On Good Friday, the crucifixion and death of Jesus are commemorated
Invitation
May I draw your attention to…
the daily Gospel reading?
The purpose of this invitation is to share with you the joy of the Gospel.
Everyone, without exception,
can experience that joy by opening their heart
to the healing power of the word of God.
Available every day
FIRST READING Isaiah 52, 13–53, 12
He was crushed for our sins.
From the prophet Isaiah
Behold, my servant shall prosper,
he shall be exalted and lifted up, and greatly honoured.
Just as many were appalled at him,
so disfigured was he, so devoid of human form,
and his beauty was less than that of the sons of men.
So shall he astonish many nations,
kings shall shut their mouths before him,
for they shall behold what they were not told,
and understand what they have not heard.
Who could believe what we have heard,
and to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed?
He was despised and rejected by men,
a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief;
as one from whom men hide their faces,
he was despised, and we esteemed him not.
Despised and rejected by men,
a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief;
as one from whom men hide their faces,
despised, and we esteemed him not.
Yet it was our sorrows that he bore,
and our griefs that he carried.
We, however, regarded him as one afflicted,
as one struck down and humiliated by God.
But he was pierced for our transgressions,
crushed for our iniquities,
for the punishment that brings us peace fell upon him,
and by his wounds there is healing for us.
We have all gone astray like a flock,
each has gone his own way,
the Lord has laid upon him the iniquity of us all.
They have mistreated him and he has accepted it,
he has not opened his mouth.
Like a lamb led to the slaughter,
and like a sheep silent before its shearers,
so he did not open his mouth.
By a violent decree he was taken away.
Who remembers his life?
For he was cut off from the land of the living,
struck down because of the sins of my people.
He is buried among the wicked,
and the will of the Lord shall be fulfilled through his hand.
Through his suffering he shall see the light and be satisfied.
Through his wisdom my servant, as a righteous man,
shall justify many,
and bear their transgressions.
Therefore I will give him a portion among the great,
and he shall divide the spoil with the mighty,
for he has given his soul over to death,
and was counted among the sinners.
For he bears the sins of many,
and intercedes for sinners.
Responsorial Ps. 31(30), 2, 6, 12-13, 15-16, 17 , 25
Verses
Father, into your hands I commend my spirit.
In you, Lord, I seek refuge;
never let me down.
Righteous God, deliver me.
Lord, into your hands I commend my spirit,
You are my Saviour, faithful God.
My enemies mock me,
my neighbours laugh at me.
My friends are terrified when they see me,
in the street they avoid me.
They have forgotten me as if I were dead,
I am like a broken object.
Yet I continue to trust in You, Lord,
I always say: You are my God.
You hold my fate in Your hands,
deliver me from my persecutors.
Let Your face shine upon Your servant,
save me through Your mercy.
Be courageous and do not fear,
all who hope in the Lord.
SECOND READING Heb . 4, 14–16, 5, 7–9
He has learned obedience and has become a source of eternal salvation for all who obey Him.
From the Letter to the Hebrews
Brothers and sisters,
Now that we have a great high priest,
one who has passed through the heavens,
Jesus, the Son of God,
we must hold fast to our confession.
For we have a High Priest,
who can sympathise with our weaknesses.
He himself was tested in every way,
just as we are, except in sin.
Let us then approach with confidence
the throne of God’s grace,
to receive mercy and find grace,
and timely help.
During the days of his earthly life,
Christ, with loud cries and tears,
offered up prayers and supplications to God,
who was able to save him from death.
Through his piety he was heard:
Though he was the Son of God,
he learnt obedience in the school of suffering;
and when he reached the end,
he became, for all who obey him,
a source of eternal salvation.
Antiphon before the Gospel Phil. 2:8-9
Praised and glorified be Thou, Lord Jesus.
Christ became obedient for us unto death, even death on the cross.
Therefore God has exalted Him and given Him the name which is above every name.
Praised and glorified be Thou, Lord Jesus.
Gospel John 18, 1–19, 42
The Passion of our Lord Jesus Christ.
The account of the Passion of our Lord Jesus Christ according to John
At that time,
Jesus went with his disciples
to the other side of the Kidron Valley.
There was a garden there, into which He entered with his disciples.
But Judas, who was to betray Him, also knew that place,
for Jesus often met there with His disciples.
So Judas arrived there,
with a group of soldiers,
and with the servants of the chief priests and the Pharisees,
equipped with torches, lanterns and weapons.
Jesus, who knew what was going to happen to Him,
stepped forward and said to them:
“Who are you looking for?”
They replied:
“Jesus of Nazareth.”
Jesus said to them:
“It is I.”
Judas, his betrayer, was with them too.
