Lay Cistercians of Gethsemani Abbey

Vigils Reading - SS Joachim & Ann
2025-07-26
JOACHIM AND ANN
From a sermon by St John Damascene
◊◊◊
Ann was to be the mother of the Virgin Mother of God, and hence nature
did not dare to anticipate the flowering of grace. Thus nature remained sterile,
until grace produced its fruit. For she who was to be born had to be a first-born
daughter, since she would be the mother of the first-born of all creation, in
whom all things are held together.
Joachim and Ann, how blessed a couple! All creation is indebted to you.
For your hands the Creator was offered a gift exceeding all other gifts: a chaste
mother, who alone was worthy of him.
And so rejoice, Ann, that you were sterile and have not borne children;
break forth into shouts, you who have not given birth. Rejoice, Joachim,
because from your daughter a child is born for us, a son is given us, whose
name is Messenger of great counsel and universal salvation, mighty God. For
this child is God.
Joachim and Ann, how blessed and spotless a couple! You will be known
by the fruit you have borne, as the Lord says: “by their fruits you will know
them”. The conduct of your life pleased God and was worthy of your daughter.
For by the chaste and holy life you led together, you have fashioned a jewel of
virginity; she who remained a virgin before, during and after giving birth. She
alone for all time would maintain her virginity in mind and soul as well as in
body. Joachim and Ann, how chaste a couple! While safeguarding the chastity
prescribed by the law of nature, you achieved with God’s help something which
transcends nature in giving the world the Virgin Mother of God as your
daughter. While leading a devout and holy life in your human nature, you gave
birth to a daughter nobler than the angels, whose queen she now is.
Girl of utter beauty and delight, daughter of Adam and mother of God,
blessed the loins and blessed the womb from which you come! Blessed the arms
that carried you, and blessed your parent’s lips, which you were allowed to cover
with chaste kisses, ever maintaining your virginity. Rejoice in God, all the earth.
Sing, exult and sing hymns. Raise your voice, raise it and be not afraid.

Skema
2025-07-27
Biblical Readings for Office and Mass
17th Week in Ordinary Time

Mass Readings: Sunday (C), Weekdays (I)
July 27 – Aug.2, 2025

Sun
27
Mon
28
Tue
29
Wed
30
Thu
31
Fri
1
Sat
2

Office
17th Sunday
Weekday
SS Martha, Mary & Lazarus
Weekday
St Ignatius Loyola
St Alphonsus Ligouri
Memorial of the BVM

Vigils
Gen 30:25-43
Gen 31:1-24
Gen 31:25-54
Gen 32:1-22
Gen 32:23-33:20
Gen 34:1-31
Gen 35:1-29

Lauds
Hos 4:7-12
Hos 4:13-19
Hos 5:1-7
Hos 5:8-15
Hos 6:1-6
Hos 6:7-7:2
Hos 7:3-10

Mass
111
401
402, 607
403
404
405
406

1st
Gen 18:20-32
Exod 32:15-24, 30-34
Exod 33:7-11; 34:5b-9, 28
Exod 34:29-35
Exod 40:16-21, 34-38
Lev 23:1, 4-11, 15-16, 27, 34b-37
Lev 25:1, 8-17

2nd
Col 2:12-14

Gospel
Luke 11:1-13
Matt 13:31-35
John 11:19-27
Matt 13:44-46
Matt 13:47-53
Matt 13:54-58
Matt 14:1-12

Vespers
Eph 6:1-9
Eph 6:10-17
Eph 6:18-24
Phil 1:1-11
Phil 1:12-18a
Phil 1:18b-26
Phil 1:27-30

Vigils Reading - 17th Sunday
2025-07-27
ASK, SEEK, AND KNOCK
From a commentary by The Venerable Bede
◊◊◊
Our Lord and Savior wishes us to attain the joy of the heavenly kingdom,
and so he taught us to pray for it, promising to give it to us if we did so. Ask, he
said, and you will receive, seek and you will find, knock and the door will be
opened to you.
We should consider most seriously and attentively what these words of
the Lord may mean for us, for they warn that not the idle and lazy but those who
ask, seek, and knock will receive, find and have the door opened to them. We
must therefore ask for entry into the kingdom by prayer, seek it by upright
living, and knock at its door by perseverance. Merely to ask verbally is not
enough; we must also diligently seek to discover how to live so as to be worthy of
obtaining what we ask for. We know this from our Savior’s words: Not everyone
who says to me, “Lord, Lord” will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only those
who do the will of my heavenly Father.
There is a need, then, for constant and unflagging prayer. Let us fall upon
our knees with tears before our God and Maker; and that we may deserve a
hearing, let us consider carefully how he who made us wishes us to live, and
what he has commanded us to do…
Seek first the kingdom of God and its justice, and these other things will
be given you as well. To seek the kingdom of God and its justice is to long for the
graces of our heavenly homeland, and to give constant thought to the kind of
upright living that will deserve to obtain them; for should we chance to stray
from the path that leads there we shall never be able to reach our goal.
To ask God for the justice of his kingdom is to ask principally for faith,
hope and love. These virtues above all we should strive to obtain, for Scripture
says: Mercy surrounds those who hope in the Lord; and To love is to fulfill the
law, for the whole law is summed up in one word: You shall love your neighbor
as yourself. And so the Lord graciously promises that the Father will give the
good Spirit to those who ask him, in order to show that those who of themselves
are evil can become good only by receiving the grace of the Spirit…
As we do our best, then, to follow in our Lord’s footsteps, let us ask God
the Father for the grace of his Spirit to lead us along the path of that true faith
which works through love… Then, if we keep the almighty Father’s
commandments, he will certainly reward us with the eternal blessing which
from the beginning he prepared as our heritage through Jesus Christ our Lord,
who with the Holy Spirit lives and reigns with him, God for ever and ever.

Vigils Reading
2025-07-28
THE GLORY OF GOD
From a commentary by Eric Peterson
◊◊◊
Angels are more than poetic extras from the repertoire of folk-lore. They
have to do with Christ and with the Holy Spirit; but they have to do with us well.
They represent for us a possibility in our own nature, an enhancement and
intensification of our being – but never the possibility of a new and different
faith. They teach us about dark depths in our being wherein is movement and
impulse, independent, it may be, of ourselves, and which we may not even
recognize for what they really are, nor attribute yet awhile to angelic influence.
An impulse might simply be felt as an urge towards purity of heart; or one might
become conscious of an overwhelming desire for mental clarity and a true
existence.
We hurry towards the angels along many paths, not as though we
expected to become an angel, but because our own being is only a preliminary
existence and it does not yet appear what we shall be. And if we do not hurry
towards those angels who stand in God’s presence, then we shall most certainly
hasten towards those who have turned away from God; we shall rush towards
the demons. For we always live so that we transcend ourselves and thus move
toward either the angels or the demons. And we who transcend ourselves – for
to do this is our being – are able to ascend higher and higher, not in the moral
but in the metaphysical sense, until we become an associate of the angels and
arrive at the frontier of that realm where stand the cherubim and seraphim.
This boundary line, marked out neither by ourselves nor by any
archangel, arrests our progress: here we begin to join in the music of the
spheres and in the singing of the angels. Our song is no mere imitation of the
angelic song, no modest joining in the cry of Holy, holy, holy which resounds
from their lips majestically and without ceasing; but it is also something which
erupts from our innermost being when we reach the bounds of all things – the
bounds of ourselves as creatures.
What do we learn on reaching the angelic world but the creation praises
God, praises him from the last star down to the least blade of grass? What
applies to the highest grade of creation applies equally to the lowest, to plant-
life, animals and things which stand much lower than we in the scale of being.
When in the psalms let us say, animals and mountains break froth in praise of
God, this is no mere hyperbole or excess of poetic fancy, an unwarrantable
human personifying of inanimate nature. It is something based ultimately in
the nature of the created thing, and which runs fight through the whole scale of
creation from the cherubim and seraphim down to the least thing in the world.
As the Gospel has told us, the whole creation is full of the glory of God.

