Readings for the Saturday Offices of the Blessed Virgin Mary
January February March April May JuneJuly August September October November December
Lesson iii
From the letter of Blessed Ambrose, Bishop, to Pope Siricius Epistle 81, or 7 in another numbering.
Toward the beginningIt is out of perversity that some people say that they believe that a Virgin conceived, but not that a Virgin gave birth. Conception always comes first, and then later birth—such is the law of nature. If the first could have taken place leaving virginity intact, why not the second? But if they will not believe the doctrines of the priests, let them believe the oracles of Christ, let them believe the admonitions of Angels who say, "For with God nothing shall be impossible." Let them give credit to the Creed of the Apostles, which the Roman Church has always kept and preserved undefiled. Mary heard the voice of the Angel, and she who before had said "How shall this be?" not asking from want of faith in the mode of generation, afterwards replied, "Behold the handmaid of the Lord, be it unto me according to thy word."
Let us pray:
O God, who by the fruitful virginity of blessed Mary, hast bestowed upon mankind the rewards of eternal salvation; grant, we beseech Thee, that we may experience her intercession for us, through whom we have been found worthy to receive the Author of life, even our Lord Jesus Christ Thy Son.Lesson iii
From the book of St. Jerome, Priest, against Jovian
Apologia to Pammachius for the Book against Jovian, at the endChrist is virgin, and the mother of our virgin Christ remains forever a virgin, the Virgin Mother. For Jesus entered the world, as he entered the upper room, "the doors being closed" (John 20:26), and in his sepulcher, which had been hewn out of the hard rock, "no one had yet been laid" (John 19:41), nor was anyone else laid in it afterward. "An enclosed garden a fountain sealed" (Canticles 4:12) was Mary. And from that fountain, according to Joel, flows the stream that waters the torrent either of "ropes" or of "thorns". The ropes would be the sins by which we had been bound down; the thorns would be those which choke the householder's seed. Mary is the eastern gate, of which Ezechiel speaks, always closed and luminous, whether concealing in itself or bringing forth from itself the Holy of holies. She is the gate through which the Sun of justice and our High Priest according to the order of Melchisedech goes in and out.
Let us pray:
O God, who by the fruitful virginity of blessed Mary, hast bestowed upon mankind the rewards of eternal salvation; grant, we beseech Thee, that we may experience her intercession for us, through whom we have been found worthy to receive the Author of life, even our Lord Jesus Christ Thy Son.
After 2 February:
Grant, we beseech Thee, O Lord God, to us Thy servants, that we may evermore enjoy health of mind and body, and by the glorious intercession of blessed Mary ever Virgin be delivered from present sorrow and obtain everlasting happiness. Through our Lord Jesus Christ.
Lesson iii
From the book of St Irenæus, Bishop and Martyr
Against Heretics Book 5 chapter 19That the Lord should come "unto His own" and that His own creation should bear Him by whom itself was born; that He should make amends through His obedience on the tree of the Cross for the disobedience committed at the tree in Paradise; that He should annul the effects of the seduction by which the virgin Eve, already destined for a husband, was led into evil—all this good news, this true revelation was fittingly brought by an Angel to the Virgin Mary, already espoused to a husband. For, just as Eve was seduced by the words of a fallen angel into turning away from God by disobeying His command, so Mary was evangelized by the words of an Angel, who persuaded her to give birth to God in obedience to His word. One has lured into fleeing from God, the other was persuaded to obey God, that the Virgin Mary might became an advocate for the virgin Eve. Through a virgin mankind was was tied to death; so also through a virgin the bonds loosed; the Virgin's obedience balanced the virgin's disobedience.
Let us pray:
Grant, we beseech Thee, O Lord God, to us Thy servants, that we may evermore enjoy health of mind and body, and by the glorious intercession of blessed Mary ever Virgin be delivered from present sorrow and obtain everlasting happiness. Through our Lord Jesus Christ.Lesson iii
From the Commentary of St Jerome, priest
On the prophet Ezechiel Book 13 chapter 4, at the end."This gate is to remain closed; it is not to be opened" (Ezechiel 44:2). In a beautiful figure, some persons understand the closed gate, by which only the Lord, the God of Israel enters—the leader on whose account it has been closed—as a type of the Virgin Mary who remained a virgin both before and after she gave birth. She remained a virgin while the Angel was speaking to her: "The Holy Ghost shall come upon you and the power of the Most High shall overshadow you; and therefore the Holy to be born of you shall be called the Son of God" (Luke 1:35) And when He was born, she remained a virgin, her perpetual virginity confounding those who think, because of the mention in the Gospel of the Savior's "brethren," that after His birth she had children by Joseph.
