Weekday
2023-01-11
The Meaning of the Incarnation in Ordinary Time
A Meditation by Dom Augustin Guillerand
Instead of attempting to free ourselves from the things of the senses, or
abstracting from them, we should try to probe deeper into them; not stopping at
their external appearance, which changes, but seeking what is hidden deep in
their substance: their being, in a word. For God is Being. And thus we shall find
him beneath the veil of the senses.
This is the meaning of the Incarnation. God became tangible, in order to
teach us to find him in all that we touch and see and feel; for we are necessarily
bound to the senses in this life. Jesus did not do away with these external
contacts; what he taught us is not to stop at them. He taught us to find His
Father in everything: in the flowers, in the lilies of the field, in the birds, in
sorrow – in everything, because everything comes from his love, and must return
to it. That while we acknowledge him as God seen by men, we may be drawn by
him to the love of things unseen.
We must endeavour, therefore, to cultivate this spiritual ‘second sight’. It
is the secret of the saints, for whom this world is not an obstacle between their
souls and God, but a living image, a resplendent mirror of his goodness and
beauty. It is this great Reality, so utterly beyond our conception, that the
Incarnation made possible: that by loving and imitating Jesus incarnate, we love
and imitate God himself.
Dom Augustin Guillerand. Where Silence is Praise. Trans. A Monk of Parkminster. London: Darton,
Longman & Todd, 1960. 121-122.

St. Aelred of Rievaulx
2023-01-12
From Homily 26 on the Prophetic Burdens of Isaiah
by St Aelred of Rievaulx
Wishing to make his soldiers lightly armed for this spiritual war, our
leader says, Those who do not renounce all their possessions cannot be my
disciples. And again, Those who do not hate their father and mother and wife
and children, and even their own soul, cannot be my disciples. And so the
lightly armed soldiers…are those who disentangle themselves from all this
world’s affairs and riches, from all their longings and even from their own will.
They can thus safely resist the Moabite vices into which they had fallen and
nakedly follow the naked Christ.
When these lightly armed soldiers feel themselves attacked by natural
provocations, demonic suggestions, or their own thoughts, they send forth to God
a loud wail of the heart and a wretched lamentation of voice with tears and sighs,
saying with the prophet, I am terribly afflicted and lowly; I roared out my
complaint from my heart.
…Thanks be to you, good Jesus! Truly, your compassion is over all your
works! If inwardly where God sees, a person’s heart turns to God and is crushed,
then God’s heart will soon turn to that person. God’s heart expresses his
goodness and compassion. My heart will cry out to Moab. Moab wails in
repentance; Christ cries out in mercy. Moab wails in fear; Christ cries out by
showing pity. Moab wails in confession; Christ cries out with forgiveness. Moab
seeing the strong wind coming, fears and wails; Christ, stretching out his hand
and crying out, rebukes the hesitating, trembling one, saying You of little faith,
why did you doubt? The cry thus answers the wail, desire answers desire, mercy
answers the wretched one; the doctor, the sick one; compassion, the one laboring
and in pain.
Further…the depths of Scripture…are opened to us when the Lord cries out
in our hearts…The more outer persecution or inner disturbance saddens us, the
more does divine consolation from the sacred writings cheer us. For whatever
has been written was written for our instruction, so that we might have hope
through the patience and consolation of the Scriptures. I say to you, brothers,
nothing adverse can happen, nothing so sad or so bitter can take place, which
does not quickly vanish or is not more easily endured as soon as the sacred page
is opened to us. This is the field to which Isaac went to meditate when the day
was already drawing to a close; Rebecca met him there and relieved his pain with
her sweetness.
How often does day give way to evening for me, good Jesus! How often
does unbearable pain take the place of what little consolation I have, just as the
dark of night succeeds daylight. All things turn to boredom, and everything that I
see is a burden. If someone speaks, I barely hear; if someone knocks, I barely
perceive it. My heart grows as hard as a rock, my tongue clings to my palate, and
my eyes dry up. What then? I go out, of course, to the field to meditate, I reflect
on the sacred book, and I fix my meditations in wax. Then suddenly, Rebecca
comes to meet me. In other words, your grace, good Jesus, scatters the darkness
with your light, drives away boredom, and breaks up the hardness. Soon tears
follow sighs, and heavenly joy accompanies tears. Unhappy are those who do not
enter this field and rejoice in this way when some sadness disturbs them!
Aelred of Rievaulx. Homilies on the Prophetic Burdens of Isaiah. CF 83. Trans. Lewis White.
Collegeville, MN: Cistercian Publications, 2018. 256-265.

Weekday
2023-01-13
The Promises of Our Lord
A Discourse by Symeon the New Theologian
What then are the promises of our Lord Jesus Christ, God’s Son Himself,
on which he hangs? Listen intelligently to that which He promises us. “…there
will be joy in heaven over one sinner who repents”, and again, “Him who comes
to Me…I will by no means cast out”… Elsewhere He says, “Draw near to Me and I
will draw near to you”, and “Come to Me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I
will give you rest…And He says, “If you who are evil men know how to give good
gifts to your children, will not your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those
who ask Him?”
He who ceaselessly keeps all these things in mind, and others like them,
and occupies himself with them day and night, and thinks of them with mind and
sense and puts them zealously into practice, will gradually be separated from
memory of the world, of secular affairs, of possessions, and of his own family and
friends, and correspondingly draw nearer to spiritual things. As he daily
advances he will notice how the thoughts of the passions to which he is prone are
gradually withdrawing, then how these passions themselves diminish, and how
the heart is softened and comes to humility; then in turn how the heart gives rise
to thoughts that bring about humbleness of mind…Nevertheless he arrives at this
through many tribulations and the more he is humbled the more he feels
compunction. Humiliation brings about affliction, but affliction feels the
humility that is its source and makes it grow. This activity, which is exercised by
the fulfilling of the commandments, washes away – what a marvel! – every stain
from the soul. It expels every passion and every evil lust, by which I mean not
only those of the body but also of the world. Thus a man will be set free in soul
from every earthly desire, and that not only from physical bonds – it is as when
one puts off a garment and is completely stripped. Rightly so, for the soul is
stripped of its insensitivity, which God’s apostle calls a “veil,” that “lies on the
hearts” of the unbelieving…Then, just as he who has been physically stripped
naked sees the wounds of his body, so he who has been stripped spiritually may
clearly see the passions that cling to his soul… So he applies the commandments
to them as medicines, and trials as cautery, and is humbled and sorrowful, and
fervently seeks God’s help. He clearly sees the grace of the Holy Spirit coming to
him and tearing all these [passions] away from him one after the other and
eliminating them until it has entirely freed his soul from them all. The coming of
the Paraclete grants freedom to the soul, not merely in part, but completely and
totally…Thus it renews and restores a man both spiritually and physically, so that
such a person seems to be clothed, not with a corruptible and gross body, but
with one that is spiritual and immaterial and even now ready for the rapture…For
whenever the mind is united to the objects of intellect it finds itself entirely
beyond the realm of sense, even though it appears to be looking at sensible
objects.
Symeon The New Theologian. The Discourses. The Classics of Western Spirituality. New York: Paulist
Press, 1980. 187-189.

Memorial of BVM
2023-01-14
On the Mother of God
A Meditation by St Silouan the Athonite
When the soul abides in the love of God – how good and gracious and festive
all things are! But even with God’s love, sorrows continue and the greater the love,
the greater the sorrow. Never by a single thought did the Mother of God sin, nor did
she ever lose grace, yet vast were her sorrows; when she stood at the foot of the Cross
her grief was as boundless as the ocean and her soul knew torment incomparably
worse than Adam’s when he was driven from paradise, in that the measure of her
love was beyond compare greater than the love which Adam felt when he was in
paradise. That she remained alive was only because the Lord’s might sustained her,
for it was His desire that she should behold His Resurrection, and live on after His
Ascension to be the comfort and joy of the Apostles and the new Christian peoples.
We cannot attain to the full the love of the Mother of God, and so we cannot
thoroughly comprehend her grief. Her love was complete. She had an illimitable
love for God and her Son but she loved the people, too, with a great love. What,
then, must she have felt when those same people whom she loved so dearly, and
whose salvation she desired with all her being, crucified her beloved Son?
We cannot fathom such things, since there is little love in us for God and man.
Just as the love of the Mother of God is boundless and passes our
understanding, so is her grief boundless and beyond our understanding.
Oh holy Virgin Mary, tell us, thy children,
of thy love on earth for thy Son and God.
Tell us how thy spirit rejoiced in God thy Saviour.
Tell us of how thou didst look upon His fair countenance,
and reflect that this was He
Whom all the heavenly hosts wait upon in awe and love…
Tell us of thine agony
when the Lord was delivered up to be crucified,
and lay dying on the Cross.
Tell us what joy was thine over the Resurrection…
Once when I was a young novice I was praying before an ikon of the Mother of
God, and the Jesus Prayer entered into my heart and there began to repeat itself of
its own accord. And another time in church I was listening to a reading from the
prophet Isaiah and at the words, ‘Wash you, make you clean,’ I reflected, ‘Maybe the
Mother of God sinned at one time or another, if only in thought.’ And, marvellous to
relate, in unison with my prayer a voice sounded in my heart, saying clearly, ‘The
Mother of God never sinned even in thought.’ Thus did the Holy Spirit bear witness
in my heart to her purity. But during her earthly life even she was not quite perfect
and complete – she did make some mistakes that did not involve sin. We can see
this from the Gospel when on the return from Jerusalem she did not know where her
Son was, and together with Joseph sought Him for three days…
The Mother of God committed to writing neither her thoughts nor her love for
God and her Son, nor her soul’s suffering at the Crucifixion, because in any case we
could not have understood, for her love for God is stronger and more ardent than the
love of the Seraphim and Cherubim, and all the hosts of angels and archangels
marvel at her.
And though the life of the Mother of God is hidden, as it were in a holy
silence…she embraces the whole world in this love of hers, and in the Holy Spirit
sees all the peoples of the earth, and like her Son pities all men and has compassion
on them…
And this most pure Mother of His, the Lord has bestowed on us. She is our
joy and our expectation. She is our Mother in the spirit, and kin to us by nature, as a
human being, and every Christian soul leaps to her in love.
Archimandrite Sophrony. Saint Silouan the Athonite. Trans. Rosemary Edmonds. Crestwood, NY: St
Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 1999. 390-393

