own sins: let us weep over the sufferings of our Victim, for our sins caused him to suffer and die. Everything around us urges us to mourn. The images of the Saints, the very crucifix on our Altar, are veiled from our sight. The Church is oppressed with grief. During the first four weeks of Lent, she compassionated her Jesus fasting in the desert; his coming Sufferings and Crucifixion and Death are what now fill her with anguish. We read in to-day's Gospel, that the Jews threaten to stone the Son of God as a blasphemer: but his hour is not yet come. He is obliged to flee and hide himself. It is to express this deep humiliation, that the Church veils the Cross. A God hiding himself, that he may evade the anger of men,-what a mystery! Is it weakness? Is it, that he fears death? No, we shall soon see him going out to meet his enemies: but, at present, he hides himself from them, because all that had been prophesied regarding him has not been fulfilled. Besides, his death is not to be by stoning; he is to die upon a Cross, the tree of malediction,which, from that time forward, is to be the Tree of Life. Let us humble ourselves, as we see the Creator of heaven and earth thus obliged to hide himself from men, who are bent on his destruction! Let us go back, in thought, to the sad day of the first sin, when Adam and Eve hid themselves because a guilty conscience told them they were naked. Jesus is come to assure us of our being pardoned! and lo! he hides himself, not because he is naked,-He that is to the Saints the garb of holiness and immortality, -but because he made himself weak, that he might make us strong. Our First Parents sought to hide themselves from the sight of God; Jesus hides himself from the eye of men; but it will not be thus for The day will come, when sinners, from whose anger he now flees, will pray to the mountains that they fall on them to shield them from his gaze; but their ever. prayer will not be granted, and they shall see the Son of man coming in the clouds of heaven, with much power and majesty.1 This Sunday is called Passion Sunday, because the Church begins, on this day, to make the Sufferings of our Redeemer her chief thought. It is called also, Judica, from the first word of the Introit of the Mass; and again, Neomania, that is, the Sunday of the new (or, the Easter) moon, because it always falls after the new moon which regulates the Feast of Easter Day. In the Greek Church, this Sunday goes under the simple name of the Fifth Sunday of the Holy Fests. MASS. At Rome, the Station is in the Basilica of St. Peter. The importance of this Sunday, which never gives way to any Feast, no matter what its solemnity may be, required that the place for the assembly of the Faithful should be in one of the chief Sanctuaries of the Holy City. The Introit is taken from the first verses of the 42nd Psalm. The Messias appeals to God's tribunal, and protests against the sentence about to be pronounced against him by men. He likewise expresses his confidence in his Father's help, who, after his Sufferings and Death, will lead him in triumph into the Holy Mount. INTROIT. Judge me, O God, and distinguish my cause from the nation that is not holy; de Judica me, Deus, et discerne causam meam de gente non sancta: ab ho 1 St. Matth. xxiv. 30. mine iniquo et doloso eripe me: quia tu es Deus meus, et fortitudo mea. Ps. Emitte lucem tuam et veritatem tuam ipsa me deduxerunt et adduxerunt in montem sanctum tuum, et in tabernacula tua. Judica me. liver me from the unjust and deceitful man; for thou art my God and my strength. Ps. Send forth thy light and thy truth; for they have conducted me, and brought me to thy holy mount, and into thy tabernacles. Judge me, &c. The Gloria Patri is not said during Passiontide and Holy Week, (unless a Saint's Feast be kept,) but the Introit is repeated immediately after the Psalm. In the Collect, the Church prays that there may be produced, in her children, that total reformation, which the holy Season of Lent is intended to produce. This reformation is such, that it will not only subject the body to the spirit, but preserve also the spirit itself from those delusions and passions, to which it has been, hitherto, more or less, a slave. COLLECT. Quæsumus, omnipotens Deus, familiam tuam propitius respice: ut, te largiente, regatur in corpore, et, te servante, custodiatur