The Sun.
London, England, 1867-03-05 00:00:00

PASTORAL LETTER OF THE ARCH-
BISHOP OF WES I MINSTER.

Reverend and dear Brethren, aad dear Children
in Jesus Christ,—Once more the season of Lent
calls us to repentance. One more year, with all
its sins of thought, word, deed, and omission has
been recorded against us. The voice of the Church,
or rather the voice of our Divine Redeemer, calls
us to the absolution of His most Precious Blood,
and therefore to the sorrow and the works of
penance.

6o great is His compassion, and so abundant the
re&mption He has wrought for -us, that to every
one. howsoever fallen, He offers a full forgiveness.
All that he requires for the validity of our absolu-
tion is that we should come to him with a sorrow
for the past, and a purpose to sin no more. And
inasmuch as they who have fallen into mortal sin
have thereby lost both the sanctifyng grace of the
Holy Ghost and the gift of supernatural charity,
all that He requires of them is the sorrow which
springs from faith and hope. These two remain
after charity is diparted. The light of faith still
draws us with desire of pardon to the feet of Jesus
Christ. Such is the imperfect contrition which,
through the infinite compassion of God and the
infinite power of the most Precious Blood suffices
for the validity of our absolution.
Let none, therefore, despair of forgiveness, or
stand afar off as if afraid to return. "Him that
cometh to me I will not cast out." "If your sins
be as scarlet, they shall be made as white as snow ;
and if they be red as crimson, they shall be as
white as wool." There is only one sin which shall
never be forgiven : the sin against the Holy
Ghost ; because it is the sin against the spirit of
penance, against the Absolver of sinners—and
therefore the sin which is not repented of. For
all other sins there is pardon, full, free, sovereign.
Howsoever stubborn, inveterate, and reiterated
the sin may be, there is absolution. For leprosy
in all its types and stages, there is perfect cleans-
ing. Only let no soul turn away from the voice
which is now calling us to peace, or persist in
voluntary exile from God. It may be, some will
hear these words who for years have forsaken the
piety of their childhood ; who have for long years
neglected both confession and communion ; and
Easter after Easter have hid themselves from the
warning voice of the Church and of our Divine
Saviour. Let this Lent be their resurrection from
the dead, and their reconciliation with God.
" Blessed and holy is he that hath part in the first
resurrection ; in these the second death hath no
power." He has "passed from death to life."
" Old things are passed away ; all things are made
new." Nothing but the resurrection to eternal
life will exceed in blessedness the calm confidence
of hope which sustains the penitent after his ab-
solution, and the peace and sweetness restored to
the heart by the revived conciousness of union
with God and with His Kingdom.
To this then you are called, whosoever you are,
who by your past sins have long been cast out of
the presence of God. " Harden not your hearts,
as in the provocation :" but open them to the love
of God, which is patiently and tenderly upbraid-
ing you with those words : " You will not come
to me that you may have life.' Every year, as Lent
comes round, many who have long been in mortal
sin are raised again ; many who were long lost are
brought home to the fold. So it will be now. The
work of grace is among you, and many will arise
from the dead and live for ever. In the last Lent,
from Ash Wednesday to Low Sunday included,
54,000 persons came to confession for their Easter
duties. But the number of our flock is fourfold,
or more than threefold at last. After casting off
the largest number for the aged and the sick, and
for ghildren under the age of reason, there will
yet remain as many more who ought to come to
confession and communion at Easter next.

Rev. and dear Brethren, I know that your zeal
and charity is always at work to restore the
negligent, the careless, the fallen, the outcast, to
God and to His Church. You will labour this
Lent as before, encouraged by the sensible and
visible growth of devotion and piety which,
through your labour, is to be found year by year
advancing in your flocks. And you, dear children
in Jesus Christ, who have hitherto been faithful
to the precept of the-Church and to the Spirit of
God in your conscience, persevere as before. Let
this Lent be a time of increased piety and charity.
The obligation to confess your sins once a year
is light to you, who gladly do so month by month,
or week by week. The preceipt of Easter Com-
munion is a consolation to you, who count your
weekly or almost daily communion to be your
highest joy on earth. This law of the Church is
a sweet obligation, which binds you to the peace
of God and to the Sacred Heart of Jesus. Labour
all you can to bring others to the same peace and
joy. If in this Lent each were to bring one soul
to the confessional, it would be a noble harvest of
grace. The love of our neighbour is the test of

