Full Mass Recording: A Moment in the Midst of Lent to Rejoice - Laetare Sunday

Laetare Sunday is a moment in the midst of a penitential season during which the Church calls Her children to rejoice. Why? It is all too often that we, as fallen creatures, easily lose sight of the goal, of the purpose for which we are fasting, for which we are striving during Lent. She calls us to re-orient, to remember, and to look up towards our true calling, the path to which is the answer to finding true (not perfect, but true) happiness in this life and in the next.

Rejoice, O Jerusalem, and come together all you that love her; rejoice with joy, you that have been in sorrow: that you may exult, and be filled from the breasts of your consolation. I rejoiced at the things that were said to me: We shall go into the house of the Lord. Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost, as it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end. Amen. Rejoice, O Jerusalem, and come together all you that love her; rejoice with joy, you that have been in sorrow: that you may exult, and be filled from the breasts of your consolation.



Grant, we beseech Thee, O almighty God, that we, who for our evil deeds justly deserve to be punished, by the comfort of Thy grace may mercifully be relieved. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, Thy Son, Who lives and reigns with Thee in the unity of the Holy Ghost, God, forever and ever.



it is written that Abraham had two sons; the one by a bond- woman, and the other by a free- woman. But he who was of the bond- woman was born according to the flesh; but he of the free-woman was by promise. Which things are said by an allegory. For these are the two testaments; the one from Mount Sina, engendering unto bondage, which is Agar: for Sina is a mountain in Arabia, which hath affinity to that Jerusalem which now is, and is in bondage with her children: but that Jerusalem which is above is free, which is our mother. For it is written, Rejoice, thou barren that bearest not; break forth and cry, thou that travailest not; for many are the children of the desolate, more than of her that hath a husband. Now we, brethren, as Isaac was, are the children of promise. But as then he that was born according to the flesh persecuted him that was after the spirit, so also it is now. But what saith the Scriptures?Cast out the bond- woman and her son; for the son of the bond-woman shall not be heir with the son of the free-woman. So then, brethren, we are not the children of the bond-woman, but of the free; by the freedom wherewith Christ hath made us free.