Skema
2025-04-06
Biblical Readings for Office and Mass
5th Week of Lent

Mass Readings: Sunday (C), Weekdays (I)
March 6 – 12, 2025

Sun
6
Mon
7
Tue
8
Wed
9
Thu
10
Fri
11
Sat
12

Office
5th Sunday
Lenten Weekday
Lenten Weekday
Lenten Weekday
Lenten Weekday
Lenten Weekday
Lenten Weekday

Vigils
Lev 26:1-17, 40-46
Num 9:15-23; 10:33-36
Num 11:1-6, 10-30
Num 12:1-15
Num 13:1-3, 17-33
Num 14:1-25
Num 20:1-13; 21:4-9

Lauds
Exod 19:16-19
Exod 20:1-7
Exod 20:8-17
Exod 20:18-21
Exod 24:12-18
Exod 32:7-14
Exod 32:30-35

Mass
36
250
252
253
254
255
256

1st
Isa 43:16-21
2 Kgs 4:18b-21, 32-37
Num 21:4-9
Dan 3:14-20, 91-92, 95
Gen 17:3-9
Jer 20:10-13
Ezek 37:21-28

2nd
Phil 3:8-14

Gospel
John 8:1-11
John 11:1-45
John 8:21-30
John 8:31-42
John 8:51-59
John 10:31-42
John 11:45-56

Vespers
Deut 30:1-6
Deut 30:9-14
Deut 30:15-20
Deut 31:1-6
Deut 31:9-13
Deut 32:45-47
1 Tim 6:11-16

Vigils Reading - 5th Sunday of Lent
2025-04-06
IT IS SIN HE CONDEMNS,
NOT PEOPLE
From a commentary by St Augustine
◊◊◊
The scribes and Pharisees brought to him a woman who had been
caught committing adultery. Now the penalty of the law for adultery was
stoning. It was, of course, unthinkable that any of the prescriptions of the law
could be unjust, so it followed that anyone whose teachings contravened what
the law required would lay himself open to the charge of advocating injustice.
The Lord’s enemies accordingly said to themselves: “He has a reputation
for truth and is regarded as a man of great kindness and forbearance, so we
must find a pretext for accusing him on the grounds of injustice. Let us confront
him with a woman caught committing adultery, and quote the ruling of the law
in her regard. If he orders her to be stoned, he will lose his name for clemency; if
he tells us to release her, he will not be upholding justice. There is little doubt
that he will sway she must be freed, in order not to lose the reputation which has
made him so popular. That will be our chance to incriminate him and find him
guilty of an offense against the law. We shall be able to say: ‘You are an enemy
of the law! Your answer is not merely an attack on Moses but on God who gave
the law to Moses. You have made yourself liable to the death penalty. You and
the woman should both be stoned.’” By voicing such opinions the Lord’s
enemies might be able to enflame popular feelings against him; they might
incite the crowds to denounce him and demand his condemnation.
But look at the way our Lord’s answer upheld justice without forgoing
clemency. He was not caught in the snare his enemies had laid for him; it was
they themselves who were caught in it. He did not say the woman should not be
stoned, for then it would look as though he were opposing the law. But he had no
intention of saying: “Let her be stoned,” because he came not to destroy those he
found but to seek those who were lost. Mark his reply. It contains justice,
clemency and truth in full measure. Let the one among you who has never
sinned be the first to throw a stone at her. Let the sinner be punished, yes – but
not be sinners. Let the law be carried out, but not by lawbreakers.
This, unquestionably, is the voice of justice, justice that pierced those men
like a javelin. Looking into themselves, they realized their guilt, and one by one
they all went out. Two remained behind: the miserable woman, and Mercy. The
Lord raised his eyes, and with a gentle look he asked her: Has no one
condemned you? She replied: No one, sir. And he said: Neither will I condemn
you. What is this, Lord? Are you giving approval to immorality? Not at all. Take
note of what follows: Go and sin no more.
You see then that the Lord does indeed pass sentence, but it is sin he
condemns, not people. One who approved of immorality would have said:
“Neither will I condemn you. Go and live as you please; you can be sure that I
will acquit you. However much you sin, I will release you from all penalty, and
from the tortures of hell and the underworld.” He did not say that. He said:
“Neither will I condemn you; you need have no fear of the past, but beware of
what you do in the future. Neither will I condemn you: I have blotted out what
you have done; now observe what I have commanded, in order to obtain what I
have promised.”

Vigils Reading
2025-04-07
THE LIFE THAT RISES
THROUGH DEATH
From “The Eternal Year” by Fr Karl Rahner2
◊◊◊
There is a distance of God that permeates the pious and the impious, that
perplexes the mind and unspeakably terrifies the heart. The pious do not like to
admit it, because they suppose that such a thing should not happen to them
(although the Lord himself cried out, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken
me?”); and the others, the impious, draw false consequences from the admitted
facts… For when the bitter God-distance becomes a divine service, the fasting
season of the world changes into the fasting season of the Church.
The first thing we have to do is this: stand up and face this God-distance of
a choked-up heart. We have to resist the desire to run away from it either in
pious or in worldly business. We have to endure it without the narcotic of the
world, without the narcotic of sin or of obstinate despair. What God is really far
away from you in this emptiness of heart? Not the true and living God; for he is
precisely the intangible God, the nameless God; and that is why he can really be
the God of your measureless heart. Distant from you is only a God who does not
exist: a tangible God, a God of our small thoughts and our cheap, timid feelings,
a God of earthly security, a God whose concern is that the children don’t cry and
that philanthropy doesn’t fall into disillusion, a very venerable – idol! That is
what has become distant…
Do not be frightened over the loneliness and abandonment of your
interior dungeon, which seems to be so dead – like a grave. For if you stand firm
– this is already a wonder of grace – then you will suddenly perceive that your
grave-dungeon only blocks the futile finiteness; you will become aware that
your deadly void is only the breadth of God’s intimacy, that the silence is filled
up by a word without words, by the one who is above all name and is all in all.
That silence is God’s silence. It tells you that God is there.
That is the second thing you should do in your despair: notice that God is
there. Know with faith that he is with you. Perceive that for a long time now he
has been waiting for you in the deepest dungeon of your blocked-up heart, and
that for a long time he has been quietly listening to you, even though you, after
all the busy noise that we call our life, do not even let him get a word in edgewise,
and his words to the person-you-were-until-now seem only deadly silence. You
shall see that you by no means make a mistake if you give up your anxiety over
yourself and your life, that you by no means make a mistake if you relax your
hold on self, that you are by no means crushed with despair if once and for all
you despair of yourself, of your wisdom and strength, and of the false image of
God that is snatched away from you…
If we do this, then peace comes all by itself. Peace is the most genuine
activity: the silence that is filled with God’s word, the trust that is no longer
afraid, the sureness that no longer needs to be assured, and the strength that is
powerful in weakness – it is, then, the life that rises through death.

