DAILY READINGS & REFLECTION

6 February, 2025 - Thursday

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DAILY READINGS & REFLECTION

FEBRUARY 6, 2025

THURSDAY - MEMORIAL OF SAINT PAUL MIKI AND COMPANIONS, MARTYRS

FIRST READING

HEBREWS 12:18-19, 21-24 OR (GALATIANS 2:19-20 / ROMANS 8:31-39)

18 For you have not come to what may be touched, a blazing fire, and darkness, and gloom, and a tempest, 19 and the sound of a trumpet, and a voice whose words made the hearers entreat that no further messages be spoken to them. 21 Indeed, so terrifying was the sight that Moses said, "I tremble with fear." 22 But you have come to Mount Zion and to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to innumerable angels in festal gathering, 23 and to the assembly of the first-born who are enrolled in heaven, and to a judge who is God of all, and to the spirits of just men made perfect, 24 and to Jesus, the mediator of a new covenant, and to the sprinkled blood that speaks more graciously than the blood of Abel.

The Word of the Lord
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RESPONSORIAL PSALM

PSALMS 48:2-4, 9-11 OR (PSALMS 126:1-6 / PSALMS 31:3-4, 6-8, 16-17)

Response: O God, we ponder thy mercy within thy temple.

Great is the LORD and greatly to be praised
in the city of our God!
His holy mountain, beautiful in elevation,
is the joy of all the earth.

R. O God, we ponder thy mercy within thy temple.

Mount Zion, in the far north,
the city of the great King.
Within her citadels God
has shown himself a sure defense.

R. O God, we ponder thy mercy within thy temple.

As we have heard, so have we seen
in the city of the LORD of hosts,
in the city of our God,
which God establishes for ever.

R. O God, we ponder thy mercy within thy temple.

We have thought on thy steadfast love, O God,
in the midst of thy temple.
As thy name, O God,
so thy praise reaches to the ends of the earth.
Thy right hand is filled with victory.

R. O God, we ponder thy mercy within thy temple.
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GOSPEL

Jesus gave them authority over sickness and unclean spirits

MARK 6:7-13 OR (MATTHEW 28:16-20 / MATTHEW 16:24-27)

7 And he called to him the twelve, and began to send them out two by two, and gave them authority over the unclean spirits. 8 He charged them to take nothing for their journey except a staff; no bread, no bag, no money in their belts; 9 but to wear sandals and not put on two tunics. 10 And he said to them, "Where you enter a house, stay there until you leave the place. 11 And if any place will not receive you and they refuse to hear you, when you leave, shake off the dust that is on your feet for a testimony against them." 12 So they went out and preached that men should repent. 13 And they cast out many demons, and anointed with oil many that were sick and healed them.

The Gospel of the Lord
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REFLECTION

DAILY QUOTE FROM THE EARLY CHURCH FATHERS

Jesus gives them power to heal and cast out evil spirits, by Cyril of Alexandria (376-444 AD)

"The grace bestowed upon the holy apostles is worthy of all admiration. But the bountifulness of the Giver surpasses all praise and admiration. He gives them, as I said, his own glory. They receive authority over the evil spirits. They reduce to nothing the pride of the devil that was so highly exalted and arrogant. They render ineffectual the demon's wickedness. By the might and efficacy of the Holy Spirit, burning them as if they were on fire, they make the devil come forth with groans and weeping from those whom he had possessed... "He glorified his disciples, therefore, by giving them authority and power over the evil spirits and over sicknesses. Did he honor them without reason and make them famous without any logical cause? How can this be true? It was necessary, most necessary, that they should be able to work miracles, having been publicly appointed ministers of sacred proclamations. By means of their works, they then could convince men that they were the ministers of God and mediators of all beneath the heaven. The apostles then could invite them all to reconciliation and justification by faith and point out the way of salvation and of life that is this justification."

(excerpt from COMMENTARY ON LUKE, HOMILY 47)
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Revised Standard Version Catholic Edition (RSVCE)
The Revised Standard Version of the Bible: Catholic Edition, copyright © 1965, 1966 the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

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