Caritas Meeting 6:30 eastern
2026-02-23 18:30 - 20:30 (America/New_York)

Vigils Reading
2026-02-24
THE RAYS SHINING
FROM THE THORNS
From a commentary by St Gregory of Nyssa
◊◊◊
Let us, like Moses, live a solitary life, no longer entangled with adversaries
or mediating between them. Let us live among those of like mind who are fed by
us, while all the movements of our soul are led by reason like sheep by their
shepherd. Then, as we are living at peace, the truth will shine upon us and its
radiance will illuminate the eyes of our soul.
Now this truth is God. Once in an ineffable and mysterious vision it
manifested itself to Moses, and it is not without significance for us that the
flame from which the soul of the Prophet was illuminated was kindled from a
thorn-bush.
If truth is God and if it is also light – two of the sublime and sacred
epithets by which the Gospel describes the God who manifested himself to us in
the flesh – it follows that a virtuous life will lead us to a knowledge of that light
which descended to the level of our human nature. It is not from some luminary
set among the stars that it sheds its radiance, which might then be thought to
have a material origin, but from a bush on the earth, although it outshines the
stars of heaven.
This also symbolizes the mystery of the Virgin, from whom came the
divine light that shone upon the world without damaging the bush from which it
emanated or allowing the virgin shoot to wither. This light teaches us what we
must do to stand in the rays of the true light, and that it is impossible with our
feet in shackles to run toward the mountain where the light of truth appears. We
have first to free the feet of our soul from the covering of dead skins in which our
nature was clad in the beginning when it disobeyed God’s will and was left
naked.
To know that which is, we must purify our minds of assumptions
regarding things which are not. In my opinion the definition of truth is an
unerring comprehension of that which is. He who is immutable, who does not
increase or diminish, who is subject to no change for better or worse, but is
perfectly self-sufficient; he who alone is desirable, in whom all else participates
without causing in him any diminution, he indeed is that which truly is, and to
comprehend him is to know the truth.
It is he whom Moses approached and whom today all approach who like
Moses free themselves from their earthly coverings and look toward the light
coming from the bramble bush, at the ray shining on us from the thorns, which
stand for the flesh, for as the Gospel says, that ray is the real light and the truth.
Then such people will also be able to help others find salvation. They will be
capable of destroying the forces of evil and of restoring those enslaved by them
to liberty.

Vigils Reading
2026-02-25
A PHYSICIAN OF SOULS
From the Philokalia of Origen
◊◊◊
Nearly all readers of the Book of Exodus, both believers and unbelievers,
are disturbed at the frequently occurring words, The Lord hardened the heart
of Pharaoh, and, I will harden the heart of Pharaoh. For among many other
causes of men’s disbelief we must include this: that things unworthy of God are
spoken about God; and it is unworthy of God to bring about the hardening of
any man’s heart so that he may disobey the will of him who hardens.
For readers who are convinced that there is no other God but the
Creator think that God arbitrarily has mercy on whom he will have mercy,
and hardens whom he will, when there is no reason why this should be so.
Others, better advised than these, say they look upon Scripture as
containing many secrets, and do not on that account turn aside from the
sound faith. One of the secrets they hold to be the true account of this
portion of Scripture. Others, alleging that there is a God other than the
Creator, will have him to be just but not good, very foolishly and impiously
going the length of severing righteousness from goodness.
For ourselves, we are convinced, as we study the sacred Scriptures and
contemplate creation with its evidence of orderly design, that things visible and
invisible, things temporal and things eternal, come from God the Creator, who
is the same with the Father of our Lord and Saviour, the good and just and wise
God. In handling the Scriptures we strive to keep that steadily in view, begging
God our Saviour to show us all things pertaining to a good and just and wise
God, for we suppose that the things we speak of cannot be regarded, at least
by intelligent beings, as the result of chance, but that we must ask ourselves
whether they are consistent with his goodness and justice and wisdom…
The Word of God is a physician of souls and uses the most diverse
methods of healing the sick. Some of these methods of healing give pain and
torment to those who are under treatment, some act speedily and some slowly.
The whole of inspired Scripture abounds in proofs of each of these statements.
The God who designed souls knows all their different constitutions, and,
because he is an expert in the art of healing, it is for him alone to say what is
best to be done for each, and when.

Vigils Reading
2026-02-26
THE BOND OF LOVE
From a sermon by St Leo the Great
◊◊◊
Among all the days which Christian devotion holds honorable in many
ways, there is none more excellent than the Paschal Feast, through which the
dignity of all the solemnities in the Church of God is consecrated. Even the very
birth of our Lord from a human mother is credited to this mystery, for there was
no other reason for the Son of God to be born than that he could be fixed to a
cross. Our mortal flesh was taken up in the womb of a Virgin, and in this mortal
flesh the unfolding of his Passion was accomplished. Thus the mercy of God
fulfilled a plan too deep for words: Christ’s humanity became for us a sacrifice of
redemption, the destruction of sin, and the firstfruits of resurrection to eternal
life.
When we consider what the entire world owes to our Lord’s Cross, we
realize our need to prepare for the celebration of Easter by a fast of forty days if
we are to take part worthily in these sacred mysteries. It is not only the highest
bishops or the priests of the second order, nor the ministers who administer the
sacraments alone, but the whole body of the Church and the entire company of
the faithful who must be purified, so that in the Temple of God, whose
foundation is its Founder himself, every stone may be beautiful and all parts
radiant.
If it is reasonable to embellish a king’s palace or governor’s residence with
every ornamental art, so that the greater a person’s importance the more
splendid his dwelling, what zeal ought to be expended in building the House of
God himself, and how distinguished should be its furnishing! No doubt such a
task can be neither undertaken nor completed without the architect;
nevertheless the builder of the house has given it the power to grow in stature
through its own efforts. In the building of this Temple living and intelligent
materials are being used, which of their own free will assemble themselves into
a single structure at the prompting of the Spirit of grace. There was a time when
they neither loved God nor sought him; but he loved and sought them so that
they might begin to love and seek him in return. This is what the blessed apostle
John speaks of when he says: Let us love God, for he first loved us.
Since therefore the entire company of the faithful and each believer in
particular form one and the same Temple of God, there must be the same
perfection in each individual as there is in the whole; for even if all are not
alike in beauty nor is there equal merit in such a diversity of membership, yet
the bond of love ensures communion of beauty among them all. While those
who are united in holy love may not all have received the same gifts of grace,
they rejoice nonetheless in their mutual blessings. Nothing that they love can
be wanting to them, for they become rich in their own increase when they
rejoice in another’s progress.

Vigils Reading
2026-02-27
A FORESHADOW OF
THE GRACE TO COME
From the treatise on the Holy Spirit by St Basil the Great
◊◊◊
The type manifests things to come by imitating them, foreshadowing
future events in order to make them understood. For example, Adam was a
type of the One who was to come, the rock was a type of Christ, and the water
that flowed from the rock was a type of the life-giving power of the Word, for the
Lord said: If anyone is thirsty, let him come to me and drink. The manna
typified the living bread that came down from heaven and the serpent fixed to
the pole typified the saving Passion consummated upon the Cross, which is why
all who looked at it were saved.
Similarly, the reason the story is told of the Israelites’ exodus from Egypt
is that they prefigure those who are saved by baptism. The firstborn of the
Israelites were saved in the same way as are the bodies of the baptized, since
grace was given to those marked by the blood. For the blood of the lamb was a
symbol of the first man who was created and who of necessity still exists in us,
transmitted through succeeding generations until the end of the world.
The sea and the cloud had the immediate effect of producing faith because
of the amazement they aroused, but in relation to the future they were types
foreshadowing the grace to come. Who is wise enough to understand these
things, to understand how the sea is a type of baptism because it separated the
Israelites from Pharaoh just as baptism separates us from the tyranny of the
devil?
In its waters the sea destroyed the enemy and in baptism is slain our
enmity with God. From those waters the people emerged unharmed, and we
emerge from the waters of baptism as though we had died and come to life
again, saved by the grace of him who called us. As for the cloud, that
foreshadowed the gift of the Spirit, who cools the heat of the passions by the
mortification of our body.

