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by Brother Hermenegild Tosf (Editor), Catholic Church (Author)
These beautiful prayers of the Catholic Church for the holiest week of the year should be studied by all Catholics. THE week before Easter has been called by several names, from the great mysteries and various ceremonies celebrated and performed in it. The Greeks and Latins anciently called it the Great Week, the Holy Week - sometimes the Painful Week-that is, the Week of Austerities; also, the Week of Sorrows, the days of the Cross or of sufferings. "We call it the Great Week," says S. Chrysostom, on Ps. 145, "not that it consists of a greater number of days, or that the days in it are longer;- but on account of the great things which God has wrought in it; for on these days was the tyranny of the devil overthrown, death disarmed, sin and its curse taken away, heaven opened and made accessible, and men made fellows with the angels." The chief object of the Church in this week is to celebrate the memory of the passion and death of her Redeemer. Every part of the sacred liturgy is directed to this end; the Church's offices, more solemn and more multiplied in this week than in any other during the whole year, are most especially adapted to excite in the hearts of the Faithful those various sentiments of love and gratitude, of compassion for the sufferings of our Lord, of sorrow and detestation for sin, which every Christian ought to cherish in this holy time. It is with the sincere desire of exciting pious sentiments in the hearts of the faithful that the whole liturgy of the Church for Holy Week has been collected in this volume, and is presented to the public, both in the Latin and English languages. Thus, while the pious Christian unites his voice with that of die priest and of the choir, he may also penetrate the sense of the divine office, and sanction by the fervor of his heart what he pronounces with his tongue. For this reason, the editor flatters himself that this book will not fail to please all those who still entertain a due sense of piety and religion; and may profit even those who, through a want of instruction, seldom or never reflect on the great mysteries which the Church commemorates during Holy Week. The very reading of this most pious and affecting part of the Church's liturgy is capable of exciting in their hearts a true and solid devotion.