2 The Eternal Year, K. Rahner, Helicon: Baltimore MD 1964. pp 68ff.5

Vigils Reading
2025-04-08
NOW IS THE TIME
OF SALVATION
From a sermon by St Aelred of Rievaulx
◊◊◊
Shake yourself from the dust, rouse yourself, sit up, O Jerusalem. Break
the chains off your neck captive daughter of Zion. Behold how sweetly, how
affectionately the heavenly spouse desires to reconcile the church to himself.
The loving father exhorts his daughter to salvation, her who was prostrate in the
dust for a long time. Therefore she is admonished by the prophet to rise from the
dust, break her chains, go out from captivity.
Dust is human frailty when no virtue has been strengthened, Dust is also
temporary wealth which lightly passes away and flies as though from the face of
the wind. Wretched human beings seek and do not find blessedness in this dust.
It takes away our eyesight, because the cupidity of temporary wealth blinds our
minds… We cannot rise while we are heavy with dust. Sins weigh down a soul;
temporary desires also weigh us down. Those who are weighed down are
overwhelmed. Those who are burdened try in vain to rise up… Therefore, Shake
yourself from the dust, Jerusalem; rouse yourself and sit up. We must sit, not
upright through pride, not prostrating through ruin, according to the saying of
David: Beside the rivers of Babylon, there we sat and wept. Certainly beside the
transitory and temporary things of this world, not mixed up with them but
trampling them under foot, we must sit repenting and weeping for all our sins.
In the first creation, the human was made free, but afterwards he sold
himself to the devil. The devil’s money with which he buys humans is sin… The
devil deceived humankind by promising what he did not pay, saying, You shall
be as gods, knowing good and evil. The human obeyed; he ate the forbidden
fruit, and he received no other recompense except sin. And so he was sold for
nothing. After the human surrendered, the devil…put chains on his neck.
Chains are sins, and the unfortunate sinner adds sin to sin… That is why Isaiah
says, Woe to you who drag iniquity with ropes of vanity, and drag sin like the
chain of a cart. These are the ropes with which sinners shall be bound in the
end…
Break the chains off your neck, captive daughter of Zion. Break them by
repentance, destroy them by making satisfaction. Shake your neck from the
devil’s yoke and submit yourself to the yoke of Christ, whose yoke is light and
burden sweet. Escape from the prison. The price has been given for you. The
enemy cannot hold you back any longer, if you are willing to escape. Destroy the
rope that trails behind you, lest the devil have the means to draw you…
As the Lord would say, “You had not merited that I should redeem you,
because you have sold yourself to the devil gratis and for nothing, and yet I shall
redeem you, not with money, because the money of the whole world cannot
redeem you, but rather with the price of my blood…” You are that bride
redeemed by the blood of the Lamb. You are those lying in the dust, to whom it
is said, Rise up! You are those captives who are ordered to escape. Behold now is
the time of salvation.
Therefore so that we might quickly and easily obtain pardon and find
mercy, let us seek God more attentively and carefully in this sacred fasting
through true contrition and through pure confession and worthy satisfaction.

Vigils Reading
2025-04-09
YOUR VERDICT ON OTHERS,
WILL BE THE VERDICT
PASSED ON YOU
From a homily by St Asterius of Amasea
◊◊◊
If you desire to resemble God, for you have been created in God’s own
image, imitate your model. You, Christians, whose very name calls to mind love,
imitate Christ’s love. Consider and wonder at the wealth of Christ’s love for us.
When he was about to show himself to us in our own nature, he sent John to
preach repentance by word and example. Before John he sent all the prophets.
They too were to teach people to amend their lives. Then he came himself and
with his own voice cried out: Come to me, all you who labour and are
overburdened, and I will give you rest. And how did he receive those who
listened to his call and followed him? He readily forgave them their sins,
instantly relieving them of all their cause for grief. The Word has sanctified
them and the Spirit has confirmed them. Their old self was buried in the waters
of baptism and a new self born; their youth was renewed by grace. And the
result? Enemies of God became his friends, strangers to him became his
children, idolaters became worshipers of the true God.
You, therefore, who are harsh and unable to show gentleness, learn
goodness from your Creator. Do not act as bitter judges and severe arbiters
toward those who are your companions in service, as you wait for the coming of
One who will reveal the secret recesses of the heart and, as the Almighty Lord,
will assign to each person their proper place in the life beyond.
Do not pass severe judgments that you may avoid being judged with the
same severity, being pierced yourselves by the words of your own mouth as by
sharp-pointed teeth. For it is against this kind of fault that the words of the
gospel seem indeed to warn us where it is said: If you want to avoid judgment,
stop passing judgment, your verdict on others will be the verdict passed on
you.
Christ does not thereby mean that he wants to banish discernment and
wisdom. What he condemns is a condemnation that is too severe. So, lighten as
much as possible the weight of your measurement of others, if you want your
own actions not to be considered excessively heavy when our lives are weighed
at the divine judgment… Do not refuse to act mercifully that you yourselves may
not be sent away unpardoned at the time when you will need forgiveness.

Vigils Reading
2025-04-10
THE GREATEST
OF ALL VIRTUES
From a sermon by Blessed Guerric of Igny
◊◊◊
Keep…O happy sinner, keep carefully and watchfully this spirit of yours,
this most fitting affection of humility and devotion by which you may always so
think of yourself in humility and of the Lord in goodness. There is nothing
greater than it among the gifts of the Holy Spirit, nothing more precious in the
treasures of God, nothing more holy among all the charisms, nothing more
health-giving in all the sacraments… This humility not only justifies sinners but
also perfects the just and brings their justice to fullness if they confess
themselves humble servants even when they have done all they were bidden.
Let your sin be present to you always and, according to the Wise Man’s
advice, do not be without fear even for sin that has been forgiven. God’s
judgments are uncertain and hidden; they are not rashly to be presumed upon,
for we hold nothing more certain in that regard than that in God’s sight no man
or woman alive shall be justified, except insofar as they justify themselves to be
sinners…
Mercy has welcomed you kindly, received you with loving-kindness. Fear
the judgment, lest the grace given you in your humility be taken away from you
in your pride. You have chosen to be of little account… Remain in that frame of
mind, so that even if you are promoted you may be advanced to greater things
still. Always take the last place, or at least desire it… Never let humility become
displeasing to you; through it you began to please and without it you will begin
to displease however great the virtues by which you are distinguished…
Humility is the greatest of all virtues, although it does not know itself to
be a virtue. It is the root and seedbed, the tinder and incentive, it is the
summit and peak, the custody and discipline of almost all the virtues. From it
they begin, through it they make progress, in it they are perfected, by it they
are preserved. It is humility that makes all the virtues what they are, and if
any one of them be lacking or less perfect it is humility that compensates for
the loss since it profits by the other’s absence.

Vigils Reading
2025-04-11
A LIFE WITH CHRIST
by Fr Louis Bouyer
◊◊◊
Our death with Christ and this resurrection with Him, giving us the life
hidden with Christ in God, who will appear when Christ Himself will appear, is
the whole mystery that St Paul tells us God had reserved for these later times.
Writers have often stressed the extraordinary frequency of grammatical
compounds containing the word “with” in the writings of St Paul, and have
rightly observed that it is a characteristic feature of his whole conception of the
Christian life. Indeed, for him, the Christian life, the life of the Church or that of
each Christian, is a life with Christ. It is important to grasp all that that implies.
Jesus of Nazareth, who died and rose under Pontius Pilate and is now
seated at the right hand of the Father until the day He will come to judge the
living and the dead, has never been for St Paul, nor for any Catholic theologian,
a hero whose epic must leave the impression that His achievements are too
wonderful ever to be duplicated in ourselves. Surely no poet has dreamed of a
hero more sublime than the One of whom the Apostle wrote: Despoiling the
principalities and the powers, he made a public spectacle of them, leading
them away in triumph. But it is for us that He triumphed thus, and we must
know that by Him and with Him, dead as we were, God has raised us up with
him and seated us with him in the heavens in Christ Jesus.
Yes, Christ accomplished all that in us, for, if the sense of our own
weakness is what faith, in cutting at the very root of our pride, first thrusts upon
us, it does so only to make clear to us that strength is made perfect in weakness
and that we can do all things in Him who strengthens us – that is, Jesus Christ.
That the Church celebrates Easter, that today she suffers and weeps with
her Head, then rises and exults with Him, is the sign that the relation between
Christ and the Church, between Christ and us, is quite different from that
existing between any historic personages of different epochs, even between a
master and his disciples. For the authors of the New Testament, even for the
evangelists whose immediate end is to recount the earthly life of Jesus of
Nazareth, this Christ can never be considered simply as a man whose life and
death might inspire sentiments analogous to those awakened by, say, the life
and death of a Socrates, even though those sentiments were incomparably
deepened and purified. He is truly the Son of God made flesh for our sake.

