Psallam​​ TIBI​

 

MEDIA VITA IN MORTE SUMMUS

 

IN THE MIDST OF LIFE WE ARE IN DEATH: for the eternal life we have been promised as our inheritance in Christ is not a novelty of the state of death but a continuance of the life we were first given and have lived upon the earth. As the Preface for the Missa pro defunctis reminds us, “vita mutatur non tollitur” – life is altered, it is not taken away. So is death found literally in the midst of life; not as its end but marking its continuance in the manner of life to which we have accustomed ourselves. Must we not then take today’s reminder of the inevitability of death as a means to alter the course of our life, so that when, in its transformation into the eternal counterpart to our life in this world, we may find ourselves living in the light of His countenance and not cast into the darkness.

 

Be of no doubt that it is grief that should strike your heart as the ashen cross is imposed on your forehead – the grief that is God’s for you, as He sees how you have rejected the salvation He freely gave in the death of His Son; as you continue to walk in the darkness of sin towards a death that will be eternal in its suffering. It is the grief of love unrequited, of life unlived, of God in the days of Noah, and of Christ on the mount overlooking Jerusalem. Weep with Him as you stand on the edge of Eden, standing on the ground cursed by man’s disobedience and bound, there, to return, for “out of it you were taken; you are dust and to dust you shall return” (Gen. 3:19).

 

And yet, the memento mori is not of unconsoled grief, for in confronting the reality of death we see Christ, who for our sakes first died, that we might make His death our own and see our lives conformed in life to, and transformed in death by, His love. For in our deepest grief for our sins, the wounds and scars which we bear in the tribulations of our earthly sojourn, we hear the voice of the Lord, “Repent, and believe in the Gospel!” And with these words, all is changed: grief transfigured by love into pure joy; the banishment from Eden reversed and the earth renewed by the roots of the Tree of Life – no longer eternal darkness for those who descend into it, but the promise of eternal glory in Him who conquered death and restored life.

 

So it is in hope of that life, that we make, today, a decisive turn towards Christ in repentance of our sins. And with the image of the cross emblazoned on our foreheads, recommit to walking the path of life led always by the Cross of Christ. It is for this reason that we are given the 40 days of Lent: to search the wilderness of our hearts to find those things that obstruct our return to God, that impede our vision of Calvary, and to ask His love to purify them, that we might approach, unencumbered and devoid of worldly attachments, Jerusalem with Christ; there to die with Him to sin, and in the midst of life to embrace His death as our very own transformation to life in the light of the Resurrection.

 

Give up what you will for Lent, but pray that your self denial will strengthen your resolve to follow in the way of the Cross; that each sacrifice will prepare you to receive in fullness the redemption wrought by the Christ’s self-sacrifice; and that each act of penance will well-up in you that true contrition, which is the wellspring of repentance and the gateway to the Good News that the Kingdom of God is your inheritance.

 

Media vita in morte sumus quem quaerimus adjutorem nisi te Domine

qui pro peccatis nostris juste irasceris sancte Deus sancte fortis sancte et misericors Salvator

amarae morti ne tradas nos.

Responsorium breve — Tempus Quadragesimae

In the midst of life we are in death: of whom may we seek for succour, but of thee, O Lord,

who for our sins art justly displeased? Yet, O Lord God most holy, O Lord most mighty,

O holy and most merciful Saviour, deliver us not into the bitter pains of eternal death.