I
The Fathers of the Church have seen in the call of the Magi to
Christ's cradle the vocation of pagan nations to the Faith. This
is the very foundation of the mystery, explicitly indicated by the
Church in the collect wherein she sums up the desires of her
children on this solemnity: Deus qui hodierna die Unigenitum tnum
GENTIBUS stella duce revelasti.
The Incarnate Word is first of all manifested to the Jews in the
person of the shepherds. Why was this? Because the Jewish people
were the Chosen People. From this people was to come forth the
Messias, the Son of David. The magnificent promises to be realised
in the establishing of the Messianic Kingdom had been made to this
people; it was to them that God had entrusted the Scriptures and
given the Law whereof each element prefigured the grace that was
to be brought by Christ. It was then befitting that the Incarnate
Word should first be manifested to the Jews.
The shepherds, simple and upright men, represented the Chosen
People at the Crib: Evangelizo vobis gaudium magnum.., quia natus
est vobis hodie Salvator (Lk 2:10-11).
Later on, in His public life, Our Lord would again manifest
Himself to the Jews, by the wisdom of His doctrine and the
splendour of His miracles.
We shall even find that He restricts His teaching to the Jews
alone. See, for example, when the woman of Canaan, from the pagan
regions of Tyre and Sidon, asks Him to have mercy upon her. What
does Christ answer to the disciples when they interpose in her
favour? "I was not sent but to the sheep that are lost of the
house of Israel" (Mt 15:24). It needed the ardent faith and
profound humility of the poor pagan woman to wrest from Jesus, so
to speak, the grace that she implored.
When, during His public life, Our Lord sent His Apostles to
preach, like Himself, the good news, He likewise said to them: "Go
ye not into the way of the Gentiles, and into the city of
Samaritans enter you ye not. But go ye rather to the lost
sheep of the house of Israel" (Mt 10:5-6). Why this strange
recommendation? Were the pagans excluded from the grace of
redemption and salvation brought by Christ? No; but it entered
into the divine economy to reserve the evangelization of the pagan
nations to the Apostles, after the Jews should have definitely
rejected the Son of God, by crucifying the Messias. When Our Lord
dies upon the cross, the veil of the temple is rent in twain to
show that the Ancient Covenant with the Hebrew people had ceased.
Many Jews indeed did not want to receive Christ. The pride of
some, the sensuality of others, blinded their souls, and they
would not receive Him as Son of God. It is of them that St. John
speaks when he says: "The light shineth in darkness, and the
darkness did not comprehend it" (Jn 1:5, 11). Therefore Our Lord
says to these incredulous Jews: "The Kingdom of God shall be taken
from you, and shall be given to a nation yielding the fruit
thereof" (Mt 21:43).
The pagan nations are called to become the inheritance promised by
the Father to His Son Jesus: Postula a me, et dabo tibi gentes
haereditatem tuam (Ps 11:8). Our Lord Himself says: "The good
shepherd giveth His life for His sheep," adding immediately:
"Other sheep I have, that are not of this fold": Alias oves habeo,
quae non sunt ex hoc ovili. "Them also I must bring, and they
shall hear My voice, and there shall be one fold and one shepherd"
(Jn 10: 11, 16).
This is why, before ascending into heaven, He sends His Apostles
to continue His work and mission of salvation, no longer among the
lost sheep of Israel, but among all people. "Going therefore," He
says to them, "teach ye all nations... preach the gospel to every
creature... I am with you all days, even to the consummation of
the world" (Mt 28:19-20).
The Word Incarnate did not, however, await His Ascension to shed
abroad the grace of the Gospel upon the Gentile world. As soon as
He appeared here below, He invited it to His cradle in the person
of the Magi. He, Eternal Wisdom, would thus show us that He
brought peace, Pax hominibus bonae voluntatis (Lk 2:14), not only
to those who were nigh to Him- the faithful Jews represented by
the shepherds, -but also to those who " were afar off "-the Pagans
represented by the Magi. Thus, as St. Paul says, of the two people
He made but one: Qui fecit utraque unum, because He alone, by the
union of His Humanity with His Divinity, is the perfect Mediator,
and "by Him we have access both in one Spirit to the Father" (Eph
2:14, 17-18).
The calling of the Magi and their sanctification signifies the
vocation of the Gentiles to the faith and to salvation. God sends
an angel to the shepherds, for the Chosen People were accustomed
to the apparition of the celestial spirits; to the Magi, who
studied the stars, He causes a marvellous star to appear. This
star is the symbol of the inward illumination that enlightens
souls in order to call them to God.