No sooner had Jesus said to them, “I am he,”
than they recoiled and fell to the ground.
He asked them again:
“Who are you looking for?”
They said to him:
“Jesus of Nazareth.”
Jesus replied:
“I have told you that it is I.
“If you are looking for me, let these men go.”
What he had said was to be fulfilled:
“Of those whom you have given me,
I have lost none.”
But Simon Peter had a sword with him.
He drew it and struck the high priest’s servant,
cutting off his right ear.
That servant’s name was Malchus.
But Jesus said to Peter:
‘Put your sword back into its sheath;
must I not drink the cup
which my Father has given me?’
The troops, along with their commander and the servants of the Jews,
then seized Jesus, bound him,
and brought him first to Annas.
For he was the father-in-law of Caiaphas,
who was high priest that year,
the very same Caiaphas who had advised the Jews:
‘It is better that one man die for the people.’
Simon Peter and another disciple followed Jesus.
That disciple was known to the high priest;
and so he went in with Jesus
into the high priest’s palace,
while Peter remained standing outside the door.
The other disciple, who was known to the high priest,
went out,
spoke to the gatekeeper and brought Peter in.
The girl standing at the door asked Peter:
‘Aren’t you also one of that man’s disciples?’
He replied:
‘No.’
Because it was cold, the servants and attendants
had lit a charcoal fire and were warming themselves by it.
Peter also stood with them and warmed himself.
The high priest
questioned Jesus about his disciples and his teaching.
Jesus replied to him:
‘I have spoken openly to the world.
I have always taught
in the synagogue or in the temple,
where all the Jews come together,
and there is nothing I have said in secret.
‘Why are you questioning me?
Ask the people
who have heard what I have preached.
They know very well what I have said.’
When one of the servants standing there heard this,
he struck Jesus in the face and said:
‘Is that how you answer the high priest?’
Jesus replied to him:
‘If I have spoken wrongly,
explain to me what was wrong;
but if I spoke rightly,
why do you strike me?’
Then Annas sent him, bound, to the high priest Caiaphas.
Simon Peter was warming himself when someone asked him:
‘Aren’t you one of his disciples too?’
He denied it and said:
‘Absolutely not.’
But one of the high priest’s servants,
a relative of the man
whose ear Peter had cut off, said:
‘Didn’t I see you with him in the garden?’
Peter denied it again,
and at that very moment a cock crowed.
Then they took Jesus
from Caiaphas’s house to the praetorium.
It was early in the morning.
They did not enter the praetorium,
because they had to be able to eat the Passover meal
and therefore could not defile themselves.
So Pilate went out and asked them:
‘What charge do you bring against this man?’
They replied to him:
‘If he were not a criminal,
we would not have handed him over to you.’
Then Pilate said:
‘Take him yourselves and judge him according to your law!’
The Jews replied to him:
«We have no authority to put anyone to death.»
Thus the word of Jesus was to be fulfilled,
by which He had indicated the manner in which He would die.
Then Pilate went into the praetorium,
called Jesus to him and said to Him:
«Are You the King of the Jews?»
Jesus answered him:
‘Are you saying this of your own accord,
or have others told you about me?’
Pilate replied:
‘Am I a Jew, then?
‘Your own people and the chief priests
have handed you over to me.
‘What have you done?’
Jesus answered:
‘My kingdom is not of this world.
‘If my kingdom were of this world,
my servants would have fought
to prevent me from being handed over to the Jews.
‘But my kingdom is not from here.’
Pilate asked again:
‘Are you then a king?’
Jesus replied:
‘Yes, I am a king.
‘For this I was born, and for this I came into the world,
to bear witness to the truth.
‘Everyone who is of the truth listens to my voice.’
Pilate said to him:
«What is truth?»
After these words, he went out again to the Jews and said to them:
«I find no fault in him.
‘But you have a custom, among yourselves,
that I release someone to you at Passover.
‘Do you want me to release the King of the Jews?’
Then they shouted again:
‘No, not him,
but Barabbas!’
Barabbas was a robber.
Then Pilate had Jesus flogged.
The soldiers wove a crown of thorns,
placed it on his head,
and put a purple robe over him.
They came up to him and said:
‘Hail, King of the Jews!’
And they struck him on the face.
Pilate went out again and said to them:
‘Look, I am bringing him out, so that you may know
that I find no fault in him.’
So Jesus came out,
still wearing the crown of thorns and the purple robe.
Pilate said to them:
‘Behold the man.’
But when the chief priests and the guards saw him,
they shouted:
‘Crucify him, crucify him!’
Pilate said to them:
‘Take him yourselves and crucify him,
for I find no fault in him.’
The Jews replied to him:
‘We have a law,
and according to that law he must die,
because he has claimed to be the Son of God.’
