Daily Reading for April 1 • Frederick Denison Maurice, Priest, 1872

Passion Week may tell us, indeed, that the mere sight of the Lamb of God, in His outward form, could not soften the hearts of Jewish priests or Roman soldiers. It may tell us, that the hearts of those, who saw Him hanging on the cross, were hardened by that spectacle, so that they cried, “He saved others, Himself He cannot save.” It may tell us, that the sop at the Paschal Feast, the last token of friendship and tenderness from the Master and Lord, hardened the heart of the son of perdition, so that Satan entered into him, and he went out a conscious traitor. It tells us, that even the eleven had their hearts hardened, so that, at the Last Supper, they were disputing which of them should be the greatest—so that they could not watch with Christ one hour during the agony—so that they all forsook Him and fled.

But it tells us of a Love, deeper than all this mockery, betrayal, desertion, of a Love, brought out through them, and by means of them. It tells us, that in the Agony and Death of Christ, the Will of the Son yielded itself absolutely, unreservedly, to the Will of the Father, and that the whole of that perfectly loving Will shone forth in the acts and sufferings of a man. It tells us, that with this Sacrifice God is well pleased, that this Sacrifice is an eternal bond between the Creator and creature, which sin, and death, and hell, cannot break. It tells us, that we may give up ourselves to God, and that His own Spirit, the Spirit by which Christ offered up Himself, will come down to consume the sacrifice. It tells us, that, whatever reluctance we may feel in ourselves, or see in our brethren, there is a mysterious power that can make us willing. It tells us, that, however hard our hearts may be, and whatever new hardness they may have contracted, from God’s own discipline and our refusal to understand it, the Divine Spirit of Grace and Discipline can subdue even all things to Himself.

From Sermons on the Old Testament by F.D. Maurice, quoted in The Communion Service from the Book of Common Prayer, With Select Readings from the Writings of the Rev. F. D. Maurice, M.A., edited by the Right Rev. John William Colenso, D.D. (London: Macmillan and Co., 1874).
http://anglicanhistory.org/maurice/colenso_communion/15.html

Daily Reading for April 2 • James Lloyd Breck, Priest, 1876

After long years of waiting on Heaven-commissioned men, who ought to have acted for us with alacrity, we at length obtained the Episcopate for America! But the condition of things here had been so long that of a Presbyter-Church, it was not an easy matter to put the Bishop in his right place. He had been imported for only two things, Ordination and Confirmation! He had no cure in a Diocese beyond these, except he went down to the rank of a Priest, in which case he could become the Rector of a Parish. But he had no rights over any other parish, saving such as were in harmony with those things for which he had been imported. And so tenacious has been this uncatholic Presbyter-Church that, even to our day, the great work of our General Triennial Council has been to make Canons enough, and strong enough, to govern the Bishops!—as though they were a dangerous element in the Church, and to be guarded against, and tolerated only as a necessary evil. . . .

This state of things, like an iceberg, held in being only by the cold with which it is surrounded, is only now beginning to dissolve into its original parts, by the life and heat of Missionary enterprise. In the year 1835, the General Convention sent forth the first Missionary Bishop, the Rt. Rev. Jackson Kemper; but he was to go forth little different from any Presbyter Missionary, saving the vast extent of territory he was to travel over, viz.: Missouri, Indiana, Iowa, Wisconsin, and Territories adjacent. It was expected that members of the second Order of the Ministry would join him; but it was likewise understood that he would distribute and locate these at isolated points, where young cities were likely to spring up, and the Bishop, as a Superintendent, would visit them in their isolation.

How different the present plan of operation with our lately appointed Missionary Bishops, may clearly be seen; and it will not be thought presuming if I allude somewhat to it, and to that which awakened it in the mind of the American Church.

The first aim of the new Bishop now, is centralization. He does not count his forces as formerly, and distribute them asunder as wide as the poles, but he looks over his field to find the proper fulcrum; and establishing himself upon it, he proceeds to rally his men at this centre, and here puts them to work, and from this they radiate, along with him, over the whole Diocese. . . . [The] Cathedral is the Bishop’s See or Seat, and it does not depend on what that seat is made of, whether he can be seated there. It is not many years past when it was thought that Bishops must be lords, and that kings and Bishops were necessarily related to one another. But the American Episcopacy has proved the absurdity of this, and only now in the year 1867, do we find that a Bishop of Apostolic lineage can be securely and honorably seated within his Cathedra that is built of wood at a cost of less than $3000! He is not ashamed to leave his Presbyter-Parish Church, however grand, for such a Bishop’s See, when it is to be surrounded with all that blessed work, which alone is the glory of the Episcopal throne.

From a sermon preached by James Lloyd Breck in June 1867, before the Convention of the Diocese of Minnesota, at the time of his bidding farewell to that diocese for his new work of faith in California. Quoted in The Life of the Reverend James Lloyd Breck, D.D.; Chiefly from Letters Written by Himself, compiled by Charles Breck, D.D. (New York: E. & J. B. Young, 1883). http://anglicanhistory.org/usa/jlbreck/letters/sermon.html

Daily Reading for April 3 • Richard, Bishop of Chichester, 1253

Day by day, dear Lord, of you three things I pray: to see you more clearly, love you more dearly, follow you more nearly, day by day.

