Saturday, January 14 : St Hildegard of Bingen

Praise to you Spirit of fire! to you who sound the timbrel and the lyre. Your music sets our minds ablaze! The strength of our souls awaits your coming in the tent of meeting. There the mounting will gives the soul its savor and desire is its lantern. Insight invokes you in a cry full of sweetness, while reason builds you temples as she labors at her golden crafts. But sword in hand you stand poised to prune shoots of the poisoned apple — scions of the darkest murder — when mist overshadows the will. Adrift in desires the soul is spinning everywhere. But the mind is a bond to bind will and desire. When the heart yearns to look the Evil One in the eye, to stare down the jaws of iniquity, swiftly you burn it in consuming fire. Such is your wish. And when reason doing ill falls from her place, you restrain and constrain her as you will in the flow of experience until she obeys you. And when the Evil One brandishes his sword against you, you break it in his own heart. For so you did to the first lost angel, tumbling the tower of his arrogance to hell. And there you built a second tower — traitors and sinners its stones. In repentance they confessed all their crafts. So all beings that live by you praise your outpouring like a priceless salve upon festering sores, upon fractured limbs. You convert them into priceless gems! Now gather us all to yourself and in your mercy guide us into the paths of justice.
Roman Catholic Ordinary Calendar – rosary,team