Liturgy of the Sunday

Sixteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time
Memorial of the prophet Elijah who was taken into heaven and left his mantle to Elisha.

First Reading

Genesis 18,1-10

Yahweh appeared to him at the Oak of Mamre while he was sitting by the entrance of the tent during the hottest part of the day. He looked up, and there he saw three men standing near him. As soon as he saw them he ran from the entrance of the tent to greet them, and bowed to the ground. 'My lord,' he said, 'if I find favour with you, please do not pass your servant by. Let me have a little water brought, and you can wash your feet and have a rest under the tree. Let me fetch a little bread and you can refresh yourselves before going further, now that you have come in your servant's direction.' They replied, 'Do as you say.' Abraham hurried to the tent and said to Sarah, 'Quick, knead three measures of best flour and make loaves.' Then, running to the herd, Abraham took a fine and tender calf and gave it to the servant, who hurried to prepare it. Then taking curds, milk and the calf which had been prepared, he laid all before them, and they ate while he remained standing near them under the tree. 'Where is your wife Sarah?' they asked him. 'She is in the tent,' he replied. Then his guest said, 'I shall come back to you next year, and then your wife Sarah will have a son.' Sarah was listening at the entrance of the tent behind him.

Psalmody

Psalm 14

Antiphon

O Lord show us your sanctuary.

Lord, who shall be admitted to your tent
and dwell on your holy mountain?

He who walks without fault;
he who acts with justice and speaks the truth from his heart;

He who does not slander with his tongue;
he who does no wrong to his brother,
who casts no slur on his neighbour,

Who holds the godless in disdain,
but honours those who fear the Lord;

He who keeps his pledge, come what may;
who takes no interest on a loan
and accepts no bribes against the innocent.

Such a man will
stand firm for ever.

Second Reading

Colossians 1,24-28

It makes me happy to be suffering for you now, and in my own body to make up all the hardships that still have to be undergone by Christ for the sake of his body, the Church, of which I was made a servant with the responsibility towards you that God gave to me, that of completing God's message, the message which was a mystery hidden for generations and centuries and has now been revealed to his holy people. It was God's purpose to reveal to them how rich is the glory of this mystery among the gentiles; it is Christ among you, your hope of glory: this is the Christ we are proclaiming, admonishing and instructing everyone in all wisdom, to make everyone perfect in Christ.

Reading of the Gospel

Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia

Yesterday I was buried with Christ,
today I rise with you who are risen.
With you I was crucified;
remember me, Lord, in your kingdom.

Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia

Luke 10,38-42

In the course of their journey he came to a village, and a woman named Martha welcomed him into her house. She had a sister called Mary, who sat down at the Lord's feet and listened to him speaking. Now Martha, who was distracted with all the serving, came to him and said, 'Lord, do you not care that my sister is leaving me to do the serving all by myself? Please tell her to help me.' But the Lord answered, 'Martha, Martha,' he said, 'you worry and fret about so many things, and yet few are needed, indeed only one. It is Mary who has chosen the better part, and it is not to be taken from her.'

 

Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia

Yesterday I was buried with Christ,
today I rise with you who are risen.
With you I was crucified;
remember me, Lord, in your kingdom.

Alleluia, alleluia, alleluia

Homily

The Gospel brings us with Jesus to Bethany, in the house of Martha and Mary. We know from John's Gospel that this was a place dear to Jesus: he often stayed there, especially when quarrels with the Pharisees hardened and hostility towards him grew. The friendship, the welcome of that family helped him and supported him. All the homes, all the communities of Jesus' disciples should do the same. This is a precious indication also for our days, when we see mistrust and rejections, conflicts and wars growing, near and far, so numerous that we forget most of them. The house of Bethany reminds us of the urgency of welcome and encounter. A dimension that is also rooted in the Bible: we need only think of what happened at Mamre, an episode that today's liturgy juxtaposes with that of the Gospel. Upon seeing the three pilgrims, Abraham runs to meet them, prostrates himself to the ground and then welcomes them for lunch. What a distance from the hostility with which foreigners who also cross the desert or the sea to escape war, hunger or injustice are stopped today!
The Gospel urges the disciples to understand deeply the style and meaning of welcome and encounter. The Evangelist Luke, the only one who reports this episode, suggests that it was Martha who welcomed Jesus: "a woman named Martha welcomed him into her home." And it is she who undertakes to prepare the table, even in haste. Her sister Mary was also present, she "sat at the Lord's feet and listened to what he was saying." Martha let herself be overwhelmed by the preparations for the table. Jesus does not condemn Martha for her activism, instead he wants her to understand the primacy of listening to the Word of God. All the more so because the gesture that Mary was performing was inconceivable at the time: women were excluded from the reading of the Torah. And the evangelist is well aware that with this scene he proposes an innovative teaching: Mary, a woman, enters as a disciple in the same way as the apostles. She shows what the identity of the disciple of Jesus is. It is a scene to contemplate, to preserve, and not to forget. The disciple is the one who listens. This is why Paul could later write that faith comes from listening. Listening to the Word of God is the disciple's first work, his first posture: to stand at the feet of the master and listen to him without missing any of the words that come out of his mouth. To Martha, who risks obscuring this primacy, Jesus reminds her what is essential, the only thing that is really needed: listening.