The Benedict Year › Reading Backwards from the Pascha
Lent · Weeks 22–23
The New Heart
I will sprinkle clean water upon you, and a new heart I will give you. Read it, then Romans 6, then stop talking.
Why it is here
Daniel 3 is a branch, an older Vigil prophecy: three youths unburnt and a fourth figure walking with them, the Old Testament’s clearest image of the one who goes into the fire with you. Their song, the Benedicite, is no longer sung at the Roman Vigil; the Byzantine Vigil still sings it, with its verses, as the fifteenth reading.
What is it for?
The new heart. The text answers: to walk in my statutes (Ezekiel 36:27).
Unanswerable
Can a heart be given, or only grown?
The weeks
| Week | Dates | Read aloud |
|---|---|---|
| Week 22 | 22–26 February 2027 | Clean water, a new heart: Ezekiel 36:16–28; Romans 6:3–11 |
| Week 23 | 1–5 March 2027 | The valley and the furnace: Ezekiel 37:1–14; Daniel 3, with the Song of the Three Young Men |
Books for this unit
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