Words of the Word

Easter, Week 4: Tuesday

“I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish. No one can take them out of my hand.” (John 10:28)

Origen of Alexandria comments on this verse from the Gospel proclaimed at Mass today:

”For “no one snatches us away from his hands,” according to what was said in the Gospel according to John. Yet it is not written that just as no one snatches us away, no one also falls from his hands. For one who is self-determined is free. And, I say, no one will snatch us away from the hand of God, no one can take us. But we are able to fall from his hands if we are negligent.” (Homilies on Jeremiah, 18)

Grant, we pray, almighty God,
that, celebrating the mysteries of the Lord’s Resurrection,
we may merit to receive the joy of our redemption.
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.

The Lord is risen! Alleluia!
He is risen, indeed! Alleluia!

Voices ever ancient, ever new. Easter, Week 4: Monday

“A hired man, who is not a shepherd and whose sheep are not his own, sees a wolf coming and leaves the sheep and runs away, and the wolf catches and scatters them.” (John 10:12)

Saint Augustine of Hippo offers the following insight on these verses from today’s Gospel:

“Who then is the hireling? There are some in office in the church, of whom the apostle Paul says, “Who seek their own, not the things that are Jesus Christ’s.” What does that mean, “who seek their own”? It means those who do not love Christ freely, who do not seek after God for his own sake. It means those who are pursuing temporal advantages, gaping for gain, coveting honors from people. When such things are loved by an overseer, and this is why they serve God, whoever does this is a hireling who cannot count himself among the children. For of such also the Lord says, “Truly, I say to you, they have their reward.” Listen to what the apostle Paul says of Timothy: “But I trust in the Lord Jesus to send Timothy shortly to you, that I also may be of good comfort, when I know your circumstances; for I have no man like-minded, who will naturally care for you. For all seek their own, not the things that are Jesus Christ’s.” (Tractates on the Gospel of John, 46)

O God, perfect light of the blessed,
by whose gift we celebrate the paschal mysteries on earth,
bring us, we pray,
to rejoice in the full measure of your grace
for ages unending.
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.

The Lord is risen! Alleluia!
He is risen, indeed! Alleluia!

Voices ever ancient, ever new. Easter, Week 4: Sunday

“But they will not follow a stranger; they will run away from him, because they do not recognize the voice of strangers.” (John 10:5)

Saint Gregory of Nazianzus reflects on this verse from today’s Gospel:

“He offers you a shepherd. For this is what your good Shepherd who lays down his life for his sheep is hoping and praying for. Do you on your side offer to God and to us obedience to your pastors? Will you dwell in a place of pasture and be fed by refreshing waters, knowing your Shepherd well and being known by him? Will you follow when he earnestly calls you as a Shepherd through the door? Or will you follow a stranger climbing up into the fold like a robber and a traitor? Will you listen to a strange voice when that voice would take you away by stealth and scatter you from the truth on mountains, and in deserts, and pitfalls, and places that the Lord does not visit? And would you be led away from the sound faith in the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, the one power and Godhead whose voice my sheep always heard — and may they always hear it — to follow deceitful and corrupt words that would tear them from their true Shepherd? May we all be kept from this, both shepherd and flock. May we guide and be guided away from such a poisoned and deadly pasture so that we may all be one in Christ Jesus our Lord, now and unto our heavenly rest.” (On Easter and His Reluctance, Oration 1)

Almighty ever-living God,
lead us to a share in the joys of heaven,
so that the humble flock may reach
where the brave Shepherd has gone before.
Who lives and reigns with You
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

Mothers’ Day Blessing Prayer

Loving God, as a mother gives life
and nourishment to her children,
so you watch over your Church.
Bless these women, that they may be
strengthened as Christian mothers.
Let the example of their faith
and love shine forth.
Grant that we, their sons and daughters,
may honor them always
with a spirit of profound respect.
Grant this through Christ our Lord.

The Lord is risen! Alleluia!
He is risen, indeed! Alleluia!

