Love, source of light

When you live by all of this doctrine, there will be times when you find that words are just not enough: you’ll want to break into song, like the young men who go and sing love-songs to their sweethearts. But you and I will sing human love-songs to God’s love, and you will feel like the living creatures Ezekiel described, representing Our Lord’s Evangelists: ibant et revertebantur in similitudinem fulguris coruscantis,³⁴ you will go through the world giving off light, like burning torches throwing out fiery sparks.

The Church, an ever-living reality

The Holy Spirit ensures that our Mother, the Church of Jesus Christ, is a living and ever up-to-date reality that is both modern and ancient; that she always finds, in faithfulness to the rich, well-guarded deposit entrusted to her, the strength she needs to renew her youthfulness and to pass the Christian message on to all souls in accordance with the times, adapting it to people’s language, and understanding their mentality. As we read in the Song of Songs, nova et vetera, dilecte mi, servavi tibi (Song 7:13); I have stored up for you, my beloved, things both new and old.

And in the Gospel it is written that omnis scriba doctus in regno caelorum similis est homini patrifamilias, qui profert de thesauro suo nova et vetera (Matt 13:52); every man instructed in the kingdom of heaven is like a householder who brings forth from his store room things new and old.