Friday, September 20, 2024
Liturgical Season: 
VII The Season of Sleebo
Special Significance: 
The Syro-Malankara Re-union Day (1930)

Jn 17:6-16

6“I revealed your name* to those whom you gave me out of the world. They belonged to you, and you gave them to me, and they have kept your word. 7Now they know that everything you gave me is from you, 8because the words you gave to me I have given to them, and they accepted them and truly understood that I came from you, and they have believed that you sent me. 9I pray for them. I do not pray for the world but for the ones you have given me, because they are yours,e 10and everything of mine is yours and everything of yours is mine, and I have been glorified in them.f 11And now I will no longer be in the world, but they are in the world, while I am coming to you. Holy Father, keep them in your name that you have given me, so that they may be one just as we are. 12When I was with them I protected them in your name that you gave me, and I guarded them, and none of them was lost except the son of destruction, in order that the scripture might be fulfilled.g 13But now I am coming to you. I speak this in the world so that they may share my joy completely.h 14I gave them your word, and the world hated them, because they do not belong to the world any more than I belong to the world.i 15* I do not ask that you take them out of the worldj but that you keep them from the evil one. 16They do not belong to the world any more than I belong to the world.

Gn 15:1-21

The Covenant with Abram.* 1Some time afterward, the word of the LORD came to Abram in a vision: Do not fear, Abram! I am your shield; I will make your reward very great.

2But Abram said, “Lord GOD, what can you give me, if I die childless and have only a servant of my household, Eliezer of Damascus?” 3Abram continued, “Look, you have given me no offspring, so a servant of my household will be my heir.” 4Then the word of the LORD came to him: No, that one will not be your heir; your own offspring will be your heir.a 5He took him outside and said: Look up at the sky and count the stars, if you can. Just so, he added, will your descendants be.b 6c Abram put his faith in the LORD, who attributed it to him as an act of righteousness.*

7He then said to him: I am the LORD who brought you from Ur of the Chaldeans to give you this land as a possession.d 8“Lord GOD,” he asked, “how will I know that I will possess it?” 9* He answered him: Bring me a three-year-old heifer, a three-year-old female goat, a three-year-old ram, a turtledove, and a young pigeon.e 10He brought him all these, split them in two, and placed each half opposite the other; but the birds he did not cut up. 11Birds of prey swooped down on the carcasses, but Abram scared them away. 12As the sun was about to set, a deep sleep fell upon Abram, and a great, dark dread descended upon him.

13* Then the LORD said to Abram: Know for certain that your descendants will reside as aliens in a land not their own, where they shall be enslaved and oppressed for four hundred years.f 14But I will bring judgment on the nation they must serve, and after this they will go out with great wealth.g 15You, however, will go to your ancestors in peace; you will be buried at a ripe old age. 16In the fourth generation* your descendants will return here, for the wickedness of the Amorites is not yet complete.h

17When the sun had set and it was dark, there appeared a smoking fire pot and a flaming torch, which passed between those pieces. 18* On that day the LORD made a covenant with Abram, saying: To your descendants I give this land, from the Wadi of Egypt to the Great River, the Euphrates,i 19j the land of the Kenites, the Kenizzites, the Kadmonites, 20the Hittites, the Perizzites, the Rephaim, 21the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Girgashites, and the Jebusites.

Ex 34:10-28

Religious Laws. 10The LORD said: Here is the covenant I will make. Before all your people I will perform marvels never before done* in any nation anywhere on earth, so that all the people among whom you live may see the work of the LORD. Awe-inspiring are the deeds I will perform with you! 11As for you, observe what I am commanding you today.d

See, I am about to drive out before you the Amorites, Canaanites, Hittites, Perizzites, Hivites and Jebusites. 12e Take care not to make a covenant with the inhabitants of the land that you are to enter; lest they become a snare among you. 13Tear down their altars; smash their sacred stones, and cut down their asherahs.* 14You shall not bow down to any other god, for the LORD—“Jealous”* his name—is a jealous God. 15Do not make a covenant with the inhabitants of the land; else, when they prostitute themselves with their gods and sacrifice to them, one of them may invite you and you may partake of the sacrifice. 16And when you take their daughters as wives for your sons, and their daughters prostitute themselves with their gods, they will make your sons do the same.

