THE LITURGY OF THE WORD

Daily Mass Readings

Memorial of Saints Andrew Kim Tae-gŏn

Priest

and

Paul Chŏng Ha-sang and Companions

Martyrs

Antiphon

The blood of the holy Martyrs

was poured out for Christ upon the earth;

therefore they have gained everlasting rewards.

Collect

O God, who have been pleased to increase

your adopted children in all the world,

and who made the blood of the Martyrs

Saint Andrew Kim Tae-gon and his companions

a most fruitful seed of Christians,

grant that we may be defended by their help

and profit always from their example.

Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son,

who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit,

God, forever and ever.

Amen.

Reading

PRV 21:1-6, 10-13

Like a stream is the king’s heart in the hand of the LORD;

wherever it pleases him, he directs it.

All the ways of a man may be right in his own eyes,

but it is the LORD who proves hearts.

To do what is right and just

is more acceptable to the LORD than sacrifice.

Haughty eyes and a proud heart–

the tillage of the wicked is sin.

The plans of the diligent are sure of profit,

but all rash haste leads certainly to poverty.

Whoever makes a fortune by a lying tongue

is chasing a bubble over deadly snares.

The soul of the wicked man desires evil;

his neighbor finds no pity in his eyes.

When the arrogant man is punished, the simple are the wiser;

when the wise man is instructed, he gains knowledge.

The just man appraises the house of the wicked:

there is one who brings down the wicked to ruin.

He who shuts his ear to the cry of the poor

will himself also call and not be heard.

Responsorial Psalm

PS 119:1, 27, 30, 34, 35, 44

R. Guide me, Lord, in the way of your commands.

Blessed are they whose way is blameless,

who walk in the law of the LORD.

R. Guide me, Lord, in the way of your commands.

Make me understand the way of your precepts,

and I will meditate on your wondrous deeds.

R. Guide me, Lord, in the way of your commands.

The way of truth I have chosen;

I have set your ordinances before me.

R. Guide me, Lord, in the way of your commands.

Give me discernment, that I may observe your law

and keep it with all my heart.

R. Guide me, Lord, in the way of your commands.

Lead me in the path of your commands,

for in it I delight.

R. Guide me, Lord, in the way of your commands.

And I will keep your law continually,

forever and ever.

R. Guide me, Lord, in the way of your commands.

 

Alleluia

LK 11:28

R. Alleluia, alleluia.

Blessed are those who hear the word of God

and observe it.

R. Alleluia, alleluia.

Gospel

LK 8:19-21

The mother of Jesus and his brothers came to him

but were unable to join him because of the crowd.

He was told, 

“Your mother and your brothers are standing outside

and they wish to see you.”

He said to them in reply, 

“My mother and my brothers 

are those who hear the word of God and act on it.”

SAINT OF THE DAY

September 20

Saints Andrew Kim Taegon, Paul Chong Hasang, and Companions

Saint Andrew Kim Taegon 

(1821 - 1846)

Saint Paul Chong Hasang and Companions 

(d. between 1839 - 1867)

The first native Korean priest, Andrew Kim Taegon was the son of Christian converts. Following his baptism at the age of 15, Andrew traveled 1,300 miles to the seminary in Macao, China. After six years, he managed to return to his country through Manchuria. That same year he crossed the Yellow Sea to Shanghai and was ordained a priest. Back home again, he was assigned to arrange for more missionaries to enter by a water route that would elude the border patrol. He was arrested, tortured, and finally beheaded at the Han River near Seoul, the capital.

Andrew's father Ignatius Kim, was martyred during the persecution of 1839, 

and was beatified in 1925. Paul Chong Hasang, a lay apostle and married man, 

also died in 1839 at age 45.

Among the other martyrs in 1839 was Columba Kim, an unmarried woman of 26. She was put in prison, pierced with hot tools and seared with burning coals. She and her sister Agnes were disrobed and kept for two days in a cell with condemned criminals, but were not molested. After Columba complained about the indignity, no more women were subjected to it. The two were beheaded. Peter Ryou, a boy of 13, had his flesh so badly torn that he could pull off pieces and throw them at the judges. He was killed by strangulation. Protase Chong, a 41-year-old nobleman, apostatized under torture and was freed. Later he came back, confessed his faith and was tortured to death.

Christianity came to Korea during the Japanese invasion in 1592 when some Koreans were baptized, probably by Christian Japanese soldiers. Evangelization was difficult because Korea refused all contact with the outside world except for taking taxes to Beijing annually. On one of these occasions, around 1777, Christian literature obtained from Jesuits in China led educated Korean Christians to study. A home Church began. When a Chinese priest managed to enter secretly a dozen years later, he found 4,000 Catholics, none of whom had ever seen a priest. Seven years later there were 10,000 Catholics. Religious freedom came to Korea in 1883.

Besides Andrew and Paul, Pope John Paul II canonized 98 Koreans and three French missionaries who had been martyred between 1839 and 1867, when he visited Korea in 1984. Among them were bishops and priests, but for the most part they were lay persons: 47 women and 45 men.

