Tuesday 19 October 2021
Saints John de Brébeuf and Isaac Jogues, priests, and their Companions, Martyrs
on Tuesday of week 29 in Ordinary Time
Office of Readings
Introduction (without Invitatory)
If this is the first Hour that you are reciting today, use the version with the Invitatory Psalm instead.
O God, come to our aid.
O Lord, make haste to help us.
Glory be to the Father and to the Son
and to the Holy Spirit,
as it was in the beginning,
is now, and ever shall be,
world without end.
Amen. Alleluia.
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Hymn
The martyrs living now with Christ
In suffering were tried,
Their anguish overcome by love
When on his cross they died.
Across the centuries they come,
In constancy unmoved,
Their loving hearts make no complaint,
In silence they are proved.
No man has ever measured love,
Or weighed it in his hand,
But God who knows the inmost heart
Gives them the promised land.
Praise Father, Son and Spirit blest,
Who guides us through the night
In ways that reach beyond the stars
To everlasting light.
Francis E. Mostyn (1860-1939)
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Psalm 9B (10):1-11
Thanksgiving
“Blessed are you poor, for yours is the kingdom of God” (Lk 6:20).
The Lord will protect the rights of the oppressed.
Lord, why do you stand afar off
and hide yourself in times of distress?
The poor man is devoured by the pride of the wicked:
he is caught in the schemes that others have made.
For the wicked man boasts of his heart’s desires;
the covetous blasphemes and spurns the Lord.
In his pride the wicked says: ‘He will not punish.
There is no God.’ Such are his thoughts.
His path is ever untroubled;
your judgement is far from his mind.
His enemies he regards with contempt.
He thinks: ‘Never shall I falter:
misfortune shall never be my lot.’
His mouth is full of cursing, guile, oppression,
mischief and deceit under his tongue.
He lies in wait among the reeds;
the innocent he murders in secret.
His eyes are on the watch for the helpless man.
He lurks in hiding like a lion in his lair;
he lurks in hiding to seize the poor;
he seizes the poor man and drags him away.
He crouches, preparing to spring,
and the helpless fall beneath his strength.
He thinks in his heart: ‘God forgets,
he hides his face, he does not see.’
Glory be to the Father and to the Son
and to the Holy Spirit,
as it was in the beginning,
is now, and ever shall be,
world without end.
Amen.
The Lord will protect the rights of the oppressed.
________
Psalm 9B (10):12-18
Lord, you have seen our trouble and our sorrow.
Arise then, Lord, lift up your hand!
O God, do not forget the poor!
Why should the wicked spurn the Lord
and think in his heart: ‘He will not punish’?
But you have seen the trouble and sorrow,
you note it, you take it in hand.
The helpless trusts himself to you;
for you are the helper of the orphan.
Break the power of the wicked and the sinner!
Punish his wickedness till nothing remains!
The Lord is king for ever and ever.
The heathen shall perish from the land he rules.
Lord, you hear the prayer of the poor;
you strengthen their hearts; you turn your ear
to protect the rights of the orphan and oppressed:
so that mortal man may strike terror no more.
Glory be to the Father and to the Son
and to the Holy Spirit,
as it was in the beginning,
is now, and ever shall be,
world without end.
Amen.
Lord, you have seen our trouble and our sorrow.
Psalm-prayer
Rise up, Lord, in defence of your people; do not hide your face from our troubles. Father of orphans, wealth of the poor, we rejoice in making you known; may we find comfort and security in times of pain and anxiety.
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Psalm 11 (12)
A prayer against the proud
“The Father deigned to send his Son for the sake of us, the poor” (St Augustine).
The words of the Lord are words without alloy, silver from the furnace, seven times refined.
Help, O Lord, for good men have vanished;
truth has gone from the sons of men.
Falsehood they speak one to another,
with lying lips, with a false heart.
May the Lord destroy all lying lips,
the tongue that speaks high-sounding words,
those who say: ‘Our tongue is our strength;
our lips are our own, who is our master?’
‘For the poor who are oppressed and the needy who groan
I myself will arise,’ says the Lord,
‘I will grant them the salvation for which they thirst.’
The words of the Lord are words without alloy,
silver from the furnace, seven times refined.
It is you, O Lord, who will take us in your care
and protect us for ever from this generation.
See how the wicked prowl on every side,
while the worthless are prized highly by the sons of men.
Glory be to the Father and to the Son
and to the Holy Spirit,
as it was in the beginning,
is now, and ever shall be,
world without end.
Amen.
The words of the Lord are words without alloy, silver from the furnace, seven times refined.
Psalm-prayer
Your light is true light, Lord, and your truth shines like the day. Direct us to salvation through your life-giving words. May we be saved by always embracing your word.
________
℣. Our soul is waiting for the Lord.
℟. The Lord is our help and our shield.
