Moonstruck

Et ipsi videtis, fratres, quod mea non cessat humilitas omni circa vos sollicitudine laborare, et ad frugem bonam vos tota festinatione convertere: sed quanto plus laboro vobiscum, tanto amplius confundor in vobis. Cum enim video tot commonitionibus meis nullum vos habere profectum, labor meus jam non gratulationi est, sed rubori. Dicit Apostolis: Quis plantavit vineam, et de fructru ejus non edit? Quis pascit gregem, et de lacte gregis non percipit? Ecce ego pasco gregem Christi, et gregis fructum extorquere non valeo; pasco gregem Domini, et nulla ex eo religiositatis alimenta percipio. Nulla enim me fidei ejus dulcedo laetifcat; sed quidquid ex eo profluit asperum et amarum est; tunc enim pastor Christiani gregis lacte reficitur, quando bonorum operum ejus candore laetatur. Quis enim, fratres, in vobis, non graviter ferat (non tamen de omnibus dico, sunt enim inter vos quos ad religionis cultum debeatis habere exemplo,) quis, inquam, non moleste ferat, sic vos esse vestrae salutis immemores, ut etiam coelo teste peccetis? Nam cum ante dies plerosque de vestrae avaritiae cupiditate pulsaverim, ipse die circa vesperum tanta vociferatio populi exstitit, ut irreligiositas ejus penetraret ad coelum. Quod cum requirerem quid sibi clamor hic velit? dixerunt mihi quod laboranti lunae vestra vociferatio subveniret, et defectum ejus suis clamoribus adjuvaret. Risi equidem, et miratus sum vanitatem, quod quasi devotii Christiani Deo ferebatis auxilium. Clamabatis enim ne, tacentibus vobis, perderet elementum: tanquam infirmus enim et imbecillis, nisi vestris adjuvaretur vocibus, non posset luminaria delendere quae creavit; bene igitur facitis, qui Divinitati exhibetis solatium, ut vobis juvantibus possit coelum regere. Sed si vultis hoc plenius facere, cunctis et totis noctibus pervigilare debetis: nam quoties putatis, vobis dormientibus, luna vim passa est; et tamen de coelo non corruit? Aut numquid semper circa vesperum defectum patitur, non aliquando et circa lucem laborat? Sed apud vos vespertinis tantum horis laborare consuevit, quando copiosa coena venter distenditur, quando majoribus poculis caput movetur. Tunc igitur apud vos laborat luna, quando laborat et vinum, tunc, inquam, apud vos turbatur carminibus globus lunae, quando calicibus turbantur et oculi. Quomodo igitur, ebrius, videre potes circa lunam quid agatur in coelo, qui circa te non vides quod agatur in terra? Hoc est plane, quod ait Salomon dicens: Stultus ut luna mutatur. Mutaris enim, sicut luna, dum stultus et insipiens ad motum ejus, qui Christianus fueras, incipis esse sacrilegus. Sacrilegium enim Creatori committitur, dum imbecillitas ascribitur creaturae. Mutaris ergo, sicut luna, ut qui paulo ante fidei devotione fulgebas, postea perfidiae infirmitate deficias; mutaris, sicut luna, dum cerebrum tuum ita exinanitur sapientia, sicut lunae obscuritas; te vero teterrimae tenebrae mentis invadunt. Atque utinam, o stulte, sicut luna muteris! Illa enim cito ad plenitudinem suam redit; tu ad sapientiam nec sero converteris; illa velociter colligit quod amiserat lumen, tu nec tarde fidem recipis quam negasti gravior ergo tua quam lunae mutatio est; luna defectum luminis patitur, tu salutis. Quam bene scriptum est de sapiente: Et permanebit cum sole; permanet enim sapiens cum sole, cum constantia fidei permanet cum Salvatore. Sed dicet aliquis: Luna igitur non laborat? Laborat plane, negare non possumus; sed laborat cum caeteris creaturis, sicut Apostolus dicit: Quia omnis creatura ingemiscit, et parturit usque adhuc; et infra: Quoniam et ipsa creatura liberabitur a servitute corruptionis, et reliqua. Liberabitur, inquit, a servitute; vides ergo, quoniam luna non laborat carminibus, sed laborat obsequiis; non laborat periculis, sed laborat serviat. Vanitati enim creatura subjecta est non sponte, et reliqua. Ergo luna a statu suo non sponte mutatur, te de sensu tuo sponte mutaris; illa in diminutionem sui conditione deducitur, tu in detrimentum tui voluntate pertraheris. Nolo igitur, frater, ita sis, sicut luna, cum deficit; sed esto, sicut quando est plena atque perfecta; scriptum est enim de justo: Sicut luna in aeternum, et testis in coelo fidelis. Sanctus Maximus Taurinensis, Homilia C, De defectione lunae I Source: Migne PL 57.483c-486c

