the feet of Jesus.
Perhaps we have not got there yet, but are only on the way. Perhaps our
religion as yet is a formality and not a devotion. Perhaps our pride
still struggles against the Catholic practice of religion. Then why not
give way now, to-night? Let Mary take you and lead you to Jesus. She
will bring you to him with her half-suggestion, half-prayer: "He has no
wine." He has got to the end of his strength, and he has found the
weariness of self, he is ready for healing. O my divine Son, is not this
your opportunity, your "hour"?

Jesus loves to have us bring one another to Him. It is so obviously the
response to His Spirit, that carrying out of His teaching, so to love
the brother that we may bring him to the healing of the Cross. To care
for the spiritual needs of the brother is a real ministry: it is an
extension of Christ in us that clothes us with the power to aid other
souls in work or prayer. What a beautiful picture of this work there is
in the Gospel of St. John. "And there were certain Greeks among them
that came up to worship at the feast: the same came therefore to Philip,
which was of Bethsaida of Galilee, and desired him, saying, Sir, we
would see Jesus. Philip cometh and telleth Andrew: and again Andrew and
Philip tell Jesus." And this work of presenting souls to Jesus which is
so clearly one of our chief privileges, how should not that be also the
privilege of all the saints, and especially of the Holy Mother? Blessed
Mary, we may be sure, delights in leading souls who so hesitatingly come
to her, to the presence of her Son,--just presenting them in their need
and with her prayer, which is all the plea that is needed to attract the
love and mercy of Jesus. "Why not," ask certain people who have not
thought out the meaning of Catholic dogma, "why not go at once to our
Lord; why go in this roundabout way?" Why not? Because of our human
qualities. Because we need company and sympathy. For the same reason
precisely that makes us ask one another's prayers here. "The Father
Himself loveth you." Why in this roundabout way ask me to pray? You do
not come to me because you lack faith in God or in God's love; you come
to me because you feel, if only implicitly, that in the Body of Christ
association in love and sympathy and work is a high privilege, and that
it is God's will that we should work together and "bear one another's
burdens." And the frontiers of the Kingdom of God are not the frontiers
of the C