THE HOURS OF OUR LADY #8

 

(The translation of the Psalms and the brief introductory comments on the Psalms of this Little Office of the Blessed Virgin are taken largly from: The Psalms and Canticles by George O'Neill, S.J. [Bruce Publishing Co. 1937.] The late Father O'Neill's work has long been out of print.)

INTRODUCTION 

[Continued] 

Quotations no less ardent and eloquent might be drawn in abundance from the literature of every Christian age. No wonder if the Psalter, thus highly valued and commended, has always occupied, with the Gospels, the foremost place in the Church's liturgical devotions. It must be admitted, however, that with a lessening participation of the faithful in those devotions has gone a lessening use of them as prayers. Not to go back to the primitive centuries--laity and clergy--with one heart, one soul, and one voice took part in the Eucharistic and other celebrations (Acts 2:42-47; 4:32); throughout the Middle Ages the recitation of large portions of the Psalms--gradually made up into the "Breviary"--was customary for all devout Christians. 

To learn the Psalms was for boys and girls a chief part of education. 

Not only saintly kings such as Louis of France, Wenceslas of Bohemia, or Stephen of Hungary, but also less devout personages, grim soldiers and statesmen, like William the Conqueror and Philip Augustus, sought and found time from their secular cares to join the monks in their chant of the canonical hours, or to imitate them by private recital--much as this may amaze our modern Christians, who leave the Breviary, with its Psalms, hymns, lessons, and prayers to the clergy and are content it should be a closed volume to themselves.

(O'Neill, The Psalms and Canticles).

[To be continued]

THE HOURS OF OUR LADY #7

 

(The translation of the Psalms and the brief introductory comments on the Psalms of this Little Office of the Blessed Virgin are taken largly from: The Psalms and Canticles by George O'Neill, S.J. [Bruce Publishing Co. 1937.] The late Father O'Neill's work has long been out of print.)

INTRODUCTION 

Continued] 

Denis the Areopagite says that the Psalms are, as it were, "a compendium of all the Scriptures. They teach the eradication of all vices, the attaining of all virtues, the fulness of all perfection; they illuminate faith, strengthen hope, inflame charity, inspire humility, especially comment meekness, are a school of patience and all other virtues: they give deep pleasure to the mind of the devout reciter and take away idle and worldly sadness. They set before us the torments of the impious, the rewards and joys of the just, the lessons of the beginner, the steps of the onward pilgrim, the completeness of the perfect, the life of the active, the meditations of the contemplative."

(O'Neill)

[To be continued]

EMBER SATURDAY IN ADVENT

SIMPLE / PURPLE
INTROIT Ps. 79:4, 2
Come, O Lord, and show us Thy face, Thou that sittest upon the Cherubim: and we shall be saved.
Ps. 79:2. Give ear, O Thou that rulest Israel: Thou that leadest Joseph like a sheep.
Glory be . . .

Let us pray.
Let us kneel.
Arise.

COLLECT
O God, who seest that we are afflicted because of our iniquity, mercifully grant that we may be comforted by Thy visitation: Who livest . . .

LESSON Isa. 19:20-22
In those days, they shall cry to the Lord because of the oppressor, and he shall send them a Saviour and a defender to deliver them. And the Lord shall be known by Egypt, and the Egyptians shall know the Lord in that day, and shall worship him with sacrifices and offerings: and they shall make vows to the Lord, and perform them. And the Lord shall strike Egypt with a scourge, and shall heal it, and they shall return to the Lord, and he shall be pacified towards them, and heal them.

GRADUAL Ps. 18:7, 2
His going out is from the end of heaven: and His circuit even to the end thereof. The heavens show forth the glory of God: and the firmament declareth the work of His hands.

COLLECT
O God, who didst deaden the flames of fire for the three children: mercifully grant that the flame of vice may not consume us Thy servants. Through our Lord . . .

EPISTLE 2 Thess. 2:1-8
Brethren, we beseech you, by the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and of our gathering together unto Him: That you be not easily moved from your sense nor be terrified, neither by spirit nor by word nor by epistle. as sent from us, as if the day of the Lord were at hand. Let no man deceive you by any means: for unless there come a revolt first, and the man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition Who opposeth and is lifted up above all that is called God or that is worshipped, so that he sitteth in the temple of God, shewing himself as if he were God. Remember you not that, when I was yet with you, I told you these things? And now you know what withholdeth, that he may be revealed in his time. For the mystery of iniquity already worketh: only that he who now holdeth do hold, until he be taken out of the way. And then that wicked one shall be revealed: whom the Lord Jesus shall kill with the spirit of His mouth and shall destroy with the brightness of His coming.

TRACT Ps. 79:2, 3
Give ear, O Thou that rulest Israel: Thou that leadest Joseph like a sheep. Thou that sittest upon the Cherubim, shine forth before Ephraim, Benjamin and Manasses. Stir up Thy might, O Lord, and come and save us.

GOSPEL St. Luke 3:1-6
Now in the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar, Pontius Pilate being governor of Judea, and Herod being tetrarch of Galilee, and Philip his brother tetrarch of Iturea and the country of Trachonitis, and Lysanias tetrarch of Abilina: Under the high priests Anna and Caiphas: the word of the Lord was made unto John, the son of Zachary, in the desert. And he came into all the country about the Jordan, preaching the baptism of penance for the remission of sins. As it was written in the book of the sayings of Isaias the prophet: A voice of one crying in the wilderness: Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make straight his paths. Every valley shall be filled and every mountain and hill shall be brought low: and the crooked shall be made straight, and the rough ways plain. And all flesh shall see the salvation of God.

OFFERTORY ANTIPHON Zac. 9:9
Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Sion, shout for joy, O daughter of Jerusalem: Behold thy King will come to thee, the Holy and Savior.

SECRET
O Lord, we beseech Thee, look down favorably upon these present Sacrifices: that they may profit us unto both devotion and salvation. Through our Lord . . .

COMMUNION ANTIPHON Ps. 18:6, 7
He hath rejoiced as a giant to run the way: His going out is from the end of heaven, and His circuit even to the end thereof.

POSTCOMMUNION
We beseech Thee, O Lord, our God, that the most holy Mysteries, which Thou hast given us for a safeguard of our renewal, may become our remedy both now and for time to come. Through our Lord . . .

THE HOURS OF OUR LADY #6

 

(The translation of the Psalms and the brief introductory comments on the Psalms of this Little Office of the Blessed Virgin are taken largly from: The Psalms and Canticles by George O'Neill, S.J. [Bruce Publishing Co. 1937.] The late Father O'Neill's work has long been out of print.)

Image by Getty Images via @daylife

INTRODUCTION 

[Continued]

Venerable Denis the Carthusian (d 1471) expresses the mind of medieval contemplatives:

"The Holy Spirit has poured into the Psalms words full of feeling, words suited to every description of mankind; now putting forward what belongs to the perfect and is to be sung with much fervor of spirit; now what concerns the imperfect and the penitent. He has hymns suited to every virtuous movement of the soul. Sometimes the words spoken in the person of Christ, sometimes in the person of the Church, sometimes in the person of a single sinner or penitent, sometimes in the person of one sharing the Divine zeal, sometimes in the language of thanksgiving." (O'Neill).

[To be continued] 

 

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