Vigils Reading - SS Martha, Mary & Lazarus
2025-07-29
THE HAPPINESS OF
MARTHA AND MARY
From a sermon by St Aelred of Rievaulx
◊◊◊
Jesus entered a certain fortress, and a certain woman named Martha
received him into her house. And she had a sister named Mary. You have heard
in the Gospel about the great happiness of the two women. Truly, brothers, great
was the happiness of Martha, who welcomed such a guest, who waited upon
him, who was completely engaged with serving him. Great was the happiness of
Mary, who recognized the excellence of her guest, who listened to his wisdom
and tasted his sweetness…
If therefore…our soul according to what we have said, becomes a fortress,
it is fitting that two women live in it: one who sits at the feet of Jesus and listens
to his words, the other who waits upon Jesus and feeds him. Consider this: if
Mary were alone in this house, there would be no one to feed the Lord; if Martha
were alone, there would be no one to take delight in the discourses and presence
of the Lord. Therefore…Martha signifies that action by which a person labors
for Christ, and Mary signifies that rest by which a person ceases from bodily
activities and takes delight in the sweetness of God, either through reading,
prayer, or contemplation. Therefore…as long as Christ is poor and goes about
afoot on earth, and is hungry and thirsty, and is tempted, it is necessary that
both of these women dwell in one house, that both of their actions be in one
soul.
As long as you or I or anyone else is on earth, he himself is present in the
world, if we are his members. Whenever those who are his members are hungry,
thirsty, and tempted, then Christ will be hungry, thirsty, and tempted. For this
reason, Christ himself will say on the day of judgment: “Whenever you, did it to
one of the least of my brothers or sisters, you did it to me”. Therefore…in this
miserable and burdensome life, it is necessary that Martha be in our house, that
is, that our soul be busy with bodily activities. As long as we must eat and drink,
then we have to labor. As long as we are tempted by carnal pleasures, it is
necessary for us to tame the flesh by vigils, fasts, and bodily labor. This part is
Martha’s.
Mary also should be in our soul, for she represents activity of spirit. We
should not always give ourselves to bodily exercises but occasionally should rest
and see how delightful, how sweet, is the Lord; we should sit at the feet of Jesus
and listen to his word. In no way ought you to neglect Mary because of Martha,
nor again Martha because of Mary. If you neglect Martha who will feed Jesus? If
you neglect Mary, what will it benefit you that Jesus entered your house, since
you taste nothing of his sweetness?

Vigils Reading
2025-07-30
ASCETICISM
AS A WAY OF LOVE
By Paul Evdokimov
◊◊◊
The methods provided for asceticism reflect the epoch which practices it
and adapt themselves to its way of thinking. In the conditions of modern life,
under the weight of overwork and nervous exhaustion, emotional reaction
changes. Medicine protects and prolongs life but at the same time diminishes
the resistance to suffering and to privations. Christian asceticism is never an
end in itself; it is only a means, a method in the service of life, and it will seek to
be in harmony with new requirements.
Formerly, the asceticism of the desert Fathers imposed fasts of a severe
kin, and constraints; today the battle is shifting to other ground. Man has no
need to impose supplementary suffering upon himself; to use [highly artificial
methods] would be to risk breaking him to no purpose.
Today ‘mortification’ means being relaxed from all necessity to ‘dope’
oneself: through speed, noise, excitements, drugs, alcohol, [and similar] stimuli
of all kinds. Asceticism would be, rather, the repose that is imposed upon us, the
discipline of calmness and silence in which a man rediscovers the faculty to
pause for prayer and contemplation, even at the heart of all the noises of the
world, in the [train and bus stations], in the crowd, at the crossroads of a town;
but above all it is the faculty of appreciating the presence of others, the friends of
each encounter.
Fasting, contrary to the maceration which one inflicts upon oneself,
would be the joyous renunciation of all that is superfluous, sharing it with the
poor, and a smiling, natural, peaceful equilibrium. Back beyond the [bodily] and
psychological asceticism of the Middle Ages, we should seek the eschatological
asceticism of the first centuries, that act of faith which transformed the whole
human being into the joyous expectation of the Second Coming, an expectation
which was not chronological, but qualitative, and which discerns the final and
sole necessity, for, according to the Gospel, the time is short and “the Spirit and
the Bride say ‘Come!’”
Asceticism thus becomes a means of paying attention to the challenges of
the Gospel, to the standard of the Beatitudes: it will seek for humility and purity
of heart, in order to deliver its neighbor and to restore him to God. In a world
that is weary, crushed with cares, living to an intensely accelerated rhythm, the
task is to find and to live a ‘spiritual childhood’, the freshness and the
evangelical simplicity of the ‘little way’ which leads to sitting at the table of
sinners, to blessing and breaking bread together.…
Thus, [asceticism] is never anything but a means, a strategy… The
evangelical asceticism of the Gospel goes to extremes, not out of fear, but out of
a love that overflows with tenderness towards the world. St. Dorotheus gives a
beautiful picture of salvation, in the form of a circle. Its center is God, and all the
people stand at the circumference. The nearer one draws to the center — God —
the nearer do the rays of the circle — one’s neighbor — draw to one another.
[And so] St. Isaac can say [a similar thing] to his disciple: “Here is a
commandment for you: let mercy always [be the measure] your scale, until…
you feel within yourself the mercy that God feels towards you and towards the
world.”

Vigils Reading -St Ignatius Loyola
2025-07-31
THE FIRST TRIAL OF
IGNATIUS OF LOYOLA
From The Autobiography of St Ignatius
◊◊◊
On the Vigil of the Annunciation in 1522 he set out at nightfall, as
discreetly as possible, to find a beggar. Stripping off his clothes he gave them to
this pauper and dressed…in the garb for which he had longed. Then he went and
knelt before the altar of our Lady, where, staff in hand, he spent the whole night,
now kneeling, now standing, and after receiving the Blessed Sacrament left at
day-break <for Manresa>, in order not to be recognized.
It was while he was living at the hospital at Manresa that the following
strange event took place. Very frequently on a clear moonlight night there
appeared in the courtyard before him an indistinct shape which he could not see
clearly enough to tell what it was. Yet it appeared so symmetrical and beautiful
that his soul was filled with pleasure and joy as he gazed at it. It had something
of the form of a serpent with glittering eyes, and yet they were not eyes. He felt
an indescribable joy steal over him at the sight of this object. The oftener he saw
it, the greater was the consolation he derived from it, and when the vision left
him, his soul was filled with sorrow and sadness.
Up to this period he had remained in a constant state of tranquility and
consolation, without any interior knowledge of the trials that beset the
spiritual life. But during the time that the vision lasted, sometimes for days,
his soul was violently agitated by a thought that brought him no little
uneasiness. There flashed upon his mind the idea of the difficulty that
attended the kind of life he had begun, and he felt as if he head some one
whispering to him, “How can you keep up for seventy years of your life these
practices which you have begun?” Knowing that this thought was a
temptation of the evil one, he expelled it by this answer: “Can you, wretched
one, promise me one hour of life?” In this manner he overcame the temptation,
and his soul was restored to peace. This was his first trial.

