MAUNDY THURSDAY.

 

Of the glorious body telling, O my tongue, its mysteries sing,

And the blood, all price excelling, Which the world’s eternal King,

In a noble womb once dwelling, Shed for this world’s ransoming.

Everything that is Divine in Christ Jesus is of GOD, everything that is human is of Mary. That ‘glorious body’ – of the GOD-MAN begins the final moments for our redemption, Mary, who had held that body for the shepherds and the Wise Men to worship, joins with us, for us to do the same. May Mary pray for us.



Given for us, for us descending, Of a virgin to proceed,

Man with man in converse blending, Scattered he the gospel seed,

Till his sojourn drew to ending, Which he closed in wondrous deed.

From the moment of his birth, St. Joseph watched over, protected and helped nurture the Lord. He helped the Lord in his skills to offer to the world the means of repentance and ‘converse blending’ to ‘scatter the gospel seed’. May St. Joseph pray for us.



At the last great supper lying Circled by his chosen band,

Duly with the law complying, First he finished its command,

Then, immortal food supplying, Gave himself by his own hand.

In accordance with the existing covenant of Moses and the Prophets, the Lord fulfils the requirements of that covenant….the Passover is prepared and he ‘finished its commend’. ‘with the law (of Moses and the Prophets) complying’ the Lord now prepares himself to be that final and new Passover –with ‘immortal food’



Word-made-flesh, by word he maketh Bread his very flesh to be;

Man in wine Christ’s blood partaketh: And if senses fail to see,

Faith alone the true heart waketh To behold the mystery.

This ‘immortal food’, bread and wine, by the words spoken by the ‘Word-made-flesh’ become the Body and Blood of what will be the New covenant. For if our ‘senses fail’ to recognise this ‘immortal food’ be ‘the glorious body’: our heart of faith tells us to recognise ‘the world’s eternal king’ who will be the NEW PASSOVER in the ‘wondrous deed’ of the Cross



Therefore we, before him bending, This great sacrament revere:

Types and shadows have their ending, For the newer rite is here;

Faith, our outward sense befriending, Makes the inward vision clear.

As the curtain of the Temple is torn in two, the Lord ‘finished the command’ the ‘newer rite is here’ which replaces the sacrifices of that Temple. The ‘types and shadows’ are revealed (through the open curtain) ‘to behold  the mystery’ – the mystery of the Sacrifice of the Lord ‘ given for us, for us descending’ ‘shed for this word’s ransoming’. The ‘newer rite’ of ‘wondrous deed’ on the Cross foreseen in the ‘great sacrament’ given ‘himself by his own hand’



Glory let us give and blessing To the Father and the Son,

Honour, might and praise addressing, While eternal ages run;

Ever too his love confessing, Who, from both, with both is one. Amen.

"Was ever another command so obeyed? For century after century, spreading slowly to every continent and country and among every race on earth, this action has been done, in every conceivable human circumstance, for every conceivable human need from infancy and before it to extreme old age and after it, from the pinnacle of earthly greatness to the refuge of fugitives in the caves and dens of the earth. Men have found no better thing than this to do for kings at their crowning and for criminals going to the scaffold; for armies in triumph or for a bride and bridegroom in a little country church; for the proclamation of a dogma or for a good crop of wheat; for the wisdom of the Parliament of a mighty nation or for a sick old woman afraid to die; for a schoolboy sitting an examination or for Columbus setting out to discover America; for the famine of whole provinces or for the soul of a dead lover; in thankfulness because my father did not die of pneumonia; for a village headman much tempted to return to fetich because the yams had failed; because the Turk was at the gates of Vienna; for the repentance of Margaret; for the settlement of a strike; for a son for a barren woman; for Captain so-and-so wounded and prisoner of war; while the lions roared in the nearby amphitheatre; on the beach at Dunkirk; while the hiss of scythes in the thick June grass came faintly through the windows of the church; tremulously, by an old monk on the fiftieth anniversary of his vows; furtively, by an exiled bishop who had hewn timber all day in a prison camp near Murmansk; gorgeously, for the canonisation of S. Joan of Arc—one could fill many pages with the reasons why men have done this, and not tell a hundredth part of them. And best of all, week by week and month by month, on a hundred thousand successive Sundays, faithfully, unfailingly, across all the parishes of Christendom, the pastors have done this just to make the plebs sancta Dei—the holy common people of God." (Dom Gregory Dix)

ALL THIS TO THE PRAISE OF THE MOST HOLY TRINITY.