in mente. Per Dominum. Mercifully look down on thy people, we beseech thee, O Almighty God, that, by thy bounty and protection, they may be governed and guarded both in body and soul. Through, &c. Then is added one of the following Prayers: AGAINST THE PERSECUTORS OF THE CHURCH. Ecclesiæ tuæ, quæsu- Mercifully hear, we beseech mus, Domine, preces, placatus admitte: ut, destructis adversitatibus et erroribus universis, secura tibi serviat libertate. Per Dominum. thee, O Lord, the prayers of thy Church: that, all oppositions and errors being removed, she may serve thee with a secure liberty. Through, &c. FOR THE POPE. O God, the Pastor and Ruler of all the Faithful, look down, in thy mercy, on thy servant N., whom thou hast appointed Pastor over thy Church; and grant, we beseech thee, that both by word and example, he may edify all those that are under his charge and, with the flock intrusted to him, arrive at length at eternal happiness. Through, &c. Deus, omnium fidelium Pastor et Rector, famulum tuum N., quem Pastorem Ecclesiæ tuæ præesse voluisti, propitius respice: da ei, quæsumus, verbo et exemplo, quibus præest, proficere; ut ad vitam, una cum grege sibi credito, perveniat sempiternam. Per Dominum. EPISTLE. Lesson of the Epistle of St. Paul the Apostle to the Hebrews. Ch. IX. Brethren : Christ being come, an High Priest of the good things to come, by a greater and more perfect tabernacle not made with hands, that is, not of this creation, neither by the blood of goats or of the calves, but by his own Blood, entered once into the Holies, having obtained eternal redemption. For, if the blood of goats and of oxen, and the ashes of an heifer being sprinkled, sanctify such as are defiled, to the cleansing of the flesh; how much more shall the Blood of Christ (who by the Holy Ghost offered himself unspotted unto God), cleanse Our conscience from dead works to serve the living God? And, therefore, he is Lectio Epistolæ beati Pauli Apostoli ad Hebræos. Cap. IX. Fratres Christus assistens Pontifex futurorum bonorum, per amplius et perfectius tabernaculum non manufactum, id est, non hujus creationis: neque per sanguinem hircorum aut vitulorum, sed per proprium Sanguinem introivit semel in Sancta, æterna redemptione inventa. Si enim sanguis hircorum et taurorum, et cinis vitulæ aspersus inquinatos sanctificat ad emundationem carnis: quanto magis Sanguis Christi, qui per Spiritum Sanctum semetipsum obtulit immaculatum Deo, emundabit conscientiam nostram ab operibus mortuis, ad serviendum Deo viventi? Et ideo novi Testamenti mediator the mediator of the New est ut morte intercedente, Testament; that by means in redemptionem earum of his death, for the redempprævaricationum, quæ erant tion of those transgressions sub priori Testamento, re- which were under the former promissionem accipiant, qui testament, they that are called vocati sunt, æternæ hære- may receive the promise of ditatis in Christo Jesu eternal inheritance. Domino nostro. This It is by Blood alone that man is to be redeemed. He has offended God. This God cannot be appeased by anything short of the extermination of his rebellious creature, who, by shedding his blood, will give an earnest of his repentance and his entire submission to the Creator, against whom he dared to rebel. Otherwise, the justice of God must be satisfied by the sinner's suffering eternal punishment. truth was understood by all the people of the ancient world, and all confessed it by shedding the blood of victims, as in the sacrifices of Abel, at the very commencement of the world; in the hecatombs of Greece; in the countless immolations whereby Solomon dedicated the Temple. And yet, God thus speaks to his people: Hear, O my people, and I will speak: 0 Israel, and I will testify to thee: I am God thy God. I will not reprove thee for thy sacrifices, and thy burnt-offerings are always in my sight. I will not take calves out of thy house, nor hegoats out of thy flocks. I need them not: for all the beasts of the woods are mine. If I should be hungry, I would not tell thee; for the world is mine, and the fulness thereof. Shall I eat the flesh of bullocks? or shall I drink the blood of goats?1 Thus, God commands the blood of victims to be offered to him, and, at the same time, declares that neither it nor they are precious in his sight. Is this a contra 1 Ps. xlix. 7-13. |