Vigils Reading
2025-04-12
OUR STRUGGLE
IN SEARCH OF TRUTH
By Thomas Merton7
◊◊◊
Life is, or should be, nothing but a struggle to seek truth: yet what we seek
is really the truth that we already possess. Truth is mine in the reality of life as it
is given to me to live: yet to take life thoughtlessly, passively as it comes, is to
renounce the struggle and purification which are necessary. One cannot simply
open his eyes and see. The work of understanding involves not only dialectic,
but a long labor of acceptance, obedience, liberty, and love. The temptation of
monastic life is to evade this austere responsibility by falling back into passive
indifference, thinly veiled resentment disguised as obedience and
abandonment. Since in fact one need not positively accept what happens, one
can be merely resigned and negative.
Others make all the important decisions: but the most important decision
always falls to me, and if I am in the habit of never deciding, I will evade it. The
root decision to accept my own life and to obey its demands may challenge my
understanding of those demands, my honesty in their regard. The worst
temptation, and that to which many monks succumb early in their lives, and by
which they remain defeated, is simply to give up asking and seeking. To leave
everything to the superiors in this life and to God in the next – a hope which may
in fact be nothing but a veiled despair, a refusal to live. And it is not Christian to
despair of the present, merely putting off hope into the future. There is also a
very essential hope that belongs in the present, and is based on the nearness of
the hidden God, and of His Spirit, in the present. What future can make sense
without this present hope?
Evil and falsity are unavoidable: but one does not bow down to them
passively and without response. Resignation is not enough. God demands of us
a creative consent, in our deepest and most hidden self, the self we do not
experience, though it is always there. This creative consent is the obedience of
my whole being to the will of God, here and now. The inner “word” of consent is
the coincidence, in the Spirit, the identity of my own obedience and will with the
obedience and will of Christ. Such is the depth of our Sonship and of the life of
grace.
Gradually, by accepting our place in the world and our tasks as they are,
we come to be liberated from the limitations of the world and of a restricted,
halfhearted milieu: yet one is content with one’s moment of history and one’s
obscure task in it. One must be detached from systems and collective plans,
without rancor toward them, but with insight and compassion. To be truly
Catholic is not merely to be correct according to an abstractly universal
standard of truth, but also and above all to be able to enter into the problems
and the joys of all, to understand all, to be all things to all persons. This
cannot be done if we do not first completely and honestly accept ourselves,
our own problems, our own defeats, with the creative consent and
responsibility that unite us to God’s will and thus to the dynamism of history
in its very source.

7 Conjectures of a Guilty Bystander, by Thomas Merton, Doubleday & Co. 1966, pp.166-167.15

LCG Chicago April 12, 2025, Meeting 9:00 am CDT
2025-04-12 09:00 - 12:00 (America/Chicago)
All in LCG are invited to join our Chicago Zoom meeting. 9:00 am CDT on April 12, 2025.
Join Zoom Meeting
https://us02web.zoom.us/j/86028356465
Meeting ID: 860 2835 6465
One tap mobile
+13126266799,,86028356465# US (Chicago)
+13092053325,,86028356465# US

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:
Br. Luke Armour
Fr. Andrew McAughan
9:10 Lectio. Our lectio piece will be led by Robert Johnson.
9:50 Reading. Our reading this month is the first 50 pages (through Part III) of The Impact of God by Fr. Iain Matthew.Does St. John of the Cross sharpen your Lenten journey?
10:45 Housekeeping. Volunteer to lead lectio next month? Chicago Report on LCG Advisory Council activity. Plans for international meeting in 2025 and Anglophone lead-ins thereto.
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: May 10, 2025.

Skema
2025-04-13
Biblical Readings for Office and Mass
Holy Week

Mass Readings: Sunday (C), Weekdays (I)
April 13 – 19, 2025

Sun
13
Mon
14
Tue
15
Wed
16
Thu
17
Fri
18
Sat
19

Office
Palm Sunday
Monday of Holy Week
Tuesday of Holy Week
Wednesday of Holy Week
Holy Thursday
Good Friday
Holy Saturday

Vigils
Zech 9:9-17
Lam 1:1-16
Lam 2:1-10
Lam 2:18-22
Lam 3:19-54
Lam 4:1-6
Lam 5:1-22

Lauds
Zeph 3:14-20
Lam 1:17-22
Lam 2:11-17
Lam 3:1-18
Lam 3:55-66
Wis 2:10-22
Isa 63:1-6

Mass
38
257
258
259
39
40

1st
Isa 50:4-7
Isa 42:1-7
Isa 49:1-6
Isa 50:4-9a
Exod 12:1-8, 11-14
Isa 52:13-53:12

2nd
Phil 2:6-11

1 Cor 11:23-26
Heb 4:14-16; 5:7-9

Gospel
Luke 22:14-23:56
John 12:1-11
John 13:21-33, 36-38
Matt 26:14-25
John 13:1-15
John 18:1-19:42

Vespers
Gal 3:7-14
Rom 5:6-11
1 Cor 1:18-25
1 Pet 2:20-25

1 Pet 4:1-8

Vigils Reading - Palm Sunday
2025-04-13
THE WAY OF CHRIST
IS STRAIGHT
From a commentary by St Cyril of Alexandria
◊◊◊
“Behold a righteous king will reign, and princes will rule with justice.”
The only-begotten Word of God, together with God the Father, has always been
king of the universe, and to him all creatures, visible and invisible, are subject.
People on earth, having been caught in the snares of sin, were persuaded by the
devil to reject his sovereignty and despise his royal power, but the judge and
dispenser of all justice brought them back under his own dominion.
All his ways are straight, says Scripture, and by the ways of Christ we
mean the divine precepts laid down by the gospel. By observing them we make
progress in every virtue, do honor to ourselves by the moral beauty of our lives,
and attain the heavenly reward to which we have been called. These are straight,
not winding ways; they are direct and easily followed. As it is written: “The way
of the upright is straight; the road of the just is made smooth.” Its many decrees
make the law a rugged way and its difficulty intolerable, but the way of the
gospel commands is smooth, without any roughness or steep ascents.
The ways of Christ are straight, then, and as for the holy city. Which is the
Church, he himself was its builder and he makes it his own dwelling. In other
words, he makes the saints his dwelling, sharing as we do in the Holy Spirit, we
have Christ within us and have become temples of the living God. Christ is both
the founder of the Church and its foundation, and upon this foundation we, like
precious stones, are built into a holy temple to become, through the Spirit, a
dwelling place for God…
When he founded the Church, Christ delivered his people from bondage.
He saved us from the power of Satan and of sin, freed us and subjected us to his
own rule, but not by paying a ransom or by bribes. As one of the disciples wrote:
“we have been freed from the futile ways handed down to us by our ancestors,
not by anything perishable like silver and gold, but by the precious blood of
Christ, like that of a lamb without mark or blemish.” He gave his own blood for
us, so that we no longer belong to ourselves, but to him who bought us and saved
us. Those therefore who turn aside from the noble rule of the true faith are justly
accused by all the saints of denying the Lord who redeemed them.

Vigils Reading
2025-04-14
WHEN ALL WAS TO BE
PUT TO THE TEST
By Henri Daniel-Rops
◊◊◊
The day which followed the astonishing Sunday of the triumphal entry
was not so striking, but was nonetheless full of significance. Jesus entered
Jerusalem every day, went up to the Temple, and spoke to audiences which
listened to him with enthusiasm, while the chief priests and scribes sought
means to destroying him. To Jesus, the slightest incident was an occasion for a
lesson, which often took the form of a warning.
So it was all through the Monday. What precisely was the meaning of the
curious episode, uncharacteristic of Christ’s normally merciful manner, in
which he condemned a fig tree on which he found no figs to wither? And who is
the bad son who pretends to be submissive to his father’s will, but in reality
disobeys him? Or the rebellious wine dressers who kill their master’s servants
in order to seize the harvest? What is the name of the stone rejected by the
builders which will be the cornerstone of the new building? And do we not know
these guests invited to the royal feast who refuse to attend? One is almost afraid
to understand at whom these gestures, these parables are aimed. At this
moment, Israel’s refusal seems to haunt Jesus’ mind and to fill it with anguish.
We are hardly surprised to find that the leaders of the community sent
emissaries to ask Jesus with what right he was behaving as he was. He avoided
the question by himself asking them an embarrassing one concerning what kind
of a man was John, and they could not give him any answer. But we can hardly
be surprised that their anger grew, and that they were on the point of laying
hands on him. Jesus cast a real challenge at his adversaries at this moment
when he knew that all was to be put to the test.

