He descended into Hell ...

εὐαγγελίζω (euaggelizo)
“to announce the Good News of victory in battle”

“For Christ also suffered for sins once,

the righteous for the sake of the unrighteous,

that he might lead you to God.

Put to death in the flesh,

He was brought to life in the spirit.

In it He also went to preach to the spirits in prison,

who had once been disobedient while God patiently waited

in the days of Noah during the building of the ark,

in which a few persons, eight in all, were saved through water.”

(1 Peter 3:18-19.)

θεωρέω (theoreo)
(“to perceive, discover, ponder a deeper meaning”)

As an ancient homily powerfully states, “something strange is happening” today. There is no celebration of the Eucharist today, Holy Communion may only be given this day as Viaticum, and the Altar remains bare following the Celebration of the Passion of the Lord. In some parishes, the communal, prayerful celebration of the Liturgy of the Hours and the Preparation Rites for the Elect challenge all to keep this as a day of prayer and fasting. Such prayer and fasting directs us to continued meditation on Jesus’ Passion and Death as well as His descent into Hell.

While not found in the Nicene Creed, the earlier Symbol of Faith known as the Apostles’ Creed expresses an ancient Christian belief and practice that Holy Saturday (not to be confused in anyway with The Easter Vigil in the Holy Night despite how parishes present schedules) is the time of Jesus’ journey to the abode of the dead to bring all the holy women and men of antiquity with Him into the realm of Heavenly salvation. The Catechism of the Catholic Church notes that Jesus’ descent into Hell (Sheol or Hades) is the event of the life-saving Gospel proclamation to the saintly ones who died before the historical event of Jesus’ redemptive act of love on the Cross. In the silence and strangeness that is Holy Saturday, pondering the Church’s catechetical words in light of Sacred Scripture will prepare for the celebration of Jesus’ Resurrection in a unique way.

Consider also, these words from the Divine Liturgy of Saint Basil the Great for Holy Saturday in the Greek Orthodox tradition. During the Morning Liturgy, the following is chanted:

“For with the Lord there is mercy, and with Him is plenteous redemption; and He shall redeem Israel from all his iniquities.”

Today Hades cried out groaning: 

“Would that I had not received 

the One born of Mary; 

for He came upon me and loosed my power. 

He shattered the gates of brass; the souls, 

which I held captive of old as God He raised up. 

Glory O Lord to Your Cross and Your Resurrection.

“Praise the Lord, all you nations; raise him all you people.”

Today Hades cried out groaning: 

"My authority is dissolved; I received a mortal, 

as one of the mortals; but this One, 

I am powerless to contain; 

with Him I lose all those, over which, 

I had ruled. For ages I had held the Dead, 

but behold, He raises up all.” 

Glory O Lord, to Your Cross and Your Resurrection.

“For His mercy is ever more and more upon us: and the truth of the Lord endures forever.”

Today Hades cried out groaning: 

“My power has been trampled on; 

the Shepherd has been crucified, 

and Adam He raised up. 

I have been deprived of those, over whom I ruled; 

and all those, I had the power to swallow, 

I have disgorged. 

He, Who was crucified has cleared the tombs. 

The dominion of Death is no more.” 

Glory O Lord, to Your Cross and Your Resurrection.

 

THE SACRED PASCHAL TRIDUUMHoly Saturday

“He will revive us after two days; on the third day he will raise us up, to live in his presence.” (Hosea 6:2.)

Origen of Alexandria (part 2 of Pope Benedict’s reflections on Origen) comments on this verse from the Reading proclaimed at Morning Prayer as there is no Mass on Holy Saturday:

“Hear what the prophet says: “God will revive us after two days, and on the third day we shall arise and live in his sight.” The first day is the passion of the Savior for us. The second is the day on which he descended into hell. The third day is the day of resurrection. Therefore on the third day “God went before them, by day in a column of cloud, by night in a column of fire.” But if according to what we said above, the apostle teaches us rightly that the mysteries of baptism are contained in these words, it is necessary that “those who are baptized in Christ are baptized in his death and are buried with him.” [They must] also arise from the dead with him on the third day, according to what the apostle says, “He raised up together with him and at the same time made them sit in the heavenly places.” When, therefore, you shall have undertaken the mystery of the third day, God will begin to lead you and will himself show you the way of salvation.” (Homilies on Exodus, 5.)

Collect

All-powerful and ever-living God,
Your only Son went down among the dead
and rose again in glory.
In Your goodness
raise up Your faithful people,
buried with Him in baptism,
to be one with Him
in the everlasting life of heaven,
where He lives and reigns with You
and the Holy Spirit,
one God, for ever and ever.

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

Top

The Lord descends into hell

Ancient Christian Author

Anonymous

An excerpt from Homily on Holy Saturday

THE SACRED PASCHAL TRIDUUM: Holy Saturday

Something strange is happening — there is a great silence on earth today, a great silence and stillness. The whole earth keeps silence because the King is asleep. The earth trembled and is still because God has fallen asleep in the flesh and he has raised up all who have slept ever since the world began. God has died in the flesh and hell trembles with fear.

He has gone to search for our first parent, as for a lost sheep. Greatly desiring to visit those who live in darkness and in the shadow of death, he has gone to free from sorrow the captives Adam and Eve, he who is both God and the son of Eve. The Lord approached them bearing the cross, the weapon that had won him the victory. At the sight of him Adam, the first man he had created, struck his breast in terror and cried out to everyone: “My Lord be with you all.” Christ answered him: “And with your spirit.” He took him by the hand and raised him up, saying: “Awake, O sleeper, and rise from the dead, and Christ will give you light.”