We do not find an end to our restlessness in this life, but we may find the beginning of this end when in love’s worship and prayer we go outside or beside ourselves. And for Richard, as we have seen, relationship with God found its most intimate expression in his sense of kinship with the living presence of God in Jesus. This is how he could best know and love God. His love for Jesus, as the movement of Richard’s three petitions suggests, is the centerpiece of the triptych of his prayer: seeing, loving, and following. A triptych is a painting on three panels that are joined by hinges, so that the two sides can fold over the central panel. With love as the centerpiece, the eyes of faith may move back and forth from knowing the Lord more clearly and to following more nearly by and through loving more dearly. Love is the heart of the relationship. Without love, as Paul put it, all other skills and talents make one but “a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal” (1 Corinthians 13:1), for “the only thing that counts is faith working through love” (Galatians 5:6). Love, reaching out beyond self, is enabled to see and follow more nearly. And here, at the heart of knowing and following, the soul of our human awareness finds at least a measure of contentment in recognizing its deepest desire. It rests in the love and loving of the beloved. It knows that there is no other way of knowing and wishes to follow in the way that there is no other way of going.

Letting go, quieting down from anxiety and competitiveness, the loving heart may for a time have no further need of words. There may arise the silence of lovers who have done all they can to express and embody their love. No more is needed. Love is in the silence. Love is the silence. Such loving silence seems the keenest adoration, full of harmony and love’s peace.

From Day by Day: Loving God More Dearly by Frederick Borsch. Copyright © 2008. Used by permission of Morehouse Publishing, Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. www.morehousepublishing.com

Daily Reading for April 4 • Martin Luther King, Jr., Civil Rights Leader, 1968

Sometimes, you know, it’s necessary to go backward in order to go forward. (Yes) . . . Now that’s what we’ve got to do in our world today. We’ve left a lot of precious values behind; we’ve lost a lot of precious values. And if we are to go forward, if we are to make this a better world in which to live, we’ve got to go back. We’ve got to rediscover these precious values that we’ve left behind. I want to deal with one or two of these mighty precious values that we’ve left behind, that if we’re to go forward and to make this a better world, we must rediscover.

The first is this—the first principle of value that we need to rediscover is this: that all reality hinges on moral foundations. In other words, that this is a moral universe, and that there are moral laws of the universe just as abiding as the physical laws. (Lord help us) I’m not so sure we all believe that. . . . I’m not so sure if we really believe that there is a law of love in this universe, and that if you disobey it you’ll suffer the consequences. (Yes) I’m not so sure if we really believe that. Now at least two things convince me that we don’t believe that, that we have strayed away from the principle that this is a moral universe. (Lord help him)

The first thing is that we have adopted in the modern world a sort of a relativistic ethic. . . .. Most people can’t stand up for their convictions, because the majority of people might not be doing it. (Amen, Yes) See, everybody’s not doing it, so it must be wrong. And since everybody is doing it, it must be right. (Yes, Lord help him) So a sort of numerical interpretation of what’s right.

But I’m here to say to you this morning that some things are right and some things are wrong. (Yes) Eternally so, absolutely so. It’s wrong to hate. (Yes, that’s right) It always has been wrong and it always will be wrong. (Amen) It’s wrong in America, it’s wrong in Germany, it’s wrong in Russia, it’s wrong in China. (Lord help him) It was wrong in 2000 B.C., and it’s wrong in 1954 A.D. It always has been wrong, (That’s right) and it always will be wrong. (That’s right) . . .

Now that isn’t the only thing that convinces me that we’ve strayed away from this attitude, (Go ahead) this principle. The other thing is that we have adopted a sort of a pragmatic test for right and wrong—whatever works is right. (Yes) If it works, it’s all right. Nothing is wrong but that which does not work. If you don’t get caught, it’s right. [laughter] That’s the attitude, isn’t it? It’s all right to disobey the Ten Commandments, but just don’t disobey the eleventh, “Thou shall not get caught.” [laughter] That’s the attitude. That’s the prevailing attitude in our culture. (Come on) No matter what you do, just do it with a bit of finesse. (All right) . . . . It’s even all right to hate, but just dress your hate up in the garments of love and make it appear that you are loving when you are actually hating. Just get by! That’s the thing that’s right according to this new ethic. (Lord help him)

My friends, that attitude is destroying the soul of our culture. (You’re right there) It’s destroying our nation. (Oh yes) The thing that we need in the world today is a group of men and women who will stand up for right and to be opposed to wrong, wherever it is. (Lord have mercy) A group of people who have come to see that some things are wrong, whether they’re never caught up with. And some things are right, whether nobody sees you doing them or not. . . . That’s what we need in the world today: people who will stand for right and goodness. . . . It is not enough to know that two and two makes four, but we’ve got to know somehow that it’s right to be honest and just with our brothers. (Yes) It’s not enough to know all about our philosophical and mathematical disciplines, (Have mercy) but we’ve got to know the simple disciplines of being honest and loving and just with all humanity. (Oh yes) If we don’t learn it, we will destroy ourselves (That’s right) by the misuse of our own powers. (Amen)

From the sermon “Recovering Lost Values,” quoted in A Knock at Midnight: Inspiration from the Great Sermons of Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr. (New York: Warner Books, 1998). Copyright held by the Estate of Martin Luther King, Jr.

