The Mystic Number of Seven

From Vultus Christi:

The mystic number of seven signifies the fullness that overflows into eternity. The duties of our service, nostrae servitutis officia, are but a foretaste of heaven where our adoration and our praise will never cease. The vocation to perpetual adoration is a vocation to heaven on earth. Rightly did the Venerable Mother Caterina Lavizzari repeat, Gesù–Ostia è il nostro Paradiso in terra. This is the phrase that appears on the mementos printed after her death on Christmas day 1931.

Our obligation to the full Divine Office, by day and by night, though it be demanding of our time, of our best energies, and of our sustained attention, is the sweet duty of love. While all the community may not be present for every Hour of the Divine Office, when even a representative nucleus of the community assemble for the praise of God, they do so in communion of mind and heart with the absent brethren. The labours of the absent brethren, or their infirmity, or the duties that under obedience oblige them to be elsewhere, do not break the “charity that is the bond which makes us complete.” (Colossians 3:14). In the Epistle to the Colossians, the Apostles gives us the context of the Opus Dei. He says:

Put ye on therefore, as the elect of God, holy, and beloved, the bowels of mercy, benignity, humility, modesty, patience: bearing with one another, and forgiving one another, if any have a complaint against another: even as the Lord hath forgiven you, so do you also. But above all these things have charity, which is the bond of perfection: and let the peace of Christ rejoice in your hearts, wherein also you are called in one body: and be ye thankful. Let the word of Christ dwell in you abundantly, in all wisdom: teaching and admonishing one another in psalms, hymns, and spiritual canticles, singing in grace in your hearts to God. All whatsoever you do in word or in work, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, giving thanks to God and the Father by him. (Colossians 3:12–17)

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