Friday of the Thirtieth Week in Ordinary Time
People Of the Promise
Liturgical Cycle: C | Lectionary Cycle: I
Introduction
We are the new Israel, the people of God’s promise, the new chosen people. God has given us many privileges. Is the anguish that Paul expresses with regard to Israel not to be felt by the Church too, with regard to many Christians, and by many Christians with regard to a Church sluggish to seek renewal? Are we ready with St. Paul to dedicate ourselves, whatever the cost, to the salvation of our brothers and sisters, including those outside the Church?
Something of what this goodness means is shown in practice. When eating at the house of a prominent man on a Sabbath, Jesus cures there someone who suffers, even on a Sabbath. Love is the reason and inspiration of the Christian Law. Is it in our lives, in our Christian community?
Opening Prayer
Lord our God,
Israel, your first chosen people,
was not ready to accept Jesus.
This is a warning to us today.
God, make us authentic Christians,
who do not rely on privileges
or on observances of the letter of the Law,
but people who carry out your project
with us and with all your people
in love, in spirit and in truth,
by the free grace of Jesus Christ,
your Son and our Lord for ever.
Responsorial Psalm
R. Praise the Lord, Jerusalem.
Glorify the LORD, O Jerusalem;
praise your God, O Zion.
For he has strengthened the bars of your gates;
he has blessed your children within you.
R. Praise the Lord, Jerusalem.
He has granted peace in your borders;
with the best of wheat he fills you.
He sends forth his command to the earth;
swiftly runs his word!
R. Praise the Lord, Jerusalem.
He has proclaimed his word to Jacob,
his statutes and his ordinances to Israel.
He has not done thus for any other nation;
his ordinances he has not made known to them. Alleluia.
R. Praise the Lord, Jerusalem.
Alleluia Verse
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
My sheep hear my voice, says the Lord;
I know them, and they follow me.
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
Gospel
One Sabbath, Jesus went to eat at the house of a leading Pharisee, and he was carefully watched.
In front of him was a man suffering from dropsy;
so Jesus asked the teachers of the law and the Pharisees:
“Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath, or not?”
But no one answered.
Jesus then took the man, healed him, and sent him away.
And he said to them:
“If your lamb or your ox falls into a well on a Sabbath day, who among you doesn’t hurry to pull it out?”
And they could not answer.
Prayers of the Faithful
– For the whole People of God, that we may strip ourselves of all arrogance and power and reveal to the world of today the face of a humble and serving Christ we pray:
– For all Christians, that we may not seek a hollow peace in conformism and lack of involvement, but that we commit ourselves to renew the world in Christ, we pray:
– For the sick and those near death, that the vision of the transfigured Lord may confirm their hope in the resurrection and in eternal happiness, we pray:
Prayer over the Gifts
Our Lord and our God,
you wanted Jesus, your Son,
to be born a human being from a Jewish mother.
He loved his land and his people.
May the sign of your presence and love,
your people of the first covenant,
one day come to know Christ
and inherit a promised land
that can never be taken away from them.
We ask you this through Christ our Lord.
Prayer after Communion
Lord our God, you have made us
your new people of the promise.
We pray you today:
Give us the courage to remain
your people on the march
toward constant reform and renewal,
the people united with you
in a covenant of love and fidelity,
through Jesus Christ, our Lord.
Blessing
The Jewish people should be very dear to us. They are our relatives. There is so much we inherited from them. Even much in our faith could also be professed by any believing Jew. And they gave us Jesus, and Mary. May Almighty God bless them and you, the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit.
REFLECTION:
31 October 2025
Luke 14: 1-6
In today’s Gospel, Jesus heals again on the Sabbath. This is not the first time—Scripture mentions at least seven such instances. Each time, his act of mercy provokes anger in the scribes and Pharisees rather than joy or gratitude. They saw Jesus as a lawbreaker and a threat to their strict religious system.
We can almost picture the scene. The mistake of the Pharisees was that they preached a God and a religion that was mainly about regulations. The man suffering from dropsy in today’s Gospel may have been planted there as a trap. But Jesus, under their hostile watch, does not hesitate. He heals him—and then exposes their hypocrisy. How can it be unlawful to help a suffering human being?
This passage teaches us three lessons.
First, even under constant criticism and surveillance, Jesus never lost his calm, nor his compassion. How often do we become irritable or defensive when judged! Yet Jesus shows us the strength that comes from staying rooted in love.
Second, Jesus never refused an invitation, even from those who opposed him. He never gave up on the chance that someone might be touched or changed by his presence. This is a challenge to us: do we only share meals with those we like, or are we willing to reach out even to those who misunderstand or resist us?
Third, the Pharisees magnified small rules while ignoring greater needs. How often in our families, our communities, and even in our parishes, we let petty matters cause division and pain! We argue over details and forget what truly matters: mercy, kindness, and love.
Jesus reminds us that love comes first. If our religion does not make us more compassionate, then we have missed the heart of God. On the Sabbath—and on every day—the call is the same: to put people before rules, and mercy before legalism.
Meeting human needs makes the day ‘holy’
Two men saw through the prison bars. One saw mud. The other saw stars. You will only see what you want to see. There is so much good in the worst of us. There is so much bad in the best of us.
Today’s world is known for using people for one’s vested interest by hook or crook and for instinctively finding fault with everyone. Both these attitudes emerge from altered self-worth and tunnel vision. As a result, there are flaws and shortcomings in every organisation, family and individual. Any simpleton can point out what’s wrong. If I am looking for faults, I will find them. It is no badge of honour to be a ‘fault’ finder. It takes an ‘able’ minded and ‘noble’ hearted person to be a ‘good’ finder.
Jesus, in the gospel as the master of sabbath, carefully explains that the heart of every law is to humanize one’s heart to love the life in all forms particularly that of human and to compulsively uphold the goodness in everyone as St. Paul does in the first reading. Therefore, every law has its relevance as long as it regulates the society so that human life is regarded with utmost dignity. So, the kernel of every law is to conscientize one’s heart to become fully humane to look at the need of the other that may eventually give birth to gospel values.
When nobody is around me, the law becomes irrelevant. If my heart is ruled with love, I expand and the other becomes an extension of me. As the ‘otherness’ in me disappears intrinsically, the law has no part to play and so ceases to exist. This is what Jesus said in Mt 25: 40, whatever you do to other, you do unto me. So, Jesus invites each of us to understand the purpose and relevance of every law in relation to human life to live fully and St. Ireneus elevates this by saying, ‘glory of God is man fully alive’. Life becomes meaningful when we mean and touch the lives beyond us fully. Therefore, let us prioritise fulfilling human needs and baptise the day holy, thereby glorifying the Lord.