Daily Reading for April 5 • The Sunday of the Passion: Palm Sunday

You went into the holy city
with your disciples,
sitting on the colt of a donkey,
as though borne upon the cherubim,
so fulfilling what the prophets proclaimed.
The children of the Hebrews,
with palms and branches,
came to meet you.
So do we carry branches of olive and palms,
and cry out our thanks:
Hosanna in the highest!
Blessed is the one who comes
in the name of the Lord!

Carrying spiritual branches,
and with souls made clean,
let us joyfully cry out
with faith to Christ,
like the children,
loudly praising the Lord:
Blessed are you, Savior!
You have come into the world
to save Adam from the primal curse.
Loving humankind, you were well pleased
to become spiritually the new Adam.
Glory to you, O Word, for you have done all things for good.

From palms and branches,
from one divine feast to another,
let us make haste, we who believe,
to reverence Christ’s passion,
that mystery of salvation.

From ancient Orthodox hymns for Matins and Vespers on Palm Sunday, quoted in Orthodox Lent, Holy Week and Easter: Liturgical Texts with Commentary by Hugh Wybrew (London: SPCK, 1995).

Daily Reading for April 6 • Monday in Holy Week

If then we look at the Crucifix—“that supreme symbol of our august religion,” as von Hügel loved to call it—and then at our selves, testing by the Cross the quality of our courage and love; if we do this honestly and unflinchingly, this will be in itself a complete self-examination, judgment, purgatory. It is useless to talk in a large vague way about the Love of God. Here is its point of insertion in the world of men, in action, example and demand. Every Christian is required to be an instrument of God’s rescuing action; and His power will not be exerted through us except at considerable cost to ourselves. Muzzy, safety-first Christianity is useless here. We must accept the world’s worst if we are to give it of our best. The stinging lash of humiliation and disillusionment, those unfortunate events which strip us of the seamless robe of convention and reserve, and expose us naked to the world in the weakness of our common humanity, the wounds given by those we love best, the revelation that someone we had trusted could not be trusted any more, and the peculiar loneliness and darkness inseparable from some phases of the spiritual life, when it looks as though we were forsaken and our ultimate hope betrayed: all these are sufficiently common experiences, and all can be united to the Cross. Here again Christ remains without our limitations. He hallows real life, and invites us to hallow it by the willing consecration of our small humiliations, sacrifices and pains; transmuting them into part of that creative sacrifice, that movement of faith, hope and charity in which the human spirit is most deeply united to the Spirit of God.

From The School of Charity: Meditations on the Christian Creed by Evelyn Underhill (London: Longmans, Green and Co Ltd., 1934).

Daily Reading for April 7 • Tuesday in Holy Week

There is a phrase which the Greek Liturgy constantly applies to God in Christ: “O Lord and Lover of Men!” The whole meaning and drama of the Passion is gathered up in that. The Evangelists’ accounts—all the curt notes crowded together—reveal, when we take them separately and dwell upon them, the deep entrance into human suffering in all its phases, the utter self-giving to the vocation of sacrifice, of One Who is, in completeness, both the Lord and Lover of mankind.

Consider some of these episodes. The anointing by the woman of Bethany, of one who never seemed more divine than at this moment, accepting so peacefully the menacing web of events that are closing in; and then even that gesture of love spoilt by the sordid displeasure of His own disciple.

Then the incredible beauty of that two-fold act of selfless generosity, the Last Supper and the Washing of the Feet; the humble cleansing and feeding of the imperfect human creature, with its deep reverence for that human creature’s limitations and concern for that human creature’s needs.

And then Gethsemane, the real crisis and victory. The first prayer of natural agony: “If it is possible, don’t let this happen! I can’t face it!” And the second prayer: “If I must go through with this, Thy Will be done.” Because of that scene, at the very heart of human suffering, even its rebellions and fears, we are never alone. We often feel that we make a mess of our suffering and lose the essence of sacrifice, waste our opportunity, fail God, because we cannot stand up to it. Gethsemane is the answer of the Divine Compassion to that fear.

From The School of Charity: Meditations on the Christian Creed by Evelyn Underhill (London: Longmans, Green and Co Ltd., 1934).

Daily Reading for April 8 • Wednesday in Holy Week

Wretch that I am,
I have fallen into the hands of robbers—
my own thoughts.
My mind has been stripped,
and I have been severely beaten.
My whole being is wounded,
and stripped of virtues
I lie naked on life’s road.
The priest saw me in sharp pain,
but thought my wounds incurable.
He took no notice of me,
refusing to look at me.
The Levite could not bear my agony,
destructive of my very being,
and when he saw me
passed by on the other side.
But you, Christ my God,
were pleased to come incarnate,
not from Samaria but from Mary.
In your great love for us,
give me healing
and pour your abundant mercy on me.

