Churches of the Day

Saint of the Day: Sep 21; – St Matthew, Apostle and Evangelist
C/f A short look at this saint’s life can be found below today's Readings and Reflection

FIRST READING

A reading from the letter of St Paul to the Ephesians 4:1-7. 11-13
To some, his gift was that they should be apostles; to some evangelists.

I, the prisoner in the Lord, implore you therefore to lead a life worthy of your vocation. Bear with one another charitably, in complete selflessness, gentleness and patience. Do all you can to preserve the unity of the Spirit by the peace that binds you together. There is one Body, one Spirit, just as you were all called into one and the same hope when you were called. There is one Lord, one faith, one baptism, and one God who is Father of all, over all, through all and within all.

Each one of us, however, has been given his own share of grace, given as Christ allotted it. And to some, his gift was that they should be apostles; to some, prophets; to some, evangelists; to some, pastors and teachers; so that the saints together make a unity in the work of service, building up the body of Christ.

In this way we are all to come to unity in our faith and in our knowledge of the Son of God, until we become the perfect Man, fully mature with the fullness of Christ himself.

The Word of the Lord.             Thanks be to God.


Responsorial Psalm          Ps 18: 2-5 . R/v 5
Response                              Their word goes forth through all the earth.

1. The heavens proclaim the glory of God and the firmament shows forth the work of his hands.
Day unto day takes up the story and night unto night makes known the message. Response

2. No speech, no word, no voice is heard yet their span extends through all the earth,
their words to the utmost bounds of the world.                                                               Response

Gospel Acclamation
Alleluia, alleluia!
We praise you, O God, we acknowledge you to be the Lord.
The glorious company of the apostles praise you, O Lord.
Alleluia!

GOSPEL

The Lord be with you.          And with your spirit
A reading from the holy Gospel according to Matthew        9:9-13        Glory to you, O Lord.
Follow me. And he got up and followed him.

As Jesus was walking on from there he saw a man named Matthew sitting by the customs house, and he said to him, 'Follow me'. And he got up and followed him.

While he was at dinner in the house it happened that a number of tax collectors and sinners came to sit at the table with Jesus and his disciples. When the Pharisees saw this, they said to his disciples, 'Why does your master eat with tax collectors and sinners?'
When he heard this he replied,
'It is not the healthy who need the doctor, but the sick.
Go and learn the meaning of the words: What I want is mercy, not sacrifice.
And indeed I did not come to call the virtuous, but sinners.'

The Gospel of the Lord.            Praise to you, Lord Jesus Christ.



Gospel Reflection     Sept. 21,      Saint Matthew, Apostle, Evangelist      Matthew 9:9-13

According to Saint Paul in today’s first reading, ‘each of us… has been given their own share of grace, given as Christ allotted it’. We have each been gifted in some way by the Lord for his service and the service of his people. Each one of us has been gifted by the Lord, not just some of us. We all have a role to play in the Lord’s work of making present the kingdom of heaven in the here and now. Jesus saw that Matthew had been gifted by God in a way that could serve all of God’s people. Because Matthew was a tax collector, collecting taxes from his own people on behalf of the Romans, many would have dismissed him as a traitor, and those who thought of themselves as religious would have considered him a sinner, someone who did not do God’s will. Yet, Jesus saw something much more in Matthew, and he called him to become one of his closest followers, one of the Twelve. He saw in Matthew what others failed to see, refused to see. Jesus looked upon people with generous and merciful eyes.

The risen Lord looks on all of us in the same way. He doesn’t just see our failings; he sees all we can become with his help. Sometimes it can be a struggle to see ourselves with the same generous and merciful eyes as the Lord sees us. Jesus reminds his critics in today’s gospel reading what it is that God really wills, quoting from the prophet Hosea, ‘What I want is mercy, not sacrifice’. More important to God than all the sacrifices in the Temple at the time is that merciful perspective on others, and on ourselves, that Jesus gives expression to in his whole way of life.

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The Scripture Readings are taken from The Jerusalem Bible, published 1966 by Darton, Longman & Todd Ltd. and used with the permission of the publishers. http://dltbooks.com/The Scripture Reflection is made available with our thanks from his book Reflections on the Weekday Readings : 'The Word is near to you, on your lips and in your heart' by Martin Hogan and published by Messenger Publications , c/f www.messenger.ie/bookshop/

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Saint of the Day: Sep 19; – St Matthew, Apostle and Evangelist

 Matthew: There is an irony that Matthew, a Jew was a tax collector for the Romans and accused of being a traitor to his own people, should in his Gospel portray Jesus as the Messiah, the fulfilment of all God's promises to the Jews.

Patrick Duffy fills out the background here.

Matthew "a tax collector" is identified with Levi, son of Alphaeus, in Mark 2:13. In the list of the apostles (Matt 10:3) he is called "the tax collector". Jesus saw him sitting by the customs house in Capernaum and said to him:
"Follow me". And leaving everything, he got up and followed him (Mt 9:9). Mark (2:14) and Luke (5:27-32) call him Levi when they describe this event.

As a Roman tax collector, the people would have regarded Matthew as an exploiter and collaborator with the Romans, in that sense a traitor to his people. And so when Jesus and other disciples were at dinner at Matthew's house, the scribes and Pharisees taunt the disciples, "Why does your master eat with tax collectors and sinners?"

