2 posts tagged “wine”
[From The Sacred Heart, by Dietrich von Hildebrand, p. 124]
The first miracle of our Lord at the wedding of Cana is one of the three mysteries of the feast of Epiphany. The Gospel says: "He manifested his glory, and his disciples believed in him." The Church sees in this miracle the manifestation of the divinity of Christ primarily. Yet, it also is a revelation of the boundless superabundance of divine love. The first miracle of Christ was neither the healing of the sick, nor the restoration of a natural good--like the sight to the blind--nor even an indispensable good like the multiplication of the loaves. The transmutation of water into wine was not an indispensable good either for the couple or for the wedding as such. It served merely to heighten the joy of the feast. It was not even absolutely lacking, but was only in insufficient quantity. Divine superabundance! Christ our Redeemer, who continually exhorts us to seek only the one thing necessary, manifesting such an interest in the wedding taking place in cloudless joy, that the bridegroom should not be humiliated or perturbed by the insufficiency of wine!
Divine, boundless superabundance of love! What an abyss separates it from the hard zeal of many pious people who are moved and interested only when either something vital to their neighbor's eternal welfare or at least some elementary indispensable good is at stake. That the wine was not sufficient for a wedding would strike those "pious souls" as a trifle not deserving their attention. They forget that the sublime words of St. Aloysius, Quid ad aeternitatem? "What is this to eternity?" should be applied to one's own person only, but never to one's neighbor.
[From Ecclesiasticus, Chapter 31]
How sufficient is a little wine for a man well taught, and in sleeping thou shalt not be uneasy with it, and thou shalt feel no pain. Watching, and choler, and gripes, are with an intemperate man: Sound and wholesome sleep with a moderate man: he shall sleep till morning, and his soul shall be delighted with him. Challenge not them that love wine: for wine hath destroyed very many.
Fire trieth hard iron: so wine drunk to excess shall rebuke the hearts of the proud. Wine taken with sobriety is equal lire to men: if thou drink it moderately, thou shalt be sober. What is his life, who is diminished with wine? What taketh away life? death. Wine was created from the beginning to make men joyful, and not to make them drunk.
Wine drunken with moderation is the joy of the soul and the heart. Sober drinking is health to soul and body. Wine drunken with excess raiseth quarrels; and wrath, and many ruins. Wine drunken with excess is bitterness of the soul. The heat of drunkenness is the stumblingblock of the fool, lessening strength and causing wounds.
