CHRISTMAS NOVENA 3
Dec. 19: God’s Redeeming Incarnation.
AV summary (0:53 s) & text.
Dear brethren in Christ, as preparation for Christmas, below you have the corresponding Antiphon, Opening prayer and Gospel reading of the Mass and the daily 2nd reading of the Divine Office for meditation.
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Fr. Rolly Arjonillo, Catholics striving for Holiness.
OUTLINE
- Antiphon Cfr. Hb 10, 37
- Gospel reading from St. Luke 1:5–25: The Birth of John the Baptist Foretold
- Divine office Reading: God’s Redeeming Incarnation.
- Prayer
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1. Antiphon: Cfr. Hb 10, 37
He who is to come will come and will not delay, and now there will be no fear within our land, for he is our Savior.
2. Gospel reading from St. Luke 1:5–25: The Birth of John the Baptist Foretold
In the days of Herod, King of Judea, there was a priest named Zechariah of the priestly division of Abijah; his wife was from the daughters of Aaron, and her name was Elizabeth. Both were righteous in the eyes of God, observing all the commandments and ordinances of the Lord blamelessly. But they had no child, because Elizabeth was barren and both were advanced in years.
Once when he was serving as priest in his division’s turn before God, according to the practice of the priestly service, he was chosen by lot to enter the sanctuary of the Lord to burn incense. Then, when the whole assembly of the people was praying outside at the hour of the incense offering, the angel of the Lord appeared to him, standing at the right of the altar of incense. Zechariah was troubled by what he saw, and fear came upon him.
But the angel said to him, “Do not be afraid, Zechariah, because your prayer has been heard. Your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son, and you shall name him John. And you will have joy and gladness, and many will rejoice at his birth, for he will be great in the sight of the Lord. He will drink neither wine nor strong drink. He will be filled with the Holy Spirit even from his mother’s womb, and he will turn many of the children of Israel to the Lord their God. He will go before him in the spirit and power of Elijah to turn the hearts of fathers toward children and the disobedient to the understanding of the righteous, to prepare a people fit for the Lord.”
Then Zechariah said to the angel, “How shall I know this? For I am an old man, and my wife is advanced in years.” And the angel said to him in reply, “I am Gabriel, who stand before God. I was sent to speak to you and to announce to you this good news. But now you will be speechless and unable to talk until the day these things take place, because you did not believe my words, which will be fulfilled at their proper time.” Meanwhile the people were waiting for Zechariah and were amazed that he stayed so long in the sanctuary. But when he came out, he was unable to speak to them, and they realized that he had seen a vision in the sanctuary. He was gesturing to them but remained mute.
Then, when his days of ministry were completed, he went home.
After this time his wife Elizabeth conceived, and she went into seclusion for five months, saying, “So has the Lord done for me at a time when he has seen fit to take away my disgrace before others.”
2. Commentary from the Gospel of St. Luke, Navarre Bible (with permission)
6 After referring to the noble ancestry of Zechariah and Elizabeth, the evangelist now speaks of a higher type of nobility, the nobility of virtue: “Both were righteous before God”. “For not everyone who is righteous in men’s eyes is righteous in God’s; men have one way of seeing and God another; men see externals, but God sees into the heart. It can happen that someone seems righteous because his virtue is false and is practised to win people’s approval; but he is not virtuous in God’s sight if his righteousness is not born of simplicity of soul but is only simulated in order to appear good.
- “Perfect praise consists in being righteous before God, because only he can be called perfect who is approved by him who cannot be deceived” (St Ambrose, Expositio Evangelii sec. Lucam, in loc.).
- In the last analysis what a Christian must be is righteous before God. St Paul is advocating this when he tells the Corinthians, “But with me it is a very small thing that I should be judged by you or by any human court. It is the Lord who judges me. Therefore do not pronounce judgment before the time, before the Lord comes, who will bring to light the things now hidden in darkness and will disclose the purposes of the heart. Then every man will receive his commendation from God” (I Cor 4:3ff). On the notion of the just or righteous man, cf. note on Mt 1:19.
8 There were twenty-four groups or turns of priests to which functions were allocated by the drawing of lots; the eighth group was that of the family of Abijah (cf. 1 Chron 24:7-19), to which Zechariah belonged.
9-10 Within the sacred precincts, in a walled-off area, stood the Temple proper. Rectangular in form, there was first a large area which was called “the Holy Place”, in which was located the altar of incense referred to in v.9. Behind this was the inner sanctum, called “the Holy of Holies”, where the Ark of the Covenant with the tablets of the Law used to be kept; only the High Priest had access to this, the most sacred part of the Temple. The veil or great curtain of the Temple separated these two areas from one another. The sacred building was surrounded by a courtyard, called the courtyard of the priests and outside this, at the front of the Temple, was what was called the courtyard of the Israelites, where the people stayed during the ceremony of incensing.
