| Choir VI | 2 October |
|---|---|
| “The faithful” | The Guardian Angels |
We have much to thank him for, this good angel. Into his quiet and kindly hands Almighty God has laid a seed, which today he offers to the Lord: it is the office of Guardian Angel.
“Bless the Lord, all ye His angels: you that are mighty in strength, and execute His word, hearkening to the voice of His orders” (Ps. 102:20).
When a Guardian Angel is called by the Lord, that is, as soon as one of the millions of angels is called by the Lord to the office of Guardian Angel, he hastens with the speed of lightning to the Throne of the Most High. There he receives the command, the instruction. Then he turns to his Queen. She is the Mother of the living; now that he is to become the brother of a human being, She also becomes his Mother.
Under Her Eyes he lays aside everything that has adorned him until now: all his splendour and power. He kneels down in the simple working garment that all Guardian Angels have in common. Only his essence, his task, remains to him, in the lessened degree of an angel of the IX. Choir. And then the Mother accepts him. Through Her, who stands above the earth and above Heaven and above all that is created, he may pass as through a cathedral, as through his parents’ home, and now he looks with different eyes across to his brother, for whom the Lord bled to death on the Cross, and no longer down upon man. His blessedness, which remains unchanged, has now taken on a new and wonderful colouring. It is as though he had somehow become a mother; he may now himself experience sacrifice, which an angel otherwise does not experience. Thus the office of Guardian Angel, which was opened to the angels after their trial, is the means of their perfection; in drawing close to men, they experience in this office the accompanying of the Lord in His work of Redemption on earth.
Saint Ezechiel,
the High Prince, stands in his position as one of a pair with the Archangel-Prince, Saint Jophiel. Saint Jophiel is the angel of depth and inwardness, the “Ploughman”, the angel of penance and atonement. Saint Ezechiel is the angel of stability, of singleness of purpose and steadfastness. In the wonderfully harmonious structure of the High Princes’ part of the choir, each angel, through his own being, gives the other his colouring and form. Thus Saint Jophiel gives his brother Saint Ezechiel the great longing for God, the will to atonement, the striving for inwardness; Saint Ezechiel, in turn, gives his brother Saint Jophiel stability in the depths, firmness of aim in ploughing, the strong, calm hand. Together, in the seven-coloured rainbow of the Queen, they are the violet, which inclines on the one side to the blue of faithfulness and on the other to the red of self-giving. They are the chord of longing and simplicity, which we may call A minor.
Saint Jophiel bears as his symbol the shell with the roaring of the seas, which is an image both of longing for God and of the pilgrimage to God. Saint Ezechiel, however, bears as his symbol the one denarius, for one thing only is necessary: God; One is our reward: God. This one denarius is the seed which Saint Ezechiel offers to the Lord today. So, in the unspeakable Love of God, the office of Guardian Angel becomes the one denarius which every angel – whether at the first or at the last hour – can win, and in which the Lord Himself is hidden, He, the one true reward of all His own.
Prayer: Great, kind friend and angel with the one denarius, Saint Ezechiel, order our lives by this one principle, “God alone suffices!”, and let us become guardian angels to all those around us. Amen.