Vigils Reading
2025-04-15
TODAY YOU WILL BE
WITH ME IN PARADISE
By St John Chrysostom
◊◊◊
Today the cross has opened Paradise which had been closed to us for
thousands of years. For today God has brought a robber there. Thus he effects
two marvels: he opens Paradise, and he brings in a thief. Today God has given
us our ancient fatherland, today he has brought us to the paternal city, today he
has opened his house to the whole of humanity. ‘Today,’ he said, ‘you will be
with me in Paradise’.
What did you say, Lord? You are crucified, nailed there, and you
promise Paradise?
Yes, so that you may learn how great is my power on the cross.
It is indeed a cruel sight. And to deflect your attention from this aspect of
the cross and make you realize the power of the Crucified, Jesus works this
miracle from the cross, the miracle which more than any other bears witness to
his power. For it was not when raising the dead, commanding the wind and the
waves, expelling demons, but when crucified, fixed with nails, covered with
insults, spittle, mockery and abuse, that he had power to change the evil state of
the thief; and in this you can see two aspects of his power.
He shook the whole of creation, he split the rocks, and he drew the soul of
the thief, which was harder than rock; for the thief believed in him and Jesus
said in return, ‘Today you will be with me in Paradise.” Doubtless the
cherubim guarded paradise, but he was master of the cherubim. A flaming
sword twirled at the entrance, but he had all power over fire and sword, over life
and death.
Truly, no king ever allowed a thief or any other subject to sit with him
while he made an entrance into a town. But Christ has done this: when he
entered into his fatherland he brought a thief with him. In doing this he did not
slight Paradise, did not dishonor it by the thief’s presence there; on the contrary,
he honored Paradise, because it is glorious for Paradise to have a master who
can make a thief worthy of the joys to be found there. Likewise when he brings
publicans and prostitutes into the kingdom of heaven he is not insulting the
kingdom but honoring it, for he shows that the master of the kingdom of heaven
is strong enough to make prostitutes and publicans worthy enough to receive
such an honor and such a gift.

Vigils Reading
2025-04-16
THE CROSS OF CHRIST
From a sermon by St Aelred of Rievaulx
◊◊◊
Our Lord Jesus Christ worked for our salvation not in one way only but in
many. Because his mercy provided for our redemption, he accomplished it in
such a way that he might be an example for us. Behold, my brothers, how at this
time you call to mind our redemption; therefore pay diligent attention not only
to the redemption itself but also to both the manner by which redemption was
accomplished and the place in which it was done. The manner of the
redemption is the passion of Christ; the place outside the city. You must know
then that from this redemption and the manner of accomplishing it, we receive
both a way of living and the right location that we must choose in order to live in
this way.
Let us accept now the way of living that comes from this cross of Jesus. Do
I say a way of living or of dying? Certainly both of living and of dying: of of dying
to the world, of living for God; of dying to vices, and of living in virtues; of dying
to the flesh, of living however in the Spirit. Therefore in the cross of Christ there
is death and in the cross of Christ there is life. There the death of death and the
life of life. There the death of sins and the life of virtues. There the death of the
flesh and the life of the Spirit. Why, however did God choose this kind of death?
Because of both the divine mystery itself and the example to be given. Then, too,
because our illness was such that the remedy should fit in this way.
It was certainly fitting that we who had fallen through the wood would rise
up through the wood. Fitting that he who conquered through the wood would
himself be conquered through it. Fitting that we who chose the fruit of death
from the wood would be given the fruit of life from the wood. And because we
fell from the stability of this most beautiful earth into the great and spacious sea,
it is fitting that wood be prepared for us by which we would cross over that sea.
For no one can cross the sea without wood, nor this world without the cross…
Therefore do you see how Christ chose this kind of death as full of some
divine meaning…? The Apostle explains it openly, saying, He humbled himself,
being made obedient even to death, death on the cross. He then proclaims the
meaning: Because of this, God exalted him and gave him the name which is
above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven,
on earth, and in the depths. Because he was about to take possession of heaven
and earth through the cross, he was placed on the cross as if he embraced
heaven and earth. Since in truth his death has already taken place not on the
earth nut above the earth, what can it mean except that, raised up as we are
from the earth through his blessed passion, we taste what is above, not those
things on earth. The fact that he died with arms outstretched is a sign of his
great loving kindness. Just as a hen gathers her chicks under her wing and
defends them from a persistent raptor, so he, clasping us with maternal
affection under the wings of his grace, makes us completely secure against the
attack of heinous spirits.

Vigils Reading - Holy Thursday
2025-04-17
THE BRIDGE BETWEEN
THE COVENANT
AND THE EUCHARIST
By St Edith Stein
◊◊◊
We know from the Gospel narratives that Christ prayed as a Jew who
believed in and was faithful to the Law. When he was a child with his parents,
and later with his disciples, he used to go on pilgrimage to Jerusalem at the
appointed times to take part in the festivals that were celebrated in the temple.
He sang joyfully with the pilgrims, “I was glad when they said unto me: We
will go into the house of the Lord”. He recited the ancient prayers of blessing,
which are still said today, for bread, wine, and the fruits of the earth, as the
accounts of the Last Supper bear witness, This was wholly consecrated to the
fulfillment of one of the holiest religious obligations – the solemn Passover meal
which commemorated the deliverance from slavery in Egypt. Perhaps it is here
that we are given the deepest insight into the prayer of Christ, as it were the key
which gives access to the prayer of the Church.
Now as they were eating, Jesus took bread, and blessed, and broke
it, and gave it to the disciples, and said, “Take, eat; this is my body.”
And he took a cup, when he had given thanks he gave it to them,
saying, “Drink of it, all of you; for this is my blood of the covenant,
which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sin”
.
The blessing and giving of the bread and wine have become part of the rite
of the Passover meal. But at the Last Supper this blessing and giving takes on a
wholly new meaning. For this is the birth of the Church. Doubtless it was only
at Pentecost that the Church was born a spiritual and visible community. But
here, at the Supper, took place that grafting of the shoot in the vine branch
which made the outpouring of the Spirit possible.
The ancient prayers of blessing became creative words of life on Christ’s
lips. The fruits of the earth became his flesh and blood, filled with his life. The
visible creation into which he was inserted by his incarnation is now bound to
him in a new and mysterious way. The foods that are indispensable for the
growth of the human organism are transformed in their nature, and those
partaking of them with faith are themselves transformed too; incorporated into
Christ in a living union, they are filled with his divine life. The quickening power
of the Word is fused with the sacrifice. The Word becomes flesh to give us that
Life which is his own. He offered himself, and has thus offered the creation
which he ransomed by this offering, as a sacrifice of praise to the Creator.
The Passover of the ancient covenant has become the Passover of the
new covenant, at the Lord’s Last Supper, at the Sacrifice of the Cross, and,
between the Resurrection and the Ascension, at the joyful agape where the
disciples recognized their Lord in the breaking of the bread; and, in the
Sacrifice of the Mass, at Holy Communion.

