It’s been a while, eh? I’ve been thinking over this post for a few days now, waiting for a chance to actually sit down and think it through at a keyboard. The reading for Midday Prayer in the Liturgy of the Hours for this past Friday struck me as another one where you can really get an awful lot more out of it by putting an accent on certain words rather than with just a flat reading. First, without the accent of which I’m thinking:
Yet it was our infirmities that he bore,
our sufferings that he endured,
While we thought him as stricken,
as one smitten by God and afflicted.
But he was pierced for our offenses,
crushed for our sins.
Upon him was the chastisement that makes us whole,
by his stripes we were healed.
I think just about any Christian, and particularly any Catholic, should be familiar with this reading from Isaiah 53:4-5. In the story of the Suffering Servant none in my mind are more poignant. Come Good Friday as you are staring at the Cross, think back to this and remember. But now look at the accents and see how this jumps out:
Yet it was our infirmities that he bore,
our sufferings that he endured,
While we thought him as stricken,
as one smitten by God and afflicted.
But he was pierced for our offenses,
crushed for our sins.
Upon him was the chastisement that makes us whole,
by his stripes we were healed.
Notice the symmetry in almost all of the highlighted lines – “his – our”, “he – we”. Of all the things he has done, we are the beneficiaries. Of all the things we have done, he accepts the chastisement. Freely. Willingly. Intentionally. As Archbishop Fulton Sheen pointed out in his Life of Christ, Jesus was the only man ever born with the express intent of dying. You might notice one other thing – we are responsible for doing none of the good here but yet we are the recipients of all those benefits. We are not worthy, we cannot be worthy, yet receive them we do.
Take time this Holy Week to contemplate how freely this gift was given, how costly this gift is, and how unworthy we are to receive it. Keep all three in balance, for all three are important and all three feed on and magnify the others. Let us say with the centurion, “Domine, non sum dignus…”
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The beauty of the Psalms and Canticles in the Divine Office often strike me. Of course, this is why the Church also includes Psalms in the Mass. They express, succintly, an idea or image.
I can’t believe I am saying this, but I also give a tip of the hat to OCP. The setting for Psalm 22 this Sunday was beautifully melancholy. I was privledged to sing it here and the minor key made the lament real. I could almost hear our Lord saying it on the Cross!
Wow. I think that’s the first time I can recall someone giving praise to OCP. Then again even a stopped clock is right twice a day.
Seriously though, they do have some good stuff in there – it’s just the drek that makes up so much of it that obscures the good from vision.
Your point, though, about the Psalms and Canticles is a good one. They are, in fact, one driving reason I’d like to learn the older Breviarium – they pack into a month all of the Psalms which the new one takes several months to cover. But I’m sure that’s just nostalgia.
To my knowledge, if one includes Daytime Prayer, one gets all psalms in the four week psatler in English. Although a few are redacted a bit.
You’re correct – my mistake was shifting too far to one side. The Breviarium completes the full Psalter in one week, whereas the LoTH does so in four, redacts some and I believe skips a few. According to the review at A Minor Friar a big addition to the LoTH is the OT/NT canticles. If time were freely available I think I’d want to pray both the LoTH and the Breviarium…
I do want to thank you for this post. I read this reading on Good Friday, and having seen your post, I opted to use similar emphasis; pushing the words “our” and “he.”
You have no idea how glad I am to read that something I’ve written has helped in any way. I (obviously) don’t get a lot of comments here and I sometimes wonder, but it doesn’t take much to keep me going. I hope your Triduum was most blessed indeed!
Well, I enjoy coming to our site, and commenting from time to time. This post was perfectly timed, as I said, because it helped me put some real feeling behind the reading.
I had a tremendous Triduum and an even more fantastic Easter Vigil. My home parish received 8, in various ways (a couple of adolescent baptisms, a couple adult baptisms, some converts from other Christian sects) and it was, as the Vigil always is, inspiring and uplifting.
I hope your Easter is going well too.