Beloved, to you, as people comparing spiritual things with spiritual (cf. I Corinthians 2:13), we depict the procession as representing the glory of our heavenly homeland and the passion as the way to it. If in the procession you think of the joy that is to come and the exceedingly great gladness when we will be caught up in the clouds to meet Christ in the air (I Thessalonians 4:17); if with all your heart you desire to see that day when Christ the Lord will be received in the heavenly Jerusalem, the head with all his members, bearing the triumphal sign of victory, not now applauded by throngs of people but by angelic hosts, with the people of each testament crying out on all sides, "Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord" (Matthew 21:9) - if, I say, you think where this procession is hastening, learn from the passion the route it takes. This present tribulation is the path of life, the path of glory, the path to the inhabited town, the path of the kingdom, as the thief cried from the cross: "Remember me, Lord, when you come into your Kingdom" (Luke 23:42). He saw going into his kingdom the one he asked to remember him when he arrived there. Therefore he too reached it; and if you want to know how short the way is, he merited to be in paradise with the Lord that same day. The glory of the procession makes even the suffering of the passion bearable, for nothing is difficult for a lover (cf. Cicero, Orator 10:33).
- Saint Bernard of Clairvaux
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