Cry out with joy to God, all the earth: serve the Lord with gladness.
Year: C(II). Psalm week: 4. Liturgical Colour: Green.
Other saints: Bl Angelus Mazzinghi (c.1386-1438)
17 Aug (where celebrated)
Angelus was born near Florence, around the year 1386. He entered the Carmelite Order in 1413, being later ordained a priest in 1415. He was the first member of the reform movement delle selve (of the woods), which began in the convent of Santa Maria delle Selve at Lastra a Signa, west of Florence, a reform that later spread to the Carmelite Congregation of Mantua. Angelus served as prior of the reformed community from 1419 to 1430, as well as prior for two years in the community of Florence. He was a lector (teacher) in theology and was renowned for his preaching, no doubt arising from a deep love and practice of praying the Scriptures in his Carmelite life. Angelus is often depicted in iconography with flowers falling from his mouth as he preaches. He died in Florence on the 17th August 1438.
About the author of the Second Reading in today's Office of Readings:
Second Reading: St Augustine of Hippo (354 - 430)
Augustine was born in Thagaste in Africa of a Berber family. He was brought up a Christian but left the Church early and spent a great deal of time seriously seeking the truth, first in the Manichaean heresy, which he abandoned on seeing how nonsensical it was, and then in Neoplatonism, until at length, through the prayers of his mother and the teaching of St Ambrose of Milan, he was converted back to Christianity and baptized in 387, shortly before his mother’s death.
Augustine had a brilliant legal and academic career, but after his conversion he returned home to Africa and led an ascetic life. He was elected Bishop of Hippo and spent 34 years looking after his flock, teaching them, strengthening them in the faith and protecting them strenuously against the errors of the time. He wrote an enormous amount and left a permanent mark on both philosophy and theology. His Confessions, as dazzling in style as they are deep in content, are a landmark of world literature. The Second Readings in the Office of Readings contain extracts from many of his sermons and commentaries and also from the Confessions.
Liturgical colour: green
The theological virtue of hope is symbolized by the colour green, just as the burning fire of love is symbolized by red. Green is the colour of growing things, and hope, like them, is always new and always fresh. Liturgically, green is the colour of Ordinary Time, the orderly sequence of weeks through the year, a season in which we are being neither single-mindedly penitent (in purple) nor overwhelmingly joyful (in white).
| Mid-morning reading (Terce) | 1 Corinthians 10:24,31 © |
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Nobody should be looking for his own advantage, but everybody for the other man’s. Whatever you eat, whatever you drink, whatever you do at all, do it for the glory of God.
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| Noon reading (Sext) | Colossians 3:17 © |
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Never say or do anything except in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.
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| Afternoon reading (None) | Colossians 3:23-24 © |
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Whatever your work is, put your heart into it as if it were for the Lord and not for men, knowing that the Lord will repay you by making you his heirs. It is Christ the Lord that you are serving.
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