O Lord, open my lips.
– And my mouth will proclaim your praise.
Antiphon: Come, let us worship the Lord, for he is already close at hand.
(repeat antiphon*)
Come, let us rejoice in the Lord,
let us acclaim God our salvation.
Let us come before him proclaiming our thanks,
let us acclaim him with songs.
(repeat antiphon*)
For the Lord is a great God,
a king above all gods.
For he holds the depths of the earth in his hands,
and the peaks of the mountains are his.
For the sea is his: he made it;
and his hands formed the dry land.
(repeat antiphon*)
Come, let us worship and bow down,
bend the knee before the Lord who made us;
for he himself is our God and we are his flock,
the sheep that follow his hand.
(repeat antiphon*)
If only, today, you would listen to his voice:
“Do not harden your hearts
as you did at Meribah,
on the day of Massah in the desert,
when your fathers tested me –
they put me to the test,
although they had seen my works.”
(repeat antiphon*)
“For forty years they wearied me,
that generation.
I said: their hearts are wandering,
they do not know my paths.
I swore in my anger:
they will never enter my place of rest.”
(repeat antiphon*)
Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit,
as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be,
world without end.
Amen.
(repeat antiphon*)
Prayers and vows of an exile
Psalm 101 (102)
Lord, let my cry come to you: do not hide your face from me.
Lord, listen to my prayer
and let my cry come to you.
Do not hide your face from me:
whenever I am troubled,
turn to me and hear me.
Whenever I call on you,
hurry to answer me.
For my days vanish like smoke,
and my bones are dry as tinder.
My heart is cut down like grass, it is dry –
I cannot remember to eat.
The sound of my groaning
makes my bones stick to my flesh.
I am lonely as a pelican in the wilderness,
as an owl in the ruins,
as a sparrow alone on a rooftop:
I do not sleep.
All day long my enemies taunt me,
they burn with anger and use my name as a curse.
I make ashes my bread,
I mix tears with my drink,
because of your anger and reproach –
you, who raised me up, have dashed me to the ground.
My days fade away like a shadow:
I wither like grass.
Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit,
as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be,
world without end.
Amen.
Lord, let my cry come to you: do not hide your face from me.
Psalm 101 (102)
Lord, listen to the prayers of the lowly.
But you, Lord, remain for ever
and your name lasts from generation to generation.
You will rise up and take pity on Zion,
for it is time that you pitied it,
indeed it is time:
for your servants love its very stones
and pity even its dust.
Then, Lord, the peoples will fear your name.
All the kings of the earth will fear your glory,
when the Lord has rebuilt Zion
and appeared there in his glory;
when he has listened to the prayer of the destitute
and not rejected their pleading.
These things shall be written for the next generation
and a people yet to be born shall praise the Lord.
Because he has looked down from his high sanctuary,
– the Lord has looked down from heaven to earth –
and heard the groans of prisoners
and freed the children of death
so that they could proclaim the Lord’s name in Zion
and sing his praises in Jerusalem,
where people and kingdoms gather together
to serve the Lord.
Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit,
as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be,
world without end.
Amen.
Lord, listen to the prayers of the lowly.
Psalm 101 (102)
You, Lord, founded the earth, and the heavens are the work of your hands.
He has brought down my strength in the midst of my journey;
he has shortened my days.
I will say, “My God, do not take me away
half way through the days of my life.
Your years last from generation to generation:
in the beginning you founded the earth,
and the heavens are the work of your hands.
They will pass away but you will remain;
all will grow old, like clothing,
and like a cloak you will change them, and they will be changed.
“But you are always the same,
your years will never run out.
The children of your servants shall live in peace,
their descendants will endure in your sight.”
Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit,
as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be,
world without end.
Amen.
You, Lord, founded the earth, and the heavens are the work of your hands.
Listen, nations, to the word of the Lord.
– Take the news to the ends of the earth.
Reading Isaiah 49:14-50:1
For Zion was saying, ‘The Lord has abandoned me,
the Lord has forgotten me.’
Does a woman forget her baby at the breast,
or fail to cherish the son of her womb?
Yet even if these forget,
I will never forget you.
See, I have branded you on the palms of my hands,
Your ramparts are always under my eye.
