MYSTERY OF THE INCARNATION

The devout person, stripped of self, seizes the opportunity to be filled with Christ Jesus and his graces by the loving contemplation of his Incarnation.


"I begin with the adorable mystery
of your Incarnation.

I see in this sacred mystery
the inexpressible love
that you had for us.

For us,
you condescended
to become man
and to take upon yourself
the sins of humanity,
to wash them in your precious blood.

It seems to me, good Jesus,
that at the moment of your Incarnation,
God your Father
or your holy angels
might possibly have reminded you
that you were about to
lay yourself open
to great suffering
for the sake of creatures
far too unworthy of it,
and your love
would have urged you
to reply
that whatever it might cost you,
your desire was to save them.

In gratitude
for such great goodness
ought I not likewise say
that whatever might be the cost to me, good Jesus,
I want to be wholly yours,
even if at every moment
out of love for you,
I must endure sufferings
as great and painful
as those you were pleased
to endure for me.
And what more do I learn
in contemplating your self-emptying
in the womb of the glorious Virgin?

Here I see and admire
your ineffable abasement.

Ah, good Jesus,
how true it is
that there indeed
you are an "abbreviated Word."

Here I must adore
-the profound adoration
and infinite reverence that you offer your Father
at the first moment of your Incarnation;

-the offering you make of yourself to him,
accepting his will in all things,
no matter how severe it may seem;

-your zeal for the glory
and the salvation of souls
which already begins to inflame your heart
and which will never be extinguished
until it has consumed it;

-the adorable dispositions
of your infinitely perfect soul
in all its operations.

It was, O good Jesus,
a sovereign purity,
an unfathomable humility,
an active all-consuming love,
a total submission
to all the dispositions
of your Father's will,
and above all, an attitude
of continual self-offering
and a loving death to self
that made of you at each moment
a perfect holocaust in the presence
of your eternal Father.

Oh, if only
I could engrave in my soul
these excellent virtues.

If only I could maintain it always
in these dispositions.

I desire this with my whole heart,
and uniting myself
with profound homage
to the sacred mystery of your Incarnation,
I beg you, good Jesus,
to engrave in my soul
its beautiful qualities
and excellent perfections.

In order to obtain this grace,
I want to meditate
on these perfections
one after the other,
pondering them,
one at a time,
admiring them,
imprinting them
deep in my heart.

In a word,
I want to be filled with them
so that I might begin to live
out of your dear life
and possess
the first fruits of the grace
of your ineffable self-emptying."

(Writings of J.P. Médaille, pp. 114-115)