Let the cantor go up, then, but let that man sing from the heart of everyone of you, and let each person be that man. For although you all say that, because all of you are one in Christ, it is the one man who is saying it. He doesnt say, "To you, O Lord, we have lifted up our eyes," but "To you, O Lord, I have lifted up my eyes." You should consider that it is each of you who is saying that, but the one chiefly speaking is that single man who is spread throughout the whole round world. That one man is speaking who says elsewhere, "To you have I cried from the ends of the earth when my heart was in anguish" (Ps 60:3). Who is it who is crying from the ends of the earth? Who is that man spread out to the ends of the earth? An individual person can cry out in his own region, but from the ends of the earth? But the inheritance of Christ of which it was said, "I will give you the nations for your inheritance and the ends of the earth for your possession" (Ps 2:8), it is she who cries out and says, "From the ends of the earth I have cried to you, when my heart was in anguish." [Augustine, In Ps 122, 1-2; PL 37: 1630-31]

Rev. Joseph A. Komonchak, professor emeritus of the School of Theology and Religious Studies at the Catholic University of America, is a retired priest of the Archdiocese of New York.

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