Vigils Reading
2026-02-28
OUR PART IN THE PASSOVER
From a homily by St Gregory Nazianzen
◊◊◊
We are soon going to share in the Passover, and although we still do so
only in a symbolic way, the symbolism already has more clarity than it
possessed in former times, because under the law, the Passover was, if I may
dare to say so, only a symbol of a symbol. Before long, however, when the Word
drinks the new wine with us in the kingdom of his Father, we shall be keeping
the Passover in a yet more perfect way and with deeper understanding. He will
then reveal to us and make clear what he has so far only partially disclosed. For
this wine, so familiar to us now, is eternally new. It is for us to learn what this
drinking is, and for him to teach us. He has to communicate this knowledge to
his disciples, because teaching is food, even for the teacher.
So let us take our part in the Passover prescribed by the law, not in a literal
way, but according to the teaching of the Gospel; not in an imperfect way, but
perfectly; not only for a time, but eternally. Let us regard as our home the
heavenly Jerusalem, not the earthly one, the city glorified by angels, not the one
laid waste by armies. We are not required to sacrifice young bulls or rams,
beasts with horns and hoofs that are more dead than alive and devoid of feeling;
but instead let us join the choirs of angels in offering God upon his heavenly
altar a sacrifice of praise.
We must now pass through the first veil and approach the second, turning
our eyes toward the Holy of Holies. I will say more: we must sacrifice ourselves
to God each day and in everything we do, accepting all that happens to us for the
sake of the Word, imitating his passion by our sufferings, and honoring his
blood by shedding our own. We must be ready to be crucified.
If you are a Simon of Cyrene, take up your cross and follow Christ. If you
are crucified beside him like one of the thieves, now, like the good thief,
acknowledge your God. For your sake, and because of your sin, Christ himself
was regarded as a sinner; for his sake, therefore, you must cease to sin. Worship
him who hung on the cross because of you, even if you are hanging there
yourself. Derive some benefit from the very shame; purchase salvation with
your death. Enter paradise with Jesus, and discover how far you have fallen.
Contemplate the glories there, and leave the other scoffing thief to die outside in
his blasphemy.
If you are a Joseph of Arimathea, go to the one who ordered his
crucifixion, and ask for Christ’s body. Make your own the expiation for the
sins of the whole world. If you are a Nicodemus, like the man who worshiped
God by night, bring spices and prepare Christ’s body for burial. If you are one
of the Mary’s or Salome or Joanna, weep in the early morning. Be the first to
see the stone rolled back, and even the angels perhaps, and Jesus himself.

Skema
2026-03-01
Biblical Readings for Office and Mass
2nd Week of Lent

Mass Readings: Sunday (A), Weekdays (II)
March 1 – 7, 2026

Sun
1
Mon
2
Tue
3
Wed
4
Thu
5
Fri
6
Sat
7

Office
2nd Sunday of Lent
Lenten Weekday
Lenten Weekday
Lenten Weekday
Lenten Weekday
Lenten Weekday
Lenten Weekday

Vigils
Exod 9:1-12
Exod 9:13-35
Exod 10:1-20
Exod 10:21-11:10
Exod 12:1-20
Exod 12:21-36
Exod 12:37-51

Lauds
Deut 6:10-15
Deut 6:16-19
Deut 6:20-25
Deut 7:1-6
Deut 7:7-11
Deut 7:12-15
Deut 7:16-21

Mass
25
230
231
232
233
234
235

1st
Gen 12:1-4a
Dan 9:4b-10
Isa 1:10, 16-20
Jer 18:18-20
Jer 17:5-10
Gen 37:3-4, 12-13a, 17b-28a
Mic 7:14-15, 18-20

2nd
2 Tim 1:8b-10

Gospel
Matt 17:1-9
Luke 6:36-38
Matt 23:1-12
Matt 20:17-28
Luke 16:19-31
Matt 21:33-43, 45-46
Luke 15:1-3, 11-32

Vespers
Heb 6:1-8
Heb 6:13-20
Heb 7:17-28
Heb 8:1-6
Heb 8:7-13
Heb 9:1-10
Heb 9:11-14

Vigils Reading - 2nd Sunday of Lent
2026-03-01
THE JUST SHALL SHINE
LIKE THE SUN
From a commentary by St Leo the Great
◊◊◊
In the presence of chosen witnesses, the Lord unveils his glory, investing
with such splendor that bodily appearance which he shares with the rest of the
human race that his face shines like the sun and his clothes become white as
snow.
The primary purpose of this transfiguration was to remove the scandal of
the cross from the hearts of Christ’s disciples; the greatness of his hidden glory
was revealed to them to prevent their faith being shaken by the self-abasement
of the suffering he was voluntarily to undergo. In his foresight, however, he was
also laying the foundations of the Church’s hope, teaching the whole body of
Christ the nature of the change it is to receive, and schooling his members to
look forward to a share of the glory which had already shone forth in their head.
The Lord had told them of this when he spoke of his coming in majesty:
Then shall the just shine like the sun in the kingdom of their Father. The blessed
apostle Paul bears witness to the same thing: I consider that the sufferings of
this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed
in us. And again: You have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God.
When Christ who is your life appears, then you will appear with him in glory.
Still further instruction was to come from the transfiguration to fortify the
apostles and perfect their understanding. Moses and Elijah, representing the
law and the prophets. appeared in conversation with the Lord. Thus through the
presence of these five men the saying was fulfilled: On the evidence of two or
three witnesses every word shall stand. What could be more firmly established
than that the Word in whose proclamation the trumpets of Old and New
Testaments sound in unison, and the writings of ancient witnesses are in perfect
accord with the teaching of the gospel? The pages of both covenants agree with
one another. He who had been promised beforehand by mysteriously veiled
signs was now revealed clearly and distinctly in the radiance of his glory, as St
John says: The Law was given by Moses, but grace and truth have come
through Jesus Christ. In Christ what was promised by prophetic figures and
what was signified by legal precepts are alike fulfilled, for by his presence he
teaches the truth of the prophecies, and by grace he makes it possible for us to
obey the commandments.
May we all therefore be confirmed in our faith through the preaching of
the holy Gospel, and let no one be ashamed of the cross by which Christ has
redeemed the world. None of us must be afraid to suffer for the sake of justice or
doubt the fulfillment of the prophecies, for it is through toil that we come to rest
and through death that we pass to life. If we continue in the acknowledgment
and love of Christ who took upon himself all the weakness of our lowly nature,
what he conquered we too shall conquer, and the promise he gave us we shall
receive. So then, whether it is to encourage us to obey his commands or to
endure hardships, let the Father’s voice always be ringing in our ears and telling
us: This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased; Listen to him.

