Shadowless Light
Shadowless Light
"Because the flesh of sinful human beings riots against the spirit, all life in the flesh is battle and suffering," wrote Edith Stein in 1942, while SS killers hunted for her in occupied Holland.
As the Nazi's noose tightened around this beautiful, Jewish Carmelite's convent in Echt, Edith (Teresa Benedicta of the Cross) continued labouring over a book about the remarkable life and teaching of the 16th C Spanish contemplative and reformer, John of the Cross. She was arrested on August 2 and transported into the east. Seven days later Edith arrived at Auschwitz death camp where she was immediately murdered.
Her religious sisters back at her convent in Holland found the manuscript of Edith's "profound study" lying open in her room. It was published under the title, "The Science of the Cross". Reading her book ought to provoke tears of joy and anguish...for the existence and then the destruction of such a refined intellect and spirit.
Speaking of union with God as the ultimate goal of human existence, Edith continued (on from our first paragraph), "(Jesus Christ) chases away satan and all evil spirits wherever he personally encounters them. He snatches souls from the tyranny of the evil ones. Relentlessly he uncovers human malice wherever it approaches him in delusion, disguise, and obduracy. To all who recognize their own sinfulness, remorsefully acknowledge it, and long to be liberated from it, he extends his hand. But he demands that they follow him unconditionally, and renounce everything that can oppose his Spirit within them...
"(On the cross) he pays divine Justice the ransom for the accumulated debt of sin for all times and opens the sluice of paternal Mercy for all who have the courage to embrace the cross and the crucified one. Into them he pours his divine light and life...The pain of yearning for the fullness of life persists until, through the door of actual physical death, entrance into the shadowless light is gained."
("The Science of the Cross" Edith Stein. Transl. Josephine Koeppel OCD. Institute of Carmelite Studies, Washington DC, 2002)
The Church must never ever tire nor cease staring the horrors of Hitler's Germany full in the face. Especially we must constantly and unflinchingly regard the marginalization and seduction of the great majority of Teutonic Christendom, and the destruction of such completely luminous and gifted saints like Edith. For it is only by so doing that we may yet escape our own seduction by antichrist in these Last Days. Above all lessons to be learned out of those desperately dark days is this...that any kind of "marriage" of the Crucified One and the kingdoms of this world is simply impossible, and completely and utterly out of the question.
"Again, the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their splendour. 'All this I will give you,' he said, 'if you bow down and worship me.' " (Matthew 4.8-9)
"Jesus, knowing that they intended to come and make him king by force, withdrew again to a mountain by himself." (John 6.15)
"Jesus said, 'My kingdom is not of this world. If it were, my servants would fight to prevent my arrest by the Jews. But now my kingdom is from another place.' " (John 18.36)
By the time Hitler slithered onto the stage of history, Christianity had for generations been permeating the warp and weft of the fabric of German Society. And yet, the greater part of that nation's Church proved no match for antichrist. Why? Because God's People wanted to "marry" themselves to a "kingdom of the world"! It seduced them, took what it wanted (a cloak of morality and respectability), and then cast them away...and at the same time, by government decree, that "kingdom" murdered those Believers who dared to oppose it.
Immediately before Sophie Scholl (a Christian aged 21) was beheaded by the Nazi Regime for distributing leaflets, she cried out against the awful darkness, "How can we expect righteousness to prevail when there is hardly anyone willing to give himself up individually to a righteous cause. (It is) such a fine, sunny day and I have to go. But what does my death matter, if through us thousands of people are awakened and stirred to action."
The cold-blooded murder of Edith (twice a martyr for being Jewish and a lover of Jesus), and of Sophie, must put paid to any kind of illusion (delusion?) that the Church can ride to glory and power and influence of the back of the State!
"I will explain to you the mystery of the woman (the great prostitute, who sits on many waters) and of the beast she rides, which has the seven heads and ten horns. The beast, which you saw, once was, now is not, and will come up out of the Abyss and go to his destruction...The ten horns you saw are ten kings...(they) will give their power and authority to the beast. They will make war against the Lamb, but the Lamb will overcome them...The beast and the ten horns you saw will hate the prostitute. They will leave her to ruin and leave her naked..." (Revelation 17)
But the prospect of Church-State power is a strong drug which some Christians (especially leaders) find impossible to decline. But the consequences are very real and incomprehensibly destructive. (Hitler's Reich Minister, Hans Frank repented and turned to Christ immediately before his execution as a Nazi war criminal. His last words were, "I am thankful for the kind treatment during my captivity, and I ask God to accept me with mercy." He also chillingly said, "A thousand years will pass and the guilt of Germany will not be erased.")
I doubt very much if that part of the Church in the United States which so absolutely and completely identified with the most recent Republican Administration ("God is in the White House!") will ever recover its private and public integrity. Their defeat at the last Presidential Elections should be regarded and embraced as the mercy of God. Now decent folk may have the opportunity to step out of the shambles (butcher's slaughter house) of the corridors of power, and return to dwell in "the courts of our God". (Sadly, they have already been replaced by yet another in-crowd, eager for their few seconds in fame's illusory and deceiving spotlight!)
Increasingly as the End approaches, traditionally blurred lines and distinctions are suddenly going to become very, very clear. Do not leave your alignment too late. It is most likely that those who seek to keep one foot in both camps (lusting after Church-State power) will end up belonging to what is to perish...or to neither.
"The kings of the earth take their stand and the rulers gather together against the Lord and against his Anointed One...The One enthroned in heaven laughs...saying, 'I have installed my King on Zion, my holy hill.' I will proclaim the decree of the Lord: He said to me, 'You are my Son; today I have become your Father. Ask of me, and I will make the nations your inheritance, and the ends of the earth your possession. You will rule them with an iron scepter; you will dash them to pieces like pottery.' " (Psalm 2)
It should be our joy and our privilege to kneel with Sophie Scholl in her cell, after her sham trial and minutes before her martyrdom, and hear her prayer, "Dear God. All I can do is stammer to You. I can do nothing but hold out my heart to You. You created us in Your image. I beg You from the bottom of my heart...I beseech You, even though I know nothing about You, You alone are my salvation. I beg You, please don't turn away from me, dear God...my glorious Father."
Emmanuel (God with us) alone is our Salvation. Not the National Party nor the Labour Party. Neither the Republicans nor the Democrats nor the Conservatives nor the Liberals! Jesus is Lord!
"Kiss the Son, lest He be angry and you be destroyed in your way, for his wrath can flare up in a moment. Blessed are all who take refuge in him." (Psalm 2.12)
"Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life. We believe and know that you are the Holy One of God." (John 6.68)
"When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, he will sit on his throne in heavenly glory. All the nations will be gathered before him." (Matthew 25.31-32)
