Invitatory
V. Lord, open my lips.
R. And my mouth shall declare thy praise.
Invitatory Antiphon
Christ the Lord was tempted and suffered for us: come, let us adore him. (universalis.com)
Psalm 94 (95) — Come, let us adore the Lord
Come let us praise the Lord with joy: let us joyfully sing to God our saviour.
Let us come before his presence with thanksgiving; and make a joyful noise to him with psalms.
For the Lord is a great God, and a great King above all gods.
For in his hand are all the ends of the earth: and the heights of the mountains are his.
For the sea is his, and he made it: and his hands formed the dry land.
Come let us adore and fall down: and weep before the Lord that made us.
For he is the Lord our God: and we are the people of his pasture and the sheep of his hand.
To day if you shall hear his voice, harden not your hearts:
As in the provocation, according to the day of temptation in the wilderness: where your fathers tempted me, they proved me, and saw my works.
Forty years long was I offended with that generation, and I said: These always err in heart.
And these men have not known my ways: so I swore in my wrath that they shall not enter into my rest. (universalis.com)
Glory be to the Father…
(Repeat the Invitatory Antiphon.)
Hymn (Hymn Cycle — Week I)
Hear us, Almighty Lord (Audi benigne Conditor — Lenten hymn, public domain)
Hear us, Almighty Lord, and grant
That we may profit by this fast;
May every passion be subdued,
And every guilty pleasure past.
May we with earnest prayer implore
Thy grace, O God, with contrite heart;
That so we may be purified
And fitted for Thy holy part.
O blessed Trinity, to Thee
Be praise and glory ever given;
Grant us Thy grace on earth below,
And after death the joys of heaven.
Amen.
Morning Prayer (Lauds)
O God, come to my assistance.
O Lord, make haste to help me.
Glory be to the Father…
Psalmody
Antiphon 1
In thy light, O God, we shall see light. (universalis.com)
Psalm 35 (36) — The malice of the wicked; the goodness of God
The unjust hath said within himself, that he would sin: there is no fear of God before his eyes.
For in his sight he hath done deceitfully, that his iniquity may be found unto hatred.
The words of his mouth are iniquity and guile: he would not understand that he might do well.
He hath devised iniquity on his bed, he hath set himself on every way that is not good: but evil he hath not hated.
O Lord, thy mercy is in heaven, and thy truth reacheth even to the clouds.
Thy justice is as the mountains of God, thy judgments are a great deep. Men and beasts thou wilt preserve, O Lord:
O how hast thou multiplied thy mercy, O God! But the children of men shall put their trust under the covert of thy wings.
They shall be inebriated with the plenty of thy house; and thou shalt make them drink of the torrent of thy pleasure.
For with thee is the fountain of life; and in thy light we shall see light.
Extend thy mercy unto them that know thee, and thy justice unto them that are right in heart.
Let not the foot of pride come to me, and let not the hand of the sinner move me.
There the workers of iniquity are fallen, they are cast out, and could not stand. (drbo.org)
Glory be to the Father…
(Repeat Antiphon 1.)
Antiphon 2
Lord, thou art great, thou art glorious, thou art wonderfully strong. (universalis.com)
Canticle — Judith 16
Begin ye to the Lord with timbrels, sing ye to the Lord with cymbals, tune unto him a new psalm, extol and call upon his name.
The Lord putteth an end to wars, the Lord is his name.
He hath set his camp in the midst of his people, to deliver us from the hand of all our enemies.
O Adonai, Lord, great art thou, and glorious in thy power, and no one can overcome thee.
Let all thy creatures serve thee: because thou hast spoken, and they were made: thou didst send forth thy spirit, and they were created, and there is no one that can resist thy voice.
The mountains shall be moved from the foundations with the waters: the rocks shall melt as wax before thy face.
But they that fear thee, shall be great with thee in all things. (drbo.org)
Glory be to the Father…
(Repeat Antiphon 2.)
Antiphon 3
Cry to God with shouts of joy. (universalis.com)
Psalm 46 (47) — God is King of all the earth
O clap your hands, all ye nations: shout unto God with the voice of joy,
For the Lord is high, terrible: a great king over all the earth.
He hath subdued the people under us; and the nations under our feet.
He hath chosen for us his inheritance the beauty of Jacob which he hath loved.