The soul of every grown-up person is in fact enlightened, once at
least, like the Magi, by the star of the vocation to eternal
salvation. To all the light is given. It is a dogma of our faith
that God "will have all men to be saved": Qui OMNES homines vult
salvos fieri, et ad agnitionem veritatis venire (1 Tim 2:4).
On the day of judgment, all without exception will proclaim, with
the conviction produced by evidence, the infinite justice of God
and the perfect rectitude of His judgments: Justus es, Domine, et
rectum judicium tuum (Ps 118:137). Those whom God shall have told
to depart from Him for ever will acknowledge that they are the
workers of their own ruin.
Now this would not be true if the reprobate had not had the
possibility of knowing and accepting the divine light of faith. It
would be contrary not only to God's infinite goodness, but even to
His justice, to condemn a soul on account of its invincible
ignorance.
Doubtless, the star that calls men to the Christian faith is not
the same for all; it shines in different ways, but its brightness
is visible enough for hearts of good will to be able to recognise
it and see in it the sign of the Divine call. In His providence
full of wisdom, God incessantly varies His action,
incomprehensible like Himself. He varies it according to the ever
active promptings of His love and the ever holy exigencies of His
justice. We ought herein to adore the unfathomable depths of God's
ways and proclaim that they infinitely surpass our created views.
Indeed "who hath known the mind Or the Lord ? Or who hath been His
counsellor ? " O altitudo divitiarum sapientiae et scientiae Dei!
Quam incomprehensibilia sunt judicia ejus et investigabiles viae
ejus! (Rom 11:33).
We have "seen the star" and have recognised as our God the Babe of
Bethlehem; we have the happiness of belonging to the Church
whereof the Magi were the first fruits.
In the office of the feast, the Liturgy celebrates this vocation
of all humanity to faith and salvation in the person of the Magi
as the nuptials of the Church with the Bridegroom. Hear with what
gladness, in what magnificent symbolical terms, borrowed from the
prophet Isaias, the liturgy proclaims (Epistle of the Mass) the
splendour of this spiritual Jerusalem which is to receive into her
maternal bosom the nations become the inheritance of her divine
Bridegroom. "Arise, be enlightened, O Jerusalem, for thy light is
come, and the glory of the Lord is risen upon thee. For behold,
darkness shall cover the earth, and a mist the people; but the
Lord shall arise upon thee, and His glory shall be seen upon thee.
And the Gentiles shall walk in thy light, and kings in the
brightness of thy rising. Lift up thy eyes round about, and see;
all these gathered together, they are come to thee: thy sons shall
come from afar, and daughters shall rise up at thy side. Then
shalt thou see, and abound, and thy heart shall wonder and be
enlarged, when the multitude of the sea shall be converted to
thee, the strength of the Gentiles shall come to thee" (Is 60:15).
Let us offer continual thanksgiving to God "Who hath delivered us
from the power of darkness, and hath translated us into the
kingdom of the Son of His love" (Col 1:13), " that is to say into
His Church.
The call to the faith is a signal benefit because it contains in
germ the vocation to the eternal beatitude of the Divine vision.
Never let us forget that this call was the dawn of all God's
mercies towards us, and that for man all is summed up in fidelity
to this vocation; faith is to bring us to the Beatific Vision
(Collect for the Feast).
Not only ought we to thank God for this grace of the Christian
faith, but we ought each day to render ourselves more worthy of it
by safeguarding our faith against all the dangers that it
encounters in our age of naturalism, scepticism, indifference,
human respect, and by living a life of faith with constant
fidelity.
Moreover, let us beseech God to grant this precious gift of the
Christian faith to all the souls who yet "sit in darkness, and in
the shadow of death"; let us beseech Our Lord that the star may
shine upon them; that, through His tender mercy, He Himself will
be the Sun to visit them from on high: Per viscera misericordiae
Dei nostri in quibus visitavit nos, Oriens ex alto (Lk 1:78-79)
This prayer is very pleasing to Our Lord; it is, in fact, to
beseech Him that He may be known and exalted as the Saviour of all
mankind and the King of kings.
It is likewise pleasing to the Father, for He desires nothing so
much as the glorification of His Son. Let us then often repeat,
during these holy days, the prayer that the Incarnate Word Himself
has put upon our lips: O Heavenly Father, "Father of Lights," Thy
Kingdom come, that kingdom whereof Thy Son Jesus is the head.
Adveniat regnum tuum! May Thy Son be more and more known, loved,
served, glorified, so that in His turn He may, by manifesting Thee
the more to men, glorify Thee in the unity of the Holy Ghost:
Pater, clarifica Filium taum ut Filius tuus clarificet te !
