There is but one way, really, to avert war…
The dawn of a new year has broken. What will its now empty hands garner to bring the Lord of Hosts? With what are we, to whom this space of time has been given, going to fill them?
The carnage of war? The smoking ruins of our proud cities? The moans of men and women broken under them and the pitiful cries of dying children? Will we fill those hands only with the bitter, dark flowers of hatred, fratricide, and lust to kill?
Or will this year bring us to our senses and hence to our knees, making us realize, finally, that all of us, with our tragic civilization, our magnificent buildings, and all our technical achievements constitute but a grain of dust in the hollow of God’s hand?
Will we begin to understand that there is but one way, really, to avert war and that is to don sack cloth and ashes, to mortify our senses, to retire into the fastness of our own souls and hearts and spend most of our leisure time in prayer?
Prayers of repentance, of atonement, of petition and adoration. Prayer besieging the Prince of Pardon and Peace to take us back into his wounded heart from which, like the Prodigal of the Gospel, we have wandered far.
O Lord of Mercy, make this new year a miracle year. Bring us to our knees. Give us the grace to weep over our sins. Let our consciences remind us that you alone possess the answers to our anguish, that you alone can change darkness into light, sorrow into joy, death into life.
Lord of Love, open our dried-up little hearts. Make them big. Big enough for you to come and dwell again therein. Unveil our souls that have enclosed themselves in the dark fortresses of ourselves. Set them free, that they may destroy this idol, this self, and adore again only you, the Adorable One.
Lord of Light, be a lamp to our straying feet. Set them on your path of gladness and joy. Teach them to walk once more in charity and self-forgetfulness.
Mary, Mother of God, bend down to us, and turn our eyes, which have been immersed in the sea of godlessness, upward and inward so that we may be rid of our blindness and, seeing, behold him who came down from Heaven through you to give us sight. And beholding him, may we fall down and worship him fully, as did the Magi.
Be our star. Lead us back home. For well we know that if we do not rise now and start on this holy journey, the empty hands of this new year will bring to the Lord of Hosts only the stench of burning cities and of rotting flesh. Amen.
Adapted from Where Love is, God is Bruce publishing Co. Milwaukee 1953. Out of print.
Photo by ©Teresa Reilander