Vigils Reading- Good Friday
2025-04-18
SOVEREIGNTY IS LAID
ON HIS SHOULDERS
From a sermon by St Leo the Great
◊◊◊
When our Lord was handed over to the will of his cruel foes, they ordered
him, in mockery of his royal dignity, to carry the instrument of his own torture.
This was done to fulfill the prophecy of Isaiah: “A child is born for us, a son is
given to us; sovereignty is laid upon his shoulders.” To the wicked, the sight of
the Lord carrying his own cross was indeed an object of derision; but to the
faithful a great mystery was revealed, for the cross was destined to become the
scepter of his power. Here was the majestic spectacle of a glorious conqueror
mightily overthrowing the hostile forces of the devil and nobly bearing the
trophy of his victory. On the shoulders of his invincible patience he carried the
sign of salvation for all the kingdoms of the earth to worship, as if on that day he
would strengthen all his future disciples by the symbol of his work, and say to
them: “Anyone who does not take up his cross and follow me is not worthy of
me.”
O the marvelous power of the cross, the glory in the passion! No tongue
can fully describe it. Here we see the judgment seat of the Lord, here sentence
is passed upon the world, and here the sovereignty of the Crucified is revealed.
You drew all things to yourself, Lord, when you stretched out your hands all
the day long to a people that denied and opposed you, until at last the whole
world was brought to proclaim your majesty. You drew all things to yourself,
Lord…when the lights of heaven were darkened and the day was turned into
night; when the land was shaken by unwonted earthquakes, and all creation
refused to serve those wicked people. Yes, Lord, you drew all things to
yourself; the veil of the temple was torn in two and the Holy of Holies taken
away from those unworthy high priests. Figures gave way to reality,
prophecy to manifestation, law to gospel. You drew all things to yourself in
order that the worship of the whole human race could be celebrated
everywhere in a sacramental form which would openly fulfill what had been
enacted by means of veiled symbols in that single Jewish temple. A nobler
order of levites has now arisen, we have elders of a greater dignity and priests
of a holier anointing, because your cross is the fountainhead of every blessing
and the source of every grace. Through your cross the faithful are given
strength instead of weakness, glory instead of shame, life instead of death.

Vigils Reading - Holy Saturday
2025-04-19
THE DEATH OF CHRIST
HAS TRANSFORMED DEATH
By St Cyril of Alexandria
◊◊◊
They took the body of Jesus and wrapped it in linen cloths with the spices,
according to the Jewish burial custom. At the place where he had been crucified
there was a garden, and in this garden a new tomb in which no one had yet been
buried.
Christ was numbered among the dead. For our sake he was put to death
in the body, even though of himself and through his Father we believe him to be,
and indeed he is, life it self. In order to do all that was required by God, all that
was involved in his having become man, he freely submitted the temple of his
body not only to death, but to everything that accompanies it, to the laying out of
his body and its burial in a tomb.
The Evangelist says that his tomb was in a garden and that it was new.
This teaches us in a symbolic way that it is through Christ’s death that we gain
entry into paradise; he entered as the forerunner on our behalf. The newness of
the tomb suggests the new and untrodden path from death to life and the
renewal by which Christ frees us from corruption. By Christ’s death, our death
has been transformed into something quite new, more like a kind of sleep. We
are alive now to God, as Scripture says, and destined to live for ever. This is why
Saint Paul frequently refers to those who have died in Christ as those who have
fallen asleep.
In the past the power of death had always prevailed against our nature.
From the time of Adam to the time of Moses, death ruled over all, even over
those who did not sin, as Adam did, by disobeying God’s command. We bore the
image of the earthly man, Adam, and underwent the death inflicted by the
divine curse, but when the second Adam who is divine and from heaven
appeared among us, he fought for the lives of us all, purchased them by his own
death in the flesh and then, having destroyed the power of corruption, he rose
again. In this way he transformed us into his own image, so that the death we
now undergo is of a new kind; it does not lead to eternal destruction, but is
rather a sleep, full of good hope. In fact, it resembles the death of Christ, who
opened up for us this new pathway to life.

Skema
2025-04-20
Biblical Readings for Office and Mass
Easter Octave

Mass Readings: Sunday (C), Weekdays (I)
April 20 – 26, 2025

Sun
20
Mon
21
Tue
22
Wed
23
Thu
24
Fri
25
Sat
26

Office
EASTER SUNDAY
Easter Monday
Easter Tuesday
Easter Wednesday
Easter Thursday
Easter Friday
Easter Saturday

Vigils
* Easter Vigil
1 Pt 1:1-21
1 Pt 1:22-2:10
1 Pt 2:11-25
1 Pt 3:1-17
1 Pt 3:18-4:11
1 Pt 4:12-5:14

Lauds
Acts 13:28-33
1 Cor 15:1-11
1 Cor 15:12-19
1 Cor 15:20-28
1 Cor 15:35-41
1 Cor 15:42-49
1 Cor 15:50-58

Mass
42
261
262
263
264
265
266

1st
Acts 10:34a, 37-43
Acts 2:14, 22-33
Acts 2:36-41
Acts 3:1-10
Acts 3:11-26
Acts 4:1-12
Acts 4:13-21

2nd
Col 3:1-4

Gospel
John 20:1-9
Matt 28:8-15
John 20:11-18
Luke 24:13-35
Luke 24:35-48
John 21:1-14
Mark 16:9-15

Vespers
Rev 1:12-18
Acts 1:1-5
Acts 1:12-14
Acts 1:15-26
Acts 2:42-47
Acts 4:32-37
Acts 5:1-11

Easter Vigil Readings* 1st) Gen 1:1-2:2 2nd) Gen 22:1-18 3rd) Exod 14:15-15:1 4th) Isa 54:5-14 5th) Isa 55:1-11
6th) Bar 3:9-15,32-4:4 7th) Ezek 36:16-17a,18-28 Epistle) Rom 6:3-11 Gospel) Matt 28:1-10; Mk 16:1-8; Luke 24:1-12

Vigils Reading - Easter Sunday
2025-04-20
CHRIST’S RESURRECTION
IS OUR RESURRECTION
By Symeon the New Theologian
◊◊◊
Already Easter, that joyful day, that day of all gladness and delight, the
day of Christ’s resurrection, has arrived in the circle of the year. But rather, it
happens daily and eternally in those who know its mystery, and so has filled our
hearts with unspeakable joy and gladness. Let us look and carefully examine
what is the mystery of that resurrection of Christ our God which takes place
mystically in us at all times, if we are willing…
Christ our God was hanged on the cross and nailed on it the sin of the
world. He tasted death and went down to the uttermost depths of hell… He
returned from hell into His own spotless body, from which He had in no way
been separated as He descended…and He arose from the dead. After that He
ascended into heaven with great glory and power. So, likewise, as we have now
come out of the world and entered into the tomb of repentance and humiliation
by being assimilated to the sufferings of the Lord, He Himself comes down from
heaven and enters into our body as into a tomb. He unites Himself to our souls
and raises them up, though they were undoubtedly dead, and then grants to him
who has thus been raised with Christ that he may see the glory of His mystical
resurrection.
Christ’s resurrection is thus our resurrection, ours who lie here below. He
who has never fallen into sin, as it is written, nor lost anything whatever of His
own glory, how will He ever be raised up or be glorified, since He is always
glorified above all and remains the same, “far above all rule and authority”…?
Through His resurrection in us it comes into being in us, is shown to us, and is
seen by us. Once He has appropriated what is ours, that which He works in us
He attributes to Himself…
The body is dead and cannot live or be called alive unless it receives the
living soul in itself and is joined to it, though not mingled with it. Likewise the
soul cannot live unless it is ineffably and without confusion united to God, who
is truly the life eternal…
A blind man who hits his foot against a stone feels it, but a dead man does
not… In spiritual things, unless the mind comes to the contemplation of the
things that are above thought, it does not perceive the mystical activity. Those
who have not arrived at contemplation in spiritual matters and claim that they
perceive the things that are above intellect, word, and thought are like those
whose eyes are blinded and who have a sensation of good or bad things that they
experience, but do not know what is in their hands or at their feet, even if they
are for them a matter of life or death. Since they are deprived of the faculty and
perception of vision they in no way perceive the bad or the good things that
come upon them. Thus they will often lift up their staff to ward off an enemy
and possibly strike a friend instead, while their enemy stands before their eyes
and laughs at them.
Most people believe in the resurrection of Christ, but very few have a clear
vision of it. Those who have no vision thereof cannot even adore Christ Jesus as
the Holy One and as Lord.

