Liturgical Readings for : Friday, 29th December, 2023
-29-12 – Fifth Day of the Christmas Octave
Memorial may be made today of of St Thomas Becket, bishop and martyr.
Christmas is a feast of light overcoming darkness, Christ being the true light.
FIRST READING
A reading from the letter of St John 2:3-11
Anyone who loves his brother is living in the light.
We can be sure that we know Jesus only by keeping his commandments.
Anyone who says, ‘I know him‘, and does not keep his commandments,
is a liar, refusing to admit the truth.
But when anyone does obey what he has said, God’s love comes to perfection in him.
We can be sure that we are in God only when the one who claims to be living in him
is living the same kind of life as Christ lived.
My dear people, this is not a new commandment that I am writing to tell you,
but an old commandment
that you were given from the beginning,
the original commandment which was the message brought to you.
Yet in another way, what I am writing to you,
and what is being carried out in your lives as it was in his,
is a new commandment;
because the night is over and the real light is already shining.
Anyone who claims to be in the light but hates his brother is still in the dark.
But anyone who loves his brother is living in the light and need not be afraid of stumbling; unlike the man who hates his brother and is in the darkness, not knowing where he is going, because it is too dark to see.
The Word of the Lord Thanks be to God.
Responsorial Psalm Ps 95
Response Let the heavens rejoice and earth be glad.
1. O sing a new song to the Lord, sing to the Lord all the earth.
O sing to the Lord, bless his name. Response
2. Proclaim his help day by day, tell among the nations his glory
and his wonders among all the peoples. Response
3. It was the Lord who made the heavens, his are majesty and state and power
and splendour in his holy place. Response
Gospel Acclamation Jn 1:14, 12
Alleluia, alleluia!
The Word became flesh, and dwelt among us.
To all who received him he gave power to become children of God
Alleluia!
GOSPEL
The Lord be with you. And with your spirit
A reading from the holy Gospel according to Luke 2:22-35 Glory to you, O Lord
A light to enlighten the pagans.
And when the day came for them to be purified as laid down by the Law of Moses, they took him up to Jerusalem to present him to the Lord, observing what stands written in the Law of the Lord: Every first-born male must be consecrated to the Lord- and also to offer in sacrifice, in accordance with what is said in the Law of the Lord, a pair of turtledoves or two young pigeons.
Now in Jerusalem there was a man named Simeon. He was an upright and devout man; he looked forward to Israel’s comforting and the Holy Spirit rested on him. It had been revealed to him by the Holy Spirit that he would not see death until he had set eyes on the Christ of the Lord. Prompted by the Spirit he came to the Temple and when the parents brought in the child Jesus to do for him what the Law required, he took him into his arms and blessed God; and he said:
‘Now, Master, you can let your servant go in peace,
just as you promised; because my eyes have seen the salvation
which you have prepared for all the nations to see,
a light to enlighten the pagans and the glory of your people Israel’.
As the child’s father and mother stood there wondering at the things that were being said about him, Simeon blessed them and said to Mary his mother,
You see this child: he is destined for the fall and for the rising of many in Israel, destined to be a sign that is rejected- and a sword will pierce your own soul too-so that the secret thoughts of many may be laid bare’.
The Gospel of the Lord. Praise to you, Lord Jesus Christ.
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Gospel Reflection 29th Dec Fifth Day in the Octave of Christmas Luke 2:22-35
The theme of light connects both of today’s readings. In the first reading, Saint John declares, ‘the night is over and the real light is already shining’. In the gospel reading, Simeon recognizes the child of Mary and Joseph as a ‘light to enlighten the pagans and the glory of your people Israel’. Simeon recognized that the light of God’s loving presence was shining through this bundle of new life. He also recognized that not everyone would welcome this extraordinary light, as this child is ‘destined to be a sign that is rejected’. The rejection of the one who embodied God’s loving light would impact on his mother, according to Simon, ‘and a sword will pierce your own soul too’. Some would experience the light of God’s all-embracing love in Jesus to be scandalous, ‘Why does this man eat with tax collectors and sinners?’ What many experienced as good news, others found unduly disturbing.
The feast of Christmas calls on us to welcome this extraordinary light of God’s unconditional love shining through Jesus, as Simeon did, and allow it to penetrate our lives. As we welcome this light, we are sent to let it shine through us. As John says in the first reading, ‘anyone how loves his brother or sister is living in the light’. Jesus once declared to his disciples, ‘you are the light of the world’. We are sent to light up our world and the lives of others by allowing the light of God’s love that shone so brightly through Jesus to shine through us. We are to live in such a way that others can see in us what Simeon saw in the child Jesus when he was brought into the Temple by his parents.
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The Scripture Readings are taken from The Jerusalem Bible, published 1966 by Darton, Longman & Todd Ltd.
