St. Nicholas and St. Thomas Aquinas: Keeping Christmas

The Christian must never think he will someday be mature enough to be able to move on from a child's Christmas. No intellectual achievement, no humanitarian activity, no synthesis of faith can ever replace the treasure of wonder as one contemplates the Son of God made Man, the Divine Person taking on mortal flesh. 

The world -- and our families -- and the smallest child -- and the greatest theologian -- would be made bereft of the fulfillment of their deepest longings if ever we Christians were to abandon our simple observance of this time of preparing for and celebrating the Incarnation of Our Lord Jesus Christ!

Nothing can replace it; nothing can fulfill the longing and excitement of the preparations of Advent and the joy of a childlike Noël, lovingly prepared by Church, priest, mother, father, and grandparents, passed down through the generations. Many a convert has been made, secretly, in the love of Christmas carols and the dear crèche with its Infant and Mother, star, angels, shepherds, ox, and ass.

Today at 1Peter5, Peter Kwasniewski makes a brilliant connection between the great saint of charity, St. Nicholas, and the great saint of wisdom, St. Thomas Aquinas. Thinking in a worldly way, one might suppose the latter had found the key to transcendence in his own mind and been able to achieve a higher level of faith. Instead, we see that contemplation found him at the feet of Santa Claus (the identity of the great bishop, as Pope Benedict tells us, forged in the depths of history). 

It seems that St. Thomas, aided by St. Nicholas, saw the Christmas path and could no longer stop to write about it anymore; famously he compared his work to straw, which sounds sad but was a great joy for him. He found, like a child, the Christ whom Isaiah foresaw: "A Word completing and shortening in righteousness, because a shortened word will God make in the whole earth." 

All of Christendom has built up a wealth of customs, music, and art, all fittingly radiating the glory of this otherwise hidden event; let us dedicate ourselves to preserving this wealth and to protecting it from those who are arrogantly, erroneously beyond or above such things, who slothfully wish a change, or who fatally succumb to the world and its weary ways. 

Let us be as little children, the Angelic Doctor, and St. Nicholas, accepting what is so greatly given. Let us piously do our humble best to make straight the paths and keep Christmas.

Waiting for Advent

Looking for some insight into the spiritual life? I suggest you read this post from Leila Miller: How we perceive the cross depends on our level of holiness...

Her common-sense explanation of the three stages of the spiritual road (and her further common-sense advice not to worry about figuring out where you are, as it tends to vary) can be a real help in understanding our struggle (aka The Cross).

For years now I've noticed that our hierarchy has pretty much abandoned this classical expression -- the Ways of Purgation, Illumination, and Union -- in favor of something much more psychological, that is to say emotion-based. I won't go into it too much here, but it's a shame, because the old framework had a lot more to offer us as far as getting us out of our earth-bound state. Simply put, it offered a way to heaven, where the psychological approach tends to leave us here with our problems.

In any case, there is a practical way to put this newfound old wisdom to work in our lives. If we want to get started on the three-fold way, we have only to follow the Liturgical Year. Daily and in its seasons, the Liturgical Year offers us ever-relevant wisdom and really, Christ Himself, to guide us along this tried-and-true path.

And that is why I have urged on my blog for over a decade now that we do our best to live Advent, the beginning of the Liturgical Year. It's not mean-spirited to say: wait to do things at their appointed time. On the contrary, it's the essence of the Purgative Way to do just that. Restraint and submission to something larger than ourselves -- something True and Beautiful -- give us the possibility of experiencing what we crave, namely Illumination (a deeper understanding of what is really meaningful in life) and leads us towards what we really need: Union with God.

Just as we ask our children to wait patiently for something good (because we know it's good for them -- this is our intuition about the Purgative Way), we must be willing to wait patiently ourselves. Let the Church lead you, step by step, and don't rush. This is the Way. This is the only Way.