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We continue our project of delving into the texts for Holy Mass on Sundays with today’s offerings for the 4th Sunday after Pentecost in the Vetus Ordo of the Roman Rite. The Epistle to the Romans and the Gospel of Luke, converge to paint a vivid portrait of our present state and the glory to which we are called. The Collect petitions God to direct and calm the course of the Church and the world. If we examine them in a unifying way, their common threads become clearer: our groaning under the burden of Original Sin, our longing for the liberation of all creation, our humble recognition of unworthiness, and the invitation to active devotio that steadies the ship of the Church in the tumultuous sea of history.
The first reading, Romans 8:18-23, sets the stage with its contrast between present suffering and future glory. St. Paul declares:
18 I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us. 19 For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the sons of God; 20 for the creation was subjected to futility, not of its own will but by the will of him who subjected it in hope; 21 because the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to decay and obtain the glorious liberty of the children of God. 22 We know that the whole creation has been groaning in travail together until now; 23 and not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the first fruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait for adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies.
Paul acknowledges that there are sufferings. They result from Original Sin, the Enemy, and his agents. Yet he insists that the glory to come so far surpasses our present woes that they are unworthy of comparison. This is a profound reason for hope. Indeed, the Greek text emphasizes that creation (ktísis) itself experiences apokaradokía—“earnest expectation, eager longing.” This longing is not an impersonal force but the yearning of a sentient creation that strains toward the revelation (apokálypsis) of the sons of God. Creation, groaning together (systenázo), labors as in childbirth (synodíno) to bring forth the new order of things. That “syn-,” the “togetherness” of creation and humanity, underscores the solidarity of all that God has made in its hope for freedom.
The Catechism of the Catholic Church affirms this in its treatment of the consequences of Original Sin:
The harmony in which [our First Parents] had found themselves, thanks to original justice, is now destroyed… Harmony with creation is broken: visible creation has become alien and hostile to man. Because of man, creation is now subject “to its bondage to decay.” (CCC 400)
Recall John 12:31: “Now is the judgment of this world; now shall the ruler of this world be cast out.” And John 14:30: “I will no longer talk much with you, for the ruler of this world is coming. He has no power over me.” Paul writes in Ephesians 2:2 of the “prince of the power of the air,” the same spirit at work in the sons of disobedience. All of creation, therefore, is not only suffering but yearning for deliverance from this bondage.
The vision concludes in the promise of the final restoration:
The visible universe, then, is itself destined to be transformed, “so that the world itself, restored to its original state, facing no further obstacles, should be at the service of the just,” sharing their glorification in the risen Jesus Christ. (CCC 1047)
As we hold in mind this cosmic groaning, the Gospel reading complements it with the image of Peter and the miraculous catch of fish. It is no accident that this pericope is appointed near the Feast of Saints Peter and Paul, the “birthday” of the Apostles’ martyrdom on 29 June. The Church thus proposes that we contemplate Peter’s own transformation—from toiling in darkness to the abundance that Christ alone provides, and finally to humble surrender.
Luke recounts how Peter, after laboring through the night and catching nothing, obeys the Lord’s word:
At Your word I will let down the nets. (Luke 5:5)
This obedient act led to nets breaking with the weight of the catch, to beckoning their partners for help, and finally to Peter’s own prostration before Christ:
He fell down at Jesus’ knees, saying, ‘Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord.’ (v.8)
The verb prospípto, “to fall forward, prostrate one’s self,” captures Peter’s total surrender in the recognition of unworthiness. Yet it is precisely there, on his knees, that Peter’s true vocation begins. This encounter mirrors the tension of Romans 8: on the one hand, the futility of human effort apart from grace, and on the other, the promise of an abundance beyond all measure when we submit to God’s command.
This episode also reveals another dimension: the interplay of perseverance and help from others. Peter and the future Apostles endured a dark night of fruitless toil. If they had given up, they would have missed their meeting with the Lord. Once the miraculous catch occurred, they called their partners to help haul the nets, showing that divine gifts often demand collaboration. Here emerges a deeper spiritual principle: good works, even when externally similar, differ in merit depending on the disposition of the heart. As Pope Benedict XVI observed in Deus caritas est, the Church must never be reduced to an NGO concerned merely with material goods: her mission is the salvation of souls. Works performed with pride or indifference, even if beneficial, are spiritually sterile. Thus, the Gospel calls us to humility, gratitude, and authentic charity.
