Ambrogio Lorenzetti's Madonna and Child depicts
swaddling bands.
MEDITATIONS FOR THE OCTAVE OF THE NATIVITY
By St. Alphonsus Liguori
Third Day
JESUS IN SWADDLING CLOTHES
Imagine that you see Mary, having
now brought forth her Son, taking Him with reverence in her arms, adoring Him
as her God, and then wrapping Him up in swaddling clothes: “she wrapped Him up
in swaddling-clothes” The Holy Church says the same: ‘His limbs, wrapped in
swaddling-clothes, the Virgin Mother binds.’ Behold the Infant Jesus, who
obediently offers His little hands and feet, and allows Himself to be swaddled.
Consider how that every time the Holy Infant allowed Himself to be swathed, He
thought of the cords with which He should one day be bound and led captive in
the garden, and of those also with which He should be tied to the column, and
of the nails which should fasten Him to the cross; and thinking on these
things, He willingly allowed Himself to be bound, in order to deliver our souls
from the chains of hell. Bound, then, in these swaddling-clothes, and turning
towards us, Jesus invites us to unite ourselves to Him with the holy bonds of
love. And turning to His Eternal Father, He says: My Father, men have abused
their liberty, and by rebelling against Thee have made themselves the slaves of
sin; but I will make satisfaction for their disobedience, and will be bound and
confined in these swaddling-clothes. Bound with these, I offer Thee My liberty,
in order that man may be delivered from the slavery of the devil. I accept
these swaddling-clothes; they are dear to Me, because they are the symbols of
the cords with which, from this moment forth, I offer Myself to be one day
bound and led to death for the salvation of men: “His bands are a healthful
binding.” The bands of Jesus were the healthful binding, to heal the wounds of
our souls. Therefore, O my Jesus, Thou wouldest be bound in swaddling-clothes
for the love of me. “O Love, how great is thy bond, which could bind a
God!" O Divine Love, Thou alone couldest make my God Thy prisoner. And
shall I then, O Lord, refuse to allow myself to be bound by Thy holy love?
Shall I for the future have the courage to detach myself from Thy sweet and
amiable chains? And for what? To make myself a slave of hell? O my Lord, Thou
remainest bound up in this manger for the love of me; I desire always to remain
bound to Thee. St. Mary Magdalene of Pazzi said that the bands that we ought to
take should be a firm resolution of uniting ourselves to God by means of love;
detaching ourselves at the same time from all affection for anything that is
not God. For this reason also it seems that our loving Jesus has allowed
Himself to be (as it were) bound and made a prisoner in the most Holy Sacrament
of the Altar, under the sacramental species, in order that He might behold His
beloved souls made also prisoners of His love.
AFFECTIONS AND PRAYERS
And what fear can I have of Thy
chastisement, O my beloved Infant, now that I see Thee bound in the swaddling
clothes, depriving Thyself (as it were) of the power of raising Thy hands to
punish me? Thou dost give me to understand by these bands that Thou wilt not
chastise me, if I will detach myself from the chains of my vices, and bind
myself to Thee. Yes, my Jesus, I will bind myself. I repent with all my heart
of having separated myself from Thee, by abusing that liberty which Thou hast
given me. Thou dost offer me a more desirable liberty; a liberty which delivers
me from the chains of the devil, and places me among the children of God. Thou
hast given Thyself up to be imprisoned in these swaddling-clothes for the love
of me; I will be in future a prisoner of Thy infinite love. O blessed chains, O
beautiful emblems of salvation, which bind souls to God, bind also my poor
heart; but bind it so fast, that it may never in future be able to disengage
itself from the love of this sovereign Good. My Jesus, I love Thee; I bind
myself to Thee; I give Thee my whole heart, my whole will. No, I will never
leave Thee again, my beloved Lord. O my Saviour, who, to pay my debts, wouldest
not only be wrapped by Mary in swaddling clothes, but even be bound as a
criminal by the executioners, and thus bound wouldest go along the streets of
Jerusalem, led to death as an innocent lamb to the slaughterhouse; O Thou, who
wouldest be nailed to the cross, and didst not leave it until Thou hadst given
up Thy life upon it, I beseech Thee permit me not to be ever separated again
from Thee, so that I should again find myself deprived of Thy favor and of Thy
love. O Mary, who didst one day bind in swaddling-clothes this thy innocent
Son, I pray thee, do thou bind me also, a miserable sinner; bind me to Jesus,
so that I may never again separate myself from His feet, that I may always live
and die bound to Him, so that one day I may have the happiness to enter into
that blessed country where I shall never be able and shall never be afraid of
detaching myself from His holy love.