Vigils Reading
2026-03-02
FROM THE WEST TO THE EAST
From the catechesis of St Cyril of Jerusalem
◊◊◊
I long ago desired, true born and dearly beloved children of the Church, to
speak to you concerning these spiritual and heavenly mysteries in which you
came to participate. Knowing well that seeing is far more persuasive than
hearing, I waited until now with the hope of finding you more open to the
influence of my words from the actions you experience. Thus I might take and
lead you to the brighter and more fragrant meadow of this present paradise,
especially as you have been made fit to receive the more sacred mysteries and
have been counted worthy of divine and life-giving baptism.
On that evening of your baptism you entered into the outer hall of the
Baptistry, and there facing toward the west you heard the command to stretch
forth your hand, and as in the presence of Satan, you renounced him. This figure
is found in ancient history. For when Pharaoh, that most cruel and ruthless
tyrant, oppressed the free and royal people of the Hebrews, God sent Moses to
bring them out of the evil grip of the Egyptians. Then the doorposts were
anointed with the blood of the lamb that the destroyer might flee from the
houses which had the sign of the blood. And the Hebrew people were
marvelously delivered. The enemy, however, after their rescue, pursued them,
and saw the sea wondrously parted for them. Nevertheless he went on,
following in their footsteps and was all at once overwhelmed and engulfed in the
Red Sea.
Now turn from the ancient to the recent, from the figure to the reality.
There, we have Moses sent from God to Egypt; here, Christ sent by his Father
into the world. There, that Moses might lead forth an oppressed people out of
Egypt; here, that Christ might rescue mankind who is overwhelmed with sins.
There, the blood of a lamb was the spell against the destroyer; here, the blood of
the unblemished Lamb Jesus Christ is made the charm to scare evil spirits.
There, the tyrant pursued even to the sea that ancient people; and in like
manner this daring and shameless spirit, the author of evil, followed you, even
to the very streams of salvation. The tyrant of old was drowned in the sea; and
this present one disappears in the saving water.
What then did each of you standing up say? ‘I renounce Satan’, meaning ‘I
fear your power no longer, for Christ has overthrown it, having partaken with
me of flesh and blood, that through these he might by death destroy death that I
might not for ever be subject to bondage. I renounce you, you crafty and most
subtle serpent. I renounce you, plotter as you are, who under the guise of
friendship brought about disobedience and the apostasy of our first parents. I
renounce you, Satan, the source of all wickedness.’
When you renounced Satan, utterly breaking all covenants with him, that
ancient connection with hell, there is opened to you the paradise of God, which
he planted toward the east, where for his transgression our first father was
exiled. Symbolic of this was your turning from the west to the east, the place of
light. Then you were told to say: I believe in the Father, and in the Son, and in
the Holy Spirit, and in one baptism of repentance.

Vigils Reading
2026-03-03
THE FOOD OF THE SPIRIT
From a commentary by St Cyril of Alexandria
◊◊◊
We shall think of the manna as a figure foreshadowing the teaching and
the spiritual gifts of Christ. These also are from heaven, and have nothing
earthly about them. They produce no physical nausea, and are real food not only
of men but of angels as well.
In his own person the Son has revealed the Father to us, and through the
Son we have come to believe the teaching about the holy and consubstantial
Trinity, and have been well and truly guided into all the paths of virtue. The
orthodox and unadulterated knowledge of these things is the food of the spirit.
To the people of old the manna was given at dawn, as the light began to
shine, because the wealth of Christ’s teaching would be distributed so to speak
by daylight The day has dawned upon us who believe, as Scripture says; the
morning star has risen in all our hearts, and the Sun of Righteousness, Christ,
the giver of spiritual manna, has appeared.
From his own words to the Jews we can be certain that Christ himself is
the true manna, and the material manna was but an image: Your ancestors ate
manna in the desert and they died. This is the bread that comes down from
heaven so that anyone who eats it may never die. I am the living bread come
down from heaven. Whoever eats this bread will live forever. The bread I shall
give is my flesh which I shall give for the life of the world.
Our Lord Jesus Christ nourishes us for eternal life both by his commands,
which teach us how to live holy lives, and by the Eucharist. In himself, therefore,
he is truly the divine, life-giving manna. Anyone who eats it will be exempt from
corruption and will escape death, unlike those who ate the material manna. The
type had no power to save, but was merely an imitation of the reality.
God sent down manna like rain from above, and ordered everyone to
gather as much as necessary, those who shared a tent gathering together if they
wished. Gather it, each of you, he said, with those who share your tent. Let
none of it be left over till the morning. That is to say, we must fill ourselves
with the divine teaching of the Gospel.

Vigils Reading
2026-03-04
THE LIFTING UP
OF HIS HANDS
From a sermon by St Aelred of Rievaulx
◊◊◊
We read in the Old Testament that, after the people of Israel left Egypt
with Moses at their head, the Amalekites, a savage race, came and did battle
against them. Moses sent an army against them, while he himself went up on to
a mountain to pray for them and raised his hands to the Lord. And it came to
pass that while he kept his hands raised, the people of Israel were triumphant
but whenever he lowered his hands Amalek started to win. Why was it, do you
think, that the raising of his hands possessed such grace? Without doubt God
usually takes more account of the attachments of the mind than of the postures
of the body.
Why was it then? Did his prayer have no effect before God unless he raised
his hands? That lifting up of his hands had such an effect that their enemies
could not withstand the Israelites. The reason why this lifting up of hands had
such force was that it signified the raising of the hands of him who said in the
psalm, The lifting up of my hands is like an evening sacrifice. For, when evening
had already come upon the world, his sweetest hands were stretched out on the
Cross and there was offered up that evening sacrifice that took away the sins of
the whole world.
So that raising of Moses’ hands signified the Passion of our Lord Jesus
Christ who went up on to a mountain to pray because he ascended into heaven
to plead our cause with the Father. There he lifts up his hands so that Amalek –
that is, the devil – will not be able to vanquish us. For there he appears in God’s
sight on our behalf and represents to him the Passion that he underwent for us.
As for us, brothers, as long as we are in this wretched life which is a trial
upon earth, as long as our fight is against the principalities and powers,
against the rulers of the dark things of the world, against the spiritual
forces of evil in the heavens, we need to have our Lord lifting up his hands
within us – that is to say, the remembrance of his Passion should be continually
present in our minds. We can be quite sure, my brothers, that as long as the
memory of his Passion is in our heart, as long as our hope is directed to where C
hrist is pleading our cause at the right hand of the Father, the spiritual
Amalek – that is, the devil – will not be able to vanquish us.
And therefore, my brothers, let us see that this attachment, this
remembrance, does not through some negligence on our part grow lukewarm in
us. For then we shall immediately grow faint and our enemy will gain the upper
hand and cause us distress.

Vigils Reading
2026-03-05
HUMILITY AND PATIENCE
From “The Institutes” of John Cassian
◊◊◊
Whoever seeks to be received into the discipline of the cenobium is never
admitted until, by lying outside for ten days or more, he has given an indication
of his perseverance and desire, as well as of his humility and patience.
When a person has been admitted, has been tested in the perseverance
about which we have spoken, and has put aside his own garments and been
clothed in the monastic habit, he is not permitted to join the community of the
brothers immediately but is assigned to an elder who dwells not very far from
the entrance of the monastery and is responsible for being hospitable to trav-
ellers and strangers. And when he has served for a full year there and has
without any complaining waited upon travellers, having in this way been
exposed to his first training in humility and patience, and he is about to be
admitted from this to the community of the brothers, he is given over to another
elder who is responsible for ten younger men, who have been entrusted to him
by the Abba…
The chief concern and instruction of this man, whereby the young man
who was brought to him may be able to ascend even to the loftiest heights of
perfection, will be, first of all, to teach him to conquer his desires. In order to
exercise him assiduously and diligently in this respect, he will purposely see to it
that he always demands of him things that he would consider repulsive. For,
taught by numerous experiences, they declare that a monk, and especially the
younger men, cannot restrain their yearning for pleasure unless they have first
learned to mortify their desires through obedience. And so they assert that
someone who has not first learned to overcome his desires can never extinguish
anger or sadness or the spirit of fornication, nor can he maintain true humility
of heart or unbroken unity with his brothers or a solid and enduring peace, nor
can he even stay in the cenobium for any length of time.
With these institutes, then, as with the rudiments of the alphabet, they
initiate those whom they strive to direct toward perfection. In this way they
discern clearly whether they are grounded in a humility that is deceptive and
imaginary or in one that is real. In order to be able to arrive easily at this, they
are then taught never, through a hurtful shame, to hide any of the wanton
thoughts in their hearts but to reveal them to their elder as soon as they surface,
nor to judge them in accordance with their own discretion but to credit them
with badness or goodness as the elder’s examination discloses and makes clear.
Thus the clever foe is never able to get the better of a young man when he
sees that he is protected not by his own but by his elder’s discretion. Indeed, the
devil in all his slyness will not be able to deceive or cast down a young man
unless he induces him, either by haughtiness or by embarrassment, to cover up
his thoughts. For they declare that it is an invariable and clear sign that a
thought is from the devil if we are ashamed to disclose it to an elder.

