11th Sunday in Ordinary
Time
Psalter: Week 3
Saint Richard of Chichester
(1197 – 1253)
Green
Entrance Antiphon: Cf. Ps 26: 7, 9
O Lord, hear my voice, for I have called to you; be my help. Do not abandon or forsake me, O God, my Saviour!
Collect
O God, strength of those who hope in you, graciously hear our pleas, and, since without you mortal frailty can do nothing, grant us always the help of your grace, that in following your commands we may please you by our resolve and our deeds. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.
First reading: Ezekiel 17:22-24
The Lord says this: ‘From the top of the cedar, from the highest branch I will take a shoot and plant it myself on a very high mountain. I will plant it on the high mountain of Israel. It will sprout branches and bear fruit, and become a noble cedar. Every kind of bird will live beneath it, every winged creature rest in the shade of its branches. And every tree of the field will learn that I, the Lord, am the one who stunts tall trees and makes the low ones grow, who withers green trees and makes the withered green. I, the Lord, have spoken, and I will do it.’
Responsorial Psalm: Psalm 91(92):2-3,13-16
R/ It is good to give you thanks, O Lord.
It is good to give thanks to the Lord, to make music to your name, O Most High, to proclaim your love in the morning and your truth in the watches of the night.
The just will flourish like the palm tree and grow like a Lebanon cedar.
Planted in the house of the Lord they will flourish in the courts of our God, still bearing fruit when they are old, still full of sap, still green, to proclaim that the Lord is just. In him, my rock, there is no wrong.
Second reading: 2 Corinthians 5:6-10
We are always full of confidence when we remember that to live in the body means to be exiled from the Lord, going as we do by faith and not by sight – we are full of confidence, I say, and actually want to be exiled from the body and make our home with the Lord. Whether we are living in the body or exiled from it, we are intent on pleasing him. For all the truth about us will be brought out in the law court of Christ, and each of us will get what he deserves for the things he did in the body, good or bad.
Gospel Acclamation: Jn15:15
Alleluia, alleluia! I call you friends, says the Lord, because I have made known to you everything I have learnt from my Father. Alleluia!
Gospel: Mark 4:26-34
Jesus said to the crowds: ‘This is what the kingdom of God is like. A man throws seed on the land. Night and day, while he sleeps, when he is awake, the seed is sprouting and growing; how, he does not know. Of its own accord the land produces first the shoot, then the ear, then the full grain in the ear. And when the crop is ready, he loses no time: he starts to reap because the harvest has come.’ He also said, ‘What can we say the kingdom of God is like? What parable can we find for it? It is like a mustard seed which at the time of its sowing in the soil is the smallest of all the seeds on earth; yet once it is sown it grows into the biggest shrub of them all and puts out big branches so that the birds of the air can shelter in its shade.’ Using many parables like these, he spoke the word to them, so far as they were capable of understanding it. He would not speak to them except in parables, but he explained everything to his disciples when they were alone.
Prayer over the Offerings
O God, who in the offerings presented here provide for the twofold needs of human nature, nourishing us with food and renewing us with your Sacrament, grant, we pray, that the sustenance they provide may not fail us in body or in spirit. Through Christ our Lord.
Communion Antiphon: Ps 26: 4
There is one thing I ask of the Lord, only this do I seek: to live in the house of the Lord all the days of my life.
Prayer after Communion
As this reception of your Holy Communion, O Lord, foreshadows the union of the faithful in you, so may it bring about unity in your Church. Through Christ our Lord.
Meditation
In today’s gospel, Christ uses two parables to describe the kingdom of God. The kingdom he invites us to is a simple and peaceful one. It is open to all who seek it with a sincere heart. The easiest way to enter into it is by sowing a seed of faith in Christ. This is the key. Hence, in the second parable, the mustard seed, the smallest seed, refers to our faith. “If you have faith like a grain of mustard seed…nothing will be impossible for you” (Mt 17, 20). This includes entering the kingdom of God. However, it is important to note that the authenticity of our faith must be tested (James 1:3; 1Peter 1:7). Faith grows, and when it does, it achieves great things. As it grows, it leads us to Christ and, consequently, to his kingdom. Our faith also draws others to Christ and his church, the visible sign of God’s kingdom on earth. As Christ says: “The birds of the air come to take shelter under its branches.” How does our faith draw others to Christ? When we demonstrate or bear a good testimony of our individual and collective faith, the result is excellent. Lives could be touched and transformed. A few persons might come to believe in God.