FIRST READING
“We hunger and thirst, we are poorly clothed.”
A reading from the first Letter of Saint Paul to the Corinthians (1 Corinthians 4:6b- 15)
Brethren: May you learn by me and Apollos not to go beyond what is written, that none of you may be puffed up in favour of one against another. For who sees anything different in you? What have you that you did not receive? If then you received it, why do you boast as if it were not a gift? Already you are filled! Already you have become rich! Without us you have become kings! And would that you did reign, so that we might share the rule with you! For I think that God has exhibited us apostles as last of all, like men sentenced to death; because we have become a spectacle to the world, to angels and to men. We are fools for Christ’s sake, but you are wise in Christ. We are weak, but you are strong. You are held in honour, but we in disrepute. To the present hour we hunger and thirst, we are poorly clothed and buffeted and homeless, and we labour, working with our own hands. When reviled, we bless; when persecuted, we endure; when slandered, we try to conciliate; we have become, and are now, as the refuse of the world, the dregs of all things. I do not write this to make you ashamed, but to admonish you as my beloved children. For though you have countless guides in Christ, you do not have many fathers. For I became your father in Christ Jesus through the gospel.
The word of the Lord.
RESPONSORIAL PSALM Psalm ,145: 17-15.19-20.2 I (R. I Sa)
R/. The Lord is close to all who call him.
The Lord is just in all his ways,
and holy in all his deeds.
The Lord is close to all who call him,
who call on him in truth. R.
He fulfils the desires of those who fear him;
he hears their cry and he saves them.
The Loan keeps watch over all who love him;
the wicked he will utterly destroy. R.
Let my mouth speak the praise of the Lord;
let all flesh bless his holy name forever,
for ages unending. R.
ALLELUIA John14:6
Alleluia. I am the way, and the truth, and the life, says the Lord; no one comes to the Father, but by me. Alleluia.
GOSPEL
“Why are you doing what is not lawful to do on the Sabbath.”
A reading from the holy Gospel according to Luke (Luke 6:1-5)
On a sabbath, While Jesus was going through the grain fields, his disciples plucked and ate some heads of grain, rubbing them in their hands. But some of the Pharisees said, “Why are you doing what is not lawful to do on the sabbath?” And Jesus answered, “Have you not read what David did when he was hungry, he and those who were with him: how he entered the house of God, and took and ate the show bread, which it is not lawful for any but the priests to eat, and also gave it to those with him?” And he said to them, “The Son of man is lord of the sabbath.”
The Gospel of the Lord.
Today’s Reflection
In the gospel text of today, Christ challenges the rigid motives that may underlie our piety. He asked the Pharisees: “Have you not read what David did….?” Indeed, they have read it and they know it all by heart yet the real meaning and the spirit behind it have eluded them. Clearly, we may know all the laws and commandments of the church, we may have read the Bible from Genesis to Revelation, we may know the names and lives of all the saints in the Church and observe all the days of obligation. Yet we may miss this: everything finds its true meaning in Jesus Christ, the Lord of the Sabbath.