Vigils Reading - St Alphonsus Ligouri
2025-08-01
THE FULLNESS OF HIMSELF
From a sermon by St Alphonsus Ligouri
◊◊◊
All holiness and perfection of soul lies in our love for Jesus Christ our
God, who is our Redeemer and our supreme good. It is part of the love of God to
acquire and to nurture all the virtues that make one perfect.
Has not God in fact won for himself a claim on all our love? From all
eternity he has loved us. And it is in this vein that he speaks to us: “O consider
carefully that I first loved you. You had not yet appeared in the light of day, nor
did the world yet exist, but already I loved you. From all eternity I have loved
you.”
Since God knew that we are enticed by favors, he wished to bind us to his
love by means of his gifts: “I want to catch mortals with these snares, these
chains of love in which they allow themselves to be entrapped, so that they will
love me.” And all the gifts which he bestowed on us were given to this end. He
gave us a soul, made in his likeness, and endowed with memory, intellect and
will; he gave us a body equipped with the senses; it was for us that he created
heaven and earth and such an abundance of things. He made all things out of
love for us, so that all creation might serve us, and we in turn might love God out
of gratitude for so many gifts.
But God did not wish to give us only beautiful creatures; the truth is that
to win for himself our love, he went so far as to bestow upon us the fullness of
himself. The eternal Father went so far as to give us his only Son. When he saw
that we were all dead through sin and deprived of his grace, what did he do?
Compelled, as the Apostle says, by the superabundance of his love for us, he sent
his beloved Son to make reparation for us and to call us back to a sinless life.
By giving us his Son, whom he did not spare precisely so that he might
spare us, he bestowed on us every good: grace, love and heaven; for all these
goods are certainly inferior to the Son: He who did not spare his own Son, but
handed him over for all of us; how could he fail to give us along with his Son all
good things?

Vigils Reading - Memorial of the BVM
2025-08-02
THE CHRISTIAN
PAR EXCELLENCE
By Fr Émile Mersch
◊◊◊
The final step in the long preparation for Christ is His mother. We cannot
say anything more glorious or more beautiful about her than that, as the mother
of Jesus Christ, she is inseparable from Christ and from all that is Christ…
The other saints have particular kinds of holiness exclusive of one
another. Their sanctity is that of members. The foot is not the hand, and the ear
is not the eye; St Benedict Labre is quite different from St Francis de Sales, and
St Peter Damien is different from St Theresa of Lisieux. But Mary, who is holy in
her capacity as the mother of Christ, possesses all holiness: the unblemished
splendor of the woman clad with the sun is in striking fashion the splendor of
the sun itself.
This holiness partakes of all the matchless perfections of Christ. Its
excellence, which consists in uniting Christ to all humankind, makes of it a
holiness of union with all; it is a common and everyday holiness, an imitable and
approachable holiness, because it is pure holiness.
There is nothing extraordinary in Mary’s life, nothing to excite wonder. As
Jesus was quite simply a man who did not exalt Himself above His station and
did not harden Himself against pain or despise the slight value to be found in us,
so she was simply His mother, the woman whose Son is Jesus.
All the facts at the disposal of Christian piety show her living, in faith,
hope, and charity, the life that God appointed for her. She does not hesitate to
ask herself exactly what the future will bring, but at the same time she always
and in everything sees, loves, and carries out fully the will of God. She grasps, as
a mother can, with an intuition born of love, which is adequate but may remain
indistinct, what her Son is and what mission He came to accomplish. She
accepts and wishes what he wishes, and with all her heart allows her consent to
be fixed and carried out in His. Because of this unique excellence of hers she is
the Christian par excellence; and that is exactly what she ought to be.

Skema
2025-08-03
Biblical Readings for Office and Mass
18th Week in Ordinary Time

Mass Readings: Sunday (C), Weekdays (I)
August 3 – 9, 2025

Sun
3
Mon
4
Tue
5
Wed
6
Thu
7
Fri
8
Sat
9

Office
18th Sunday
St John Vianney
Weekday
Transfiguration of the Lord
St Cajetan
St Dominic
Memorial of the BVM

Vigils
Gen 37:1-20
Gen 37:21-36
Gen 38:1-30
2 Cor 3:7-4:6
Gen 39:1-23
Gen 40:1-23
Gen 41:1-32

Lauds
Hos 7:11-16
Hos 8:1-7
Hos 8:8-14
Exod 24:12-18
Hos 9:1-9
Hos 9:10-17
Hos 10:1-8

Mass
114
407
408
614
410
411
412

1st
Eccl 1:2; 2:21-23
Num 11:4b-15
Num 12:1-13
Dan 7:9-10, 13-14
Num 20:1-13
Deut 4:32-40
Deut 6:4-13

2nd
Col 3:1-5, 9-11

2 Peter 1:16-19

Gospel
Luke 12:13-21
Matt 14:13-21
Matt 14:22-36
Luke 9:28b-36
Matt 16:13-23
Matt 16:24-28
Matt 17:14-20

Vespers
Phil 2:1-11
Phil 2:12-18
Phil 3:2-11
Heb 12:18-29
Phil 3:12-16
Phil 3:17-21
Phil 4:1-9

Vigils Reading - 18th Week
2025-08-03
THE GENEROUS INVITATION
From a commentary by St Basil the Great
◊◊◊
“The land of a rich man produced abundant harvests, and he thought to
himself: What am I to do? I will pull down my barns, and build larger ones.”
Now why did that land bear so well, when it belonged to a man who would
make no good use of its fertility? It was to show more clearly the forbearance of
God, whose kindness extends even to such people as this. He sends rain on both
the just and unjust, and makes the sun rise on the wicked and the good alike.
But what do we find in this man? A bitter disposition, hatred of other
people, unwillingness to give. This is the return he made to his Benefactor. He
forgot that we all share the same nature; he felt no obligation to distribute his
surplus to the needy. His barns were full to the bursting point, but still his
miserly heart was not satisfied. Year by year he increased his wealth, always
adding new crops to the old. The result was a hopeless impasse: greed would not
permit him to part with anything he possessed, and yet because he had so much
there was no place to store his latest harvest. And so he is incapable of making a
decision and could not escape from his anxiety. What am I to do?
Who would not pity a man so oppressed? His land yields him no profit but
only sighs: it brings him no rich returns, but only cares and distress and a
terrible helplessness. He laments in the same way as the poor do. Is not his cry
like that of one hard pressed by poverty? What am I to do? How can I find food
and clothing?
You who have wealth, recognize who has given you the gifts you have
received. Consider yourself, who you are, what has been committed to your
charge, from whom have you received it, why have you been preferred to most
other people? You are the servant of the good God, a steward on behalf of your
fellow servants. Do not imagine that everything has been provided for your own
stomach. Take decisions regarding your property as though it belonged to
another. Possessions give you pleasure for a short time, but then they will slip
through your fingers and be gone, and you will be required to give an exact
account of them.
What am I to do? It would have been so easy to say: “I will feed the
hungry, I will open my barns and call in all the poor…proclaiming good will
toward everyone.” I will offer the generous invitation: “Let anyone who lacks
bread come… You shall share, each according to need, in the good things God
has given, just as though you were drawing from a common well.”