Let us pray:
Grant, we beseech Thee, O Lord God, to us Thy servants, that we may evermore enjoy health of mind and body, and by the glorious intercession of blessed Mary ever Virgin be delivered from present sorrow and obtain everlasting happiness. Through our Lord Jesus Christ.Lesson iii
From the Treatise of St. Augustine, Bishop, on the Creed, to the Catechumens
Book 3, chapter 4, at the endThrough a woman came death; through a woman, life: through Eve ruin, through Mary salvation. The former, corrupted, followed the deceiver; the latter, uncorrupted, gave birth to the Savior. Eve willingly accepted the drink offered by the serpent and handed it on to her husband; and by their action both deserved the penalty of death. Mary, filled with heavenly grace from above, brought forth life, by which mankind, already dead, can be revived. Who has worked this miracle, if not the Son of the Virgin and the Spouse of virgin who brought fruitfulness to His mother without taking away her integrity?
Let us pray:
Grant, we beseech Thee, O Lord God, to us Thy servants, that we may evermore enjoy health of mind and body, and by the glorious intercession of blessed Mary ever Virgin be delivered from present sorrow and obtain everlasting happiness. Through our Lord Jesus Christ.Lesson iii
Sermon of St. Bernard, Abbot
On the words of the Apocalypse, chapter 12, Signum magnum.It was indeed a serious injury that one man and one woman inflected on us, dearly beloved; but thanks to God, it was also by one Man and one woman that all things were restored, and with a great increase of grace too. For "not like the offense is the gift" (cf. Romans 5:15, 16), on the contrary the benefits received are greater than the loss sustained. Yes, that was how the Maker supreme in good judgment and in kindness plied His craft: what had been bruised, He did not break. Rather, He remade it completely in such a way as to be in more advantage to us: out of the old Adam He made a new Man; Eve He transformed into Mary.
Let us pray:
Grant, we beseech Thee, O Lord God, to us Thy servants, that we may evermore enjoy health of mind and body, and by the glorious intercession of blessed Mary ever Virgin be delivered from present sorrow and obtain everlasting happiness. Through our Lord Jesus Christ.Lesson iii
From the letter of Blessed Ambrose, Bishop
To Pope Siricius Epistle 81. (7 in another numeration) near the middleThat a man was born from a virgin is not beyond belief, since a fountain of water gushed from a rock, and iron floated on water, and a man walked on the sea. Therefore if the waves bore a man, cannot a virgin give birth to a man—and to that man of whom we read. "The Lord shall send them a Savior, a man, and he shall deliver them, and the Lord shall be known to Egypt" (cf. Isaias 19:20)? In the Old Testament, a virgin led the Hebrew hosts through the Red Sea: in the New Testament, a Virgin was chosen as the palace of the heavenly Birth, to bring us salvation.
Let us pray:
Grant, we beseech Thee, O Lord God, to us Thy servants, that we may evermore enjoy health of mind and body, and by the glorious intercession of blessed Mary ever Virgin be delivered from present sorrow and obtain everlasting happiness. Through our Lord Jesus Christ.Lesson iii
From the Commentary of Pope St. Gregory
On the books of Kings (1 Kings 1)"There was a man of Ramathaim-Sophim, of mount Ephraim" (1 Kings 1:1). The name of this mountain can be taken to designate the most blessed Virgin Mary, Mother of God. She is a mountain in as much as, among chosen creatures, the dignity of her calling was above that of any others. Surely Mary was the highest of mountains, was she not, when she heaped up merits beyond all the choirs of Angels, to the very throne of God, that she might be worthy to conceive the eternal Word? It was this mountain whose supreme dignity Isaias was prophesying when he said: "In days to come, the mountain of the Lord's house shall be established as the highest mountain" (Isaias 2:20. Mary was indeed the highest mountain, since her summit gleamed above those of all the Saints.
