DECEMBER 17

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Let nothing be preferred to the Work of GOD. {‘Opus DEI’ or ‘Divine Office’} (St Benedict)

Let us always desire the blessed life from the LORD GOD and always pray for it. For this very reason we turn our mind to the task of prayer at appointed hours, since that desire grows lukewarm, so to speak, from our involvement in other concerns and occupations… The desire that began to grow lukewarm may grow chill altogether and may be totally extinguished. (St Augustine)

Prayer offered in holiness from a faithful heart rises like incense from a holy altar. Nothing is more fragrant than the fragrance of the LORD. May all who believe share in this fragrance. (St Augustine, Commentary on the Psalms)

What state can be more blessed than to imitate on earth the choruses of Angels? To begin the day with prayer, and honor our Maker with hymns and songs? (St Basil the Great)

The psalms do not tell us not to love, but to choose the object of our love. But how can we choose unless we are first chosen? We cannot love unless someone has loved us first. (St Augustine)

The collection of Psalms found in Scripture, composed as it was under Divine inspiration, has, from the very beginnings of the Church, shown a wonderful power of fostering devotion among Christians as they offer to GOD a continuous sacrifice of praise, the harvest of lips blessing His Name. (St Pius X)

The Psalms seem to me to be like a mirror, in which the person using them can see himself, and the stirrings of his own heart; he can recite them against the background of his own emotions.(St Pius X)

In the psalms, not only is JESUS born for us, HE also undergoes His saving Passion in His Body, HE lies in death, HE rises again, HE ascends into Heaven, HE sits at the right Hand of the FATHER. What no man would have dared to say was foretold by the psalmist alone and afterward proclaimed by the Lord Himself in the Gospel. (St Ambrose, Explanations of the Psalms)

A psalm is a blessing on the lips of the people, a hymn in praise of GOD… It is a medecine for our spiritual health. (St Ambrose, Explanations of the Psalms)

The Gregorian Chant has always been considered the supreme model of sacred music. (St Pius X)

When the words come, they are merely empty shells without the music. They live as they are sung, for the words are the body and the music the spirit. (St Hildegard of Bingen)

The singing of the Church comes ultimately out of love… The HOLY SPIRIT is Love, and it is HE Who produces the singing. HE is the SPIRIT of CHRIST, the SPIRIT Who draws us into love for CHRIST and so leads to the FATHER. (Pope Benedict XVI, The Spirit of the Liturgy)