Vigils Reading - St John Vianney
2025-08-04
PRAYER IN THE LIFE
OF THE CURÉ D’ ARS
From the encyclical “Sacerdoti Nostri Primordia” by St John XXIII
◊◊◊
To the priests of this century, apt to be sensitive to the effect of action and
easily tempted by a dangerous activism, how beneficial is that model of
assiduous prayer in a life given up entirely to the care of souls, which was the
Curé d’Ars! O What prevents us priests from being saints, he said. It is lack of
reflection. We don’t search our hearts; we don’t know what we do. Reflection,
prayer, union with God, are the things we need. He himself remained, according
to contemporary evidence, in a state of continual prayer from which he was not
distracted by the wearisome burden of confessions nor by his other pastoral
cares. He preserved a constant union with God in the midst of an exceedingly
busy life.
Let us listen to him again: he is unfailing on the subject of the joy and
blessing of prayer. Man is a beggar who needs to be asking everything from God.
How many souls we can convert by our prayers! And he would repeat: prayer is
all man’s happiness on earth. This happiness he long enjoyed himself with his
eyes, lit by faith, contemplating the divine mysteries and, in adoration of the
Word incarnate, his pure and simple soul lifted towards the Holy Trinity, the
supreme object of his love. And the pilgrims who thronged the Church of Ars
realized that the humble priest was confiding to them something of the secret of
his own inner life with the frequent exclamation dear to him: A Being loved by
God, united to God, living in the presence of God: oh, what happiness in life and
in death!
We could wish that all priests might be convinced, by the witness of the
holy Curé d’Ars, of the need to be men of prayer and of the possibility of being5
so, whatever the heavy and sometimes severe load of the labors of their
ministry. But we need an intense faith, such as moved Jean-Marie Vianney and
made him able to work miracles. What faith! exclaimed one of his colleagues.
Enough to spread over a whole diocese!
With St Pius X, let us consider it certain and well-founded that a priest, in
order to occupy his station properly and fulfill his duty, must devote himself
before all else to prayer. Above all he should obey Christ’s precept: We ought
always to pray, a precept earnestly recommended by St Paul: Continue
steadfastly in prayer, being watchful in it with thanksgiving. Pray constantly.
The prayer of the Curé d’Ars, who, so to speak, spent the last thirty years
of his life in his church where he was kept by his numerous penitents, was above
all a prayer of thanksgiving. His devotion to our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament
of the altar was indeed wonderful. He is there, he would say, he who loves us so
much; how could we not love him? And most certainly he loved him and felt
irresistibly drawn towards the tabernacle: We do not need many words to pray
well, he explained to his parishioners. We know that God is there, in the holy
tabernacle; we open our hearts to him; we rejoice in his holy presence. This is
the best prayer of all.

Vigils Reading
2025-08-05
THE LIVING STONES
OF THE CHURCH
From a homily by Origen
◊◊◊
All of us who believe in Christ Jesus are called “living stones” in the words
of Scripture: “You, too, are living stones, built as an edifice of spirit, into a holy
priesthood, offering spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus
Christ.”
You know that in the case of earthly stones the builder takes care to lay
first the strongest and most massive stones as the foundation, so that the whole
weight of the building can then rest upon them. The next stones, of not quite
such good quality, are laid upon the foundation stones; and so on according to
the strength of the stones: the weakest are laid at the top, near the roof. The
same is true of living stones, some of which are the foundation of our spiritual
building. Who are these stones that are laid at the foundation? “The apostles
and prophets.” This is Paul’s teaching: “You form a building which rises on the
foundations of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the
capstone.”
To prepare yourself more zealously to construct this building, to be one of
the stones near the foundation, you must realize that Christ himself is the
foundation of the building which we are describing. Paul the apostle declares
this to be so: “No one can lay a foundation other than the one that has been laid,
namely Jesus Christ.” Happy are they who have built holy, religious buildings,
on such a noble foundation!
Now in this building which is the Church there must be an altar.
Moreover, I believe that there are among you those who as “living stones” are
able to become an altar – those of you who have resolved to dedicate yourselves
to prayer, to offer God supplications day and night, and to immolate your
sacrifices – and that it is with you that Jesus builds his altar.
Think of the worth to be discerned in altar stones. “Joshua built an altar to
the Lord,” says Scripture, “of unhewn stones on which no iron tool had been
used, in keeping with the command of Moses.” What do you think these unhewn
(whole, perfect) stones represent? It is for each one’s conscience to say whether
we have integrity, whether we are without impurity or spot…
To my mind these whole, spotless stones must be the holy apostles who
together form but one stone because of their unity of heart and soul. Indeed, it is
said that “all with one accord devoted themselves to constant prayer,” and that
they said: “O Lord, you read the hearts of men.” For those who can pray with one
accord, with one voice and one spirit, are indeed worthy to have been built
together into a single altar on which Jesus offers sacrifices to his Father. But we,
for our part, must strive to “agree” in what we say, “united in spirit and ideals;
never acting out of rivalry or conceit,” but “be united in mind and judgment,” so
that we too may try to become altar stones.

Vigils Readings - Transfiguration of the Lord
2025-08-06
THE GLORY OF GOD
From the last “Angelus” message of Pope St Paul VI
◊◊◊
The Transfiguration of Our Lord, recalled by the liturgy of today’s
solemnity throws a dazzling light on our daily life, and makes us turn our mind
to the immortal destiny which that fact foreshadows. On Mount Tabor, Christ
reveals for a few moments the splendor of his dignity, and he manifests himself
to chosen witnesses as he really is, the Son of God, “the glory of God and the
very stamp of his nature”. But it also shows the transcendent destiny of our
human nature, which he assumed in order to save us, and which is destined –
because redeemed by his sacrifice of irrevocable love – to participate in the
fullness of life, “in the inheritance of the saints in light”.
That body, which is transfigured before the astonished eyes of the
apostles, is the body of Christ our brother, but it is also our body called to glory.
That light, which bathes it, is and also will be our share of inheritance and of
splendor. We are called to share such great glory because we are “partakers of
the divine nature”. And incomparable destiny awaits us if we honor our
Christian vocation, if we live a life that is logically consistent in word and deed
with the commitments that our baptism imposes on us…

