“GOD has a right to His creature’s homage. If earthly kings and lords may claim from their vassals this recognition of their sovereignty,—the sovereign dominion of the great and first Being, the first Cause and last End of all things, demands it, on an infinitely just title, from beings called forth from nothing by His almighty goodness. And just as by the rent or service which accompanies it, the homage of vassals implies, together with the avowal of their submission, the real, the effective declaration that it is from their liege-lord that they hold their property and rights; so the act, whereby the creature, as such, subjects himself to his Creator, should adequately manifest, by and of itself, that he acknowledges Him as the Lord of all things and the Author of life. Moreover, if, by the infringement of His commands, he has deserved death, and only lives because of the infinite mercy of this his sovereign Lord,—then his act of homage or fealty will not be complete unless it also express an avowal of his guilt and the justice of the punishment. Such is the true notion of Sacrifice, so called because it sets apart from the rest of similar beings, and makes sacred the offering whereby it is expressed: for spirits purely immaterial, the offering or oblation will be interior and exclusively spiritual; but as regards man, this oblation must be spiritual, and at the same time, material, for, being composed of a soul and a body, he owes homage to his God for both.”
— Dom Prosper Guéranger, “Sunday within the Octave of Corpus Christi,” The Liturgical Year
Thanks for visiting!
