Blessed Feast day of Mary, Mother of the Church! The collect and preface below. Some of my favorite prayers in the new missal.
Collect
O God, Father of mercies,
whose only Begotten son, as he hung upon the Cross, chose the Blessed Virgin mary, his mother,
to be our mother also,
grant, we pray, that with her loving help
your Church may be more fruitful day by day and, exulting in the holiness of her children,
may draw to her embrace all the families of the peoples. Through our lord Jesus Christ, your son,
who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the holy spirit,
one God, for ever and ever.
Preface
It is truly right and just, our duty and our salvation,
always and everywhere to give you thanks,
Lord, holy Father, almighty and eternal God,
and to proclaim your greatness with due praise,
as we honor the Blessed Virgin Mary.
Receiving your Word in her Immaculate Heart,
she was found worthy to conceive him in her virgin’s womb
and, giving birth to the Creator,
she nurtured the beginnings of the Church.
Standing beside the Cross,
she received the testament of divine love
and took to herself as sons and daughters
all those who by the Death of Christ
are born to heavenly life.
As the Apostles awaited the Spirit you had promised,
she joined her supplication to the prayers of the disciples
and so became the pattern of the Church at prayer.
Raised to the glory of heaven,
she accompanies your pilgrim Church with a mother’s love
and watches in kindness over the Church’s homeward steps,
until the Lord’s Day shall come in glorious splendor.
Today marks the three hundred and thirtieth birthday of the Frenchman François-Marie Arouet, better known by his nom de plume, Voltaire (1694-1778).
Born into a bourgeois family during the reign of Louis XIV, the “Sun King” (r. 1643-1715), Voltaire suffered tragedy at a young age when his mother died. Never close with his father or brother, Voltaire exhibited a rebellious attitude toward authority from his youth. His brilliant mind was fostered in the care of the Society of Jesus, who introduced him to the joys of literature and theater. Despite his later criticisms against the Church, Voltaire, throughout his life, fondly recalled his dedicated Jesuit teachers.
Although he spent time as a civil servant in the French embassy to the Hague, Voltaire’s main love was writing—an endeavor where he excelled in various genres, including poetry, which led to his appointment as the royal court poet for King Louis XV. Widely recognized as one of the greatest French writers, and even hyperbolically referred to by ...
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