Vigils Reading - St Cajetan
2025-08-07
ST CAJETAN
From Butler’s Lives of the Saints
◊◊◊
St Cajetan was son of Caspar, Count of Thiene, of the nobility of Vicenza,
where he was born in 1480. Two years later his father was killed, fighting for the
Venetians against King Ferdinand of Naples. Cajetan went for four years to
Padua University, where he distinguished himself in theology, and took the
degree of doctor in civil and canon law in 1504. He then returned to his native
town, of which he was made senator. In pursuance of his resolve to serve God as
a priest he received the tonsure. In 1506 he went to Rome. Soon after his arrival
Pope Julius II conferred on him the office of protonotary… On the death of
Julius Cajetan refused his successor’s request to continue in that office, and
devoted three years to preparing himself for the priesthood. He was ordained in
1516, being thirty-three years old, and returned to Vicenza in 1518.
Cajetan had re-founded a confraternity in Rome called “The Oratory of
the Divine Love”, which was an association of zealous and devout clerics who
devoted themselves to labor with all their power to promote God’s honor and
the welfare of souls… but consisted only of men in the lowest station of life. This
circumstance gave great offense to his friends, who thought it a reflection on the
honor of his family. He persisted, however, and sought out the sick and the poor
throughout the whole town, served them and cared for those who suffered from
the most loathsome diseases in the hospital of the incurables. He founded a
similar oratory at Verona and then went in 1520 to Venice where he took up his
lodgings in the new hospital of that city… He introduced exposition of the
Blessed Sacrament in that city, as well as continuing the promotion of frequent
communion.
The state of Christendom at this time shocked and distressed Cajetan, and
in 1523 he went back to Rome to confer with his friends of the Oratory of Divine
Love. They agreed that little could be done other than by reviving in the clergy
the spirit and zeal of those holy pastors who first planted the faith, and a plan
was formed for instituting an order of regular clergy upon the model of the lives
of the Apostles. The first associates of Cajetan were John Peter Caraffa, who
later became pope under the name of Paul IV. The institute was approved by
Clement VII, and Caraffa was chosen as the first provost general. From the
name of his episcopal see of Theatensis these clerks regular came to be
distinguished from others as Theatines…
In 1527, when it still numbered only a dozen members, the army of
Emperor Charles V sacked Rome. The Theatines house was demolished and the
members had to escape to Venice. Cajetan was sent to Verona, where both the
clergy and the laity were opposing the reformation of discipline, which their
bishop was endeavoring to introduce among them. A general improvement was
the fruit of his example, preaching and labors.
Worn out with trying to appease civil strife in Naples, and disappointed at
the suspension of the Council of Trent, from which he hoped so much for the
Church’s good, Cajetan had to take to his bed in the summer of 1547. The end
came on Sunday, August 7. Many miracles wrought by his intercession were
approved at Rome after rigorous scrutiny, and he was canonized in 1671.

Vigils Reading - St Dominic
2025-08-08
ST DOMINIC
And the History of the Order of Preachers
◊◊◊
Dominic possessed such great integrity and was so strongly motivated by
divine love, that without a doubt he proved to be a bearer of honor and grace.
And since a joyful heart animates the face, he displayed the peaceful composure
of a spiritual man in the kindness he manifested outwardly and by the
cheerfulness of his countenance.
Wherever he went he showed himself in word and deed to be a man of the
Gospel. During the day no one was more community-minded or pleasant
toward his brothers and associates. During the night hours no one was more
persistent in every kind of vigil and supplication. He seldom spoke unless it was
with God, that is, in prayer, or about God; and in this matter instructed his
brothers.
Frequently he made a special personal petition that God would deign to
grant him genuine charity in caring for and obtaining the salvation of others.
For he believed that only then would he be truly a member of Christ, when he
had given himself totally for the salvation of others, just as the Lord Jesus, the
Savior of all, had offered himself completely for our salvation. So, for this work,
after a lengthy period of careful and provident planning, he founded the Order
of Friars Preachers.
In his conversations and letters he often urged the brothers of the Order
to study constantly the Old and New Testaments. He always carried with him
the gospels according to Matthew and the epistles of Paul, and so well did he
study them that he almost knew them from memory.
Two or three times he was chosen bishop, but he always refused,
preferring to live with his brothers in poverty. Of him Pope Gregory IX
declared: “I knew him as a steadfast follower of the apostolic way of life. There
is no doubt that he is in heaven, sharing in the glory of the apostles themselves.”

Vigils Reading - Memorial of BVM
2025-08-09
MARY AND
THE VIRTUE OF HOPE
By Fr Romano Guardini
◊◊◊
Elizabeth calls the Virgin Blessed because she had faith – for everything
would happen as the Lord had told her; through the power of the Holy Spirit she
would become the Mother of the Redeemer, and in this find the fulfillment of
her life and salvation. To be assured of this was not always easy. When the
Gospel speaks of Mary and her son, one perceives a great love, but also a
remoteness.
The answer of the twelve-year-old boy in the temple; the answer Jesus
gave at the wedding feast of Cana; his words to the bystanders, when Mary, at
the door, asks for him; what he said to the woman who exalted his Mother; and
his last testament in which he committed her to the care of the disciple – in each
of these, something is revealed that removes him from her, and we always sense
the possibility that she might have become perplexed about God’s guidance. But
each time her confidence increased and she placed all into his hands. Mary lived
completely through her confidence in God’s power, a power that is capable of
consummating all, even in darkness and opposition.
Hope is confidence in God’s power to accomplish all things. He has
promised that we shall become new persons, and that his creation shall be a
“new heaven and a new earth”. This is gainsaid by the impression made on us by
worldly things; by the course our life is taking; by the opinions of people around
us; by our own daily insufficiency and sin – by everything. Hope is the
“nevertheless” of faith. In spite of all contradiction, the new life is within us, and
God will complete it if we trust in him despite all opposition. But that is difficult,
sometimes impossible. So we must ask again that the Lord “may strengthen our
hope.”

LCG Chicago Monthly Meeting 9:00 am CDT
2025-08-09 08:00 - 12:00 (America/New_York)
All are Welcome. Join us on Zoom at:
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/86028356465
Meeting ID: 860 2835 6465
One tap mobile
+13126266799,,86028356465# US (Chicago)
+13092053325,,86028356465# US

Our August meeting agenda follows:
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. Peter Tong
Br. Bartholomew Pollard
Fr. Lawrence Morey
9:10 Lectio. Our lectio piece will be led by Mary Haley.
9:50 Reading. Our reading this month is completion of God For All Days (Parts 2 and 3).
10:45 Housekeeping. Volunteer to lead lectio next month? Selection our next reading (Fr. James’ recommended Contemplation by Francis Nemeck and Marie Theresa Combs). Chicago Report on LCG Advisory Council activity. Followup on events at the international lay Cistercian meeting last month.
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: September 13, 2025.

Skema
2025-08-10
Biblical Readings for Office and Mass
19th Week in Ordinary Time

Mass Readings: Sunday (C), Weekdays (I)
August 10 – 16, 2025

Sun
10
Mon
11
Tue
12
Wed
13
Thu
14
Fri
15
Sat
16

Office
19th Sunday
St Clare
Office for the Dead
Weekday
St Maximilian Kolbe
Assumption of the BVM
Weekday

Vigils
Gen 41:33-57
Gen 42:1-17
Gen 42:18-38
Gen 43:1-34
Gen 44:1-34
Eph 1:15-2:10
Gen 45:1-28

Lauds
Hos 10:9-15
Hos 11:1-7
Hos 11:8-11
Hos 12:1-7
Hos 12:8-15
Sir 24:1-11
Hos 13:1-8

Mass
117
413
414
415
416
622
418

1st
Wis 18:6-9
Deut 10:12-22
Deut 31:1-8
Deut 34:1-12
Josh 3:7-10a, 11, 13-17
Rev 11:19a; 12:1-6a; 10ab
Josh 24:14-29

2nd
Heb 11:1-2, 8-19

1 Cor 15:20-27

Gospel
Luke 12:32-48
Matt 17:22-27
Matt 18:1-5, 10, 12-14
Matt 18:15-20
Matt 18:21-19:1
Luke 1:39-56
Matt 19:13-15

Vespers
Phil 4:10-14
Phil 4:15-23
Col 1:1-8
Col 1:9-14
1 Cor 15:50-58
Eph 2:1-10
Col 1:15-23