From an Orthodox vesper hymn for Wednesday in Holy Week, quoted in Orthodox Lent, Holy Week and Easter: Liturgical Texts with Commentary by Hugh Wybrew (London: SPCK, 1995).

Daily Reading for April 9 • Maundy Thursday

All the meals Jesus shared with his followers, and not merely the Last Supper, were seen by the early Christians as expressing not only human fellowship but also the divine acceptance of the participants in the present and the promise of their ultimate place in God’s kingdom.

The accounts of the Last Supper, and also some of the references to meals elsewhere in the New Testament, reveal a pattern that adheres to the common custom followed at all Jewish formal meals. This pattern has been called by some scholars a ‘sevenfold shape’: at the beginning of the meal, the head of the household, acting on behalf of the gathering, (1) took bread into his hands, (2) said a short blessing, (3) broke the bread, and (4) shared it with all present; and at the end of the meal, he again (5) took a cup of wine into his hands, (6) said a longer form of blessing over it, and (7) shared it with all around the table. . . .

Ritual meals like this were powerful expressions of the concept of the participants’ communion with one another and with God. Their presence at this meal was a sign of their reconciliation to God and their membership among the elect who would one day feast together in God’s kingdom, and the intimate fellowship with one another that they experienced around the table was a foretaste, an anticipation, of the union that they would enjoy for ever with God. The whole meal event was thus both a prophetic symbol of the future and also a means of entering into that future in the present.

From Early Christian Worship: A Basic Introduction to Ideas and Practice by Paul Bradshaw (Collegeville, Minn.: Liturgical Press, 1996).

Daily Reading for April 10 • Good Friday

All creation was transformed by fear
when it saw you, O Christ,
hanging on the cross.
The sun grew dark
and the foundations of the earth shook.
All things suffered
with you who created all.
For our sake you willed to suffer this:
O Lord, glory to you!

A mystery fearful and wonderful
we see happening today.
He who cannot be touched is seized;
he is tied who frees Adam from sin.
He who tries human hearts and secret thoughts
is unjustly brought to trial.
He is locked up in prison,
who shut up the abyss.
He stands before Pilate,
before whom stand and quake the powers of heaven.
By the hand of his creature
is struck the Creator.
To the cross is sentenced
the judge of alive and dead.
Hell’s destroyer is buried in a grave.
Glory to you, most patient Lord:
all this you suffer in your love,
you have saved all from the curse.

From a vesper hymn for Holy Friday, quoted in Orthodox Lent, Holy Week and Easter: Liturgical Texts with Commentary by Hugh Wybrew (London: SPCK, 1995).

Daily Reading for April 11 • Holy Saturday

Today a grave holds him
who holds creation in the palm of his hand.
A stone covers him
who covers with glory the heavens.
Life is asleep and hell trembles,
and Adam is freed from his chains.

Glory to your saving work,
by which you have done all things!
You have given us eternal rest,
your holy resurrection from the dead.

From a matins hymn for Holy Saturday, quoted in Orthodox Lent, Holy Week and Easter: Liturgical Texts with Commentary by Hugh Wybrew (London: SPCK, 1995).

Daily Reading for April 12 • The Sunday of the Resurrection: Easter Day

This ultimate day affirms that death is no more, the last enemy is overcome, the gate of heaven is open. By simply experiencing the processions of death and life with others, we come to the last mystery—that the tomb is empty, that life rises from the tomb, that God in Christ has redeemed the world, the cross of shame is the cross of glory. Understanding it is the work of a lifetime, but because we have consented to be there, by that assent glory will permeate all we do hereafter.

“Who sweeps a room as for thy law
makes that and the action fine.”

It is not that we become good, or clever, or nice, but that we are there, ready to be loved by the love which does not depend on our actions but is a free and unconditional gift to all. It is not that we shall suddenly find ourselves totally other on Easter Day—rather we shall know that each step of ordinary living from now on is within the dynamic procession of love which is the return of Christ to the Father.

From In the Company of Christ: A Pilgrimage Through Holy Week by Benedicta Ward SLG. Copyright © 2005. Used by permission of Church Publishing Incorporated, New York, NY. www.churchpublishing.org

Daily Reading for April 13 • Monday in Easter Week

Holy Week is the world’s sacred Winter:
The earth is a widow, the skies are sere,
There’s a sound of scourging and nailing in the vinegary wind;
And the darkness chokes the Son of Man.

But spring, two springs, are coming to the world
From the depths on the third morning:
The lily, the primrose and the daffodil
Will follow the Saviour from the Egypt of soil.

The rejoicing is green and white, the praise is yellow
Because the new Adam has risen alive from the grave;
And the ivy, tying itself round the tree like the old serpent,
Is for us eternal life with God.

“Easter Sunday” by Gwenallt, in Gwreiddiau, translated by Patrick Thomas, 1959; quoted in A Celtic Primer: The Complete Celtic Worship Resource and Collection, edited and compiled by Brendan O’Malley. Copyright © 2002. Used by permission of Morehouse Publishing, Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. www.morehousepublishing.com

Daily Reading for April 14 • Tuesday in Easter Week

The sword of flame no longer guards the gate of Eden,
For a strange bond came upon it: the wood of the Cross.
The sting of Death and the victory of Hades were nailed to it.
But you appeared, my Savior, crying to those in Hades:
Be brought back
Again to Paradise.