Voices ever ancient, ever new. Easter, Week 3: Saturday

“As a result of this, many [of] his disciples returned to their former way of life and no longer accompanied him. " (John 6:66)

Saint Jerome offers the following insight on this verse from today’s Gospel:

“The medical men called surgeons pass for being cruel but really deserve pity. For is it not pitiful to cut away the dead flesh of another person with merciless knives without being moved by his pain? Is it not pitiful that the one who is curing the patient is callous to his sufferings and has to appear as his enemy? Yet this is the order of nature. While truth is always bitter, a pleasant disposition waits upon evildoing. Isaiah goes naked without blushing as a type of the captivity to come. Jeremiah is sent from Jerusalem to the Euphrates (a river in Mesopotamia) and leaves his girdle to be marred in the Chaldean camp among the Assyrians hostile to his people. Ezekiel is told to eat bread made of mingled seeds and sprinkled with the dung of people and cattle. He has to see his wife die without shedding a tear. Amos is driven from Samaria. Why is he driven from it? Surely in this case, as in the others, because he was a spiritual surgeon who cut away the parts diseased by sin and urged people to repentance. The apostle Paul says, “Have I therefore become your enemy because I tell you the truth?” The Savior himself found it no different. Many of the disciples left him because his sayings seemed hard.” (Letter 40)

O God,
Who in the font of Baptism
have made new those who believe in You,
keep safe those reborn in Christ,
that, defeating every onslaught of error,
they may faithfully preserve the grace of Your blessing.
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.

The Lord is risen! Alleluia!
He is risen, indeed! Alleluia!

Voices ever ancient, ever new. Easter, Week 3: Friday

“For my flesh is true food, and my blood is true drink.” (John 6:55)

Saint Augustine of Hippo offers the following insight on these verses from today’s Gospel:

“Or think of it this way: Whereas people desire meat and drink to satisfy hunger and thirst, real satisfaction is produced only by that meat and drink that make the receivers of it immortal and incorruptible. He’s talking here about the fellowship of the saints where there is peace and unity, full and perfect. Therefore our Lord has chosen for the types of his body and blood things that become one out of many. Bread is a quantity of grains united into one mass, wine a quantity of grapes squeezed together. Then he explains what it is to eat his body and drink his blood: “He that eats my flesh and drinks my blood dwells in me and I in him.” So then to partake of that meat and that drink is to dwell in Christ and Christ in you. Whoever does not dwell in Christ, and in whom Christ does not dwell, neither eats his flesh nor drinks his blood; rather, he eats and drinks the sacrament of it to his own damnation.” (Tractates on the Gospel of John, 26)

Grant, we pray, almighty God,
that we, who have come to know
the grace of the Lord’s Resurrection,
may, through the love of the Spirit,
ourselves rise to newness of life.
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.

The Lord is risen! Alleluia!
He is risen, indeed! Alleluia!

Voices ever ancient, ever new. Easter, Week 3: Thursday

“No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draw him, and I will raise him on the last day.” (John 6:44)

Saint Augustine of Hippo offers the following insight on these verses from today’s Gospel:

“Do not think that you are drawn against your will. The soul is drawn also by love. And in case someone says to us, “How can I believe with the will if I am drawn?” I say that it is not enough to be drawn by the will; you are drawn even by delight. What is it to be drawn by delight? “Delight yourself in the Lord, and he shall give you the desires of your heart.” There is a certain craving of the heart to which that bread of heaven is sweet. If the poet could say, “Every person is drawn by his own pleasure” — not necessity but pleasure; not obligation but delight — how much more boldly ought we to say that a person is drawn to Christ when he delights in the truth, when he delights in blessedness, delights in righteousness, delights in everlasting life? Do not the bodily senses have their pleasures, and the soul its? Give me one who loves, who longs, who burns, who sighs for the source of his being and his eternal home, and he will know what I mean.