Vigils Reading - 19th Sunday
2025-08-10
AWAITING
THE MASTER’S RETURN
From a commentary by St Gregory of Nyssa
◊◊◊
When the Lord says: Let your loins be girded and your lamps lit, he is
warning us to stay awake, for a light shining in one’s eyes drives away sleep, and
a tightly fastened belt also makes sleep difficult, as the discomfort prevents
relaxation. But the real meaning of the parable is perfectly clear: a person girded
with temperance lives in the light of a clear conscience before God. And so, with
the light of truth shining, the soul stays awake and is not deceived. It does not
dally with illusive dreams.
If following the guidance of the Word we attain this goal, our lives will in a
way be like those of the angels, for we are compared with them on the divine
command: You must be like people waiting for their master to return from a
wedding, ready to open the door immediately when he comes and knocks. It
was the angels who were awaiting the Master’s return from the wedding. They
sat with unsleeping eyes at the heavenly gates, so that when he returned the
King of glory might pass through them once more into the heavenly bliss from
which, as the psalm says, he had come forth like a bridegroom from his tent.
He took us to himself as his virgin bride, our nature once prostituted to
idols being restored by sacramental rebirth to virginal incorruptibility. After the
marriage, when the Church had been wedded to the Word – as John says, He
who has the bride is the bridegroom – and admitted to the bridal chamber of
the sacred mysteries, the angels awaited the King of glory’s return to the
blessedness which is his by nature.
And so the Lord said our lives should be like theirs. Just as they, living
lives far removed from sin and error, are ready to receive the Lord at his coming,
so we also should keep watch at the entrance of our houses, and prepare
ourselves to obey him when he comes to our door and knocks.

Vigils Reading - St Clare
2025-08-11
THE MIRROR
WITHOUT CLOUD
A letter from St Clare to Blessed Agnes of Prague
◊◊◊
Happy indeed is she who is granted a place at the divine banquet, for she
may cling with her inmost heart to him whose beauty eternally awes the blessed
hosts of heaven; to him whose love inspires love, whose contemplation
refreshes, whose generosity satisfies, whose gentleness delights, whose memory
shines sweetly as the dawn; to him whose fragrance revives the dead, and whose
glorious vision will bless all the citizens of that heavenly Jerusalem. For he is the
splendor of eternal glory, the brightness of eternal light, and the mirror
without cloud.
Queen and bride of Jesus Christ, look into that mirror daily and study well
your reflection, that you may adorn yourself, mind and body, with an
enveloping garment of every virtue, and thus find yourself attired in flowers and
gowns befitting the daughter and most chaste bride of the king on high. In this
mirror blessed poverty, holy humility and ineffable love are also reflected. With
the grace of God the whole mirror will be your source of contemplation.
Behold, I say, the birth of this mirror. Behold his poverty even as he was
laid in the manger and wrapped in swaddling clothes. What wondrous humility,
what marvelous poverty! The King of angels, the Lord of heaven and earth
resting in a manger! Look more deeply into the mirror and meditate on his
humility, or simply on his poverty. Behold the many labors and sufferings he
endured to redeem the human race. Then in the depths of this very mirror,
ponder his unspeakable love which caused him to suffer on the wood of the
cross and to endure the most shameful kind of death. The mirror himself, from
his position on the cross, warned passersby to weigh carefully this act, as he
said: All of you who pass by this way, behold and see if there is any sorrow like
mine. Let us answer his cries and lamentations with one voice and one spirit: I
will be mindful and remember, and my soul will be consumed within me. In
this way, queen of the king of heaven, your love will burn with an even brighter
flame.
Consider also his indescribable delights, his unending riches and honors, and
sigh for what is beyond your love and heart’s content as you cry out: Draw me
on! We will run after you in the perfume of your ointment, heavenly spouse. Let
me run and not faint until you lead me into your wine cellar; your left hand rests
under my head, your right arm joyfully embraces me, and you kiss me with the
sweet kiss of your lips. As you rest in this state of contemplation, remember your
poor mother and know that I have indelibly written your happy memory into my
heart, for you are dearer to me than all the others.

Vigils Reading - Office for the Dead
2025-08-12
THE GOD
OF THE LIVING
By Maurice Zundel
◊◊◊
The dead have disappeared from our sight. They have not disappeared
from the sight of God. He knows where they are, He knows their lot, He “who
loved them to the end.” But, can we meet them, can we communicate with them?
Some of them occupied such a large place in our life; they were the light of our
eyes, the source of our happiness, the soul of our soul. Is all this now finished
forever?
How can it be finished, if we are more spirit than flesh, and if we have
truly been in communion with what was most intimate and spiritual in them?
But how shall we find them again? By what means shall we reach them? By
entering into what is most intimate in ourselves.
If in truth they sleep in Christ, as we may always hope, they are certainly
freed from the divisions of space and time, from all material constraints, from
all the changes of the outer world. There is, therefore, no means of meeting
them, more certainly efficacious, than to establish ourselves on that internal
plane which they have reached, and strive to live their life. Since their life is
plunged deep in the interior of God, since He is their home, their food and, as
our prayers so touchingly express it, their sleep, if we identify ourselves more
closely with Him, and enter more deeply into His Life, we shall enter into their
life, and the converse broken off on the visible plane will be resumed in a more
living fashion in the silent commerce of souls.
It is indeed within that we must seek, if we would not go astray in a world
beyond, constructed with shadows of the visible world, imagining relations with
our dear ones which would tend to hold them back on the external plane… If
they are withdrawn from the vicissitudes of the sensible world, have been born
to the Life of the Spirit, are in God, we cannot conceive a bond between
ourselves and them more sublime than the communion, always closer, of an
inner life of which God is the source, the center and the gift.
In this way our love not only safeguards its profound reality, it is also most
efficacious. For by the strength of our love for God we can in a sense give Him to
our departed, if they are still detained in the stages of purification which
constitute the mysterious state of Purgatory; or increase in some way their joy in
possessing Him, if they have already reached the beatific vision. To live so as to
be always worthy of God, this surely is the most certain way to be always with
our dead.
They are in God, the very heart of Love. But we also may approach this
Divine Love, for it is in God “that we live, and move and have our being”. We
also are in God, though not yet so completely as they. And God is in us. Christ
exceeded our most daring hopes by making the [unity] of the Divine Persons the
bond of our mutual intimacy…
There can be no surer comfort than this active and sanctifying
communion with our dear ones in an intimacy continually increasing as our
union with God becomes closer. God has not taken them from us: He has hidden
them in His heart that they may be closer to ours. “God is not a God of the dead
but of the living.”