Your rebuilders make haste,
and your destroyers and despoilers depart.
Look round about you, look,
all are assembling, coming to you.
By my life – it is the Lord who speaks –
you will wear these as your jewels,
they will adorn you as brides are adorned;
for your desolate places and your ruins
and your devastated country
will now be too small for all your inhabitants,
now that your devourers are far away.
Once more they will speak in your hearing,
those sons you thought were lost,
‘This place is too small for me,
give me more space to live in.’
You will then say in your heart,
‘Who has borne me these?
I was childless and barren,
who has brought these up?
I was left all alone,
and now, where do these come from?’
Thus speaks the Lord:
I beckon to the nations
and hoist my signal for the peoples.
They will bring back your sons in the cloak,
they will take your daughters on their shoulders.
Kings will be your foster-fathers,
their queens your nursing mothers.
They will fall prostrate before you, faces to the ground,
and lick the dust at your feet.
You shall then know that I am the Lord;
and that those who hope in me will not be put to shame.
Can spoil be snatched from heroes,
or captives escape from a soldier?
Yes, thus says the Lord:
The hero’s captive will be snatched away,
the soldier’s spoil escape.
I myself will fight with those who fight you,
and I myself will save your children.
I will make your oppressors eat their own flesh,
they shall get as drunk on their own blood as on new wine.
Then all mankind shall know
that I, the Lord, am your saviour
and that your redeemer is the Mighty One of Jacob.
Thus says the Lord:
Where is your mother’s writ of divorce
by which I dismissed her?
Or to which of my creditors
have I sold you?
You were sold for your own crimes,
for your own faults your mother was dismissed.
Reading A commentary on Luke by the Venerable Bede
The Magnificat
And Mary said: My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord, my spirit rejoices in God my Saviour.
The Lord has exalted me by a gift so great, so unheard of, that language is useless to describe it; and the depths of love in my heart can scarcely grasp it. I offer then all the powers of my soul in praise and thanksgiving. As I contemplate his greatness, which knows no limits, I joyfully surrender my whole life, my senses, my judgement, for my spirit rejoices in the eternal Godhead of that Jesus, that Saviour, whom I have conceived in this world of time.
The Almighty has done great things for me, and holy is his name.
Mary looks back to the beginning of her song, where she said: My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord. Only that soul for whom the Lord in his love does great things can proclaim his greatness with fitting praise and encourage those who share her desire and purpose, saying: Join with me in proclaiming the greatness of the Lord; let us extol his name together.
Those who know the Lord, yet refuse to proclaim his greatness and sanctify his name to the limit of their power, will be considered the least in the kingdom of heaven. His name is called holy because in the sublimity of his unique power he surpasses every creature and is far removed from all that he has made.
He has come to the help of his servant Israel for he has remembered his promise of mercy.
In a beautiful phrase Mary calls Israel the servant of the Lord. The Lord came to his aid to save him. Israel is an obedient and humble servant, in the words of Hosea: Israel was a servant, and I loved him.
Those who refuse to be humble cannot be saved. They cannot say with the prophet: See, God comes to my aid; the Lord is the helper of my soul. But anyone who makes himself humble like a little child is greater in the kingdom of heaven.
The promise he made to our fathers, to Abraham and his children for ever.
This does not refer to the physical descendants of Abraham, but to his spiritual children. These are his descendants, sprung not from the flesh only, but who, whether circumcised or not, have followed him in faith. Circumcised as he was, Abraham believed, and this was credited to him as an act of righteousness.
The coming of the Saviour was promised to Abraham and to his descendants for ever. These are the children of promise, to whom it is said: If you belong to Christ, then you are descendants of Abraham, heirs in accordance with the promise.
But it is right that before the birth of the Lord or of John, their mothers should utter prophecies; for just as sin began with a woman, so too does redemption. Through the deceit of one woman, grace perished; the prophecies of two women announce its return to life.
Concluding Prayer
O God, you saw mankind fallen into death and sent your only-begotten Son for its redemption.
We humbly and devotedly proclaim his incarnation:
grant that we may deserve to be companions of our Redeemer.
He lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
God for ever and ever.
Amen.
