Mass Reading: Sunday - 09th June 2024

Entrance Antiphon
Cf. Ps 26: 1-2

The Lord is my light and my salvation; whom shall I fear?
The Lord is the stronghold of my life; whom should I dread?
When those who do evil draw near, they stumble and fall.


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First reading
Genesis 3:9-15
'I was afraid because I was naked, and I hid'

    The Lord God called to the man after he had eaten of the tree. ‘Where are you?’ he asked. ‘I heard the sound of you in the garden;’ he replied ‘I was afraid because I was naked, so I hid.’ ‘Who told you that you were naked?’ he asked ‘Have you been eating of the tree I forbade you to eat?’ The man replied, ‘It was the woman you put with me; she gave me the fruit, and I ate it.’ Then the Lord God asked the woman, ‘What is this you have done?’ The woman replied, ‘The serpent tempted me and I ate.’

    Then the Lord God said to the serpent, ‘Because you have done this,
‘Be accursed beyond all cattle,
all wild beasts.
You shall crawl on your belly and eat dust
every day of your life.
I will make you enemies of each other:
you and the woman,
your offspring and her offspring.
It will crush your head
and you will strike its heel.’

The word of the Lord.


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Responsorial Psalm
Psalm 129(130)

With the Lord there is mercy and fullness of redemption.

    Out of the depths I cry to you, O Lord,
    Lord, hear my voice!
    O let your ears be attentive
    to the voice of my pleading.

With the Lord there is mercy and fullness of redemption.

    If you, O Lord, should mark our guilt,
    Lord, who would survive?
    But with you is found forgiveness:
    for this we revere you.

With the Lord there is mercy and fullness of redemption.

    My soul is waiting for the Lord.
    I count on his word.
    My soul is longing for the Lord
    more than watchman for daybreak.
    (Let the watchman count on daybreak
    and Israel on the Lord.)

With the Lord there is mercy and fullness of redemption.

    Because with the Lord there is mercy
    and fullness of redemption,
    Israel indeed he will redeem
    from all its iniquity.

With the Lord there is mercy and fullness of redemption.



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Second reading
2 Corinthians 4:13-5:1
We are being trained to carry the weight of eternal glory


    As we have the same spirit of faith that is mentioned in scripture – I believed, and therefore I spoke – we too believe and therefore we too speak, knowing that he who raised the Lord Jesus to life will raise us with Jesus in our turn, and put us by his side and you with us. You see, all this is for your benefit, so that the more grace is multiplied among people, the more thanksgiving there will be, to the glory of God.

    That is why there is no weakening on our part, and instead, though this outer man of ours may be falling into decay, the inner man is renewed day by day. Yes, the troubles which are soon over, though they weigh little, train us for the carrying of a weight of eternal glory which is out of all proportion to them. And so we have no eyes for things that are visible, but only for things that are invisible; for visible things last only for a time, and the invisible things are eternal.

    For we know that when the tent that we live in on earth is folded up, there is a house built by God for us, an everlasting home not made by human hands, in the heavens.

The word of the Lord.


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Gospel Acclamation
Jn14:23

Alleluia, alleluia!

If anyone loves me he will keep my word,
and my Father will love him,
and we shall come to him.

Alleluia!


Or:
Jn12:31,32

Alleluia, alleluia!

Now the prince of this world is to be overthrown,
says the Lord.
And when I am lifted up from the earth,
I shall draw all men to myself.

Alleluia!



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Gospel
Mark 3:20-35
A kingdom divided against itself cannot stand

    Jesus went home with his disciples, and such a crowd collected that they could not even have a meal. When his relatives heard of this, they set out to take charge of him, convinced he was out of his mind.

    The scribes who had come down from Jerusalem were saying, ‘Beelzebul is in him’ and, ‘It is through the prince of devils that he casts devils out.’ So he called them to him and spoke to them in parables, ‘How can Satan cast out Satan? If a kingdom is divided against itself, that kingdom cannot last. And if a household is divided against itself, that household can never stand. Now if Satan has rebelled against himself and is divided, he cannot stand either – it is the end of him. But no one can make his way into a strong man’s house and burgle his property unless he has tied up the strong man first. Only then can he burgle his house.