And you see, brothers, that my humility does not cease to have care for you in everything, even that you would turn to good fruit with all haste; but the more I labour for you, the more I am confounded by you. When I see that none of you are improved by my admonishments, my labour has no thanks but only blushes. The Apostle says: 'Who plants the vine and does not eat of its fruit? Who pastures the flock and does not drink of its milk?' 1 Behold, I pasture a flock of Christ and I am not able to partake of the fruit. I pasture the flock of the Lord, and I acquire from it no sustenance of piety. For nothing pleases me in the sweetness of its faith, but whatever from it is produced is sharp and bitter. Then indeed the shepherd of the Christian flock is refreshed by milk when he rejoices in the splendour of good works. Who among you, brothers, is not burdened? I do not speak of everyone, for they are some of you who give witness to the reverence of religion which you should have. Who, I say, is not troubled, so that you are forgetful of your salvation, so even with witness of heaven you sin? For a few days before I was intending to chide you for avarious desires, in the evening, there was such a clamour from the people, that its impiety reached even to heaven. And what happened when I sought what this noise might be? They said to me that your crying out came about because of the diminishing of the moon, and that with your cries you sought to bring aid to its lessening. Well, I laughed, and I wondered at your vanity, that as devout Christians you would give aid to God. You cried out lest because of your silence  that element perish. He is so weak and foolish that unless your cries aid, He is not able to preserve the luminary which He created. You do well, then, you who exhibit such concern for the Deity, that by your help He is able to rule heaven. But if you wish to do this fully, every night and through the whole night you should keep watch, for think how many times, while you sleep, the moon loses its strength, and yet from heaven it does not fall? Or is it that it is always around evening that it suffers its diminuation and its light never fades at any other time? But with you only the evening hours befit, when your bellies are swollen with heavy meals, when your heads spin after many drinks. Then you fall into decline like the moon, when you bend over cups. Then, I say, you spin about with songs for the sphere of the moon, when your eyes spin about on account of drinking. How, being drunk, are you able to see that moon is changed in heaven when you are not able to see what is happening around you on the earth? This is plain, what Solomon says: 'A fool changes like the moon.' 2 Thus you are changed, like the moon, when you are moved to stupidity and foolishness by its changes. You who were Christians begin to be sacrilegious. For he commits sacrifledge against the Creator while he ascribes foolishness to that which is created. You are changed, then, like the moon, so that he who a little while ago shone with the devotion of faith, diminishes into the treachery of faithlessness. You are changed like the moon when your heads having been emptied of wisdom are as the darkening of the moon, you who are possessed by the monstrous darkness of your minds. And that it might be, O fool, that you changed like the moon! She quickly returns to fullness, you, however, do not come back to your senses in the evening. She quickly gathers up the light she has lost, you are slow to regain the faith which you have denied. Worse, then, is your change than the moon's. The moon is afflicted with the loss of its light, you lose salvation. How well it has been written concerning wisdom: 'And she will remain with the sun.' 3 For wisdom remains with the sun when the constancy of faith remains with the Saviour. But let someone say: 'Does the moon, then, not diminish?' Certainly it does, I do not deny it, but it suffers with other created things, as the Apostle says: 'Because all creation groans and would birth even yet.' And after this: 'For creation will be liberated from the servitude of corruption.' and the rest. It shall be liberated, he says, from servitude. Thus you see that the moon does not diminish because it is need of songs, but in service; it does not decline on account of some danger, but as its duty. 'For creation is subject to vanity not of its own will etc' 4 Thus the moon does not change state on its own accord, as you change from a sensible state. She is lead to the lessening of her condition, you by your own will drag yourself off to worse. I do not want you to be, brothers, like the moon when she diminishes. But be as when she is full and perfect, as it is written of the righteous man: 'Like the moon in eternity, and a faithful witness in heaven.' 5 Saint Maximus of Turin, Homily 100, On an Eclipse of the Moon 1 Mt 19.24 2 Sirach 27.11 3 Ps 71.5 4 Rom 8.22,21,20 5 Ps 88.38