The Refiner's Fire

The first reading for the Mass on this Feast of the Presentation is from the prophet Malachi. “There will come to the temple the Lord whom you seek,” he prophesizes, “but who will endure the day of his coming.” Why does he say this? Because the Lord comes to bring purification. And purification is often difficult to endure, as you probably know well. Listen to the prophet:

. . . he is like refiner’s fire, or like the fuller’s lye. He will sit refining and purifying silver, and he will purify the sons of Levi, refining them like gold or like silver that they may offer due sacrifice to the Lord.”

And so the purification is coming like fire and lye. But always remember this: we are being purified because in the eyes of God, we are silver and gold. Silver and gold: we are not wretches, or worthless junk thrown on top of a heap of refuse. To God, we are worth saving—so much so that he will live a human life with us and embrace more suffering than we can ever know—for us. And it is there that we find our worth.

Nonetheless, purification is painful. Consider this, if you will: When I need to ask for forgiveness that means that I know I have sinned. And when I know I have sinned, that means that I also know what is the right way, the way I have chosen not to go. When I know the right way and I know that I have not lived up to it, I am humbled and contrite. This is purification. About this, Rabbi Rami Shapiro writes “being humbled, the lesser self is engulfed in the greater Self the way the light of a single candle is engulfed by the light of the sun.” (Perennial Wisdom, © 2013, p. 142)

And so, the Feast of the Presentation is not a gloomy event. It is filled with life and light and joy, and the prophetess Anna “gave thanks to God and spoke about the child to all who were awaiting the redemption of Jerusalem.”

This Feast holds special meaning for me, because it was during the celebration of the Mass at Saint Anselm Abbey in 1983 that I at last made a definite decision that I was going to hopefully become a monk of Saint Anselm Abbey. It is a decision that I have never regretted, even during times of fire and lye and purification. Thanks be to God! And may He bless you richly on this day.