But why did he say, “Except my Father draw him?” If we are to be drawn, let us be drawn by him to whom his love said, “We will run after the fragrance of your ointment.” But let us see what is meant by this. The Father draws to the Son those who believe on the Son because they consider that God is his Father. For the Father begat the Son equal to himself. And those who think and believe truly and seriously that he on whom they believe is equal to the Father, these are the ones the Father draws to the Son. Arius believed the Son to be a creature; the Father did not draw [Arius]. One whom the Father has drawn said, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.” And so was said, “Blessed are you, Simon Bar-Jona, for flesh and blood has not revealed it to you, but my Father which is in heaven.” This revelation is itself the drawing. For if earthly objects, when put before us, draw us how much more shall Christ, when revealed by the Father? For what does the soul long for more than truth? Here, we can more easily be hungered than satisfied, especially if we have good hope. There, we shall be filled. This is why he adds, “And I will raise him up at the last day,” as if he said, he shall be filled with that for which he now thirsts at the resurrection of the dead, for I will raise him up.” (Tractates on the Gospel of John, 26)

Almighty ever-living God,
let us feel Your compassion more readily
during these days when, by Your gift,
we have known it more fully,
so that those You have freed from the darkness of error
may cling more firmly to the teachings of Your truth.
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.

The Lord is risen! Alleluia!
He is risen, indeed! Alleluia!

Voices ever ancient, ever new. Easter, Week 3: Wednesday

“Everything that the Father gives me will come to me, and I will not reject anyone who comes to me...” (John 6:37)

Saint Augustine of Hippo offers the following insight on these verses from today’s Gospel:

“This is the reason why he does not cast out those who come to him. “For I came down from heaven not to do my own will but the will of him that sent me.” The soul departed from God because it was proud. Pride casts us out, humility restores us. When a physician in the treatment of a disease cures certain outward symptoms but not the cause that produces them, his cure is only temporary. So long as the cause remains, the disease may return. That the cause then of all diseases, that is, pride, might be eradicated, the Son of God humbled himself. Why are you proud, O man? The Son of God humbled himself for you. It might shame you, perhaps, to imitate a humble man; but imitate at least a humble God. And this is the proof of his humility: “I came not to do my own will but the will of him that sent me.” Pride does its own will; humility does the will of God. For this very reason, therefore, I will not cast out the one who comes to me, because I came not to do my own will, but the will of him who sent me. I came to teach humility by being humble myself. Whoever comes to me is made a member of me. Such a person is necessarily humble, because he will not do his own will but the will of God; and therefore [this person] is not cast out. He was cast out, as proud. But he will not cast us out because we are members of the one who desired to be our head by teaching us humility.” (Tractates on the Gospel of John, 25)

Be present to your family, O Lord, we pray,
and graciously ensure
those You have endowed with the grace of faith
an eternal share in the Resurrection of Your Only Begotten Son.
Who lives and reigns with You
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

The Lord is risen! Alleluia!
He is risen, indeed! Alleluia!

Voice ever ancient, ever new. Easter, Week 3: Tuesday

“Our ancestors ate manna in the desert, as it is written: ‘He gave them bread from heaven to eat.’” So Jesus said to them, “Amen, amen, I say to you, it was not Moses who gave the bread from heaven; my Father gives you the true bread from heaven.” (John 6:31-32)

Saint Ephrem the Syrian offers the following insight on these verses from today’s Gospel:

“From a little bread, our Lord made an abundance of bread in the midst of the desert, and in Cana he turned water into wine. At first he set out to give instruction to their mouths about his bread and wine, until the time came for him to give them his blood and his body also. He gave them the taste of a superabundance of transitory bread and wine in order to give them an eager desire for the superabundance of his living body and blood. He gave them these lesser things without price, so that they might know that this gift of his, of highest value, was free. He gave to them freely those things that they were able to purchase from him at a price. He therefore did not sell to them anything that they were able to buy, so that they might know that there was no fee he required from them for that which they did not have; for they were able to pay the price of his bread and wine, but they could not pay the price of his body and blood. It was in this way that he not only gave to us freely, but he was even enticing us as well; for he gave these lesser things freely to captivate us to come and receive this of highest value, which is without price. These lesser things that he gave of bread and wine delighted the mouth; that [highest gift] of body and blood brings aid to the mind. He captivated us with these things, which bring pleasure to the palate, in order to draw us to that which brings life to [our] souls. For this reason, he hid the sweetness in the wine he made, so that they might know what treasure is hidden in his life-giving blood.” (Commentary on Tatian’s Diatessaron, 12)

