An Eye Towards Eternity
This year, we're collaborating with writers across the Augustine Collective, a network of student-led Christian journals, to bring you a series of short devotional articles during this season of Advent, the season of anticipation leading up to Christmas. Find this series also published by the Penn Epistle.
by Nicolas Cloutier, university of pennsylvania
With wonder, the people of Judea spread the story in hushed excitement. Not two centuries after the revolt of Judas Maccabeus, a time of subjugation had befallen the Jewish people; the centurions of the Great Babylon tread on the streets of Jerusalem. There were rumors, as there often are in times like these, of foreboding signs to come: that the end of an age was near, that a time of strife was only beginning, that there would be wailing and gnashing of teeth, that the Temple itself would soon be brought to its knees. And yet, one rumor seemed to outshine the others, not in its grandeur but in its quiet beauty. Yes, some said that the Temple was to be condemned, but others said that a new one was to be raised. In whispers, no louder than their dwindled sense of hope would allow them, the people of God spoke of the birth of a King; they spoke of a new creation.
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A new creation stood before Abel the Just as he wandered the empty earth. He was a sinner, a son of Adam and of Eve. Like us, he never himself knew the flavor of the fruit of Eden, yet he seemed to keep a remembrance of things long past. He felt shame at his nakedness, and clothed himself in the fruit of the Earth. The fruit of the Earth; the very sugar of God, vibrant and colorful and filled with all sweetness.
He offered a pure sacrifice, giving as much as he could, and this was pleasing in the eyes of God. Cain his brother gave a shallow sacrifice and, seeing God take no delight in this, he became jealous of Abel. He grew in anger and led his brother to a field and struck him down. Cain drove his own brother into the dirt, and in triumph stood over his decaying body. Abel's blood soiled the field and his eyes looked to the heavens one final time. At the very moment of his death, he marveled once again at being surrounded by such immense beauty.
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Such immense beauty moved the spirit of Elijah to a life given up for God. He cried at the sins of his people, who offered sacrificial worship to foreign gods, to idols with no life fashioned from the hands of sculptors. He climbed up Mount Carmel and challenged the many false prophets to call on their god, so that he might give them a miracle. All day, these prophets called upon his name, and there was no response.
Elijah built an altar; with his own hands he built an altar to the one true God. He stacked twelve stones, one for each of the tribes of Israel. He lifted his gaze and saw with new eyes the bright colors of the sky, which clothe the earth as the finest of linens. The world melted behind him, and in quiet stillness he humbly called upon the God of Jacob, and upon the God of Isaac, and upon the God of Abraham, and he called himself a servant of this God. The onlookers held their breath, and watched with silent desperation in search of a sign of the Lord.
At once, a fire fell from the heavens and consumed the sacrifice that had been prepared. Elijah looked on this fire, and his world stood still. He felt awe at every spike of the flame and at the warm air he sensed even at a great distance. He bore witness to the beauty of chaos, every second revealing new mysteries of that substance of pure warmth; this is the fire that gave birth to kingdoms, and the fire that brought them to their knees; this is the wildfire that rips through a great forest, the same that prepares it for new life. He looked and saw the flame destructive, the flame redemptive, the flame divine. This is the fire of purgatory, and the fire of the true baptism, and the fire of Gehenna. Elijah marveled at its power, and resolved at that moment to give his life to the living God.
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To give her life to the living God was the mission of Mary Magdalene. Like all of us, she was a sinner, and like a fortunate few, she found healing in Christ. She was to be stoned by the scribes and Pharisees, and the Christ, the eternal Word of God, intervened. He stood between these men and Mary, and saved her from being cast down. He said to the multitudes, "let he who is without sin cast the first stone," and they dispersed. She was saved by the one called "God is salvation," and the steel chains of sin and iniquity melted as candlewax, as mountains before the face of God, at words of such wisdom and truth. Humbled, saved, emptied of all pride, she looked on the face of Christ and saw infinite beauty.
She abandoned her care for the times in which she lived, and she meditated on the mysteries that allowed her the privilege of thinking only about eternity. The mountains will be reduced to rubble before a second is passed in its eyes; the stars will be formed and will be torn apart, the very laws of gravity will pass into the realm of the long forgotten before the finger of eternity is lifted one inch. Mary Magdalene saw in the face of Jesus a glimpse — a tiny sliver — of eternity, and she was never the same. She took her most expensive oil and used it to anoint the feet of Christ; she was criticized for this by Judas Iscariot, the apostle, the condemned, the betrayer, but she did not relent. Even the most expensive oil on earth was nothing compared to the gift of the true manna from heaven.