I am your God, who for your sake have become your son. Out of love for you and for your descendants I now by my own authority command all who are held in bondage to come forth, all who are in darkness to be enlightened, all who are sleeping to arise. I order you, O sleeper, to awake. I did not create you to be held a prisoner in hell. Rise from the dead, for I am the life of the dead. Rise up, work of my hands, you who were created in my image. Rise, let us leave this place, for you are in me and I am in you; together we form only one person and we cannot be separated.

For your sake I, your God, became your son; I, the Lord, took the form of a slave; I, whose home is above the heavens, descended to the earth and beneath the earth. For your sake, for the sake of man, I became like a man without help, free among the dead. For the sake of you, who left a garden, I was betrayed to the Jews in a garden, and I was crucified in a garden.

See on my face the spittle I received in order to restore to you the life I once breathed into you. See there the marks of the blows I received in order to refashion your warped nature in my image. On my back see the marks of the scourging I endured to remove the burden of sin that weighs upon your back. See my hands, nailed firmly to a tree, for you who once wickedly stretched out your hand to a tree.

I slept on the cross and a sword pierced my side for you who slept in paradise and brought forth Eve from your side. My side has healed the pain in yours. My sleep will rouse you from your sleep in hell. The sword that pierced me has sheathed the sword that was turned against you.

Rise, let us leave this place. The enemy led you out of the earthly paradise. I will not restore you to that paradise, but I will enthrone you in heaven. I forbade you the tree that was only a symbol of life, but see, I who am life itself am now one with you. I appointed cherubim to guard you as slaves are guarded, but now I make them worship you as God. The throne formed by cherubim awaits you, its bearers swift and eager. The bridal chamber is adorned, the banquet is ready, the eternal dwelling places are prepared, the treasure houses of all good things lie open. The kingdom of heaven has been prepared for you from all eternity.

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

 

Top

 

THE SACRED PASCHAL TRIDUUMFriday of the Passion of the Lord[Good Friday]

“He grew up like a sapling before him, like a shoot from the parched earth; He had no majestic bearing to catch our eye, no beauty to draw us to him.” (Isaiah 53:2.)

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

“For he whom you now treat with contempt was once above you. He who is now man was once the uncompounded. What he was he continued to be; what he was not he took to himself. In the beginning he was uncaused; for what is the cause of God? But afterwards for a cause he was born. And that cause was that you might be saved, who insult him and despise his godhead, because of this, that he took on him your denser nature, having converse with flesh by means of mind. While his inferior nature, the humanity, became God, because it was united to God and became one person because the higher nature prevailed, [this happened] in order that I too might be made God so far as he is made man. He was born—but he had been begotten. He was born of a woman — but she was a virgin. The first is human, the second divine. In his human nature he had no father, but also in his divine nature [he had] no mother. Both these belong to godhead. He dwelled in the womb — but he was recognized by the prophet [John the Baptist], himself still in the womb, leaping before the Word, for whose sake he came into being. He was wrapped in swaddling clothes — but he took off the swathing bands of the grave by his rising again. He was laid in a manger — but he was glorified by angels, and proclaimed by a star and worshiped by the magi. Why are you offended by what is presented to your sight, because you will not look at what is presented to your mind? He was driven into exile into Egypt — but he drove away the Egyptian idols. He had no form or comeliness in the eyes of the Jews — but to David he is fairer than the children of humankind. And on the mountain he was bright as the lightning and became more luminous than the sun, initiating us into the mystery of the future.” (Theological Oration 3)

Collect

O God,
Who by the Passion of Christ Your Son, our Lord,
abolished the death inherited from ancient sin
by every succeeding generation,
grant that just as, being conformed to Him,
we have borne by the law of nature
the image of the man of earth,
so by the sanctification of grace
we may bear the image of the Man of heaven.
Through Christ our Lord.

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

The power of Christ’s blood

Saint John Chrysostom

Bishop and Great Eastern Father of the Church

An excerpt from his Catechesis 3

THE SACRED PASCHAL TRIDUUM
Friday of the Passion of the Lord
[Good Friday]

If we wish to understand the power of Christ’s blood, we should go back to the ancient account of its prefiguration in Egypt. Sacrifice a lamb without blemish, commanded Moses, and sprinkle its blood on your doors. If we were to ask him what he meant, and how the blood of an irrational beast could possibly save men endowed with reason, his answer would be that the saving power lies not in the blood itself, but in the fact that it is a sign of the Lord’s blood. In those days, when the destroying angel saw the blood on the doors he did not dare to enter, so how much less will the devil approach now when he sees, not that figurative blood on the doors, but the true blood on the lips of believers, the doors of the temple of Christ.

If you desire further proof of the power of this blood, remember where it came from, how it ran down from the cross, flowing from the Master’s side. The gospel records that when Christ was dead, but still hung on the cross, a soldier came and pierced his side with a lance and immediately there poured out water and blood. Now the water was a symbol of baptism and the blood, of the holy eucharist. The soldier pierced the Lord’s side, he breached the wall of the sacred temple, and I have found the treasure and made it my own. So also with the lamb: the Jews sacrificed the victim and I have been saved by it.

There flowed from his side water and blood. Beloved, do not pass over this mystery without thought; it has yet another hidden meaning, which I will explain to you. I said that water and blood symbolized baptism and the holy eucharist. From these two sacraments the Church is born: from baptism, the cleansing water that gives rebirth and renewal through the Holy Spirit, and from the holy eucharist. Since the symbols of baptism and the eucharist flowed from his side, it was from his side that Christ fashioned the Church, as he had fashioned Eve from the side of Adam. Moses gives a hint of this when he tells the story of the first man and makes him exclaim: Bone from my bones and flesh from my flesh! As God then took a rib from Adam’s side to fashion a woman, so Christ has given us blood and water from his side to fashion the Church. God took the rib when Adam was in a deep sleep, and in the same way Christ gave us the blood and the water after his own death.