________
Readings (official one-year cycle)
First Reading
Esther 4:1-17
Haman procures an order for the destruction of the Jews
When Mordecai learned what had happened, he tore his garments and put on sackcloth and ashes. Then he went right through the city, wailing loud and bitterly, until he arrived in front of the Chancellery, which no one clothed in sackcloth was allowed to enter. And in every province, no sooner had the royal edict been read than among the Jews there was great mourning, fasting, weeping and wailing, and many lay on sackcloth and ashes.
When Queen Esther’s maids and eunuchs came and told her, she was overcome with grief. She sent clothes for Mordecai to put on instead of his sackcloth, but he refused them. Then Esther summoned Hathach, a eunuch whom the king had appointed to wait on her, and ordered him to go to Mordecai and enquire what was the matter and why he was acting in this way.
Hathach went out to Mordecai, who was still in the city square in front of the Chancellery, and Mordecai told him what had happened to him personally, and also about the sum of money which Haman had offered to pay into the royal treasury as compensation for the destruction of the Jews. He also gave him a copy of the edict of extermination published in Susa for him to show Esther for her information, with the message that she was to go to the king and implore his favour and plead with him for her people. ‘Remember your humbler circumstances,’ he said ‘when you were fed by my hand. Since Haman, the second person in the realm, has petitioned the king for our deaths, invoke the Lord, speak to the king for us and save us from death!’
Hathach came back and told Esther what Mordecai had said; and she replied with the following message for Mordecai, ‘All the king’s servants and the people of his provinces know that for a man or woman who approaches the king in the inner court without being summoned there is one penalty: death, unless, by pointing his golden sceptre towards him, the king grants him his life. And I have not been summoned to the king for the last thirty days.’
These words of Esther were reported to Mordecai, who sent back the following reply, ‘Do not suppose that, because you are in the king’s palace, you are going to be the one Jew to escape. No; if you persist in remaining silent at such a time, relief and deliverance will come to the Jews from another place, but both you and the House of your father will perish. Who knows? Perhaps you have come to the throne for just such a time as this.’
Whereupon Esther sent this reply to Mordecai, ‘Go and assemble all the Jews now in Susa and fast for me. Do not eat or drink day or night for three days. For my part, I and my maids will keep the same fast, after which I shall go to the king in spite of the law; and if I perish, I perish.’ Mordecai went away and carried out Esther’s instructions.
Responsory
Est 14:14; Ps 103:8-10; Jdt 6:19
℟. Never have I relied on anyone but you alone, O God of Israel.* Even though you be angry, yet will you be merciful and forgive the offences of those who suffer misfortune.
℣. Lord God of heaven and earth, relieve our distress.* Even though you be angry, yet will you be merciful and forgive the offences of those who suffer misfortune.
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Second Reading
The spiritual diaries of St John de Brébeuf
May I die only for you, Jesus, who willingly died for me
For two days now I have experienced a great desire to be a martyr and to endure all the torments the martyrs suffered.
Jesus, my Lord and Saviour, what can I give you in return for all the favours you have first conferred on me? I will take from your hand the cup of your sufferings and call on your name. I vow before your eternal Father and the Holy Spirit, before your most holy Mother and her most chaste spouse, before the angels, apostles and martyrs, before my blessed fathers Saint Ignatius and Saint Francis Xavier – in truth I vow to you, Jesus my Saviour, that as far as I have the strength I will never fail to accept the grace of martyrdom, if some day you in your infinite mercy should offer it to me, your most unworthy servant.
I bind myself in this way so that for the rest of my life I will have neither permission nor freedom to refuse opportunities of dying and shedding my blood for you, unless at a particular juncture I should consider it more suitable for your glory to act otherwise at that time. Further, I bind myself to this so that, on receiving the blow of death, I shall accept it from your hands with the fullest delight and joy of spirit. For this reason, my beloved Jesus, and because of the surging joy which moves me, here and now I offer my blood and body and life. May I die only for you, if you will grant me this grace, since you willingly died for me. Let me so live that you may grant me the gift of such a happy death. In this way, my God and Saviour, I will take from your hand the cup of your sufferings and call on your name: Jesus, Jesus, Jesus!
My God, it grieves me greatly that you are not known, that in this savage wilderness all have not been converted to you, that sin has not been driven from it. My God, even if all the brutal tortures which prisoners in this region must endure should fall on me, I offer myself most willingly to them and I alone shall suffer them all.
Responsory
℟. Through faith the saints overthrew kingdoms, established justice, saw God’s promises fulfilled, and grew powerful in war.* These, one and all, are commemorated for their faith.
℣. God tested them and found them worthy to be his.* These, one and all, are commemorated for their faith.
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Let us pray.
Lord God,
you consecrated the first-fruits of the faith in North America
by the preaching and martyrdom of Saint John de Brébeuf, Saint Isaac Jogues and their companions.
Through their intercession
may the Church of Christ flourish abundantly in every nation.
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.
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Let us praise the Lord.
– Thanks be to God.
Copyright © 1996-2021 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.