Milton Walsh - Witness of the Saints: Patristic Readings in the Liturgy of the Hours

WITNESS OF THE SAINTS

PATRISTIC READINGS
IN THE LITURGY OF THE HOURS

by
Milton Walsh

IGNATIUS PRESS SAN FRANCISCO

Unless otherwise noted, Scripture quotations (except those within citations) have been taken from the Revised Standard Version of the Holy Bible, Second Catholic Edition, 2006. The Revised Standard Version of the Holy Bible: the Old Testament, 1952, 2006; the Apocrypha, 1957, 2006; the New Testament, 1946, 2006; the Catholic Edition of the Old Testament, incorporating the Apocrypha, 1966, 2006, the Catholic Edition of the New Testament, 1965, 2006 by the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America.
All rights reserved.

Excerpts from the English translation of the non-biblical readings from The Liturgy of the Hours 1974, International Committee on English in the Liturgy, Inc. All rights reserved. Used by permission.

Cover art:
Saints Paraskeve, Gregory the Theologian, John Chrysostom,
and Basil the Great (early 15th century)
From the Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow, Russia.
HIP / Art Resource

Cover design by Riz Boncan Marsella

2012 by Ignatius Press, San Francisco
All rights reserved
ISBN 978-1-58617-662-4
Library of Congress Control Number 2012933891
Printed in the United States of America

Some History: Vigils, Matins, Office of Readings

A Chronological List of Readings from the Fathers and Saints

Reading the Bible with the Saints

THE PROFESSION OF FAITH

I BelieveWe Believe

Mans Capacity for God

God Comes to Meet Man

The Revelation of God

The Transmission of Divine Revelation

Sacred Scripture

Mans Response to God

I Believe

We Believe

The Profession of the Christian Faith

I Believe in God the Father

I Believe in God, the Father Almighty, Creator of Heaven and Earth

I Believe in God

The Father

The Almighty

The Creator

Heaven and Earth

Man

The Fall

I Believe in Jesus Christ, the Only Son of God

And in Jesus Christ, His Only Son, Our Lord

Who was Conceived by the Holy Spirit, Born of the Virgin Mary

The Son of God Became Man

Conceived by the Holy Spirit, Born of the Virgin Mary

The Mysteries of Christs Life

Christs Whole Life Is Mystery

The Mysteries of Jesus Life

The Mysteries of Jesus Public Life

Jesus Christ Suffered under Pontius Pilate, Was Crucified, Died, and Was Buried

He Descended into Hell; On the Third Day He Rose Again

Christ Descended into Hell

On the Third Day He Rose Again from the Dead

He Ascended into Heaven, and Is Seated at the Right Hand of God the Father Almighty

From There He Will Come to Judge the Living and the Dead

I Believe in the Holy Spirit

I Believe in the Holy Spirit

I Believe in the Holy Catholic Church

The Church in Gods Plan

The ChurchPeople of God, Body of Christ, Temple of the Holy Spirit

The Church Is One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic

Christs FaithfulHierarchy, Laity, Consecrated Life

The Communion of Saints

MaryMother of Christ, Mother of the Church

I Believe in the Forgiveness of Sins

I Believe in the Resurrection of the Body

I Believe in Life Everlasting

THE CELEBRATION OF THE CHRISTIAN MYSTERY

The Sacramental Economy

The Seven Sacraments of the Church

The Sacraments of Christian Initiation

The Sacrament of Baptism

The Sacrament of Confirmation

The Sacrament of the Eucharist

The Sacraments of Healing

The Sacrament of Penance and Reconciliation

The Anointing of the Sick

The Sacraments at the Service of Communion

The Sacrament of Holy Orders

The Sacrament of Matrimony

LIFE IN CHRIST

Mans Vocation: Life in the Spirit

The Dignity of the Human Person

Man: The Image of God

Our Vocation to Beatitude

Mans Freedom

The Morality of the Passions

Moral Conscience

The Virtues

Sin

The Human Community

Gods Salvation: Law and Grace

The Ten Commandments

You Shall Love the Lord Your God with All Your Heart, and With All Your Soul, and With All Your Mind

The First Commandment

The Second Commandment

The Third Commandment

You Shall Love Your Neighbor as Yourself

The Fourth Commandment

The Fifth Commandment

The Sixth Commandment

The Seventh Commandment

The Eighth Commandment

The Ninth Commandment

The Tenth Commandment

CHRISTIAN PRAYER

Prayer in the Christian Life

The Revelation of Prayer

In the Old Testament

In the Fullness of Time

In the Age of the Church

The Tradition of Prayer

At the Wellsprings of Prayer

The Way of Prayer

Guides for Prayer

The Life of Prayer

Expressions of Prayer

The Battle of Prayer

The Lords Prayer: Our Father!

The Summary of the Whole Gospel

Our Father Who Art in Heaven

The Seven Petitions

It is interesting to me that to be a Doctor of the Church or a Father of the Church one has to have a kind of sanctity. Only saints are made doctors and fathers of the Church because they have a close existential affinity with the things of God. And that must be cultivated through an intense life of prayer. The lex orandi is considered to be a source for the lex credendi : the law of prayer establishes the law of belief, according to a famous saying of Prosper of Aquitaine. That goes to some extent for private prayer and certainly goes for the public prayer of the church.Avery Cardinal Dulles, SJ.

In the foyer of the Gregorian University, where Avery Dulles earned his doctorate in theology, there stands a statue of Jesus Christ, with the inscription Euntes, Docete . This was the command of the risen Lord to his disciples: Go therefore and make disciples of all nations (Mt 28:19). For two thousand years the Catholic Church has lived by that mandate. She has handed on the gospel in many ways: through the Scriptures themselves, but also through her liturgical life, the teachings of her leaders, the insights of her theologians, and the great monuments of Christian art, architecture, music, and poetry. In the interview cited above, Cardinal Dulles indicates one of the richest ways that the gospel of Christ has been handed on for twenty centuries: through the writings of the Fathers and saints of the Church. They are privileged witnesses to the message of salvation, a message that they proclaimed in their writings and confirmed by their lives. Their testimony is one of most precious elements of our Catholic faith.

The witness of the Fathers has always been treasured by the Church. In the words of Pope John Paul II:

They are fathers of the Church in truth, because they have given her life by handing on the gospel (cf. 1 Cor 4:15). They are also her architects, because by thembuilding on the one foundation laid by the apostles, that is, Jesus Christ (cf. 1 Cor 3:11)the Church takes shape in her fundamental configuration.... Fathers they were, and Fathers they remain forever: they constitute a stable structure of the Church, and they exercise a permanent function in the Church throughout the ages. For this reason, any later proclamation or teaching, if it is authentic, must agree with what they proclaimed and taught; every charism and ministry must be nourished at the life-giving springs of their paternity; and every new stone, added to the holy temple that grows and expands each day (cf. Eph 2:21), must rest on what they have already built and be linked to and connected with it. Guided by this conviction, the Church never tires of returning to their writingsfull of wisdom and incapable of growing oldand constantly recalls their memory. Therefore, it is with great joy that we renew our acquaintance with our Fathers through the course of the liturgical year: and at each encounter we are confirmed in our faith and encouraged in our hope.Next page