Do you understand, then, how Christ has united his bride to himself and what food he gives us all to eat? By one and the same food we are both brought into being and nourished. As a woman nourishes her child with her own blood and milk, so does Christ unceasingly nourish with his own blood those to whom he himself has given life.

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

 

Top

 

THE SACRED PASCHAL TRIDUUMThursday of the Lord's SupperAt the Evening Mass

“They will consume its meat that same night, eating it roasted with unleavened bread and bitter herbs.” (Exodus 12:8.)

Origen of Alexandria (part 2 of Pope Benedict’s reflections on Origen) comments on this verse from the First Reading proclaimed at Mass this evening.:

“Then too the unleavened bread is commanded to be eaten with bitter herbs; nor is it possible to attain the promised land unless we pass through bitterness. For just as physicians put bitter substances in medicines with a view to the health and healing of the infirm, so also the Physician of our souls with a view to our salvation has wished us to suffer the bitterness of this life in various temptations. [He knows] that the end of this bitterness gains the sweetness of salvation for our soul, just as, on the contrary, the end of the sweetness found in corporeal pleasure, as the example of that rich man teaches, brings a bitter end: torments in hell.” (Homilies on Numbers, 27.)

Collect

O God,
Who have called us to participate
in this most sacred Supper,
in which Your Only Begotten Son,
when about to hand Himself over to death,
entrusted to the Church
a sacrifice new for all eternity,
the banquet of His love,
grant, we pray,
that we may draw from so great a mystery,
the fullness of charity and of life.
Through our Lord Jesus Christ, Your Son,
Who lives and reigns with You
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
God, for ever and ever.

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

Top

Thursday of Holy Week - The Chrism Mass

“The spirit of the Lord GOD is upon me, because the LORD has anointed me; He has sent me to bring good news to the afflicted, to bind up the brokenhearted, To proclaim liberty to the captives, release to the prisoners ...” (Isaiah 61:1.)

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

“The Spirit of the Lord God is on me, because the Lord has anointed me to bring good tidings to the afflicted,” that is, God anointed him with the Holy Spirit. Therefore, after being incarnated and clothed with a human body, as is said, he has received the Spirit and has been anointed with the Spirit, because he has received the Spirit for us and has anointed us with it.

“The Spirit of the Lord is on me.” That Spirit, which proceeds from the Father and is his essence, is in me, who am the Word and the Son of the Father, and through my incarnation I received the anointment of the economy of salvation.” (Commentary on Isaiah)

Collect

O God,
Who anointed Your Only Begotten Son
with the Holy Spirit
and made Him Christ and Lord,
graciously grant
that, being made sharers
in His consecration,
we may bear witness
to Your Redemption in the world.
Through our Lord Jesus Christ, Your Son,
Who lives and reigns with You
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
God, for ever and ever.

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

The lamb that was slain has delivered us from death and given us life

Saint Melito of Sardis

Apostolic Father of the Church, Bishop and Martyr

An excerpt from his Easter Homily

Thursday of Holy Week

There was much proclaimed by the prophets about the mystery of the Passover: that mystery is Christ, and to him be glory for ever and ever. Amen.

For the sake of suffering humanity he came down from heaven to earth, clothed himself in that humanity in the Virgin’s womb, and was born a man. Having then a body capable of suffering, he took the pain of fallen man upon himself; he triumphed over the diseases of soul and body that were its cause, and by his Spirit, which was incapable of dying, he dealt man’s destroyer, death, a fatal blow.

He was led forth like a lamb; he was slaughtered like a sheep. He ransomed us from our servitude to the world, as he had ransomed Israel from the land of Egypt; he freed us from our slavery to the devil, as he had freed Israel from the hand of Pharaoh. He sealed our souls with his own Spirit, and the members of our body with his own blood.

He is the One who covered death with shame and cast the devil into mourning, as Moses cast Pharaoh into mourning. He is the One who smote sin and robbed iniquity of offspring. He is the One who brought us out of slavery into freedom, out of darkness into light, out of death into life, out of tyranny into an eternal kingdom; who made us a new priesthood, a people chosen to be his own for ever. He is the Passover that is our salvation.

It is he who endured every kind of suffering in all those who foreshadowed him. In Abel he was slain, in Isaac bound, in Jacob exiled, in Joseph sold, in Moses exposed to die. He was sacrificed in the Passover lamb, persecuted in David, dishonored in the prophets.

It is he who was made man of the Virgin, he who was hung on the tree; it is he who was buried in the earth, raised from the dead, and taken up to the heights of heaven. He is the mute lamb, the slain lamb, the lamb born of Mary, the fair ewe. He was seized from the flock, dragged off to be slaughtered, sacrificed in the evening, and buried at night. On the tree no bone of his was broken; in the earth his body knew no decay. He is the One who rose from the dead, and who raised man from the depths of the tomb.

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

 

Top

Wednesday of Holy Week

“The Lord GOD has given me a well-trained tongue, that I might know how to answer the weary a word that will waken them. Morning after morning he wakens my ear to hear as disciples do.” (Isaiah 50:4.)

