The Benedict Year › Reading Backwards from the Pascha
The books
What to buy, and what is free
A Catholic Bible, five cheap paperbacks, two more in print, the rest free online, and one game. Each lists the weeks that use it.
Scripture
- A Catholic Bible with the deuterocanonical books. Baruch and the Greek parts of Daniel are read in Lent, so the Bible must have them. The RSV Second Catholic Edition and the NABRE both do.
Every week
Popular Patristics Series (St Vladimir’s Seminary Press)
- Irenaeus of Lyons, On the Apostolic Preaching. trans. John Behr, PPS 17.
Read in week 2, week 3, week 12 - Melito of Sardis, On Pascha. trans. Alistair Stewart-Sykes, PPS 20.
Read in week 17, week 18 - Athanasius, On the Incarnation. trans. John Behr, PPS 44B.
Read in week 5, week 6 - Cyril of Jerusalem, Lectures on the Christian Sacraments. the Mystagogical Catecheses, ed. F. L. Cross, PPS 57.
Read in week 28, week 29, week 30, week 31, week 32 - Ephrem the Syrian, Hymns on Paradise. trans. Sebastian Brock.
Read in week 4, week 7
Two more in print
- Origen, Homilies on Genesis and Exodus. trans. Ronald E. Heine, Fathers of the Church 71.
Read in week 9, week 10 - Gregory of Nyssa, The Life of Moses. Classics of Western Spirituality.
Read in week 16
Free online
- Irenaeus of Lyons, Against Heresies. Book I, chapter 8, section 1: the mosaic.
Read in week 1 - Justin Martyr, Dialogue with Trypho. chapter 100.
Read in week 13 - Ambrose of Milan, On the Mysteries. chapter 3: the sea as the font.
Read in week 16 - John Chrysostom, The Paschal Homily. read on Easter morning in the Byzantine churches.
Read in week 27 - An ancient homily, On Holy Saturday. the Office of Readings for Holy Saturday (“Something strange is happening”). The author is unknown; the Patrologia Graeca gives it to Epiphanius. It is in any Liturgy of the Hours.
Read in week 27 - The Roman Missal, The Exsultet. the Easter Proclamation sung at the Vigil.
Read in week 26
Video
- BibleProject, Free animated overviews and theme videos. bibleproject.com. The catalogue gets reorganized and some theme videos are now folded into longer series, so check each title as you go.
A game
- Unlock! Kids: Irish Folklore. Space Cowboys, a co-operative card game in the manner of an escape room, with three stories after the films of Cartoon Saloon: The Secret of Kells, Song of the Sea and Wolfwalkers. One to four players, ages 6 and up, about twenty minutes a story, with a tutorial first.
Played before week 1, week 16, week 22
For the parent
- John Behr, The Mystery of Christ: Life in Death. St Vladimir’s Seminary Press. The theology under the whole method: Christ known from the Cross, the Scriptures read from the end.
Public domain I have dedicated this page to the public domain under CC0 1.0. Copy it, change it, translate it, print it and share it, for any purpose, without asking. Quotations from other writers keep their own terms.