Presentation of the Blessed Virgin Mary. Paul VI, « Gaudete in Domino »

Thursday, 21 November 2013. Thirty-third week in Ordinary Time

Feast of the Church : Presentation of the Blessed Virgin Mary

Commentary of the day : 

Paul VI, Pope from 1963-1978 

Apostolic Exhortation on Christian joy « Gaudete in Domino » (trans. Libreria Vaticana editrice) 

"Now it is hidden from your eyes"

No holy city here below constitutes this goal. This goal is hidden beyond this world, in the heart of God's mystery which is still invisible to us. For it is in faith that we journey, not in clear vision, and what we shall be has not yet been manifested. The New Jerusalem of which we are already citizens and sons and daughters, comes down from above, from God. Of this only lasting city we have not yet contemplated the splendour, except as in a mirror and in a confused way, by holding fast to the prophetic word. But already we are its citizens, or we are invited to become so; every spiritual pilgrimage receives its interior meaning from this ultimate destination. 

And so it was with the Jerusalem praised by the psalmists. Jesus Himself and Mary His Mother sang on earth as they went up to Jerusalem the canticles of Zion: "perfection of beauty," "joy to the whole world."(72) But henceforth it is from Christ that the Jerusalem above receives its attraction, and it is towards Him that we are making our inner journey. 

(Biblical references : 1Jn 3,2; Ga 4,26; Rv 21,2; 1Co 13,12; Ps 49[48],2; Ps 47[46],3)

 

Danielou, "the very name of the Lord bespeaks jealous love". Night Office Readings

+ Jean Danielou, The Lord of History, 316-318

A WORD IN SEASOM,Readings for the Liturgy of the Hours. Augustine Press 1995

33^rd Week Ord Time WEDNESDAY

First Reading

EzekieI20:27-44

Responsory          Ex 20:1-3; Is 42:8

I am the Lord your God who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery. + You shall have no other gods but me.

V. I am the Lord; the Lord is my name. I will not yield my glory to another, nor my honor to idols. + You shall have ...

Second Reading      From The Lord of History by Jean Danielou

If you would only bear with my vanity for a little! Pray be patient with me; after all, my jealousy on your behalf is the jealousy of God himself; I have betrothed you to Christ, so that no other but he should claim you, his bride without spot. Saint Paul is thinking of the churches he has won for Christ betrothed to the Lord. His affection for them is anxious, exacting. He cannot bear any suspicion of infidelity in the engagement; the very thought of them falling short of their promises to Christ is intolerable to him. As he says, he is "jealous" of them; but this quality of mind requires some further elucidation, for the idea of "jealousy" has unpleasant associations. Elsewhere in the New Testament, jealousy sometimes stands for the feeling of resentment against any perfection in others that we ourselves lack; this is certainly one of the vilest deformities of which human nature is patient. Yet the scriptures also use the word in quite another meaning, to denote something of great religious worth, belonging in particular and primarily to God himself.

It is actually stated in the Bible that the very name of the Lord bespeaks jealous love. This terminology is somewhat disconcerting; but it is simply the vivid presentation of one attribute of the living God, namely his absolute refusal to tolerate any rival in human affections. It is important to be accurate here: it is only the worship due to God alone that he will in no case consent to share; there is no question of forbidding the indulgence of ordinary human affections in their proper place. But nothing and no one may trespass upon the exclusive right of God, his primacy, his unique claim of worship. No creature may ever be treated as God.

This scriptural use of language derives, of course, from customary usage in respect of something that is lawful and valuable in human life, and is seen at its best in the jealous regard that husbands and wives have for each other, inasmuch as they will have no intrusion of third parties, or reconcile themselves to any idea that love once given can ever be withdrawn or transferred. Essentially, that is a noble attitude of mind, and simply gives expression to the quality of singleness in human love. Scripture transposes the same attitude of mind into the context of divine love, because the whole Bible is there to show that the bond between the Lord and the Israelites, and between Christ and the soul, is also a single, exclusive and irrevocable union.

Responsory   Jer 3:11.20

Come back, faithless Israel. + No longer will I frown on you, for my love is unfailing.

V. As a faithless wife leaves her husband, so have you, Israel, been faithless to me, says the Lord. + No longer ...

33rd Wed 'One Talent in Bank' Lk. 19:23

papa-francesco

Intro: Fr. Nivard

Magnificat adapted

33 Wed 19 Nov 13 Lk 17_26-37

 Why did you not put my money in the bank?  

The mother of the Maccabees said to her sons. “The creator of the world will give you back both breath and life.”

To everyone who has will be given more. The act of spending ourselves for Jesus Christ creates a space in us that Jesus will fill with himself.

   We obey the command of the one who places gold coins in our hands with the words, “Do business.” 

   That “business” is what it means to live by faith.