Saint Justin of Rome comments on this verse from the First Reading proclaimed at Mass today:

“The power of his mighty word with which he always refuted the Pharisees and scribes, and indeed all the teachers of your race who disputed with him, was stopped like a full and mighty fountain whose waters have been suddenly shut off when he remained silent and would no longer answer his accusers before Pilate, as was recorded in the writings of the apostles, in order that those words of Isaiah might bear fruit in action: “The Lord gives me a tongue, that I may know when I ought to speak.” And his words, “You are my God, depart not from me,” teach us to put all our trust in God, the Creator of all things, and to seek aid and salvation from him alone; and not to imagine, as other [people] do, that we can attain salvation by means of birth, or wealth, or power or wisdom..” (Dialogue with Trypho, 102)

Collect

O God,
Who willed Your Son
to submit for our sake
to the yoke of the Cross,
so that You might drive from us
the power of the enemy,
grant us, Your servants,
to attain the grace of the resurrection.
Through our Lord Jesus Christ, Your Son,
Who lives and reigns with You
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
God, for ever and ever.

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

Top

The perfection of love

Saint Augustine of Hippo

Bishop and Great Western Father of the Church

An excerpt from his Treatise 84

Wednesday of Holy Week

Dear brethren, the Lord has marked out for us the fullness of love that we ought to have for each other. He tells us: No one has greater love than the man who lays down his life for his friends. In these words, the Lord tells us what the perfect love we should have for one another involves. John, the evangelist who recorded them, draws the conclusion in one of his letters: As Christ laid down his life for us, so we too ought to lay down our lives for our brothers. We should indeed love one another as he loved us, he who laid down his life for us.

This is surely what we read in the Proverbs of Solomon: If you sit down to eat at the table of a ruler, observe carefully what is set before you; then stretch out your hand, knowing that you must provide the same kind of meal yourself. What is this ruler’s table if not the one at which we receive the body and blood of him who laid down his life for us? What does it mean to sit at this table if not to approach it with humility? What does it mean to observe carefully what is set before you if not to meditate devoutly on so great a gift? What does it mean to stretch out one’s hand, knowing that one must provide the same kind of meal oneself, if not what I have just said: as Christ laid down his life for us, so we in our turn ought to lay down our lives for our brothers? This is what the apostle Paul said: Christ suffered for us, leaving us an example, that we might follow in his footsteps.

This is what is meant by providing “the same kind of meal.” This is what the blessed martyrs did with such burning love. If we are to give true meaning to our celebration of their memorials, to our approaching the Lord’s table in the very banquet at which they were fed, we must, like them, provide “the same kind of meal.”

At this table of the Lord we do not commemorate the martyrs in the same way as we commemorate others who rest in peace. We do not pray for the martyrs as we pray for those others, rather, they pray for us, that we may follow in his footsteps. They practiced the perfect love of which the Lord said there could be none greater. They provided “the same kind of meal” as they had themselves received at the Lord’s table.

This must not be understood as saying that we can be the Lord’s equals by bearing witness to him to the extent of shedding our blood. He had the power of laying down his life; we by contrast cannot choose the length of our lives, and we die even if it is against our will. He, by dying, destroyed death in himself; we are freed from death only in his death. His body did not see corruption; our body will see corruption and only then be clothed through him in incorruption at the end of the world. He needed no help from us in saving us; without him we can do nothing. He gave himself to us as the vine to the branches; apart from him we cannot have life.

Finally, even if brothers die for brothers, yet no martyr by shedding his blood brings forgiveness for the sins of his brothers, as Christ brought forgiveness to us. In this he gave us, not an example to imitate but a reason for rejoicing. Inasmuch, then, as they shed their blood for their brothers, the martyrs provided “the same kind of meal” as they had received at the Lord’s table. Let us then love one another as Christ also loved us and gave himself up for us.

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

 

Top

Tuesday of Holy Week

“Hear me, coastlands, listen, distant peoples. Before birth the LORD called me, from my mother’s womb he gave me my name.” (Isaiah 49:1.)

Saint Cyril of Alexandria comments on this verse from the First Reading proclaimed at Mass today:

“He calls to “the islands,” which we take to be the churches of Christ, just as they are lying in the sea or the waves of this present existence and surrounded by the insulting attacks of “the waves,” or the persecutions and afflictions that the enemies of the truth inflict on the churches as they war against the divine call. Concerning these islands the divinely inspired Scripture often speaks. There the blessed David sang a psalm and said, “The Lord reigns, and let the earth be glad and many islands rejoice.” So when Christ taking all things in his hands reigned over it from heaven and ejected the demons’ tyranny, then did they rejoice, that is, the churches over all the earth were filled with happiness. [Isaiah] promised that our Savior Jesus Christ would be revealed to everyone and that God as the Word would come on the earth among them in a form “after our likeness.” That this is so, the person of the Savior himself attests, “Out of my mother’s womb he called my name.” Mixed into these words is a deep and great mystery that requires mystical understanding from above. For he was and is God the Word, equal and sharing the throne with God the Father, coexisting and coeternal.” (Commentary on Isaiah, 4.)

Collect

Almighty ever-living God,
grant us so to celebrate
the mysteries of the Lord’s Passion
that we may merit to receive Your pardon.
Through our Lord Jesus Christ, Your Son,
who lives and reigns with You
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
God, for ever and ever.

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

Top

By one death and resurrection the world was saved

Saint Basil the Great

Bishop and Great Eastern Father of the Church

An excerpt from his On the Holy Spirit

Tuesday of Holy Week

When mankind was estranged from him by disobedience, God our Savior made a plan for raising us from our fall and restoring us to friendship with himself. According to this plan Christ came in the flesh, he showed us the gospel way of life, he suffered, died on the cross, was buried and rose from the dead. He did this so that we could be saved by imitation of him, and recover our original status as sons of God by adoption.

To attain holiness, then, we must not only pattern our lives on Christ’s by being gentle, humble and patient, we must also imitate him in his death. Taking Christ for his model, Paul said that he wanted to become like him in his death in the hope that he too would be raised from death to life.