O God,
Who open wide the gates of the heavenly Kingdom
to those reborn of water and the Holy Spirit,
pour out on your servants
an increase of the grace you have bestowed,
that, having been purged of all sins,
they may lack nothing
that in your kindness you have promised.
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.

The Lord is risen! Alleluia!
He is risen, indeed! Alleluia!

Voices ever ancient, ever new. Easter, Week 3: Monday

“Jesus answered and said to them, “This is the work of God, that you believe in the one he sent.” (John 6:29)

Saint Augustine of Hippo offers the following insight on these verses from today’s Gospel:

“Why do you make ready your teeth and stomach? Believe, and you have eaten. Faith is, indeed, distinguished from works, as the apostle says, “that a person is justified by faith without works.” And there are works that seem to be good because they are not referred to that end from which they are good. “For the end of the law is Christ, unto justice to everyone who believes.” Therefore, he did not wish to separate faith from work, but he said that faith itself is a work. For this is the faith that works by love. He did not say, “This is your work” but “This is the work of God, that you believe in him whom he has sent,” so that he who takes glory may take glory in the Lord.” (Tractates on the Gospel of John, 25)

Grant, we pray, almighty God,
that, putting off our old self with all its ways,
we may live as Christ did,
for through the healing paschal remedies
you have conformed us to his nature.
Who lives and reigns with You
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

The Lord is risen! Alleluia!
He is risen, indeed! Alleluia!

Voices ever ancient, ever new. Easter, Week 3: Sunday

“And it happened that while they were conversing and debating, Jesus himself drew near and walked with them,but their eyes were prevented from recognizing him.” (Luke 24:15-16)

Saint Augustine of Hippo offers the following insight on these verses from today’s Gospel:

““We,” they said, “had hoped that he was the one to redeem Israel.” O my dear disciples, you had hoped! So now you no longer hope? Look, Christ is alive! Is hope dead in you? Certainly, certainly, Christ is alive! Christ, being alive, found the hearts of his disciples dead, as he appeared and did not appear to their eyes. He was at one and the same time seen and concealed. I mean, if he wasn’t seen, how could they have heard him questioning them and answered his questions? He was walking with them along the road like a companion and was himself the leader. Of course he was seen, but he wasn’t recognized. For their eyes were restrained, as we heard, so that they wouldn’t recognize him. They weren’t restrained so that they wouldn’t see him, but they were held so that they wouldn’t recognize him.

Ah yes, brothers and sisters, but where did the Lord wish to be recognized? In the breaking of bread. We’re all right, nothing to worry about — we break bread, and we recognize the Lord. It was for our sake that he didn’t want to be recognized anywhere but there, because we weren’t going to see him in the flesh, and yet we were going to eat his flesh. So if you’re a believer, any of you, if you’re not called a Christian for nothing, if you don’t come to church pointlessly, if you listen to the Word of God in fear and hope, you may take comfort in the breaking of bread. The Lord’s absence is not an absence. Have faith, and the one you cannot see is with you. Those two, even when the Lord was talking to them, did not have faith, because they didn’t believe he had risen. Nor did they have any hope that he could rise again. They had lost faith, lost hope. They were walking along, dead, with Christ alive. They were walking along, dead, with life itself. Life was walking along with them, but in their hearts life had not yet been restored.” (Sermon 235)

May your people exult for ever, O God,
in renewed youthfulness of spirit,
so that, rejoicing now in the restored glory of our adoption,
we may look forward in confident hope
to the rejoicing of the day of resurrection.
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.

The Lord is risen! Alleluia!
He is risen, indeed! Alleluia!