The Eve of Pentecost / Whitsunday

Come, Holy Ghost our souls inspire,
and lighten with celestial fire.
Enable with perpetual light
the dullness of our blinded sight.

Thou the anointing Spirit art,
who does thy sevenfold gifts impart
Anointed and cheer our soiled face
with the abundance of thy grace.

Thy blessed unction from above
is comfort, life, and fire of love.
Teach us to know the Father, Son,
and thee, of both, to be but One.

that through the ages all alone,
this may be our endless song:
praise to thy eternal merit,
Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

Veni Creator Spiritus,
9th Century

Mystagogia #8

In the week following the Ascension, the Collects of the Day turn our hearts toward the coming of the Holy Spirit, the empowerment from on high. As disciples of Christ, we pray that with Jesus' ascent into heaven that we will not be left alone or comfortless, and beseech him to send us the strengthening presence of the Holy Spirit. It will be through the agape-love of the Holy Spirit that we will be raised to newness of life and continue to grow into the full maturity of our Lord and Savior. Through the Wind and the Fire, my the Spirit come now upon us with power distributing among us the gifts of the selfsame Spirit, that dedicating ourselves more and more to the service of God, and living more fully the riches of our faith,

The Feast of Augustine of Canterbury

O Lord our God, by your Son Jesus Christ you called your apostles and sent them forth to preach the Gospel to the nations: We bless your holy Name for your servant Augustine, first Archbishop of Canterbury, whose labors in propagating your Church among the English people we commemorate today; and we pray that all whom you call and send may do your will, and bide your time, and see your glory; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives, and reigns with ou, and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

The Rule of Saint Benedict

On Humility

Holy Scripture, brethren, cries out to us, saying,
"Everyone who exalts himself shall be humbled,
and he who humbles himself shall be exalted" (Luke 14:11).
In saying this it shows us
that all exaltation is a kind of pride,
against which the Prophet proves himself to be on guard
when he says,
"Lord, my heart is not exalted,
nor are mine eyes lifted up;
neither have I walked in great matters,
nor in wonders above me."
But how has he acted?
"Rather have I been of humble mind
than exalting myself;
as a weaned child on its mother's breast,
so You solace my soul" (Ps. 130:1-2).

Hence, brethren,
if we wish to reach the very highest point of humility
and to arrive speedily at that heavenly exaltation
to which ascent is made through the humility of this present life,
we must
by our ascending actions
erect the ladder Jacob saw in his dream,
on which Angels appeared to him descending and ascending.
By that descent and ascent
we must surely understand nothing else than this,
that we descend by self-exaltation and ascend by humility.
And the ladder thus set up is our life in the would,
which the Lord raises up to heaven if our heart is humbled.
For we call our body and soul the sides of the ladder,
and into these sides our divine vocation has inserted
the different steps of humility and discipline we must climb.