Therefore, when he was gone out, Jesus said, Now is the Son of man glorified, and God is glorified in him.
S John 13 v 31
“Now is the Son of Man glorified” indeed But see also in our own case how this may still be said. We know, (dearest Sisters,) what a sad, weary battle this is in which we are all engaged. We know how hard, how very hard, it is to bear the wickedness and profanity which, regarding the two greatest Gifts of our Lord, meet us in a torrent; how the blessed Eucharist, and the scarcely less Blessed Sacrament of Penitence, are alike ridiculed, reviled, cast out. Nevertheless Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, and today, and for ever. Yes, and the words of Jesus Christ are the same yesterday, and today, and for ever, too.
You read in the newspaper some bitter attack on our dear Lord’s dying gift: well, ‘now is the Son of Man glorified! You hear the question asked with the fiercest scorn, ‘Who is this that forgiveth sins also?’ You see those who are valiant for the truth persecuted and hated, and their names cast out as evil: well, ‘now is the Son of Man glorified!’ Glorified, because, oh how infinitely impotent are all these attacks, these revilings, these reproaches, to stop for one moment the cause of God’s truth! Glorified, because how little they avail to rob us of one moment’s comfort in these great Sacraments! To rob us! why, dearest Sisters, we cling to the truth more lovingly the more it is assailed; the more others would cast it out, the more it becomes part and parcel of ourselves.”
- The Crucifix is that of Dr Neale’s, kept with his prayer desk in S Swithun’s Church, East Grinstead.
WITH DR NEALE 