Maronite Readings

Listen to the prophet announcing our Lord. He compares him to a lamb, a sheep, the most innocent of animals: “Like a lamb led to the slaughter, or a sheep before the shearers, he was silent and opened not his mouth” (Is 53,7)… Our Lord was not compared to a lion when he was led […]

Virtue does not only have one face. Martha and Mary’s example shows us active devotion in the works of the former and a heart’s devout attention to the word of God in the latter. If this attentiveness is joined to a deep faith, it is to be preferred to works: “Mary has chosen the better […]

The senses are full of curiosity; faith is content to know nothing, it… longs to pass its life motionless before the Tabernacle. The senses love riches and honour; faith holds them in horror… “Blessed are the poor” (Mt 5,3). She adores the poverty and lowliness with which Jesus covered his life as though with a […]

Love in yourself what he who loved you has made you to be. Despise in yourself what you yourself have made of yourself. Submit yourself to what is above you; despise what is beneath you. Love yourself in the same way as he loved you who gave himself up for you. Despise yourself for having […]

Unless the mission is oriented by charity, that is, unless it springs from a profound act of divine love, it risks being reduced to mere philanthropic and social activity. In fact, God’s love for every person constitutes the heart of the experience and proclamation of the Gospel, and those who welcome it in turn become […]

Coming forth from the eternal Father’s love, founded in time by Christ the Redeemer and made one in the Holy Spirit, the Church has a saving and an eschatological purpose which can be fully attained only in the future world. But she is already present in this world, and is composed of men, that is, […]

Since I came here, I have had no rest. I have been from village to village and every child not yet baptized I have baptized… But the children would not let me say my office or eat or rest till I had taught them some prayer. It was then that I really began to feel […]

Let us consider the words Jesus addressed on our behalf to his Father, speaking of us: “You have hidden these things from the wise and learned and revealed them to children. Yes, Father, for such was your gracious will.” And indeed, God the Father has revealed to us the mystery hidden in the silence of […]

In his intimate life, God “is love,” (1Jn 4,8) the essential love shared by the three divine Persons: personal love is the Holy Spirit as the Spirit of the Father and the Son. Therefore he “searches even the depths of God,”(1Cor 2,10) as uncreated Love-Gift. It can be said that in the Holy Spirit the […]

I cannot look directly into your light; it is too great for me. But whatever I see, I see through it, like a weak eye that sees what it does by the light of the sun, though it cannot look at the sun itself. My understanding cannot take it in, it is too bright, I […]

Admire God’s wonderful works ; come out of your sleep. Are you only going to admire extraordinary miracles? But are they any greater than those that daily take place before your eyes? Are people astonished because our Lord Jesus Christ satisfied several thousand persons with five loaves (Mt 14,19f) and are not surprised that a […]

When one might have expected she would depart in utter despair, at that very moment the Canaanite woman drew nearer and worshiped, saying, “Lord, help me!”… What is this, O woman? Did you not hear him saying, “I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel”? “I heard,” she says, “but […]

To carry out the will of the Father, Christ inaugurated the Kingdom of heaven on earth and revealed to us the mystery of that kingdom. By His obedience He brought about redemption. The Church, or, in other words, the kingdom of Christ now present in mystery, grows visibly through the power of God in the […]

Peter is considering Christ’s suffering and death from a purely natural and human point of view, and this death seems to him to be unworthy of God, dishonorable for his glory. Christ reproves him as though to say: “But no! Suffering and death are not unworthy of me. Earthly opinions disturb and mislead your judgment. […]

Again we kneel before the manger… Closest to the newborn Savior we see St. Stephen. What secured the first martyr of the Crucified this place of honor? In youthful enthusiasm he accomplished what the Lord said upon his entrance into the world, “A body you have prepared for me. Behold, I come to fulfill your […]

The Lord said: “Whoever welcomes this little child on my account welcomes me.” (Lk 9:48) The smaller our brother is, the more Christ is present. For when we welcome a great personality, we often do so out of vainglory; but the person who welcomes someone unimportant, does so with a pure intention and for Christ. […]