As we ponder the Epistle’s cosmic groaning and the Gospel’s miracle of abundance, we turn to the Collect, a prayer that embodies both themes: the yearning for divine order and the tranquility of devout surrender. The Collect, unchanged since ancient sacramentaries, reads:
Da nobis, quaesumus, Domine,
ut et mundi cursus pacifico nobis tuo ordine dirigatur:
et Ecclesia tua tranquilla devotione laetetur.
Some vocabulary from the Lewis & Short Dictionary will illumine this prayer further. Cursus can mean the “course, way, journey,” dirigo is “to give a particular direction,” ordo denotes a “methodical arrangement,” and pacificus combines pax and facio, meaning “peacemaker.” The verb laetetur may be from the deponent laetor or passive from laeto. Given the ablatives, the passive sense is preferred:
Literal Attempt:
Grant us, we beg, O Lord,
both that the course of the world be set by Your methodical peace-producing plan for us
and that Your Church may be made joyful by means of tranquil devotion.
Even in this literal rendering, there is a poetic resonance. The vocabulary traces faint nautical and military images: a ship set upon the sea by its Captain, who commands both the course and the calm. The Church becomes the ship on that turbulent sea, and devotion is the wind that fills the sails. The Captain is the Lord, who calmed the storm and commanded Peter to walk upon the waves. When all is made ship-shape, our devotio carries us forward.
This invites a closer look at the nature of devotion. According to St. Thomas Aquinas:
The intrinsic or human cause of devotion is contemplation or meditation. Devotion is an act of the will by which a man promptly gives himself to the service of God. Every act of the will proceeds from some consideration of the intellect, since the object of the will is a known good… meditation is the cause of devotion since through meditation man conceives the idea of giving himself to the service of God. (STh II-II 82,3)
Thus, devotion is not merely sentiment but an active virtue: the conscious resolve to offer oneself entirely to God’s will, here and now. The Jesuit Louis Bourdaloue called this “a devotion to duty.” Devotion, in this sense, anchors the ship even when tempests rage. If we remain faithful to the duties of our state in life, God supplies every grace needed. In this way, the collect’s plea for “tranquil devotion” is not a prayer for passivity but for fidelity and steadfastness.
Returning to the Epistle’s imagery of groaning creation and longing expectation, we recall that even the smallest particles — quarks, leptons, bosons — might be thought of as yearning toward their final purpose. In this cosmic order, angels guide all that moves, and though some have fallen, twisting their mission, God’s providence remains sovereign. This universal groaning becomes an invitation to hope. As Prosper Guéranger wrote in The Liturgical Year:
Men who recognize no other law than that of the flesh may be as deaf and indifferent as they please to the teachings of positive revelation; but mere matter will go on ever condemning their materialism. Nature… will continue to preach the supernatural with her thousand mouths… and creation… will still keep proclaiming all the louder because it is in suffering—that the fallen king, whom it was intended to serve, has a destiny far beyond all finite things.
This meditation harmonizes with the Gospel’s call to humility. Like Peter, we must acknowledge our insufficiency, casting ourselves upon the Lord’s mercy. Like the Apostles, we must persevere, trusting that God will fill our empty nets. Like creation itself, we must groan in expectation, yearning for the revelation of the sons of God. Like the Church in the Collect, we must submit our course to the Captain, trusting His plan of peace.
From the darkness of futile striving without grace to the superabundance of God’s gifts, from the bondage of decay to the glorious liberty of the children of God, this Sunday’s Mass formulary draws the heart into hopeful longing and resolute devotion. It beckons us to fix our gaze on the final port, the sight of God’s face, “in whose will is our peace” (Paradiso 3,85).
The readings and prayers of the 4th Sunday after Pentecost remind us that creation groans in longing for redemption, that humble surrender yields divine abundance, and that our devotion is both the sail and the rudder guiding us to the safe harbor of God’s glory. As the Catechism affirms:
In the heart of every human person, God has placed a longing for Himself alone: “The desire for God is written in the human heart, because man is created by God and for God; and God never ceases to draw man to Himself.” (CCC 27)
Finally, our peace, our tranquility may well depend on making a good confession.
May our tranquil devotion be the wind that bears us home.