It has its reason, of course, a theological reason, in the situation that the King of England, which was, you know, done and came about through the vultum eloquium, non fugitis peccatum, And Evie's reaction was a characteristic reaction of one who was talking too much and loved to talk. And then the reaction of that, in the messianic time, the ecclesia following and, let us say, living out, as it were, the spirit of Our Lady, Mary, in mulia ecclesia, in silentio dicit, learns in silence.

[01:02]

Silence, therefore, of that ancillar domini, that silence of obedience. So, as a characteristic virtue of the messianic age. But again, you know, through the corresponding to the specific way in which the word of God is spoken through the ecclesia, and the still small voice of God. And it is the still small voice of silence because the word of God emptied itself of all glory, and descended, became one of us, and died for us. Therefore it is the voice of forgiveness. And this voice of forgiveness is the still small voice, spoken into the depth of the heart of the humble, of the heart of the poor ones.

[02:07]

Therefore, it is only in silence, in the silence of humility and in the silence of confidence, and in that silence which gives room to God's saving action, in which we can hear, receive the word of peace and of the remittance, the forgiveness of our sins, in which this word of forgiveness comes to us through our Savior and his silence on the cross. Father, forgive them because they do not know what they are doing. That is the still, small voice of silence. And that enters into our heart, and there in our heart becomes the saving power. That's so beautiful that we say that thing, that word, in Holy Week.

[03:21]

In when? I think it's the thing about your first Saturday, isn't it? Or Holy Saturday. We prepare through our silence, the salvation of God, God's saving action in our hearts. Therefore also, when we confess the great importance of silence, here now during the Lenten season, let us really practice silence in mutual respect, for that inner room in which every heart that is here, meeting in this community, needs that silence, because we all need forgiveness. And in much speaking, we don't come into that depth where we realize the measure in which we need that forgiveness.

[04:25]

only the abyss of our silence, which we call for the forgiving also of the peccata abscondita, for the hidden sins have we ever, you know, after to guard the room in which then his celebration can enter really deeply into every corner of our home to make a new man. A long time ago I had thought of this Psalm 105 or 106 as just a little, not a little, step and contribution towards our knowing the psalm better and therefore being able to read them better.

[05:33]

And the Psalm 105, as you know, the reason for it, because it summarizes the guilt of the people in their wanderings through the desert and in the conquest of the Holy Land. And therefore it has something to do with our life also in Lent, as marching through the desert and, of course, also being exposed to the same temptations and sins that the chosen people were, or they were, because that is, as you know, the keynote of all these psalms, the remembrance of a common thing.

[06:37]

They are the voice of our solidarity, of the solidarity of the people and all the members of the people throughout history in various generations. It's the history of salvation. And what happens to one generation is typical for the things that happen to another generation. And there is a bond therefore, of a solidarity, a solidarity of guilt and a solidarity of redemption. And so it is here in the Psalm 106 where the solidarity is asked to cry over the dispersion which the exile has brought over the chosen people, the solidarity first with all the generations of the past.

[07:37]

And in this psalm, 106, the solidarity with their sins. As you know, the psalm... Oh, no, 106, I say for you is 105, you know, in connection with 104. You see, these psalms, 104 and 105, in some way correspond to one another, 104 and 105. 104 is more the grateful remembrance of God's great deed, of God's saving deed. And 105, the remembrance of the failing, the failure of the people to respond to the... So it's a confession, a collective confession. the things of the past, which of course include and are constantly being renewed in the things of the present. And that corresponds, as what the writer points out, to a ritual which we still have or have again today in, for example,

[08:51]

covenant feast of the Korah people. They are also a propagation or solemn announcement of God's saving deeds by the priest, which is combined with an enumeration of the sins of the people by the Levites. an old system, an old idea, which, of course, we still ought to have in the Christian liturgy. It can be seen in Eastern liturgy in the role of priest and deacon. So then let us turn to Psalm a little sixth and just pray to the Lord, give thanks unto the Lord, for he is good, for his mercy endures for ever. Who can utter the mighty acts of the Lord, who can show forth all his praise? Blessed are they that keep judgments, and see that just righteousness at all times.