«A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho”… Jericho is the symbol of this world where, after he had been cast out of Paradise, that is to say the heavenly Jerusalem, Adam went down… It was his change of behavior, not of place, that made his exile. And what a change! This man Adam, […]

My soul yearns after the Lord and I seek Him in tears. How could I do other than seek Thee, for Thou first didst seek and find me, and gavest me to delight in Thy Holy Spirit, and my soul fell to loving Thee. Thou seest, O Lord, my grief and my tears. Hadst Thou […]

Before John the Baptist, we have seen many other great and saint prophets, worthy of God, filled with his Holy Spirit, who announced the coming of the Lord and who testified to the Truth. Nevertheless no one said of them what was said about John the Baptist: “among those born of women there has been […]

Our Lord and Master’s precept is salutary: “Whoever holds out till the end will be saved.” He also said: “If you live according to my teaching, you are truly my disciples; then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” (Jn 8:31) We must endure and persevere, beloved brothers. Thus, admitted […]

It is to you, young men and women of the world, that the Council wishes to address its final message. For it is you who are to receive the torch from the hands of your elders and to live in the world at the period of the most gigantic transformations ever realized in its history. […]

The Lord founded the Church by calling together the Twelve, who were to represent the future People of God. Faithful to the Lord’s mandate, after his Ascension…, the Twelve continued to involve others in the duties entrusted to them so that they might continue their ministry. The Risen Lord himself called Paul (cf. Gal 1: […]

Two years before his death the blessed Francis was already ill, suffering especially from his eyes… He had been fifty days or more without being able to stand the sunlight by day nor the brightness of the fire by night. He remained continually in his cell, in the gloom at the interior of the house… […]

The promise attached to the eucharistic table makes us live in Christ and Christ in us, for it is written: “He remains in me and I in him” (Jn 6,56). If Christ remains in us, of what else could we have need? What could we lack? If Christ remains in us what more can we […]

Someone who celebrates alone in the heart of the wilderness, is a great assembly. If two together celebrate among the rocks, thousands and tens of thousands are present there. If three are gathered together, a fourth is among them. If there are six or seven together, twelve thousand thousand are assembled. If they range themselves […]

If only men knew what the love of the Lord is like they would run as one mass to be near Christ and he would warm them all with his grace. His mercy is inexpressible. The Lord loves the repentant sinner and clasps him tenderly to his breast: “Where were you, my child? I have […]

Watch that you don’t despise one of these little ones for, I tell you, their angels see the face of my Father in heaven. » With these words Christ is saying to us something like this : « Be vigilant, take care that you don’t despise people who are simple, poor or weak. As for […]

Now a gray, ordinary day has begun. The solemn hours of the perpetual vows have passed, but God’s great grace has remained in my soul. I feel I am all God’s; I feel I am His child, I feel I am wholly God’s property. I experience this in a way that can be physically sensed. […]

Right from the beginning, God formed the human person in view of his gifts. He chose the patriarchs in view of their salvation. He prepared for himself a people and taught the ignorant to follow God’s path. Then he taught the prophets so as to get the human person accustomed to bearing his Spirit already […]

It is so that our spirit may be detached from its fantasies that the Word invites us to shake off this heavy sleep from the eyes of our souls, so that we may not slide away from the true reality by clinging to what lacks substance. That is why he sets before us an image […]

At the end of our prayers we say: «Through Jesus Christ your Son, our Lord» and not «Through the Holy Spirit». This practice of the universal Church is not without reason. At its root lies the mystery according to which Jesus Christ is the mediator between God and humanity (1Tim 2,5), a priest for ever […]

Bishops, as successors of the apostles, receive from the Lord, to whom was given all power in heaven and on earth, the mission to teach all nations and to preach the Gospel to every creature, so that all men may attain to salvation by faith, baptism and the fulfilment of the commandments.(161) To fulfill this […]

