Liturgical Readings for : Monday, 29th July, 2024
7/29 Ss Martha, Mary and Lazarus, memorial
FIRST READING
A reading from the first letter of St John 4:7-16
As long as we love one another God will live in us.
My dear people,
Let us love one another since love comes from God and everyone who loves is begotten by God and knows God.
Anyone who fails to love can never have known God, because God is love.
God’s love for us was revealed when God sent into the world his only Son
so that we could have life through him;
this is the love I mean: not our love for God, but God’s love for us
when he sent his Son to be the sacrifice that takes our sins away.
My dear people, since God has loved us so much, we too should love one another.
No one has ever seen God; but as long as we love one another
God will live in us and his love will be complete in us.
We can know that we are living in him and he is living in us because
he lets us share his Spirit.
We ourselves saw and we testify that the Father sent his Son as saviour of the world.
If anyone acknowledges that Jesus is the Son of God, God lives in him, and he in God.
We ourselves have known and put our faith in God’s love towards ourselves.
God is love and anyone who lives in love lives in God, and God lives in him.
The Word of the Lord Thanks be to God.
Responsorial Psalm Ps 33
Response I will bless the Lord at all times.
Or Taste and see that the Lord is good.
I. I will bless the Lord at all times, his praise always on my lips;
in the Lord my soul shall make its boast. The humble shall hear and be glad. Response
2. Glorify the Lord with me. Together let us praise his name.
I sought the Lord and he answered me; from all my terrors he set me free. Response
3. Look towards him and be radiant; let your faces not be abashed.
This poor man called; the Lord heard him and rescued him from all his distress. Response
4. The angel of the Lord is encamped around those who revere him, to rescue them.
Taste and see that the Lord is good. He is happy who seeks refuge in him. Response
5. Revere the Lord, you his saints. They lack nothing, those who revere him.
Strong lions suffer want and go hungry but those who seek the Lord lack no blessing. Response
Gospel Acclamation Jn 15: 16
Alleluia, Alleluia!
I am the light of the world, says the Lord,
anyone who follows me will have the light of life .
Alleluia!
GOSPEL
The Lord be with you. And with your spirit
A reading from the Gospel according to John 11:19-27 Glory to you, O Lord
I believe that you are the Christ, the Son of the Living God.
Many Jews had come to Martha and Mary to sympathise with them over their brother. When Martha heard that Jesus had come she went to meet him. Mary remained sitting in the house.
Martha said to Jesus,
‘If you had been here, my brother would not have died, but I know that, even now, whatever you ask of God, he will grant you.’
‘Your brother’ said Jesus to her ‘will rise again.’
Martha said, ‘I know he will rise again at the resurrection on the last day.’
Jesus said:
‘I am the resurrection and the life.
If anyone believes in me, even though he dies he will live,
and whoever lives and believes in me will never die.
Do you believe this?’
‘Yes, Lord,‘ she said ‘I believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God, the one who was to come into this world.‘
The Gospel of the Lord Praise to you, Lord Jesus Christ.
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or Alternate Gospel
GOSPEL
The Lord be with you. And with your spirit
A reading from the Gospel according to John 11:38-42 Glory to you, O Lord
Martha, Martha, you worry and fret about so many things.
Jesus came to a village, and a woman named Martha welcomed him into her house. She had a sister called Mary, who sat down at the Lord’s feet and listened to him speaking. Now Martha who was distracted with all the serving said,
‘Lord, do you not care that my sister is leaving me to do the serving all by myself? Please tell her to help me.‘
But the Lord answered:
‘Martha, Martha, you worry and fret about so many things yet few are needed, indeed only one. It is Mary who has chosen the better part; it is not to be taken from her. ‘
The Gospel of the Lord Praise to you, Lord Jesus Christ.
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Gospel Reflection Ss Martha, Mary and Lazarus Luke 10:38-42
We don’t often have the feast of two sisters and a brother. John’s gospel suggests that Jesus had a warm, friendly, relationship with this family. Earlier in the chapter from which our gospel reading is taken, the evangelist tells us that ‘Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus’. When the sisters sent word to Jesus that Lazarus was ill, their message was, ‘Lord, he whom you love is ill’. Later on in this same chapter, when Jesus saw Mary weeping because her brother Lazarus had died, it is said that, ‘Jesus began to weep’, and those present said, ‘See how he loved him’. Martha, Mary and Lazarus are beloved disciples of Jesus. To that extent they represent us all. What Jesus said to his disciples at the last supper in John’s gospel is said to us all, ‘As the Father has loved me, so I have loved you; abide in my love’. Beloved disciples, like Martha, Mary and Lazarus, are not spared the trauma of profound loss in the face of death. Jesus himself, the beloved Son of God, experienced the cruellest of deaths on a Roman cross.
Yet, Jesus’ words to Martha in today’s gospel reading assures her, and all beloved disciples, that the bond which his love for us and our faith in him creates will not be broken by death. Rather, that bond will be deepened as we come to share in his own risen life. ‘If anyone believes in me, even though they die they will live, and whoever lives and believes in me will never die’. Yes, the Lord’s beloved disciples will die, as he did, but beyond death they will live, and, therefore, they will never die in the ultimate sense. According to our first reading, the essence of God is love, and God’s love for us was revealed when ‘God sent into the world his only Son so that we could have life through him’. This is the hope which the feast of this beloved family gives us.
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The Scripture Readings are taken from The Jerusalem Bible, published 1966 by Darton, Longman & Todd Ltd.