[09:55]

Remember me, O Lord, with the favor that thou bearest unto thy people. Visit me with thy salvation, that I may see the good of thy chosen, I may rejoice in the gladness of thy nation. and the glory of thine inheritance. In the first introduction, close to that of Psalm 104 in spirit, see right away that basic idea of the solidarity, the salvation of the individual is bound up in part of the salvation of the people. Remember me, O Lord, with the favor that thou bearest unto thy people. That's such an important sentence in verse 4. Remember me, O Lord, with the favor that thou bearest unto thy people. The individual salvation is through the people.

[10:57]

Just as when we ask, you know, look, O Lord, on the priest of thy church. that I may see the good of thy chosen, I may rejoice in the gladness of thy nation. Salvation and joy, of which the individual takes part, is first of all the joy of the whole. No true joy without joy of the whole. And the idea of the communion of saints of heaven. That I may glory with thine inheritance. Then comes the confession. We have sinned with our partners. We have committed iniquity. We have done wicked things. That is now starts in 6 and ends only late in, let's go to the...

[11:59]

And then in 243, 42, after the press, they were brought into subjection under their hands. And not many times were delivered to them, but they provoked them with pouncing, with oaths, no, for their iniquities. And then we got their picture, and we heard their cry. That's the kind of summary of the whole thing. So until there, there is then the enumeration. There is first then the... we often say, the weak reaction or the disregard of the basic saving deed, which is the salvation from Egypt. We have sinned with our fathers, and all that again. We have committed iniquity. We have done wickedly. Our sin, the present sin, is a parcel bound up with the sin of the Father. Then it comes, our fathers understood not thy wonders in Egypt.

[13:14]

They remembered not the multitude of thy mercies, but provoked him at the sea at the Red Sea. Nevertheless, he saved them for his name's sake, that he might make his mighty power to be known. He rebuked the Red Sea also, and was dried up, so he led them through the depths, as to the wilderness, and he saved them from the hand of him that hated them, redeemed them from the hands of their enemies, and the waters covered their enemies, and there was not one of them left. Then they believed his word, and they sang his praise. So that is the basic, let us say, the typical event of salvation. attitude of the people too is the same. They don't really respond to what God is doing for them, but nevertheless he saved them, nevertheless he saved them, for his name's sake, that is, in our eyes, of course, with our faith, is through his agape, his name's sake, because God is agape, that is his name, so that he might make his mighty power to be known.

[14:37]

And he saved them from the hand of him that hated them, and waters covered their enemies, Then they finally believe his words and they sound his praise. That is the Alleluia at the end. That is the common salvation through which the whole history of the chosen people tends. And then after that comprehensive and typical faith, the rest of it, then come the various of the desert, and those are just one of them. Well, 13 the 1st, 13 to 15, they soon forgot his work, but waited not for his counsel, but lusted exceedingly in the wilderness, and tempted God in the desert, and he gave them their request to send leanness into their souls. That is 13 to 15 that alludes to the sin of lust.

[15:42]

It's in Numbers, the fourth book of Moses, in 11, the 11th. And that is When the people complained, you know, see the first thing, the first thing is that of complain. When the people complained, it is he, the Lord, and the Lord heard it, and his anger was kindled, the fire of the Lord burnt among them, and the people cried unto Moses, and the fire was quenched. And then the next one too, and the mixed multitude, that means that rabble, you know, that famous expression, you know, that was among them, fell a-lusting, and the children of Esau also wept again, and said, Who shall give us flesh to eat?

[16:45]

We remember the fish which we did eat, and eat it freely, the cucumbers and the melons, and the leeks and the onions and the garlic, Well, all right, it's not such a terrible temptation of all in our age, but now our soul is dried away. There's nothing at all beside this manna before our eyes, and the manna on the coriander seeds, on the red broth, the gabardine, and the dupil. And then Moses heard the people weep throughout their family. Every man wept in the door of his tent. It's a wonderful picture. The anger of the Lord was kindled greatly, but A wonderful description, you know, Arlene, of that condition of the soul, which is so easily there, you know, who would have, let's say, a lean time to deal, you know, everybody was weeping at the door of his cage, to make everybody else feel miserable, and they say how wonderful it was, you know, who shall give us pleasure to eat, to remember the fish we should eat, and so on.