The Sleep he deigns to take
From the Liturgical year - Dom Guéranger, O.S.B.
Let us, on this second day after our
Divine Infant's Birth, meditate upon the Sleep he deigns to take. Let us
consider how this God of all goodness, who has come down from heaven to invite
his creature man to come to him and seek rest for his soul — seeks rest himself
in our earthly home, and sanctifies, by his own divine Sleep, that rest, which
to us is a necessity. We have just been dwelling, with delighted devotion, on
the thought of his offering his Breast as a resting-place for the Beloved
Disciple, and for all souls that imitate John in their love and devotedness:
now, let us look at this our God, sweetly sleeping in his humble Crib, or on
his Mother's lap.
St. Alphonsus Liguori, in one of his
delicious Canticles, thus describes the Sleep of Jesus and the enraptured love
of the Mother:
Mary sings the ravish'd heavens Hush the music of their spheres;
Soft her voice, her beauty fairer Than the glancing stars appears: While to
Jesus slumbering nigh, While to Jesus slumbering nigh, Thus she sings her
lullaby.
Sleep my Babe! my God! my Treasure! Gently sleep: but ah! the sight With
its beauty so transports me, I am dying of delight: Thou canst not thy Mother
see, Yet thou breathest flames to me.
If within your lids unfolded, Slumbering eyes!
you seem so fair; When upon my gaze you open, How shall I your beauty bear ? Ah! I tremble when you wake, Lest my heart with love should break.
Cheeks than sweetest
roses sweeter, Mouth where lurks a smile divine. Though the kiss my Babe should
waken, I must press those lips to mine. Pardon, Dearest, if I say, Mother's
love will take no nay.
As she ceased, the gentle Virgin Clasped the Infant to
her breast, And upon his radiant forehead Many a loving kiss impress'd: Jesus
woke, and on her face Fixed a look of heavenly grace.
Ah! that look, those
eyes, that beauty, How they pierce the Mother's heart; Shafts of love from
every feature Through her gentle bosom dart. Heart of stone! can I behold
Mary's love, and still be cold ?
Where, my soul! thy
sense, thy reason? When will these delays be o'er? All things else, how fair so
ever, Are but smoke: resist no more! Yes!
'tis done! I yield my arms Captive to those double charms.
If, alas, O
heavenly beauty! Now so late those charms I learn, Now at least, and ever,
ever, With thy love my heart will burn For the Mother and the Child, Rose and
Lily undefiled.
Plant and fruit, and fruit and blossom, I am theirs, and they
are mine; For no other prize I labour, For no other bliss I pine; Love can
every pain requite, Love alone is full delight.
Let us, then, adore the Divine Babe
in this state of Sleep, to which he voluntarily subjects himself and contrast
it with the cruel fatigues, which are one day to be His. When he is grown up,
and come to the age of manhood, he will go through every toil and suffering in
search of us his Lost Sheep. But these first slumbers shall not be troubled by
anything of ours, which could pain this loving wakeful Heart; and the Blessed
Mother shall not be disturbed in the blissful contemplation of her Sleeping
Child, over whom she is, at a future time, to shed such bitter tears. The day
is not far distant, when he will say: The foxes have holes, and the birds of
the air nests; but the Son of Man hath not where to lay his head. Christ has
had three resting-places, says Peter of Celles. The first was in the Bosom of his
Eternal Father. He says: I am in the Father, and the Father is in me. What
repose could be compared to this, of the Father's complacency in the Son, and the
Son's complacency in the Father? It is a mutual and ineffable love, and they
are happy in the union. But, whilst maintaining this place of his eternal rest,
the Son of God has sought a second, in the womb of the Virgin Mary. He overshadowed
her with the Holy Ghost, and slept a long sleep in her chaste womb, whilst his
Body was there being formed. The holy Virgin troubled not the sleep of her
Child: she kept all the powers of her soul in a silence like that of heaven;
and, rapt in self-contemplation, she heard mysteries which it is not permitted
to man to utter. The third resting-place of Christ is in man. Jesus dwells in a
heart that is purified by faith, enlarged by charity, raised above Earth by
contemplation, and is renewed by the Holy Ghost. Such a heart as this offers to
Jesus not an earthly but a heavenly dwelling; and the Child, who is born unto
us, will not refuse to enter it, and take his rest within it.
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