When our Lord was leaving his Apostles, and they were sorrowful, he consoled them by the promise of another Guide and Teacher, on whom they might rely instead of him, and who should be more to them even than he had been… At the same time this new and most gracious Comforter, while bringing a […]

In the beginning, according to God’s plan, God’s Spirit filled the world, “reaching mightily from one end of the earth to the other, and governing all things sweetly.” (Wis 8:1) But where the Spirit’s work of sanctification is concerned, it was on the day of Pentecost that “the Spirit of the Lord filled the world.” […]

Christ really is with us now, whatever be the mode of it. This he says expressly Himself; “Lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the world” (Mt 28,20)… You may be led to explain his declaration thus; “He has come again, but in his Spirit; that is, his Spirit has come […]

Christ dwells in his Church: in its sacraments, liturgy, preaching, and all its activities. Christ remains present among us in a special way in the daily gift of the holy eucharist. That is why the Mass is at the centre and root of christian life. In every Mass the whole Christ is always there, Head […]

Who are you, sweet light, that fills me?… Are you the ray That flashes down from the eternal Judge’s throne And breaks into the night of the soul That had never known itself? (Lk 12,39) Mercifully, relentlessly It penetrates hidden folds. Alarmed at seeing itself, The self makes space for holy fear, The beginning of […]

It is in the “consolation of the Holy Spirit” that the Church increases. The Holy Spirit is the soul of the Church. It is He who explains to the faithful the deep meaning of the teaching of Jesus and of His mystery. It is the Holy Spirit who, today just as at the beginning of […]

Death, having now been conquered and exposed by the Savior on the cross and bound hand and foot, all who are in Christ trample on it as they pass by and, witnessing to Christ, scoff at death, jesting at it and say what has been written against it of old: «O death, where is your […]

If there is true Christian love in a man, let him carry out the precepts of Christ. Who can describe the constraining power of love for God? (cf. Col 3,14) Its majesty and its beauty, who can adequately express? No tongue can tell the heights to which love can uplift us. Love binds us fast […]

In the passage of this Gospel where our Lord says that he is the vine and we are the branches, he is speaking as he who is Head of the Church and of us as his members (Eph 5,30) and as “mediator between God and the human race” (1Tm 2,5). For indeed, the vine and […]

After our Lord had been raised from the dead and the apostles had been endowed with power from on high by the coming of the Holy Spirit (Lk 24:49), they were filled with certainty about everything and they had perfect knowledge. Then they, who all possessed equally and each one in particular the Gospel of […]

For I know well the spring that flows and runs, Although it is night. That eternal spring is hidden, For I know well where it has its rise, Although it is night. I do not know its origin, for it hasn’t one, But I know that every origin has come from it, Although it is […]

Moses wrote in the Torah: “God made humankind in his image and likeness.” (Gen 1:26)… So it is up to us to reflect for our God, for our Father, the image of his holiness… Let us not be painters of a strange image… And so that we don’t bring in to ourselves the image of […]

Our Lord said: “Blessed are the poor in spirit” (Mt 5,3), by which eternal Wisdom shows us how the workers of the gospel should avoid all flamboyance in deed and word and adopt a humble, easy, straightforward manner of acting and speaking. It’s the devil who delivers us over to the tyranny of wanting to […]

Our Lord has allowed no doubt or uncertainty regarding so great a mystery… Hear him revealing to the apostles everything we need to know to believe: “I am the way, the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. If you know me then you will also know my Father… […]

The first of sign of love teaches us that Christ gave his flesh to be our soul’s food and his blood to be our soul’s drink. Such a marvel of love had never been heard of in previous times. Now it is the nature of love always to give and to take, to love and […]

All of us who believe in Jesus Christ are said to be “living stones” according to the statement of scripture when it says: “Like living stones be yourselves built into a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ” (1Pt 2,5). We have learned to notice […]

God and Father of all who believe in you, you promised Abraham that he would become the father of all nations (Gn 12,3), and through the death and resurrection of Christ you fulfil that promise: everywhere throughout the world you increase your chosen people. May we respond to your call by joyfully accepting your invitation […]