our love to God. The seven spiritual and the
seven corporal works of mercy are the fruit of our
love to Jesus. " Love is the fulfilling of the law." 4
The law of nature in the conscience, and of re- ]
velation in the Ten Commandments, and of grace
in the Sermon on the Mount, in the life of Jesus,
and the Spirit of God in the heart—all are fulfilled
in the love of our neighbour : for the charity of
God is poured out into our hearts, by the Holy Ghost
who is given to us." And that charity is the one
source of a twofold love, which fulfils the two
tables and the two precepts—the love of God with
all our heart, and of our neighbour as ourselves.
The whole law " is comprised in this word : thou
shalt love thy neighbour as thyself ;" for this two-
fold operation of charity, though distinct, is in-
divisible. It is the same affection, the same energy,
the same grace. " If any man say, I love God and
hath his brother, he is a liar. For he that loveth not
his brother, whom he seeth, how can he love God,
whom he seeth not ?" "He that hath the sub-
stance of this world, and shall see his brother in
need, and shall shut up his compassion against
him, how cloth the charity of God abide in him ?"
If our hearts are at enmity with our neighbour,
they cannot be in friendship with God. If they
are cold towards men, they cannot be fervent
towards our Divine Redeemer. If we are hard,
selfish, unsympathising ; if we are soft, luxurious,
self-indulgent ; if we lavish much on ourselves
and refuse to the wants of others ; if we live softly
and are careless of the privations of the poor ; if
we never deny ourselves and never lay to heart
the wants of those who are in need, then certainly
the love of God is not in us. Love to our neigh-
bour is the pledge that we are in a state of grace.
" We know that we have passed from death to
life, because we love the brethren." How is it
that charity is invested with such great prero-
gatives ? Why has our Divine Lord made love to
others the best of our salvation ? It is because
charity is the nature of God Himself, and there
fore the greatest conceivable perfection. " God
is charity." The uncreated essence is love. It is
the character of God. Infinite Love is God. All
the words, works, and operations of God are love.
He is intrinsically love, and His operations ex-
ternally are prompted by love. Creation, Re-
demption, Providence, His whole Kingdom in
Heaven and Earth, in all its manifold operations,
all are charity.

And again, in order to our perfection, the
charity of God is poured forth into our hearts in
Baptism. When the Holy Ghost was given, both
the created and the untreated charity were infused
into us. The Uncreated Charity, that is, the Holy
Ghost, made us his temple ; the created charity
is the third and greatest of the three theological
virtues. God, in our Baptism, made us to be his
children ; and the formal cause of our adoption is
the Spirit of the Son " whereby we cry, abba,
Father :" that is, the love of God, from which
flows, as heat from light, the love of
our brethren. The law was therefore written
in our hearts, and fulfilled as it was written.
The command to love God and our neigh-
bours was imposed when this twofold grace
of charity was infused. And this love has a two-
fold measure : towards God, the whole heart ;
towards our neighbour, the love of self—not that
love of self which is irrational, narrow, and selfish,
but the rational love of the soul conscious of its

own dignity in the image of God ; of its own
destiny to the Kingdom of God ; of its own duty,
the knowledge and love of God ; of its own price,

the Blood of Jesus Christ. Such a love teaches

us first to be unselfish, self-denying, self-chasten-
ing ; to count' all things to be loss that we may
win Christ ; to cast all away, the right hand or the

right eye, that we may enter into life everlasting.

This love of self subdues and subordinates self to

the law of God and His kingdom.

It makes our

own sanctification and salvation the first thing,

vital and paramount. Such also is the love of our
neighbour. It is the love of the image of God
and of the presence of God in him : the desire of
his sanctification and dignity, of his perfection

and salvation ; and, subordinately to this, the de-
sire of his welfare and happiness in every kind.

['he divine love of self casts out self, and perfects

the love of our neighbour. The selfish love of
self excludes our neighbour and casts out the love
of God. " He," therefore, " that loveth his
neighbour, hath fulfilled the laws.
And it is by this that charity perfects the soul.
A soul conformed to the law of God is perfect.

But a soul•. animated by charity is conformed to
the law of God. It is more ; it is a law to itself.
As the conscience is a law to itself in the order of
nature, the soul governed by charity is a law to
itself in the order of grace. St. Augustine there-
fore says, Ama, et fac quod vis—" Love God, and

do what you will :" because the will is one with
God's will, and the balance which determines the
will is charity. Pondus voluntatis amor. A good
will is the perfection of the whole soul. It is to

the spiritual being what symmetry is to the body,

or fruit to the tree, or bloom to the flower. It is
its ultimate and full perfection : its whole nature
in all its expansion and beauty. But a good will
is a will instinct with charity, and united to God

as to the source from which it flows, by which it is
continually replenished. Charity therefore per-
fects all the powers of the soul, and all the graces

Faith and hope are barren without

Faith informed by charity is living,