Lesson for Matins – Isaias lxvi. 5‒16
Hear the word of the Lord, you that tremble at His word. Your brethren that hate you and cast you out for my name’s sake, have said: Let the Lord be glorified, and we will see in your joy: but they will be confounded. A voice of the people from the city, a voice from the temple, the voice of the Lord that renders recompense to His enemies. Before she was in labour, she brought forth: before her time came to be delivered, she brought forth a man-child. Who has ever heard such a thing? And who has seen the like of this? Will the Earth bring forth in one day? or will a nation be brought forth at once, because Sion has been in labour and has brought forth her children? Will not I that make others to bring forth children, myself bring forth, says the Lord? Will I, that give generation to others, be barren, says the Lord your God? Rejoice with Jerusalem, and be glad with her, all you that love her: rejoice for joy with her, all you that mourn for her: that you may suck and be filled with the breasts of her consolations: that you may milk out and flow with delights, from the abundance of her glory. For thus says the Lord: Behold I will bring upon her as it were a river of peace, and as an overflowing torrent the glory of the Gentiles, which you will suck: you will be carried at the breasts, and upon the knees they will caress you. As one whom the mother caresses, so will I comfort you, and you will be comforted in Jerusalem. You will see, and your heart will rejoice, and your bones will flourish like a herb, and the hand of the Lord will be known to His servants, and He will be angry with His enemies. For behold the Lord will come with fire, and His chariots are like a whirlwind: to render His wrath in indignation, and His rebuke with flames of fire: for the Lord will judge by fire: and by His sword of all flesh, and the slain of the Lord will be many.
Thanks be to God.
Dom Prosper Guéranger:
Your presence, O Jesus, will give fruitfulness to her that was barren, and the despised Sion will suddenly bring forth a people which the world is too small to hold. But all the glory of this fruitfulness belongs to you, O divine Word! The Psalmist had foretold it when speaking to Jerusalem, as to a Queen, he said to her: “Instead of your fathers, sons are born to you. You will make them princes over all the Earth: they will remember your name throughout all generations. Therefore shall people praise you forever and ever, yea forever and ever” (Psalm xliv.). But for this end it was necessary that God Himself should come down in person. He alone could make a Virgin-Mother. He alone could raise up children to Abraham out of the very stones. “Yet one little while,” as He says by one of His Prophets, and I will “move Heaven and Earth, and I will move all nations” (Aggeus ii. 7, 8). And by another: “From the rising of the sun even to the going down, my name is great among the Gentiles; and in every place there is sacrifice, and there is offered to my name a clean oblation” (Malachias i. 11). There will soon be, then, but one Sacrifice, for the Lamb who is to be offered in that Sacrifice will be born in a few hours hence, and since Sacrifice is the bond of union among men when there will be but one Sacrifice, there will be but one People.
Come then quickly, O Church of God, that are to unite us all into one. Come and be born into our world. And since for us your children you are already born, may the Lamb, your Spouse, pour out upon you the river of peace announced by the Prophet. May He open out upon you the glory of the Gentiles as an overflowing torrent. May the nations cluster around you as their common Mother, and be filled with the abundance of your glory, with the breasts of your consolations, and you carry them on your heart and caress them in your tender love. O Jesus! It is you that has inspired our Mother with this wonderful love. It is you that consoles us and enlightens us by her. Come to her and visit her. Come, and, by the New Birth you are about to take among us, renew her life within her. Give her, during this year also, firmness of Faith, the Grace of the Sacraments, the efficacy of Prayer, the Gift of Miracles, the Succession of her Hierarchy, power of Government, Fortitude against the Princes of the world, love of the Cross, victory over Satan, and the crown of Martyrdom. During this new year, make her, as ever, your beautiful Spouse. Make her faithful to your love, and more than ever successful in the great work you have put on her, for each year brings us nearer to the day when you will come for the last time, not in the swathing bands of infancy, but on a cloud with great majesty to render your rebuke with flames of fire and destroy those that have despised or have not loved your Church, which you will then raise up and admit into your eternal Kingdom.
