by Faith Central & Steve Welsh
“… someone said to Him, ‘I will follow You wherever You go.’ Jesus answered … ‘Foxes have dens and birds of the sky have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to rest his head.’ … ‘No one who sets a hand to the plow and looks to what was left behind is fit for the Kingdom of God.'”
Catholic TV Mass for the Memorial of the Guardian Angels, Tuesday, Oct. 2, 2018, from Loretto Abbey in the Archdiocese of Toronto. [Click here for Mass Readings
[featured image adapted from image at Creative Commons Wikimedia Commons Pjposullivan,
commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Loretto_Abbey_chapel_interior,_Toronto.JPG, with additional conditions stated at that link and in the alt-tag here]
[The Divine Office, or Liturgy of the Hours, begins the Liturgical Day with “A Call to Praise God” in the form of the Invitatory Psalm, usually Psalm 95, in stanzas, or strophes, led into by an antiphon. For the Memorial of the Guardian Angels on Oct. 2, the antiphon is “Come, Let Us Worship the Lord, Whom the Angels Serve.“]
[Prior to the Psalm is an introductory phrase taken from Psalm 51 and a quote from the Letter to the Hebrews]
Lord, open my lips.
— And my mouth will proclaim Your Praise.
Encourage each other daily, while it is still today (Hebrews 3:13)
Come, Let Us Worship the Lord, Whom the Angels Serve.
Come, let us sing to the Lord
and shout with joy to the Rock Who Saves us.
Let us approach Him with Praise and Thanksgiving
and sing joyful songs to the Lord.
Come, Let Us Worship the Lord, Whom the Angels Serve.
The Lord is God, the Mighty God,
the Great King over all the gods,
He holds in His Hands the depths of the earth
and the highest mountains as well.
He made the sea; it belongs to Him,
the dry land, too, for it was formed by His Hands.
Come then, let us bow down and worship,
bending the knee before the Lord, our Maker.
For He is our God, and we are His People,
the Flock He Shepherds.
Come, Let Us Worship the Lord, Whom the Angels Serve.
Today, listen to the Voice of the Lord:
Do not grow stubborn, as your fathers did
in the wilderness,
when at Meribah and Massah
they challenged me and provoked me,
Although they had seen all of my works.
Forty years I endured that generation.
I said, “They are a People whose hearts go astray
and they do not know My Ways.”
So I swore in my anger,
“The shall not enter into my rest.”
Come, Let Us Worship the Lord, Whom the Angels Serve.
Glory to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit:
as it was in the beginning, is now, and will be for ever.
Amen.
Come, Let Us Worship the Lord, Whom the Angels Serve.
[The Divine Office also indicates that Psalm 100, Psalm 67 or Psalm 24 may be used, and indicates that the psalm may be omitted when the Invitatory precedes Morning Prayer. An added note provides that, in individual recitation, the antiphon may be said once, at the beginning, rather than with each strophe.]
[As can be seen, the psalm presents a a wide-ranging encounter with God’s Greatness and our Relationship to Him. We are exhorted to approach God, to sing and shout with joy, praise and thanksgiving. God is Almighty and our Creator, indeed holding creation in His Hands.
We are to worship and follow Him in His Greatness. Yet He also is a Person Whose Voice we are to listen to and follow, Who Shepherds us as His Flock. At times, there are those who stubbornly failed to follow him, challenging Him and provoking His Wrath. In particular, with the reference to Meribah and Massah, the psalm recalls the Israelites grumbling and challenging God at points during their exodus in the desert.]
Catholic TV Mass for the Memorial of the Guardian Angels, Tuesday, Oct. 2, 2018, from Catholic TV in the Archdiocese of Boston. [Click here for Mass Readings]
“… [Jesus] said, ‘Amen, I say to you, unless you turn and become like children, you will not enter the Kingdom of Heaven. Whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the Kingdom of Heaven. And whoever receives one child such as this in My Name receives Me. … I say to you that their Angels in Heaven always look upon the Face of My Heavenly Father.”
Catholic TV Mass for the Memorial of Saint Thérèse of the Child Jesus and the Holy Face, Oct. 1, 2018, from Loretto Abbey in the Archdiocese of Toronto. [Click here for Mass Readings
[featured image adapted from image at Creative Commons Wikimedia Commons Pjposullivan,
commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Loretto_Abbey_chapel_interior,_Toronto.JPG, with additional conditions stated at that link and in the alt-tag here]
“An argument arose among the Disciples about which of them was the greatest. Jesus realized the intention of their hearts and took a child and placed it by His side and said to them, ‘Whoever receives this child in My Name receives me, and whoever receives Me receives the One Who sent Me. For the one who is least among all of you is the one who is the greatest.’ …”
Catholic TV Mass for the Memorial of Saint Thérèse of the Child Jesus, Oct. 1, 2018, from Catholic TV in the Archdiocese of Boston. [Click here for Mass Readings]
“… It is to you, dear Mother,
that I am about to confide
the story of my soul. When you
asked me to write it, I feared the task might unsettle
me, but since then Our Lord has deigned
to make me understand
that by simple obedience
I shall please Him best. I begin therefore
to sing what must be my eternal
song: “the Mercies
of the Lord.”
1
Before setting about my task I knelt before the statue of Our Lady which had given my
family so many proofs of Our Heavenly
Mother’s
loving care.
2
As I knelt I begged
of that
dear Mother
to guide my hand, and thus ensure that only what was pleasing
to her should
find place here.
Then opening
the Gospels,
my eyes fell on these words: “Jesus, going up into a mountain,
called unto Him whom He would Himself.”
“… God can and will work mighty deeds through the most unexpected and unlikely people. All of us are called to perform even our most humble tasks, such as giving a cup of water, for the sake of His Name and the cause of His Kingdom. …”