Skema
2023-01-15
Biblical Readings for Office and Mass
2nd Week in Ordinary Time

Mass Readings: Sunday (A), Weekdays (I)
January 15 – 21, 2023

Sun
15
Mon
16
Tue
17
Wed
18
Thu
19
Fri
20
Sat
21

Office
2nd Sunday
Office for the Dead
St Anthony
Weekday
Weekday
Bl Cyprian Tansi
St Agnes

Vigils
Judg 4:1-24
Judg 5:1-31
Judg 6:1-18
Judg 6:19-40
Judg 7:1-22
Judg 7:23-8:21
Judg 8:22-35

Lauds
Zech 3:1-7
Zech 3:8-4:5
Zech 4:6-10a
Zech 4:10b-5:4
Zech 5:5-11
Zech 6:1-8
Zech 6:9-15

Mass
64
311
312
313
314
315
316

1st
Isa 49:3, 5-6
Heb 5:1-10
Heb 6:10-20
Heb 7:1-3, 15-17
Heb 7:25-8:6
Heb 8:6-13
Heb 9:2-3, 11-14

2nd
1 Cor 1:1-3

Gospel
John 1:29-34
Mark 2:18-22
Mark 2:23-28
Mark 3:1-6
Mark 3:7-12
Mark 3:13-19
Mark 3:20-21

Vespers
Eph 3:1-7
Eph 3:8-13
Eph 3:14-21
Eph 4:1-6
Eph 4:7-16
Eph 4:17-24
Eph 4:25-32

Vigils Reading - 2nd Sun ORD
2023-01-15
A Commentary on the Gospel of John1 by Cyril of Alexandria
When he saw Jesus coming toward him, John said: Behold the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world.” No longer does he say: Prepare. That would be out of place now that at last he who was prepared for is seen, is before our very eyes. The nature of the case now calls for a different type of homily. An explanation is needed of who is present, and why he has come down to us from heaven. So John says: Behold the Lamb of God, of whom the prophet Isaiah told us in the words: He was led like a sheep to the slaughter, and like a lamb before his shearer he opened not his mouth. In past ages he was typified by the law of Moses, but because the law was merely a figure and a foreshadowing, its salvation was only partial; its mercy did not reach out to embrace the whole world. But now the true lamb, the victim without blemish obscurely prefigured in the former times, is led to the slaughter for all to banish sin from the world, to overthrow the world’s destroyer, to abolish death by dying for the entire human race, and to release us from the curse: Dust you are and to dust you shall return. He will become the second Adam who is not of earth but of heaven, and will be for us the source of every blessing. He will deliver us from the corruptibility foreign to our nature; he will secure eternal life for us, reconcile us with God, teach us to revere God and to live upright lives, and be our way to the kingdom of heaven.
Our Lamb died for all to restore the whole flock on earth to God the Father; one died for all to make all subject to God; one died for all to gain all so that all might live no longer for themselves, but for him who died and was raised to life for them.
Because our many sins had made us subject to death and corruption, the Father gave his son as our redemption, one for all, since we all were in him and he

was greater than all. One died for all so that all of us might live in him. Death swallowed the Lamb who was sacrificed for all, and then disgorging him, disgorged all of us in him and with him; for we were all in Christ who died and rose for us.
Once sin had been destroyed how could death, which was caused by sin, fail to be wholly annihilated? What power will death have over us now that sin has been blotted out? And so, rejoicing in the sacrifice of the Lamb let us cry out: O death, where is your victory? O grave, where is your sting? All wickedness shall hold its tongue, as the Psalmist sings somewhere. Henceforth it will be unable to denounce sinners for their weakness, for God is the one who acquits us. Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for our sake, so that we might escape the curse brought down on us by sin.

1 Journey with the Fathers – Year A – New City Press – 1992 – pg 80.

Vigils Reading - Office for the Dead
2023-01-16
THE MOMENT OF DEATH
from the Desert Sayings of Abba Theophilus
Abba Theophilus said: “What fear, what trembling, what uneasiness will there be for us when our soul is separated from the body. Then indeed the force and strength of the adverse powers come against us, the rulers of darkness, those who command the world of evil, the principalities, the powers, the spirits of evil. They accuse our souls as in a lawsuit, bringing before it all the sins it has committed, whether deliberately or through ignorance, from its youth until the time when it has been taken away. So they stand accusing it of all it has done. Furthermore, what anxiety do you suppose the soul will have at that hour, until sentence is pronounced and it gains its liberty. That is its hour of affliction, until it sees what will happen to it. On the other hand, the divine powers stand on the opposite side, and they present the good deeds of the soul. Consider the fear and trembling of the soul standing between them until in judgment it receives the sentence of the righteous judge. If it is judged worthy, the demons will receive their punishment, and it will be carried away by the angels. Then thereafter you will be without disquiet, or rather you will live according to that which is written: ‘Even as the habitation of those who rejoice is in you.’ Then will the Scripture be fulfilled: ‘Sorrow and sighing shall flee away.’
Then your liberated soul will go on to that joy and ineffable glory in which it will be established. But if it is found to have lived carelessly, it will hear that terrible voice: ‘Take away the ungodly, that he may not see the glory of the Lord.’ Then the day of anger, the day of affliction, the day of darkness and shadow seizes upon it. Abandoned to outer darkness and condemned to everlasting fire it will be punished through the ages without end. Where then is the vanity of the world? Where is vainglory? Where is carnal life? Where are enjoyments? Where is imagination?

Where is ease? Where is boasting? Riches? Nobility? Father, mother, brother? Who could take the soul out of its pains when it is burning in the fire, and remove it from bitter torments?
Since this is so, in what manner ought we not to give ourselves to holy and devout works? What love ought we to acquire? What manner of life? What virtues? What speed? What diligence? What prayer? What prudence? Scripture says: ‘In this waiting, let us make every effort to be found blameless and without reproach in peace.’ In this way, we shall be worthy to hear it said: ‘Come, O blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.
THE SAYINGS OF THE DESERT FATHERS, trans. by Benedicta Ward, SLG (Cistercian Publ. USA, 1984) pp. 81-82.

Vigils Reading - St Anthony
2023-01-17
The Ascetical Discourse of St. Anthony from the Life of Anthony by St Athanasius
All the monks were one day gathered around Anthony so as to hear his words. He said to them with the authority of a prophet: “The Holy Scriptures are sufficient for our instruction; nevertheless it is a good thing to encourage each other mutually in the faith and to urge one another in discourse. You, therefore, in a filial manner, bring what you know to your father, and I, your elder, will transmit to you something of what I have experienced.
In the first place, let us all endeavor together not to become lax after having begun well, and not to be discouraged in the face of difficulties. Let us not say to ourselves: We have been living the ascetical life for a long time. On the contrary, let us increase our ardor every day as if we were just beginning, for a person’s whole life is very short compared with the centuries to come, and the whole of time present is nothing compared with eternal life. Everything in this world is sold at its value, or exchanged for something of the same worth, but the promise of eternal life is bought cheaply. After combating on earth we shall obtain no earthly inheritance but a celestial one, and when we have left this corruptible body we shall receive it again incorruptible. Therefore, dear sons, let us not be discouraged nor find the time long. Let us not believe ourselves doing too much, for ‘The sufferings of this present time cannot be compared to the glory that will be revealed in us.’
For this reason, my sons, let us remain firm in asceticism and flee from sloth. The Lord is working with us, as it is written: ‘God collaborates for good with the one who has chosen what is good.’ In order to avoid negligence we will do well to meditate upon the Apostle’s words: ‘I die every day’. If, in fact, we live as if each day were that of our death, we shall not sin. This means that every day, on waking, we must think that we shall not last until evening; and every night, in falling asleep, we must think that we shall not reawaken.

Having thus begun and walked along the path of virtue, let us press straight on, straining forward. Let no one look back, like Lot’s wife, especially as the Lord has said: ‘No one who puts his hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God.’ Looking back is nothing else than feeling regret, and renewing a taste for things of the world.
Do not fear, on hearing talk of virtue, that it will remain foreign to you. It is not far from us nor outside of us. It is a work which is taking place within us, and an easy thing if only we wish it. The Greeks leave their country and cross the sea to gain learning, but as for us we have no need to travel to obtain the kingdom of heaven, nor to cross the ocean to become instructed in virtue. The Lord indeed said: ‘The kingdom of God is within you.’ So virtue has need only of our will, as it is in us and finds its source in ourselves. To have a righteous soul is just a matter of keeping one’s soul in conformity with its nature and in the state in which it was created. It is when it deviates and turns away from its nature that one calls it vicious. It is not a difficult thing then if we remain in the state in which we were created, we are in virtuousness; but if, on the contrary, we give ourselves up to evil thoughts we shall be condemned as wicked. If we had to go outside of ourselves to acquire virtue, it would be difficult; but since it is actually within us, let us keep ourselves from evil thoughts and preserve our soul for the Lord as a trust received from him, to the end that he may recognize his handiwork, for it is in the state in which he formed it

The Writings of the Saints: The Holy Monks of the East. Life of St. Anthony by St. Athanasius. A.I.M. Center, St. Louis, Mo.