Vigils Reading
2026-03-06
THE LUMINOUS DARKNESS
From “The Life of Moses” by St Gregory of Nyssa
◊◊◊
Moses entered into the darkness and there he saw God. What does this
signify? This present account seems in a way to contradict that of the first
theophany. Then God appeared in light, but now he appears in darkness. Yet we
must not imagine this to be at variance with our normal experience of spiritual
contemplation. By this statement the text teaches us that religious knowledge is
first experienced as light. All that is seen to be opposed to religion is darkness,
and darkness vanishes when we receive the light.
But the more the mind advances and by ever increasing and more perfect
application attains an intellectual comprehension of realities and approaches
contemplation, the more clearly it sees that the divine nature is invisible.
Having left behind all appearances, not only those perceived by the senses but
also those the intellect seems to see, it plunges ever deeper within itself, until by
spiritual effort it penetrates to the invisible and the unknowable, and there it
sees God.
This is the true knowledge of what is sought; this is the seeing that
consists in not seeing, because that which is sought transcends all knowledge,
being separated on all sides by incomprehensibility as by a kind of darkness.
This is why John the contemplative, who had penetrated this luminous
darkness, said that no one had ever seen God, declaring by this negation that the
divine essence is beyond the reach not only of men but of every rational nature
as well.
And so, when Moses had advanced in knowledge he declared that he saw
God in the darkness, or in other words that he recognized that the Divinity is
essentially that which transcends all knowledge and which no mind can
apprehend. The text says: Moses entered into the darkness where God was.
What God? He who has made the darkness his covering, as David declared,
who had himself been initiated into the divine mysteries in that same sanctuary.
When Moses arrived there, he was taught by word what he had formerly learned
from darkness, so that, I think, the doctrine on this matter may be made more
firm for us by the witness of the divine voice. The divine word at the beginning
forbade that the Divine be likened to any of the things known by men, since
every concept which comes from some comprehensible image constitutes an
idol of God and does not proclaim God.

Vigils Reading
2026-03-07
LOVE GOD AND NEIGHBOUR
From a sermon by St Augustine of Hippo
◊◊◊
Make it up with your adversary while he is with you on the road. This life
is called a road, along which everybody travels. And this adversary does not go
away. But who is this adversary? This adversary is not the devil, for Scripture
would never urge you to come to an agreement with the devil. So who is this
adversary? It is the word of God. Why is it your adversary? Because it
commands things against the grain which you do not do. It tells you: Your God
is one; worship one God.
What you want is to put away the one God who is like the lawful husband
of your soul and go fornicating, and what is much more serious, not openly
deserting and repudiating him as apostates do, but remaining in your husband’s
house and letting in adulterers. That is, as if you were a Christian you do not
leave the Church but you consult astrologers or sorcerers.
You are told, Do not take the name of the Lord your God in vain and you
are told to observe the Sabbath in a spiritual way, in hope of the future rest
which the Lord has promised you. Whoever does whatever he can for the sake of
that future rest, even though what he is doing seems toilsome, nonetheless he
already has the Sabbath in hope, though he does not yet have it in fact. But as for
you, the reason you want to rest is in order to work, whereas you ought to be
working in order to rest.
You are told, Honour your father and your mother. You heap insults on
your parents, which you certainly do not want to endure from your children.
You are told, You shall not kill. But you want to kill your enemy; and the only
reason you do not do it is that you are afraid of the human judge. Do you not
realize that God is the witness of your thoughts? The man you want dead is alive,
but God holds you to be a murderer in your heart.
You were singing earlier on: O God, I will sing you a new song, on a harp
of ten strings I will play to you. Now I am strumming these ten strings. You see,
the decalogue of the Law has ten commandments. These ten commandments
are arranged in such a way that three refer to God and seven refer to men.
Commandments on three strings refer to God. But to the other commandment,
that is, the love of neighbour, seven strings refer to how people should live
together. This series of seven, like seven strings, begins with the honouring of
parents: Honour your father and your mother… Let us join these to those three
that refer to love of God, if we wish to sing the new song to the harp of the ten
strings.
The ten commandments are reducible to those two commandments, that
we should love God and our neighbour, and these two to the one we are looking
for: What you do not want done to you, do not do to another. There the ten are
contained, and there also are contained the two. Sing to the harp of ten strings,
sing a new song, and come to an agreement with the word of God, while it is with
you on the road.

Skema Third Week of Lent
2026-03-08
Biblical Readings for Office and Mass
3rd Week of Lent

Mass Readings: Sunday (A), Weekdays (II)
March 8 – 14, 2026

Sun
8
Mon
9
Tue
10
Wed
11
Thu
12
Fri
13
Sat
14

Office
3rd Sunday of Lent
Lenten Weekday
Lenten Weekday
Lenten Weekday
Lenten Weekday
Lenten Weekday
Lenten Weekday

Vigils
Exod 13:1-16
Exod 13:17-14:9
Exod 14:10-31
Exod 15:1-21
Exod 15:22-16:15
Exod 16:16-35
Exod 17:1-16

Lauds
Deut 8:1-6
Deut 8:7-14
Deut 9:1-6
Deut 9:7-13
Deut 9:15-21
Deut 9:22-29
Deut 10:12-22

Mass
28
237
238
239
240
241
242

1st
Exod 17:3-7
2 Kgs 5:1-15a
Dan 3:25, 34-43
Deut 4:1, 5-9
Jer 7:23-28
Hos 14:2-10
Hos 6:1-6

2nd
Rom 5:1-2, 5-8

Gospel
John 4:5-42
Luke 4:24-30
Matt 18:21-35
Matt 5:17-19
Luke 11:14-23
Mark 12:28b-34
Luke 18:9-14

Vespers
Heb 9:15-22
Heb 9:23-28
Heb 10:1-10
Heb 10:11-18
Heb 10:19-25
Heb 10:26-31
Heb 10:32-39

Third Sunday of Lent
2026-03-08
POWER TOGETHER
WITH WEAKNESS
From a commentary by St Augustine 1
◊◊◊
Wearied by his journey, Jesus sat down beside a well. It was about the sixth hour. Already divine mysteries begin. Not for nothing is Jesus wearied; nor for nothing does the Power of God suffer fatigue. Not for nothing does he who refreshes the weary endure weariness. Not for nothing is he wearied, whose absence makes us weary, whose presence gives us strength.
Jesus is tired, tired out by his journey. He sits down. On the edge of a well he seats himself. It is midday, and he sits there exhausted. All these details have meaning. They are meant to signify something. They capture our attention, persuading us to knock and investigate further. We have Christ’s own exhortation to do so, for he said: Knock, and it will be opened to you. May he, then, open up the meaning of this text to us as well as to you.
It was for your sake that Jesus was wearied by his journey. In Jesus we encounter divine power together with weakness. He is strong and weak at one and the same time: strong, because in the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God, present with God from the beginning. Would you know how strong the Word of God is? All things were made through him, and apart from him nothing came into being. The whole universe was made without effort. Could any greater power exist than the power of one who was able effortlessly to construct the entire universe?
And would you know him in his weakness? The Word was made flesh, and lived among us. The power of Christ created you; the weakness of Christ recreated you. Christ’s power caused what did not exist to come into being; Christ’s weakness saved existing things from destruction. In his might he fashioned us; in his weakness he came in search of us.
Jesus, then, is weak, tired out after his journey. Now that journey of his, undertaken for our sake, was his incarnation. How could he otherwise journey when he is present everywhere, and absent from nowhere? To what place or from what place could he travel? In only one way could he come to us, and that was by assuming our visible human flesh. Since then he condescended to come to us in that way, and to appear in the condition of a servant by taking to himself a human nature, that assumption of our nature was his journey.
The fatigue caused by his journey, therefore, was the weariness Jesus experienced in our human nature. In his human body he was weak, but you must not be weak. You must be strong in his weakness, for there is more power in divine weakness than in human strength.
1
Journey with the Fathers – Year A – New City Press – NY – 1992 – pg 40.

