Roman Extraordinary (Tridentine)

When from the height of the Lord’s steep words I contemplate their infinite abyss as from the top of a cliff, my mind gets the same impression one gets when gazing at the immensity of the sea… My soul feels dizzy before this word of the Lord: “Blest are the pure of heart for they shall see God.” (Mt 5:8) God gives himself to the gaze of those who have a pure heart. But Saint John says that “no one has ever seen God.” (Jn 1:18) And Saint Paul confirms this idea when he speaks of him whom “no human being has ever seen or can see.” (1 Tim 6:16) God is the abrupt and highly sharpened rock, which does not give even the smallest hold to our imagination. Moses also called God the Inaccessible One… He said that “no man sees the Lord and still lives.” (Ex 33:20) But what? Eternal life is the vision of God, and these pillars of faith certify that this vision is impossible? What an abyss! … If God is life, the person who does not see him does not see life either… But the Lord stimulates this hope. Did he not give Peter the proof? Under the feet of this disciple who was close to drowning, he consolidated and hardened the waves (Mt 4:30).Will the hand of the Word also stretch out over us who are submerged in this abyss, will it strengthen us? Then we shall be reassured, for we shall be firmly led by the hand of the Word. “Blest are the pure of heart for they shall see God.” Such a promise goes beyond our greatest joys; after this happiness, what other happiness could we desire? … The person who sees God has every imaginable good through that vision: life without end, perpetual incorruptibility, inexhaustible joy, unconquerable power, eternal delights, true light, the sweet words of the spirit, incomparable glory, uninterrupted happiness, finally, every good. What great and beautiful hope this beatitude thus offers us!

Roman Extraordinary (Tridentine) Daily Readings – rosary,team

Lord Jesus Christ, once again grant that of us, too, there may be but “one heart and mind” (Acts 4:32) for then there will be “a great calm” (Mk 4:39). My dear listeners, I exhort you to good will and kindness to one another and peace with all. For were we to have charity among ourselves, we would have both peace and the Holy Spirit. Let us undertake to become devout and pray to God… since the apostles persevered in prayer… If we set ourselves to fervent prayer then the Holy Spirit will enter us and say: “Peace be with you! It is I; do not be afraid” (cf. Mk 6:50)… And what ought we to ask God for, my brethren? For all that is for his honor and the salvation of your souls and, in a word, for the help of the Holy Spirit: “Send forth your Spirit and they will be created” (Ps 104[103]:30) – peace and tranquillity… We are to ask for this peace so that the Spirit of peace may come down on us. We should give thanks to God, too, for all his blessings if we want him to grant us those victories that are the beginning of peace. And to obtain the Holy Spirit we should give thanks to God the Father for having first of all sent him upon our Head, Jesus Christ, who is our Lord and His Son… – for “from his fullness we have all received” (cf. Jn 1:16) – and for having sent him upon his apostles that through their hands they might pass him on to us. We should give thanks to the Son: as God he sends the Spirit upon those who prepare themselves to receive him. But, most especially, we should thank him because, as man, he merited for us the grace of receiving this divine Spirit… And how has Jesus Christ merited the Holy Spirit’s coming? When “bowing his head, he gave up his spirit” (Jn 19:30), for, when he gave breathed his last and handed over his spirit to the Father, he merited the Father’s sending his Spirit upon his mystical body.

Roman Extraordinary (Tridentine) Daily Readings – rosary,team

It is right and just that someone who was loved by Christ more than any other should be the object of a very special love by Christ’s friends, all the more so since John has shown such love for us that… he has shared with us the riches of eternal life that he himself received. Indeed, God gave him the keys to wisdom and knowledge (cf Lk 11:52)… John’s God-illumined mind conceived the incomparable height of divine wisdom when he reclined on the Redeemer’s breast during the holy Last Supper meal (Jn 13:25). And because “all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge” (Col 2:3) are within the heart of Jesus, it is from there that he drew and from there that he greatly enriched our wretchedness as people who are poor and generously distributed these goods taken from their source for the salvation of the whole world. And because this blessed John speaks about God in a marvelous way that cannot be compared to that of anyone else, it is only right that the Greeks as well as the Latins have given him the name of “Theologian”. Mary is “Theotokos” because she has truly given birth to God; John is “Theologos” because he saw in an indescribable way that the Word of God was with the Father before the beginning of time and was God (Jn 1:1) and because, too, he spoke about this with extraordinary depth.

Roman Extraordinary (Tridentine) Daily Readings – rosary,team

Christ’s going to the Father is at once a source of sorrow, because it involves his absence; and of joy, because it involves his presence. And out of the doctrine of his Resurrection and Ascension, spring those Christian paradoxes, often spoken of in Scripture, that we are sorrowing, yet always rejoicing; “as having nothing, yet possessing all things” (2Cor 6,10). This, indeed, is our state at present; we have lost Christ and we have found him; we see him not, yet we discern him. We embrace his feet (Mt 28,9), yet he says, “Touch Me not” (Jn 20,17). How is this? it is thus: we have lost the sensible and conscious perception of him; we cannot look on him, hear him, converse with him, follow him from place to place; but we enjoy the spiritual, immaterial, inward, mental, real sight and possession of him; a possession more real and more present than that which the Apostles had in the days of his flesh, because it is spiritual, because it is invisible. We know that the closer any object of this world comes to us, the less we can contemplate it and comprehend it. Christ has come so close to us in the Christian Church (if I may so speak), that we cannot gaze on him or discern him. He enters into us, he claims and takes possession of his purchased inheritance; he does not present himself to us, but he takes us to him. He makes us his members… We see him not, and know not of his presence, except by faith, because he is over us and within us. And thus we may at the same time lament because we are not conscious of his presence… and may rejoice because we know we do possess it… , according to the text, “Whom having not seen… you love; in whom, though now you see him not, yet believing, you rejoice with joy unspeakable and full of glory: receiving the end of your faith, even the salvation of your souls” (1Pt 1,8-9).

Roman Extraordinary (Tridentine) Daily Readings – rosary,team

Mary, in tears, bent down and looked inside the tomb. But she had already seen that it was empty, she had announced the Lord’s disappearance. Why does she still bend down; why does she still want to see? Because love is not satisfied with just one look; love is an ever more ardent quest. She already looked for him, but in vain; she is obstinate, and she ends up discovering him… In the Song of Songs, the Church said of the same Spouse: “On my bed at night I sought him whom my heart loves – I sought him but I did not find him. I will rise then and go about the city; in the streets and crossings I will seek him whom my heart loves. I sought him but I did not find him… Have you seen him whom my heart loves?” (Song 3:1-3) Twice she expresses her disappointment: “I sought him but I did not find him.” But finally, success crowns her efforts: “The watchmen came upon me as they made their rounds of the city: Have you seen him whom my heart loves? I had hardly left them when I found him whom my heart loves.” (Song 3:3-4) And we, when do we seek the Beloved as we lie on our bed? During the brief times of rest during this life, when we sigh because our Redeemer is absent. We seek him during the night, for even if our spirit is already watching over him, our eyes so far only see his shadow. But since we do not find the Beloved there, let us rise; let us make the rounds of the city, that is to say, the holy assembly of the elect. Let us seek him with all our heart; let us look in the streets and crossings, that is to say, in life’s steep passages or on the spacious paths; let us open our eyes and seek there the steps of our Beloved… This desire caused David to say: “Athirst is my soul for God, the living God. When shall I go and behold the face of God?” (Ps 42:3)

Roman Extraordinary (Tridentine) Daily Readings – rosary,team