Father, we beg you to sanctify our daily life of prayer, praise and work by purity of heart, through Christ Jesus our Lord.

                          * * * * * * * *

Not Our Talents

Let us ever bear in mind ... that we in this place are only then really strong when we are more than we seem to be. It is not our attainments or our talents, it is not philosophy or science, letters or arts which will make us dear to God. It is not secular favour, or civil position, which can make us worthy of the attention and the interest of the true Christian. A great university is a great power, and can do great things; but, unless it be something more than human, it is but foolishness and vanity in the sight and in comparison of the little ones of Christ. It is really dead, though it seems to live, unless it be grafted upon the True Vine, and is partaker of the secret supernatural life which circulates through the undecaying branches. "Unless the Lord build the house, they labour in vain that build it." Idle is our labour, worthless is our toil, ashes is our fruit, corruption is our reward, unless we begin the foundation of this great undertaking in faith and prayer, and sanctify it by purity of life.

BLESSED JOHN HENRY NEWMAN († 1890) established the English Oratory in Birmingham, and was a preacher of great eloquence.

Pope Francis 
General Audience of 05/06/2013 (trans. © copyright Libreria Editrice Vaticana) 

"'Engage in trade with these"

St. Mechtilde (MATILDA VON HACKEBORN-WIPPRA).

SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 17, 2012

“What do you fear? This child most certainly will not die, but she will become a saintly religious in whom God will work many wonders, and she will end her days in a good old age…”

St. Mechtilde

(MATILDA VON HACKEBORN-WIPPRA).

Benedictine; born in 1240 or 1241 at the ancestral castle of Helfta, near Eisleben, Saxony; died in the monastery of Helfta, 19 November, 1298. She belonged to one of the noblest and most powerful Thuringian families, while here sister was the saintly and illustrious Abbess Gertrude von Hackeborn. Some writers have considered that Mechtilde von Hackeborn and Mechtilde von Wippra were two distinct persons, but, as the Barons of Hackeborn were also Lords of Wippra, it was customary for members of that family to take their name indifferently from either, or both of these estates.

So fragile was she at birth, that the attendants, fearing she might die unbaptized, hurried her off to the priest who was just then preparing to say Mass. He was a man of great sanctity, and after baptizing the child, uttered these prophetic words:

“What do you fear? This child most certainly will not die, but she will become a saintly religious in whom God will work many wonders, and she will end her days in a good old age.”  

  http://www.americaneedsfatima.blogspot.co.uk/2012/11/what-do-you-fear-this-child-most.html    
  GERTRUDE CASANOVA (Catholic Encyclopedia).

When she was seven years old, having been taken by her mother on a visit to her elder sister Gertrude, then a nun in the monastery of Rodardsdorf, she became so enamoured of the cloister that her pious parents yielded to her entreaties and, acknowledging the workings of grace, allowed her to enter the alumnate. Here, being highly gifted in mind as well as in body, she made remarkable progress in virtue and learning.

Ten years later (1258) she followed her sister, who, now abbess, had transferred the monastery to an estate at Helfta given her by her brothers Louis and Albert. As a nun, Mechtilde was soon distinguished for her humility, her fervour, and that extreme amiability which had characterized her from childhood and which, like piety, seemed hereditary in her race.

While still very young, she became a valuable helpmate to Abbess Gertrude, who entrusted to her direction the alumnate and the choir. Mechtilde was fully equipped for her task when, in 1261, God committed to her prudent care a child of five who was destined to shed lustre upon the monastery of Helfta.

This was that Gertrude who in later generations became known as St. Gertrude the Great. Gifted with a beautiful voice, Mechtilde also possessed a special talent for rendering the solemn and sacred music over which she presided as domna cantrix. All her life she held this office and trained the choir with indefatigable zeal. Indeed, Divine praise was the keynote of her life as it is of her book; in this she never tired, despite her continual and severe physical sufferings, so that in His revelations Christ was wont to call her His “nightingale”.  

ST. MARGARET QUEEN OF SCOTLAND David McRoberts

Previous fore-programmed seems to have failed.    
Printed here usefully from EWTN, below.