Weekday in Third Week in Lent
2026-03-09
THE BLOOD OF CHRIST
From “A Treatise Upon the Passion” by St Thomas More 2
◊◊◊
In the twenty-fourth chapter of Exodus it is related that Moses, in confirmation of the old Law, put half the blood of the sacrifice into a cup, and the other half he shed upon the altar. And, after the book of the Law had been read, he sprinkled the blood upon the people and said unto them: This is the blood of the covenant that the Lord has made with you in all these words. And so was the Old Testament ratified and confirmed with blood.
And in like manner was the New Testament confirmed with blood, saving that, in order to declare the greater excellence of the New Testament brought by the Son of God, above the Old Testament brought by the prophet Moses, whereas the Old Testament was ratified with the blood of a brute beast, the New Testament was ratified with the blood of a rational man, and of that man who was also God, that is to say, with the blessed blood of our holy Saviour himself. And that self-same blood did our Lord here give unto his apostles in this blessed sacrament, as he plainly declared himself, saying: This is my blood of the New Testament, or: This is the chalice of the New Testament in my blood which shall be shed for you and for many for the remission of sins.
When our Lord said this, he declared therein the efficacy of the New Testament above the old, in that the old Law in the blood of beasts could only promise the remission of sin that was to come later. For as Saint Paul says: It was impossible that sin should be taken away by the blood of brute beasts.
But the new Law with the blood of Christ does perform the thing that the old Law promised, that is, the remission of sin And therefore our Saviour said: This is the chalice of the New Testament in my blood – that is, to be confirmed in my blood – which shall be shed for the remission of sins.
His words also declared the wonderful excellence of this new blessed sacrament above the sacrifice of the paschal lamb, in these words: For you and for many. For in these words our Saviour spoke, says Saint Chrysostom, as though he meant to say: The blood of the paschal Lamb was shed only for the first-born among the children of Israel, but this blood of mine shall be shed for the remission of the sin of all the whole world.
2
St Thomas More, A Treatise upon the Passion, 4.1; from Word in Season II, 1st ed.

Tuesday in Third Week in Lent
2026-03-10
GOD MADE VISIBLE
IN THE FLESH
By St John of Damascus 3
◊◊◊
God, the best physician of souls, prohibits from making images those who are still infants and ill with a diseased inclination to idolatry, those who are apt to venerate idols as gods. For it is impossible to make an image of God who is incorporeal, invisible, and with neither shape nor circumscription; how can what cannot be seen be depicted? That they did venerate idols as gods, listen to what Scripture says in Exodus, when Moses went up on to Mount Sinai and was there for some time, waiting to receive the Law from God, the senseless people rose up against the servant of God, Aaron, saying, Make us gods to go before us; as for this man, Moses, we do not know what has become of him.
I know what the One who cannot lie said: The Lord your God is one Lord, and you shall not make any carved likeness, of anything in heaven or on the earth, and all who venerate carved images shall be put to shame. I venerate one God, one divinity but also I worship a trinity of persons, God the Father and God the Son incarnate and God the Holy Spirit. I do not offer three venerations, but one, not to each of the persons separately, but I offer one veneration to the three persons together as one God. I do not venerate the creation instead of the creator, but I venerate the Creator, created for my sake, who came down to his creation that he might glorify my nature and bring about communion with the divine nature.
I venerate together with the King and God the purple robe of his body, not as a garment, nor as a fourth person (God forbid!), but as unchangeably equal to God and the source of anointing. For the nature of the flesh did not become divinity, but as the Word became flesh immutably, remaining what it was, so also the flesh became the Word without losing what it was… Therefore I am emboldened to depict the invisible God, not as invisible, but as he became visible for our sake, by participation in flesh and blood. I do not depict the invisible divinity, I depict God made visible in the flesh…
We, who, passing beyond childhood to reach maturity, are no longer under a custodian, have received the habit of discrimination from God and know what can be depicted and what cannot be delineated in an image. For it is now clear that you cannot depict the invisible God. When you see the bodiless become human for your sake, then you may accomplish the figure of a human form; then you may depict him on a board and set up to view the One who has accepted to be seen.
Depict his ineffable descent, his birth from the Virgin, his being baptized in the Jordan, his transfiguration on Tabor, what he endured to secure our freedom from passion, the miracles which are symbols of his divine nature and activity accomplished through the activity of the flesh, the saving tomb of the Saviour, the resurrection, the ascent into heaven. Depict all these in words and in colors, in books and on tablets.
3
St John of Damascus, On the Divine Images III. 4, 6, 8; (1996) tr. Andrew Louth.

Wednesday in Third Week in Lent
2026-03-11
THE LIGHT OF CHRIST
From a commentary by St Ambrose 4
◊◊◊
Let your face shine on your servant, and teach me your precepts. The Lord enlightens his saints and makes his light shine in the hearts of the just. This means that when you see wisdom in anyone you can be sure that the glory of God has come down and flooded that person’s mind with the light of understanding and knowledge of divine truth. With Moses, however, it was different: God’s glory affected his body also, causing his face to shine. Indeed, his countenance was so transfigured that the <children of Israel> were afraid to look at him, and he was obliged to cover his face with a veil so that <they> should not be alarmed at the sight of it.
Now the face of Moses represents the splendor of the Law; yet this splendor is not to be found in the written letter but in the Law’s spiritual interpretation. As long as Moses lived, he wore a veil over his face whenever he spoke… But after his death Jesus, or Joshua, the son of Nun, spoke to the elders and the people without a veil. When he did so no one was afraid, even though God had spoken to Joshua as well as to Moses, assuring him that he would be with him just as he had been with Moses and would make him resplendent also.
Joshua’s glory, however, would be seen in his deeds rather than in his face. By this the Holy Spirit signified that when Jesus, the true Joshua, came, he would lift the veil from the heart of anyone who turned to him in willingness to listen, and that person would then see his true Saviour with unveiled face.
So it was that, through the coming of his Son, God the almighty Father made his light shine into the hearts of the Gentiles, bringing them to see his glory in the face of Christ Jesus. This is clearly stated in the Apostle’s letter, where we find the following written: The God who commanded light to shine out of darkness has made his light shine in our hearts, to enlighten us with the knowledge of God’s glory shining in the face of Christ Jesus.
And so when David says to the Lord Jesus: Let your face shine upon your servant, he is expressing his longing to see the face of Christ, so that his mind may be capable of enlightenment. These words can be taken as referring to the incarnation, for as the Lord himself declared: Many prophets and righteous men have desired to have this vision. David was not asking for what had been denied to Moses, namely that he might see the face of the incorporeal God with his bodily eyes… There was nothing wrong, therefore, in David’s desire to see the face of the Virgin’s Son who was to come; he desired it in order that God’s light might shine in his heart, as it shone in the hearts of the disciples who said: Were not our hearts burning within us when he opened up the Scriptures to us?
4
St Ambrose, On Psalm 118 17:26-29 (CSEL 62:390-392); from Word in Season II, 1st ed.