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The gift of the true manna from heaven was held tightly in the arms of Tarcisius. He was a young boy of Rome and a subject of the emperor Valerian, but first of all he was a Christian. He held in his arms the Blessed Sacrament, the true Body and Blood of our Lord, Jesus Christ. He held It tighter than he would hold any treasure on earth. The pagans mocked and beat him, and he did not let go, he held on to this holy Gift even in the face of death. With the spirit of a child's devotion, he trusted fully in the presence that he felt, knowing that to be close to such a presence even for a moment outweighed any pain or suffering the world could deliver him. In his hands, he held this fruit of the earth and work of human hands, this Bread living, this Bread triumphant, this Bread divine. He spit in the face of death, with knowledge that from the dead Christ had risen, conquered death by death, and to those in the tombs granted life. Even in death, he did not separate himself from the holy Eucharist, the pearl of great price.
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The pearl of great price of the Holy Gospel was the sole focus of Clare of Assisi. She was a bride of Christ, a cloistered nun outside of the view of the world. She sold all of her goods and gave to the poor, and she retreated to the church of Saint Damian, where she and her sisters lived a life of holy poverty. She saw in Lady Poverty a companion ever-faithful in her walk with Christ. She looked at all the wealth of the earth and with an eye towards eternity she judged it to be dust, and cast it aside.
Clare kneels with her sisters in the convent and lifts her eyes to the Byzantine cross hanging above. On it, the suffering Christ, surrounded by those who loved Him. She sees beside Him the icons of the Virgin Mary, the God-bearer, of St. John the Evangelist, the apostle whom Christ loved, St. Mary Magdalene, and the Centurion who asked Christ to heal his servant. There is Longinus, who pierced His side, who felt the cool flow of living water gushing out with the very Blood of the Altar. There is Stephaton, who put wine on the lips of Christ, who provided Him a final kindness for Him to cry out His pain to conclude His sorrowful Passion. There are images of angels and martyrs, of bishops and confessors, beautiful images of those who saw complete beauty only in the risen Savior. Clare looks at these images, and at her sisters who surround her and pray with her, themselves icons in the image of God, and she gives thanks. She was infected with this grace by the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of Love.
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The Holy Spirit, the Spirit of Love, presented to Maximilian Kolbe visions when he was a boy: rushing water and blinding light, still chaos and material spirit. Before his eyes was the immaculate Virgin Mary, she to whom the messenger of God, St. Gabriel the Archangel, announced the coming Savior. He fell to his knees, and saw this figure of woman holding out two crowns: the white crown of purity, and the red crown of martyrdom. The young Maximilian, joyful, confused, and determined as she had once been, took them both.
In the wake of the German invasion of Poland during the Second World War, he ran a hospital through his monastery where he served as a priest. He began to provide shelter for refugees, including secretly sheltering Jews from the Nazis. Due to his anti-Nazi publications, he was arrested by the Gestapo and sent as a political prisoner to Auschwitz. While there, despite his lifelong physical weakness and infirmity, he never stopped thinking of the things of heaven, and provided great consolation to those suffering around him. After a prisoner escaped from the camp, ten other prisoners were sentenced at random to starvation in accordance with Nazi practice. The tenth of these prisoners began to cry out for mercy, telling the soldiers that he had a wife and children. The soldiers did not care, but Kolbe was greatly moved, and offered himself to die willingly instead of this man. His wish was granted, and he was placed in a small, damp cell with nine other men to slowly starve.
While there, he called these men to prayer, and together they sang songs of praise to God. The other groups who had been made to starve would often fall to despair and cannibalism, would feel their hope being extinguished by the forces of Satan. In the end, long after all the other men in his group had died, Kolbe sat there still, weak and joyful, dying and being reborn, sustained only by the power of God. His starvation was taking too long, so the soldiers had to go into the dungeon and kill him themselves. He sees them and grins, lifting up his arm for the lethal injection. In a dark, damp cell, surrounded by the musk of decay, a starving man dies with a smile.
Before the moment of reckoning, he closes his eyes and thinks of the night sky. He imagines every star, its magnitude and history and splendor; he imagines the mechanics, the pure mathematics that in such abstract complexity produce things of plain beauty; he puts to mind the story of each refugee he saved, each brother he served with, each fellow man he judged, each human he encountered. He sees in these stars a beauty indescribable, and yet itself only a glimpse of the beauty of eternity. It puts him in mind of a story. It’s a story he’d been told many times, and yet one that every once in a while he would remember and be struck with awe: In the dark stillness of night, in a humble manger of a quiet village in Judea, a Child is born to a virgin; one day, He will save the world. Today, He looks at the stars with wonder.
Nicolas Cloutier is a sophomore at the University of Pennsylvania School of Engineering and Applied Science studying computer science.