In the next place, Communion is an act which possesses a peculiar significance for the forgiven sinner. It should have. It was sin that made Him die, and Communion is a memorial of His death. But why is it that a contrite sinner, burdened with the memory of the many outrages he has committed against Jesus Christ by his bad life, by his cursing, his profanation of the Holy Name, his drunkenness and debaucheries, his lies and thefts, his dark crimes, it may be, that make even his brother men shun him as they would a poisonous reptile--why is it, I ask, that even such an one, coming, heartily sorry, to Confession, ready and eager to amend his life and do better, and so receives absolution, should have such a strange longing, as all forgiven sinners do have, to get Communion, and that as soon as possible? {99} One would think they would rather fear to approach Him, and dread to be confronted with the awful memorial of their crucified and so cruelly offended Lord. Not so. Their hearts are Christian after all; and He draws them to Him closer and closer by the strong cords of love the moment they turn to Him. True, He appoints His priest to forgive them in His name. But that does not satisfy the desire with which He desires to be reconciled with them in person. "Come to Me," He cries from the altar; "come to Me now. My poor lost one. Come, get My kiss of peace. Come, we have been separated too long. I have been watching you. I have heard you praying. I saw you go into the confessional. I heard you tell your sins. I saw the tears course down your cheeks. I felt every throb of your heart. My hand, too, gave you absolution and full forgiveness for all. You went there one of the devil's own. Now you are Mine. Come, now, take Me to your heart. We will be friends again, and I shall have only one reproach to make you; Oh! why have you stayed so long away?" The forgiven sinner knows Jesus is saying all this. {100} Do you wonder that he goes home from confession a happy man; that he counts the hours until he can come back, and thinks the time long until he can go up to the Holy Table, and there clasp his long-forgotten and neglected Lord to his bosom? Oh! the earnest, upturned face, radiant with joy, which makes the priest's hand tremble with sympathetic emotion as he gives him the Holy Sacrament. You have seen friends long separated and divided come together and make up. You know what a touching scene it is. There are smiles upon your lips and sparkling tears in your eyes at the same moment. So it is often here when Jesus meets and makes up with old hardened sinners. Blessed, a million times blessed, be the kind and loving heart of Jesus, which, once laid open by the spear, is never shut to any one who will enter in and abide there.