273 part i: sunday meditations for the entire year but, going to the banquet with Christ, consider yourself rather as a penitent Zacchaeus. After Holy Communion 1. “[H]e wept over it” (Lk 19:41) [DRB]. O the incredible of goodness of God! O the immense love, even towards those who are ungrateful and towards enemies! He knows that by these very people whose grievous lot He mourns, He is to be killed. He knows that in this city, the forthcoming destruction of which He mourns, He is to be raised on the Cross in cruel torments. Nevertheless, unmindful of future injuries, and wounded by the sharpest dart of pain, He manifests compassion to both of them: to the people and to the city, in their misfortune. O meekest Savior, You leave this example to me, so that I may always be forgiving to my enemies; especially today, when You granted me the gift of your generosity by the reception of Your Most Holy Body. But if all are very friendly to you, O my soul, be mindful of the enemies of your Lord, [f.73r] and with your tears and humble prayers commit to your Spouse, Jesus, all those who are separated from His love. 2. “But now they are hidden from your eyes” (Lk 19:42). It is a great distress and misfortune not to know that our goods and belongings shall be lost; much worse is to be ignorant of the impending loss of one’s soul. But alas! Even if you, my soul, know this loss very well, yet you do not evade it at all, and you do not pray to avoid it. Indeed, making light of eternal death, which waits for you to fall mortally in any way whatsoever, you never withdraw yourself from the danger of grave evil deeds. For if you looked at yourself from the beginning of your existence, you would perceive that you have always been in sin, and that you remain in this miserable state of condemnation. You came out of the womb with sin, and who could count the faults committed by you after you reached the use of reason? They have become more numerous than the sand of the sea, than the stars of the sky, than the leaves of the trees, than the grasses of the meadows. They are innumerable.
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