Thursday in Third Week in Lent
2026-03-12
THE POWER OF
CHRISTIAN PRAYER
From the treatise “On Prayer” by Tertullian 5
◊◊◊
Prayer is the spiritual offering that has replaced the ancient sacrifices. What good do I receive from the multiplicity of your sacrifices?, asks God. I have had enough of burnt offerings of rams, and I do not want the fat of lambs and the blood of bulls and goats. Who has asked for these from your hands? What God has asked for, we learn from the Gospel: The hour will come, it says, when true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and in truth. God is spirit, and so he looks for worshipers who are like himself.
We are the true worshipers and the true priests. Praying in spirit we offer prayer to God as a sacrifice. Prayer is an appropriate and an acceptable sacrifice to God. It is the offering he has asked for and the offering he expects. We must make this offering with our whole heart. We must fatten it on faith, prepare it by truth, keep it unblemished by innocence, spotless by chastity, and we must crown it with love. We must escort it to the altar of God in a procession of good works to the sound of psalms and hymns. Then it will gain for us all that we ask of God. What can God refuse to prayer offered in spirit and in truth, when he himself asks for such prayer? How many proofs of its efficacy we read about, hear of, and believe!
Of old prayer brought deliverance from fire and beasts and hunger even before it received its pattern from Christ. How much greater then is the power of Christian prayer! It does not bring an angel of comfort to the heart of a fiery furnace, or shut the mouths of lions, or transport to the hungry food from the fields. The grace it wins does not remove all sense of pain, but it does endow those who suffer with the capacity to endure and the faith to know what the Lord will give those who suffer for the name of God.
In the past prayer caused plagues, routed armies, withheld the blessing of rain. Now the prayer of good people turns aside the anger of God, keeps vigil for their enemies, pleads for their persecutors. If prayer once had the power to call down fire from heaven, is it any wonder that it can call down from heaven the waters of grace? Prayer is the one thing that can conquer God. But Christ has willed that it should work no evil: all the power he has given it is for good.
All the angels pray. Every creature prays. Cattle and wild beasts pray and bend the knee. As they come from their barns and caves they look up to heaven and call out, lifting up their spirit in their own fashion. The birds too rise and lift themselves up to heaven: they open out their wings, instead of hands, in the form of a cross, and give voice to what seems to be a prayer.
What more need be said about the duty of prayer? Even the Lord himself prayed. To him be honour and power for ever and ever. Amen.
5
Tertullian, De oratione 28-29 (CCL 1:273-274); from Word in Season II, 1st ed.

Friday in Third Week in Lent
2026-03-13
THE MYSTERY OF
THE TABERNACLE
From “The Life of Moses” by St Gregory of Nyssa 6
◊◊◊
What then is that tabernacle not made with hands which was shown to Moses on the mountain and to which he was commanded to look as to an archetype so that he might reproduce it in a handmade structure? God said, See that you make them according to the pattern shown you on the mountain. Of what things not made with hands are these an imitation? And what benefit does the material imitation of those things Moses saw there convey to those who look at it?
Taking a hint from what has been said by Paul, who partially uncovered the mystery of these things, we say that Moses was earlier instructed by a type in the mystery of the tabernacle which encompasses the universe. This tabernacle would be Christ who is the power and the wisdom of God, who in his own nature was not made with hands, yet capable of being made when it became necessary for this tabernacle to be erected among us. Thus, the same tabernacle is in a way both unfashioned and fashioned, uncreated in pre-existence but created in having received this material composition. This one is the Only Begotten God, who encompasses everything in himself but who also pitched his own tabernacle among us.
Whenever the prophet looks to the tabernacle above, he sees the heavenly realities through these symbols. But if one should look at the tabernacle below, since in many places the Church also is called Christ by Paul, he would see the Church. In this tabernacle both the sacrifice of praise and the incense of prayer are seen offered continually at morning and evening. The great David allows us to perceive these things when he directs the incense of his prayer in an odor of sweetness to God, performing his sacrifice through the lifting up of his hands…
If the interior, which is called the Holy of Holies, is not accessible to the multitude, let us not think that this is at variance with the sequence of what has been perceived. For the truth of reality is truly a holy thing, a holy of holies, and is incomprehensible and inaccessible to the multitude. Since it is set in the secret and ineffable areas of the tabernacle of mystery, the apprehension of the realities above comprehension should not be meddled with; one should rather believe that they do exist and that they remain in the secret and ineffable areas of the Intelligence.
6 St Gregory of Nyssa, The Life of Moses 170, 173-175, 184-188; CWS (1978) tr.Malherbe & F erguson.

Saturday in the Third Week in Lent
2026-03-14
HIDDEN BY HIS HOLY FLESH
From a commentary by St Cyril of Alexandria 7
◊◊◊
Emmanuel, God-with-us, is presented in figure and image when Scripture says: And you will place the ark of the testimony in the tabernacle and cover it with the veil. For in the preceding account the Word was described to us as in the whole tabernacle; for it was the house in which God dwelt, namely, the holy body of Christ. But despite that, the ark gives us the same meaning in detail. For it was made of acacia wood, for you to perceive his incorruptibility. It was entirely overlaid with pure gold, as it is written, both inside and outside. For everything in him, both divine and human, is precious and splendid; and in everything he is pre-eminent, as Paul says…
So the ark was made of acacia wood and overlaid with gold, and had the divine Law put into it as a symbol of the indwelling Word of God united to a holy body. For the Word of God was also the Law, even, if not in human form, as the Son is. But it is covered with the veil.
It was much the same with God the Word made man, the covering of his own body obscured to the many. He, too, was hidden by his holy flesh as by a veil. Some of the Jews, therefore, failing to recognize his divine majesty, sometimes tried to stone him to death, accusing him of claiming to be God, when he was a man. Others again did not hesitate to say: Is this not Jesus, the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? How, then, can he say: ‘I have come down from heaven.’
So the laying of a veil on the ark tells us symbolically that Jesus would not be recognized by the many. Then even the ark itself was a symbol of him. So it was even he who went before the Israelites in the desert, taking the place of God at that time; for it was he who led the people. The psalmist is also a witness to this, saying: When you went before your people, O God, when you crossed the desert, the earth shook and the heavens, too, poured down rain. For the ark being always in front clearly means that God leads the way.
For Christ is one, but is understood in many and various ways: he is the tabernacle, because of the veil of flesh; he is the ark, containing the divine Law, as he is the Word of God the Father; he is the table, as life and nourishment; the lampstand, as intellectual and spiritual light; he is the altar of sacrifice, as the fragrant odor in sanctity; and the altar of offerings, as an offering for the life of the world. Thus all things in life are sanctified, for Christ is entirely holy, in whatever way he is understood.
7 St Cyril of Alexandria, On John IV.4 (PG 73:620-621, 625); from Word in Season II, 2nd ed

LCG Chicago 9:00 am CDT
2026-03-14 09:00 - 12:00 (America/Chicago)
All are welcome to visit with the Chicago lay Community at:
Join Zoom Meeting
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/86028356465
Meeting ID: 860 2835 6465
One tap mobile
+13126266799,,86028356465# US (Chicago)
+13092053325,,86028356465# US
Agenda:
9:00 Gather for Opening prayer.
We also pray for all our lay Cistercian sisters and brothers in the US and around the world. Specially we pray for our Gethsemani monks. Finally, we pray this month specially for:
Fr. Timothy Kelly
Br. Malachy Samanns
Fr. Michael Casagram

9:10 Lectio. Our lectio piece will be led by Mary Haley .
9:50 Reading. Our reading this month is The Cistercian Way by Andre Louf.
10:45 Housekeeping. Volunteer to lead lectio next month? Our next study book. Chicago Report on LCG Advisory Council activity.
11:00 Update. Share how the Holy Spirt has entered our lives as lay Cistercians since our last meeting.
11:45 Closing worship and prayer. We will pray the liturgical hour of None as with our Gethsemani monks (identical Psalms as done today at Gethsemani Abbey.)
Our next meeting: April11, 2026.

