Invitation
May I hereby draw your attention to
the daily reading of the Gospel?
This invitation wants to share with You the joy
of the Gospel. Everyone, no one excepted,
can experience that joy by opening their hearts
to the healing power of God’s word.
Available every day
Opening word
Today we are invited
to walk in the ways of God
and choose the good,
so that we too may bring forth fruit.
In God’s name, then, may we be here together
and form community.
Now open our hearts
to unite with the living Lord
and come to know his ways.
FIRST READING Isa 5:1-7
The vineyard of the Lord of heavenly powers is the house of Israel.
From the prophet Isaiah
I want to sing to my friend,
sing the song of my friend and his vineyard.
My friend had a vineyard,
which lay on a fertile slope.
He turned it over and cleared it of stones,
he planted exquisite vines there;
in the middle he built a tower
and he cut out a press pit.
Then he hoped to get grapes ,
but the vineyard gave only wild fruit.
And now, inhabitants of Jerusalem,
children of Judah,
now ye must be the judges
over me and my vineyard!
What more could I have done for my vineyard
and have I not done for him ?
I had hoped for grapes!
Why does he give me wild fruits ?
I will tell you now then
what I am going to do with my vineyard.
I will remove his fence,
that he may be eaten bare.
I break down its walls,
that it may be trampled down.
I turn him into a feral piece of land;
he will no longer be pruned
and worked with no more heel;
thistles and thorns shoot upon it,
and to the clouds I forbid
their rain to fall on it.
The vineyard of the Lord of heavenly powers
is the house of Israel.
His favoured plants are the children of Judah.
The Lord hoped for justice but saw injustice,
not practice
but rape of justice.
Responsorial Ps 80(79), 9 and 12, 13-14, 15-16, 19-20
Refrain
The vineyard of the Lord is the house of Israel.
Thou hast brought out of Egypt a vine,
driven out nations to plant it.
He stretched out his tendrils to the sea,
to the rivers its shoots.
Why hast thou destroyed its enclosure,
so that whoever comes by may pluck it ?
The wild boars turn him over,
the cattle of the field graze it.
God of hosts, do return,
look down from heaven and watch over your vineyard.
Protect what Thy own hand has planted,
the cutting which Thou hast grown.
Never again shall we forsake Thee:
Preserve Thou our life, we will praise Thee.
Lord, God of hosts, raise us up again,
let Thy face shine upon us,
smile upon us again and we shall be saved.
SECOND READING Phil. 4, 6-9
The God of peace will be with you.
From the letter of the holy apostle Paul to the Christians of
Philippi
Brothers and sisters,
Be unconcerned.
Let all your desires be made known to God
in prayer and supplication, and never without thanksgiving.
And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding,
will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.
Finally, brothers and sisters,
keep your attention on all that is true,
all that is noble, all that is just and pure,
amiable and attractive,
to all that is called virtue and worthy of praise.
And put into practice what has been taught and handed down to you,
and what thou hast heard and seen of me.
Then the God of peace will be with you.
Verse for the Gospel John 15, 16
Alleluia.
I have chosen thee out of the world,
to go on a journey and bring forth fruit
that may be lasting, says the Lord.
Alleluia.
GOSPEL Mt 21:33-43
He will lease his vineyard to other vine-growers.
From the holy gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ according to
Matthew
In those days Jesus spoke
to the high priests and the elders of the people:
“Listen to this parable:
Once there was a landowner who planted a vineyard;
he put a fence around it,
cut out a winepress in it and built a watchtower.
“Thereupon he leased it to vintners
and left for the foreign country.
“When the time of harvest had come ,
he sent his servants to the winegrowers
to receive the proceeds.
“But the vintners seized his servants.
“They mistreated one, killed another
and stoned a third.
“Thereupon he sent other servants, more numerous than the first;
but the vine-dressers treated them in the same way.
“Finally, the landowner sent his son to them ,
on the assumption that they would spare his son.
“But when the vine-growers saw the son ,
they said among themselves:
That is the heir;
onward, let us kill him
and appropriate his inheritance.
“They seized him,
threw him out of the vineyard and killed him.
“Now when the owner of the vineyard comes ,
what will he do to those vine-growers?”
They answered him:
“He will make those criminals die a miserable death
and his vineyard
shall he lease to other vineyard owners ,
who will pay him the proceeds
at the appointed time.”
Then Jesus spoke to them:
“Have ye never read in the Scriptures:
The stone which the builders rejected ,
became the very cornerstone.
“By the Lord’s command this has happened
and it is wonderful in our eyes.
“Therefore I say to you:
The kingdom of God shall be taken away from you
and given to a people
who do bring forth the fruits thereof.”
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Laudato Si
Encyclical by
POPE FRANCISCUS
On the care of the common home
69. While we can make responsible use of things, we are called to recognise that the other living beings have their own value before God and “by their very existence bless and praise the Lord”, because the Lord finds his joy in his works. Precisely because of his unique dignity and because he is endowed with reason, the human being is called to respect creation with its inner laws, since “the Lord by wisdom founded the earth” (Spr. 3, 19) . Today the Church does not simplistically say that the other creatures are entirely subject to the welfare of the human being, as if they had no value in themselves and we could not dispose of them at will. Thus, the bishops of Germany explained that with regard to other creatures, “one could speak of the priority of being over being ‘useful'”. The Catechism questions in a very direct and penetrating way what would be a wrong anthropocentrism: “Every creature has its own goodness and perfection (…). The different creatures, willed according to their own being, reflect in their own way the infinite wisdom and goodness of God. Therefore, man must respect the own goodness of each creature to avoid a disordered use of things.”
To be continued
The Bible text in this issue is taken from The New Bible Translation,
©Dutch Bible Society 2004/2007.
Considerations from Liturgical suggestions for weekdays and Sundays
Laudato Si Official English translation