We imitate Christ’s death by being buried with him in baptism. If we ask what this kind of burial means and what benefit we may hope to derive from it, it means first of all making a complete break with our former way of life, and our Lord himself said that this cannot be done unless a man is born again. In other words, we have to begin a new life, and we cannot do so until our previous life has been brought to an end. When runners reach the turning point on a racecourse, they have to pause briefly before they can go back in the opposite direction. So also when we wish to reverse the direction of our lives there must be a pause, or a death, to mark the end of one life and the beginning of another.

Our descent into hell takes place when we imitate the burial of Christ by our baptism. The bodies of the baptized are in a sense buried in the water as a symbol of their renunciation of the sins of their unregenerate nature. As the Apostle says: The circumcision you have undergone is not an operation performed by human hands, but the complete stripping away of your unregenerate nature. This is the circumcision that Christ gave us, and it is accomplished by our burial with him in baptism. Baptism cleanses the soul from the pollution of worldly thoughts and inclinations: You will wash me, says the psalmist, and I shall be whiter than snow. We receive this saving baptism only once because there was only one death and one resurrection for the salvation of the world, and baptism is its symbol.

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

 

Top

Monday of Holy Week

“Here is my servant whom I uphold, my chosen one with whom I am pleased. Upon him I have put my spirit; he shall bring forth justice to the nations.” (Isaiah 42:1)

In commenting on these verses from today’s First Reading, Eusebius of Caesarea writes:

“Although this very great person is not the one who was in the mind of those hearing the prophecy the first time, he is not here called “Jacob” or “Israel” or “the seed of Abraham,” so clearly the Christ of God is meant here, just as the Evangelist paid witness: “I have set my Spirit on him, and he will execute judgment on the nations.” And after many things have taken place in the nations, which were not made fit to be counted in the apostolic chorus, the nations will hope in him. But in Isaiah’s prophecy the names of Jacob and Israel are missing. Who else could this be, the one called servant of God and his chosen one? Therefore it continues, “My soul delights in him.” For only he is the chosen one of God, and the socalled soul of God was delighting in him. In a manner similar to referring to the feet, hands, fingers and eyes of God, Scriptures make use of the term “soul” in relation to God. He is “chosen, ”not in the same way as the apostles, since it is to him alone that it is said, “whom my soul esteems,” but also “the Spirit of God was dwelling in him alone.” “For in him the fullness of the deity dwelled bodily.” For the Spirit is given to the one coming forth “from the root of Jesse,” the unique Word of God, whom the apostle revealed saying, “The Lord is the Spirit.” For he alone, pouring out the Spirit of inheritance, worked all things outwardly concerning the worldwide judgment on the nations, so that all would be prepared for the coming of God’s verdict.” (Commentary on Isaiah, 2)

Collect

Grant, we pray, almighty God,
that, though in our weakness we fail,
we may be revived through the Passion
of your Only Begotten Son.
Who lives and reigns with You
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
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

 

Top

Let us too glory in the cross of the Lord

Saint Augustine of Hippo

Bishop and Great Western Father of the Church

An excerpt from a Sermon

Monday of Holy Week

The passion of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ is the hope of glory and a lesson in patience.

What may not the hearts of believers promise themselves as the gift of God’s grace, when for their sake God’s only Son, co-eternal with the Father, was not content only to be born as man from human stock but even died at the hands of the men he had created?

It is a great thing that we are promised by the Lord, but far greater is what has already been done for us, and which we now commemorate. Where were the sinners, what were they, when Christ died for them? When Christ has already given us the gift of his death, who is to doubt that he will give the saints the gift of his own life? Why does our human frailty hesitate to believe that mankind will one day live with God?

Who is Christ if not the Word of God: in the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God? This Word of God was made flesh and dwelt among us. He had no power of himself to die for us: he had to take from us our mortal flesh. This was the way in which, though immortal, he was able to die; the way in which he chose to give life to mortal men: he would first share with us, and then enable us to share with him. Of ourselves we had no power to live, nor did he of himself have the power to die.

Accordingly, he effected a wonderful exchange with us, through mutual sharing: we gave him the power to die, he will give us the power to live.

The death of the Lord our God should not be a cause of shame for us; rather, it should be our greatest hope, our greatest glory. In taking upon himself the death that he found in us, he has most faithfully promised to give us life in him, such as we cannot have of ourselves. He loved us so much that, sinless himself, he suffered for us sinners the punishment we deserved for our sins. How then can he fail to give us the reward we deserve for our righteousness, for he is the source of righteousness? How can he, whose promises are true, fail to reward the saints when he bore the punishment of sinners, though without sin himself?

Brethren, let us then fearlessly acknowledge, and even openly proclaim, that Christ was crucified for us; let us confess it, not in fear but in joy, not in shame but in glory. The apostle Paul saw Christ, and extolled his claim to glory. He had many great and inspired things to say about Christ, but he did not say that he boasted in Christ’s wonderful works: in creating the world, since he was God with the Father, or in ruling the world, though he was also a man like us. Rather, he said: Let me not boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ.

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

Top

A timeless prayer: “Jesus, remember me when You come into Your Kingdom”

εὐαγγελίζω (euaggelizo)
“to announce the Good News of victory in battle”

“Now one of the criminals hanging there reviled Jesus, saying,
“Are you not the Christ?
Save (σῶσον, soson) Yourself and us.”
The other, however, rebuking him, said in reply,
“Have you no fear of God,
for you are subject to the same condemnation?
And indeed, we have been condemned justly,
for the sentence we received corresponds to our crimes,
but this Man has done nothing criminal.” Then he said,
“Jesus, remember (μνήσθητι, mnesthsti) me
when You come into your kingdom.”
He replied to him, “Amen, I say to you,
today you will be with me in Paradise.”

