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.
Consideration
A faith proclaimer can quickly become exhausted. The reality of proclamation is hard and requires a lot of strength. It will therefore be necessary for him to find a good balance between always coming to personal conversion and actually proclaiming. To this end, a spirit of discernment is needed. After all, the proclaimer of faith is not himself at the centre. He is not the message being proclaimed. It is Jesus Christ who is proclaimed. Spiritual guidance from a wise man of faith helps to achieve discernment.
FIRST READING I John 3:22-4:6
Examine the spirits whether they come from God.
From the first letter of the holy apostle John
Friends,
We receive from God all that we ask
Because we keep his commandments
and do what is pleasing to Him.
And this is His commandment :
to believe wholeheartedly in His Son Christ
and loving one another as He has commanded us.
Whoever keeps his commandments
abides in God
and God abides in him.
And that He dwells in us
we know by the Spirit He has given us.
Friends,
do not trust every spirit.
Examine the spirits whether they come from God,
for among those who have gone out into the world
are many false prophets.
By this you recognise the Spirit of God :
every spirit
who confesses that Jesus Christ truly became man
is of God ;
but every spirit that casts down Jesus
is not of God
and that is the actual ,antichrist’.
You have been told that he would come
but he is already in the world, already now.
Children,
you belong to God
and ye are stronger than the lying prophets,
for He who inspires you
is mightier than he who controls the world.
They belong to the world,
therefore they also derive their teachings from the world
and the world listens to them.
But we belong to God
and those who really know God
listens to us.
Those who do not belong to God
refuses to listen to us.
Thus we discern the spirit of truth
from the spirit of error.
INTERLUDIUM Ps. 2, 7-8, 10-11
I give you the nations as an inheritance.
This is the decree of the Lord :
He spake unto me : thou art my son,
I have begotten thee this day.
Ask Me, I give thee the nations as an inheritance,
give thee the earth for a possession.
Be wise now, ye princes,
rulers of the earth, know what ye do!
Serve the Lord with awe,
kiss His trembling feet.
ALLELUIA Mt 4:16
Alleluia.
The people who sat in darkness
Has beheld a great light ;
And over those who sat in the land of the shadow of death
have sat ,
over them a light has risen;
Alleluia.
GOSPEL Mt 4:12-17. 23-25
The kingdom of heaven is at hand.
From the Holy Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ according to
Matthew
When Jesus learned that John had been captured,
He fled to Galilee.
However, passing by Nazareth
He settled in Capernaum, on the shore of the lake,
in the border region of Zebulun and Naphtali,
that the word of the prophet Isaiah might be fulfilled:
‘Land of Zebulon, land of Naftali ,
lying by the sea, Overjordan :
Galilee of the Gentiles !
‘The people who sat in darkness
beheld a great light ;
and over those
who sat in the land of the shadow of death ,
over them a light has risen.’
From then on, Jesus began preaching and saying :
‘Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.’
Jesus went around all over Galilee,
acting as a teacher in their synagogues,
preaching the Good News of the Kingdom
and cured all diseases and ailments among the people.
His fame went out over all Syria
and they brought to Him all who were in a bad state,
who were afflicted with many diseases and pains,
the possessed, those suffering from falling sickness and the lame.
And He healed them.
Great crowds from Galilee and Dekápolis
from Jerusalem, Judea and the Overjordan
joined Him.
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Fratelli tutti
encyclical by
Pope Francis
On brotherhood and social friendship
150 This approach ultimately requires one to joyfully
accept that no people, culture or person can achieve everything on
its own. The other is essentially necessary for the
construction of a complete life. Awareness of boundaries or one’s own
boundedness, far from being a threat, becomes the key to the
dreaming of and working out a common project. Therefore
‘man is the bounded being that has no limit’.
To be continued
Every day at 1 am
The Bible text in this issue is taken from The New Bible Translation,
© Netherlands Bible Society 2004/2007.
Considerations from Liturgical suggestions for weekdays.
Fratelli tutti English translation