Nailed to the form of the Cross
As truly a ransom for many,
You redeemed us, Christ our God,
For by your precious blood in love for mankind
You snatched our souls from death.
You brought us back with you
Again to Paradise.

All things in heaven and earth rightly rejoice with Adam,
Because he has been called
Again to Paradise.

“On the Victory of the Cross” by St. Romanos the Melodist, found in On the Life of Christ: Kontakia, translated by Ephrem Lash (San Francisco: Harper, 1995).

Daily Reading for April 15 • Wednesday in Easter Week

Last night did Christ the Sun rise from the dark,
The mystic harvest of the fields of God,
And now the little wandering tribes of bees
Are brawling in the scarlet flowers abroad.
The winds are soft with birdsong; all night long
Darkling the nightingale her descant told,
And now inside church doors the happy folk
The Alleluia chant a hundredfold.
O father of thy folk, be thine by right
The Easter joy, the threshold of the light.

A Latin verse for Easter, quoted in A Celtic Primer: The Complete Celtic Worship Resource and Collection, edited and compiled by Brendan O’Malley. Copyright © 2002. Used by permission of Morehouse Publishing, Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. www.morehousepublishing.com

Daily Reading for April 16 • Thursday in Easter Week

By the observance of these forty days, we have wanted to devote ourselves to this, namely, that we should know something about the Cross in this season of our Lord’s Passion. Consequently, we must try very hard also to be found companions of Christ’s Resurrection, moving from death to life while we are in this body. For any who have been changed from one thing to another by some conversion, there comes an end (in ceasing to be what they were), and there comes a beginning (in becoming what they were not). Yet it makes a difference for whom one dies or lives, since there is a death which brings life and a life which brings death. . . .

We must rejoice a great deal over this transformation by which we are taken from earthly coarseness to heavenly dignity through that ineffable mercy of the one who descended to our state in order to lift us up to his.

A sermon for the Holy Saturday Vigil by Leo the Great, quoted in The Fathers of the Church: St. Leo the Great, Sermons, translated by Jane Patricia Freeland, C.S.J.B. and Agnes Josephine Conway, S.S.J. (Washington, D.C.: The Catholic University of America Press, 1996).

Daily Reading for April 17 • Friday in Easter Week

There is one God, who by his word and wisdom created all things and set them in order. His Word is our Lord Jesus Christ, who in this last age became human among us to unite the end and the beginning, that is, humanity and God. Humankind was to receive the Spirit of God and so attain to the glory of the Father.

The Spirit prepares us to receive the Son of God, the Son leads us to the Father, and the Father, freeing us from change and decay, bestows the eternal life that comes to everyone from seeing God.

As those who see light are in the light sharing its brilliance, so those who see God are in God sharing his glory, and that glory gives them life. To see God is to share in life.

From the treatise Against Heresies by Irenaeus, Bishop of Lyons [c. 202], found in Readings for the Daily Office from the Early Church, edited by J. Robert Wright. Copyright © 1991. Used by permission of Church Publishing Incorporated, New York, NY. www.churchpublishing.org

Daily Reading for April 18 • Saturday in Easter Week

He who was also the carpenter’s glorious son set up his cross above death’s all-consuming jaws, and led the human race into the dwelling place of life. We give glory to you, Lord, who raised up your cross to span the jaws of death like a bridge by which souls might pass from the region of the dead to the land of the living. We give glory to you who put on the body of a single mortal and made it the source of life for every other mortal. You are incontestably alive. Your murderers sowed your living body in the earth as farmers sow grain, but it sprang up and yielded an abundant harvest of people raised from the dead.

Come, then, my brothers and sisters, let us offer our Lord the great and all-embracing sacrifice of our love, pouring out our treasury of hymns and prayers before him who offered his cross in sacrifice to God for the enrichment of us all.

From a sermon of Ephrem of Edessa, Deacon [373], found in Readings for the Daily Office from the Early Church, edited by J. Robert Wright. Copyright © 1991. Used by permission of Church Publishing Incorporated, New York, NY. www.churchpublishing.org

Daily Reading for April 19 • The Second Sunday of Easter

Let us rise in early morning.
Reconciliation’s plan devising,
Fellow-sharer of the Father’s Throne,
Thee, O Christ, we, very early rising,
Tender lover of our spirits, own!

When Thy Friends, with deep dismay confounded,
Stood amazed, and knew not where to fly,
All the darkness that their souls surrounded
Thou didst scatter with Thy drawing nigh

Touch how aweful, how consolatory!
When, O Thomas, thou didst stretch thine hand,
And that Side, resplendent in its glory,
Didst explore, because He gave command!

Unbelief of Thomas was the Mother
Of Thy Church’s most unshaken Creed:
Thou, O Saviour, wise above all other,
Had’st, before the world was, thus decreed.