(Luke 23:39-43.)

θεωρέω (theoreo)
(“to perceive, discover, ponder a deeper meaning”)

As the term synoptic expresses, there certainly are notable similarities among Mark, Matthew and Luke. From the start of His Public Ministry through His Passion, Death and Resurrection Mark, Matthew and Luke present the deeds and words of Jesus through the lens of a single or ‘one eye.’ The ‘other eye’ sees differences among the 3 Evangelists that set each apart from one another and these differences can help offer a particular insight or two that draw each of us more deeply into the heart of the Paschal Mystery, more deeply into the very life of Jesus.

Saint Luke records the words and deeds of Jesus as a journey from Galilee to Jerusalem marked by moving moments of table fellowship, offering all who come to His table hospitality that nourishes and sustains body and soul while reconciling one to His Father and one another. When encountering Jesus at the table, “enemies speak to each other again, adversaries join hands and peoples seek to meet together.” In addition, at His table “hatred is overcome by love, revenge gives way to forgiveness and discord is changed to mutual respect (Eucharistic Prayer for Reconciliation II).” Even on the threshold of breathing His last breath, Jesus continuously offers His unique hospitality that reconciles each person with and to His Father as the ‘Good Thief’ marvelously discovered.

The irony of the episode is that the ‘other’ crucified man asks a question that gets to the heart of faith: “Are You not the Christ?” At face value the question is ambiguous, devoid of any attitude or disposition. It is the “rebuke” of the ‘Good Thief’ that colors the question and initiates a conversation that extends the promise of Paradise, THE ultimate act of hospitality. Saint Leo comments in Sermon 53: “Until now, one [thief] was the equal in all things of his companion. He was a robber on the roads and always a danger to the safety of people. Deserving the cross, he suddenly becomes a confessor of Christ…. “Remember me, Lord, when you enter into your kingdom.” … Then came the gift in which faith itself received a response. Jesus said to him, “Truly, I say to you, today you will be with me in paradise.” This promise surpasses the human condition, because it did not come so much from the wood of a cross as from a throne of power. From that height, he gives a reward to faith. There he abolishes the debt of human transgression, because the “form of God” did not separate itself from the “form of a servant.” Even in the middle of this punishment, both the inviolable divinity and the suffering human nature preserved its own character and its own oneness.”

“In the middle of this punishment,” the plea “remember me?” The direct word of the ‘other thief’ appears on target: “Save yourself and us!” His word to Jesus is an imperative: short, blunt and to the point. σώζω (sozo), the Greek verb that means “to save,” “to deliver from danger to safety” or “to protect,” is the basis for the biblical experience of “salvation.” Is not the request for “salvation” a proper one, especially on the lips of a sinner seeking reconciliation from Jesus? Absolutely. But it seems (and ‘seems’ is extremely important here because human language can never express a limit to the Father’s mercy) that the ‘other thief’ has missed the point. He literally wants to be delivered from danger: suffering and death that will come from crucifixion. The ‘Good Thief’ wants to be “remembered,” a request that may sound odd to the western ear.

Steeped within the rich experience of Israel’s covenant relationship with God, “remembering” is a crucial response to the Covenant. zakar (זָכַר) is the Hebrew verb translated into English as “to remember.” For the Israelites, the act of “remembering” was far more than a neurological event of recalling a fact. zakar expresses “remembering” in the sense of ‘re-connecting,’ ‘re-joining,’ re-establishing.’ More than mental activity, zakar involves the whole person – body and soul – being ‘re-membered’ to a body. In a rather graphic way, zakar is the re-attaching of limbs that have been severed from the body. Once attached, the limbs ‘come to life’ and serve the needs of the whole. The ‘Good Thief’ is making the proper request – ‘graft me onto You, Jesus Who are the Christ.’ Even more remarkable is the additional meaning conveyed by the Greek verb μιμνήσκω (mimnesko). Translated here as “remember,” the Greek verb μιμνήσκω (mimnesko) not only reflects the Old Testament sense of zakar, it is also related to another Greek verb, very important in Johannine theology: μένω (meno). μένω (meno), meaning “to remain,” and expressing ‘abiding presence.’ Such is the unmerited, undeserved Gift of Jesus to all Who seeks a humble response of gratitude from each.

Thus the Good Thief’s request is more than ‘spot-on,’ it expresses the very essence of Jesus’ ministry. His was and continues to be a work to ‘re-connect’ each of us with His Father in a way that the Divine Persons continuously abide within each person, animating and infusing each of us with such a life and love that our only way of living is gracious, charitable service to Our Lord and to one another. Eyes riveted on Jesus Christ crucified during this sacred time of Holy Week puts all of life in a proper perspective. With all that Jesus did for each one of us, how can I and we not sing and live, “Jesus – remember me when You come into Your Kingdom!”

Palm Sunday of the Passion of the Lord

“He replied to him, “Amen, I say to you, today you will be with me in Paradise.”” (Luke 23:43.)

Pope Saint Leo the Great offers the following insight on this verse from today’s First Reading:

“Until now, one [thief] was the equal in all things of his companion. He was a robber on the roads and always a danger to the safety of people. Deserving the cross, he suddenly becomes a confessor of Christ…. “Remember me, Lord, when you enter into your kingdom.”

