This is the Liturgy of the Hours for August 20. Your local date is .
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Ribbon Placement:
Liturgy of the Hours Vol. IV:
Ordinary: 615
Psalter: Saturday, Week IV, 1214
Common of Doctors: 1777 (not used)
Common of Holy Men: 1821 (verse before the readings)
Proper of Seasons: 145 (first reading)
Proper of Saints: 1333 (second reading, responsory, concluding prayer)
Christian Prayer:
Does not contain Office of Readings
Office of Readings for Saturday in Ordinary Time, for the Memorial of Saint Bernard, Abbot and Doctor
God, come to my assistance.
— Lord, make haste to help me.
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. Alleluia.
HYMN
O God, our help in ages past,
Our hope for years to come,
Our shelter from the stormy blast,
And our eternal home.
Beneath the shadow of Your throne
Your saints have dwelt secure;
Sufficient is your arm alone,
And our defense is sure.
Before the hills in order stood,
Or earth received her frame,
From everlasting you are God,
To endless years the same.
A thousand ages in your sight
Are like an evening gone;
Short as the watch that ends the night
Before the rising sun.
Time, like an ever rolling stream,
Bears all our lives away;
They fly, forgotten, as a dream
Dies at the opening day.
O God, our help in ages past,
Our hope for years to come,
Be now our guard while troubles last,
And our eternal home.
𝄞 | "O God, Our Help in Ages Past" by Melinda Kirigin-Voss, Vince Clark • Title: O God, Our Help in Ages Past; Text: Based on Psalm 90; Isaac Watts, 1674-1748, Psalms of David..., 1719, alt.; Tune: ST. ANNE, CM; later form of melody (rhythm adapted), attr. to William Croft, 1678-1727, A Supplement to the New Version of Psalms, 1708; Artist: Melinda Kirigin-Voss, Vince Clark; Copyright 2016 Surgeworks Inc. • Albums that contain this Hymn: Divine Office |
PSALMODY
Ant. 1 The Lord summons heaven and earth to witness his judgment on his people.
Psalm 50
Genuine love of God
I have come not to abolish the law but to bring it to perfection (see Matthew 5:17).
I
The God of gods, the Lord,
has spoken and summoned the earth,
from the rising of the sun to its setting.
Out of Zion’s perfect beauty he shines.
Our God comes, he keeps silence no longer.
Before him fire devours,
around him tempest rages.
He calls on the heavens and the earth
to witness his judgment of his people.
“Summon before me my people
who made covenant with me by sacrifice.”
The heavens proclaim his justice,
for God himself is the judge.
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.
Ant. The Lord summons heaven and earth to witness his judgment on his people.
Ant. 2 Come to me in your distress, and I will save you.
II
“Listen, my people, I will speak;
Israel, I will testify against you,
for I am God your God.
I accuse you, lay the charge before you.
I find no fault with your sacrifices,
your offerings are always before me.
I do not ask more bullocks from your farms,
nor goats from among your herds.
For I own all the beasts of the forest,
beasts in their thousands on my hills.
I know all the birds in the sky,
all that moves in the field belongs to me.
Were I hungry, I would not tell you,
for I own the world and all it holds.
Do you think I eat the flesh of bulls,
or drink the blood of goats?
Pay your sacrifice of thanksgiving to God
and render him your votive offerings.
Call on me in the day of distress.
I will free you and you shall honor me.”
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.
Ant. Come to me in your distress, and I will save you.
Ant. 3 A sacrifice of praise will give me glory.
III
But God says to the wicked:
“But how can you recite my commandments
and take my covenant on your lips,
you who despise my law
and throw my words to the winds,
you who see a thief and go with him;
who throw in your lot with adulterers,
who unbridle your mouth for evil
and whose tongue is plotting crime,
you who sit and malign your brother
and slander your own mother’s son.
You do this, and should I keep silence?
Do you think that I am like you?
Mark this, you who never think of God,
lest I seize you and you cannot escape;
a sacrifice of thanksgiving honors me
and I will show God’s salvation to the upright.”
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.
Psalm-prayer
Father, because Jesus, your servant, became obedient even unto death, his sacrifice was greater than all holocausts of old. Accept the sacrifice of praise we offer you through him and may we show the effects of it in our lives by striving to do your will until our whole life becomes adoration in Spirit and truth.
Ant. A sacrifice of praise will give me glory.
Sacred Silence (indicated by a bell) – a moment to reflect and receive in our hearts the full resonance of the voice of the Holy Spirit and to unite our personal prayer more closely with the word of God and public voice of the Church.
The Lord led this holy man along a sure path.
— He showed him the kingdom of God.
