

Something tremendous confronted her. What was being asked of her was nothing less than blind surrender into the hands of God. Precisely this surrender is what she gave, with a quiet greatness, wholly unselfconscious. A good part of this greatness of soul sprang from her nobleness of being, her sheer uncluttered stature.

And from this time forth, her destiny was linked to her Childs: first by the bitterness that came between her and her betrothed; then by the journey to Bethlehem, where she bore her Child in surroundings of poverty and want; then the flight and exile to a foreign country her way of life upset, full of danger, taken with such suddenness from the security she had always known until it was safe to go home again.

When her Child was twelve years old and stayed behind in the temple and she found Him again only after an anxious search, then for the first time the divine mystery was revealed in which her life was caught up. Her seemingly well-founded reproach, Son, why hast Thou done so to us? Behold Thy father and I have sought Thee sorrowing! was answered in a tone of astonishment (and the tone must have been the most unnerving thing of all): How is it that you sought me? Did you not know that I must be about my Fathers business?

Then indeed Mary must have had some inkling of what the future held for her. There must have been a foreknowledge that Simeons prophecy would be fulfilled: And thy own soul a sword shall pierce.

However, we read directly after, His mother kept these words in her heart. She could not understand the word that He spoke; she was not equal to the situation in the way of intellectual comprehension, but she was indeed equal to it in the way of being a person of enough gravity to take it in, like the good soil that takes into itself a rare and precious seed which then begins to grow there.

Then follow eighteen years of tranquillity. The holy Gospel tells us nothing further about them. But when the ear is properly tuned for it, this silence of the Gospels speaks with a great voice. Eighteen years of silence going by in her heart: we are told no more than that the Child was subject to them and advanced in wisdom and age and grace with God and men tranquil, profound surroundings, ever in the presence of the love of this holiest of all mothers.

Then He went forth from His home and into His mission, His destiny. But she was still with Him. At the beginning, she was at the marriage-feast of Cana, where a last remnant of maternal protectiveness and correction can still be seen. Another time, when some sort of disturbing news must have found its way to Nazareth, she bestirred herself to look Him up, and stood there waiting at the door. Again she was with Him in His last days, and stood under the Cross.

The entire life of Jesus is surrounded by the deep significance of having His mother close by. The strongest message of all comes out of her silence.

One word may give us some indication of how profound the affinity was between the Lord and His mother. He is standing in the midst of the people, teaching them, when suddenly a womans voice speaks out: Blessed is the womb that bore Thee, the breast which Thou hast sucked! And Jesus answers, Shall we not say, Blessed are those who hear the word God and keep it? It is as if all at once He has drawn away from the noise and hubbub of the crowd, as though a bell has sounded deep in this soul... and He is in Nazareth with His mother.

Elsewhere, however, if we listen to the words which Jesus speaks to His mother and simply let them make their impression upon us just as they arise out of the situation, it is as if a gulf opens up between Him and her every time.

That time in Jerusalem when He was still a child and, without a word to her, had stayed behind, when all the city was in a state of unrest and He could have been injured, not simply by accident, but by foul play surely then she had the right to ask Him why He had acted as He did. But He answers her with astonishment: How is it that you sought me? And as we wait for a further word of explanation, some bridging of the gulf, we read only this: And they understood not the word that He spoke unto them.

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