[17:57]

All that. So that is the first. It's a thing which we find so very often, so much up our alley, so to speak. And then we have the next one. Then we have the next one, 16 to 18, you see, and that is, I mean, in the song, you know, the 16 to 18 is another type of thing. You see, this here first is, the first thing, you see, is, how would you say, it is not compassion, one would say, Sorry for what I'm saying. The self-pity on account of, you know, difficulty, the self-pity on account of, what did you say?

[19:02]

Hardships, you know, and hardships, of course, of eating the, you know, the external, the commodities of life. that are lacking in the desert, and the food that the Lord is giving, you know, gets rather annoying all the longer. I mean, that's a very particular situation. And then we have 16 to 11, 18 to 18, not the time, that is then the thing of ambition. I mean that time which causes division. We have one, we have this kind of... complain and tell pity, you know, is, as it is hard to describe so wonderfully in the literature, is something that immediately works by the way of mass infection. This year, 15 to 18, is the scene of ambition.

[20:10]

That is the sons of Korah, you know, who are they? Daphne and, what is it, Ephraim, or Daphne and Ephraim, and acquired in the company. Their thing is, of course, that actually most of the 16th chapter, and where the word is, They envied Moses. They rose up before Moses, you know, at the rebellion with certain children. These 250 princes, famous in the congregation, men of renown, And they gathered themselves together against Moses, against Aaron, said unto them, You take too much upon you, seeing all the congregation are holy, every one of them. See, they take the part of the holy against the...

[21:15]

the most arrogant, holy everyone, and the Lord is among them, therefore then lift ye up yourselves about the congregation of the Lord. That is the thing of the arrogant envy of Nathan and of Isaac, 16 to 18, the other. Then comes 19 to 23. Psalms that is then the other practical sin of the desert and that is the worship of the golden calf and that means the sin against the leadership of God you know is the sin against the leadership which has been instituted by God, human leadership. The Egil sin, as we call it, the sin of Egil, you know, is the sin against the leadership of God, substituting somebody else for God.

[22:29]

And that is the golden power. They forgot God their Saviour, which had done great things in Egypt, wondrous works in the land of Canaan, the things by the Red Sea. Therefore he said that he would destroy them, had not Moses his chosen stood before him in the breach to turn away his wrath, lest he should destroy them. so that either Russia, when they're getting another guard, you know, who would lead us back to Egypt, you know, instead of the one who brought us here into the desert. Their sin and its consequences are overcome by the readiness of Moses to, as they say, jump into the breach offering his own life. That's the classical way in which then later on the Son of God made man on the cross, you know, save the people.

[23:34]

And then we have, that goes to 23, destroy them. And then we have the next one, 24 to 27, ye that despise the pleasant land, that believe not his words, but murmur in their tents, hearken not unto the voice of the Lord. Of course, the sin of the golden scar, that you know that is in the third, in Exodus, chapter 32. Then we have the next one, that is the, um, the, uh, [...] And once they give the child a picture about all the dangers that would befall the people. So discouragement and loss of faith begin in God's guidance.

[24:43]

This time not into the very idea of God as leader, but the way and the goal to which God wants to lead us. And the reason, of course, is that we have to stand up against all these giants, despise the threatened land, murmur in their tents, hearken not unto the voice of the Lord, lift that object's hand against them to overthrow them, in the wilderness to overthrow their seed or among the nations to scatter them in the land then comes 28 to 31 again not the other 20 um the 28 to 31 that is what they call the sin of Baalzeor And that is the divinization, I would say, the glorification, cultic glorification of sensuality.

[25:50]

That is the greatest, you know, of all the sins of the dead. brought about by mixing with heathen custom and heathen cult. That is the headless of all the sins of the dead. 28 to 31, they joined themselves. You know, it's always that kind of key word, you know, it's always characteristic. of the singing questions. They mixed with, you know, they mixed with, of course, the basic denial of the, what we call, how we say, the principle of the separateness of the chosen holy people from the, what we call, the world. So that is the They joined themselves and ate the sacrifices of the dead.

