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Ribbon Placement:
Liturgy of the Hours Vol. II:
Ordinary: 1045
Proper of Seasons: 675
Psalter: Friday, Week II, 1321

Office of Readings for Friday in Week 2 of Easter

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.

PSALMODY

Ant. 1 Lord, in your anger, do not punish me, alleluia.

Psalm 38
A sinner in extreme danger prays earnestly to God
All his friends were standing at a distance (Luke 23:49).

I

O Lord, do not rebuke me in your anger;
do not punish me, Lord, in your rage.
Your arrows have sunk deep in me;
your hand has come down upon me.

Through your anger all my body is sick:
through my sin, there is no health in my limbs.
My guilt towers higher than my head;
it is a weight too heavy to bear.

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. Lord, in your anger, do not punish me, alleluia.

Ant. 2 Lord, you know all my longings, alleluia.

II

My wounds are foul and festering,
the result of my own folly.
I am bowed and brought to my knees.
I go mourning all the day long.

All my frame burns with fever;
all my body is sick.
Spent and utterly crushed,
I cry aloud in anguish of heart.

O Lord, you know all my longing:
my groans are not hidden from you.
My heart throbs, my strength is spent;
the very light has gone from my eyes.

My friends avoid me like a leper;
those closest to me stand afar off.
Those who plot against my life lay snares;
those who seek my ruin speak of harm,
planning treachery all the day long.

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. Lord, you know all my longings, alleluia.

Ant. 3 I confess my guilt to you, Lord; do not abandon me, for you are my savior, alleluia.

III

But I am like the deaf who cannot hear,
like the dumb unable to speak.
I am like a man who hears nothing,
in whose mouth is no defense.

I count on you, O Lord:
it is you, Lord God, who will answer.
I pray: “Do not let them mock me,
those who triumph if my foot should slip.”

For I am on the point of falling
and my pain is always before me.
I confess that I am guilty
and my sin fills me with dismay.

My wanton enemies are numberless
and my lying foes are many.
They repay me evil for good
and attack me for seeking what is right.

O Lord, do not forsake me!
My God, do not stay afar off!
Make haste and come to my help,
O Lord, my God, my savior!

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

Do not abandon us, Lord our God; you did not forget the broken body of your Christ, nor the mockery his love received. We, your children, are weighed down with sin; give us the fullness of your mercy.

Ant. I confess my guilt to you, Lord; do not abandon me, for you are my savior, alleluia.

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.

Christ Jesus you have risen from the dead, alleluia.
— Let the heavens and the earth rejoice, alleluia.

READINGS

First reading
From the book of Revelation
4:1-11
The vision of God

I, John, had another vision: above me there was an open door to heaven, and I heard the trumpetlike voice which had spoken to me before. It said, “Come up here and I will show you what must take place in time to come.”

At once I was caught up in ecstasy . A throne was standing there in heaven, and on the throne was seated One whose appearance had a gemlike sparkle as of jasper and carnelian. Around the throne was a rainbow as brilliant as emerald. Surrounding this throne were twenty-four other thrones upon which were seated twenty-four elders; they were clothed in white garments and had crowns of gold on their heads. From the throne came flashes of lightning and peals of thunder; before it burned seven flaming torches, the seven spirits of God.

The floor around the throne was like a sea of glass that was crystal-clear.
At the very center, around the throne itself, stood four living creatures covered with eyes front and back. The first creature resembled a lion, the second an ox; the third had the face of a man, while the fourth looked like an eagle in flight. Each of the four living creatures had six wings and eyes all over, inside and out.

Day and night, without pause, they sing:
“Holy, holy, holy, is the Lord God Almighty,
He who was, and who is, and who is to come!”

Whenever these creatures give glory and honor and praise to the One seated on the throne, who lives forever and ever, the twenty-four elders fall down before the One seated on the throne, and worship him who lives forever and ever. They throw down their crowns before the throne and sing:

“O Lord our God, you are worthy
to receive glory and honor and power!
For you have created all things;
by your will they came to be and were made!”

RESPONSORY Revelation 4:8; Isaiah 6:3

Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty, he who was, and who is, and who is to come;
— all the earth is full of his glory, alleluia.

The seraphim cried out to one another: Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts.
— All the earth is full of his glory, alleluia.

Second reading
From a sermon by Saint Theodore the Studite
The precious and life-giving cross of Christ

How precious the gift of the cross, how splendid to contemplate! In the cross there is no mingling of good and evil, as in the tree of paradise: it is wholly beautiful to behold and good to taste. The fruit of this tree is not death but life, not darkness but light. This tree does not cast us out of paradise, but opens the way for our return.

This was the tree on which Christ, like a king on a chariot, destroyed the devil, the Lord of death, and freed the human race from his tyranny. This was the tree upon which the Lord, like a brave warrior wounded in his hands, feet and side, healed the wounds of sin that the evil serpent had inflicted on our nature. A tree once caused our death, but now a tree brings life. Once deceived by a tree, we have now repelled the cunning serpent by a tree. What an astonishing transformation! That death should become life, that decay should become immortality, that shame should become glory! Well might the holy Apostle exclaim: Far be it from me to glory except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world! The supreme wisdom that flowered on the cross has shown the folly of worldly wisdom’s pride. The knowledge of all good, which is the fruit of the cross, has cut away the shoots of wickedness.

The wonders accomplished through this tree were foreshadowed clearly even by the mere types and figures that existed in the past. Meditate on these, if you are eager to learn. Was it not the wood of a tree that enabled Noah, at God’s command, to escape the destruction of the flood together with his sons, his wife, his sons’ wives and every kind of animal? And surely the rod of Moses prefigured the cross when it changed water into blood, swallowed up the false serpents of Pharaoh’s magicians, divided the sea at one stroke and then restored the waters to their normal course, drowning the enemy and saving God’s own people? Aaron’s rod, which blossomed in one day in proof of his true priesthood, was another figure of the cross, and did not Abraham foreshadow the cross when he bound his son Isaac and placed him on the pile of wood?

By the cross death was slain and Adam was restored to life. The cross is the glory of all the apostles, the crown of the martyrs, the sanctification of the saints. By the cross we put on Christ and cast aside our former self. By the cross we, the sheep of Christ, have been gathered into one flock, destined for the sheepfolds of heaven.

RESPONSORY

A tree of priceless value stands in the center of paradise;
— by his own death on this tree, our Savior overcame death for us, alleluia.

Among the cedars of the forest, this one surpasses all the others.
— By his own death on this tree, our Savior overcame death for us, alleluia.

CONCLUDING PRAYER

O God,
hope and light of the sincere,
we humbly entreat you to dispose our hearts
to offer you worthy prayer and ever to extol you
by dutiful proclamation of your praise.
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.