Saturday of the Twenty-ninth week in Ordinary Time

Today the Church celebrates : St. Anthony Mary Claret, Archbishop (1807-1870),  St. Magloire, Bishop (+ c. 575)

See commentary below or click here
Didache : «Choose life» (Dt 30,19)

Letter to the Romans 8:1-11.

Hence, now there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. For the law of the spirit of life in Christ Jesus has freed you from the law of sin and death. For what the law, weakened by the flesh, was powerless to do, this God has done: by sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for the sake of sin, he condemned sin in the flesh, so that the righteous decree of the law might be fulfilled in us, who live not according to the flesh but according to the spirit. For those who live according to the flesh are concerned with the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the spirit with the things of the spirit. The concern of the flesh is death, but the concern of the spirit is life and peace. For the concern of the flesh is hostility toward God; it does not submit to the law of God, nor can it; and those who are in the flesh cannot please God. But you are not in the flesh; on the contrary, you are in the spirit, if only the Spirit of God dwells in you. Whoever does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him. But if Christ is in you, although the body is dead because of sin, the spirit is alive because of righteousness. If the Spirit of the one who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, the one who raised Christ from the dead will give life to your mortal bodies also, through his Spirit that dwells in you.

Psalms 24(23):1-2.3-4.5-6.

A psalm of David. The earth is the LORD’S and all it holds, the world and those who live there.
For God founded it on the seas, established it over the rivers.
Who may go up the mountain of the LORD? Who can stand in his holy place?
“The clean of hand and pure of heart, who are not devoted to idols, who have not sworn falsely.
They will receive blessings from the LORD, and justice from their saving God.
Such are the people that love the LORD, that seek the face of the God of Jacob.” Selah

Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ according to Saint Luke 13:1-9.

At that time some people who were present there told him about the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mingled with the blood of their sacrifices. He said to them in reply, “Do you think that because these Galileans suffered in this way they were greater sinners than all other Galileans? By no means! But I tell you, if you do not repent, you will all perish as they did! Or those eighteen people who were killed when the tower at Siloam fell on them –do you think they were more guilty than everyone else who lived in Jerusalem? By no means! But I tell you, if you do not repent, you will all perish as they did!” And he told them this parable: “There once was a person who had a fig tree planted in his orchard, and when he came in search of fruit on it but found none, he said to the gardener, ‘For three years now I have come in search of fruit on this fig tree but have found none. (So) cut it down. Why should it exhaust the soil?’ He said to him in reply, ‘Sir, leave it for this year also, and I shall cultivate the ground around it and fertilize it; it may bear fruit in the future. If not you can cut it down.'”

Copyright © Confraternity of Christian Doctrine, USCCB

Commentary of the day :

Didache (between 60-120), judeo-christian catechesis
§ 1-6 (trans. Maxwell Staniforth)

«Choose life» (Dt 30,19)

There are two ways: a way of life and a way of death, and the difference between these two ways is great. The way of life is this: you shall love first the Lord your Creator, and secondly your neighbour as yourself; and you shall do nothing to anyone that you would not wish to be done to yourself. What you may learn from those words is to bless those who curse you, to pray for your enemies, and to fast for your persecutors. For where is the merit in loving only those who return your love? Even the heathen do as much as that. But if you love those who hate you, you will have nobody to be your enemy. Beware of the carnal appetites of the body…

The second commandment in the teaching means: Commit no murder, adultery, sodomy, fornication, or theft. Practise no magic, sorcery, abortion, or infanticide. See that you do not covet anything your neighbour possesses, and never be guilty of perjury, false witness, slander, or malice. Do not equivocate in thought or speech, for a double tongue is a deadly snare; the words you speak should not be false or empty phrases, but fraught with purposeful action. You are not to be avaricious or extortionate, and you must resist any temptation to hypocrisy, spitefulness, or superiority. You are to have no malicious designs on a neighbour. You are to cherish no feelings of hatred for anybody; some you are to reprove, some to pray for, and some again to love more than your own life.

Keep away from every bad man, my son, and from all his kind… Take care that nobody tempts you away from the path of this teaching, for such a man’s tuition can have nothing to do with God. If you can shoulder the lord’s yoke in its entirety, then you will be perfect; but if that is too much for you, do as much as you can.

(Biblical references: Mt 22,37f; 7,12; Tb 4,15; Mt 5,44f; 1Pt 2,11; Ex 20; Mt 24,4)