10 While the priest offered incense to God, the people in the courtyard joined with him in spirit: even in the Old Testament every external act of worship was meant to be accompanied by an interior disposition of self-offering to God.
- With much more reason should there be this union between external and internal worship in the liturgical rites of the New Covenant (cf. Mediator Dei, 8), in the liturgy of the Church. Besides, this consistency befits the nature of man, comprised as he is of body and soul.
11 Angels are pure spirits, that is, they have no body of any kind; therefore, “they do not appear to men exactly as they are; rather, they manifest themselves in forms which God gives them so that they can be seen by those to whom he sends them” (St John Damascene, De fide orthodoxa, 2, 3).
- In addition to adoring and serving God, angelic spirits act as God’s messengers and as channels of his Providence towards men; this explains why they appear so often in salvation history and why Sacred Scripture refers to them in so many passages (cf., for example, Heb 1:14).
- Christ’s birth was such an important event that angels were given a very prominent role in connexion with it. Here, as at the Annunciation to Mary, the archangel St Gabriel is charged with delivering God’s message.
- “It is no accident that the angel makes his appearance in the Temple, for this announces the imminent coming of the True Priest and prepares the heavenly Sacrifice at which the angels will minister. Let it not be doubted, then, that the angels will be present when Christ is immolated” (St Ambrose, Expositio Evangelii sec. Lucam, in loc.).
12 “No matter how righteous a man be, he cannot look at an angel without feeling afraid; that is why Zechariah was alarmed: he could not but quake at the presence of the angel, he could not take the brightness that surrounded him” (St John Chrysostom, De incomprehensibili Dei natura). The reason for this is not so much the angel’s superiority to man as the fact that the grandeur of God’s majesty shines out through the angel: “And the angel said to me, ‘Write this: Blessed are those who are invited to the marriage supper of the Lamb.’ And he said to me, ‘These are true words of God.’ Then I fell down at his feet to worship him, but he said to me, ‘You must not do that! I am a fellow servant with you and your brethren who hold the testimony of Jesus. Worship God.” (Rev 19:9-10).
13 Through the archangel God intervenes man exceptional way in the married life of Zechariah and Elizabeth; but the message he brings has much wider reference; it has significance for the whole world. Elizabeth is already quite old but she is going to have a son who will be called John. John means “God is gracious” and he will be the Forerunner of the Messiah. This showed that “the fullness of time” (cf. Gal 4:4) was imminent, for which all righteous people of Israel had yearned (cf. Jn 8:56; Heb 11:13).
- “Your prayer is heard”. St Jerome comments: “That is to say, you are given more than you asked for. You prayed for the salvation of the people and you have been given the Precursor” (Expositio in Evangelium sec. Lucam, in loc.). Our Lord also sometimes gives us more than we ask for: “There is a story about a beggar meeting Alexander the Great and asking him for alms. Alexander stopped and instructed that the man be given the government of five cities. The beggar, totally confused and taken aback, explained, ‘I didn’t ask for that much’. And Alexander replied, ‘You asked like the man you are; I give like the man I am’” (J. Escrivá, Christ is passing by, 160). Since God responds so generously and gives us more than we ask for, we should face up to difficulties and not be cowed by them.
14-17 The archangel St Gabriel gives Zechariah three reasons why he should rejoice over the birth of this child: first, because God will bestow exceptional holiness on him (v.15); second, because he will lead many to salvation (v.16); and third, because his whole life, everything he does, will prepare the way for the expected Messiah (v.17).
- In St John the Baptist two prophecies of Malachi are fulfilled, in which we are told that God will send a messenger ahead of him to prepare the way for him (Mal 3:1; 4:5-6). John prepares the way for the first coming of the Messiah, in the same way as Elijah will prepare the way for his second coming (cf. St Ambrose, Expositio Evangelii sec. Lucam, in loc.; St Thomas Aquinas, Commentary on St Matthew, 17, II, in loc). This is why Christ will say, “What did you go out to see? A prophet? Yes, I tell you, and more than a prophet. This is he of whom it is written, ‘Behold, I send my messenger before thy face, who shall prepare thy way before thee’” (Lk 7:26-27).
18 Zechariah’s incredulity and his sin lie not in his doubting that this message has come from God but in forgetting that God is almighty, and in thinking that he and Elizabeth are past having children. Later, referring to the conception of John the Baptist, the same angel explains to Mary that “with God nothing will be impossible” (Lk 1:37). When God asks us to take part in any undertaking we should rely on his omnipotence rather than our own meagre resources. Cf. note on Mt 10:9-10.
