Pope Benedict XVI

"Beauty... is not mere decoration, but rather an essential element of the liturgical action, since it is an attribute of God Himself and His revelation."
(Pope Benedict XVI, Sacramentum Caritatis, 35)

27 December 2009

A Very Blessed and Happy Christmas!



Come rejoicing, faithful men,

With rapture singing
Alleluia!


Monarch's Monarch,

From a holy maiden sprung,

Mighty Wonder!

Angel of the counsel here,

Sun from star, he doth appear,

Born of maiden:


He a sun who knows no night,
She a star whose paler light

Fadeth never.

As a star its kindred ray,

Mary doth her Child display,

Like in nature;


Still undimmed His star shines on,

And the maiden bears a Son,

Pure as ever.

Lebanon his cedar tall

To the hyssop on the wall

Lowly bendeth;


From the highest, him we name

Word of God, to human frame

Now descendeth.

Yet the synagogue denied

What Isaiah had descried:

Blindness fell upon the guide,

Proud, unheeding.


If her prophets speak in vain,

let her heed a gentile strain,
And, from mystic Sybil, gain
Light and leading.

No longer then delay,

Hear what the scriptures say,

Why be cast away

A race forlorn?


Turn and this Child behold,

That very Son, of old

In God's writ foretold,

a maid hath borne.

Sequence by St. Bernard of Clairvaux

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