God is ascended with jubilee, and the Lord with the sound of trumpet.
Sing praises to our God, sing ye: sing praises to our king, sing ye.
For God is the king of all the earth: sing ye wisely.
God shall reign over the nations: God sitteth on his holy throne.
The princes of the people are gathered together, with the God of Abraham: for the strong gods of the earth are exceedingly exalted. (drbo.org)
Glory be to the Father…
(Repeat Antiphon 3.)
Short Reading — Deuteronomy 7:6, 8–9
Because thou art a holy people to the Lord thy God. The Lord thy God hath chosen thee, to be his peculiar people of all peoples that are upon the earth.
But because the Lord hath loved you, and hath kept his oath, which he swore to your fathers: and hath brought you out with a strong hand, and redeemed you from the house of bondage, out of the hand of Pharao the king of Egypt.
And thou shalt know that the Lord thy God, he is a strong and faithful God, keeping his covenant and mercy to them that love him, and to them that keep his commandments, unto a thousand generations. (drbo.org)
Short Responsory
V. It is he who will free me from the snare of the hunters.
R. It is he who will free me from the snare of the hunters.
V. And from the evil word.
R. It is he who will free me from the snare of the hunters.
V. Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit.
R. It is he who will free me from the snare of the hunters.
Canticle of Zachary (Benedictus) — Luke 1:68–79
Benedictus Antiphon
A wicked, godless generation asks for a sign; and the only sign that will be given it is the sign of the prophet Jonah. (universalis.com)
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. (drbo.org)
Glory be to the Father…
(Repeat Benedictus Antiphon.)
Intercessions
Blessed be Christ our Saviour. In him we become a new creation, the old order passes and all things are renewed. Let us pray in living hope.
R. Renew us, Lord, in your Spirit.
You promised us, Lord, a new heaven and a new earth; renew us in your Spirit, that we may come to the new Jerusalem and rejoice in you for ever.
R. Renew us, Lord, in your Spirit.Let us work with you to fill the world with your Spirit; let us perfect our earthly city in justice, charity and peace.
R. Renew us, Lord, in your Spirit.Grant that we may put aside our apathy; help us to recognize with joy the power you have given us.
R. Renew us, Lord, in your Spirit.Set us free from all evil; show us in the confusion of our lives the things that really matter.
R. Renew us, Lord, in your Spirit.
The Lord’s Prayer
Our Father…
Concluding Prayer (universalis.com)
Look with favour on our Lenten observance, Lord, and while we subdue our bodies by self-denial, renew our spirit with the grace that prompts us to good works.
Through our Lord Jesus Christ, thy Son, who liveth and reigneth with thee in the unity of the Holy Spirit, God, world without end. Amen.
May the Lord bless us, and keep us from all evil, and bring us to everlasting life. Amen.
Paradox of the Day
The fast is not meant to make us smaller; it is meant to make our excuses smaller—so that God may become large again.
A Word from G.K. Chesterton
“There is only one thing which is generally safe from plagiarism — self-denial.” (goodreads.com)
Chestertonian Reflection (200–350 words)
Lent is the season in which we discover an astonishing fact: we are not as hungry as we thought, and yet we are far hungrier than we knew. For a man may miss his supper and survive; but he cannot miss his God and remain himself.
The Scriptures this morning speak with the blunt cheerfulness of truth. God chose Israel not because she was impressive, but because He is faithful; not because she was large, but because Love is large. And the Psalms answer with the only sensible response to such a Love: they do not bargain with it—they adore it. They do not argue with mercy—they run into it “under the covert of thy wings.” (drbo.org)
That is why self-denial is not a gloomy hobby for spiritual athletes. It is simply the smallest door into the largest room. We deny ourselves some lawful thing in order to remember the Lawgiver; we silence the appetite, not because food is evil, but because we are forgetful. We fast so that our senses may stop shouting long enough to hear the gentle, terrible sentence: “To day if you shall hear his voice, harden not your hearts.” (universalis.com)
And then, in the middle of all this holy severity, the Church gives us the Benedictus: the sunrise breaks in. The “Orient from on high” visits a world that has been sitting in shadow, and guides feet—ordinary feet—into the way of peace. (drbo.org)
So take up the day’s little penance with a smile that is almost defiant. For Lent is not God pushing us away; it is God clearing the clutter so we can come home.
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