Vigils Reading - Easter Monday
2025-04-21
THE RESURRECTION
AND THE LIFE
From a sermon by Blessed Guerric of Igny
◊◊◊
Let us go to see Jesus journeying to the mountain of the heavenly Galilee,
where he awaits us. On the way our love will increase, and on our arrival at least,
it will be perfected. On the way, the road, at first hard and difficult, will grow
easier and the strength of the weak will increase. The flesh of Christ is our food
for the journey, his Spirit our means of conveyance. He Himself is the food; he
himself is the chariot and charioteer of Israel. When you arrive, all the goods,
not of Egypt but of heaven, will be yours. There, in the best place in the
kingdom, at the bidding of your Joseph you will take your rest. He who first sent
angels, women and apostles as witnesses and messengers of his resurrection,
now cries from heaven: “Behold, I whom you have mourned as dead these three
days did indeed die for you, but see, I live. And all power in heaven and earth is
given unto me.”…
“I am the resurrection and the life”, Jesus said. He indeed is the first
resurrection; he is also the second resurrection. For rising from the dead as the
first fruits of those who sleep Christ both brings about for us the first
resurrection by the mystery of his own resurrection and by the example of that
same resurrection will bring about for us the second. The first is that of souls,
when he raises them together with himself to newness of life; the second will be
that of bodies, when he forms this humbled body of ours anew, molding it into
the image of his glorified body. Christ does well then to proclaim himself the
resurrection and the life since it is through him and into him that we rise in
order to live according to him and with him; now according to him in holiness
and justice, afterwards with him in happiness and glory.
Now the first resurrection of our Head, the Lord Jesus Christ, is the cause
and the proof of the second resurrection which will be that of his whole body. So
also for each of us the first resurrection of the soul, by which it comes to life
again from the death of sin, is the proof and the cause of its second resurrection,
by which the body will be freed not only from the corruption of death but also
from every tendency to corruption and death. That the one is proof of the other
St Paul shows clearly in the words: “If the Spirit of Christ who raised Jesus from
the dead dwells in you, he will also give life to your perishable bodies on
account of his Spirit who dwells in you”.

Vigils Reading - Easter Tuesday
2025-04-22
THE REALITY OF
THE RESURRECTION
By Bruce Vawter
◊◊◊
In biblical faith the resurrection is something; something did occur to
account for the appearances of Jesus after his death. It is not to retreat into
obscurity or equivocation to confess that we have no better way of defining that
something than to call it resurrection. We cannot define what is indefinable in
terms of human experience; we can only describe it in some fashion by the use of
the pictures we call analogies. The picture we use following the New Testament
precedent to describe both what God effected in Christ and, with it as the
proleptic example, what its faith promises to all who share in God’s kingdom, is
mythical to the extent that, taken in all literalness, it might equally well serve to
describe the resuscitation of a corpse, which the New Testament does not intend
to do…
Paul…for all his insistence on the resurrection as a reality, did not think of
it as a resurrection of dead flesh: “Perhaps someone will say, ‘How are the dead
to be raised up? What kind of body will they have?’ A nonsensical question!
The seed you sow does not germinate unless it dies. When you sow, you do not
sow the full-blown plant but a kernel of wheat or some other grain. God gives
body to it as he pleases – to each seed its own fruition… So is it with the
resurrection of the dead.”
Paul admittedly tells us more about what, in his view, the resurrection is
not than what it is, but at the same time he tells us enough to dissuade us from
dismissing lightly the testimony of his senses, which he joined to the witness of
his tradition. Here was a man quite conscious of the validity of what are
sometimes thought to be modern and scientific objections to the idea of
resurrection; a man convinced that something had occurred that he could only
call resurrection while regretting the inadequacy of the concept. Paul was as
prepared as anyone today for demythologizing, but he was not prepared to
disallow any fact out of his inability to explain it. Rather than deny the fact, he
preferred to retain the myth with all its attendant ambiguities.

Vigils Reading - Easter Wednesday
2025-04-23
THE TREMENDOUS DESTINY
OF LOVE
By Caryl Houselander
◊◊◊
Quite different from His appearance to Magdalene or the apostles is
Christ’s approach to the disciples on the road to Emmaus. These are scholars,
they must come to the point of communion with him through the travail of the
mind. Step by step he takes them back through the scriptures, leading them to
know him by thinking their own thoughts, by linking up the academic
knowledge they have acquired in the past with the events of the day, and
thrashing out the problem that is so baffling to intellectuals in all ages, the
problem of suffering.
Through a totally different approach to the same problem he convinces
Thomas…the poor man who has no philosophy to be armor against the wounds
of the world, no thoughts to help him through the loneliness of his own
anguish… It was when Thomas actually put his own hands into these wounds
and felt, as it were, his own sins and sorrows redeemed in the glorious Body of
Christ, that the cry came out of his heart: “You are my Lord and my God!”.
Last there is Peter. Who but Christ would have known that the one thing
that could lift up that broken heart was not a formal act of contrition, but a
spontaneous, almost an exasperated cry of love? —Who but he would have
thought of provoking the same impulsive temperament, which had made a
coward of Peter with such cruel results, to give it the courage to break out into
those acts of love? And, as it was with the others, Peter is given something to do
for Christ, something that is exactly suited to his inmost need, as it has been in
the case of each of the others. He is to become the shepherd. Christ shows him
that he knows what the sorrow for his sin has done to him, how it has taken away
his cowardice, so that he can give him even this charge, the charge of the
shepherd who is to protect the frailest of his flock, his lambs…to feed them, and
if need be to give his life for them. Could he give greater proof of his trust in the
reality of Peter’s love, in the truth of Peter’s word: “Lord, you know all things;
you can tell that I love You”.
Why we, who are members of Christ’s body on earth, his Church, are so, is
a great mystery. But the fact remains that God has chosen us for the tremendous
destiny of love, and if the wonder and the joy of it is ours, so too is the
responsibility of it. That responsibility is to prove to those who are still unaware
of it that Christ has risen from the dead and that he is in the world now. We
cannot do this without a very close imitation of Christ’s way with other people.
Christ “knew what was in them”: that is the secret of his method; he knew and
loved every one, objectively and individually, as a separate person, a unique
person; he respected their otherness, their independence, even their slowness,
their limitations, which were all part of the experience which was to bring them
to the realization of his love. Christ wishes to approach people through us today
in just the same way, through just the same means, as he did in his Risen Life.

Vigils Reading - Easter Thursday
2025-04-24
THE SECRET
OF THE CHRISTIAN LIFE
By Fr Barnabas Ahern
◊◊◊
So often when St. Paul writes of the death of Christ, two expressions keep
recurring: “He loved me,” and “He gave Himself for me.” He loved me, and
therefore He went down to death in order that love, because it was love, could
become dynamically active when He would rise from the dead as the glorious
messianic Son of God. In this He has proven His love for us, because when as
yet we were sinners and unworthy of His love, He laid down His life for us. He
died so that He could become the risen Savior and pour out upon the Church the
fullness of the Spirit. It is the light of this mystery of our Lord’s death and
resurrection, of His suffering and of His life, of the love which led Him to die and
to suffer, and the love which leads Him to give everything to us today as the risen
Savior; it is in this that we ourselves begin to understand the mystery of our own
Christian life.
Our baptism incorporates us into Christ in such a way that we become
“other Christs.” The Spirit who guided our Lord, the Spirit who illumined Him,
the Spirit who charged His soul with love, is the same Spirit who reproduces
that same love in our own life through the mystery of our Christian
incorporation. This is why for Paul the whole meaning of the Christian life is
love. For Paul… all law has been abrogated—not merely the ceremonial, ritual
law of Judaism, but all law. Now the Christian knows only one principle of
action, and that principle of action is totally from within—the love, the agape,
which the Spirit is infusing…
“If we live by the spirit, then we must walk by the spirit”… The liturgy
speaks of the weight of our poor humanness that is always twisting us, as it were,
to selfishness and away from God. Now, our Lord knew the same weight, that
same pull of humanness. He was “tempted” to give people what they wanted, to
meet their need for excitement and pleasure. This easy way of meeting needs
was opposed by the hard way which the Father required. And Jesus kept
clinging to the Father, which meant a constant cross in His life: the vertical pull
to the will of the Father, the horizontal pull to the desires of His people.
We are in a similar situation. We know the will of God, the vertical pull in
life, and at the same time we feel the horizontal pull of our mortality, our “flesh,”
the needs of our human nature. The agape is always trying to lift us up in
fidelity, but it is always being dragged down by the pull of our poor humanness.
In such lives the Cross is inevitable. The agape is not only responsible for
introducing the Cross, it also gives it meaning
This is the secret of our Lord’s life, as Paul saw it; and it is the secret of the
Christian life as we must live it. Mortification and self-denial, all those negative
factors of life are without meaning if they are not prompted by agape. Our Lord
could become all things to all men, He could forget Himself completely because
there was this driving urge to love. And those who have followed Him have been
given this same spirit.

