For our redemption is not only nearer but wider than we believed, and includes not only humanity but the whole creation groaning and travailing in pain together.... It is not only in poetry but in truth that the Priest bids nature join in his thanksgiving after every Mass. “Let us sing the song of the Three Children which they sang when they blessed the Lord in the furnace of fire.” And the Song of the Three Holy Children, redeemed from the furnace, is also the song of earth redeemed: “O let the earth bless the Lord, yea let it praise him and magnify him for ever.... O ye mountains and hills bless ye the Lord.... O all ye green things upon the earth bless ye the Lord.... O ye wells bless ye the Lord.... O ye seas and floods.... O all ye fowls of the air.... O all ye beasts and cattle—join to-day with the angels and with the priests of the Lord, with the servants of his sanctuary and the spirits and souls of the righteous, with all holy and humble men of heart, in singing the song of our redemption which we sing in the midst of the furnace of fire, praising and magnifying him for ever.” “The angel of the Lord came down into the oven and smote the flame of the fire out of the oven; and made the midst of the furnace as it had been a moist whistling wind. Then the three, as out of one mouth praised, glorified and blessed God in the furnace, saying: Blessed art thou, O Lord God of our fathers, and to be praised and exalted above all for ever.” The heart of the burning fiery furnace has become Joseph of Arimathea’s garden—the garden of the new earth and of the new spring, the blessed country where all the works of the Lord praise the Lord, the home of the children of men, of the holy souls and of the angels, where the risen Christ stands between the sun and moon, and greets the Church of his new creation with “Peace be unto you.” ● Transcriber’s Notes: ○ Text that was in italics is enclosed by underscores (_italics_).