Vigils Reading
2023-01-18
A Reading on the Path to Christian Discipleship by Isaac of Stella
We were enemies of God, “slaves of sin, rightdoing had no claims upon us.” The Son set us free, so that we are really “free from the claims of sin” and from the devil, and have become “slaves of rightdoing”. This is the first stage, the one the Psalmist craves and calls for in the words: “Save me, Lord.” Once his prayer has been granted he rejoices thus: “O Lord, you have freed me from peril, I, your servant and the son, not yet of you, but of your handmaid.” You have broken the chains that bound me.” The chains, he means, with which the devil had controlled him as though he were no better than a four-footed beast. Kept from doing and from moving as he should, man was no longer the “man who went abroad to toil and drudge”.
Set free, man can use his feet, is able to, at least, stretch out his withered hand. The crooked has come straight, the enemy has become a willing servant. Though utterly worthless he would be of service to him who had “no need of his services.” The service of God is profitable to such as would “earn salvation in anxious fears,” to those who remembered the words, “And you, when you have done all that was commanded you, are to say, we are servants and worthless.” One who does evil with a bad intention or good with an evil intention is reckoned an enemy. One who does everything with a good intention ranks as a servant, but not yet as a friend.
It is for a servant of God to do good, to perform the works of virtue, of justice and of mercy; to know his plans and be involved in his secrets is for God’s friends. They had reached this second stage, those one-time enemies of God become his servants, to whom were addressed the words “I do not speak of you anymore as my servants but as my friends.” Is there a further stage? Yes, none other than the third stage where Christ’s friends become his brothers, become children of God and thereby finally his heirs, for if we are his children then we are also made his heirs”. “Blessed,” says our Lord, “are the peacemakers! They shall be counted the children of God.” In other words, the clean of heart have through contemplation, come to know all that the Son has heard from the Father, and because they are pacified they are counted the children of God.

For the love of Christ tell me, my dear brothers, I beg you, tell me what is this satisfying peace, so worth loving and desiring, so precious that it ranks higher than all the virtues, is beyond all deserving, surpasses all else, obtains the highest and greatest happiness? Let us question our fellowmen, let us question those companions and intercessors of awe, the holy angels. Let us especially ask God for this wisdom we need so much, for “he gives freely and ungrudgingly”.
Let us seek it through prayer, meditation and reading, and never be discouraged. If only our seeking is in good earnest, the gift will be ours; the truth itself that we seek has guaranteed it to me in the words, “Seek and you shall find”. This is the treasure hidden in the field, the rare pearl that repays the most unwearied search. Cheap at any price, no miser could hoard it too closely. This is that highest of mountains upon which the Son alone had access to the Father as a natural right. Yet having no mind to be the Father’s only heir, he freely chose to have adopted brothers. We should, you will agree, spare no effort to achieve whatever is necessary to become brothers of Christ and sons of God, “heirs of God and coheirs with Christ”

Isaac of Stella. Sermons of the Christian Year: Volume One. CF 11. Trans. Hugh McCaffery. Kalamazoo, MI: Cistercian Publications, 1979, 38-39.

Vigils Reading
2023-01-19
Faith, Hope and Charity Operating in the Soul
by William of St Thierry
A man begins at faith. During the time while we pilgrimage far from the Lord, the Apostle who says that Christ dwells in our hearts by faith does not deceive us. Yet hope is also necessary for our journey. This it is that consoles us along the way. Take away from a traveler the hope of arriving, and his courage to go on is broken. When we have arrived at where we are headed, faith will no longer exist. Will anyone ask us: do you believe? No, indeed! For we will see God and contemplate him. Nor will hope be necessary when this comes about. For when someone sees, what does he hope for? Yet faith and hope will not vanish but will pass over into their objects when what was believed will be seen and what was hoped for will be possessed. Charity will not only be present, it will be perfected, since what we love in this present life by believing in and hoping for it we will then love by seeing and possessing it. In the meanwhile, it is easy to see how really necessary are these powers for the person who desires to move toward that uncircumscribed light.
…For if one does not believe that he will see what cannot as yet be shown to a sick soul (for only a healthy soul can see) he will make no effort to recover. But what if one believes he possesses this faith…and is able to see what can be seen, and still despairs of being able himself to be healed? Is he not utterly casting himself out and contemning himself? Does he not especially follow the doctor’s ordersbecause as a sick man he feels these prescriptions are necessarily harsh? Consequently, hope must be added to faith.
What if one believes that he has all things and hopes that he can be healed, yet does not love, that light which is promised him? And what if he meanwhile believes he ought to be content with the darkness which is now, because of its familiarity, usually agreeable for him? Isn’t he still spurning the physician?Therefore, a third thing is necessary: charity – and there is nothing so necessary!

Without these three, no soul is so healed it can see, which means ‘understand’, God. Therefore, when one shall finally have healthy eyes, he has only to gaze; as reason is the soul’s gaze…That gaze cannot as yet, although it would like to, turn healthy eyes to the light unless these three remain: faith whereby the gaze must be turned toward the reality which one believes he shall possess, which once seen, will make him happy; hope whereby, when one has looked hard, he assumes that he will be able to see; charity whereby one desires to see and enjoy forever.
The vision of God follows upon this gaze. The purpose of the gaze is this: not that it cease to exist but that it no longer need anything to orient itself in this direction. This is truly perfect power: reason attaining its purpose, which attends the happy life.
This vision is that very understanding, which is in the soul, since it was the soul’s function to understand…to see God. Since the upright man lives by faith, then, these three [powers] remain to form the life of the faithful…
Perfection in this life is nothing other than forgetting entirely, by means of faith, hope and charity, those things that are behind and pushing on to those that are ahead. For the Apostle says: May as many as are perfect know this. Anyone who truly seeks the Triune God therefore must strive to have the trinity of these powers in himself and must eagerly study to conform himself to their teaching.

Vigils Reading - Bl Cyrian Tansi
2023-01-20
A Reading on BLESSED CYPRIAN TANSI
Blessed Cyprian Michael Iwene Tansi, the first blessed of Nigeria, was born in 1903 in Igboezunu…At the age of nine, he was baptized and was given the name of Michael. He felt the call of God to the priestly life, and in 1925, at the age of 22, resolutely overcoming the opposition of family members, entered the newly established St. Paul Seminary in Igbariam, becoming the first indigenous vocation of the area. On December 19, 1937, he was ordained a priest by the missionary Bishop Charles Heerey, in the Cathedral of Onitsha.
Michael demonstrated his exceptional gifts throughout the first twelve years of his priesthood… personal asceticism, great capacity for commitment and physical resistance, goodness towards the sick and the poor, concern for the sanctity of marriage and the spiritual formation of women, as well as personal charisma…
Amid the whirlwind of pastoral activities, he perceived the beauty of the contemplative life. During a retreat day with the clergy, Archbishop Charles Heerey expressed the wish that a few of his priests embrace a monastic experience, in order to bring the seed of contemplative life into the diocese. Father Tansi, without hesitating,declared himself ready to put his bishop’s proposal into action, along with the assistant priest at his parish, Fr. Clement Ulogu. In July 1949, contacts were made with the Cistercian Abbey of Mount Saint Bernard in Leicester, England, which agreed to welcome the two priests. Michael arrived at Mount Saint Bernard on July 3, 1950, accompanied by Archbishop Heerey.
Under the action of the Spirit, the man who had been an authentic pioneer and “manager” in the young missionary church of the diocese of Onitsha made himself a humble and docile monk in his new way of life. He embraced the austerity and silence of everyday Trappist life, where no one except the novice master, Fr. Gregory Wareing, had any idea of the magnificent work he had done as a priest…

The original idea with which the two Nigerians had entered the community was to receive formation in monastic life, with the aim of then bringing it to Nigeria, but the difficulty of making a foundation with only two people soon became clear. Eventually they freely asked to be admitted to profession at Mount Saint Bernard and to wait until the community was able to send a group. In 1963, the monastic community decided to establish a foundation in Africa, but in Cameroon rather than Nigeria…
When the group for the foundation in Cameroon was appointed, Fr. [Tansi] was chosen as the novice master… The first four founders left Mount Saint Bernard on October 28, 1963, to prepare the buildings for the rest of the group’s arrival, scheduled for the spring of the following year. But God’s plan for Fr. [Tansi] was different, and it was made manifest in a very short time.
In January 1964, he was struck with acute pain in one of his legs, which swelled enormously…Urgently admitted to the Royal Infirmary in Leicester, he was diagnosed with an aortic aneurysm. During the night he got worse, and on the morning of January 20, 1964, in a spirit of total poverty and detachment, Fr. Cyprian Michael Iwene Tansi took the last step of his long journey of faith and love in silence.
On January 22, 1986, twenty-two years after his death, with great solemnity before a gathering of faithful from all parts of Nigeria, the process of his canonization was opened in the Cathedral of Onitsha. By that time, a few monastic communities of contemplative life had already begun to flourish in the area. The remains of Fr. Michael were exhumed in 1988 and returned to Onitsha. During the reburial Mass, a miracle occurred when the bishop allowed seventeen-year-old Philomina Emeka, who had been suffering from inoperable tumors, to approach and touch Fr. Michael’s coffin, and she was immediately healed. The miracle led to his beatification celebrated by Pope St. John Paul II on March 22, 1998

Baptized and Sent: October 2019. Diocese of St. Louis.https://www.archstl.org/Portals/0/Documents/Mission_Office/EMM%20Mission%20Testimonies/11)%20 Bl.%20Cyprian%20Michael%20Iwene%20Tansi.pdf?ver=2019-04-11-155650-950. Accessed Jan. 12, 2023.