From Ode 5 of the Canon for St. Thomas’ Sunday of John of Damascus. Found at http://www.ccel.org/ccel/neale/easternhymns.johndmsc.html

Daily Reading for April 20

“Have you believed because you have seen me?” Jesus asked Thomas, our twin. My guess is that Thomas believed not because of what his eyes had seen, but because of what his heart had seen. With his eyes, he had seen only Jesus the son of Joseph and Mary, a man much like other men—so many inches high, so many pounds heavy, hair this color, eyes that color. But with his heart, he saw, maybe for the first time in his life, the one he was destined to love and search for and try to follow as best he could for the rest of his days when Jesus was no longer around for him to see with his eyes—any more than he is around for us to see with ours.

The last thing of all that Jesus said to his disciples that day was, “Blessed are those who have not seen and yet believe,” and I think that among others he meant you and me. We have not seen him with our eyes the way Thomas did, but precious as that sight would have been, I wonder in the long run what difference it would have made. What makes all the difference in the world is the one whom from time to time, by grace, I believe we have seen with our hearts. The one who is there to see always if we will only keep our hearts peeled for him.

To see him with the heart is to know that, in the long run, his kind of life is the only life worth living. To see him with the heart is not only to believe in him, but little by little to become bearers to each other of his healing life until we become finally healed and whole and alive within ourselves. To see him with the heart is to take heart, to grow true hearts, brave hearts, at last.

From “The Eyes of the Heart” by Frederick Buechner, in Shouts and Whispers: Twenty-One Writers Speak About Their Writing and Their Faith, edited by Jennifer L. Holberg (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2006).

Daily Reading for April 21 • Anselm, Archbishop of Canterbury, 1109

Lord Jesus Christ, my sweet and gracious Master,
Thou has displayed a greater love than that of any man;
nor can the love of any equal Thine.
For, owing nought to death,
Thou none the less didst lay down Thy sweet life
for slaves and sinners;
Thou didst pray for those who murdered Thee,
that Thou mightest make them righteous, and Thy brethren,
and mightst reconcile them to Thy tender Father and Thyself.
Thou, Lord, Who to Thine enemies didst show so great a love,
Thyself enjoinedst love upon Thy friends.

Good Master, how shall I recount this Thine inestimable charity?
What return can I make for this vast boon?
The sweetness of Thy kindness overpasses all feeling and expression;
and the immeasurable service
that Thy love has rendered can never be repaid.
What reward shall I give to my Creator, then,
and to my Re-creator?
What reward shall I give to Him, my merciful Redeemer?
O Lord, Thou art my God;
my goods are nothing unto Thee.
For the round world is Thine, and all the fullness of it.
What reward shall I give my God,
except my heart’s obedience to His command?
And Thy command is this:
that we love one another.

From “A Prayer for Friends” in Prayers and Meditations of St. Anselm, selected and translated by a Religious of C.S.M.V. (London: A. R. Mowbray, 1952).

Daily Reading for April 22

For a long time I felt jealous of your disciples who saw your pierced side when you appeared to them, and of Thomas who was allowed to touch your wounds. Often I thought, “How much easier would it have been to believe in you and give myself to you without reservation if I could just have been there with them!” But even as I think this way, I know already that I am fooling myself and looking for an excuse to keep my distance from you.

O dear Jesus, your broken heart is so visible and so touchable if I but take the risk of trusting you completely. The hungry, the thirsty, the naked, the prisoners, the refugees, the lonely, the anguished, the dying, they are all around me and show me your broken heart. I see you every time I walk down the streets, every time I watch television or listen to the radio, every time I open a newspaper, every time I pay attention to a woman, a man or a child who comes to me. I see you every time I let my eyes see the pain of all those with whom I live day after day.

O Lord Jesus, this is not a sentimental thought. Oh no, it is a very tangible reality. You who drew all people to yourself as you were lifted up in your pain and in your glory, you stay with us as the wounded and risen Lord. Whenever I touch your broken heart, I touch the hearts of your broken people, and whenever I touch the hearts of your broken people, I touch your heart. Your broken heart and the broken heart of the world are one.

From Heart Speaks to Heart: Three Prayers to Jesus by Henri J.M. Nouwen (Notre Dame, Ind.: Ave Maria Press, 1989).

Daily Reading for April 23

In the silence, we are being prepared for this awakening which is an encounter with the fullness and the splendour of Jesus in that fully awakened state to which the Resurrection led Him, because no one comes to the Father of all except through the Son in whom all creation comes into being. But even if we know intellectually that this is the purpose of the silence, at the time our actual experience is of the void. . . . The Christian carries this dying within him as he goes about his daily routine, not in a self-dramatizing or self-obsessed way, but with a joyful awareness that more and more deeply suffuses his whole being, that the degree to which he dies to himself in this void is the degree to which he is revivified in the transcendent life of the completely free man, Jesus. . . .

As the Christian enters into the cycles of death and resurrection more thoroughly, he becomes more aware of its universal truth, that it is the model of all being. He begins to appreciate what Mystery is. In order to become fully opened to the force of this universal cycle, we need to understand that it is completed at every level of every life, and in all of the countless ways in which we can examine or apprehend the meaning of our own life.

From Word into Silence by John Main OSB (New York: Paulist Press, 1981).