THE LITURGY OF HOURS

The Liturgy of the Hours, also known as the Divine Office or the Work of God
(Opus Dei), is the daily prayer of the Church, marking the hours of each day and sanctifying the day with prayer.  The Hours are a meditative dialogue on the mystery of Christ, using scripture and prayer.  At times the dialogue is between the Church or individual soul and God; at times it is a dialogue among the members of the Church; and at times it is even between the Church and the world.  The Divine Office "is truly the voice of the Bride herself addressed to her Bridegroom. It is the very prayer which Christ himself together with his Body addresses to the Father." (SC 84)  The dialogue is always held, however, in the presence of God and using the words and wisdom of God.  Each of the five canonical Hours includes selections from the Psalms that culminate in a scriptural proclamation.  The two most important or hinge Hours are Morning and Evening Prayer. These each include a Gospel canticle:  the Canticle of Zechariah from Luke 1:68-79 for Morning Prayer (known as the Benedictus), and the Canticle of Mary from Luke 1:46-55 for Evening Prayer (known as the Magnificat). The Gospel canticle acts as a kind of meditative extension of the scriptural proclamation in light of the Christ event.  Morning and Evening Prayer also include intercessions that flow from the scriptural proclamation just as the Psalms prepare for it.

In the Hours, the royal priesthood of the baptized is exercised, and this sacrifice of praise is thus connected to the sacrifice of the Eucharist, 

both preparing for and flowing from the Mass.

"The hymns and litanies of the Liturgy of the Hours integrate the prayer of the psalms into the age of the Church, expressing the symbolism of the time of day, the liturgical season, or the feast being celebrated. Moreover, the reading from the Word of God at each Hour (with the subsequent responses or troparia) and readings from the Fathers and spiritual masters at certain Hours, reveal more deeply the meaning of the mystery being celebrated, assist in understanding the psalms, and prepare for silent prayer." (CCC 1177)

OFFICE OF READINGS

"The office of readings seeks to provide God's people, and in particular those consecrated to God in a special way, with a wider selection of passages from sacred Scripture for meditation, together with the finest excerpts from spiritual writers. Even though the cycle of scriptural readings at daily Mass is now richer, the treasures of revelation and tradition to be found in the office of readings will also contribute greatly to the spiritual life" (General Instruction of the Liturgy of the Hours [GILH], no. 55).

https://www.universalis.com/0/readings.htm

LAUDS - Morning Prayer

"As is clear from many of the elements that make it up, morning prayer is intended and arranged to sanctify the morning. St. Basil the Great gives an excellent description of this character in these words: "It is said in the morning in order that the first stirrings of our mind and will may be consecrated to God and that we may take nothing in hand until we have been gladdened by the thought of God, as it is written: 'I was mindful of God and was glad' (Ps 77:4 [Jerome's translation from Hebrew]), or set our bodies to any task before we do what has been said: 'I will pray to you, Lord, you will hear my voice in the morning; I will stand before you in the morning and gaze on you' 

(Ps 5:4-5)."

"Celebrated as it is as the light of a new day is dawning, this hour also recalls the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, the true light enlightening all people (see Jn 1:9) and "the sun of justice" (Mal 4:2), "rising from on high" (Lk 1:78). Hence, we can well understand the advice of St. Cyprian: "There should be prayer in the morning so that the resurrection of the Lord may thus be celebrated" (GILH, no. 38).

https://www.universalis.com/0/lauds.htm

TERCE - Mid-Morning Prayer

"Following a very ancient tradition Christians have made a practice of praying out of private devotion at various times of the day, even in the course of their work, in imitation of the Church in apostolic times. In different ways with the passage of time this tradition has taken the form of a liturgical celebration.

"Liturgical custom in both East and West has retained midmorning, midday, and midafternoon prayer, mainly because these hours were linked to a commemoration of the events of the Lord's passion and of the first preaching of the Gospel" 

(GILH, no. 74-75).

https://www.universalis.com/0/terce.htm

SEXT - Mid-Day Prayer

 https://www.universalis.com/0/sext.htm

NONE - Afternoon Prayer

 https://www.universalis.com/0/none.htm

VESPERS - Evening Prayer

"When evening approaches and the day is already far spent, evening prayer is celebrated in order that 'we may give thanks for what has been given us, or what we have done well, during the day.' We also recall the redemption through the prayer we send up 'like incense in the Lord's sight,' and in which 'the raising up of our hands' becomes 'an evening sacrifice' (see Ps 141:2). This sacrifice 'may also be interpreted more spiritually as the true evening sacrifice that our Savior the Lord entrusted to the apostles at supper on the evening when he instituted the sacred mysteries of the Church or of the evening sacrifice of the next day, the sacrifice, that is, which, raising his hands, he offered to the Father at the end of the ages for the salvation of the whole world.' Again, in order to fix our hope on the light that knows no setting, 'we pray and make petition for the light to come down on us anew; we implore the coming of Christ who will bring the grace of eternal light.' Finally, at this hour we join with the Churches of the East in calling upon the 'joy-giving light of that holy glory, born of the immortal, heavenly Father, the holy and blessed Jesus Christ; now that we have come to the setting of the sun and have seen the evening star, we sing in praise of God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit…'" 

(GILH, no. 39).

https://www.universalis.com/0/vespers.htm

COMPLINE - Night Prayer

"Night prayer is the last prayer of the day, said before retiring, even if that is after midnight" (GILH, no. 84).The Psalms that are chosen for Night Prayer are full of confidence in the Lord.

https://www.universalis.com/0/compline.htm

ABOUT TODAY

https://www.universalis.com/0/today.htm