MASS READINGS & SAINT QUOTE OF THE DAY : Thursday - December 16, 2021

Thursday - December 16, 2021

 December 16, 2021

Thursday of the Third Week in Advent
Lectionary: 190

 

Reading 1                                                     Is 54:1-10

Raise a glad cry, you barren one who did not bear,

        Break forth in jubilant song, you who were not in labor,

    For more numerous are the children of the deserted wife

        than the children of her who has a husband,

        says the LORD.

    Enlarge the space for your tent,

        spread out your tent cloths unsparingly;

        lengthen your ropes and make firm your stakes.

    For you shall spread abroad to the right and to the left;

        your descendants shall dispossess the nations

        and shall people the desolate cities.

 

    Fear not, you shall not be put to shame;

        you need not blush, for you shall not be disgraced.

    The shame of your youth you shall forget,

        the reproach of your widowhood no longer remember.

    For he who has become your husband is your Maker;

        his name is the LORD of hosts;

    Your redeemer is the Holy One of Israel,

        called God of all the earth.

    The LORD calls you back,

        like a wife forsaken and grieved in spirit,

    A wife married in youth and then cast off,

        says your God.

    For a brief moment I abandoned you,

        but with great tenderness I will take you back.

    In an outburst of wrath, for a moment

        I hid my face from you;

    But with enduring love I take pity on you,

        says the LORD, your redeemer.

 

    This is for me like the days of Noah,

        when I swore that the waters of Noah

        should never again deluge the earth;

    So I have sworn not to be angry with you,

        or to rebuke you.

    Though the mountains leave their place

        and the hills be shaken,

    My love shall never leave you

        nor my covenant of peace be shaken,

        says the LORD, who has mercy on you.

 

Responsorial Psalm                                              30:2 and 4, 5-6, 11-12a and 13b

 

R.    (2a) I will praise you, Lord, for you have rescued me.

 

I will extol you, O LORD, for you drew me clear

    and did not let my enemies rejoice over me.

O LORD, you brought me up from the nether world;

    you preserved me from among those going down into the pit.

R.    I will praise you, Lord, for you have rescued me.

Sing praise to the LORD, you his faithful ones,

    and give thanks to his holy name.

For his anger lasts but a moment;

    a lifetime, his good will.

At nightfall, weeping enters in,

    but with the dawn, rejoicing.

R.    I will praise you, Lord, for you have rescued me.

“Hear, O LORD, and have pity on me;

    O LORD, be my helper.”

You changed my mourning into dancing;

    O LORD, my God, forever will I give you thanks.

R.    I will praise you, Lord, for you have rescued me.

 

Alleluia                                                                      Luke 3:4, 6

R. Alleluia, alleluia.

Prepare the way of the Lord, make straight his paths:

All flesh shall see the salvation of God.

R. Alleluia, alleluia.

 

Gospel                                                                       Lk 7:24-30

When the messengers of John the Baptist had left,

Jesus began to speak to the crowds about John.

“What did you go out to the desert to see  a reed swayed by the wind?

Then what did you go out to see?

Someone dressed in fine garments?

Those who dress luxuriously and live sumptuously

are found in royal palaces.

Then what did you go out to see?

A prophet? Yes, I tell you, and more than a prophet.

This is the one about whom Scripture says:

 

    Behold, I am sending my messenger ahead of you,

    he will prepare your way before you.

 

I tell you,

among those born of women, no one is greater than John;

yet the least in the Kingdom of God is greater than he.”

(All the people who listened, including the tax collectors,

who were baptized with the baptism of John,

acknowledged the righteousness of God;

but the Pharisees and scholars of the law,

who were not baptized by him,

rejected the plan of God for themselves.)

 

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WHO HAS FORSAKEN YOU?

Who has stolen your joy by forsaking you? In today's first reading, God says, "For a brief moment I abandoned you...." How could God abandon us? Haven't we been told again and again: "I will never forsake you"?

 

Isaiah was writing to the Israelites who had abandoned God and, consequentially, had been captured by the enemy. God was promising that their time of salvation was nearing.

 

Have you strayed into captivity? What bad habits do you have? What sins are enslaving you? What codependent relationships are controlling you? What sorrow is blocking your joy? While you're in that prison, the Lord does not share your captivity, although he never stops loving you and he never stops caring about you. Thus, it feels like he has forsaken you.

 

Your escape from captivity is as near as the Sacrament of Reconciliation. Then, as you exit the confessional, you will once again feel the joy of friendship with God. And if that's not enough to restore your joy fully, find a Christian therapist who can help you heal the wounds that were inflicted on you during your captivity.

 

The Lord calls you back. With great tenderness he takes you back. With enduring love he has pity on you and redeems you.

 

Who has grieved you in spirit? God? He always loves us and does good for us, but when we can't feel it, we mourn. Our spirits grieve over the loneliness of befriending an invisible God. Well, he has a cure for that, too. He gave us a Christian community -- the Body of Christ dwelling on earth -- to provide us with his touchable love.

 

When anyone does a caring deed for you, it is God doing it through them. He inspired it. God is reaching out to you.

 

All good things come from God, and most of the time he delivers them through human beings. If we say "no" to the gifts of goodness that are offered by others, we're rejecting God's help, just like those who rejected the gift of God offered by John the Baptizer in today's Gospel story.

 

When we feel cast off, rejected and uncared for, as if God has hidden himself from us, it's because we're not embracing him in the Christian community that he's given us. We must prepare the way of the Lord by making ourselves available to his blessings.

 

And when people fail to be Jesus for you, take your eyes off of them and put your focus back on Jesus, who redeemed you and never stops loving you.

 

Today's Prayer

 

My Lord, may my human criteria and the desires of the flesh not interfere with the work You want to do; rather may I be an evangelizing instrument in Your hands. Amen.

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God Bless You.....

The Rosary Family

The mother of Jesus promised St. Dominic that, “one day through the rosary & the scapular I shall save the world!”