[26:54]

Thus they provoked him to anger with their inventions and the plague breaking through them. And then stood up Phineas and executed judgment. And so the plague stayed and was counted unto him for righteousness unto all generations forevermore. That is Peneas. I mean, just as Moses, you know, to here is Peneas. Peneas, the appetite and the foreshadowing of Elias in the Pentateuch. And that was counted unto him for righteousness unto all generations forevermore. And then we have the anguish in the waters of strife. They went ill with Moses for their sake. Now, that is the sin of the innumerable chapter 21 to 13, where Moses becomes unsure of himself and not of himself, but of God.

[28:02]

You know, it's the sin. Can I get water here out of this rock? So that is the thing, the weakness of the leader. See, there are all these things that I just want to call your attention to, that the things, other things, that they are typical things. So in that way, they have to be understood. Then we have, first, 34 you see there verse 34 they did not destroy the nations that's again that is now the sin in the in the promised land in the promised land there they did not destroy they tolerated those nations in the Canaanitic nations uh

[29:04]

They tolerated them without asking them or forcing them to renounce their pagan customs and their pagan worship. That's, of course, the essence of it. So, again, this thing of mixing, of wrong toleration. 33 to 39, or 34, they did not destroy the nations concerning whom the Lord commanded them, But they're mingled among the heathen and learn their work. Learning their work, of course, is the adaptation to their life. As you know, that is one of the key things. We are the chosen people in cult as well as in moral, which is always one. That is what modern people can't so easily understand, difficult to understand for modern people, because everybody is saying, I'll hear this.

[30:05]

this campaign of annihilation of the Israelites against the Canaanites, what about that? This and that against all humanity. Of course, that is a thing which cannot be measured in the modern. Of course, in the modern, in some way, it always remains. Because today, too, you know, what you worth it is always what they not announced it determines your power. If you worship Moloch, you know, and bring in your children and so on, then it affects the whole reality. So today, too, you see that the whole struggle is going on today, you know, and all these things about control, about sterilization, and all the papers are full of it. And they help, you know, with sterilization and all of these things.

[31:09]

And that is always a strange thing, you know, that those things affect the social life of the whole nation, the entire nation. It's very, very strange. So it was in a much more outspoken way, of course, there among the Kena line. Then you have in... In 1436, they served their idols, which were a snare unto them. So the pagan worship, you know, becomes an opportunity, an occasion of the fall for the Ephraimites. And they sacrificed their sons and their daughters unto devils, and shed innocent blood. The blood of their sons and of their daughters whom they sacrificed went to the islands of Canaan, and the land was polluted with blood.

[32:13]

Blessed there were they defiled with their own works, and went in ruling with their own inventions. The whole invention is always to worship your own ideas. Worship your own. Then he fired his own words. Therefore was the wrath of the Lord kindled against his people, insomuch as he had accrued his own inheritance. And he gave them into the hands of the heathen, and they that hated them ruled over them. That is now taken to know the time of the judges. Their enemies also oppressed them, and they were brought into subjection under their hands. Many times that is now the burden of the whole thing. Many times did he deliver things, but they provoked him with their counsel and were brought low for their iniquity.

[33:16]

That's really a summary of the whole book of Genesis. Nevertheless, he regarded their affliction when he heard their cry, and he remembered for them his cognizance and repented according to the multitude of his mercy. He made them also be pitied of all those that carried them captive. Then comes the end. Save us, O Lord our God. Gather us from among the heathen. Give thanks unto thy holy name, and find us in thy praise. Let it be the Lord God of Israel, from everlasting to everlasting, as all the people say. Amen. Praise be the Lord. So, a beautiful, common confession for the Siegel of the Father, not only remember the miracles of God, but also remember the weaknesses of the people, and by remembering them and fainting, For them, make another step toward that salvation which we all look for on the Easter day.

[34:24]

We all think. Amen. Praise ye our Lord. And go into the school of the heart. with the word of God made man that has come to dwell among us, or to tabernacle among us. This word is taken by St. John in absolute deliberation, to tabernacle among us. Because there we see immediately that is the continuation of that school of the heart which was first established in the temple, in the tabernacle.