17You shall not make for yourselves molten gods.f

18You shall keep the festival of Unleavened Bread.g For seven days at the appointed time in the month of Abib you are to eat unleavened bread, as I commanded you; for in the month of Abib you came out of Egypt.

19To me belongs every male that opens the womb among all your livestock, whether in the herd or in the flock.h 20The firstling of a donkey you shall redeem with a lamb; if you do not redeem it, you must break its neck. The firstborn among your sons you shall redeem.

No one shall appear before me empty-handed.

21Six days you may labor,i but on the seventh day you shall rest; even during the seasons of plowing and harvesting you must rest.

22j You shall keep the feast of Weeks with the first fruits of the wheat harvest, likewise, the feast of the Ingathering at the close of the year.* 23Three times a year all your men shall appear before the Lord, the LORD God of Israel. 24Since I will drive out the nations before you and enlarge your territory, no one will covet your land when you go up three times a year to appear before the LORD, your God.

25You shall not offer me the blood of sacrifice with anything leavened, nor shall the sacrifice of the Passover feast be kept overnight for the next day.

26The choicest first fruits of your soil you shall bring to the house of the LORD, your God.

You shall not boil a young goat in its mother’s milk.k

Radiance of Moses’ Face. 27Then the LORD said to Moses: Write down these words, for in accordance with these words I have made a covenant with you and with Israel. 28So Moses was there with the LORD for forty days and forty nights,l without eating any food or drinking any water, and he wrote on the tablets the words of the covenant, the ten words.

Hb 3:17-19

17For though the fig tree does not blossom,

and no fruit appears on the vine,

Though the yield of the olive fails

and the terraces produce no nourishment,

Though the flocks disappear from the fold

and there is no herd in the stalls,

18Yet I will rejoice in the LORD

and exult in my saving God.

19GOD, my Lord, is my strength;

he makes my feet swift as those of deer

and enables me to tread upon the heights.* e

For the leader; with stringed instruments.

Is 41:1-7

1Keep silence before me, O coastlands;*

let the nations renew their strength.

Let them draw near and speak;

let us come together for judgment.

2Who has stirred up from the East the champion of justice,

and summoned him to be his attendant?

To him he delivers nations

and subdues kings;

With his sword he reduces them to dust,

with his bow, to driven straw.

3He pursues them, passing on without loss,

by a path his feet scarcely touch.

4Who has performed these deeds?

Who has called forth the generations from the beginning?a

I, the LORD, am the first,

and at the last* I am he.

5The coastlands see, and fear;

the ends of the earth tremble:

they approach, they come on.

6Each one helps his neighbor,

one says to the other, “Courage!”

7The woodworker encourages the goldsmith,

the one who beats with the hammer, him who strikes on the anvil,

Saying of the soldering, “It is good!”

then fastening it with nails so it will not totter.

1 Jn 3:11-18

11* For this is the message you have heard from the beginning: we should love one another,f 12unlike Cain who belonged to the evil one and slaughtered his brother. Why did he slaughter him? Because his own works were evil, and those of his brother righteous.g 13Do not be amazed, [then,] brothers, if the world hates you.h 14We know that we have passed from death to life because we love our brothers. Whoever does not love remains in death.i 15Everyone who hates his brother is a murderer, and you know that no murderer has eternal life remaining in him.j 16The way we came to know love was that he laid down his life for us; so we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers.k 17If someone who has worldly means sees a brother in need and refuses him compassion, how can the love of God remain in him?l 18Children, let us love not in word or speech but in deed and truth.m

Eph 4:1-6

Unity in the Body. 1* I, then, a prisoner for the Lord, urge you to live in a manner worthy of the call you have received,a 2with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another through love,b 3striving to preserve the unity of the spirit through the bond of peace:c 4* one body and one Spirit, as you were also called to the one hope of your call;d 5one Lord, one faith, one baptism;e 6one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.f

Jn 17:16-23

16They do not belong to the world any more than I belong to the world. 17Consecrate them in the truth. Your word is truth.k 18As you sent me into the world, so I sent them into the world.l 19And I consecrate myself for them, so that they also may be consecrated in truth.

20“I pray not only for them, but also for those who will believe in me through their word, 21so that they may all be one, as you, Father, are in me and I in you, that they also may be in us, that the world may believe that you sent me.m 22And I have given them the glory you gave me, so that they may be one, as we are one, 23I in them and you in me, that they may be brought to perfection as one, that the world may know that you sent me, and that you loved them even as you loved me.