“Nicodemus said to him, “How can a person once grown old be born again? Surely he cannot reenter his mother’s womb and be born again, can he?” (John 3:4.)
Saint Gregory of Nazianzus reflects on this verse from today’s Gospel:
“We are a compound of both body and soul. The one part is visible, the other invisible. In the same way, our cleansing also is twofold, that is, by water and the Spirit. The one is received visibly in the body, the other concurs with it invisibly and apart from the body. The one that comes to the aid of our first birth makes us new instead of old and like God instead of what we now are. It recasts us without fire and creates us anew without breaking us up. For the virtue of baptism is to be understood as a covenant with God for a second life and a purer conversation.” (On Holy Baptism [Theological Oration 40])
Collect
O God,
Who set Saint Catherine of Siena
on fire with divine love
in her contemplation of the Lord’s Passion
and her service of Your Church,
grant, through her intercession,
that Your people,
participating in the mystery of Christ,
may ever exult in the revelation of His glory.
Who lives and reigns with You
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, for ever and ever. Amen.
Grant, we pray, almighty God,
that we, who have been renewed by paschal remedies,
transcending the likeness of our earthly parentage,
may be transformed in the image of our heavenly maker.
Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son,
Who lives and reigns with You
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, for ever and ever. Amen.
Who set Saint Catherine of Siena
on fire with divine love
in her contemplation of the Lord’s Passion
and her service of Your Church,
grant, through her intercession,
that Your people,
participating in the mystery of Christ,
may ever exult in the revelation of His glory.
Who lives and reigns with You
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, for ever and ever. Amen.
Grant, we pray, almighty God,
that we, who have been renewed by paschal remedies,
transcending the likeness of our earthly parentage,
may be transformed in the image of our heavenly maker.
Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son,
Who lives and reigns with You
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, for ever and ever. Amen.
Glory to the Father
and to the Son
and to the Holy Spirit:
as it was in the beginning,
is now, and will be forever. Amen
and to the Son
and to the Holy Spirit:
as it was in the beginning,
is now, and will be forever. Amen