Vigils Reading - St Agnes
2023-01-21
St Agnes, Virgin and Martyr From Butler’s Lives of the Saints
Rome was the scene of [St Agnes’s] triumph…She suffered perhaps not long after the beginning of the persecution of Diocletian, whose cruel edicts were published in March in the year 303. We learn from St Ambrose and St Augustine that she was only thirteen years of age at the time of her glorious death. Her riches and beauty excited the young noblemen of the first families in Rome to contend as rivals for her hand. Agnes answered them all that she had consecrated her virginity to a heavenly husband, who could not be beheld by mortal eyes. Her suitors, finding her resolution unshakable, accused her to the governor as a Christian, not doubting that threats and torments would prove more effective with one of her tender years on whom allurements could make no impression. The judge at first employed the mildest expressions and most seductive promises, to which Agnes paid no regard, repeating always that she could have no other spouse but Jesus Christ. He then made use of threats, but found her endowed with a masculine courage, and even eager to suffer torment and death. At last terrible fires were made, and iron hooks, racks and other instruments of torture displayed before her, with threats of immediate execution. The heroic child surveyed them undismayed, and made good cheer in the presence of the fierce and cruel executioners…
The governor, seeing his measures ineffectual, said he would send her to a house of prostitution, where what she prized so highly should be exposed to the insults of the brutal and licentious youth of Rome. Agnes answered that Jesus Christ was too jealous of the purity of His chosen ones to suffer it to be violated in such a manner… “You may…stain your sword with my blood, but you will never be able to profane my body, consecrated to Christ.” The governor was so incensed at this that he ordered her to be immediately led to the place of shame…Many young profligates ran thither, full of wicked desires, but were seized with such awe at the sight of the saint that they durst not approach her; one only excepted, who…was… by a flash, as it were of lightning from Heaven, struck blind, and fell trembling to the ground. His companions, terrified, took him up and carried him to Agnes, who was singing hymns of praise to Christ, her protector. The virgin by prayer restored his sight and his health.

The governor…condemned her to be beheaded. Agnes, filled with joy on hearing this sentence, “went to the place of execution more cheerfully…then others go to their wedding”. The executioner had instructions to use all means to induce her to give way, but Agnes remained constant; and having made a short prayer, bowed down her neck loaded with fetters, and offering herself fearlessly to the sword of the executioner, who with trembling hand cut off her head at one stroke.
…modern authorities incline to the view that little reliance can be placed on the details of the story. They point out that the “acts” of St Agnes, attributed unwarrantably to St Ambrose, can hardly be older than A.D. 415, and that these seem to represent an attempt to harmonize and embroider the discordant datafound in the then surviving traditions…
…however, there can be no possible doubt of the fact that St Agnes was martyred, and that she was buried beside the Via Nomentana in the cemetery afterwards called by her name. Here a basilica was erected in her honour before 354 by Constantina, daughter of Constantine and wife of Gallus; and the terms of the acrostic inscription set up in the apse are still preserved…it tells us…she was “a virgin” and “victorious”.

6 Butler’s Lives of the Saints – Complete Edition: Volume 1. New York: P.J. Kenedy & Sons, 1956. 133-135.

SKEMA
2023-01-22
Biblical Readings for Office and Mass
3rd Week in Ordinary Time

Mass Readings: Sunday (A), Weekdays (I)
January 22 – 28, 2023

Sun
22
Mon
23
Tue
24
Wed
25
Thu
26
Fri
27
Sat
28

Office
3rd Sunday
Weekday
St Francis de Sales
Conversion of St Paul
SS Robert, Alberic, & Stephen
SS Timothy & Titus
St Thomas Aquinas

Vigils
Judg 9:1-21
Judg 9:22-41
Judg 9:42-57
Acts 26:1-23
Lev 26:3-13
Judg 10:6-18
Judg 11:1-11

Lauds
Zech 7:1-7
Zech 7:8-14
Zech 8:1-6
Sir 39:1-10
Sir 2:1-11
Zech 8:7-11
Zech 8:12-17

Mass
67
317
318
519
606, 322, 815.8
520, 321
322

1st
Isa 8:23b-9:3
Heb 9:15, 24-28
Heb 10:1-10
Acts 22:3-16
Sir 44:1,10-15
2 Tim 1:1-8
Heb 11:1-2, 8-19

2nd
1 Cor 1:10-13, 17

Heb 11:1-2, 8-16

Gospel
Matt 4:12-23
Mark 3:22-30
Mark 3:31-35
Mark 16:15-18
Mark 10:24b-30
Mark 4:26-34
Mark 4:35-41

Vespers
Eph 5:1-5
Eph 5:6-14
Eph 5:15-20
Eph 4:1-6
1 Jn 4:13-21
Eph 6:1-9
Eph 6:10-17

Vigils Reading - 3rd Sunday in Ordinary Time
2023-01-22
He Went to Capernaum, that the Prophecy of Isaiah Might be Fulfilled1
A Commentary by John Justus Landsberg
The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light. Everyone knows that we were all born in darkness, and once lived in darkness. But now that the Sun of Righteousness has risen for us, let us see that we no longer remain in darkness.
Christ came to enlighten those who lived in darkness, overshadowed by death, and to guide their feet into the way of peace. Do you ask what darkness? Whatever is present in our intellect, in our will, or in our memory that is not God, or which has not its source in God; that is to say, whatever in us is not for God’s sake, is a barrier between God and the soul – it is darkness.
In himself Christ brought us light which would enable us to see our sins, and hate our darkness. His freely chosen poverty, when there was no place for him in the inn, is for us a light by which we can now learn that the poor in spirit, to whom the kingdom of heaven belongs, are blessed.
The love with which Christ offered himself to instruct us, and to endure for us injuries, ostracism, persecution, lashes, and death upon a cross; the love finally which made him pray for those who crucified him – that love is for us a light by which we may learn to love our enemies.
The humility with which he emptied himself, taking the nature of a slave, and with which he scorned the glory of the world, and willed to be born, not in a palace but in a stable, and to die ignominiously on a gibbet – that humility is for us a light showing us what a detestable crime it is for clay, that is to say, for poor weak creatures, to be proud, to exalt themselves, or to refuse submission, when the infinite God was humbled, despised, and subject to human beings.
The meekness with which Christ endured hunger, thirst, cold, harsh words, lashes, and wounds, when he was led like a sheep to the slaughter, and like a lamb before his shearer opened not his mouth – that meekness is for us a light. By it we see how useless it is to be angry, how useless to threaten. By it we accept our own suffering, and do not serve Christ merely from routine. By it we learn how much is required of us, and that when suffering comes our way we should bewail our sins in silent submission, since he endured affliction with such patience and long-suffering, not for his own sins, but for ours.
Reflect then, beloved, on all the virtues which Christ taught us by his example, which he recommends by his counsel, and which he enables us to imitate by the assistance of his grace.
1 Journey with the Fathers: Commentaries on the Sunday Gospels Year A. Ed. Edith Barnecut, O.S.B. New York: New City Press, 1992. 82-83.

Vigils Reading - Weekday
2023-01-23
Simplicity and Openness2
from the Collected Works of Saint Rafael Arnaiz
One must walk so many tortured paths to arrive at simplicity. Complication is such an uncomfortable thing…and we human beings like to complicate everything for ourselves. Often, if we fail to practice virtue, it’s because our complicated nature rejects what is simple. Often, we fail to appreciate the magnificence hidden within an act of simplicity, because we look for greatness in complicated things; we judge the magnificence of things based on their difficulty…I clearly see that what seemed dark and complicated to me before is actually rather simple and straightforward.
Virtue…God…the interior life, how difficult I thought it was to live that! It’s not that I’m virtuous now, or that I have a completely clear knowledge of God and spiritual life, but I’ve realized that you get there without complications or complexities, without clever philosophy, without technical challenges. I’ve come to see that you reach God in precisely the opposite manner. You come to know Him through simplicity of heart and being uncomplicated. There’s nothing difficult about acts of love…What’s truly difficult is wanting to know God by searching out His mysteries. The former leads us to God, and the latter does not…
So, then, why do we lack virtue at times? Because we aren’t simple; because we complicate our desires; because everything we want is made difficult by our weak will, which gets carried away by whatever is pleasing, comfortable, and unnecessary, and often by its passions. We lack virtue not because it is difficult, but because we don’t want it. We lack patience…because we don’t want it. We lack temperance…because we don’t want it. We lack chastity…for the same reason. We would be saints if we wanted to be…it’s much harder to become an engineer than it is to become a saint. If only we had faith!
The interior life…the spiritual life, a life of prayer. “My God! That must be difficult!” But it’s not at all. Get rid of everything in your heart that’s in the way, and you’ll find God there. That’s it. Often we look for things that aren’t there, and on the other hand we’ll walk right by a treasure without seeing it…We look for Him in a whole tangled mess of things, and to us, the more complicated they are, the better. And all the while, we are carrying God around inside of us, yet we don’t look for Him there. Collect yourself within…gaze upon your nothingness, gaze upon the nothingness of the world, place yourself at the foot of the cross, and if you are simple, you will see God.
Behold, the life of prayer. We don’t need to add something that’s already there. Rather, we need to get rid of what is in the way. I say “something that’s already there” because I assume the soul to be in a state of God’s grace, but if God is not present there at times, it’s because we don’t want that. We have such a great big heap of interests, distractions, affinities, vain desires, pretensions…we have so much of the world inside of us that God is driven away…But all we have to do is want Him, and God will fill the soul again in such a way that you’d have to be blind not to see it.
If a soul wants to live according to God’s ways…it must be rid of everything that is not Him…and that is it. It’s quite easy. If we wanted to, and if we asked God with simplicity, we would make great progress in the spiritual life. If we wanted to be saints, we would be…But we’re such fools that we don’t want to…We prefer to waste time on stupid vanities. We’ll regret that someday.
But I am very happy, because I have come to see that everything is simple and straightforward…and this is within my reach. May the Most Blessed Virgin Mary come to my aid. Amen.
2Saint Rafael Arnaiz. The Collected Works. Ed. Sr. Maria Gonzalo-Garcia, OCSO. Trans. Catherine Addington. Collegeville, MN: Cistercian Publications, 2022. 542-544.

