The Fourth Sunday of Lent, March 14th this year, is traditionally called “Laetare Sunday.” Laetare is the Latin word for “Rejoice.” That is the first word of the Entrance Antiphon for Mass on that day: “Rejoice, Jerusalem.”
Why rejoice? Because “our salvation is nearer now than when we first believed,” as Saint Paul expressed it so beautifully in his Letter to the Romans, chapter 13, verse 11.
Liturgically, the Forty days of Lent are halfway over on the Fourth Sunday of Lent and the celebration of the Lord’s Resurrection, Easter Sunday, is only twenty-one days away.
To emphasize the spirit of rejoicing on the Fourth Sunday of Lent, the Church prescribes the use of rose-colored vestments, rose being considered a flower and color of joy.
The vestment worn by our Father Jeffrey was the work of the famous Swiss Franciscan nun and noted weaver, Sister Mary Augustina Flueler, whose was active in vestment making in the 1940s, 50s and early 60s.
Our founder Father Aelred Wall (1917-1984) acquired some of Flueler’s vestments for our monastery. Now some seventy years old, our Laetare Sunday vestment is still in excellent condition.
May the Lenten journey we have begun be a source of enlightenment in the ways of God, who calls us to “go up with rejoicing to the house of the Lord,” as Psalm 122 says.
Blessed week in progress!
Abbot Christian and the monks
