Introit: Psalms viii. 3

    Out of the mouth of infants and of sucklings, O God, Thou hast perfected praise, because of Thy enemies. Ps.O Lord our God: how admirable is Thy name in the whole earth! ℣. Glory be. Out of the...

Collect

    O God, whose praise the martyred Innocents confessed this day, not in speech, but by death: mortify within us all vices: that Thy faith which our tongues profess, our lives also by their actions may confess. Through our Lord.

Commemoration of the Octave of the Nativity:

Collect

    Grant, we beseech Thee, almighty God, that the new birth in the flesh of Thine only-begotten Son may set us free, whom the old bondage doth hold under the yoke of sin. Through the same our Lord.

Epistle: Apocalypse xvi. 1-5

    Lesson from the book of Apocalypse. In those days I saw upon Mount Sion a Lamb standing, and with Him an hundred forty-four thousand, having His name and the name of His Father written on their foreheads. And I heard a voice from heaven, as the noise of many waters and as the voice of great thunder: and the voice which I heard was as the voice of harpers, harping on their harps. And they sung as it were a new canticle before the throne, and before the four living creatures and the ancients: and no man could say the canticle, but those hundred forty-four thousand who were purchased from the earth. These are they who were not defiled with women: for they are virgins. These follow the Lamb whithersoever He goeth. These were purchased from among men, the first-fruits to God and to the Lamb: and in their mouth there was found no lie: for they are without spot before the throne of God.

Gradual: Psalms cxxiii. 7-8

    Our soul hath been delivered as a sparrow out of the snare of the fowlers. ℣. The snare hath been broken, and we have been delivered. Our help is in the name of the Lord, who made heaven and earth.

Tract: Psalms lxxviii. 3, 10

    They have poured out the blood of the saints as water, round about Jerusalem. ℣. And there was none to bury them. ℣. Avenge, O Lord, the blood of Thy saints, which has been shed upon the earth.

Gospel: Matthew ii. 13-18

    + Continuation of the Gospel of St. Matthew. At that time an Angel of the Lord appeared in sleep to Joseph, saying: Arise, and take the Child and His mother, and fly into Egypt, and be there until I shall tell thee. For it will come to pass that Herod will seek the Child to destroy Him. Who arose and took the Child and His mother by night and retired into Egypt: and he was there until the death of Herod: that it might be fulfilled which the Lord spoke by the Prophet, saying: Out of Egypt have I called My Son. Then Herod, perceiving that he was deluded by the wise men, was exceeding angry, and sending killed all the male children that were in Bethlehem and in all the borders thereof, from two years old and under, according to the time which he had diligently inquired of the wise men. Then was fulfilled that which was spoken by Jeremias the Prophet, saying: A voice in Rama was heard, lamentation and great mourning: Rachel bewailing her children, and would not be comforted, because they are not.

Offertory: Psalms cxxiii. 7

    Our soul hath been delivered as a sparrow out of the snare of the fowlers: the snare is broken, and we are delivered.

Secret

    May the devout prayer of Thy saints not be wanting to us, O Lord: may it make our offerings acceptable to Thee and ever obtain for us Thy pardon. Through our Lord.

Commemoration of the Octave of the Nativity:

Secret

    The gifts we offer, do Thou, O Lord, sanctify by the new birth of Thine only-begotten Son: and cleanse us from the stains of our sins. Through the same.

Communion: Matthew ii. 18

    A voice in Rama was heard, lamentation and great mourning: Rachel bewailing her children, and would not be comforted, because they are not.

Postcommunion

    Do Thou grant, we beseech Thee, O Lord, through the prayers of the saints, that these votive offerings partaken by us, may gain help both in this life and in the life to come. Through our Lord.

Commemoration of the Octave of the Nativity:

Postcommunion

    Grant, we beseech Thee, almighty God, that as the Savior of the world born on this day is the author of our divine generation, so He may Himself also be to us the giver of immortality. Who with Thee liveth.

+ Taken from St. Andrew Daily Missal, by Dom Gaspar Lefebvre, O.S.B., Imprimi Potest 11-18-1945 P. Joannes Delacroix, O.S.B., Imprimatur 11-22-1945 Joseph Van Der Meersch