Daily Reading for April 24

Thomas is the saint who makes sure that the Easter people do not omit the missing factor. He shows what there is in this story of resurrection which we can celebrate without hollow unreality in the midst of these grievous years, in the midst of our powerlessness. Only a Lord with wounds can save us now. To us who are so captive to the principalities and powers liberation wears the face, not of the conquering hero, but of the fellow victim on the cross. When you come to think of it, the first person to bear witness to the aliveness of Jesus was the man who was dying at his side and dared to ask for a place in his Kingdom. The real Easter people have the exhausted, enduring faces of Mother Teresa, Helder Camara, and thousands like them. The characteristic actions of the resurrection life are wiping away the tears, showing scars and sharing food.

From “The Resurrection Life” in The Incarnate God by John V. Taylor. Copyright © 2003. A Continuum book used by permission of Morehouse Publishing, Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. www.morehousepublishing.com

Daily Reading for April 25 • Saint Mark the Evangelist

The history of Saint Mark, the Disciple and Evangelist, Archbishop of the great city of Alexandria, and first of its Bishops. . . . Now Aristobulus had a son named John. And after they had taken up their abode in the province of Palestine, near the city of Jerusalem, the child John grew and increased in stature by the grace of the Holy Ghost. And these two brothers had a cousin, the wife of Simon Peter, who became the chief of the disciples of the Lord Christ; and the said John whom they had surnamed Mark, used to visit Peter, and learn the Christian doctrines from him out of the holy Scriptures. . . .

Mark was one of the Seventy Disciples. And he was one of the servants who poured out the water which Our Lord turned into wine, at the marriage of Cana in Galilee. And it was he who carried the jar of water into the house of Simon the Cyrenian, at the time of the sacramental Supper. And it was also he who entertained the disciples in his house, at the time of the Passion of the Lord Christ, and after his resurrection from the dead, where he entered to them while the doors were shut.

And after his Ascension into heaven, Mark went with Peter to Jerusalem, and they preached the word of God to the multitudes. And the Holy Ghost appeared to Peter, and commanded him to go to the cities and the villages which were in that country. So Peter, and Mark with him, went to the district of Bethany, and preached the word of God; and Peter remained there some days. And he saw in a dream the angel of God, who said to him: “In two places there is great dearth.” So Peter said to the angel: “Which places meanest thou?” He said to him: “The city of Alexandria with the land of Egypt, and the land of Rome. It is not a dearth of bread and water, but a dearth arising from ignorance of the Word of God, which thou preachest.” So when Peter awoke from his sleep, he told Mark what he had witnessed in his dream. And after that, Peter and Mark went to the region of Rome, and preached there the word of God.

And in the fifteenth year after the Ascension of Christ, the holy Peter sent Saint Mark, the father and evangelist, to the city of Alexandria, to announce the good tidings there, and to preach the word of God and the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ, to whom is due glory, honour and worship, with the Father and the Holy Ghost, the one God forever. Amen.

From Life of the Apostle and Evangelist Mark by Severus, Bishop of Al-Ushmunain (fl. ca. AD 955-987), translated from the Arabic by B. Evetts, from Patrologia Orientalis, first series. Entire text found at http://www.voskrese.info/spl/patmark.html

Daily Reading for April 26 • The Third Sunday of Easter

There he was. In the midst, though the doors were still firmly bolted. He was familiar, yet different. . . . “Have you anything to eat?” And he “ate before their eyes.” How often had they shared a meal! How important it is for friends to share a meal, to break bread! This communion in the neediness of our humanity—how it feeds our relationship! Now the Risen Friend would enter again into this basic human communion, even after he had left the human way of mortal life that needed to be so sustained. He let them serve him. It would be their gift of food. He would be the receiver. They would know well that it was the food of the ordinary person. A piece of grilled fish. This Divine Fish, the ICHTHUS, grilled on the fire of the wood of the cross, took their humble offering of fish. This time he would not bless and multiply it to fill many empty stomachs. Rather, he would eat it himself to fulfill the hope in those who surrounded him and to take away the emptiness that death had left in their lives.

Their eyes were fixed upon him as he bit into the fish in the old familiar way. They watched him chew, and the swallowing. The fish was truly consumed, and so was their doubt. I suspect then that those who had held back when he urged them to touch now rushed forward, all seeking a place in his expansive arms. He was indeed their Jesus, their Master. He was here, he was risen.

From Breaking Bread: The Table Talk of Jesus by M. Basil Pennington, O.C.S.O. (San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1986).

Daily Reading for April 27

The overarching story of the cross and resurrection, within which Jesus’ stories and the stories about Jesus come together, in turn gathers in the stories of the Hebrew Scriptures so that they become newly laden with transforming potential. The drama of the early Christians’ discovery of the newly revealing power of the old stories in the light of the cross is condensed in Luke’s wonderful account of the walk to Emmaus. “And he said to them, ‘O foolish men, and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken! Was it not necessary that the Christ should suffer these things and enter into his glory?’ And beginning with Moses and all the prophets, he interpreted to them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself” (24:25-27).

