Vocation Prayers

The Maronite Servants of Christ the Light have written prayers of petition for vocations according each Sunday of the Maronite Liturgical year. These brief, one-sentence prayers are designed to be included the weekly church bulletin as a reminder to the faithful to pray for vocations. The prayers are available on the vocations website: VineyardoftheLord.com at the “Get Involved” link, under the category of “vocations”. Please encourage your bulletin editor to make use of these weekly prayers by including a vocations corner in each bulletin.

Here is a sample of an up-coming prayer for the Third Sunday After Epiphany: “’Very truly, I tell you, no one can enter the Kingdom of God without being born of water and Spirit.’ Gracious Father, grant that the families of our parish may grow in your spirit of holiness. We especially pray that parents may encourage their children to seek first the Kingdom of God in choosing their life’s vocation.”

For more information on the mission and life of the Maronite Servants, visit our website at MaroniteServants.org and our blog at RadiateHisLight.blogspot.com.

Feast of the Circumcision of Our Lord

(Taken from the Synaxarion of the Feast.)

"The entire Maronite Liturgical year is centered on the life, death and resurrection of Jesus. The Season of Announcement recalls for us the great events in the history of our salvation leading up to the Birth of our Lord.
The Feast of the Circumcision of Our Lord celebrated in our Maronite Church on January 1st, commemorates an event in the life of Jesus which took place eight days after his birth: his naming and circumcision.
According to Hebrew Law, every male child was to be circumcised on the eight day after his birth (Genesis 17:11-12). Circumcision was the sign God gave to Abraham of his covenant with his chosen people. Through circumcision the Hebrew child received the physical sign of his membership in the chosen people of God. At the time of circumcision the child was also given the name by which he was to be known among God’s people.
It is thus that Jesus is circumcised and given his name which means, 'Yahweh is Savior.'
Jesus, as God’s true Son had no need of circumcision and yet, in order to show that he was the fulfillment of the law, he submitted to its prescriptions. Jesus was already a member of God’s chosen people; for, in fact, he was God’s chosen One, the Son of the Most High. And yet, Jesus not only observed the prescription of the law, he also surpassed them since after his death and resurrection, the New Covenant would be established and the Old Covenant would be abolished.
The infant church questioned whether circumcision was necessary for those who wished to become Christians. Saint Paul who brought the gentiles into the Church asserted that circumcision is no longer required in the light of the death and resurrection of Jesus. One becomes a member of the new Israel, not by circumcision of the flesh, but by faith and baptism in Christ Jesus (Colossians 2:11f)."

Glorious Nativity! Milaad Majeed! Joyeux Noel! Merry Christmas!

You are remembered in prayer and especially thought of during this Christmas Season of the Glorious Birth.
“Today the Lord Jesus is born of the Blessed Virgin Mary, and he has freed all people from their captors. Let us raise a hymn of glory.” (Christmas Divine Liturgy, Proemion)

Winter Newsletter

Read the Maronite Servants of Christ the Light Newsletter, Winter Issue.