Christ is Risen! A brief commentary on St. Augustine's Sermon 228b

Jan Van Eyck's The Adoration of the Lamb of God

Today I would like to offer a commentary on one of St. Augustine’s sermons purported to have been given during the Resurrection of the Lord perhaps prior to 411 AD. This would have placed the sermon between the first 16 years of his episcopate, and we place this cutoff point because it was at the Council of Carthage in 411 AD that St. Marcellinus (a Roman official) and the Catholic bishops exiled the Donatists from northern Africa and seized their properties, which eliminated much of St. Augustine’s need to address questions of the unity of the Church and Donatism. It is disputed by some scholars that this sermon is a true sermon of St. Augustine, but some (like Edmund Hill OP, whose work I’ve used before) believe it to be a true sermon and so I will proceed anyway in presenting it.

Holy Days of Obligation and Liturgical Realism

O Lord grant me wisdom and Your holy guidance in the path I walk. Grant that I, Your unworthy servant, might speak well on Your behalf. In my speculation and contemplation grant that I might stand by Your side and not be confounded with error.

In this article I would like to speak on the topic of Holy Days of Obligation within the Catholic Church and in separate dioceses of the Catholic Church. What is the rationale behind Holy Days of Obligation besides those which reside on the Lord’s day? How do we move forward in our own lives as we strive to make our entire life a liturgy of praise and worship to God?