Vigils Reading
2025-08-13
HOLINESS BEFITS
YOUR HOUSE, OH LORD
From a sermon by St Bernard of Clairvaux
◊◊◊
“Our bed is covered with flowers; the beams of our houses are of cedar,
the paneling of cypress.” She is singing her marriage-song, describing in
beautiful language the marriage bed and bridal suite. She invites the
bridegroom to repose: for the better thing is to remain at ease and be with
Christ; but necessity drives one forth to help those who are to be saved. So now
when she feels that the opportunity presents itself, she announces that the
bridal suite has been furnished, and pointing to the bed with her finger she
invited, as I have said, the Beloved to rest there. Like the disciples on the way to
Emmaus she cannot contain the ardor in her heart, but entices him to be the
guest of her soul, compels him to spend the night with her. With Peter she says:
“Lord it is good for us to be here.“
Let us now seek the spiritual content of these words. And indeed in the
Church the ‘bed’ where one reposes is, in my opinion, the cloisters and
monasteries, where one lives undisturbed by the cares of the world and the
anxieties of life. This bed is seen to be adorned with flowers when the conduct
and life of the brothers brightly reflect the examples and rules of the Fathers, as
if strewn with sweet smelling flowers. By ‘houses’ understand the ordinary
communities of Christians.
Those who enjoy high office, the Christian leaders of both orders, strongly
bind them together with laws justly imposed, as beams bind the walls, lest living
by their own law and will, they should fall apart from each other like tilting walls
and tottering fences, and thus the whole building fall to the ground and be
destroyed. The paneling however, which is firmly attached to the beams, and
impressively adds to the beauty of the house, seems to me to designate the
courteous and disciplined behavior of a well-trained clergy, who carry out their
duties correctly. For how shall the clerical orders stand and fulfill their duties
unless they are sustained, as by beams, by the beneficence and munificence of
those who govern and protect by their power?…
The cedar, an incorruptible and fragrant wood of great height,
sufficiently indicates the qualities of the men who ought to be selected for the
role of beams. Hence it is necessary that those who are appointed over others
should be strong and reliable, tenacious in hope, their mind directed to
supernatural truths, radiating everywhere the good odor of their faith and
conduct. With the Apostle they can say: We are the incense offered by Christ to
God in every place. The cypress too, a wood that is equally incorruptible and
fragrant, shows that every cleric ought to be of unblemished life and faith, that
he may be seen as an ornamental paneling for the beauty of the house. For it is
written: “Holiness befits your house, O Lord, for evermore,” which expresses
both the beauty of virtue and the constancy of unfailing grace.

Vigils Reading - St Maximilian Kolbe
2025-08-14
A TESTIMONY FROM
THE BEATIFICATION PROCESS
OF ST MAXIMILIAN KOLBE
◊◊◊
Fr Kolbe and I worked together in May or June 1941. We were bringing
sand up from the Sola River. This was some of Auschwitz’s heaviest work, so our
squad had a very hard time indeed. The work itself was very painful; we were
lightly and very insufficiently dressed, and yet we had to wade into the cold
water to dig the sand. In addition, the guards beat us cruelly or sometimes
killed prisoners outright. From the first time I saw Father Maximilian I was
struck by his dignity and calm, so different from others. In spite of the terrible
conditions and bad treatment, he never complained nor did he curse. Instead,
he tried to comfort the other prisoners and lift our spirits. During the three
weeks we worked together, I sometimes saw the kapo beat Father Kolbe with a
big stick. Each time, Father Kolbe took it without a murmur.
The news of his death was an enormous shock to the whole camp. We
became aware someone among us in this spiritual dark night of the soul was
raising the standard of love on high. Someone unknown, like everyone else,
tortured and bereft of name and social standing, went to a horrible death for the
sake of someone not even related to him. Therefore it is not true, we cried, that
humanity is cast down and trampled in the mud, overcome by oppressors, and
overwhelmed by hopelessness. Thousands of prisoners were convinced the true
world continued to exist and that our torturers would not be able to destroy it.
More than one individual began to look within himself for this real world, found
it, and shared it with his camp companion, strengthening both in this encounter
with evil. To say that Father Kolbe died for one of us or for that person’s family
is too great a simplification.
His death was the salvation of thousands. And on this, I would say, rests
the greatness of that death. That’s how we felt about it. And as long as we live,
we who were at Auschwitz will bow our heads in memory of it as at that time we
bowed our head before the bunker of death by starvation. That was a shock full
of optimism, regenerating and giving strength; we were stunned by his act,
which became for us a mighty explosion of light in the dark camp night.

Vigils Reading - Assumption of the BVM
2025-08-15
FROM ESTEEM TO ESTEEM
From a homily by Amadeus of Lausanne
◊◊◊
Who would not hasten, who would not run from the ends of the earth to
gaze upon the beauty of the venerable majesty [of the Mother of God] and to
behold the countenance endowed with all manner of sweetness and with
commanding dignity and unique power? Indeed, nothing was found like to her
among the sons and daughters of Adam, none such among the prophets,
apostles or angels. Heaven and earth have put forth nothing like her. Who in the
clouds would equal her, or be like the Mother of the Lord among the sons of
God?
And see how fittingly before her Assumption her wonderful name blazed
forth in the whole world and her renown was everywhere spread abroad before
her grandeur was raised above the heavens. For it was fitting that the Virgin
Mother, for the honor of her Son, should reign first upon earth and then, at last,
receive the heavens with glory; should tarry in the depths that she might enter
the heights in the fullness of sanctity; and just as she was carried from virtue to
virtue, so by the Spirit of the Lord [should she] be borne from esteem to esteem.
While present in the flesh she tasted in advance the first-fruits of the
future kingdom; now [she is] going forth to God in unspeakable sublimity, now
in wondrous charity condescending to her neighbors. On the one side she was
attended by the services of angels, on the other venerated by the devotion of
man. Gabriel, the groomsman, with the angels was at her side; John, with the
apostles, ministered to her, rejoicing that at the cross the Virgin Mother was
entrusted to him. [The angels] rejoiced to see their queen; [the apostles
rejoiced] to see their lady, and all obeyed her with pious devotion.
But she, dwelling in the lofty citadel of the virtues and enriched by an
ocean of divine gifts, poured out in generous diffusion upon a believing and
thirsting people an abyss of graces, in which she surpassed all others. She
brought health to their bodies and cure to their souls, being powerful to raise
them from the death of body and soul. Who ever went away from her sick or sad
and not knowing heavenly mysteries? Who did not return to his home glad and
joyful, having obtained from the Mother of God his wish?

Vigils Reading
2025-08-16
THE COMMON LIFE
By Baldwin of Ford
◊◊◊
There is still another sort of communion: that of those who live in a
[monastic] community. It is said of them: ‘The multitude of believers had but
one heart and one soul; no one said that any of the things he possessed was his
own, but they had everything in common.’ What makes the common life,
therefore, is one heart, one soul, and having everything in common. Such a life
is an earthly copy—so far as human weakness allows—of the life of the angels.
Since they have but one heart and one soul and all things in common,
there is concord and unanimity throughout, and they always put the general
profit and the common good before their own individual convenience. They so
far renounce themselves and what is theirs that none of them, if indeed he is
[truly] one of them, whether in [making] decisions or in [giving] advice,
presumes to make a stubborn defense of his own opinion, nor to strive hard
after his own will and the desires of his own heart, nor to have the least thing
which could be called his own. Instead, as servants of God, they humble
themselves for the sake of God under the hand of one of their fellow servants,
and in him all power is vested. His judgment alone determines the decisions,
regulates the will, and governs the needs of all. He alone can want something or
refuse it, for the others have renounced their own power and freedom [of will].
Thus, they are not permitted to want what they want, nor to be able [to do]
what they are able [to do], nor to feel what they feel, nor to be what they are, nor
to live by their own spirit, but by the Spirit of God. It is he who leads them to be
sons of God, and it is he who is their love, their bond, and their communion. The
greater their love, the stronger is their bond and the more perfect is their
communion: and conversely, the greater their communion, the stronger is their
bond and the more perfect is their love.

