NEUOFFENBARUNG← Gifts of Heaven · Volume 2 · Contents
Jesuits, opera and the cult of the host
6th June 1844
Oh Lord! Let me, poor sinner, ask you a few questions, so that by Your answer, oh holy Father, my mind may be enlightened and relieved!
[1] The Lord: “Ask then your questions which are not very important.” Oh Lord! What am I to think of the present predominance of the Jesuits and other orders?
[2] As much as from a snow in the month of March, which falls today and is destroyed tomorrow by the sun's rays! When the snow covers the area, it looks rather sad and it has the appearance of a deep winter. But only a few hours of sunshine, and the so powerfully threatening winter is no more!
[3] See, that is what the present institution of this Congregation thinks! Have you not seen how the parasitic plants attach themselves to a tree, as if they wanted to give the weak one a new life force ?! But it is precisely them that are the full death of the tree! Do you understand this picture? What should I, dearest Lord and Father, think of yesterday's opera, which was very uplifting from a musical point of view? How am I supposed to take it that I would not go against your mind?!
[4] This is a purely worldly thing that is none of My business! – But you can remember that: this opera, or rather musical comedy, is like any human work that always consists of garbage and gold! The "rubbish" is the material, and in the comedy, the shameful action. The "gold" is the spiritual activity before any material act – but is turned into rubbish by the action.
[5] So is the case with the music in this comedy! It is a gold with which a heap of rubbish is gilded, but which nevertheless stinks a lot through the beautiful gold, and especially for young people whose sensual nostrils are very sensitive!
[6] The plot is true in a hellish way. Because this is how purely infernal spirits does. The so-called "Don Juan" is from the third hell, his companion from the second and most of the other staff from the first! Now ask yourself whether such infernal stuff is suitable to be clothed in heavenly things?!
[7] Before the world it seems as if it is precisely here that there is the greatest harmony between the action and between the music. But right here in front of Me is the greatest disharmony between the action and between the music. Because the more cunning an action is, the less it is suitable for music!
[8] You are now thinking and saying to yourself: By such a shameful act that reaches it’s infernal goal, people can only be deterred rather than led to similar acts.
[9] But I tell you: Examples are like a draught-patch, which also draws out the good juices, and leaves the bad ones the more firmly in the skin – The plaster often stops the pain, but not because of the reduction of the bad juices, but only because the plaster literally kills off the area which was formerly sensitive to pain, due to the deprivation of the good juices.
[10] And behold, it is just so that the so-called moral betterment is also achieved by the performance of infernal ways of acting! They draw the noble feelings out of the better soul, and then kill half the soul by the left behind base feelings, whose birthplace is hell. And it takes quite a lot to heal the evil wound and revive the half-dead soul!
[11] See, this is a perfect "review" of your musical comedy yesterday. The world would hardly approve of it, but alone in the heavens it is judged in this way.
[12] But if anyone sets notes to words, he should always set notes only to words from heaven, but never to words of the world. Because the notes are heavenly pure in and of themselves.
[13] But it is best to set the notes alone and listen to them in their melodic and harmonic ways. Because then they are like the speech in the heavens, which can also be heard as the purest music in a distant state!
[14] Understand and observe these things carefully. Oh Lord, oh holy, dear Father! What is the matter with the Feast of Corpus Christi? Shall we celebrate it as the Roman Church wants us to?
[15] I don't feel like talking about it! Under this feast the invention and establishment of the host and also the monstrance is celebrated! But what is the host and what is the monstrance – and what is the feast? Am I and the host one? And is the monstrance like heaven, which is My eternal throne ?!
[16] But if there were an emperor who had given all his subjects a memorial, like I did the love feast with bread and wine once – and the subjects would not be satisfied with the memorial, but would like to remodel it and shape it so that it with would not have the slightest resemblance to the first, then honored this completely changed memorial more than the emperor himself and in the end would not want to regard the emperor as the emperor, but merely the redesigned memorial as the living emperor.
[17] And if the emperor himself came and asked "What are you doing? Is this my sign?" And the subjects would then mock the emperor, always rebelling against him and saying "So this sign has been given to us by the emperor, and it is the emperor himself who is alive, and there is no other emperor! If you do not recognize this sign as the real and living true one, then you are not the emperor, but only a heretical emperor, a prince of hell, and you are guilty of death by fire forever!
[18] Say! How will this reply taste to the true emperor because of the memorial? See, so this festival also pleases Me!
[19] But what would an emperor say to his servant who said to his face: "I trample your kingdom and I have you in My power!" – and then the servant would still give the emperor festivals as if he, the servant, have some hold on the emperor – will the emperor attend this festival and delight in it?!
[20] I think that the emperor will leave it just fine. But I also think that this will be the same case from my side at a very similar feast!
[21] And finally I also think that you will have enough of what has been said so far. But hide these lines well! Because they would be too displeasing to those who do not consider Me, but only consider and set the greatly changed symbol as everything!
[22] I tell you all of this as if in quiet trust. So don't share it with many! That is My good, holy will! But your friends may already know. Amen.