Twenty-Sixth Sunday After Pentecost

From Dom Prosper Guéranger's Liturgical Year:

The Introit, Gradual, Offertory and Communion are from the Twenty-third Sunday After Pentecost. The Collect, Epistle and the Gospel are taken from the Sixth Sunday After Epiphany:

INTROIT

The Lord saith: I think thoughts of peace, and not of affliction; ye shall call upon me, and I will hear you: and bring back your captive people from all places.

Ps. Thou, O Lord, hast blessed thy land: thou hast brought back the captive children of Jacob. Glory, etc. The Lord.

Prayer for pardon is continually on the lips of the Christian people, because the weakness of human nature is, here below, ever making itself felt, even by the just man. (Proverbs 24:16) God knows our frailty, and he is always ready to pardon us; but it is on the condition, that we humbly acknowledge our faults, and have confidence in his mercy. These are the sentiments which suggest to the Church the words of the Collect.

COLLECT

Grant, we beseech thee, O Almighty God, that, being always intent upon what is reasonable and just, we may, both in word and deed, carry out the things which are acceptable to thee. Through, etc.

For the other Collects, see earlier in the volume.

EPISTLE

Lesson of the Epistle of Saint Paul the Apostle to the Thessalonians 1:

Brethren, we give thanks to God always for you all: making a remembrance of you in our prayers without ceasing: being mindful of you in the work of your faith, and labor, and charity, and of the enduring of the hope of our Lord Jesus Christ, before God and our Father; knowing, brethren beloved of God, your election. For our Gospel hath not been to you in word only, but in power also, and in the Holy Ghost, and in much fullness, as you know what manner of men we have been among you for your sakes. And you became followers of us, and of the Lord, receiving the word in much tribulation, with joy of the Holy Ghost; so that you were made a pattern to all that believe, in Macedonia and in Achaia. For from you was spread abroad the word of the Lord, not only in Macedonia and in Achaia, but also in every place your faith, which is towards God, is gone forth, so that we need not speak anything. For they themselves relate of us, what manner of entering in we had unto you; and how you turned to God from idols, to serve the living and true God, and to wait for his Son from heaven (whom he raised up from the dead) Jesus, who hath delivered us from the wrath to come.

GRADUAL

Thou hast saved us, O Lord, from them that afflict us: and hast put them to shame that hate us.

℣. In God shall we glory all the day long; and, in thy name, we will give praise for ever.

Alleluia, alleluia.

℣. Out of the depths I have cried unto thee, O Lord: Lord, hear my prayer. Alleluia.

GOSPEL

Sequel of the holy Gospel according to Matthew 13:31-35:

At that time: Jesus spoke to the multitude this parable: The kingdom of heaven is like to a grain of mustard-seed, which a man took and sowed in his field. Which indeed is the least of all seeds; but when it is grown up, it is greater than all herbs, and becometh a tree, so that the birds of the air come and dwell in the branches thereof. Another parable he spoke to them: The kingdom of heaven is like to leaven, which a woman took and hid in three measures of meal, until the whole was leavened. All these things Jesus spoke in parables to the multitudes, and without parables he did not speak to them; that the word might be fulfilled which was spoken by the Prophet, saying: I will open my mouth in parables, I will utter things hidden from the foundation of the world.

OFFERTORY

Out of the depths have I cried unto thee, O Lord: Lord, hear my prayer: out of the depths have I cried unto thee, O Lord!

COMMUNION

Amen I say unto you, —all things whatsoever ye ask for when ye pray, believe that ye shall receive, and it shall be done unto you.