Vigils Reading - St Francis de Sales
2023-01-24
On Receiving Holy Communion3
by St Francis de Sales
Prepare yourself for holy communion the evening before…retiring earlier, that you may rise sooner in the morning. Should you awake in the night, raise your heart to God immediately, and make some ardent aspirations, in order to prepare your soul for the reception of her Spouse, who, being awake whilst you were asleep, prepares a thousand graces and favors for you, if, on your part, you are disposed to receive them. In the morning, rise up with alacrity to enjoy the happiness you hope for; and having confessed, go with a great, but humble confidence, to receive this heavenly food, which nourishes your soul to immortality… Represent to yourself, that as the bee, after gathering from the flowers the dew of heaven, and the choicest juice of the earth, reducing them into honey, carries it into her hive, so the priest, having taken from the altar the Savior of the world… puts Him as delicious food into your mouth and body.
Having received Him in your breast, excite your heart to do homage to the author of your salvation: treat with Him concerning your internal affairs; consider that He has taken up His abode within you for your happiness; make Him then as welcome as you possibly can, and conduct yourself in such a manner as to make it appear by all your actions, that God is with you.
But when you cannot enjoy the benefit of really communicating at the holy Mass, communicate at least spiritually, uniting yourself by an ardent desire to this life-giving flesh of our Savior.
Your principal intention in communicating should be to advance in virtue, to strengthen yourself in the love of God, and to receive comfort from this love; for you must receive through love, that which love alone caused to be given to you. You cannot consider our Savior in an action, either more full of love, or more tender than this, in which He annihilates Himself, or as we may more properly say, changes Himself into food, that so He may penetrate our souls, and unite Himself most intimately to the heart, and to the body of His faithful.
If worldlings ask you why you communicate so often, tell them it is to learn to love God, to purify yourself from your imperfections, to be delivered from your miseries, to be comforted in your afflictions, and supported in your weaknesses. Tell them that two sorts of persons ought to communicate frequently; the perfect, because being well disposed, they would be greatly to blame not to approach to the source and fountain of perfection; and the imperfect, to the end that they may be able to aspire to perfection; the strong, lest they should become weak; and the weak, that they may become strong; the sick, that they may be restored to health; and the healthy, lest they should fall into sickness: that for your part, being imperfect, weak, and sick, you have need to communicate frequently with Him who is your perfection, your strength, and your physician. Tell them, that those who have not many worldly affairs to look after, ought to communicate often, because they have leisure; that those who have much business on hand, should also communicate often; for he who labors much and is loaded with pains, ought to eat solid food, and that frequently. Tell them that you receive the holy sacrament, to learn to receive it well; because one hardly performs an action well, which he does not often practice.
Communicate frequently, then… so, by approaching to, and eating beauty, purity, and goodness itself, in this divine sacrament you will become altogether fair, pure and virtuous.
3 St Francis de Sales. Introduction to a Devout Life. New York: Catholic Book Publishing Co., 1946, 143-146.

Vigils Reading - Conversion of St Paul
2023-01-25
From a Homily on the Praise of St Paul4
by St John Chrysostom
Paul, more than anyone else, has shown us what humankind really is, and in what our nobility consists, and of what virtue this particular animal is capable. Each day he aimed ever higher; each day he rose up with greater ardor and faced with new eagerness the dangers that threatened him. He summed up his attitude in the words: I forget what is behind me and push on to what lies ahead. When he saw death imminent, he bade others share his joy: Rejoice and be glad with me! And when danger, injustice and abuse threatened, he said: I am content with weakness, mistreatment and persecution. These he called the weapons of righteousness, thus telling us that he derived immense profit from them.
Thus, amid the traps set for him by his enemies, with exultant heart he turned their every attack into a victory for himself; constantly beaten, abused and cursed, he boasted of it as though he were celebrating a triumphal procession and taking trophies home, and offered thanks to God for it all: Thanks be to God who is always victorious in us!
The most important thing of all to him, however, was that he knew himself to be loved by Christ. Enjoying this love, he considered himself happier than anyone else; were he without it, it would be no satisfaction to be the friend of principalities and powers. He preferred to be thus loved and be the least of all, or even to be among the damned, than to be without that love and be among the great and honored.
To be separated from that love was, in his eyes, the greatest and most extraordinary of torments; the pain of that loss would alone have been hell, and endless, unbearable torture.
So too, in being loved by Christ he thought of himself as possessing life, the world, the angels, present and future, the kingdom, the promise and countless blessings. Apart from that love nothing saddened or delighted him; for nothing earthly did he regard as bitter or sweet.
Death itself and pain and whatever torments might come were but child’s play to him, provided that thereby he might bear some burden for the sake of Christ.
4Hom. 2 de laudibus sancti Pauli: PG 50, 477-480.

Vigils Reading - SS Robert, Alberic, & Stephen
2023-01-26
A Reading on the Holy Founders Journey to the Wilderness of Citeaux5
from the Exordium Magnum of Conrad of Eberbach
In the year of the Incarnation of the Lord 1098, Dom Robert, the abbot of the Abbey of Molesme…and with him went those brothers whose hearts God had touched, set out from Molesme, making the same choice as their father Saint Benedict, to tire themselves out in working for God rather than settling down in a comfortable way of life. They hurried eagerly to that place which by the grace of God had been offered them beforehand as suitable to their endeavor, that is, to the wilderness called Citeaux. Situated in the diocese of Chalon, it was at that time a place but seldom approached by human beings because of the woods and dense briars and inhabited only by wild beasts.
The men of God arrived at this place of horror and vast solitude; and thought it quite suitable for the sort of religious observance which they had long had in mind and for which they had come, all the more so when they realized that the density of woods and briars would make the monastery remote and cut off, quite forgotten by and inaccessible to the world. So by the will of the bishop of Chalon and the consent of the person to whom the place belonged, they began to build there… on 21 March, that is, on the solemnity of the birth [to eternal life] of Saint Benedict, which was also Palm Sunday and therefore celebrated with double joy, to the rejoicing of angels and the casting down of demons…By a happy omen, those who had decided to arrange the ordering of their life and the guidelines for divine services according to the form prescribed in the Rule began this undertaking on the birthday of the very person who had, through the life-giving Spirit, given the saving law to many.
…Just as at the beginning of grace, when Christ our Lord and Savior was born, the world, while it knew him not, received a pledge of new redemption, of ancient reconciliation, of eternal happiness, so too in these last days, when charity is cold and iniquity everywhere abounds, the almighty and merciful Lord planted the seed of that same grace in the wilderness of Citeaux. Watered by the rain of the Holy Spirit, it gathered an incredibly plentiful harvest of spiritual riches, growing and developing into a great tree so surpassingly beautiful and fruitful that people of various nations, tribes, and tongues delighted to rest in its shade and satisfy themselves with its fruits. Yet although this fruit makes bitter the stomach of carnal desire by the work of repentance, it is as sweet as honey in the mouth of the developing conscience.
Moreover, the lord archbishop, legate of the apostolic see, acknowledged this solid foundation by his blessing, advice, and authority. Taking note of the poverty of the servants of God, moreover, and the fact that in the barren place they were living in they were able neither to subsist nor to construct a building unless they had the support of some powerful person, he wrote to the illustrious prince Odo, then Duke of Burgundy, asking and urging him to support the poor men of Christ who were so zealous for the Rule and monastic way of life, and to grant them his protection and come to their help with what they needed, as becomes the generosity of a prince. To this request and advice Lord Odo…agreed, and he was delighted by the fervor and devotion of the brothers; at his own cost he completely finished the wooden monastery they had begun in their poverty, procured for them everything they needed, and supported them abundantly with lands and livestock.
5 Conrad of Eberbach. The Great Beginnning of Citeaux: A Narrative of the Beginning of the Cistercian Order: The Exordium Magnum of Conrad of Eberbach. CF 72. Trans. Benedicta Ward, SLG, and Paul Savage. Collegeville, MN: Cistercian Publications, 2012. 75-78.

