Hieronymus, Commentaire in Job 38, Patrogolia Latina 26, 760, folgende. In the grasping words, Hieronymus praises the wonder of this rising of the stars from their own life-sweeping descent, genitalis occasus. In the fullness of time he was, Christ, led out by God the Father, so that he might seek home the earth. Therefore the earth is called blood-stripper, because he brought the light, coming from the heights and sitting in darkness in the shadow of death. Vesper, Abendstern, aber wird der Menschensohn genannt, der am Kreuze unterging zur Zeit der Passion. Von ihm sagt der Prophet den Völkern, die zum Glauben kommen werden. Er hat ihm einen Weg gebahnt, der über den Untergang hinaus führt.

[01:04]

Kyrios ist sein Name. Und zur Zeit seines Untergangs, da er zum Vater rief, in deine Hände befehle ich mein Pneuma, ließ er finstersichtig niedersenken. Diesen Wesper sage ich, weil er am Abend der Zeiten gesandt, sein Abendopfer dargebracht hat, ließ er als Menschensohn über den Erdensöhnen aufgehen, auf dass sie nicht mehr Fleisch und Erde seien, nicht mehr Söhne der Nacht und der Finsternis, sondern Söhne des Lucifer, Söhne Gottes. Dear Officials and Members of the Altar and Rosary Society, The words which your beloved pastor has just addressed to you show you how highly we as priests appreciate whatever you do in the service of the altar.

[02:19]

You realize very well that the altar is the most sacred spot in your parish. It is the heart of your parish church. There your prayers ascend to God, and there God's grace descends to you. Therefore you love to take care of the altar. You love to cover it with white linen. You love to adorn it with flowers. In the course and rhythm of the seasons of the ecclesiastical year, you feel close to God in doing it. And still, my dear friends, to take care of the altar involves a lot of business, many things that have to be done, money that has to be raised, laundering, all kinds of different services that have to be performed. And they take time and they take your attention and maybe also they draw you away from the true meaning of what you are doing.

[03:29]

and therefore I thought that I would reciprocate your kindness in inviting me here by telling you a little about the meaning of a Christian altar, so that reflecting upon it, you may stop and think and see better the importance of what you are doing and the blessing which you draw down from God upon yourself and upon your family through this, your serving the altar. Let me begin by telling you a little about the idea of a Christian altar. It has a long history. You can go back into the beginnings of the history of our salvation. We find the first altar They were nowhere, leaving the ark after the flood, entering upon the earth which had been cleansed by its waters, built, as Holy Scripture says, built an altar, heaping stones together.

[04:48]

The altar in divine revelation is never something that is simply offered to us by nature. I mean, the altar that is built for the God of mercy by us is really built by a special human effort. It's not identical with nature. It's not just one of those elevations, sacred hills or sacred rocks. that were popular among the pagans in the antiquity to offer sacrifices to their gods. These gods themselves were really only the personifications of the powers of nature, and therefore to worship them, and in order to worship them, one had to be close to nature. the closer to nature, the closer also to these imaginary gods, who are nothing else but personifications of natural powers.

[06:01]

But the altar that is built for the god who is above heavens and earth is an altar which is built by special effort and by planning of man. because this God, who is so high above the powers of nature, can be addressed by us only in prayer, only in a special act of our free will, in which we express to him our eagerness and readiness to serve him, our longing for him, our longing to be united to him. And therefore these altars, as I say, the first altar that Noah built in the history of our salvation is an altar built by him out of stones that he collected. And these very stones, they are the symbols and they are the expression of his own readiness to serve God.

[07:06]

But there are many stones that are being put together in order to form this altar. And these many stones simply mean the various members of his family, each stone remembering and representing before God a member of his family. So, Noah builds this altar as the head of a family, as the head of a new community, as the head of that new mankind which emerges from the flood in order then, under the guidance of Noah, to serve God. And that is the meaning of his altar which he built. We can see that clearly when we go later, into later times, and we observe and think about the altar that was built on Mount Sinai according to the law. There too Moses was ordered to make, as it were, an elevation, a hill out of earth, and to put around it twelve stones.

[08:11]

And these twelve stones represented the twelve tribes of Israel. So the chosen people of God in its entirety was represented in that order that Moses built And therefore the altar is the incorporation, as it were, of God's people in its free longing, lifting up itself, sosum corda, in order to serve, in order to be united to God. Even the Old Testament has the prescription, the rule, that not even an actual tree or anything like that or

[08:54]

@Transcribed_v005
@Text_v005
@Score_92.92