Vigils Reading - Easter Friday
2025-04-25
WITNESSES OF
THE RESURRECTION
From a sermon by St John Henry Newman
◊◊◊
It might have been expected that, on our Savior’s rising again from the
dead, He would have shown Himself to very great numbers of people, and
especially to those who crucified Him; whereas we know from history that, far
from this being the case, He showed Himself only to chosen witnesses, chiefly
His immediate followers… This seems at first sight strange. We are apt to fancy
the resurrection of Christ as some striking visible display of His glory, such as
God showed from time to time to the Israelites in Moses’ day; and considering it
in the light of a public triumph, we are led to imagine the confusion and terror
which would have overwhelmed His murderers had He presented Himself alive
before them. Now, to reason in this way is to conceive Christ’s kingdom of this
world, which it is not; and to suppose that then Christ came to judge the world,
whereas that judgment will not be till the last day, when in very deed those
wicked men shall “look on Him whom they have pierced“.
After His resurrection, Jesus said to His disciples, “Go, convert all
nations“. This was His special charge. If, then, there are grounds for thinking
that, by showing Himself to a few rather than to many, He was more surely
advancing this great object, the propagation of the Gospel, this is sufficient
reason for our Lord’s having so ordained. Now consider what would have been
the probable effect of a public exhibition of His resurrection. Let us suppose that
our Savior had shown Himself as openly as before He suffered: preaching in the
Temple and in the streets of the city; traversing the land with His Apostles, and
with multitudes following to see the miracles which He did. What would have
been the effect of this? Of course, what it had already been. His former miracles
had not effectively moved the body of the people; and, doubtless, this miracle
too would have left them as it found them, or worse than before. They might
have been more startled at the time; but why should this amazement last?
When the man taken with a palsy was suddenly restored at His word, the
multitude were all amazed and glorified God, and were filled with fear saying, “
We have seen strange things this day.” What could they have said and felt more
than this, when “one rose from the dead“? In truth, this is the way of most
people in all ages, to be influenced by sudden fears, sudden contrition, sudden
earnestness, sudden resolves, which disappear just as suddenly. Nothing is
accomplished effectively through untrained human nature; and such is always
the condition of the multitude. Unstable as water, it cannot excel. One day it
cried Hosanna; the next, Crucify Him.
And, had our Lord appeared to them after they had crucified Him, of
course they would have shouted Hosanna once more; yet when He had
ascended out of sight, then again they would have persecuted His followers…
Surely so it would have been; the chief priests would not have been moved at all;
and the populace, even though they had been moved at the time, would not have
been moved in a lasting way, nor in a practical way, so as to proclaim to the
world what they had heard and seen, as to preach the gospel. The very reason
why Christ showed Himself at all was in order to raise up witnesses to His
resurrection, ministers of His word, founders of His Church; and how in the
nature of things could a populace ever become such?

Vigils Reading - Easter Saturday
2025-04-26
THE LEAVENING OF
MORTALITY AND INIQUITY
From a sermon by St Aelred of Rievaulx
◊◊◊
He who is the creator, made himself a creature. He who was Lord, made
himself a servant. He who was rich, made himself poor. He who was great, made
himself little. And the Word was made flesh. He was bread and he fed the
angels. But he did not feed us. We were, however, so weak that in no way could
we taste that bread in all its purity. We had within us a corrosive leaven that
robbed us of our pristine strength. We had become so unlike that pure and
untainted bread that we could not taste it at all. This leavening which we had
within us was twofold. We had within us the leavening of mortality and we had
within us the leavening of iniquity…
We are mortals and sinners; he is immortal and just. How were we to
come together? He saw this, he who is caring and merciful. Because we could
not ascend to him, he came down to us. He took upon himself one part of our
leavening and so adapted himself to our weakness. He did not take to himself
the whole leaven that was in us, but a certain part of it. If he had taken on the
whole of it he would be as we are and he would not be able to help us. If he had
taken none of it he would be so distant from us that we would not be able in any
way to approach him. And so we would remain forever in our wretchedness…
The leavening of our mortality therefore he accepted, and abode in the purity of
his justice, so that he would be the sort of being who could come down to us and
yet remain the sort of being to whom we ought to ascend…
To this leavening of mortality belongs hunger, thirst, sorrow, misery. All
of this our Lord took on himself. He chose to take on this leavening, but he was
not obliged to remain in ferment. First he showed this leavening in himself
through a wondrous compassion and then he purged himself of this leaven
through a wondrous charity…
We ought to know that our iniquity is the cause of our mortality. And
therefore when we are fully purged of iniquity we will doubtless also be purged
of mortality… Our iniquity is twofold. It comes from the nature in which we
were born and from the evil which we later brought to it. From both of these the
Lord purges us. He offered for us a sacrifice – his own blood – and through this
sacrifice we are purged. And therefore what we suffer now from the corruption
of our nature is no longer iniquity but infirmity.
From the corruption of our nature come the impulses of concupiscence
which we suffer unwillingly. From this come the impulses of lust, anger, pride,
ambition. But if we do not consent to them, God does not impute them to us,
because the pure sacrifice was offered to offset the corruption of our nature… By
the workings of his compassion in us in baptism we are purged of all sins, both
those which came from nature and those which we added voluntarily.

Skema
2025-04-27
Biblical Readings for Office and Mass
2nd Week of Easter

Mass Readings: Sunday (C), Weekdays (I)
April 27 – May 3, 2025

Sun
27
Mon
28
Tue
29
Wed
30
Thu
1
Fri
2
Sat
3

Office
2nd Sunday of Easter
Easter Weekday
St Catherine of Siena
Easter Weekday
St Joseph the Worker
St Athanasius
SS Philip & James

Vigils
Col 3:1-17
Rev 1:1-20
Rev 2:1-11
Rev 2:12-29
Rev 3:1-22
Rev 4:1-11
1 Cor 12:1-13

Lauds
Eph 1:1-10
Eph 1:11-14
Eph 1:15-23
Eph 2:1-10
Eph 2:11-18
Eph 2:19-22
2 Thess 2:13-3:5

Mass
45
267
268
269
270, 559
271
561

1st
Acts 5:12-16
Acts 4:23-31
Acts 4:32-37
Acts 5:17-26
Acts 5:27-33
Acts 5:34-42
1 Cor 15:1-8

2nd
Rev 1:9-11a, 12-13, 17-19

Gospel
John 20:19-31
John 3:1-8
John 3:7b-15
John 3:16-21
Matt 13:54-58
John 6:1-15
John 14:6-14

Vespers
Acts 5:12-16
Acts 5:27-32
Acts 6:8-15
Acts 7:51-60
Acts 8:1b-8
Acts 8:9-13
Acts 8:14-25