READINGS
First reading
From the book of the prophet Isaiah
37:21-35
Isaiah prophesies about the Assyrian king
Isaiah, son of Amoz, sent this message to Hezekiah: Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel: In answer to your prayer for help against Sennacherib, king of Assyria, this is the word the Lord has spoken concerning him:
She despises you, laughs you to scorn,
the virgin daughter Zion;
Behind you she wags her head,
daughter Jerusalem.
Whom have you insulted and blasphemed,
against whom have you raised your voice
And lifted up your eyes on high?
Against the Holy One of Israel!
Through your servants you have insulted the Lord:
You said, “With my many chariots
I climbed the mountain heights,
the recesses of Lebanon;
I cut down its lofty cedars,
its choice cypresses;
I reached the remotest heights,
its forest park.
I dug wells and drank water in foreign lands;
I dried up with the soles of my feet all the rivers of Egypt.”
Have you not heard?
Long ago I prepared it,
From days of old I planned it,
now I have brought it to pass:
That you should reduce fortified cities
into heaps of ruins,
While their inhabitants, shorn of power,
are dismayed and ashamed,
Becoming like the plants of the field,
like the green growth,
like the scorched grass on the housetops.
I am aware whether you stand or sit;
I know whether you come or go,
and also your rage against me.
Because of your rage against me
and your fury which has reached my ears,
I will put my hook in your nose
and my bit in your mouth,
and make you return the way you came.
This shall be a sign for you:
this year you shall eat the aftergrowth,
next year, what grows of itself;
But in the third year, sow and reap,
plant vineyards and eat their fruit!
The remaining survivors of the house of Judah
shall again strike root below
and bear fruit above.
For out of Jerusalem shall come a remnant,
and from Mount Zion, survivors.
The zeal of the Lord of hosts shall do this.
Therefore, thus says the Lord concerning the king of Assyria: He shall not reach this city, nor shoot an arrow at it, nor come before it with a shield, nor cast up siegeworks against it. He shall return by the same way he came, without entering the city, says the Lord. I will shield and save this city for my own sake, and for the sake of my servant David.
RESPONSORY Isaiah 52:9-10
The Lord has comforted his people;
he has redeemed Jerusalem,
— and all the ends of the earth shall see the saving power of God.
The Lord has bared his holy arm
in the sight of all the nations.
— And all the ends of the earth shall see the saving power of God.
Second reading
From a sermon by Saint Bernard, abbot
I love because I love, I love that I may love
Love is sufficient of itself, it gives pleasure by itself and because of itself. It is its own merit, its own reward. Love looks for no cause outside itself, no effect beyond itself. Its profit lies in its practice. I love because I love, I love that I may love. Love is a great thing so long as it continually returns to its fountainhead, flows back to its source, always drawing from there the water which constantly replenishes it. Of all the movements, sensations and feelings of the soul, love is the only one in which the creature can respond to the Creator and make some sort of similar return however unequal though it be. For when God loves, all he desires is to be loved in return; the sole purpose of his love is to be loved, in the knowledge that those who love him are made happy by their love of him.
The Bridegroom’s love, or rather the love which is the Bridegroom, asks in return nothing but faithful love. Let the beloved, then, love in return. Should not a bride love, and above all, Love’s bride? Could it be that Love not be loved?
Rightly then does she give up all other feelings and give herself wholly to love alone; in giving love back, all she can do is to respond to love. And when she has poured out her whole being in love, what is that in comparison with the unceasing torrent of that original source? Clearly, lover and Love, soul and Word, bride and Bridegroom, creature and Creator do not flow with the same volume; one might as well equate a thirsty man with the fountain.
What then of the bride’s hope, her aching desire, her passionate love, her confident assurance? Is all this to wilt just because she cannot match stride for stride with her giant, any more than she can vie with honey for sweetness, rival the lamb for gentleness, show herself as white as the lily, burn as bright as the sun, be equal in love with him who is Love? No. It is true that the creature loves less because she is less. But if she loves with her whole being, nothing is lacking where everything is given. To love so ardently then is to share the marriage bond; she cannot love so much and not be totally loved, and it is in the perfect union of two hearts that complete and total marriage consists. Or are we to doubt that the soul is loved by the Word first and with a greater love?
RESPONSORY Psalm 31:20; 36:9
Lord, how great are the hidden treasures of your goodness,
— which you have stored up for those who fear you.
They are filled with the bounty of your house; and you give them to drink from the stream of your delights.
— Which you have stored up for those who fear you.
CONCLUDING PRAYER
O God,
who made the Abbot Saint Bernard
a man consumed with zeal for your house
and a light shining and burning in your Church,
grant, through his intercession,
that we may be on fire with the same spirit
and walk always as children of light.
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.
ACCLAMATION (at least in the communal celebration)
Let us praise the Lord.
— And give him thanks.