Daily Reading
First Reading
Acts 16:11-15
We set sail from Troas and took a straight course to Samothrace, the following day to Neapolis, and from there to Philippi, which is a leading city of the district of Macedonia and a Roman colony. We remained in this city for some days. On the sabbath day we went outside the gate by the river, where we supposed there was a place of prayer; and we sat down and spoke to the women who had gathered there. A certain woman named Lydia, a worshiper of God, was listening to us; she was from the city of Thyatira and a dealer in purple cloth. The Lord opened her heart to listen eagerly to what was said by Paul. When she and her household were baptized, she urged us, saying, “If you have judged me to be faithful to the Lord, come and stay at my home.” And she prevailed upon us.
Psalm
Psalm 149:1b-2, 3-4, 5-6a and 9b
Praise the Lord!
Sing to the Lord a new song,
his praise in the assembly of the faithful.
Let Israel be glad in its Maker;
let the children of Zion rejoice in their King.
Let them praise his name with dancing,
making melody to him with tambourine and lyre.
For the Lord takes pleasure in his people;
he adorns the humble with victory.
Let the faithful exult in glory;
let them sing for joy on their couches.
Let the high praises of God be in their throats
and two-edged swords in their hands,
to execute on them the judgment decreed.
This is glory for all his faithful ones.
Praise the Lord!
Gospel Reading
John 15:26—16:4a
“When the Advocate comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth who comes from the Father, he will testify on my behalf. You also are to testify because you have been with me from the beginning.
“I have said these things to you to keep you from stumbling. They will put you out of the synagogues. Indeed, an hour is coming when those who kill you will think that by doing so they are offering worship to God. And they will do this because they have not known the Father or me. But I have said these things to you so that when their hour comes you may remember that I told you about them.
Reflection
Friends, in today’s Gospel, Jesus predicts that his disciples can expect violence from the world: “They will expel you from the synagogues; in fact, the hour is coming when everyone who kills you will think he is offering worship to God. They will do this because they have not known either the Father or me.”
The “world” is that collectivity of persons, institutions, armies, and nations predicated upon the loss of friendship with God. That network will hate the followers of Jesus because it cannot frighten them, and its success depends upon fear.
Jesus is about to be swallowed up by the forces of the world, but he is not held captive or entranced by them, because he does not live in himself—and hence in fear—but rather in the Father, the power that conquers the world.
What Jesus wants his followers to experience is that same freedom and insouciance, but it is participation in the coinherent dynamics of God’s being—the insertion into the loop of grace that God is—that makes such liberating detachment possible.