Skema
2025-08-17
Biblical Readings for Office and Mass
20th Week in Ordinary Time

Mass Readings: Sunday (C), Weekdays (I)
August 17 – 23, 2025

Sun
17
Mon
18
Tue
19
Wed
20
Thu
21
Fri
22
Sat
23

Office
20th Sunday
Weekday
Bl Guerric
St Bernard
St Pius X
Queenship of the BVM
Weekday

Vigils
Gen 46:1-7, 26-34
Gen 47:1-26
Gen 47:27-48:22
Sir 50:5-20
Gen 49:1-27
Gen 49:28-50:14
Gen 50:15-26

Lauds
Hos 13:9-14:1
Hos 14:2-10
Obadiah 1-7
Sir 39:6-11
Obad 8-14
Obad 15-18
Micah 1:1-9

Mass
120
419
420
641, 660, 574
422
423, 627
424

1st
Jer 38:4-6, 8-10
Judg 2:11-19
Judg 6:11-24a
Wis 7:7-10, 15-16
Judg 11:29-39a
Ruth 1:1, 3-6, 14b-16, 22
Ruth 2:1-3, 8-11; 4:13-17

2nd
Heb 12:1-4

Phil 3:17-4:1

Gospel
Luke 12:49-53
Matt 19:16-22
Matt 19:23-30
Matt 5:13-19
Matt 22:1-14
Luke 1:26-38
Matt 23:1-12

Vespers
Col 1:24-29
Col 2:1-8
2 Tim 1:6-14
1 Jn 2:12-17
Col 2:9-15
Col 2:16-23
Col 3:1-11

Vigils Reading - 20th Sunday
2025-08-17
THE PERFECTION
OF DIVINE LOVE
From a commentary by Denis the Carthusian
◊◊◊
I have come to cast fire on the earth. In other words, I have come down
from the highest heaven and appeared to men and women through the mystery
of the incarnation in order to light the fire of divine love in human hearts. And
how I wish it were already ablaze! How I wish it were already kindled, fanned
into flame by the Holy Spirit, and leaping forth in good works.
Christ foretells that he will suffer death on a cross before the human race
is inflamed by the fire of this love; for it was by his most holy passion that he won
so great a gift for humankind, and it is chiefly the recollection of his passion that
kindles the flame of love in Christian hearts.
There is a baptism which I must undergo. By divine decree there remains
for me the duty of receiving a baptism of blood, that is, of being bathed, soaked
upon the cross not in water but in my own blood poured out to redeem the whole
world. And what constraint I am under until that has been achieved – until my
passion is love and I say: It is accomplished. For Christ was impelled incessantly
by the love within him.
The way to attain the perfection of divine love is then stated. Do you think
that I have come to bring peace on earth? In other words: Do not imagine that I
have come to offer people a sensual, worldly, and unruly peace that will enable
them to be united in their vices and achieve earthly prosperity. No, I tell you, I
have not come to offer that kind of peace, but rather division – a good, healthy
kind of division, physical as well as spiritual. Love for God and desire for inner
peace will set those who believe in me at odds with wicked people and make
them part company with those who would turn them from their course of
spiritual progress and from the purity of divine love, or who attempt to hinder
them.
Good, interior, spiritual peace consists in the repose of the mind in God,
and in a right ordered harmony. To bestow this peace was the chief reason for
Christ’s coming. This inner peace flows from love. It is an unassailable joy of the
mind in God, and it is called peace of heart. It is the beginning and a kind of
foretaste of the peace of the saints in heaven – the peace of eternity.

Vigils Reading
2025-08-18
KEEP GUARD
ON YOURSELF
From “The Golden Epistle” by William of St Thierry
◊◊◊
In order that your solitude may not appall you and that you may dwell the
more safely in your cell three guardians have been assigned to you: God, your
conscience and your spiritual father. To God you owe devotion and the entire
gift of yourself; to your conscience the respect which will make you ashamed to
sin in its presence; to your spiritual father the obedience of charity and recourse
in everything…
I will add a fourth and provide you with a monitor for as long as you are
small and have not learned to keep the presence of God before your mind…
Choose for yourself a man whose life is such that it will serve as a model to
impress upon your heart, one whom you will so revere that whenever you think
of him you will rise up because of the respect you feel for him and put yourself in
order. Think of him as if he were present and let the charity you feel for one
another act in you to correct all that needs to be corrected, while your solitude
suffers no infringement of its secret. Let him be present to you whenever you
wish and let him come sometimes when you would have preferred him to stay
away. The thought of his holy severity will make it seem as if he were rebuking
you; the thought of his kindness and goodness will bring you consolation; the
purity and sanctity of his life will set you a good example. For you will be driven
to correct even all your thoughts, as if they were open to his gaze and visited by
his rebuke, when you consider that he is watching.
So, as the Apostle bids: “Keep guard on yourself” with the greatest care
and, in order to have your eyes always on yourself, turn your gaze away from all
else. The eye is a remarkable instrument of the body – if only it could see itself as
it sees other things. Now the inner eye is enabled to do this. If then it follows the
example of the outward eye and neglects itself, giving its attention to the affairs
of others, it will not be able to return to itself, however much it may wish to do
so. Give your attention to yourself; you yourself constitute abundant matter for
solicitude for yourself. Shut out also from your outward eyes what you have
grown unaccustomed to see, from your inner eyes what you no longer love, since
nothing so easily reasserts its claims as love…
Be yourself a parable of edification for yourself. You have one cell
outwardly, another within you. The outward cell is the house in which your soul
dwells together with your body; the inner cell is your conscience and in that it is
God who should dwell with your spirit, he who is more interior to you than all
else that is within you. The door of the outward enclosure is a sign of the
guarded door within you, so that as the bodily senses are prevented from
wandering abroad by the outward enclosure so the inner senses are kept always
within their own domain.

Vigils Reading - Bl Guerric
2025-08-19
THE POOR OF CHRIST
From a sermon by Blessed Guerric of Igny
◊◊◊
What then shall we bring to the Lord, my brothers? Bring to the Lord
glory of gold and honor of incense; bring to the Lord glory for his name, myrrh
for his burial. But Christ’s disciple, Peter’s son, tells me: “Silver and gold I have
none, nor bags of those foreign wares, myrrh and incense.” Will you then appear
empty-handed in the Lord’s sight… O rich poverty, O wealthy nakedness –
provided it is Christian and freely willed. With what riches do you not abound,
not only gold but the very best gold, gold that has been fired, not only myrrh and
incense but also all the fragrant powders of the merchant. Indeed who else can
abound in riches of this sort but the poor of Christ?
But I am not aware, you will say, that I have received anything of the sort,
or that anything so precious as gold, incense and myrrh is to be found in my
possession. For I am a man well acquainted with poverty, finding it hard to beg
my daily bread, leading an impoverished life. You think, you say, that you have
not received any such thing. Is it not rather that you have squandered in riotous
living the inheritance you received from your father?
But I pass over that. As the Sage says, “One who turns away from sin to
become wise is not to be reproved.” Rather I would wish that you had the energy
to examine if there be not some slight remnant of your paternal inheritance in
your hands with which you could begin to recover the whole. I would wish you to
dig within yourself, for valuable treasures are wont to lie hidden in the recesses
of the earth. That treasure, the desire of which drove a man to sell all he had, was
hidden in a field. The ten Israelites who escaped the murderer’s sword did no by
declaring that they had treasure hidden in a field.
O what treasures of good works, what riches of devotion lie hidden in the
field of one’s body; and how many more in the depths of the heart, if only we will
take the trouble to dig… Our reason and natural endowments, with the help of
grace, are a seed-bed of all the virtues. If then you will ponder in your heart and
train your body, you need not doubt that you will find worthwhile treasure – if
not gold or incense at the very beginning, certainly of myrrh, and that is not
useless. It is not for you to describe as useless what Christ accepts as a gift. With
this he willed that the burial of his body should not only be foreshadowed when
it was offered to him but also be completed when he was embalmed with it.
