Saturday 5 December 2020
Saturday of the 1st week of Advent
Spiritual Reading
Your Second Reading from the Office of Readings:
Saturday of the 1st week of Advent
From a treatise on the value of patience, by St Cyprian
What we do not see, we hope for
Patience is a precept for salvation given us by our Lord our teacher: Whoever endures to the end will be saved. And again: If you persevere in my word, you will truly be my disciples; you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.
Dear brethren, we must endure and persevere if we are to attain the truth and freedom we have been allowed to hope for; faith and hope are the very meaning of our being Christians, but if faith and hope are to bear their fruit, patience is necessary.
We do not seek glory now, in the present, but we look for future glory, as Saint Paul instructs us when he says: By hope we were saved. Now hope which is seen is not hope; how can a man hope for what he sees? But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it in patience. Patient waiting is necessary if we are to be perfected in what we have begun to be, and if we are to receive from God what we hope for and believe.
In another place the same Apostle instructs and teaches the just, and those active in good works, and those who store up for themselves treasures in heaven through the reward God gives them. They are to be patient also, for he says: Therefore while we have time, let us do good to all, but especially to those who are of the household of the faith. But let us not grow weary in doing good, for we shall reap our reward in due season.
Paul warns us not to grow weary in good works through impatience, not to be distracted or overcome by temptations and so give up in the midst of our pilgrimage of praise and glory, and allow our past good deeds to count for nothing because what was begun falls short of completion.
Finally the Apostle, speaking of charity, unites it with endurance and patience. Charity, he says, is always patient and kind; it is not jealous, is not boastful, is not given to anger, does not think evil, loves all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. He shows that charity can be steadfast and persevering because it has learned how to endure all things.
And in another place he says: Bear with one another lovingly, striving to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. He shows that neither unity nor peace can be maintained unless the brethren cherish each other with mutual forbearance and preserve the bond of harmony by means of patience.
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In other parts of the world and other calendars:
Blessed Bartholomew Fanti, Priest
From the encyclical 'The Mystery of Faith' of Pope Paul VI
Christ is truly 'God with us'
In a most sublime manner, Christ is present in his Church as she offers in his name the sacrifice of the Mass. He is present in her as she administers the sacraments. But there is yet another manner in which Christ is present in his Church, a manner which surpasses all the others; it is his presence in the Sacrament of the Eucharist, which is for this reason ‘a more consoling source of devotion, a more lovely object of contemplation, a more effective means of sanctification than all the other sacraments.’ The reason is clear: it contains Christ himself and it is ‘a kind of perfection of the spiritual life; in a way, it is the goal of all the sacraments.’
This presence is called ‘real’ – by which it is not intended to exclude all other types of presence as if they could not be ‘real’ too – but because it is presence in the fullest sense: that is to say, it is a substantial presence by which Christ, the God-Man, is wholly and entirely present.
Moreover the Catholic Church has held on to this faith in the presence in the Eucharist of the Body and Blood of Christ, not only in her teaching but also in her practice, since she has at all times given to this great Sacrament the worship which is known as Latria and which may be given to God alone.
The Catholic Church has always offered and still offers the cult of Latria to the Sacrament of the Eucharist, not only during Mass, but also outside of it, reserving Consecrated Hosts with the utmost care, exposing them to solemn veneration, and carrying them processionally to the joy of great crowds of the faithful.
In the ancient documents of the Church we have many testimonies of this veneration. The pastors of the Church, in fact, solicitously exhorted the faithful to take the greatest care in keeping the Eucharist which they took to their homes.
It is to be desired that the faithful, every day and in great numbers, actively participate in the sacrifice of the Mass, receive Holy Communion with a pure heart, and give thanks to Christ our Lord for so great a gift.
In the course of the day the faithful should not omit to visit the Blessed Sacrament, which according to the liturgical laws must be kept in the churches with great reverence in a most honourable location. Such visits are a proof of gratitude, an expression of love, and acknowledgment of the Lord’s presence.
No one can fail to understand that the Divine Eucharist bestows upon the Christian people an incomparable dignity. Not only while the sacrifice is offered and the sacrament is received, but as long as the Eucharist is kept in our churches and oratories Christ is truly the Emmanuel, that is, ‘God with us.’ Day and night he is in our midst, he dwells with us full of grace and truth. He restores morality, nourishes virtues, consoles the afflicted, strengthens the weak. He proposes his own example to those who come to him that all may learn to be, like himself, meek and humble of heart and to seek not their own interests but those of God.
Anyone who approaches this august Sacrament with special devotion and endeavours to return generous love for Christ’s own infinite love, will experience and fully understand – not without spiritual joy and fruit – how precious is the life hidden with Christ in God and how great is the value of converse with Christ, for there is nothing more consoling on earth, nothing more efficacious for advancing along the road of holiness.
Further, you realise, venerable brothers, that the Eucharist is reserved in the churches and oratories as in the spiritual centre of a religious community or of a parish, yes, of the universal Church and of all of humanity, since beneath the appearance of the species, Christ is contained, the invisible Head of the Church, the Redeemer of the World, the Centre of all hearts, ‘by whom all things are and by whom we exist.’
From this it follows that the worship paid to the Divine Eucharist strongly impels the soul to cultivate a ‘social’ love, by which the common good is given preference over the good of the individual. Let us consider as our own the interests of the community, of the parish, of the entire Church, extending our charity to the whole world, because we know that everywhere there are members of Christ.
Copyright © 1996-2020 Universalis Publishing Limited: see www.universalis.com. Scripture readings from the Jerusalem Bible are published and copyright © 1966, 1967 and 1968 by Darton, Longman & Todd, Ltd and Doubleday, a division of Random House, Inc, and used by permission of the publishers. Text of the Psalms: Copyright © 1963, The Grail (England). Used with permission of A.P. Watt Ltd. All rights reserved.