[35:25]

So, therefore, it is the sun. Nobody has ever seen God. But the Son who was in the Father's bosom, he hath told us. See, the Son is the Word. The Word is the messenger of the Father's heart. He carries the Father's heart toward mankind, put us into its presence. I am weak and lowly in heart. Learn of me. He is the master of that school of the heart that the Father has established in the new covenant among us. So the world, therefore, is really close to us as it was promised in Deuteronomy. And it is in us.

[36:28]

In us. That we still have to learn, that we still have to see. We find ourselves at this moment at the feet of Jesus, like Mary sitting at the feet of Jesus. And they'll learn how meek he is and lowly of heart, going to the school of the heart. But that is still a listening. I sit next to him. I sit at his feet. but the heart of God will be in us, that we still have to consider. But that also we can see, and see that when later on after the resurrection, when the risen Savior appears to his apostles, And when he speaks to them, the first word of his heart, which is, peace be to you, peace be to you, that is the language of the heart, isn't it?

[37:39]

Peace be to you. And then he turns himself, he turns to Thomas, Thomas the doubter, Thomas the pessimist, Thomas the one who cannot, into the whole depth of the human, of the heart, of the God-man, that heart will then be shown to him. I don't, not knowing what he said, he said, if I don't put my hand into his side, I shall not believe. But then, when Satan stands before him, and there he shows, points out his open heart, the side, and says, put your hand here, Tom, and be a believer and not a non-believer.

[38:42]

There is that gesture through which we enter into the heart. There we enter into the heart. That is only possible naturally after the resurrection. when the gloriously risen Furios stands before us, we live in his presence, and he, the Lamb of God, constantly shows us that open side through which we enter into the infinite riches of his divine, redeeming, transforming, transfiguring power. There it becomes for us then a reality in a completely new way, what we hear tomorrow in tomorrow's gospel, where on the mountain of the transfiguration, there he is, there he shows his glory to his apostles, speaking at the same time about his exodus,

[39:57]

about his end, his leaving this world, his strong middle, his pastor, to Moses and to Elias. And then the voice which the apostles hear and which says, this is my beloved son. That is the voice which publicly, solemnly acknowledges and says, this is the man according to my heart. This is the man according to my heart. Jesus, the son of David, he is the fulfilling of that promise. I shall send the man according to my heart. Now the mountain of the Transfiguration is revealed to the Apostles. This is the man according to my heart.

[41:01]

In him I am well pleased. The Transfiguration. Now don't tell anybody a word about this before the Son of Man has died, because he enters into the riches of the heart of God's mercy through the Son's death on the cross. That is the new thing. That is the thing that has not happened in David. nor have it happened in Solomon. But that is in Christ. That is the new thing. And that is the truly redeeming thing. Because now you have to think again of the incapacity of the human heart, how superficial, hopelessly superficial we are,

[42:03]

like a butterfly flying from one flower to the other, from one thrilling thing to the other. And on the other hand, remember that it is impossible for us really to plumb the depth of the heart and therefore to reach any conversion worthy of that name. There we face this onmak, this complete incapacity. And into that vacuum, that man, according to God's heart, he enters into it. And that is our Lord's mission, to enter into that depth which cannot be reached by us. not by any sorrow of repentance, by any feeling of guilt, it cannot be filled.

[43:09]

But it's filled by the cross, it's filled by the manner according to God's heart. This is my son in whom I am well pleased, and he enters into that depth. And that is the meaning of the cross. That is the depth and that is the height and that is the width and the breadth of the cross. It really fills all the potentialities of the human heart which cannot be plumbed by us. And that is the meaning of the sacrifice of the cross, therefore. There He died for us. There He is as our mediator. There He takes upon Himself our sins.

[44:11]

There He carries our guilty hearts on the cross. And there He deals their debt. That is where the sacramental power of the depth of the Lord Jesus Christ. So that then, after he, the Lord Jesus, has, as it were, descended into the heart of this earth, descended up into the earth, into that deepest It's absolutely universal, and it's the whole destiny of mankind through all the ages is bound up. Into that depth he entered, the Lord entered, descended on Ephraim. And there he built then the bridge.

