📜 Friday, February 13, 2026
✦ Opening Paradox
The man who thinks he sees clearly is often the most blind;
the man who knows he cannot hear is already listening.
✦ G.K. Chesterton Quote
“The object of opening the mind, as of opening the mouth, is to shut it again on something solid.”
— G.K. Chesterton
✦ Invitatory
O Lord, open thou my lips.
— And my mouth shall declare thy praise.
God, come to my assistance.
— Lord, make haste to help me.
Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost.
As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end. Amen.
✦ Psalmody (Douay-Rheims)
Psalm 5
Give ear, O Lord, to my words, understand my cry.
Hearken to the voice of my prayer, O my King and my God.
For to thee will I pray: O Lord, in the morning thou shalt hear my voice.
In the morning I will stand before thee, and will see:
because thou art not a God that willest iniquity.
Conduct me, O Lord, in thy justice: because of my enemies, direct my way in thy sight.
Glory be to the Father…
Psalm 63
O God, my God, to thee do I watch at break of day:
for thee hath my soul thirsted; for thee hath my flesh longed,
in a barren and dry land, where no water is.
So in the sanctuary have I come before thee,
to see thy power and thy glory.
For thy mercy is better than lives: thee my lips shall praise.
Glory be to the Father…
✦ Gospel Reading
Mark 7:31-37 (Douay-Rheims)
And again going out of the coasts of Tyre, he came by Sidon to the sea of Galilee, through the midst of the coasts of Decapolis.
And they bring to him one that was deaf and dumb; and they besought him that he would lay his hand upon him.
And taking him from the multitude apart, he put his fingers into his ears, and spitting, he touched his tongue.
And looking up to heaven, he groaned, and said to him: Ephphatha, which is, Be thou opened.
And immediately his ears were opened, and the string of his tongue was loosed, and he spoke right.
And he charged them that they should tell no man. But the more he charged them, so much the more a great deal did they publish it.
And so much the more did they wonder, saying: He hath done all things well; he hath made both the deaf to hear and the dumb to speak.
✦ Short Reading
If thou shalt hear his voice today, harden not your hearts.
— Psalm 94:8 (DR)
✦ Responsory
He hath done all things well.
— He hath made the deaf to hear and the dumb to speak.
✦ Canticle of Zachary (Benedictus)
(Douay-Rheims — Luke 1:68-79)
Blessed be the Lord God of Israel; because he hath visited and wrought the redemption of his people:
And hath raised up an horn of salvation to us, in the house of David his servant:
As he spoke by the mouth of his holy prophets, who are from the beginning:
Salvation from our enemies, and from the hand of all that hate us:
To perform mercy to our fathers, and to remember his holy testament.
The oath, which he swore to Abraham our father, that he would grant to us,
That being delivered from the hand of our enemies, we may serve him without fear,
In holiness and justice before him, all our days.
And thou, child, shalt be called the prophet of the Highest: for thou shalt go before the face of the Lord to prepare his ways:
To give knowledge of salvation to his people, unto the remission of their sins:
Through the bowels of the mercy of our God, in which the Orient from on high hath visited us:
To enlighten them that sit in darkness and in the shadow of death: to direct our feet into the way of peace.
Glory be to the Father…
✦ Intercessions
Let us pray:
— That our ears may be opened to truth.
— That our tongues may speak plainly and kindly.
— That our hearts may not harden against grace.
— That this day may be offered wholly to God.
✦ The Lord’s Prayer
Our Father, who art in heaven…
(Full traditional text)
✦ Morning Offering
O Jesus, through the Immaculate Heart of Mary,
I offer Thee my prayers, works, joys, and sufferings of this day…
✦ Extended Chestertonian Meditation
There is something magnificently unreasonable about a God who sighs.
The Gospel does not say that Christ merely commands the deaf man. It says He groans. The Creator of the cosmos sighs before healing a single pair of human ears. This is not efficiency; it is intimacy.
Modern men believe that power should be clean, mechanical, and instantaneous. But divine power is never merely mechanical. It pauses. It looks up to heaven. It touches. It groans. The miracle is not a trick of force but a transaction of love.
Chesterton would have delighted in this absurdity — that the Almighty should stoop not only to cure, but to care. The deaf man is taken aside from the crowd. God is never in a hurry when it comes to souls. He is extravagant with attention.
And what is the first gift? Not speech — but hearing.
The world today is not starved for speech. It is drowning in it. We speak endlessly and listen hardly at all. Yet salvation begins with an ear opened. “Ephphatha.” Be thou opened.
The psalms at dawn cry out for justice and thirst for God. They assume something radical: that we are not self-sufficient. The desert is not an accident of geography; it is a design of grace. We thirst because we were meant to drink.
And so the true miracle this morning may not be that we say something clever or accomplish something grand. It may be that we allow ourselves to hear.
To hear rebuke without resentment.
To hear praise without pride.
To hear God without argument.
If Christ must sigh before opening us, let Him sigh. Better a groaning God who heals than a silent heaven that leaves us comfortably closed.
✦ Concluding Blessing
May the Lord bless us, protect us from all evil,
and bring us to everlasting life.
— Amen.
✦ Chesterton Radio Outro
And so the dawn concludes not with noise, but with orientation.
If you have heard even a whisper of mercy this morning, then you are already walking in light. The world will shout; let it. The soul that has been opened does not need to shout back.
This is Chesterton Radio —
where the old psalms still breathe,
where the Gospel still astonishes,
and where the miracle of being opened is still the beginning of wisdom.
Go forth with ears attentive, tongue restrained, and heart unbarred.
Until tomorrow —
Be opened. ✦