    ‘I tell you solemnly, all men’s sins will be forgiven, and all their blasphemies; but let anyone blaspheme against the Holy Spirit and he will never have forgiveness: he is guilty of an eternal sin.’ This was because they were saying, ‘An unclean spirit is in him.’

    His mother and brothers now arrived and, standing outside, sent in a message asking for him. A crowd was sitting round him at the time the message was passed to him, ‘Your mother and brothers and sisters are outside asking for you.’ He replied, ‘Who are my mother and my brothers?’ And looking round at those sitting in a circle about him, he said, ‘Here are my mother and my brothers. Anyone who does the will of God, that person is my brother and sister and mother.’

The Gospel of the Lord.

Mass Reflection: Sunday - 09th June 2024

 
GN 3: 9-15; PS 130: 1-8; 2 COR: 4:13 – 5:1; MK 3: 20-35

The Feasts of May and June have been called a “liturgical love feast.” They should help us to realize the persistent love of God. On May 20 we received the Holy Spirit Who pours the love of God into our hearts. The following Sunday we celebrated the Blessed Trinity. On June 3, last week, we celebrated the feast of the Body and Blood of Christ. Out of love Christ gave us the gift of Himself. He is always available to us, ready to listen and ready to support.

This past Friday we commemorated the Feast of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. In the revelations of St. Margaret Mary Alacoque, Jesus promised, “Sinners shall find My Heart the source of an infinite ocean of mercy. I will console them in all their troubles.” What we hear in the Word at every Mass should be a source of inspiration and affirmation about the love of God toward us.

Adam and Eve were certainly aware of God’s love. In the First Reading from the Book of Genesis, when they “hear” that God is in the garden, they know full well that He wants to be with them. It is difficult for us to conceive of how intimate and close God was to that first couple. What made them “afraid” of God was sin, something that probably makes all of us afraid of the Lord at times. Ever since Adam we as humans have tended to run from God’s presence and we surely do not always wish to listen to His Word.

Nevertheless, we must always keep in mind that we are made in God’s image, so as fearful of Him as we may be, we still want to be in the presence of God. As we note in the reading, Adam tried to blame Eve for his sin. That is something we may tend to do as well — blame others for our sins and faults. In 2 Samuel David declares, “I have sinned against the Lord.” Each of us must consider taking that responsibility for our actions as David did.

St. Paul had a way with words to be sure. During Paul’s lifetime many felt his Paul’s life was a failure. At the height of his success in life, he chose to leave it for a career that from our perspective is much higher. We view St. Paul as the great evangelizer and the equivalent of an Apostle. Paul left a comfortable life for a life of hardship, suffering and persecution.

His message to us and to the Corinthians in this reading is that faith creates testimony. Paul believed deeply that God had a purpose in his, Paul’s, sufferings. Paul understood and embraced and truly believed in resurrection. Al the trials he faced, and all the trials we may face, are trivial in relationship to the life that is to come. Suffering can destroy us; they could have destroyed Paul. Paul recognized that we tend to see the outward, not necessarily the unseen eternal things. He speaks, nevertheless, of the “eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison.” That is where his focus was and where our focus needs to be — not the present but what is in our future.

President Abraham Lincoln is often given credit for saying “A house divided against itself cannot stand.” This was the theme of a speech he gave when he was nominated for the United States Senate in 1858. However, we see it in today’s Gospel Reading from St. Mark: “And if a house is divided against itself, that house will not be able to stand.”

Jesus is quoted as saying that in all three Synoptic Gospels (Matthew, Mark, and Luke).

Lincoln was a man familiar with scripture, and he knew that Jesus said this. He also knew most likely that most of his audience knew that. Jesus gave this answer to the Pharisees in all three instances in the Bible, including today’s reading. It was a response the Lord made when accused of being the agent of Satan. It is a logical thought because we all know that any community, including our parish, which is divided will run into problems. Success and cohesion, whether in a family or in an organization or the Church itself, is reliant upon congruency.

We face this in many ways in daily life all the time. It does not matter whether it is a sports team, a government, a family, or our own minds things must work together to accomplish goals. God expects unity among believers because once conflict enters the picture, the whole organization becomes weaker. That is part of what stewardship demands of us. There are times when each of us must place his or her personal preferences to the side for the good of the group. That is never easy to do, but to be the kind of community we wish to be and need to be it is necessary. Psalm 133 says, “How good and pleasant it is when God’s people live together in unity.” Indeed!