Then came the gift in which faith itself received a response. Jesus said to him, “Truly, I say to you, today you will be with me in paradise.” This promise surpasses the human condition, because it did not come so much from the wood of a cross as from a throne of power. From that height, he gives a reward to faith. There he abolishes the debt of human transgression,46 because the “form of God” did not separate itself from the “form of a servant.”47 Even in the middle of this punishment, both the inviolable divinity and the suffering human nature preserved its own character and its own oneness.” (Sermon 53)

Collect

Almighty ever-living God,
Who as an example of humility
for the human race to follow
caused our Savior to take flesh and
submit to the Cross, graciously grant
that we may heed His lesson of
patient suffering and so
merit a share in His Resurrection.
Who lives and reigns with You
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
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

Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord. Blessed is the king of Israel

Saint Andrew of Crete

Bishop

An excerpt from his Oration 9: On the Palm Branches

Palm Sunday of the Lord’s Passion

Let us go together to meet Christ on the Mount of Olives. Today he returns from Bethany and proceeds of his own free will toward his holy and blessed passion, to consummate the mystery of our salvation. He who came down from heaven to raise us from the depths of sin, to raise us with himself, we are told in Scripture, above every sovereignty, authority, and power, and every other name that can be named, now comes of his own free will to make his journey to Jerusalem. He comes without pomp or ostentation. As the psalmist says: He will not dispute or raise his voice to make it heard in the streets. He will be meek and humble, and he will make his entry in simplicity.

Let us run to accompany him as he hastens toward Jerusalem, and imitate those who met him then, not by covering his path with garments, olive branches or palms, but by doing all we can to prostrate ourselves before him by being humble and by trying to live as he would wish. Then we shall be able to receive the Word at his coming, and God, whom no limits can contain, will be within us.

In his humility Christ entered the dark regions of our fallen world and he is glad that he became so humble for our sake, glad that he came and lived among us and shared in our nature in order to raise us up again to himself. And even though we are told that he has now ascended above the highest heavens—the proof, surely, of his power and godhead—his love for man will never rest until he has raised our earthbound nature from glory to glory, and made it one with his own in heaven.

So let us spread before his feet, not garments or soulless olive branches, which delight the eye for a few hours and then wither, but ourselves, clothed in his grace, or rather, clothed completely in him. We who have been baptized into Christ must ourselves be the garments that we spread before him. Now that the crimson stains of our sins have been washed away in the saving waters of baptism and we have become white as pure wool, let us present the conqueror of death, not with mere branches of palms but with the real rewards of his victory. Let our souls take the place of the welcoming branches as we join today in the children’s holy song: Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord. Blessed is the king of Israel.

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

 

Top

Saturday of the Fifth Week of Lent

“So the chief priests and the Pharisees convened the Sanhedrin and said, “What are we going to do? This man is performing many signs.” (John 11:47.)

Origen of Alexandria (part 2 of Pope Benedict’s reflections on Origen) comments on this verse from the Gospel proclaimed at Mass today:

“I think the phrase “this man” was used to diminish [Jesus’] glory because they did not believe what was said above about him being God. Notice both the audacity and the blindness of their evil. It was audacious because they had already witnessed the fact that he had performed many signs, and yet they thought they could plot against him — as if he could do nothing when they plotted against him. On the other hand, they were no less blind either because it makes more sense to be on the side of someone who performs such miracles than [to be a part of] the plot of those who do not want to allow him to live. Or perhaps they thought that he performed signs that were not the result of divine power and that this was why he could not do all things or deliver himself from their plot. They resolved, therefore, not to let him live, thinking that they would place an impediment in the way of those who believed in him and also prevent the Romans from taking away their place and nation.” (Commentary on the Gospel of John)

Collect

O God,
Who have made all those reborn in Christ
a chosen race and a royal priesthood,
grant us, we pray,
the grace to will and to do what You command,
that the people called to eternal life
may be one in the faith of their hearts
and the homage of their deeds.
Through our Lord Jesus Christ, Your Son
Who lives and reigns with You
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
God, for ever and ever.

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

Top

We are soon going to share in the Passover

Saint Gregory Nazianzen

Bishop and Great Eastern Father of the Church

An excerpt from his Oration 45

Saturday of the Fifth Week of Lent

We are soon going to share in the Passover, and although we still do so only in a symbolic way, the symbolism already has more clarity than it possessed in former times because, under the law, the Passover was, if I may dare to say so, only a symbol of a symbol. Before long, however, when the Word drinks the new wine with us in the kingdom of his Father, we shall be keeping the Passover in a yet more perfect way, and with deeper understanding. He will then reveal to us and make clear what he has so far only partially disclosed. For this wine, so familiar to us now, is eternally new.

It is for us to learn what this drinking is, and for him to teach us. He has to communicate this knowledge to his disciples, because teaching is food, even for the teacher.

So let us take our part in the Passover prescribed by the law, not in a literal way, but according to the teaching of the Gospel; not in an imperfect way, but perfectly; not only for a time, but eternally. Let us regard as our home the heavenly Jerusalem, not the earthly one; the city glorified by angels, not the one laid waste by armies. We are not required to sacrifice young bulls or rams, beasts with horns and hoofs that are more dead than alive and devoid of feeling; but instead, let us join the choirs of angels in offering God upon his heavenly altar a sacrifice of praise. We must now pass through the first veil and approach the second, turning our eyes toward the Holy of Holies. I will say more: we must sacrifice ourselves to God, each day and in everything we do, accepting all that happens to us for the sake of the Word, imitating his passion by our sufferings, and honoring his blood by shedding our own. We must be ready to be crucified.

If you are a Simon of Cyrene, take up your cross and follow Christ. If you are crucified beside him like one of the thieves, now, like the good thief, acknowledge your God. For your sake, and because of your sin, Christ himself was regarded as a sinner; for his sake, therefore, you must cease to sin. Worship him who was hung on the cross because of you, even if you are hanging there yourself. Derive some benefit from the very shame; purchase salvation with your death. Enter paradise with Jesus, and discover how far you have fallen. Contemplate the glories there, and leave the other scoffing thief to die outside in his blasphemy.

