Mass Readings
Catholic Ireland
Liturgical Readings for : Saturday, 18th January, 2025Léachtaí Gaeilge
Next Sunday's Readings
Saturday of First Week in Ordinary Time, Year 1
When we stand before God for judgement, Jesus will be standing beside us feeling for our weaknesses
Week of Prayer for Christian Unity begins today
(From today, Jan 18 to the 25th , during these days, readings may be taken from Lectionary 111:508-28.)
Saturday Mass of the Blessed Virgin May
FIRST READING
A reading from the letter to the Hebrews 4:12-16
Let us be confident, then, in approaching the throne of grace.
The word of God is something alive and active:
it cuts like any double-edged sword but more finely:
it can slip through the place where the soul is divided from the spirit, or joints from the marrow;
it can judge the secret emotions and thoughts.
No created thing can hide from him; everything is uncovered and open to the eyes of the one to whom we must give account of ourselves.
Since in Jesus, the Son of God, we have the supreme high priest who has gone through to the highest heaven, we must never let go of the faith that we have professed. For it is not as if we had a high priest who was incapable of feeling our weaknesses with us; but we have one who has been tempted in every way that we are, though he is without sin. Let us be confident, then, in approaching the throne of grace, that we shall have mercy from him and find grace when we are in need of help.
The Word of the Lord Thanks be to God
Responsorial Psalm Ps 18
Response Your words are spirit, Lord, and they are life.
1. The law of the Lord is perfect, it revives the soul
The rule of the Lord is to be trusted, it gives wisdom to the simple. Response
2. The precepts of the Lord are right, they gladden the heart.
The command of the Lord is dear, it gives light to the eyes. Response
3. The fear of the Lord is holy, abiding for ever.
The decrees of the Lord are truth and all of them just. Response
4. May the spoken words of my mouth, the thoughts of my heart,
win favour in your sight, O Lord, my rescuer, my rock! Response
Gospel Acclamation Ps 118: 29. 35
Alleluia, alleluia!
Bend my heart to your will, O Lord, and teach me your commands.
Alleluia!
Or Lk 7: 16
Alleluia, alleluia!
The Lord has sent me to bring the good news to the poor, to proclaim liberty to captives.
Alleluia!
GOSPEL
The Lord be with you. And with your spirit
A reading from the holy Gospel according to Luke 4: 18 Glory to you, O Lord
‘I did not come to call the virtuous, but sinners.’
Jesus went out again to the shore of the lake; and all the people came to him, and he taught them.
As he was walking on he saw Levi the son of Alphaeus, sitting by the customs house, and he said to him, ‘Follow me‘. And he got up and followed him.
When Jesus was at dinner in his house, a number of tax collectors and sinners were also sitting at the table with Jesus and his disciples; for there were many of them among his followers. When the scribes of the Pharisee party saw him eating with sinners and tax collectors, they said to his disciples,
‘Why does he eat with tax collectors and sinners?’
When Jesus heard this he said to them,
‘It is not the healthy who need the doctor, but the sick. I did not come to call the virtuous, but sinners.’
The Gospel of the Lord. Praise to you, Lord Jesus Christ.
********************
Gospel Reflection Saturday First Week in Ordinary Time Mark 2:13-17
At one point in his first letter to the Corinthians, Paul quotes a standard piece of wisdom, ‘bad company ruins good morals’. There is nothing especially Christian about this insight. It is a wisdom saying that is common to various cultures and traditions. We have a version of it in our own culture, ‘Show me your friends and I will tell you who you are’. In every age and in every culture we find the conviction that the company we keep shapes us. However, the saying, ‘bad company ruins good morals’, certainly did not apply to Jesus.
In today’s gospel reading, Jesus keeps what would have been regarded at the time as very bad company, something he did regularly. When he called Levi, a tax collector, to follow him, he immediately went on to share table in Levi’s house, in the company of his fellow tax collectors and others considered ‘sinners’ by the moral guardians of the day. As a result, the scribes ask Jesus’ disciples, ‘Why does he eat with tax collectors and sinners?’ ‘Why does this man of God keep such bad company?
Doesn’t he know that bad company ruins good morals?’ In reality, the opposite happened. Far from sinners dragging Jesus down, his goodness lifted them up, just as a doctor heals the sick rather than being infected by them. We are all sinners, in one way or another, and Jesus came to lift us all up. He came to enhance our lives with his goodness, to make us more loving with his love. He came to enable us to keep setting out afresh, in the strength of his Spirit, the Holy Spirit. In another of his letters Paul says, ‘where sin abounds, grace abounds all the more’. If we open ourselves up to the Lord’s gracious presence, we will be empowered to grow up more fully into his image and likeness.
________________________________
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/
__________