ST. MARGARET QUEEN OF SCOTLAND

David McRoberts

Foreword We have decided to reprint David McRoberts excellent historical essay on the life of St. Margaret in this the ninth centenary year of her death. It is hoped that all who come to know her may be inspired by her Christian charity and exemplary life. Nine hundred years after Queen Margaret lived and ruled with her husband King Malcolm III the people of Scotland still revere her as their patron and admire her many qualities which had such a profound beneficial effect on the country of her adoption. In an age where the role of women in our society has only recently been seen as emerging to a truly equal status it is a matter of some wonder that nine centuries ago Margaret was to wield such an enormous influence in the life of her people on so many different and yet powerfully important levels. At court, in the life of the Church, in domestic and international affairs her influence would be seen and can still be discerned centuries after her death. It is a great privilege therefore to make her life known through this little booklet that once more we can truly benefit from her wonderful example and lasting witness as a woman of deep Christian faith who followed her path of destiny and paced them closely to her Lord and God, not rejecting her role as sovereign and lady, but neither setting so much store by them as to lose sight of her eternal destiny. It is from the viewpoint of this wider back-cloth that her life takes it's true meaning and her actions and aspirations come into focus and find their ultimate context. . . Fr. David M. Barr P.P. St. Margaret's Dunfermline April 1993 I Saint Margaret, the winds of yore Oppressed the bark that carried thee And drove a treasure from the sea To Scotland's wild and barren shore.1 The modern kingdom of Scotland is the outcome of a long and painful evolution. After the withdrawal of the Roman Legions from Britain, in the early fifth century, four kingdoms slowly came into being in the area occupied by present-day Scotland: Cumbria occupied the territory between Glasgow and Carlise, Bernicia stretched from the Firth of Forth to the Tyne, Scotia was the territory of Argyllshire with some of the Western Isles, occupied by the Scoti from Ireland, and the rest of the north and east was the extensive, ill-defined Kingdom of Pictavia—the land occupied by that race which, in our history books, is given the name, or perhaps the nickname, of Picts—the painted people. During the four or five bleak centuries which separate Roman Britain from the early Middle Ages we catch fleeting glimpses of these four kingdoms becoming gradually consolidated under the guidance of warrior kings, shadowy monarchs because of our meagre records, but men who were apparently wise and politic leaders. As the dark ages gave place to mediaeval and feudal Europe we see a united Kingdom of Scotland gradually taking shape. It was an age of iron warfare; the nobler things of life were almost lost sight of in the prolonged and bitter struggle for survival. The plight of Scotland was not exceptional; that land was only sharing in the general misery of Europe in an era when culture, orderly government and even religion seemed to be fighting a steadily losing battle against anarchy and barbarism. The Church, like the other institutions of civilised life, had suffered grievously. By the tenth century it presented a gloomy picture; almost everywhere abbacies and episcopal sees (for awhile even the great See of Rome) had fallen into the hands of the rapacious and lawless barons who had sprung up in each locality and seized the authority of the broken down central government. Only too often these local chieftains installed unworthy prelates into the churches they had seized, and, as a result, laxity of discipline and ignorance of the church's teaching prevailed over wide areas. The Celtic churches of the west had perhaps suffered most severely. The great monasteries of the Celtic lands had preserved the learning and piety of Europe during the flood-tide of the barbarian invasions and later, in the amazing wanderings of the Celtic scholar- monks during the sixth and seventh centuries, these men actually began the conversion of the new barbarian ruling classes and relit the almost extinguished lamp of monasticism in Europe. But in their turn Scotland and Ireland had to bear the full brunt of yet another invasion, that of the pagan pirates of Scandinavia. St. Margaret's Crossing Edinburgh to Fife Projection of the new Bridges When the Vikings bore down on Europe the defenceless riches of churches and abbeys attracted their ruthless bands. The great monasteries of the western islands were reduced to ruin. Clonmacnoise and Lindisfarne, Bangor and especially Iona were plundered and burnt time and again and the white monks martyred. In every place similar conditions prevailed.

COMMENT: Psalm 104 compared to Psalm 139

Comment:

Omniscience & Omnipresence

  http://www.bibleinsong.com/Song_Pages/Psalms/Psalm139/Psalm139.htm 

The theme of Ps. 139 is God’s omniscience and omnipresence.  The psalmist recognizes God as present everywhere, One who is not only all-powerful, but also all-knowing, One who has formed man from the womb, and One whose presence man cannot escape.5

Ps.139 Compared to Psalm 104

http://www.bibleinsong.com/Song_Pages/Psalms/Psalm104/Psalm104.htm

This Psalm has often been admired for the grandeur of its sentiments, the elevation of its style, as well as the variety and beauty of its imagery. Bishop Lowth, in his 29th Prelection, classes it amongst the Hebrew idyls, as next to the 104th, in respect both to the conduct of the poem, and the beauty of the style. "If it be excelled," says he, "(as perhaps it is) by the former in the plan, disposition, and arrangement of the matter, it is not in the least inferior in the dignity and elegance of its sentiments, images, and figures." "Amongst its other excellencies," says Bishop Mant, "it is for nothing more admirable than for the exquisite skill with which it descants on the perfections of the Deity.

