Saint Augustine (354-430)
Bishop of Hippo (North Africa) and Doctor of the Church
Sermon 210
“Then they will fast” “The day will come when the Bridegroom will be taken away from them and then they will fast.” Since the Bridegroom has been taken away from us, this is indeed our time for mourning and weeping. This Bridegroom is “the most handsome of men; grace is poured upon his lips” (Ps 44[45]:3) and yet, under the hands of his tormentors he lost all comeliness, all beauty and was cut off from the land of the living (Is 53:2.8). However, our mourning is right if we burn with desire to see him. How happy they were who were able to enjoy his presence before his Passion, to question him as they wished and listen to him as necessary… As for us, we see the fulfilment of what he said: “The days are coming when you will long to see one of the days of the Son of Man, and you will not see it” (Lk 17:22)…
Who would not say with the prophet: “My tears have been my food day and night while people say to me continually: Where is your God?” (Ps. 41[42]:3). Certainly we believe him to be already seated at the right hand of the Father, but so long as we are in this body we walk apart from him (2Cor 5:6) and are unable to show him to those who doubt his existence or even deny him, saying: “Where is your God?”…
“A little while and you will no longer see me, and again a little while and you will see me” (Jn 16:19). But now this is the hour of which he said: “You will weep and mourn but the world will rejoice… But, he added, I will see you again and your hearts will rejoice, and no one will take your joy away from you” (v.22). The hope thus given us by him who is faithful in his promises never now leaves us without a certain joy — until that overwhelming joy comes on the day when we will be like him because we will see him as he is (1Jn 3:2)… “When a woman is in labor, she has pain because her hour has come,” says the Lord, “but when her child is born, she no longer remembers the anguish because of the joy of having brought a human being into the world” (Jn 16:21). This is the joy no one can take away from us and with which we will be satisfied when we pass to eternal light from our present conception in faith. So let us fast and pray since we are still on the threshold of birth.