Mass Readings
Catholic Ireland
Liturgical Readings for : Monday, 17th February, 2025Léachtaí Gaeilge
Next Sunday's Readings
Monday of the Sixth Week in Ordinary Time, Cycle1
Envy and jealousy lead to murder c/f Cain and Abel. Self control is the gift of the Holy Spirit to all redeemed in Christ.
Memorials of the Seven Holy Founders of the Servite Order, they worked together to build up their mutual faith,
early in the thirteenth century. They followed the Rule of St Augustine.
and St Fintan, monk, abbot , deeply influenced by the severe Celtic monastic penitential practises. d.603
FIRST READING
A reading from the Book of Genesis 4:1-15, 25
Cain set on his brother Abel and killed him.
Adam had intercourse with his wife Eve, and she conceived and gave birth to Cain. ‘I have acquired a man with the help of the Lord. she said. She gave birth to a second child, Abel, the brother of Cain. Now Abel became a shepherd and kept flocks, while Cain tilled the soil.
Time passed and Cain brought some of the produce of the soil as an offering for the Lord, while Abel for his part brought the first-born of his flock and some of their fat as well. The Lord looked with favour on Abel and his offering. But he did not look with favour on Cain and his offering, and Cain was very angry and downcast.
The Lord asked Cain,
‘Why are you angry and downcast? If you are well disposed, ought you not to lift up your head?
But if you are ill disposed, is not sin at the door like a crouching beast hungering for you, which you must master?’
Cain said to his brother Abel, ‘Let us go out’;
and while they were in the open country, Cain set on his brother Abel and killed him.
The Lord asked Cain, ‘Where is your brother Abel?’
‘I do not know’ he replied. ‘Am I my brother’s guardian?’
‘What have you done?’ The Lord asked.
‘Listen to the sound of your brother’s blood, crying out to me from the ground. Now be accursed and driven from the ground that has opened its mouth to receive your brother’s blood at your hands. When you till the ground it shall no longer yield you any of its produce. You shall be a fugitive and a wanderer over the earth.’
Then Cain said to the Lord,
‘My punishment is greater than I can bear. See! Today you drive me from this ground. I must hide from you, and be a fugitive and a wanderer over the earth. Why, whoever comes across me will kill me!’
‘Very well, then,’ the Lord replied ‘if anyone kills Cain, sevenfold vengeance shall be taken for him.’
So the Lord put a mark on Cain, to prevent whoever might come across him from striking him down.
Adam had intercourse with his wife, and she gave birth to a son whom she named Seth, ‘
because God has granted me other offspring’ she said ‘in place of Abel, since Cain has killed him.’
The Word of the Lord Thanks be to God
Responsorial Psalm Ps 49
Response Pay your sacrifice of thanksgiving to God.
1. The God of gods, the Lord, has spoken and summoned the earth,
from the rising of the sun to its setting. ‘I find no fault with your sacrifices,
your offerings are always before me.’ Response
2. ‘But how can you recite my commandments and take my covenant on your lips,
you who despise my law and throw my words to the winds. Response
3. ‘You who sit and malign your brother and slander your own mother’s son.
You do this, and should I keep silence? Do you think that I am like you?’ Response
Gospel Acclamation Jn 8: 12
Alleluia, Alleluia!
I am the light of the world, says the Lord, anyone who follows me will have the light of life.
Alleluia!
Or Mt 4: 23
Alleluia, Alleluia!
Jesus proclaimed the Good News of the kingdom and cured all kinds of sickness among the people.
Alleluia!
GOSPEL
The Lord be with you. And with your spirit
A reading from the holy Gospel according to Mark 8:11-13 Glory to you, O Lord
Why does this generation demand a sign?
The Pharisees came up and started a discussion with Jesus;
they demanded of him a sign from heaven, to test him.
And with a sigh that came straight from the heart he said,
‘Why does this generation demand a sign?
I tell you solemnly, no sign shall be given to this generation.’
And leaving them again and re-embarking he went away to the opposite shore.
The Gospel of the Lord Praise to you, Lord Jesus Christ.
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Gospel Reflection Monday. Sixth Week in Ordinary Time Mark 8:11–13
Today’s gospel reading reveals a very human side to Jesus. He shows exasperation before the Pharisees who ask him for a sign from heaven. The evangelist comments ‘with a sigh that came straight from the heart he said “Why does this generation demand a sign?”’ Up to this point in Mark’s gospel Jesus had been healing the sick and the broken, welcoming sinners home, feeding multitudes in the wilderness. There had been no shortage of signs from heaven for those with eyes to see and ears to hear. This was the time to recognize God powerfully at work in Jesus and to believe in him as God’s unique messenger. It was not the time to be demanding that Jesus perform more signs from heaven. What God had already given through Jesus should have been enough.
Because some people, like the Pharisees, were not appreciating all the Lord was doing in their midst, more signs from heaven would serve no purpose. The gospel reading calls on us to have eyes that see and ears that hear all that the Lord is doing among us, rather than looking for more spectacular expressions of the Lord’s presence and working. In every present moment, the Lord provides us with enough to be getting on with. There is much to see and much to hear each day because the Lord is always at work deep within each of us and among us in striking ways. In our relationship with the Lord, our role is not to demand signs from him but to be open to recognize and receive the signs that are already there.
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The Scripture Readings are taken from The Jerusalem Bible, published 1966 by Darton, Longman and Todd Ltd and used with the permission of the publishers. http://dltbooks.com/
The Scripture Reflection is available with our thanks from Reflections on the Weekday Readings : Your word is a lamp for my feet and light for my path by Martin Hogan and published by Messenger Publications c/f www.messenger.ie/bookshop/
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