Skema
2026-03-15
Biblical Readings for Office and Mass
4th Week of Lent

Mass Readings: Sunday (A), Weekdays (II)
March 15 – 21, 2026

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

Office
4th Sunday of Lent
Lenten Weekday
Lenten Weekday
Lenten Weekday
St Joseph
Lenten Weekday
Lenten Weekday

Vigils
Exod 18:1-27
Exod 19:1-15
Exod 19:16-25
Exod 20:1-21
Heb 11:1-16
Exod 24:1-18
Exod 25:1-22

Lauds
Deut 11:1-7
Deut 11:8-12
Deut 11:13-17
Deut 11:18-25
Gen 45:4-8
Deut 26:16-19
Deut 27:1-10

Mass
31
244
245
246
543
248
249

1st
1 Sam 16:1b, 6-7, 10-13a
Isa 65:17-21
Ezek 47:1-9, 12
Isa 49:8-15
2 Sam 7:4-5a, 12-14a, 16
Wis 2:1a, 12-22
Jer 11:18-20

2nd
Eph 5:8-14

Rom 4:13, 16-18, 22

Gospel
John 9:1-41
John 4:43-54
John 5:1-3a, 5-16
John 5:17-30
Matt 1:16, 18-21, 24a
John 7:1-2, 10, 25-30
John 7:40-53

Vespers
Heb 11:1-7
Heb 11:8-16
Heb 11:17-22
Eph 3:14-21
James 1:22-27
Heb 12:1-6
Heb 12:7-13

Vigils Reading - 4th Sunday of Lent
2026-03-15
COME TO CHRIST
From a commentary by St Ambrose
◊◊◊
You have heard that story in the gospel where we are told that the Lord
Jesus, as he was passing by, caught sight of a man who had been blind from
birth. Since the Lord did not overlook him, neither ought we to overlook the
story of a man whom the Lord considered worthy of his attention. In particular
we should notice the fact that he had been blind from birth. This is an important
point.
There is, indeed, a kind of blindness, usually brought on by serious illness,
which obscures one’s vision, but which can be cured, given time; and there is
another sort of blindness, caused by cataract, that can be remedied by a
surgeon; he can remove the cause and so the blindness is dispelled. Draw your
own conclusion: this man, who was actually born blind, was not cured by
surgical skill, but by the power of God.
When nature is defective the Creator, who is the author of nature, has the
power to restore it. That is why Jesus also said: As long as I am in the world, I
am the light of the world, meaning: all who are blind are able to see, so long as I
am the light they are looking for. Come, then, and receive the light, so that you
may be able to see.
What is he trying to tell us, he who brought human beings back to life,
who restored them to health by a word of command, who said to a corpse, Come
out! And Lazarus came out from the tomb; who said to a paralytic, Arise and
pick up your stretcher, and the sick man rose and picked up the very bed on
which he used to be carried as a helpless cripple? Again, I ask you, what is he
trying to convey to us by spitting on the ground, mixing his spittle with clay and
putting it on the eyes of a blind man, saying: Go and wash yourself in the pool of
Siloam (a name that means “sent”)? What is the meaning of the Lord’s action in
this? Surely one of great significance, since the person whom Jesus touches
receives more than just his sight.
In one instant we see both the power of his divinity and the strength of his
holiness. As the divine light, he touched this man and enlightened him; as a
priest, by an action symbolizing baptism he wrought in him his work of
redemption. The only reason for his mixing clay with the spittle and smearing it
on the eyes of the blind man was to remind you that he who restored the man to
health by anointing his eyes with clay is the very one who fashioned the first
man out of clay, and that this clay that is our flesh can receive the light of eternal
life through the sacrament of baptism.
You, too, should come to Siloam, that is, to him who was sent by the
Father (as he says in the gospel, My teaching is not my own, it comes from him
who sent me). Let Christ wash you and you will then see. Come and be baptized,
it is time; come quickly, and you too will be able to say, I was blind, and now I
can see, and as the blind man said when his eyes began to receive the light, The
night is almost over and the day is at hand.

Vigils Reading
2026-03-16
THE ACCURSED ONE
WEARS THE WREATH
From “The Letter of Barnabas”
◊◊◊
Bear in mind, O children of joy, that there is not a single thing which the
Lord in his goodness has not made clear to us beforehand, so that we may know
to whom all our thanks and praises are due. Though the Son of God was the
divine Lord, and the future Judge of living and dead alike, yet nevertheless he
suffered, in order that his affliction might win life for us.
Notice the directions he gave. Take a couple of goats, unblemished and
well-matched; bring them for an offering, and let the priest take one of them
for a burnt offering. And what are they to do with the other? The other, he
declares, is accursed. (Now see how plainly the type of Jesus appears.) Spit on
it, all of you; thrust your goads into it, wreathe its head with scarlet wool, and
so let it be driven out into the desert.
This is done, and the servant leads the animal into the desert, where he
takes off the wool and leaves it there… Now what does that signify? Notice that
the first goat is for the altar, and the other is accursed; and that it is the accursed
one that wears the wreath. That is because they shall see him on That Day clad to
the ankles in his red woollen robe, and will say, ‘Is not this he whom we once
crucified, and mocked and pierced and spat upon? Yes, this is the man who told
us that he was the son of God.’
But how will he resemble the goat? The point of there being two similar
goats, both of them fair and alike, is that when they see him coming on the Day,
they are going to be struck with terror at the manifest parallel between him and
the goat. In this ordinance, then, you are to see typified the future sufferings of
Jesus…
Men whose sins had come to a head were to bring a heifer for an offering,
and slay it and burn it. Then, after gathering up the ashes and putting them into
basins of water, young children were to tie scarlet wool on branches of wood
(here again, you see, we have the scarlet wool and the type of the Cross),
together with sprigs of hyssop; and with these the people were to be sprinkled,
man by man, by the youngsters, to cleanse them from their sins. See how clearly
he is speaking to you here! The calf is Jesus, and the sinners who offer it are
those who dragged him to the slaughter. Why was the wool put on living wood?
Because the royal realm of Jesus is founded on a Tree, and they who hope in him
shall have eternal life. To ourselves it is plain enough that these were the true
reasons for doing things in this way; but to them it was all dark, because their
ears were deaf to the voice of the Lord.

Vigils Reading
2026-03-17
GUARDING OUR CONSCIENCE
From the writing of St Dorotheus of Gaza
◊◊◊
When God created man, he implanted in us something of his own divinity,
in the way of a more ardent disposition, with a shining spark of reason to
illuminate our minds and teach us the difference between good and evil. This is
called conscience, which is the natural law. It was by submitting to this law, that
is, to the conscience, that the patriarchs and all the faithful in the days before the
written Law were well-pleasing to God. But since conscience was clogged and
trampled on by humanity in general through successive sins, we needed the
written Law, we needed the holy Prophets, and we needed the coming of our
Lord Jesus Christ to uncover and awaken it, and to bring the buried spark back
to life through the observance of his holy commands.
So it is now up to us either to keep it buried, or to allow it to shine in us and
illuminate us if we obey it. For when our conscience tells us to do something and
we ignore it, and it speaks again and we still do nothing but trample on it, we
finally bury it, and it can no longer speak clearly to us because of the weight
pressing on it.
Let us take the greatest care, then, brothers, to guard our conscience as
long as we live in this world, and not allow it to convict us of any wrongdoing,
nor despise it even in the smallest matters for any reason at all. For, as you
know, from scorning such small and supposedly unimportant things we are led
to despise even great things. Both living a good life and living a life of sin grow
from small beginnings, to end in either great good or great evil.
Then we must guard our conscience in relation to God, in relation to our
neighbour and in relation to material things. In relation to God, so as not to
despise his commands, even if no one sees us or expects anything of us. We
guard our conscience for God in secret, for instance, when we do not neglect
prayers and, when our mind is inflamed with passion, we agree to calm down
and relax; and, when we see our neighbour talking or doing anything, we refrain
from suspecting and condemning him for appearing to be up to no good.
Guarding our conscience in relation to our neighbour means to do
nothing at all which we know will distress or frighten our neighbour, either by
deed, word, gesture or look. For, as I have often told you before, even a gesture
can upset a neighbour, and so can a look.
Guarding our conscience in relation to material things means not to
misuse anything, nor let anything be wasted or left lying about, but if we see
anything lying about not to ignore it, even if it is something quite unimportant,
but pick it up and return it to its right place; it also means not to neglect our
clothes. Equally with food: you can satisfy your needs with a small amount of
vegetables or lentils, or a few olives; but to refuse to do so, and to insist on
having either pleasanter or more expensive food – all such things are against
conscience.