Matthew's Gospel

[caption id="attachment_50929" align="alignright" width="183"] Matthew and inspiration for his Gospel[/caption]

St. Matthew's gospel has pride of place in the canon of the New Testament. Its purpose was to convince Jews that the Messiah had come in the person of Jesus, our Lord, and that all the promises of the messianic kingdom, the promises God made to his people, the Jews, had been fulfilled in him. There is an irony in this for one who was accused of being a traitor to his people. His name means "gift of the Lord". Up to this time Matthew had never known such mercy. He was a bruised person. When Jesus called him this bruising was healed and he was freed of that pain.

Mercy, not sacrifice
Jesus uses that occasion to declare the core message of his mission and of the gospel: "It is not the healthy who need the doctor, but the sick. Go and learn the meaning of the words: What I want is mercy, not sacrifice. And indeed I did not come to call the virtuous, but sinners."

Later life
Little definite is known about Matthew's later life. Legend has it that he preached the gospel for a long time after the ascension and carried it to Persia and Ethiopia where he was killed.

Patronage
Matthew is the patron of bankers, accountants, book-keepers, tax people, customs officers and all those who work in financial, customs and security institutions.

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Memorable Proverb for Today

The main difference between the saint and the sinner is that
every saint has a past, and every sinner has a future.

~ Oscar Wilde ~

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Twenty-Sixth Sunday in Ordinary Time Year A
A Day of Prayer for Life

God gives us the gift of repentance. In the gospel parable of the two sons, Jesus holds up the example of the public sinners in his time being converted while the establishment figures refuse to listen to his message. Ezekiel reminds us that repentance is always possible, for the Lord remembers his mercy.

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FIRST READING

A reading from the book of Ezekiel          18:25-28
When the sinner renounces sin, he shall certainly live.

The word of the Lord was addressed to me as follows:
You object, "What the Lord does is unjust".
Listen, you House of Israel: is what I do unjust?
Is it not what you do that is unjust? When the upright man renounces his integrity to commit sin and dies because of this, he dies because of the evil that he himself has committed.
When the sinner renounces sin to become law-abiding and honest, he deserves to live. He has chosen to renounce all his previous sins; he shall certainly live; he shall not die.

The Word of the Lord.              Thanks be to God.

Responsorial Psalm           Ps 24; 4-9 R/v 6
Response                             Remember your mercy, Lord.

1. Lord, make me know your ways. Lord, teach me your paths.
Make me walk in your truth, and teach me: for you are God my saviour.          Response

2. Remember your mercy, Lord, and the love you have shown from of old.
Do not remember the sins of my youth.
In your love remember me, because of your goodness, O Lord.                             Response

3. The Lord is good and upright. He shows the path to those who stray,
he guides the humble in the right path; he teaches his way to the poor.              Response

SECOND READING

A reading from the letter of St Paul to the Philippians     2:1-11
In your minds you must be the same as Christ Jesus.

If our life in Christ means anything to you, if love can persuade at all, or the Spirit that we have in common, or any tenderness and sympathy, then be united in your convictions and united in your love, with a common purpose and a common mind. That is the one thing which would make me completely happy. There must be no competition among you, no conceit; but everybody is to be self-effacing. Always consider the other person to be better than yourself, So that nobody thinks of his own interests first but everybody thinks of other people's interests instead. In your minds you must be the same as Christ Jesus:
His state was divine,
yet he did not cling to his equality with God
but emptied himself to assume the condition of a slave,
and became as men are; and being as all men are,
he was humbler yet, even to accepting death, death on a cross.
But God raised him high and gave him the name
which is above all other names so that all beings
in the heavens, on earth and in the underworld, should bend the knee at the name of Jesus and that every tongue should acclaim Jesus Christ as Lord,
to the glory of God the Father.

The Word of the Lord.              Thanks be to God.

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Alternative shorter
SECOND READING

A reading from the letter to the Philippians      2:1-5
In your minds you must be the same as Christ Jesus.

If our life in Christ means anything to you, if love can persuade at all, or the Spirit that we have in common, or any tenderness and sympathy, then be united in your convictions and united in your love, with a common purpose and a common mind. That is the one thing which would make me completely happy.

There must be no competition among you, no conceit; but everybody is to be self-effacing. Always consider the other person to be better than yourself, So that nobody thinks of his own interests first but everybody thinks of other people's interests instead. In your minds you must be the same as Christ Jesus.

The Word of the Lord.            Thanks be to God.
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Gospel Acclamation          Jn 14: 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                                           Jn 10: 27
Alleluia, alleluia!
The sheep that belong to me listen to my voice, says the Lord,
I know them and they follow me.
Alleluia!

GOSPEL

The Lord be with you                         And with your spirit.
A reading from the Gospel according to Matthew     21:28-32       Glory to you, O Lord
Afterwards he thought better of it and went. Tax collectors and prostitutes are making their way into the kingdom of God before you.

Jesus said to the chief priests and the elders of the people:
'What is your opinion?
A man had two sons. He went and said to the first,
"My boy, you go and work in the vineyard today".
He answered, "I will not go", but afterwards
thought better of it and went.

The man then went and said the same thing to the second who answered, "Certainly, sir", but did not go.
Which of the two did the father's will?'
'The first' they said.
Jesus said to them,
'I tell you solemnly, tax collectors and prostitutes are making their way into the kingdom of God before you. For John came to you, a pattern of true righteousness, but you did not believe him, and yet the tax collectors and prostitutes did. Even after seeing that, you refused to think better of it and believe in him'.

The Gospel of the Lord.                Praise to you, Lord Jesus Christ.

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For homily resources for this Sunday's Gospel click here: https://www.catholicireland.net/sunday-homily/




Taken from THE JERUSALEM BIBLE, published and copyright 1966, by Darton, Longman and Todd Ltd and Doubleday, a division of Random House Inc, and used by permission of the publishers.