Easter Monday

I thought this, from 'The Liturgical Year', was appropriate for today. It explained a lot for me, and I hope it does the same for you.

'In the very beginning of the world, the just Abel drew down upon himself the mercy of God, by offering on a sod-made altar the fairest lamb of his flock: he himself was sacrificed, as a lamb, by the murderous hand of his brother, and thus became a type of our divine Lamb, Jesus, who was slain by his own Israelite brethren. When Abraham ascended the mountain to make the sacrifice commanded him by God, he immolated, on the altar prepared for Isaac, the ram he found amidst the thorns. Later on, God spoke to Moses, and revealed to him the Pasch: it consisted of a lamb that was to be slain and eaten. A few days back, we had read to us the passage from the Book of Exodus where God gives this rite to his people. The Paschal Lamb was to be without blemish; its blood was to be sprinkled as a protection against the destroying angel, and its flesh was to be eaten. This was the first Pasch. It was most expressive as a figure, but void of reality. For fifteen hundred years was it celebrated by God's people, and the spiritual-minded among the Jews knew it to be the type of a future Lamb.

In the age of the great prophets, Isaias prayed God to fulfill the promise he made at the beginning of the world. We united in this his sublime and inspired prayer, when, during Advent, the Church read to us his magnificent prophecies. How fervently did we repeat those words: 'Send forth, O Lord, the ruler of the earth!' This Lamb was the long-expected Messias; and we said to ourselves: Oh what a Pasch will that be, wherein such a Lamb is to be victim! What a feast wherein he is to be the food of the feasters!

'When the fulness of time came and God sent his Son' upon our earth, this Word made Flesh, after thirty years of hidden life, manifested himself to men. He came to the river Jordan, where John was baptizing. No sooner did the holy Baptist see him, than he said to his disciples: 'Behold the Lamb of God! Behold him who taketh away the sin of the world!' By these words the saintly Precursor proclaimed the Pasch; for he was virtually telling men that the earth then possessed the true Lamb, the Lamb of God, of whom it had been in expectation four thousand years. Yes, the Lamb who was fairer than the one offered by Abel, richer in mystery than the one slain by Abraham on the mount, and more spotless than the one the Israelites were commanded to sacrifice in Egypt, had come. He was the Lamb so earnestly prayed for by Isaias; the Lamb sent by God Himself; in a word, the Lamb of God. A few years would pass, and then the immolation. But three days ago we assisted at his sacrifice; we witnessed the meek patience wherewith he suffered his executioners to slay him; we have been laved with his precious Blood, and it has cleansed us from all our sins.

We end with the words from the Apostle St. Andrew, when confessing the Name of Christ before the pagan proconsul AEgeas, spoke these sublime words: "I daily offer upon the altar the spotless Lamb, of whose flesh the whole multitude of the faithful eat; the Lamb that is sacrificed remains whole and living."

Man, if that doesn't stir you, your wood is wet.