📖 Introit (Ps 131, 9-10)
Sacerdótes tui, Dómine, índuant justítiam, et sancti tui exsúltent: propter David servum tuum, non avértas fáciem Christi tui. Ps. ibid., 1. Meménto, Dómine, David: et omnis mansuetúdinis ejus. Let thy priests, O Lord, be clothed with justice: and let thy saints rejoice: for thy servant David's sake, turn not away the face of thy Anointed. Ps. ibid., 1. O Lord, remember David: and all his meekness. ℣. Glory be to the Father.
✉️ Epistle (2 Tim 4, 1-8)
Dearly beloved: I charge thee, before God and Jesus Christ, who shall judge the living and the dead, by his coming and his kingdom: preach the word: be instant in season, out of season: reprove, entreat, rebuke in all patience and doctrine. For there shall be a time when they will not endure sound doctrine; but, according to their own desires, they will heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears: and will indeed turn away their hearing from the truth, but will be turned unto fables. But be thou vigilant, labor in all things, do the work of an evangelist, fulfill thy ministry. Be sober. For I am even now ready to be sacrificed: and the time of my dissolution is at hand. I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith. As to the rest, there is laid up for me a crown of justice, which the Lord the just judge will render to me in that day: and not only to me, but to them also that love his coming.
✠ Gospel (Lk 12, 35-40)
At that time, Jesus said to His disciples: Let your loins be girt, and lamps burning in your hands. And you yourselves like to men who wait for their lord, when he shall return from the wedding; that when he cometh and knocketh, they may open to him immediately. Blessed are those servants whom the Lord when he cometh shall find watching. Amen I say to you, that he will gird himself, and make them sit down to meat, and passing will minister unto them. And if he shall come in the second watch, or come in the third watch, and find them so, blessed are those servants. But this know ye, that if the householder did know at what hour the thief would come, he would surely watch, and would not suffer his house to be broken open. Be you then also ready: for at what hour you think not, the Son of man will come.
🕯️ Perpetual Watchfulness and the Triumph of Faith
🏛️ Today's liturgy invites us to contemplate the figure of the faithful and prudent servant through the lens of eternity, uniting the end of the civil year with the memory of Saint Sylvester, the Pope of Constantinian peace. The Gospel exhorts us to keep our "loins girt" and "lamps burning," images that Saint Gregory the Great interprets masterfully: to gird the loins means to restrain lust and earthly attachments, while keeping lamps burning symbolizes illuminating one's neighbor with the brightness of good works (Homily 13 on the Gospels). Saint Sylvester embodied this active vigilance; he not only saw the end of bloody persecutions but had to combat, with the light of doctrine, the insidious darkness of the Arian heresy which denied the divinity of the Word newborn at Christmas. The Epistle of Saint Paul to Timothy resonates perfectly with the life of this Pontiff: he "fought the good fight" and "kept the faith" in times when many turned their ears away from the truth to fables. Celebrating Sylvester within the Octave of Christmas reminds us that the Incarnation of the Word demands from us a continuous response of holiness and defense of the truth. As Saint Augustine teaches, Christian vigilance is not a paralyzing fear of the end, but an ardent love for the One who is coming; it is living in justice so that when the Lord knocks at the door - whether at the end of our lives or at the end of time - He may find us not sleeping in the negligence of the world, but awake in the charity of Christ. The peace that Sylvester brought to the external Church is a figure of the inner peace that Christ brings to the soul that watches and prays.
See English version of the critical articles here.