"Were Not Our Hearts Burning?"

The following is a reflection from St. John Henry Newman, a member of the first English-speaking congregation of the Oratory in London. Newman was known for his eloquent preaching and was a convert following the Oxford Movement. Last fall, Pope Leo XIV made him a Doctor of the Church. 

Observe what was the nature of [Jesus’] presence in the Church after his Resurrection. It was this that he came and went as he pleased; that material substances, such as the fastened doors, were no impediments to his coming; and that when he was present, his disciples did not, as a matter of course, know him. Saint Mark says he appeared to the two disciples who were going into the country, to Emmaus, in another form. Saint Luke, who gives the account more at length, says that while he talked with them, their heart burned within them. And it is worth remarking that the two disciples do not seem to have been conscious of this at the time, but on looking back, they recollected that as having been, which did not strike them while it was.

For so it was ordained, that Christ should not be both seen and known at once; first he was seen, then he was known. Only by faith is he known to be present; he is not recognized by sight. When he opened his disciples’ eyes, he at once vanished. He removed his visible presence, and left but a memorial of himself. He vanished from sight that he might be present in a sacrament; and in order to connect his visible presence with his presence invisible, he for one instant manifested himself to their open eyes; manifested himself, if I may so speak, while he passed from his hiding place of sight without knowledge to that of knowledge without sight.

Christ has promised he will be with us to the end…. How he effects it we know not; in what precisely it consists we know not. We see him not, but we are to believe that we possess him—that we have been brought under the virtue of his healing hand, of his life-giving breath, of the manna flowing from his lips, and of the blood issuing from his side. And hereafter, on looking
back, we shall be conscious that we have been thus favored…. Christians, on looking back on years past, will feel, at least in a degree, that Christ has been with them, though they knew it not, only believed it, at the time.

They will even recollect then the burning of their hearts. Nay, though they seemed not even to believe anything at the time, yet afterwards, if they have come to him in sincerity, they will experience a sort of heavenly fragrance and savor of immortality, when they least expect it, rising upon their minds, as if in token that God has been with them, and investing all that has
taken place, which before seemed to them but earthly, with beams of glory.