OCR Text |
Show j LENTEN SERMONS. A Roman correspondent, speaking of the attractive and attracting sermons of the Lemten season, now being preached by the Right Rev. Mgr. John S. Vaughan, Domestic Prelate to His Holiness Leo XIII, says: Thursday, March 1, with a familiar discourse on the "Desolation. Wrought by Worldliness." The church, which haa been nearly empty during the regular reg-ular Sunday sermons since New Year, wais now crowded, and for half an hour the preacher held the audience enthralled by his earnest eloquence. On March 4 he preached from the text, "Who are thou?" (Ruth iii, 9). This question, he began, it would be well I for every one of us to ask ourselves. Man is an animal, as much so as the beasts of the field and the birds of the air. Like them he is made up of bones, muscles, sinews, arteries, veins and nerves; like them he needs food, drink and sleep; like them he has to depend on his five senses. It is well that he should remember this; it -will serve to humble us. But man is also more than, the beast; he has a dual nature; he is the connecting link between the Creator Cre-ator and his creatures, between the visible and the invisible; he is an angel, in disguise, a seraph in embryo, a child of God with Whom he holds familiar converse. In the human soul ! in a state of grace God Himself is re-i re-i fleeted. Hence man is never satisfied as long as he is chained on earth. Though he gain the whole world, though he acquire fame" and learning, yet will he exclaim with the wise King who had never denied himself anything, any-thing, that "All is vanity," and his aspirations, the longings of his soul, soar ever upwards, higher and higher, till hi3 heart Is united with God; while beasts and birds are content and happy in their natural environment, because J here on earth they are fulfilling their destiny. The animal is here but a short period and his body returns to whence it came ami resolves itself into its component elements, but the soul lives on for ever; and in the great hereafter it makes no difference whether wheth-er you were rich or poor, learned or wise, honored or despised by the world, for you are not judged by the world's standard of perfection, but by God's. Let us, then, bear thif? ever in mind, and detach ourselves, our minds and our desires from the things of this world and cling to that which perisheth not. These two sermons here so imperfectly im-perfectly outlined, formed an introductory intro-ductory to this season of grace that will enable all who listened to them to make better use thereof. Monsignor Vaughan is a charming preacher, whose discourses reflect his own personality. On March 2, the first Friday in Lent, the Very Rev. John Baptist, C. P., preached at the Church of St. George and the English Saints on the begin.-ning begin.-ning of the Passion: of Jesus Christ in the Garden of Gethsemane, and he 6trongly recommended this subject for meditation during Lent. The Very Rev. David Fleming, O. F. M., will preach every Thursday afternoon during dur-ing the Lenten season at the Convent Chapel of the Little Sisters of the Company of Mary, 45, Via Castelfi-dardo. |