Jude 17, 20-25, Psalm 63:2-6, Mark 11:27-33

DAILY HOLY MASS READINGS

Jude 17, 20-25, Psalm 63:2-6, Mark 11:27-33

Jude 17, 20-25

My soul’s beloved, everything that St. Jude exhorts us to do confirms all You have just said to me in Your Word to me today. How gracious and good You are my Lord and my God, I do not deserve such kindness but You do not treat me as I deserve because You love me. Having experienced Your perfect love I must strive to show the same love to others. I am most deeply grateful for the gift of my faith, for the gift of being born in the One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church. I thank You for Your love that is so palpable it keeps me firmly rooted in You. Thank You for not condemning me although justice demanded that I should be; rather You took my condemnation upon Yourself and paid the  price that was mine. Thank You for the certain and sure hope I have that You are leading me to eternal life.

I am now duty bound to reveal to those who doubt all that You have done for me, how You saved me and how You make available to me rich and abundant graces through the Sacraments that help me to keep the Law of Love, exercise it daily and strengthens me in faith and in hope. Help me to be tireless in this mission that has been entrusted me which is to make You known and loved just as I know and love You.

Psalm 63:2-6

My soul’s beloved, the psalmist expresses beautifully and powerfully all that my own poor words cannot. He speaks of a longing, a thirsting, a yearning a pining for You comparing it to land that is dry, parched and gasps for water. I wake up each morning before dawn, I spend time before You in the Adoration chapel, and You bathe me in Your love filling me with grace. Just being in Your holy Presence strengthens me and I shine like Moses because I have been before You. 

If You did not love me I would no longer exist. It is Your love that upholds me, sustains me and enables me draw breath. My food and drink which feeds my spirit comes from praising You, offering You thanksgiving and worshipping You fully aware and alive to the truth that without You I can do nothing and I am nothing. You invite us to feast at the Eucharistic table and there we banquet on Your Body and Your Blood which wells up to eternal life in us.

And every night when the daylight hours have come to an end and I lie on my bed my soul clings to You. Your Name is the Name which my heartbeat, my pulse beat and my breath echo until l I fall asleep and as my sleep my spirit continues to speak Your Name until I awake to a brand new day and take up the song of Your Most Holy Name that Name that is given to us and no other by which all are saved. 

Mark 11:27-33

My soul’s beloved, so often just like the chief priests and the teachers of the Law and the elders we deliberately deny the truth that is self-evident so we can wallow in sin. We pretend we do not know because admitting that we do has serious consequences. We have to decide, to make a choice consciously to either walk on the side of Truth or live in denial of it although we know it thus making us hypocrites just like them.

The people who questioned You that day as You entered the temple after throwing out the money changers and those who were buying and selling and defiling the house of God, stood by filled with a helpless rage as You went about in righteous rage clearing the temple of God of all that had made it a market place instead of a place where people came to worship the living God. You did what they refused to do because they benefited from all the trading that went one there. They dared not approach You at the time because they were facing and enraged God although they did not know it yet had to somehow be dimly aware of it. Now it was a new day and they saw You as a man and had the courage to question You. You put before them one simple question and You assured them that if they answered Your counter question You would give them the answer to theirs.

They could not because any answer they gave would trap them just as surely as they set out to trap You time and time again and failed. A truthful, ‘Yes’, would raise the challenge as to why they did not believe John the Baptist if they knew he came from God. To say, ‘No’ would enrage the people who believed that he did so they preferred a weak denial and thus they never heard the emphatic truth from Your own lips that the authority by which You did everything they witnessed came directly from Your Father, who is the Living God. Their clung to their hypocrisy until they nailed You to the Cross and watched You die.  Blessed are those who without seeing believe. Thank You for this awesome assurance.