Vigils Reading
2026-03-18
GROUNDED IN THE FAITH
From a homily by Origen
◊◊◊
The omnipotent God, who lays down for men the contest of observing his
Law in this world, lists what ought to be done and not done, announces suitably
at the end of the book of Leviticus where each individual observance is
established, what reward he who fulfills them bears and what punishment he
who does not observe them undergoes.
But if the Law…is not spiritual but carnal, there is no doubt that he grants
carnally observed blessings also to those who observe them carnally. But if, as it
seems to the Apostle Paul, the Law is spiritual then it must be observed
spiritually and there is a spiritual reward of the blessings for which they hope…
So that what we say may not be doubted, let us hear the voice of the Apostle Paul
himself writing about spiritual blessings to the Ephesians: Blessed be the God
and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who blessed us in Christ with every
spiritual blessing in heaven.
And you will eat your bread in abundance. I do not take that to be a
physical blessing, as if he who keeps the Law of God obtains this ordinary bread
in abundance. Why? Do not the impious and wicked eat bread not only in
abundance but even in delight? Therefore, if we turn our attention more to him
who said, I am the living bread which descended from heaven, and whoever
eats this bread will live forever, and if we consider that he who said this was
the Word by which souls are nourished, then we will understand about
which bread it was said, And you will eat your bread in abundance. In
Proverbs, Solomon also proclaims similar things about the just man when
he says, When the just man eats, he will fill his soul; but the souls of the
impious will be in extreme poverty.
If you take it according to the literal sense, it appears false. For the
souls of the impious take food with eagerness and strive after satiety; but
the just meanwhile are hungry. Paul was just and he said, Up to this hour
we are hungry, and thirsty, and naked, and we are beaten with fists. But
if you consider how the just man always and without interruption eats
from the living bread and fills his soul with the heavenly food which is the
Word of God and his Wisdom, you will find how the just man eats his
bread in abundance from the blessing of God.
And you will dwell secure upon your land. The unjust man is never
secure but is always moved and wavers and is carried about by every wind of
doctrine. But the just man who keeps the Law of God dwells secure upon his
land. For his understanding is made firm by saying to God, Confirm me, O
Lord, in your words. Therefore, he lives upon his land grounded in the faith
because his building is not placed upon sand, and his root is not ‘upon a rock’,
but indeed his house was founded upon the earth, but his plant took root in the
depth of the earth, that is, in the interior of his soul. Therefore, it is rightly said
to a soul of this kind in the blessings, You will dwell secure upon your land; and
I will give peace upon your land.

Vigils Reading - St Joseph
2026-03-19
EVERYTHING HE DID
WAS DONE FOR GOD
From a sermon by Jacques Benigne Bossuet
◊◊◊
Among all the various vocations, I have noticed in Scripture two which
seem complete opposites: the first is that of the apostles; the second that of St.
Joseph. Jesus was revealed both to the apostles and to St Joseph, but for very
different reasons. He was revealed to the apostles so that they could proclaim
him to the whole world. He was revealed to Joseph so that he could remain
silent and conceal him.
The apostles were lights to make Jesus Christ visible to the whole world.
Joseph was a veil to hide him, and under this veil of mystery were hidden for us
the virginity of Mary and the greatness of the Savior. So we read in Scripture
that when people wished to belittle him they would say: Is he not Joseph’s son?
For the apostles then, Jesus was a Word to be proclaimed. Preach the message
of this gospel. For Joseph, however, Jesus was an unspoken word which was not
to be revealed.
See what the result is. The holy apostles proclaimed the word so loudly
that their word was re-echoed in the heavens, and St Paul dared to say that the
heavenly powers learned the counsels of the divine Wisdom through the
Church. On the other hand, when Joseph heard the marvels of Jesus Christ
spoke of, he listened, wondered, and kept silence.
What is the meaning of this difference? Is God at odds with Himself in
such contrasting vocations? No, you must not think so. All this diversity is
meant to teach God’s children the important truth that the whole of Christian
perfection lies simply in submission. He who glorified the apostles by conferring
on them the honorable duty of preaching, glorified Saint Joseph also by giving
him the humble duty of keeping silent. We should learn from this that true
Christian glory lies not in employments that win public acclaim, but in doing
God’s will.
If everyone cannot have the honor of preaching Jesus Christ, everyone
can have the honor of obeying him, and that is the glory of Saint Joseph, the
trustworthy honor of Christians. So do not ask me what Saint Joseph did in his
hidden life. I cannot possibly tell you. I can only reply the words of the Psalmist:
But what has the just man done? Usually the lives of sinners attract more
attention than those of good people because it is excitement and passion which
make a stir in the world. The sinners have drawn the bow, says David, they
have let fly at the righteous, destroyed, overthrown – he speaks only of worldly
people – for they have destroyed what you have made. He goes on. But what
has the just man done? He means that he has done nothing. Indeed he has done
nothing for people to see, because everything he did was done for God.
That is the way Saint Joseph lived. He saw Jesus Christ and remained
silent; he had experience of him but spoke no word. He did not share his glory
with others, but was satisfied with God alone. He fulfilled his vocation because,
just as the apostles were the ministers appointed to make Jesus Christ known,
so Joseph was his minister and companion in his hidden life.

Vigils Reading
2026-03-20
WHEREVER CHRIST LEADS
By St Cyril of Alexandria
◊◊◊
The glory of Christ filled the true Tabernacle, which is the Church, from
the very moment it was set up on earth. This, surely, is what is signified by the
cloud that covered the first Tabernacle. Christ has filled the Church with his
glory, and now like a fire, he shines forth to give light to those who live in the
darkness of ignorance and error. He shades and protects those already
enlightened by the dawn of his day in their hearts. He refreshes them with the
heavenly dew of his consolations sent down from above through the Spirit. This
is what we should understand by the saying that by night he appeared in the
form of fire, and by day in the form of cloud.
Those who were as yet uninstructed in the teaching of Christ required
spiritual enlightenment to bring them to a knowledge of God; but the more
advanced, whose minds had been illumined by faith, were in need of protection
from the scorching heat of the day, and of courage to bear the burdens of this
present life. For all who desire to live a godly life in Christ will suffer
persecution.
Whenever the cloud moved forward, the Tabernacle went with it; when
the cloud settled, the Tabernacle came to rest with it and the Israelites broke
their journey. Now the meaning of this for us is that wherever Christ leads, the
Church, the holy multitude of believers, follows him. The faithful are never
separated from the Saviour who calls them to himself. We may not be able to
find any special meaning in the constant halts and new departures throughout
our spiritual journey under Christ’s guidance. It is the whole journey, following
the cloud whether it moves forward or settles, that symbolizes our desire to be
with God.
Nevertheless, if we would have a more subtle interpretation, we could
perhaps say that our first departure is from unbelief to faith, from ignorance to
knowledge, and from having no perception of the true God to clear recognition
of the Creator and Lord of the universe. The second stage, and an essential one,
is conversion from sin and licentiousness to a desire for amendment both in
thought and deed. But the best and most glorious is the third part of the journey,
because in it we leave behind what is deficient and move onward toward what is
perfect both in our actions and in our belief.
So, little by little, we advance toward the ideal we see in Christ, to become
the perfect man, sharing in the perfection of Christ himself. This surely is what
Saint Paul means by saying: Forgetting what lies behind me and straining
forward to what lies ahead, I press on to reach the goal, the heavenly reward to
which God calls me in Christ Jesus.
