Posted on 12/19/2017 11:05:09 PM PST by CMRosary
From the first ages, the Quatuor Tempora were kept, in the Roman Church, at the same time of the year as at present. As to the expression, which is not unfrequently used in the early writers of The Three Times and not The Four, we must remember that in the spring, these Days always come in the first week of Lent, a period already consecrated to the most rigorous fasting and abstinence, and that consequently they could add nothing to the penitential exercises of that portion of the year.
The intentions which the Church has in the fast of the Ember Days are the same as those of the Synagogue; namely, to consecrate to God by penance the four Seasons of the year. The Ember Days of Advent are known, in the ecclesiastical antiquity, by the name of the Fast of the tenth Month; and St. Leo, in one of his Sermons on this Fast, and of which the Church has inserted a passage in the second Nocturn of the third Sunday of Advent, tells us that a special fast was fixed for this time of the year, because the fruits of the earth had then all been gathered in, and that it behoved Christians to testify their gratitude to God by a sacrifice of abstinence, thus rendering themselves more worthy to approach to God, the more they were detached form the love of created things; “for Fasting,” adds the holy Doctor, “has ever been the nourishment of virtue. Abstinence is the source of chaste thoughts, of wise resolutions, and of salutary counsel. By voluntary mortifications, the flesh dies to its concupiscences, and the spirit is renewed in virtue. But since Fasting alone is not sufficient whereby to secure the soul’s salvation, let us add to it works of mercy towards the poor. Let us make that which we retrench from indulgence, serve unto the exercise of virtue. Let the abstinence of him that fasts, become the meal of the poor man.”
Let us, the children of the Church, practice what is in our power of these admonitions; and since the actual discipline of Advent is so very mild, let us be so much the more fervent in fulfilling the precept of the fast of the Ember Days. By these few exercises which are now required of us, let us keep up within ourselves the zeal of our forefathers for this holy season of Advent. We must never forget that although the interior preparation is what is absolutely essential for our profiting by the Coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, yet this preparation could scarcely be real unless is manifested itself by the exterior practices of religion and penance.
The fast of the Ember Days has another object besides that of consecrating the four seasons of the year to God by an act of penance; it has also in view of the Ordination of the Ministers of the Church, which takes place on the Saturday, and of which notice was formerly given to the people during the Mass of the Wednesday. In the Roman Church, the Ordination held in the month of December was, for a long time, the most solemn of all; and it would appear, from the ancient Chronicles of the Popes, that, excepting very extraordinary cases, the tenth month was, for several ages, the only time for the conferring Holy Orders in Rome. The faithful should unite with the Church in this her intention, and offer to God their worthy Ministers of the Word and the Sacraments, and true Pastors of the People.
The Church does not read anything in the Matins today from the Prophet Isaias: she merely reads a sentence from the Chapter of St. Luke which gives our Lady’s Annunciation, to which she subjoins a passage from St. Ambrose’s Homily on that Gospel. The fact of this Gospel having been chosen for the Office and Mass of today has made the Wednesday of the third week of Advent a very marked day in the calendar. In several ancient Ordinaries, used by many of the larger Churches, both Cathedral and Abbatial, we find it prescribed that feasts falling on this Wednesday should be transferred: that the ferial prayers should not be said kneeling, on that day; that the Gospel Missus est, that is, of the Annunciation, should be sung at Matins by the Celebrant, vested in a white cope, with cross, lights, and incense, the great bell tolling meanwhile; that in Abbeys, the Abbot should preach a homily to the Monks as on solemn feasts. We are indebted to this custom for the four magnificent Sermons of St. Bernard on our Blessed Lady, and which are entitled: Super Missus est.As the Mass of the Ember Days is seldom sung, excepting in Churches where the Canonical Office is said; as also that we might not add unnecessarily to this volume, we have thought it advisable to omit the Masses of Ember Wednesday, Friday, and Saturday of Advent. The Station for the Wednesday is at St. Mary Major, on account of the Gospel of the Annunciation, which, as we have just seen, had made this day be looked upon as a real Feast of the Blessed Virgin.
Having to speak, later on, of this Mystery, in the Proper of Saints, we will conclude this Wednesday with a Prose of the Middle Ages, in honor of our Blessed Lady’s receiving the Angel’s salutation, and with a prayer taken from one of the ancient Liturgies.
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