PRAYERS OF THE CHURCH
Antiphon
Galatians 6:14
in whom is our salvation, life and resurrection,
through whom we are saved and delivered.
Collect
O God, who willed that your Only Begotten Son
should undergo the Cross to save the human race,
grant, we pray,
that we, who have known his mystery on earth,
may merit the grace of his redemption in heaven.
Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son,
who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, forever and ever.
Amen.
DAILY MASS READINGS
Feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross
Reading 1
NM 21:4B-9
With their patience worn out by the journey,
the people complained against God and Moses,
"Why have you brought us up from Egypt to die in this desert,
where there is no food or water?
We are disgusted with this wretched food!"
In punishment the LORD sent among the people saraph serpents,
which bit the people so that many of them died.
Then the people came to Moses and said,
"We have sinned in complaining against the LORD and you.
Pray the LORD to take the serpents from us."
So Moses prayed for the people, and the LORD said to Moses,
"Make a saraph and mount it on a pole,
and if any who have been bitten look at it, they will live."
Moses accordingly made a bronze serpent and mounted it on a pole,
and whenever anyone who had been bitten by a serpent
looked at the bronze serpent, he lived.
Responsorial Psalm
PS 78:1BC-2, 34-35, 36-37, 38
R. Do not forget the works of the Lord!
Hearken, my people, to my teaching;
incline your ears to the words of my mouth.
I will open my mouth in a parable,
I will utter mysteries from of old.
R. Do not forget the works of the Lord!
While he slew them they sought him
and inquired after God again,
Remembering that God was their rock
and the Most High God, their redeemer.
R. Do not forget the works of the Lord!
But they flattered him with their mouths
and lied to him with their tongues,
Though their hearts were not steadfast toward him,
nor were they faithful to his covenant.
R. Do not forget the works of the Lord!
But he, being merciful, forgave their sin
and destroyed them not;
Often he turned back his anger
and let none of his wrath be roused.
R. Do not forget the works of the Lord!
Reading 2
PHIL 2:6-11
Brothers and sisters:
Christ Jesus, though he was in the form of God,
did not regard equality with God something to be grasped.
Rather, he emptied himself,
taking the form of a slave,
coming in human likeness;
and found human in appearance,
he humbled himself,
becoming obedient to death,
even death on a cross.
Because of this, God greatly exalted him
and bestowed on him the name
that is above every name,
that at the name of Jesus
every knee should bend,
of those in heaven and on earth and under the earth,
and every tongue confess that
Jesus Christ is Lord,
to the glory of God the Father.
Alleluia
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
We adore you, O Christ, and we bless you,
because by your Cross you have redeemed the world.
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
Gospel
JN 3:13-17
Jesus said to Nicodemus:
"No one has gone up to heaven
except the one who has come down from heaven, the Son of Man.
And just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the desert,
so must the Son of Man be lifted up,
so that everyone who believes in him may have eternal life."
For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son,
so that everyone who believes in him might not perish
but might have eternal life.
For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world,
but that the world might be saved through him.
SAINT OF THE DAY
September 14
Saint Gabriel Taurin Dufrese (1750 - 1815)
Gabriel Taurin Dufresse, of Lezoux, France,
was ordained a priest of the Society for Foreign Missions of Paris at the age of twenty-four.
In 1776 he arrived in China to undertake his missionary labors in the country's Szechwan Province. The renewed persecution of Chinese Christians in 1784 led to Father Dufresse's arrest. He soon escaped from prison and was taken in by a Chinese Catholic family. He subsequently surrendered himself to the pagan authorities after an auxiliary bishop instructed all the priests staying with families to turn themselves in rather than expose their hosts to the danger of arrest. Father Dufresse was imprisoned and then exiled to Macao. In 1789 he managed to return to Szechwan Province. In the years that followed, his missionary labors were blessed with increasing success. In 1800 he was consecrated an auxiliary bishop.
The resumption of intense anti-Christian persecution in 1805 put Bishop Dufresse in so much danger that he had to change his place of residence almost daily.
In May of 1815, he was re-captured, and suffered beheading on September 14, 1815.
OFFICE OF READINGS
O Lord, open my lips,
and my mouth will proclaim Your Praise!
Invitatory Psalm
Psalm 23 (24)
Christ the King was raised up on the cross for our sake:
come, let us adore him.