Let us pray:
Grant, we beseech Thee, O Lord God, to us Thy servants, that we may evermore enjoy health of mind and body, and by the glorious intercession of blessed Mary ever Virgin be delivered from present sorrow and obtain everlasting happiness. Through our Lord Jesus Christ.Lesson iii
From the epistle of Pope Saint Leo to Pulcheria Augusta
Epistle 13, in the first half.And the fulfillment of the mystery of our atonement, which was ordained from all eternity, was not assisted by any types which prefigured the mystery of our redemption, adequate to the mystery itself, because the Holy Ghost had not yet come upon the Virgin, and the power of the Most High had not over-shadowed her: so that Wisdom building herself a house within her undefiled body, the Word became flesh; and the form of God and the form of a slave coming together into one person, the Creator of times was born in time; and He Himself through Whom all things were made, was brought forth in the midst of all things. For if the New Man had not been made in the likeness of sinful flesh, and taken on Him our old nature, and being consubstantial with the Father, had deigned to be consubstantial with His mother also, and being alone free from sin, had united our nature to Him the whole human race would be held in bondage beneath the Devil's yoke.
Let us pray:
Grant, we beseech Thee, O Lord God, to us Thy servants, that we may evermore enjoy health of mind and body, and by the glorious intercession of blessed Mary ever Virgin be delivered from present sorrow and obtain everlasting happiness. Through our Lord Jesus Christ.Lesson iii
A sermon of St. Bernard, Abbot
Sermon of chapter 12 of the Apocalypse, in the first halfMy brothers, let us cast ourselves at Mary's blessed feet with the most devout supplication. Let us embrace them, let us hold fast to her, and not let go until she blesses us; for she has great power. Like the fleece between the dew and the threshing floor, like the woman between the sun and the moon, so Mary stands between Christ and the Church. But perhaps you wonder, not so much at the fleece covered with dew, but at the woman clothed with the sun. Any relationship between the sun and the woman would be striking enough, but this proximity is indeed something to be marveled at. How can so fragile a nature subsist in that excessive heat? You have a right to wonder, saintly Moses; it is only natural that in your curiosity you should want to look more closely. But "remove the sandals from your feet" (Exodus 3:5), put aside the covering of fleshly thoughts, if you wish to draw near.
Let us pray:
Grant, we beseech Thee, O Lord God, to us Thy servants, that we may evermore enjoy health of mind and body, and by the glorious intercession of blessed Mary ever Virgin be delivered from present sorrow and obtain everlasting happiness. Through our Lord Jesus Christ.Lesson iii
A reading from the Commentary of St. Basil, Bishop,
On the Prophet Isaias—chapter 8 near the beginning"I went to the prophetess", he says, "and she conceived and bore a son" (Isaias 8:3) To see Mary in the prophetess whom Isaias approached by spiritual foreknowledge one need only recall the words Mary uttered when she was inspired by the spirit of prophecy: "My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior; because He has regarded the lowliness of His handmaid; for behold, henceforth all generation shall call me blessed" (Luke 1:46-48). In fact, if you bear in mind all that she said, you can only agree that she was indeed the prophetess, since the spirit of Lord came upon her, and the power of the Most High overshadowed her.
Let us pray:
Grant, we beseech Thee, O Lord God, to us Thy servants, that we may evermore enjoy health of mind and body, and by the glorious intercession of blessed Mary ever Virgin be delivered from present sorrow and obtain everlasting happiness. Through our Lord Jesus Christ.In Advent:
O God, who didst will that Thy Word should take flesh, at the message of an angel, in the womb of the Blessed Virgin Mary, grant to us Thy supplicants, that we who believe her to be truly the Mother of God may be helped by her intercession with Thee.
Lesson iii
From the Book of Offices of St. Ambrose, Bishop
Book I, chapter 18The good comrade and guardian of chastity is modesty. And this is the first thing that strikes the reader of the Gospel, as he begins to learn about the Mother of our Lord. Her modesty commend her, and like reliable witness, attests that she is worthy of being chosen for so high an office. Alone in her room, she was silent at the Angel's greeting. His entrance had disturbed her, and her countenance reflected the Virgins agitation at seeing this stranger appear in the form of a man. And so, although she was humble, still out of modesty she did not return his greeting, nor did she gave any answer, until she learned that she must agree to becoming the Mother of God, and then she spoke, not to reject his message but to learn how this marvel was to come about.
Let us pray:
O God, who didst will that Thy Word should take flesh, at the message of an angel, in the womb of the Blessed Virgin Mary, grant to us Thy supplicants, that we who believe her to be truly the Mother of God may be helped by her intercession with Thee.