When Pilate heard this, he was even more afraid.
He went back into the praetorium and said to Jesus:
‘Where do you come from?’
But Jesus gave him no answer.
Then Pilate said:
‘Will you not speak to me?
‘Do you not know that I have the power to release you,
but also the power to crucify you?’
Jesus replied:
“You would have no power over me
if it had not been given to you from above.
“Therefore,
the sin of the one who handed me over to you is greater.”
From that moment on, Pilate wanted to release him.
But the Jews shouted:
“If you release this man, you are no friend of the Emperor.
Anyone who makes himself a king,
is rebelling against the Emperor.’
When Pilate heard them shouting this,
he had Jesus brought out
and sat down on the judge’s seat,
at a place called Litostrotos, in Hebrew Gabbata.
It was the day of Preparation for the Passover,
around the sixth hour.
He said to the Jews:
«Here is your king.»
But they shouted:
«Away with him, away with him! Crucify him!»
Pilate asked:
«Shall I crucify your king?»
The chief priests replied:
«We have no king but Caesar!»
Then he handed him over to be crucified,
and they took him away.
Carrying his own cross,
Jesus left the city for the place called ‘Skull Place’,
in Hebrew Golgotha.
There they crucified him,
and with him two others,
one on either side and Jesus in the middle.
Pilate had also had a sign made,
and had it fixed to the cross.
It read: ‘Jesus of Nazareth,
King of the Jews’.
Many Jews read this sign,
for the place where Jesus was crucified,
was close to the city.
It was written in Hebrew, Latin and Greek.
The chief priests of the Jews then said to Pilate:
‘You should not have written: “the King of the Jews”, but:
“He said: I am the King of the Jews”.’
Pilate replied:
‘What I have written, I have written.’
When the soldiers had crucified Jesus,
they took his clothes and divided them into four parts,
one for each soldier.
They also took the tunic,
which, however, was made of a single piece, woven from top to bottom.
So they said to one another:
‘Let us not tear it,
but let us cast lots for it to see who will get it.’
Thus the Scripture was fulfilled:
‘They divided my garments among them
and cast lots for my tunic.’
Whilst the soldiers were doing this,
standing by the cross of Jesus were his mother, his mother’s sister,
Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary Magdalene.
When Jesus saw his mother,
and beside her the disciple whom he loved,
he said to his mother:
«Woman, behold, this is your son».
Then he said to the disciple:
‘Behold, your mother.’
And from that hour the disciple took her into his own home.
After this, knowing that all was now finished,
Jesus said, so that the Scripture might be fulfilled:
‘I am thirsty.’
There stood a jar full of vinegar.
They soaked a sponge in it,
put it on a hyssop branch and held it to his mouth.
When Jesus had taken the vinegar, he said:
«It is finished.»
Then he bowed his head and gave up his spirit.
(Here everyone kneels for a moment.)
Since it was the Day of Preparation,
and the Jews did not want
the bodies to remain on the cross during the Sabbath,
—it was, moreover, a high Sabbath—
they asked Pilate for permission
to break the legs of those crucified and take them down.
So the soldiers came,
The one who saw this bears witness to it;
his testimony is true;
and he knows that he speaks the truth,
so that you too may believe.
This happened so that the Scripture might be fulfilled:
‘Not a single bone of Him shall be broken’,
whilst another Scripture says:
‘They will look upon Him whom they have pierced’.
Joseph of Arimathea,
who was a disciple of Jesus,
but secretly for fear of the Jews,
then asked Pilate
for permission to take away the body of Jesus.
When Pilate granted him permission,
he went and took the body away.
Nicodemus also came, who had previously visited Him by night,
and he brought a mixture of myrrh and aloes,
about a hundred pounds.
They took the body of Jesus
and wrapped it in linen cloths with the aromatic spices,
as is customary in Jewish burials.
At the place where he had been crucified there was a garden,
and in that garden there was a new tomb,
in which no one had yet been laid to rest.
Since it was the Jewish day of preparation
and the tomb was nearby,
they laid him there.
Laudato Si
Encyclical of
POPE FRANCIS
On Care for Our Common Home
The mystery of the universe
76. In the Judeo-Christian tradition, speaking of ‘creation’ means more than
speaking of nature, for it concerns God’s plan of love,
in which every creature has value and meaning.
Nature is often seen as a system to be analysed, understood and managed,
but creation can only be understood as a gift flowing from the open hand of the Father of all,
as a reality illuminated by the love that calls us together into a universal community.
To be continued
Every day at 1 am
The Bible text in this edition is taken from The New Bible Translation,
©Dutch Bible Society 2004/2007.
Reflections taken from Liturgical Suggestions for Weekdays and Sundays
Laudato Si. Official english translation
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