Bible Diary

Daily Reading

Memorial of Saint John Vianney, Priest

LECTIONARY
408

FIRST READING

JER 30:1-2, 12-15, 18-22

The following message came to Jeremiah from the LORD:
For thus says the LORD, the God of Israel:
Write all the words I have spoken to you in a book.

For thus says the LORD:
Incurable is your wound,
grievous your bruise;
There is none to plead your cause,
no remedy for your running sore,
no healing for you.
All your lovers have forgotten you,
they do not seek you.
I struck you as an enemy would strike,
punished you cruelly;
Why cry out over your wound?
your pain is without relief.
Because of your great guilt,
your numerous sins,
I have done this to you.

Thus says the LORD:
See! I will restore the tents of Jacob,
his dwellings I will pity;
City shall be rebuilt upon hill,
and palace restored as it was.
From them will resound songs of praise,
the laughter of happy men.
I will make them not few, but many;
they will not be tiny, for I will glorify them.
His sons shall be as of old,
his assembly before me shall stand firm;
I will punish all his oppressors.
His leader shall be one of his own,
and his rulers shall come from his kin.
When I summon him, he shall approach me;
how else should one take the deadly risk
of approaching me? says the LORD.
You shall be my people,
and I will be your God.

PSALM

PS 102:16-18, 19-21, 29 AND 22-23

Response: The Lord will build up Zion again, and appear in all his glory.

The nations shall revere your name, O LORD,
and all the kings of the earth your glory,
When the LORD has rebuilt Zion
and appeared in his glory;
When he has regarded the prayer of the destitute,
and not despised their prayer.

Let this be written for the generation to come,
and let his future creatures praise the LORD:
"The LORD looked down from his holy height,
from heaven he beheld the earth,
To hear the groaning of the prisoners,
to release those doomed to die."

The children of your servants shall abide,
and their posterity shall continue in your presence,
That the name of the LORD may be declared on Zion;
and his praise, in Jerusalem,
When the peoples gather together
and the kingdoms, to serve the LORD.

GOSPEL

MT 15:1-2, 10-14

Some Pharisees and scribes came to Jesus from Jerusalem and said,
“Why do your disciples break the tradition of the elders?
They do not wash their hands when they eat a meal.”
He summoned the crowd and said to them, “Hear and understand.
It is not what enters one’s mouth that defiles the man;
but what comes out of the mouth is what defiles one.”
Then his disciples approached and said to him,
“Do you know that the Pharisees took offense
when they heard what you said?”
He said in reply, “Every plant that my heavenly Father has not planted
will be uprooted.
Let them alone; they are blind guides of the blind.
If a blind man leads a blind man,
both will fall into a pit.”

Daily Reflection

“Ars is Ars no more,” said Saint John Marie Vianney, years after he first came as the parish priest of Ars in France. This village of 230 souls, so deeply entrenched in the mire of sin, was so transformed by Vianney’s holy life, mortifications, preaching and confessional, that it became a fertile place for God to dwell.

In the first reading of today, God promises to restore another place — the nation Israel. Seeing their love for foreign kings and gods, God had cast them out of his presence and abandoned them to their wicked ways. Yet, now seeing their incurable wound, the Lord commands his prophet Jeremiah to preach restoration to the tents of Jacob — a restoration of the people, the prince, the walls and of the city.

When we hear of such a God who himself casts down, and then himself raises up — are we shocked like the Pharisees; who were naive enough to confine their understanding of God within the box of ritual cleansing? If we are, then we will become like a “blind man who follows the blind, eventually both falling into the pit.”

When Saint Vianney’s bishop sent him to Ars he gave him this message — “There is little love of God in that parish; you will be the one to put it there”. Let us pray today specially for priests that they may be pastors after God’s own heart, and not Pharisaic.