If you are a Joseph of Arimathea, go to the one who ordered his crucifixion, and ask for Christ’s body. Make your own the expiation for the sins of the whole world. If you are a Nicodemus, like the man who worshiped God by night, bring spices and prepare Christ’s body for burial. If you are one of the Marys, or Salome, or Joanna, weep in the early morning. Be the first to see the stone rolled back, and even the angels perhaps, and Jesus himself.

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

 

Top

Friday of the Fifth Week of Lent

“LORD of hosts, you test the just, you see mind and heart, Let me see the vengeance you take on them, for to you I have entrusted my cause.” (Jeremiah 20:12.)

Saint Jerome offers the following insight on this verses from today’s First Reading:

“The Lord alone is able to certify justice, in the same way that he alone sees the interior of a person’s heart. Hence, Jesus knows the thoughts of people not as an acquired skill, as some allege, but because he is God by nature. Such is what the psalmist sings: “No living creature will be justified in your presence.” If none of those living in virtue are justified, how much more true will this be of those who are dead from sin! Even though the just person knows himself to have God as a defender, the impatience of human fragility desires to see right now what it knows to be coming. Jeremiah also entrusted his cause to God, to the one who said elsewhere, “Vengeance is mine. I will repay, says the Lord.” But the conscience is happy whose cause is entrusted to the Lord, as the apostle said: “Anything that is visible is light.”” (Six Books on Jeremiah, 4.)

Collect

Pardon the offenses of Your peoples,
we pray, O Lord,
and in your goodness set us free
from the bonds of the sins
we have committed in our weakness.
Through our Lord Jesus Christ, Your Son
Who lives and reigns with You
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
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

Top

Christ offered himself for us

Saint Fulgentius of Ruspe

Bishop

An excerpt from his Treatise on Faith addressed to Peter

Friday of the Fifth Week of Lent

The sacrifices of animal victims which our forefathers were commanded to offer to God by the holy Trinity itself, the one God of the old and the new testaments, foreshadowed the most acceptable gift of all. This was the offering which in his compassion the only Son of God would make of himself in his human nature for our sake.

The Apostle teaches that Christ offered himself for us to God as a fragrant offering and sacrifice. He is the true God and the true high priest who for our sake entered once for all into the holy of holies, taking with him not the blood of bulls and goats but his own blood. This was foreshadowed by the high priest of old when each year he took blood and entered the holy of holies.

Christ is therefore the one who in himself alone embodied all that he knew to be necessary to achieve our redemption. He is at once priest and sacrifice, God and temple. He is the priest through whom we have been reconciled, the sacrifice by which we have been reconciled, the temple in which we have been reconciled, the God with whom we have been reconciled. He alone is priest, sacrifice and temple because he is all these things as God in the form of a servant; but he is not alone as God, for he is this with the Father and the Holy Spirit in the form of God.

Hold fast to this and never doubt it: the only-begotten Son, God the Word, becoming man offered himself for us to God as a fragrant offering and sacrifice. In the time of the old testament, patriarchs, prophets and priests sacrificed animals in his honor, and in honor of the Father and the Holy Spirit as well. Now in the time of the new testament the holy catholic Church throughout the world never ceases to offer the sacrifice of bread and wine, in faith and love, to him and to the Father and the Holy Spirit, with whom he shares one godhead.

Those animal sacrifices foreshadowed the flesh of Christ which he would offer for our sins, though himself without sin, and the blood which he would pour out for the forgiveness of our sins. In this sacrifice there is thanksgiving for, and commemoration of, the flesh of Christ that he offered for us, and the blood that the same God poured out for us. On this Saint Paul says in the Acts of the Apostles: Keep watch over yourselves and over the whole flock, in which the Holy Spirit has appointed you as bishops to rule the Church of God, which he won for himself by his blood.

Those sacrifices of old pointed in sign to what was to be given to us. In this sacrifice we see plainly what has already been given to us. Those sacrifices foretold the death of the Son of God for sinners. In this sacrifice he is proclaimed as already slain for sinners, as the Apostle testifies: Christ died for the wicked at a time when we were still powerless, and when we were enemies we were reconciled with God through the death of his Son.

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

 

Top

Thursday of the Fifth Week of Lent

“No longer will you be called Abram; your name will be Abraham, for I am making you the father of a multitude of nations.” (Genesis 17:5.)

Origen of Alexandria (part 2 of Pope Benedict’s reflections on Origen) comments on this verse from the Second Reading proclaimed at Mass today:

“Many responses are given to Abraham by God, but they are not all delivered to one and the same man. For some are to Abram and some to Abraham; that is, some are expressed after the change of name and others while he was still known by his name given at birth. And first indeed, before the change of name, God delivered to Abraham the oracle that says, “Go out from your country and from your kindred and from your father’s house,” and the rest. But no order is given in this about the covenant of God, no order about circumcision. For it was not possible while he was still Abram and was bearing the name of his physical birth to receive the covenant of God and the mark of circumcision. But when “he went out from his country and his kindred,” then responses of a more sacred kind are delivered to him at this time. First God says to him, “You shall no longer be called Abram, but Abraham shall be your name.” Then at once he received the covenant of God and accepted circumcision as a sign of faith that he could not accept while he was still in his father’s house and in the relationship of flesh and while he was still called Abram.” (Homilies on Genesis, 3.)

Collect

Be near, O Lord, to those who plead before You,
and look kindly on those
who place their hope in Your mercy,
that, cleansed from the stain of their sins,
they may persevere in holy living
and be made full heirs of Your promise.
Through our Lord Jesus Christ, Your Son,
Who lives and reigns with You
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
God, for ever and ever.

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

Top