Vigils Reading - SS Timothy & Titus
2023-01-27
The Virtue of St Timothy as a Pattern for Christians6
from a sermon by St John Henry Newman
“Drink no longer water, but use a little wine for your stomach’s sake and for your other infirmities”. This is a remarkable verse, because it accidentally tells us so much. It is addressed to Timothy, St Paul’s companion, the first Bishop of Ephesus. Of Timothy we know very little, except that he did minister to St Paul, and hence we might have inferred that he was a man of very saintly character; but we know little or nothing of him, except that he had been from a child a careful reader of Scripture. This indeed, by itself, in that Apostolic age, would have led us to infer that he had risen to some great height in spiritual excellence; though it must be confessed that instances are frequent at this day, of persons knowing the Bible well, and yet being little stricter than others in their lives, for all their knowledge.
Timothy, however, had so read the Old Testament, and had so heard from St Paul the New, that he was a true follower of the Apostle, as the Apostle was of Christ. St Paul accordingly calls him “my own son”, or “my true son in the faith”. And elsewhere he says to the Philippians that he has “no man like-minded to Timothy, who would naturally” or truly “care for their state”. But still, after all, this is but a general account of him, and we seem to desire something more definite in the way of description, beyond merely knowing that he was a great saint, which conveys no clear impression to the mind. Now, in the text we have accidentally a glimpse given us of his mode of life. St Paul does not expressly tell us that he was a man of mortified habits; but he reveals the fact indirectly by cautioning him against an excess of mortification. “Drink no longer water,” he says, “but use a little wine.” It should be observed that wine, in the southern countries, is the ordinary beverage; it is nothing strong or costly. Yet even from such as this, Timothy was in the habit of abstaining, and restricting himself to water; and, as the Apostle thought, imprudently, to the increase of his “frequent infirmities.”
There is something very striking in this accidental mention of the private ways of this Apostolic Bishop. We know indeed from history the doctrine and the life of the great saints, who lived some time after the Apostles’ age; but we are naturally anxious to know something more of the Apostles themselves and their associates. We say, “Oh that we could speak to St Paul – that we could see him in his daily walk, and hear his oral and familiar teaching! – that we could ask him what he meant by this expression in his Epistles, or what he thought of this or the other doctrine.” This is not given to us. God might give us greater light than He does; but it is His gracious will to give us the less. Yet perhaps much more has been given us in Scripture, as it has come to us, than we think, if our eyes were enlightened to discern it there. Such, for instance, is this text; it is a sudden revelation, a glimpse of the personal character of Apostolic Christians; it is a hint which we may follow out. For no one will deny that a very great deal of doctrine, and a very great deal of precept, goes with such a fact as this: namely, that this holy man, without impiously disparaging God’s creation, and thanklessly rejecting God’s gifts, yet, on the whole, lived a life of abstinence.
I cannot understand why such a life is not excellent in a Christian now, if it was the characteristic of Apostles and friends of Apostles then. I really do not see why the trials and persecutions, which surrounded them from Jews and Gentiles, their forlorn despised state, and their necessary discomforts, should not even have exempted them from voluntary sufferings in addition, unless such self-imposed hardships were pleasing to Christ. Such were the holy men of old. How far are we below them! Alas for our easy sensual life, our cowardice, our sloth! is this the way by which the kingdom of God is won?
6 Parochial and Plain Sermons, San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1987, p. 1193.

Vigils Reading - St Thomas Aquinas
2023-01-28
A Reading on the Passion of Christ7
from St Thomas Aquinas’s Summa Theologica
The plan of God for man’s redemption is most wondrous in every respect. Yet God could have willed to redeem mankind in some other way than by the Passion of Christ. Still, there was surely no way more suitable for man’s redeeming than the way of Incarnation and Passion. For here man sees how much God loves him; man has perfect and most noble example of all the virtues; man has grace made available through Christ’s merits; man beholds the evil conqueror of his race subdued and vanquished by One who is truly man.
For many nobly symbolic reasons it was suitable that our Lord, dying for us by his own will, should have chosen the death of the cross. This mode of death was the most feared, and was considered the most degrading. To show that the upright man need fear no mode of death; to indicate that no mode of death can sully the innocent; to give full and final evidence of his love for mankind and his hatred for sin, our Lord chose the death of the cross. And since he died for all, he chose to die in the open, on an eminence, with arms outstretched to all mankind.
Christ did not endure all forms of human suffering. He was not, as we have seen, subject to internal ailments, to sickness or disease. His bodily suffering was externally caused. And by dying on the cross, he excluded other modes of fatal suffering, such as burning or drowning. Yet, in one sense, our Lord did endure all human suffering: all types of human beings had part in afflicting him…
Christ’s suffering was the greatest of all suffering, the keenest pain. The prophet Jeremias foretold this fact in the cry: “O all ye that pass by the way, attend and see if there be any sorrow like unto my sorrow.” The external pains of the scourging, the crowning with thorns, and the crucifixion, were manifestly extreme.
And the sadness of his perfect soul over the sins of men was the greatest distress ever humanly experienced. Our Lord’s body was most perfect, and therefore most acutely sensitive to pain. And he did not permit study or consideration on the part of reason to allay the bodily pangs in any manner. For our Lord suffered voluntarily to win for man the greatest benefits; he measured his sufferings to accord with their fruits. Thus our Lord’s pain in his Passion was the very greatest, the most intense, of pains. Yet, despite the fact that our Lord truly suffered in his whole soul, that soul had, throughout the Passion, the uninterrupted enjoyment of the beatific vision. There is no conflict here…
Our Lord who willed to be “reputed with the wicked” was crucified between two thieves. It belonged to the perfection of his suffering, which was the greatest, that he should bear the insult…of being publicly executed with an ordinary group of criminals as though he were one of them. The cross of Christ, with an unrepentant sinner on one side, and a converted sinner on the other, shows the divinely innocent judge of mankind on the judgment seat between “those on the right, and those on the left,” the saved and the rejectors of salvation, as the case will be on the last day.
The Passion of Christ was the suffering and death of our Lord as man. We cannot say that the Godhead suffered and died. It is perfectly true that he who died is God. But he is also man, in the unity of the divine Person of the Son.
7 Ed. Paul J. Glenn. A Tour of the Summa. St. Louis, MO: B. Herder Book Co., 1960. 351-353.

Skema: 4th Week in Ordinary Time
2023-01-29
Biblical Readings for Office and Mass
4th Week in Ordinary Time

Mass Readings: Sunday (A), Weekdays (I)
January 29 – February 4, 2023

Sun
29
Mon
30
Tue
31
Wed
1
Thu
2
Fri
3
Sat
4

Office
4th Sunday
Office for Vocations
St John Bosco
Weekday
Presentation of the Lord
Weekday
Memorial of the BVM

Vigils
Judg 11:12-28
Judg 11:29-40
Judg 13:1-25
Judg 14:1-20
Exod 13:1-16
Judg 15:1-20
Judg 16:1-22

Lauds
Zech 8:18-23
Zech 9: 1-7
Zech 9:8-10
Zech 9:11-17
Isa 42:1-7
Zech 10:1-5
Zech 10:6-12

Mass
70
323
324
325
524
327
328

1st
Zeph 2:3; 3:12-13
Heb 11:32-40
Heb 12:1-4
Heb 12:4-7, 11-15
Heb 2:14-18
Heb 13:1-8
Heb 13:15-17, 20-21

2nd
1 Cor 1:26-31

Gospel
Matt 5:1-12a
Mark 5:1-20
Mark 5:21-43
Mark 6:1-6
Luke 2:22-40
Mark 6:14-29
Mark 6:30-34

Vespers
Eph 6:18-24
Phil 1:1-11
Phil 1:12-18a
Phil 1:18b-26
1 Jn 3:1-8
Phil 1:27-30
Phil 2:1-11

4th Sunday in Ordinary Time
2023-01-29
Blessed are the Poor in Spirit 1
A commentary by Symeon the New Theologian
When holy Scripture is being read we should look at ourselves as though in a
mirror and consider our state of soul. Let me explain what I mean. We hear the
Lord saying: Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
This must make us always examine and test ourselves whenever we suffer
humiliation, whenever we are insulted, dishonored, and treated with contempt, to
see whether or not we possess the virtue of humility. A person who has it bears
everything without feeling hurt or taking offense. His heart is not wounded by
anything that happens to him. If he is slightly wounded he is not completely upset;
on the contrary, because of that heart wound, simply for having been slightly pained
instead of accepting what happened with joy, he is distressed and thinks himself
despicable, he grieves and weeps. Withdrawing into the inner chamber of his soul
or his cell, he falls down before God and confesses to him as though he had
completely forfeited eternal life.
Then again we hear: Blessed are those who mourn. Notice that the Lord does
not say those who have mourned, but those who continually mourn. Concerning
this too, then, we must examine ourselves to see whether we mourn every day, for if
we have been made humble by repentance, obviously we shall not pass a single day
or night without tears, without mourning, and without compunction.
And again: Blessed are the gentle. Can anyone who mourns every day
continue to live in a state of anger and not become gentle? Just as water
extinguishes a blazing fire, so mourning and tears extinguish anger in the soul so
completely that a person who had long been given over to it sees his irascible
disposition transformed into perfect serenity.
Again we hear: Blessed are the merciful. Who, then, are the merciful? Those
who give away their possessions or who feed the poor? No. Then who are they?
Those who have become poor for the sake of him who became poor for our sake,
those who have nothing to give, but who in a spiritual way are always mindful of the
poor, the widows, the orphans, and the sick. Seeing them frequently, they have
compassion on them and shed burning tears over them. Such was Job, who said: I
wept over every infirmity. When they have anything they cheerfully give alms to
them, as well as ungrudgingly reminding all of how they can save their souls, thus
obeying the one who said: What I learned with pure intention I pass on without
grudging. These are the ones the Lord calls blessed, the ones who are truly
merciful, for such mercy is like a step by which they ascend to attain perfect purity
of heart.
In virtue of this God then proclaims the pure of heart blessed, saying: Blessed
are the pure of heart, for they shall see God. The purified soul sees God in
everything and is reconciled to him. Peace is established between God our creator
and the soul, his erstwhile enemy, and it is then called blessed by God for being a
peacemaker: Blessed are the peacemakers, he says, for they shall be called children
of God.
1 Journey with the Fathers: Commentaries on the Sunday Gospels Year A. Ed. Edith Barnecut, O.S.B. New
York: New City Press, 1992. 84-85.