Psalm 104 (103) God’s boundless care for his creation: a psalm of worship Douay-Rheims Bible O Lord, My God, You Are Very Great 1For David himself. Bless the Lord, O my soul: O Lord my God, thou art exceedingly great. Thou hast put on praise and beauty: 2and art clothed with light as with a garment. Who stretchest out the heaven like a pavilion: 3who coverest the higher rooms thereof with water. Who makest the clouds thy chariot: who walkest upon the wings of the winds. 4Who makest thy angels spirits: and thy ministers a burning fire. 5Who hast founded the earth upon its own bases: it shall not be moved for ever and ever. 6The deep like a garment is its clothing: above the mountains shall the waters stand. 7At thy rebuke they shall flee: at the voice of thy thunder they shall fear. 8The mountains ascend, and the plains descend into the place which thou hast founded for them. 9Thou hast set a bound which they shall not pass over; neither shall they return to cover the earth. 10Thou sendest forth springs in the vales: between the midst of the hills the waters shall pass. 11All the beasts of the field shall drink: the wild asses shall expect in their thirst. 12Over them the birds of the air shall dwell: from the midst of the rocks they shall give forth their voices. 13Thou waterest the hills from thy upper rooms: the earth shall be filled with the fruit of thy works: 14Bringing forth grass for cattle, and herb for the service of men. That thou mayst bring bread out of the earth: 15and that wine may cheer the heart of man. That he may make the face cheerful with oil: and that bread may strengthen man's heart. 16The trees of the field shall be filled, and the cedars of Libanus which he hath planted: 17there the sparrows shall make their nests. The highest of them is the house of the heron. 18The high hills are a refuge for the harts, the rock for the irchins. 19He hath made the moon for seasons: the sun knoweth his going down. 20Thou hast appointed darkness, and it is night: in it shall all the beasts of the woods go about: 21The young lions roaring after their prey, and seeking their meat from God. 22The sun ariseth, and they are gathered together: and they shall lie down in their dens. 23Man shall go forth to his work, and to his labour until the evening. 24How great are thy works, O Lord? thou hast made all things in wisdom: the earth is filled with thy riches. 25So is this great sea, which stretcheth wide its arms: there are creeping things without number: Creatures little and great. 26There the ships shall go. This sea dragon which thou hast formed to play therein. 27All expect of thee that thou give them food in season. 28What thou givest to them they shall gather up: when thou openest thy hand, they shall all be filled with good. 29But if thou turnest away thy face, they shall be troubled: thou shalt take away their breath, and they shall fail, and shall return to their dust. 30Thou shalt send forth thy spirit, and they shall be created: and thou shalt renew the face of the earth. 31May the glory of the Lord endure for ever: the Lord shall rejoice in his works. 32He looketh upon the earth, and maketh it tremble: he toucheth the mountains, and they smoke. 33I will sing to the Lord as long as I live: I will sing praise to my God while I have my being. 34Let my speech be acceptable to him: but I will take delight in the Lord. 35Let sinners be consumed out of the earth, and the unjust, so that they be no more: O my soul, bless thou the Lord.

Psalm 139 (138) 'The Hound of Heaven' Douay-Rheims Bible You Have Searched Me and Know Me 1Lord, thou hast proved me, and known me: 2thou hast know my sitting down, and my rising up. 3Thou hast understood my thoughts afar off: my path and my line thou hast searched out. 4And thou hast foreseen all my ways: for there is no speech in my tongue. 5Behold, O Lord, thou hast known all things, the last and those of old: thou hast formed me, and hast laid thy hand upon me. 6Thy knowledge is become wonderful to me: it is high, and I cannot reach to it. 7Whither shall I go from thy spirit? or whither shall I flee from thy face? 8If I ascend into heaven, thou art there: if I descend into hell, thou art present. 9If I take my wings early in the morning, and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea: 10Even there also shall thy hand lead me: and thy right hand shall hold me. 11And I said: Perhaps darkness shall cover me: and night shall be my light in my pleasures. 12But darkness shall not be dark to thee, and night shall be light as day: the darkness thereof, and the light thereof are alike to thee. 13For thou hast possessed my reins: thou hast protected me from my mother's womb. 14I will praise thee, for thou art fearfully magnified: wonderful are thy works, and my soul knoweth right well. 15My bone is not hidden from thee, which thou hast made in secret: and my substance in the lower parts of the earth. 16Thy eyes did see my imperfect being, and in thy book all shall be written: days shall be formed, and no one in them. 17But to me thy friends, O God, are made exceedingly honourable: their principality is exceedingly strengthened. 18I will number them, and they shall be multiplied above the sand: I rose up and am still with thee. 19If thou wilt kill the wicked, O God: ye men of blood, depart from me: 20Because you say in thought: They shall receive thy cities in vain. 21Have I not hated them, O Lord, that hated thee: and pine away because of thy enemies? 22I have hated them with a perfect hatred: and they are become enemies to me. 23Prove me, O God, and know my heart: examine me, and know my paths. 24And see if there be in me the way of iniquity: and lead me in the eternal way. Douay-Rheims Bible