THE SAINT ANDREW DAILY MISSAL
With Vespers for Sundays and Feasts
and Kyriale
by; Dom Gaspar Lefebvre O.S.B.
of the Abbey of St André
"The seed is the word of God"
Sexagesima Sunday
Station at St. Paul - without the Walls
Semi Double
Privilege of the Second Class
Violet vestment's
As on last Sunday and on those
which follow untll Passion Sunday the Church teaches us “ to celebrate the
Paschal Sacrament ” by “ the Scriptures of both Testaments " (Prayer of Holy
Saturday aft. 7th Prophecy).
Through the whole of this week the divine office is full of the
thought of Noah. God seeing that man’s wickedness was great upon the earth said,
I will destroy man whom I have created ”; and He told Noah, “I will estabhsh my
covenant with thee and thou shalt enter into the ark.” For forty days and forty
nights rain fell on the earth, while the ark floated on the waters which rose
above the mountain tops and covered them ; and in this whirlpool all men were
carried away " like stubble ” (Gradual -
Ps lxxxii. 19, 14)
only Noah an his companions in the ark remaining alive. 'Then God remembered
them and at length the rain ceased. After some time Noah opened the window of
the ark and set free a dove, which returned with a fresh olive leaf and Noah
understood that the waters no longer covered the earth. And God told him, “ Go
out of the ark, thou and thy wife, thy sons and the wives of thy sons with thee
” (Communion - Ps.
xlii. 4). And the rainbow appeared as a sign of reconclliatlon between God
and men .
That his story is related to the Paschal mystery is shown by the fact
that the Church read's it on Holy Saturday'; and this is how she herself applies
ln the Liturgy, to our Lord and His Church. “The just wrath of the Creator
drowned the guilty world in the vengeful waters of the flood, only Noah being
saved in the
ark. But then the admirable power of love laved the world in blood"’. It
was the wood of the ark which saved the human race and it is that of the Cross
which in its turn, saves the world. Thou alone,” says the Church, speaking of
the Cross, ‘ hast been found worthy to be, for this shipwrecked world, the ark
which brings safely into port. " The Open door in the side of the ark
by which those enter who are to escape from the Flood, and who represent the
church, are as is explained in the liturgy a type of the mystery of redemption;
for on the cross our Lord had His sacred side open and from this gate of life,
went forth the sacraments, giving true life to souls. Indeed the blood and
water which flow from thence are symbols of the Eucharist and of Holy Baptism."
“ O God, who by water didst wash away the crimes of the guilty world,
and by the overliowing of the deluge didst give a figure of regeneration, that
one and the same element might in a mystery be the end of vice and the origin of
virtue: look, O Lord, on the face of Thy Church and multiply in her Thy
regenerations, opening the fonts of baptism all over the world for the
renovation of the Gentiles. “ In the days of_Noah," says St.Peter, “ eight souls
were saved by water, whereunto Baptism being of the like form, now saveth you
also‘."
On Maundy Thursday, when the Bishop blesses the holy oil from the
olive-tree which is to be used for the sacraments, he says : “ When of old the
crimes of the world were atoned for by the waters of the Flood, a dove
foreshadowing the gift to come,_announced by an olive-branch the return of peace
to the earth. And this indeed is made clear by its effects in latter
times: when the waters of baptism having washed away all guilt of sin, the
unction of the oil makes us joyous and serene.”` The Blood of Christ is the
blood of the New Covenant, which almighty God has made with man, through His
Son. “ Thou,” cries the Church, “ who by an olive- branch didst command the dove
to proclaim peace to the world.” Peace is often mentioned in the Mass
which is the memorial of the Passion, “ Pax Domini sit semper vobiscum.” And we
shall find the collect for Easter Friday, speaking of the Paschal Sacrament, as
the seal of reconciliation between God and men.
Above all, however, in his divinely appointed mission as father of all
succeeding generations Noah is a figure of Christ” he was truly the second
father of the human race and he remains the type of life continually renewed.
We are told in the liturgy that the olive branch by
means of its foliage is a symbol of the prosperous fertility bestowed by
almighty God upon Noah when he came forth from the ark', and the ark itself is
called by St. Ambrose in today’s oftice, the “seminarium ” or nursery, that is,
the place containing the seed of life which is to fill the world.
Now, Christ, much more than Noah, was the second Adam peopling the world
with a race of believing souls, faithful to God. On Holy Saturday, in the prayer
following the second prophecy which is concerned with Noah, the Church humbly
asks almighty God to “ peacefully effect,” by His eternal decree, “ the work of
human salvation," and to “let the whole world experience and see that what was
fallen is raised up, what was old is made new,” and that " all things are
re-established, through Him from whom they received their first being, our Lord
Jesus Christ." It was through the Word that God made the world in the beginning
(last Gospel), and it is by the preaching of His Gospel that our Lord came to
bring men to a new birth. “ Being born again says St. Peter, “not of corruptible
seed, but incorruptible, by the word of God who llveth and reigneth: for
ever,... And this is the word which by the gospel hath been preached unto you .
From this we can see why to-day’s Gospel is taken from the parable of the
Sower, for “ the seed,” is the word of God". If in Noah’s days men perished, St.
Paul tells us, it was because of their unbelief, while at the same time it was
by faith that Noah “ framed the ark... by the which he condemned the world,
and was instituted heir of the justice which is by faith."
In the same way, those who believe in our Lord’s words will be saved.
According to St. Augustine’s exposition, “as there were three floors in the ark
so there are three different spiritual harvests " (See the explaination before
the Gospel -
Lk viii. 4-15). In today's Epistle, St Paul recounts all that he did and
suffered in the course of preaching the faith to the Gentiles and indeed he, the
Apostle to the Gentiles, was the outstanding preacher of the world. He is the “
minister of Christ,” that is, the one whom God had chosen to unfold to all
nations the good news of the Incarnate Word.
“ Who will grant me,” cries St. John Chrysostom, “ to walk around St.Paul’s
body, to embrace his tomb, to behold the dust of that body which filled up what
was lacking in Christ sufferings, which bore the marks of his wounds, which
everywhere spread abroad, like ‘good seed, the preaching of the Gospel‘? ”
The Roman Church has fulfilled this desire, in‘the case of her own children, by
making a station on this day to the basilica of St. Paul -without-the-walls.
“Through the Church’s neophytes "we read in the liturgy, “ the earth is renewed,
and thus renewed, she brings forth fruit as it were from the dead. "
Every parish priest celebrates Mass for the people of his parish.
Imprimatur
Brugis, 22 Octobris 1945
Jos. Van der Meersch,
Vic. Gen.
Imprimi Potest
Die 18 Octobris 1945
P. Joannes Delacroix, O.S.B.
Prior.