Entrance Antiphon Rv 5:9-10
You have redeemed us, Lord, by your Blood, from every tribe and tongue and people and nation, and have made us into a kingdom, priests for our God, alleluia.
Collect
O God, author of our freedom and our salvation, listen to the voice of our pleading, and grant that those you have redeemed by the shedding of your Son’s Blood, may have life through you and, under your protection, rejoice for ever unharmed. Through our Lord…
FIRST READING
What God promised he has fulfilled by raising Jesus.
A reading from the Acts of the Apostles (Acts 13:26-33)
In those days: [When Paul came to Antioch of Pisidia, he said in the synagogue,] “Brethren, sons of the family of Abraham, and those among you that fear God, to us has been sent the message of this salvation. For those who live in Jerusalem and their rulers, because they did not recognise him nor understand the utterances of the prophets which are read every sabbath, fulfilled these by condemning him. Though they could charge him with nothing deserving death, yet they asked Pilate to have him killed. And when they had fulfilled all that was written of him, they took him down from the tree, and laid him in a tomb. But God raised him from the dead; and for many days he appeared to those who came up with him from Galilee to Jerusalem, who are now his witnesses to the people. And we bring you the good news that what God promised to the fathers, this he has fulfilled to us their children by raising Jesus; as also it is written in the second psalm, ‘You are my Son, today I have begotten you.”‘
The word of the Lord.
RESPONSORIAL PSALM Psalm 2:6-7.8-9.10-12a (R. 7bc)
R/. You are my son. It is I who have begotten you this day.
“It is I who have appointed my king
on Sion, my holy mountain.”
I will announce the decree of the Lord:
The Lord said to me, “You are my Son.
It is I who have begotten you this day.” R.
“Ask of me and I will give you
the nations as your inheritance,
and the ends of the earth as your possession.
With a rod of iron you will rule them;
like a potter’s jar you will shatter them.” R.
R/. You are my son. It is I who have begotten you this day.
“So now, O kings, understand;
take warning, rulers of the earth.
Serve the Lord with fear;
exult with trembling, pay him your homage.” R.
ALLELUIA John 14:6
Alleluia. I am the way, and the truth, and the life, says the Lord; no one comes to the Father, but by me. Alleluia.
GOSPEL
“I am the way, and the truth, and the life.”
A reading from the holy Gospel according to John ( John 14:1-6)
At that time: Jesus said to his disciples, “Let not your hearts be troubled; believe in God, believe also in me. In my Father’s house are many rooms; if it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? And when I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also. And you know the way where I am going.” Thomas said to him, “Lord, we do not know where you are going; how can we know the way?” Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the’ Father, but by me.”
The Gospel of the Lord.
Today’s Reflection
Jesus is the journey, the aim and the strength for the journey. He is the passage, the passage through his Death and Resurrection. Through this passage he goes to prepare a place for us, to open the way for our communion with the Father. Christ is the absolutely new and unique way open for humanity to pass over from earthly life to heavenly life. He is the only and definitive way that leads to God; therefore he, Christ, is unique. To reach the home of the Father it is not important to know where it is; but it is necessary to know the way, and that way is Christ. He is the way because his is the revelation of the truth of the Father. The way to truth and life can be found only in him.