The right image can carry a good deal more meaning than the words used to express it.  That famous visual in Paul’s letter to the Corinthians, “a treasure held in earthen vessels,” is a special one of them.

Earthen Vessels: containers made of breakable material, receptacles constructed of glass or plaster that would break into a thousand pieces if dropped. This is the image Paul is using for each of us, fragile and breakable vessels, thin containers that could fall apart at the slightest impact and spill out whatever they’re holding.

The treasure they contain: the reference here is to the richest of all treasures, the Divine Presence, the incomparable treasure of God’s own Self spilling over the brittle edges of that vase.

And then the lesson St Paul draws. Over a lifetime, we the vessels come under much pressure. We experience strains that can easily rip cracks in those walls that are us. Paul goes on to name just a few of those stressors – afflictions, persecutions, abandonment.

But then he returns to what—or rather, to Whom—is alive and inexhaustible inside each one of us. It is Aliveness itself: God’s own Presence dwelling at our deepest level, enlivening us and sustaining us in our weakness at every moment.

Will we, the earthen vessels, feel the different strains building pressure against the sides of that cup? Yes indeed. Will we the receptacles and containers experience things which tear away the threads knitting these cups together? Yes again, and repeatedly so. But following the image to its gracious ending, our cooperation with the Divine Presence that’s always filling that vessel will take us through those strains and even breakages. It will refill us with God’s healing love, the love poured out so visibly in the life and death and risen life of God’s own Son, Jesus Christ.

Two quotes from St. Elizabeth Ann Seton and St. Vincent attest to the “earthiness” of their own vessel:

Almighty Giver of all Mercies, Father of all, who knows my Heart and pities its weakness and errors, Thou knows the desire of my Soul is to do Thy Will. It struggles to wing its flight to Thee its creator, and sinks again in sorrow for that imperfection which draws it back to Earth.

(St. Elizabeth, Document 8.22. “Almighty Giver of all Mercies…,” n.d., CW, 3a:36 –37.) 

Remember, Monsieur that roses are not gathered except in the midst of thorns and that heroic acts of virtue are accomplished only in weakness.

(Volume: 2 | Page#: 21-22) To Jacques Tholard, In Annecy, 1 February 1640 added on 6/28/2011)