[45:13]

There he opened the gate. There he filled to his own repentance through his own conversion, which is never in our hearts. And that, it seems to me, always is the meaning of that word, like we say at the beginning, when we go to the altar and we are about to offer the sacrifice, that divine sacrifice, which stands for the entire depth of our heart, where we say, Deus tu contertus vivificavis, Oh God, you turn around and you give us life. You see, the human heart can never turn itself around. It can't. But God, that is the true school of the heart. God turns around.

[46:15]

His heart, the Father's heart, turns around. Hence the one who looks as the judge condemning on our sin, he turns around and he himself enters into that vacuum of justice and fills it with his own divine justice. And all justice may be fulfilled, that justice of which the human heart is forever incapable. And he fills that justice. He becomes our justice. He becomes the whole depth of our heart. And so we enter into his depth. And so conversus, turning around to us, He then leads us as the Prince of Life into the Holy of Holies.

[47:21]

He himself has opened the gate with his own blood. Then, and through the veil of his purest body, we enter into the Holy of Holies, where God's heart is heightened forever upon the mercy seat and where now we can appear in parousia, in absolute confidence, in the full power and strength of our heart. And we are found in Christ and through Christ, the Lamb of God that died for us and then leads us into life. That is, he is then this Lord Jesus, He is not only the man according to God's heart, but he is also the temple. Destroy this temple, and in three days I shall build it up again.

[48:24]

That word so deep in the Gospel of St. John, that shows you the fulfillment of the two things in the one person of our Lord Jesus Christ. He is the David, the man according to God's heart, And he is the temple, and he builds the temple. He builds the temple. But what divided the Old Testament between David and Solomon, because the death of the Savior did not happen in the Old Testament, therefore it has to be divided this time. In the New Testament, it becomes one. There the man, according to God's house, enters completely into the saving will is identified absolutely with the heart of the father with the mercy of the father with the forgiving love of the father on the cross and therefore he is also able the same one to build the temple

[49:33]

I shall build it up again. Constantly, not only the temple of his own personal body, but the temple of his body. That means the entire church. That's the reason why we say we are the body of Christ. We are the body of Christ. He builds up. Christ built the temple. Therefore, in that temple, the heart of the Father is in the hearts of his children. And how is that? That is through the Holy Spirit. If you compare, and I would invite you to do that, here we have two important passages to my mind of very great decided importance for the meaning of prayer, and the one is what I told you before, that is the eighth chapter of the Third Book of Kings.

[50:39]

Also, the seventh chapter of the Second Book of Kings, naturally, where David speaks about the house, the house that God builds for him. In the eighth chapter of the Third Book, where the house which is built for God, is described, and there this house which we call the school of the heart is the school of prayer. There the prayers are poured out in the presence of the Lord's power. But then that has its power there naturally in the Ephesians. in the temple that's the temple in which the Spirit is present, which is the church, the body of Christ, but also in a special way, it seems to me, in the eighth chapter of the Epistle to the Rocks, where St. Paul speaks, as in no other place in all of Scripture, about the mystery of the heart.

[51:47]

where he speaks about that only God can and that the depth of our heart is inaccessible to us and accessible only to the spirit. The spirit. And by that he means, of course, the spirit of the risen Savior. The spirit of the risen Savior. The outpouring of the Savior, who is the man according to God's heart. And it is the spirit he gives. The spirit is the heart, as it were, of the Holy Trinity. Spiritus adjugatus, spirit helps fill our infirmitate nostra, our weakness, our infirmity, our helplessness, our vacuum, infirmitate nostra.

[52:57]

Because what we should claim as we should, we don't know. See, that is our incapacity in the depth of our own heart. Of course, prayer is that activity which fills or enters into the very depth of our heart. But it is in the spiritus postula chrono. It is the spirit who intercedes for us or who is there to pray for us in the postula chrono. The Holy Spirit acts according to God, means according to the heart of God for his holy ones, for those who are cleansed and purified in the blood of christ those who have to fight baptismal roles so it is the spirit in whom or through whom the school of the heart is that they realize in its most perfect form

[54:24]

So at the end of this whole way of the conversion of the heart, it is in the end the power of the Holy Spirit, who alone is able to touch the human heart, and who alone therefore can transform it. And then when we realize all that, then we know what Ezekiel the prophet wanted to say, and he said, that I shall give a new heart to them and a new spirit.

[55:01]

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