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Programme Note

De sancto Ioanne Baptista was commissioned by the Chapel of St John’s College, Oxford. The text, in Latin, is taken from page 103 of the Horæ Beatæ Mariæ ad usum Romanum (France, ca 1524). This Book of Hours is currently manuscript 10 in the Lessing J. Rosenwald Collection, Library of Congress, Washington D.C.


Text

Ant: Inter natos mulierum non surrexit maior Ioanne baptista.
V: Fuit homo missus a Deo.
R: Cui nomen erat Ioannes.
Oratio: Praesta quaesumus omnipotens Deus ut familia tua per viam salutis
incedat et beati Ioannis praecursoris Christi hortamenta sectando: ad eum
quem praedixit securus perveniat. Dominum nostrum Iesum Christum.

Antiphon: Among those born of woman none arose greater than John the
Baptist.
Versicle: He was a man sent by God.
Response : Whose name was John.
Prayer: Show thyself, we pray, O omnipotent God, so that thy household may go by the way of salvation, and by following the encouragements of the
blessed John, forerunner of Christ, may reach him whom he with certainty
foretold, our Lord Jesus Christ


Tarik O’Regan
New York, March 2004