19-20 “Gabriel” means “might of God”. God commanded the archangel Gabriel to announce the events connected with the Incarnation of the Word: already in the Old Testament it was Gabriel who proclaimed to the prophet Daniel the time of the Messiah’& coming (Dan 8:15-26; 9:20-27). This present passage deals with the announcement of the conception and birth of Christ’s Precursor; and it is the same angel who will reveal to the Blessed Virgin the mystery of the Incarnation.
24 Elizabeth hid herself because of the strangeness of pregnancy at her age and out of a holy modesty which advised her not to make known God’s gifts prematurely.
25 Married couples who want to have any children whom God has not yet given any can learn from Zechariah and Elizabeth and have recourse to them as intercessors.
- To couples in this situation Monsignor Escrivá de Balaguer recommended that, in addition to taking all the human steps necessary, “they should not give up hope too easily. They should ask God to give them children and, if it is his will, to bless them as he blessed the Patriarchs of the Old Testament. And then it would be advisable for both of them to see a good doctor. If in spite of everything God does not give them children, they should not feel frustrated. They should be happy, discovering in this very fact God’s will for them. Often God does not give children because he is ‘asking more’. God asks them to put the same effort and the same kind and gentle dedication into helping their neighbours as they would have put into raising their children, without the human joy that comes from parenthood. There is, then, no reason for feeling they are failures or for giving way to sadness” (Conversations, 96).
- Here is the authoritative teaching of John Paul II on this subject: “It must not be forgotten, however, that, even when procreation is not possible, conjugal life does not for this reason lose its value. Physical sterility in fact can be for spouses the occasion for other important services to the life of the human person — for example, adoption, various forms of educational work, and assistance to other families and to poor or handicapped children” (Familiaris consortio, 14).
3. Divine office Reading: God’s Redeeming Incarnation.
St Irenaeus
The operation of the redeeming Incarnation
God is man’s glory. Man is the vessel which receives God’s action and all his wisdom and power.
Just as a doctor is judged in his care for the sick, so God is revealed in his conduct with men. That is Paul’s reason for saying: God has made the whole world prisoner of unbelief that he may have mercy on all. He was speaking of man, who was disobedient to God, and cast off from immortality, and then found mercy, receiving through the Son of God the adoption he brings.
If man, without being puffed up or boastful, has a right belief regarding created things and their divine Creator, who, having given them being, holds them all in his power, and if man perseveres in God’s love, and in obedience and gratitude to him, he will receive greater glory from him. It will be a glory which will grow ever brighter until he takes on the likeness of the one who died for him.
He it was who took on the likeness of sinful flesh, to condemn sin and rid the flesh of sin, as now condemned. He wanted to invite man to take on his likeness, appointing man an imitator of God, establishing man in a way of life in obedience to the Father that would lead to the vision of God, and endowing man with power to receive the Father. He is the Word of God who dwelt with man and became the Son of Man to open the way for man to receive God, for God to dwell with man, according to the will of the Father.
For this reason the Lord himself gave as the sign of our salvation, the one who was born of the Virgin, Emmanuel. It was the Lord himself who saved them, for of themselves they had no power to be saved. For this reason Paul speaks of the weakness of man, and says: I know that no good dwells in my flesh, meaning that the blessing of our salvation comes not from us but from God. Again, he says: I am a wretched man; who will free me from this body doomed to die? Then he speaks of a liberator, thanks to Jesus Christ our Lord.
Isaiah says the same: Hands that are feeble, grow strong! Knees that are weak, take courage! Hearts that are faint, grow strong! Fear not; see, our God is judgement and he will repay. He himself will come and save us. He means that we could not be saved of ourselves but only with God’s help.
Responsory
℟. All nations, hear the word of the Lord, declare it to the ends of the earth,* say to the farthest parts: ‘Our Saviour is coming.’
℣. Say this, proclaim it, cry it aloud,* say to the farthest parts: ‘Our Saviour is coming.’
4. Prayer
O God, who through the child-bearing of the holy Virgin graciously revealed the radiance of your glory to the world, grant, we pray, that we may venerate with integrity of faith the mystery of so wondrous an Incarnation and always celebrate it with due reverence. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, for ever and ever. Amen.
FOR DEC. 19 MASS PRAYERS AND READINGS, CLICK HERE.
AUDIO CREDIT: What Child is This Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 License
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PHOTO CREDIT AND SOURCE: Adoration of the Shepherds by François Boucher (1703-1770), in http://i1.wp.com/www.catholichousehold.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/12/16.-Adoration-of-the-Shepherds-Boucher-1.jpg?resize=750%2C943
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