In Christian faith the Story and the stories within it are not illustrations of truth which could be conveyed in another way. There are no philosophical principles which can be distilled from them and the stories then discarded as empty husks. The stories themselves are indispensable sacramental means of encounter with the Word which became flesh. Just as no satisfactory definition of the kingdom of God can be extracted from the parables, no abstract theory of the atonement can be refined from the passion narratives. The personal engagement with the stories can never be superseded or sidestepped by merely subscribing to doctrines supposedly drawn from them.

From The Word is Very Near You: A Guide to Praying with Scripture by Martin L. Smith (Cowley Publications, 1989).

Daily Reading for April 28

Today there are many voices enticing people into the ways of death. As in the days of Christ, they speak in tones of prudence, expedience and self-protection. We are caught in the gravitational pull towards death. To stand on the side of life calls for the risks and initiatives of a different policy.

For behind every considered policy there is a bias either towards death or towards life. The arguments or the weapons or the methods you use reveal which side you are on. Was that why Jesus declined Peter’s sword and the merciful women’s drugged wine?

But aliveness will win, the enduring aliveness of God. Year after year Easter and Pentecost renew the promise that ‘in Christ Jesus the life-giving law of the Spirit has set you free from the law of sin and death’. After every winter the spring flowers are drawn back into the light of the sun. So may we be drawn back from our falling away and up into Christ who is our life and in him grow sensitive to the reality of God, spontaneously responsive to the glory and pain of the world, less prudential in our self-giving, more daring in our risks, each marked with the liveliness and singularity of a child of God.

From “Most Glorious Lord of Life” in The Incarnate God by John V. Taylor. Copyright © 2003. A Continuum book used by permission of Morehouse Publishing, Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. www.morehousepublishing.com

Daily Reading for April 29 • Catherine of Siena, 1380

We have seen that we must seek the kingdom of Heaven prudently: now I answer you about the attitude we should hold toward the Holy Communion, and how it befits us to take it. We should not use a foolish humility, as do secular men of the world. I say, it befits us to receive that sweet Sacrament, because it is the food of souls without which we cannot live in grace. Therefore no bond is so great that it cannot and must not be broken, that we may come to this sweet Sacrament. A man must do on his part as much as he can, and that is enough. How ought we to receive it? With the light of most holy faith, and with the mouth of holy desire. In the light of faith you shall contemplate all God and all Man in that Host. Then the impulse that follows the intellectual perception, receives with tender love and holy meditation on its sins and faults, whence it arrives at contrition, and considers the generosity of the immeasurable love of God, who in so great love has given Himself for our food. Because one does not seem to have that perfect contrition and disposition which he himself would wish, he must not therefore turn away; for goodwill alone is sufficient, and the disposition which on his part exists. . . .

I said that it did not befit us, nor do I wish you, to do as many imprudent laymen, who pass over what is commanded them by Holy Church, saying: “I am not worthy of it.” Thus they spend a long time in mortal sin without the food of their souls. Oh, foolish humility! Who does not see that thou art not worthy? At what time dost thou await worthiness? Do not await it; for thou wilt be just as worthy at the end as at the beginning. For with all our just deeds, we shall never be worthy of it. But God is He who is worthy, and makes us worthy with His worth. His worth grows never less. What ought we to do? Make us ready on our part, and observe His sweet commandment. For did we not do so, giving up communion, in such wise believing to flee from fault, we should fall into fault.

Therefore I conclude, and will that such folly be not in you; but that you make you ready, as a faithful Christian, to receive this Holy Communion as I said. You will do it just as perfectly as you are in true knowledge of yourself; not otherwise. For if you abide in that knowledge, you will see everything clearly. Do not slacken your holy desire, for pain or loss, or injury or ingratitude of those whom you have served; but manfully, with true and long perseverance you shall persevere till death. Thus I beg you to do by the love of Christ crucified. I say no more. Remain in the holy and sweet grace of God. Sweet Jesus, Jesus Love.

From one of the letters of Catherine of Siena to Ristoro Canigiani, a citizen of Florence, quoted in Saint Catherine of Siena, As Seen in Her Letters, translated and edited with an introduction by Vida Dutton Scudder (London, New York: J.M. Dent and E.P. Dutton, 1905); found online at http://www.kenrickparish.com/mcdermott/Scudder%20letters.htm

Daily Reading for April 30

As global citizens in the twenty-first century, we’re beginning to realize that none of us lives in a permanent and unchanging home, and that the way we treat our quarters—our oikos—has a big impact on all the other residents of this squatter’s camp. Our ecology and our economy—both have their roots in that same word for house—are dependent on how we live in this temporary house, this parish we call earth. . . .

Being on the road is what the early Christians called their community—“the way” or “the road.” They didn’t come to be called Christians for quite a while. They knew themselves to be aliens, wanderers like Jesus, and like him, they had no place to lay their heads.

The reality of resurrection sometimes comes to us in strange guises, and sometimes it even comes to us as we meet strangers. Most often it has something to do with hospitality—eating together, helping another to find a more stable home, building a community that says we can serve each other even if we’re still ultimately homeless.

From the sermon “Christ in the Stranger” preached in San Diego, California (6 April 2008), quoted in Gospel in the Global Village: On the Road with Bishop Katharine by Katharine Jefferts Schori. Copyright © 2009. Used by permission of Morehouse Publishing, Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. www.morehousepublishing.com