Office for Vocations
2023-01-30 08:00 - 17:00 (America/New_York)
A Reading on St Bernard and His Entrance to Monastic Life 2
From the Vita Prima by William of Saint-Thierry
When the time came for Bernard to fulfill his vow and achieve his plans, with
his brothers and spiritual children he took leave of his father’s dwelling…At that
time Citeaux was still a novelty and just a little flock living under venerable Stephen,
their abbot. They were beginning to grow dejected because of the lack of vocations,
and their hopes for future numbers were fading…But now, all of a sudden, God
visited them and made them joyful again. It was so unexpected, so sudden. It was
as if their house had received this reply from the Holy Spirit: Shout for joy, you
barren woman who bore no children! Break into cries of joy and gladness, you
who were never in labor! For the sons of the forsaken one are more in number
than the sons of the wedded one, and afterward you will see your children’s
children unto many generations.
In the year 1113 from the Lord’s Incarnation, and thirteen years from the
founding of Citeaux, Bernard, the servant of God, who was about twenty-two years
old, entered Citeaux with more than thirty companions and submitted himself to
the sweet yoke of Christ under Abbot Stephen…He had the intention of dying from
the hearts and memory of mankind, with the hope of disappearing like a lost vase.
But God had other ideas and was making him ready as a chosen vessel, not
only to strengthen and expand the monastic order but to carry his name before
kings and Gentiles to the ends of the earth. Of course he did not apply this teaching
to himself or even think about it; rather he had in his heart the need to be constant
in following his vocation, so that he constantly said in his heart and even often on
his lips, “Bernard, Bernard, what have you come for?”…
From the first day of his conversion right up to the present time, he was
known to have only one thing in his thoughts, namely, to have a mother’s love for
every soul. Indeed, there was a sort of conflict in his heart between his holy desires
and his holy humility. At one moment he confesses that he is dejected that his
efforts cannot show any results, but afterward his burning ardor makes him forget
himself, and he admits that he finds no other consolation than the salvation of
many souls. In the end, charity gives birth to confidence, yet humility keeps it in
place.
And so it happened that on one occasion he rose early for Vigils. Then after
Vigils there was a long interval before Lauds in the morning, and he went outside.
He walked around close by and was praying to God that his prayers and those of his
brothers might be acceptable, for he was, as I have said, filled with the desire for
spiritual fruitfulness. All of a sudden, while he was standing there, he closed his
eyes in prayer and saw on all sides a great multitude of men in diverse clothing and
different walks of life coming down from the hills close by into the valley below; so
many were they that the valley could not contain them. What this meant is clear to
everyone. The man of God was so encouraged by this wonderful vision that he
exhorted his brothers never to despair of God’s mercy.
2 William of Saint-Thierry. The First Life of Bernard of Clairvaux. CF 76. Trans. Hilary Costello, OCSO.
Collegeville, MN: Cistercian Publications, 2015. 20-22, 29-30.

Reading: St. John Bosco
2023-01-31
The Man and the Saint 3
A Reading on St John Bosco
People often said of Don Bosco: “Really, he is quite an ordinary person.”
There was nothing about him that revealed his mission, his profound spirituality or
his sanctity…Only his expression showed the fire that burnt in his heart. His clear
eyes looked right through you, and their brightness was disturbing.
His confidence in God was extreme. He had the faith that moves mountains.
He never doubted as to the outcome of any undertaking. If he were only sure of his
usefulness, he was certain of its success. Obstacles might arise; he laughed at them,
while fighting against them or getting round them. Financial or other means might
be lacking; if they did not come in today, he expected them tomorrow. “The main
thing,” he said, relying upon a long experience, “is to take the burden on one’s
shoulders. As you go forward, the load finds its balance and shakes down.” The
hardest humiliations, the bitterest disillusions, the strongest opposition all left him
smiling. Whence came his serenity?… He abandoned himself in the arms of God
with the uttermost love.
To him, the love of God was one with the love of souls. The second
commandment was like the first and greatest. Not only did this love of souls make
him relish all the miseries of the way, but it also inspired him to pray with an almost
wild boldness. At the beginning of his work he asked his heavenly Benefactress for
a thousand places in Paradise, and he tells us he was given them. Later on,
confronted with the unexpected growth of his enterprise, he went further and asked
for ten thousand places. At last, seeing his Houses all over the world, he was still
more pressing, and asked for a hundred thousand reserved seats for his Sons. And
this time, too, he was certain of having been granted them…His simple and calm
audacity in expressing the deepest of his desires, the salvation of souls, enables us to
surmise the degree of intimacy he had reached in prayer. In truth, such prayer was
the very life of his soul. One of those who knew him best said: “He seemed to live in
a state of permanent contemplation. He worked, indeed, upon the earth, but his
spirit was up yonder, in heaven.”
…Many, we know, have thought that prayer held but a small place in his
timetable. They are mistaken…Don Bosco was incessantly in union with Christ and
His Mother. There was no ecstasy, no irradiation of countenance, no uplifting from
the ground; but more certainly, he used all forms of prayer, vocal or mental, and
especially, that which suddenly elevates the soul till it confronts some divine truth,
embracing it in a single view and possessing it with rejoicing.
This humble and diffident priest never made any claim to be the founder of a
mystical school; but had he started any system of asceticism, he would probably
have based it on the old saying, in its fullest and truest sense: “To work is to pray.”
His own work never was apart from God. It was done under God’s eyes and for Him
only. And the manifold occupations of his hustled days, far from destroying his
serenity, only bound his heart more closely to its source of light and strength and
love – Jesus Christ and the Virgin Mary, and their servant never ceased feeling
them at his side.
…By the contrast between his humble appearance and the splendour of his
soul, we are driven to acknowledge that this man makes a great figure in the train of
sanctity. There are some Saints more impressive, greater wonder-workers, more
worldwide in their sphere of influence, to be found throughout the twenty centuries
of Christianity; but there are few more striking and more taking personalities to be
met with in the history of the Church.
3 A. Auffray, S.D.B. Saint John Bosco. North Arcot – South India: Salesian House, Tirupattur, 1959. 370-371, 380-382, 388.

Reading: Weekday
2023-02-01
Address of His Holiness Benedict XVI 4
at Collège des Bernardins, Paris – in 2008
From the perspective of monasticism’s historical influence, we could say
that…the monasteries were the places where the treasures of ancient culture
survived, and where at the same time a new culture slowly took shape out of the old.
…Amid the confusion of the times, in which nothing seemed permanent, they
wanted to do the essential – to make an effort to find what was perennially valid
and lasting, life itself. They were searching for God. They wanted to go from the
inessential to the essential, to the only truly important and reliable thing there is. It
is sometimes said that they were “eschatologically” oriented. But this is not to be
understood in a temporal sense, as if they were looking ahead to the end of the
world or to their own death, but in an existential sense: they were seeking the
definitive behind the provisional…
Because they were Christians, this was not an expedition into a trackless
wilderness, a search leading them into total darkness. God himself had provided
signposts, indeed he had marked out a path which was theirs to find and to follow.
This path was his word, which had been disclosed to men in the books of the sacred
Scripture…
Because the search for God required the culture of the word, it was
appropriate…to have a school, in which these pathways could be opened up…the
monastery…[a school of the Lord’s service]…whose ultimate aim is that man should
learn how to serve God. But it also includes the formation of reason – education –
through which man learns to perceive, in the midst of words, the Word itself…
The Word which opens the path of that search, and is to be identified with
this path, is a shared word. True, it pierces every individual to the heart. Gregory
the Great describes this a sharp stabbing pain, which tears open our sleeping soul
and awakens us, making us attentive to the essential reality, to God. But in the
process, it also makes us attentive to one another. The word does not lead to a
purely individual path of mystical immersion, but to the pilgrim fellowship of faith…
The God who speaks in the Bible teaches us how to speak with him ourselves.
Particularly in the book of Psalms, he gives us the words with which we can address
him, with which we can bring our life, with all its highpoints and lowpoints, into
conversation with him, so that life itself thereby becomes a movement towards
him…
This particular structure of the Bible issues a constantly new challenge to
every generation. It excludes by its nature everything that today is known as
fundamentalism. In effect, the word of God can never simply be equated with the
letter of the text. To attain to it involves a transcending and a process of
understanding, led by the inner movement of the whole and hence it also has to
become a process of living. Only within the dynamic unity of the whole are the
many books one book. The Word of God and his action in the world are revealed
only in the word and history of human beings…
To seek God and to let oneself be found by him, that is today no less necessary
than in former times. A purely positivistic culture which tried to drive the question
concerning God into the subjective realm, as being unscientific, would be the
capitulation of reason, the renunciation of its highest possibilities, and hence a
disaster for humanity, with very grave consequences. What gave Europe’s culture
its foundation – the search for God and the readiness to listen to him – remains
today the basis of any genuine culture.
4 Pope Benedict XVI. Address at the Collège des Bernardins, Paris, Friday, 12 September 2008.

Reading: Presentation of the Lord
2023-02-02
How the Coming and Returning of the Word
Works for the Soul’s Salvation 5
A Reading by St Bernard of Clairvaux
I admit that the Word has also come to me…But although he has come to me,
I have never been conscious of the moment of his coming. I perceived his presence,
I remembered afterwards that he had been with me; sometimes I had a
presentiment that he would come, but I was never conscious of his coming or his
going…How then did he enter? Perhaps he did not enter because he does not come
from outside? He is not one of the things which exist outside us. Yet he does not
come from within me…I have ascended to the highest in me, and look! The word is
towering above that. In my curiosity I have descended to explore my lowest depths,
yet I found him even deeper. If I looked outside myself, I saw him stretching
beyond the furthest I could see; & I looked within, he was yet further within. Then I
knew the truth of what I had read, ‘In him we live & move & have our being’. And
blessed is the man in whom he has his being, who lives for him, and is moved by
him.
You ask then how I knew he was present, when his ways can in no way be
traced? He is life and power, and as soon as he enters in, he awakens my
slumbering soul; he stirs and soothes and pierces my heart, for before it was hard as
stone, and diseased. So he has begun to pluck out and destroy, to build up and to
plant, to water dry places and illuminate dark ones; to open what was closed and to
warm what was cold; to make the crooked straight and the rough places smooth, so
that my soul may bless the Lord, and all that is within me may praise his holy name.
So when the Bridegroom, the Word, came to me, he never made known his coming
by any signs, not by sight, nor by sound, not by touch. It was not by any movement
of his that I recognized his coming; it was not by any of my senses that I perceived
he had penetrated to the depths of my being. Only by the movement of my
heart…did I perceive his presence; and I knew the power of his might because my
faults were put to flight and my human yearnings brought into subjection. I have
marvelled at the depth of his wisdom when my secret faults have been revealed and
made visible; at the very slightest amendment of my way of life I have experienced
his goodness and mercy; in the renewal and remaking of the spirit of my mind, that
is of my inmost being, I have perceived the excellence of his glorious beauty, and
when I contemplate all these things I am filled with awe and wonder at his manifold
greatness.
But when the Word has left me, all these spiritual powers become weak and
faint and begin to grow cold, as though you had removed the fire from under a
boiling pot, and this is the sign of his going. Then my soul must needs be sorrowful
until he returns, and my heart again kindles within me – the sign of his returning.
When I have had such experience of the Word, is it any wonder that I take to myself
the words of the Bride, calling him back when he has withdrawn?…
As often as he slips away from me, so often shall I call him back. From the
burning desire of my heart I will not cease to call him, begging him to return, as if
after someone who is departing, and I will implore him to give back to me the joy of
his salvation, and restore himself to me.
5 St Bernard of Clairvaux. On the Song of Songs IV. CF 40. Trans. Irene Edmonds. Kalamazoo, MI:
Cistercian Publications, 1980. 89-92.