The Lord’s is the earth and its fullness,
the world and all who live in it.
He himself founded it upon the seas
and set it firm over the waters.
Christ the King was raised up on the cross for our sake:
come, let us adore him.
Who will climb the mountain of the Lord?
Who will stand in his holy place?
The one who is innocent of wrongdoing and pure of heart,
who has not given himself to vanities or sworn falsely.
He will receive the blessing of the Lord
and be justified by God his savior.
This is the way of those who seek him,
seek the face of the God of Jacob.
Christ the King was raised up on the cross for our sake:
come, let us adore him.
Gates, raise your heads.
Stand up, eternal doors,
and let the king of glory enter.
Who is the king of glory?
The Lord of might and power.
The Lord, strong in battle.
Christ the King was raised up on the cross for our sake:
come, let us adore him.
Gates, raise your heads.
Stand up, eternal doors,
and let the king of glory enter.
Who is the king of glory?
The Lord of hosts
– he is the king of glory.
Christ the King was raised up on the cross for our sake:
come, let us adore him.
Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit,
as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be,
world without end.
Amen.
Christ the King was raised up on the cross for our sake:
come, let us adore him.
Hymn
Sing, my tongue, the glorious battle,
Sing the last, the dread affray;
O’er the Cross, the Victor’s trophy
Sound the high triumphant lay:
How, the pains of death enduring,
Earth’s Redeemer won the day.
He, our Maker, deeply grieving
That the first-made Adam fell,
When he ate the fruit forbidden
Whose reward was death and hell,
Marked e’en then this Tree the ruin
Of the first tree to dispel.
Thus the work of our salvation
Was of old in order laid.
That the manifold deceiver’s
Art by art might be outweighed.
And the lure the foe put forward
Into means of healing made.
Therefore, when at length the fullness,
Of the appointed time was come,
He was sent, the world’s Creator,
From the Father’s heavenly home;
And was found in human fashion,
Offspring of the Virgin’s womb.
Lo! He lies an Infant weeping,
Where the narrow manger stands,
While the Mother-Maid his members
Wraps in mean and lowly bands,
And the swaddling clothes is winding
Round his helpless feet and hands.
To the Trinity be glory
Everlasting, as is meet:
Equal to the Father, equal
To the Son, and Paraclete:
God the Three in One, whose praises
All created things repeat.
Psalm 2
The Messiah, king and victor
Behold the cross of the Lord:
let his enemies flee before him.
The lion of Judah, of the stock of David, is victorious.
Alleluia.
Why are the nations in a ferment?
Why do the people make their vain plans?
The kings of the earth have risen up;
the leaders have united against the Lord,
against his anointed.
“Let us break their chains, that bind us;
let us throw off their yoke from our shoulders!”
The Lord laughs at them,
he who lives in the heavens derides them.
Then he speaks to them in his anger;
in his fury he throws them into confusion:
“But I – I have set up my king on Zion,
my holy mountain.”
I will proclaim the Lord’s decrees.
The Lord has said to me: “You are my son: today I have begotten you.
Ask me, and I will give you the nations for your inheritance,
the ends of the earth for you to possess.
You will rule them with a rod of iron,
break them in pieces like an earthen pot.”
So now, kings, listen: understand, you who rule the land.
Serve the Lord in fear, tremble even as you praise him.
Learn his teaching, lest he take anger,
lest you perish when his anger bursts into flame.
Blessed are all who put their trust in the Lord.
Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit,
as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be,
world without end.
Amen.
Behold the cross of the Lord:
let his enemies flee before him.
The lion of Judah, of the stock of David, is victorious.
Alleluia.
Psalm 8
The greatness of God, the dignity of man
The holy name of the Lord has been exalted on the cross above heaven and earth.
Alleluia.
How wonderful is your name over all the earth,
O Lord, our Lord!
How exalted is your glory
above the sky!
Out of the mouths of children and infants you have brought praise,
to confound your enemies, to destroy your vengeful foes.
When I see the heavens, the work of your fingers,
the moon and stars, which you set in their place –
what is man, that you should take thought for him?
what is the son of man, that you should look after him?
You have made him but one step lower than the angels;
you have crowned him with glory and honor;
you have set him over the works of your hands.
You have put everything beneath his feet,
cattle and sheep and the beasts of the field,
the birds in the air and the fish in the sea