Vigils Reading - 2nd Sunday of Easter
2025-04-27
BLESSED ARE THOSE
WHO HAVE NOT SEEN
From a commentary by St Augustine
◊◊◊
My dear people, you, like myself, are well aware that our Lord and Savior
Jesus Christ is the one physician capable of bringing us eternal healing and
salvation. We know, too, that it was in order to accomplish this that he took
upon himself the weakness of our human nature, otherwise that weakness
would have remained with us forever. He equipped himself with a human body
liable to death, so that in and through that body he might conquer death itself.
And though, as the apostle tells us, it was his human weakness that made it
possible for him to be crucified, it was his divine power that enabled him to
return to life.
That same apostle says: He will never die again, neither will death have
any further hold upon him. All this you already know and believe, and also the
consequences flowing from it; we can be sure that the miracles he wrought while
he lived among us were meant to encourage us to accept the gifts from him that
should never pass away nor have an end. Thus he gave back sight to blind eyes
that would shortly be closed again in death; he raised Lazarus from the dead
only for him to die again. His bodily cures, indeed, were never meant to last for
ever, even though at the end of time he is to give the body itself life everlasting.
But because “seeing is believing,” he used these visible wonders to build up
people’s faith in even greater marvels that could not be seen.
Let no one then be found to say that since Christ Jesus our Lord no longer
works such miracles among us, the Church was better off in its early days. On
the contrary, in one recorded testament, the same Lord set those who have
never seen and yet believe before those who believe only because they see.
Indeed, so great was the disciples’ weakness at that time, that when they saw the
Lord they found it necessary to touch him before they could believe he had really
risen from the dead. They were unable to believe the testimony of their own
eyes, until they had handled his body and explored his recent wounds with their
fingers. Only after this was done could that most hesitant of all his disciples
exclaim: My Lord and my God! Thus it was by his wounds that Christ, who had
so often healed the manifold wounds of others, came to be recognized himself.
Now we may ask: could not the Lord have risen with a body from which all
the marks of wounds had been erased? No doubt he could have; but he knew his
disciples bore within their hearts a wound so deep that the only way to cure it
was to retain the scars of his own wounds in his body. And when that confession:
My Lord and my God! Was uttered, what was his answer to it? You believe, he
said, because you have seen me; blessed are those who have not seen and yet
believe.
And who, my brothers and sisters, are those if not ourselves and those
who are to follow after us? When, later on, the Lord had departed from human
sight and faith had time to strike roots into people’s hearts, those who believed
in him made their act of faith without seeing him in whom they made it. The
faith of such believers is highly meritorious, for it springs from a devoted heart
rather than an exploring hand.

Vigils Reading
2025-04-28
THE FIRST AND THE SECOND
RESURRECTION
By Blessed Guerric of Igny
◊◊◊
“Blessed and holy is he who has a share in the first resurrection”. “I am the
resurrection and the life”, Jesus said. He indeed is the first resurrection; he is
also the second resurrection. For rising from the dead as the first fruits of those
who sleep, Christ both brings about for us the first resurrection by the mystery
of his own resurrection and by the example of that same resurrection will bring
about for us the second. The first is that of souls, when he raises them together
with himself to newness of life; the second will be that of bodies, when he forms
this humbled body of ours anew, molding it into the image of his glorified body.
Christ does well then to proclaim himself the resurrection and the life
since it is through him and into him that we rise in order to live according to him
and with him; now according to him in holiness and justice, afterwards with him
in happiness and glory. Now the first resurrection of our Head, the Lord Jesus
Christ, is the cause and the proof of the second resurrection, which will be that
of his whole body. So also for each of us the first resurrection of the soul, by
which it comes to life again from the death of sin, is the proof and the cause of its
second resurrection, by which the body will be freed not only from corruption of
death but also from every tendency to corruption and death. That the one is the
proof and cause of the other St Paul shows clearly in the words: “If the Spirit of
Christ who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he will give life also to your
perishable bodies on account of his Spirit who dwells in you”.
It is well said then: “Blessed and holy is he who has a share in the first
resurrection”. Holy, that is, on account of the first, which he has already
obtained through the renewal of his soul; blessed on account of the second,
which he happily awaits when his body is restored. The reason for his
blessedness is indicated by the same passage of Scripture, which goes on: “Over
these (who have a share, that is, in the first resurrection), the second death has
no power, even if the first death has seemed to exercise its dominion over them
for a passing hour. For death has reigned from Adam to Moses, even over those
who did not sin according to the likeness of Adam’s transgression. But as with
Christ so with the Christian; rising from the dead, he dies no more; death has no
more dominion over him.
So over those blessed neither has the second death any power nor will the
first keep the power, which it had for a time. For the one death of Christ
triumphed over both of ours, setting free from the one those who were already
its captives, from the other, those who would be its captives. It prevented us
from falling into the one, from remaining in the other. How true, how devout
and at the same time how magnificent is that threat he uttered as he died: “I will
be your death, O death”. How fittingly and wonderfully he triumphed who
tasted death on behalf of all and so swallowed up his own death and all the dying
of all humanity. Free from fear he may mock at it, whomever that blessed man is
who has a share in the first resurrection: “Where is your victory, death? Where
is your sting, death?”

Vigils Reading - St Catherine of Siena
2025-04-29
THE WAY OF
PRAYER TO GOD
From “The Dialogues” by St Catherine of Siena
◊◊◊
A soul rises up, restless with tremendous desire for God’s honor and the
salvation of souls. she has for some time exercised herself in virtue and has
become accustomed to dwelling in the cell of self-knowledge in order to know
better God’s goodness toward her, since upon knowledge follows love. And
loving, she seeks to pursue truth and clothe herself in it.
But there is no way she can so savor and be enlightened by this truth as in
continual humble prayer, grounded in the knowledge of herself and of God. For
by such prayer the soul is united with God, following in the footsteps of Christ
crucified, and through desire and affection and the union of love he makes of her
another himself. So Christ seems to have meant when he said, “If you will love
me and keep my word, I will show myself to you, and you will be one thing
with me and I with you.”. And we find similar words in other places from which
we can see it is the truth that by love’s affection the soul becomes another
himself.
To make this clearer still, I remember having heard from a certain servant
of God that, when she was at prayer, lifted high in spirit, God would not hide
from her mind’s eye his love for his servants. No, he would reveal it, saying
among other things, “Open your mind’s eye and look within me, and you will see
the dignity and beauty of my reasoning creature. But beyond the beauty I have
given the soul by creating her in my image and likeness, look at those who are
clothed in the wedding garment of charity, adorned with many true virtues: they
are united with me through love. So I say, if you should ask me who they are, I
would answer,” said the gentle loving Word, “that they are another me, for they
have lost and drowned their own will and have clothed themselves and united
themselves and conformed themselves with mine.” It is true, then, that the soul
is united to God through love’s affection.

Vigils Reading
2025-04-30
MAKE NO PROVISION
FOR THE FLESH
From a sermon by Pope St Leo the Great
◊◊◊
Though we once knew Christ according to the flesh, we now do so no
longer. The resurrection of the Lord did not mean the end of his flesh, but its
transformation, and his bodily substance was not consumed by its increase in
power. The quality changed, but the nature did not pass away. What could die
became immortal, what could be harmed became incorruptible. And so he says
correctly that he no longer knows the body of Christ in its former state, because
there remains nothing in it subject to suffering or to weakness. It remains
essentially human, but surpasses itself through the glory of the resurrection.
It is not surprising that Paul says this of the body of Christ, when he says
about Christians who live according to the Spirit, From now on, we know no
one according to the flesh. From now on, he says, resurrection in Christ has
begun in us; from Christ who died for all comes the shape of all our hope. We do
not hold back through diffidence, nor are we held in suspense through
uncertainty: we have received the beginnings of what we are promised, and see
already with the eyes of faith the things that will be ours. Rejoicing in the lifting
up of our nature, we possess already all that we believe.
Therefore, let us not be taken up by the appearances of things that pass,
nor let things which are merely of this earth turn our thoughts from the things of
heaven. Let us take as passing those things which have even now scarcely any
reality; and with our minds intent on those that endure, let us fix our desire
there, where what is offered is eternal. For though we are saved only in hope,
and carry with us still our corruptible and mortal body, yet we rightly claim to be
no longer in the flesh if carnal passions do not rule us: rightly do we disclaim
allegiance to something which no longer holds us in its power. And so when the
Apostle says: “Make no provision for the flesh, to follow its desires, we
understand that he has not forbidden those things consistent with our bodily
health, or those demanded by human weakness. But in that we are not to cater
to all our desires, or fulfill all that the flesh covets, we recognize that he has
warned us to observe a certain measure of temperance, that the flesh, which is
created subject to the soul, is not given too much, nor is denied what is
necessary.