Reading: Weekday
2023-02-03
Ultimate Truth and Sweetness is to be Found in Reading and
Understanding Holy Scripture 6
by Nicodemos of the Holy Mountain
A source of spiritual delight is the word of God contained in Holy Scripture
because there is to be found ultimate truth that enlightens the mind, which, being
mind, has truth as its object. Moreover, there is ultimate sweetness and grace in the
words of Scripture, which draw like a great magnet the hearts of the readers to agree
with them and to be convinced. This is only natural. After all, the words of
Scripture are the words of God and of the Holy Spirit. This is to say that they are
the words of truth itself and grace itself…
St John Chrysostom said, “The reading of Holy Scripture is the opening of
heaven…” In Holy Scripture we see humble words, simple words, but within they
possess such great depths of the knowledge of God that the passing wisdom of this
world cannot even stand beside it. St. Paul wrote about this wisdom of God:
“Among the mature we do impart wisdom, although it is not a wisdom of this age or
of the rulers of this age, who are doomed to pass away. But we impart a secret and
hidden wisdom of God”…
If you love to enjoy true and complete delight from the Scriptures, seek to
read them not merely with simple understanding, but with deeds and practical
realities. Moreover, seek to read them not merely for the mere love of learning but
also for the sake of ascetic endeavors and discipline, as St. Mark wrote: “Read the
words of Holy Scripture with an eye to practical applications and not merely to be
puffed up by any fine thought that you may receive from it.” Another Father said:
“This is why the lover of knowledge must also be a lover of discipline and practical
application. For knowledge alone does not give light to the lamp.” You will receive
this light if you contemplate on the content of Scripture and realize that it was
written to correct you and not the others, as again St. Mark said: “The humble
person who has a spiritual life reads the Holy Scripture and understands everything
to refer to him and not to others.” For this is true wisdom, fear of God, and
avoidance of evil: “Behold, the fear of the Lord, that is wisdom; and to depart from
evil is understanding”… “The first wisdom is a praiseworthy life purified by God.”
6 Nicodemos of the Holy Mountain. A Handbook of Spiritual Counsel. The Classics of Western Spirituality. Trans. Peter
A. Chamberas. New York: Paulist Press, 1989. 186-190.

Reading: Memorial of the BVM
2023-02-04
Address of His Holiness Benedict XVI 7
to the monks of Heiligenkreuz Abbey
In the life of monks…prayer takes on a particular importance: it is the heart of
their calling. Their vocation is to be men of prayer. In the patristic period the
monastic life was likened to the life of the angels. It was considered the essential
mark of the angels that they are worshippers. Their very life is worship. This
should hold true also for monks. Monks pray first and foremost not for any specific
intention, but simply because God is worthy of being praised…Such prayer for its
own sake, intended as pure divine service, is rightly called officium. It is “service”
par excellence, the “sacred service” of monks. It is offered to the triune God who,
above all else, is worthy “to receive glory, honour and power”, because he
wondrously created the world and even more wondrously renewed it.
At the same time, the officium of consecrated persons is also a sacred service
to men and women, a testimony offered to them. All people have deep within their
hearts, whether they know it or not, a yearning for definitive fulfillment, for
supreme happiness, and thus, ultimately, for God. A monastery, in which the
community gathers several times a day for the praise of God, testifies to the fact that
this primordial human longing does not go unfulfilled: God the Creator has not
placed us in a fearful darkness where, groping our way in despair, we seek some
ultimate meaning; God has not abandoned us in a desert void, bereft of meaning,
where in the end only death awaits us. No! God has shone forth in our darkness
with his light, with his Son Jesus Christ. In him, God has entered our world in all
his “fullness”; in him all truth, the truth for which we yearn, has its source and
summit.
Our light, our truth, our goal, our fulfilment, our life – all this is not a
religious doctrine but a person: Jesus Christ. Over and above any ability of our own
to seek and to desire God, we ourselves were already sought and desired, and
indeed, found and redeemed by him! The gaze of people of every time and nation,
of all the philosophies, religions and cultures, ultimately encounters the wide open
eyes of the crucified and risen Son of God; his open heart is the fullness of love. The
eyes of Christ are the eyes of a loving God.
Your primary service to this world must therefore be your prayer and the
celebration of the divine office. The interior disposition…of each consecrated
person, must be that of “putting nothing before the divine Office”. The beauty of
this inner attitude will find expression in the beauty of the liturgy, so that wherever
we join singing, praising, exalting and worshipping God, a little bit of heaven will
become present on earth…In all our effort on behalf of the liturgy, the determining
factor must always be our looking to God. We stand before God – he speaks to us
and we speak to him…
…among you there burns the Marian flame of a Saint Bernard of
Clairvaux…Perhaps it was because of his particular devotion to Our Lady that he
exercised such a compelling and infectious influence on his many young
contemporaries called by God. Where Mary is, there is the pentecostal breath of the
Holy Spirit; there is new beginning and authentic renewal…Saint Bernard says, and
we say with him: “Look to the star of the sea, call upon Mary…in danger, in distress,
in doubt, think of Mary, call upon Mary. May her name never be far from your lips,
or far from your heart…If you follow her, you will not stray; if you pray to her, you
will not despair; if you turn your thoughts to her, you will not err. If she holds you,
you will not fall; if she protects you, you need not fear; if she is your guide, you will
not tire; if she is gracious to you, you will surely reach your destination”.
7 Pope Benedict XVI. Visit to Heiligenkreuz Abbey: Address of His Holiness Benedict XVI. Sunday, 8
September 2007.

Skema
2023-02-05
Biblical Readings for Office and Mass
5th Week in Ordinary Time

Mass Readings: Sunday (A), Weekdays (I)
February 5 – 11, 2023

Sun
5
Mon
6
Tue
7
Wed
8
Thu
9
Fri
10
Sat
11

Office
5th Sunday
St Paul Miki & Companions
Weekday
Office for the Dead
Weekday
St Scholastica
Our Lady of Lourdes

Vigils
Judg 16:23-31
Judg 17:1-13
Judg 18:1-11
Judg 18:13-31
Judg 19:1-21
Judg 19:20-30
Judg 20:1-19

Lauds
Zech 11:1-6
Zech 11:7-14
Zech 11:15-17
Zech 12:1-6
Zech 12:7-14
Zech 13:1-6
Zech 13:7-9

Mass
73
329
330
331
332
333
334

1st
Isa 58:7-10
Gen 1:1-19
Gen 1:20-2:4a
Gen 2:4b-9, 15-17
Gen 2:18-25
Gen 3:1-8
Gen 3:9-24

2nd
1 Cor 2:1-5

Gospel
Matt 5:13-16
Mark 6:53-56
Mark 7:1-13
Mark 7:14-23
Mark 7:24-30
Mark 7:31-37
Mark 8:1-10

Vespers
Phil 2:12-18
Phil 3:2-11
Phil 3:12-16
Phil 3:17-21
Phil 4:1-9
Phil 4:10-14
Phil 4:15-23

Vigils Reading - 5th Sun ORD
2023-02-05
Let Your Light Shine Before All1 A commentary by St John Chrysostom
We who have once for all clothed ourselves in Christ, and been made worthy to have him dwelling within us, may show everyone, if we choose, simply by the strict discipline of our life and without saying a word, the power of him who dwells in us. Therefore Christ said: Let your light so shine before all, that people may see your good works and praise your Father in heaven. This is a light that reaches not only the bodily senses, but illuminates also the beholder’s mind and soul. It disperses the darkness of evil, and invites those who encounter it to let their own light shine forth, and to follow the example of virtue.
Let your light shine before all, Christ said; and he used the words before all advisedly. He meant, “Let your light be so bright that it illuminates not only yourself, but shines also before those needing its help.” As the light our senses perceive puts darkness to flight, and enables those traveling along a road perceptible to the senses to follow a straight course, so also the spiritual light which shines from blameless conduct illuminates those who cannot see clearly how to live a virtuous life, because their spiritual eyesight has been blurred by the darkness of error. It purifies their inward vision, leads them to live upright lives, and makes them walk henceforth in the path of virtue.
That people may see your good works and praise your Father in heaven.
Christ means: Let your virtue, the perfection of your life, and the performance of good works inspire those who see you to praise the common Master of us all. And so I beg each of you to strive to live so perfectly that the Lord may be praised by all who see you. By the perfection of your lives attract to yourselves the grace of the Spirit, so that the Lord of all creation may be glorified, and so that we may all be found worthy of the kingdom of heaven by the grace, mercy, and goodness of God’s only-begotten Son our Lord Jesus Christ, to whom with the Father and the Holy Spirit be glory, might, and honor now and for ever and for endless ages. Amen
1Journey with the Fathers – Year A – New City Press – N.Y. – 1999 – pg 86
