"And God saw everything that he had made, and he saw that it was very good…. And on the seventh day God finished all his work which he had done, and he rested on the seventh day…"
Dear Friends,
In his lovely little book, The Sabbath, Abraham Joshua Heschel points out that the Hebrew word for “rest”—sometimes transliterated as menuha—has an intriguing meaning. It signifies not mere repose, but purposeful contemplation. On the seventh day, God contemplates his creation, which he has found very good.
If God considers contemplation a most appropriate activity, that must reveal something essential about our humanity. Created in the image and likeness of God, we also need to contemplate.
And this is possible in every walk of life. We only need to choose to notice. When we pause to notice God’s creative goodness, that contemplative attentiveness becomes admiration, and that admiration becomes praise: “O Lord, our God, how wonderful your name in all the earth” (Psalm 8).
Advent is an apt time to renew this contemplative attitude, as we prepare to welcome God made man at Christmas. What’s one way I can choose menuha—purposeful contemplation—today? How can I, with the Blessed Virgin Mary and all the saints, and impelled by grace, enter into God’s own way of resting? That rest will bear fruit in love, and that love will bear fruit in praise, and that praise will be the deep-set music of our lives.
God bless,
Fr. John Pietropaoli
