Saturday of the Thirty-third Week in Ordinary Time

The God Of The Living

Alternative Celebration: Learn more here.

Other Celebrations for this Day:

Saint Cecilia

Liturgical Cycle: C | Lectionary Cycle: I

Introduction

We are told in the first reading about the end of King Antiochus IV. After he had failed to rob the temple of Artemis in Mesopotamia and heard about the restoration of Jerusalem and its Temple, he died in discouragement.

“God is the God of the living,” says Jesus. He calls back to life those who die; death is overcome, since Jesus rose from the dead. The witnesses of the first reading are put to death by the mighty of this earth because they contest the abuse of power, but God raises them up. The resurrection is the core of our faith, not only as a promise to live on in God’s joy after death, but already now as a power of building up one another in human dignity, justice, peace and serving love. We cannot die forever, because God cannot stop loving us.

Opening Prayer

God, source and purpose of all life,
You have committed yourself to us
with a love that never ends.
Give us the indestructible hope
that you have prepared for us
a life and happiness
beyond the powers of death.
May this firm hope sustain us
to find joy in life
and to face its difficulties and challenges
resolutely and fearlessly,
through Jesus Christ our Lord.

First Reading

1 Maccabees 6:1-13

As King Antiochus was traversing the inland provinces,
he heard that in Persia there was a city called Elymais,
famous for its wealth in silver and gold,
and that its temple was very rich,
containing gold helmets, breastplates, and weapons
left there by Alexander, son of Philip,
king of Macedon, the first king of the Greeks.
He went therefore and tried to capture and pillage the city.
But he could not do so,
because his plan became known to the people of the city
who rose up in battle against him.
So he retreated and in great dismay withdrew from there
to return to Babylon.

While he was in Persia, a messenger brought him news
that the armies sent into the land of Judah had been put to flight;
that Lysias had gone at first with a strong army
and been driven back by the children of Israel;
that they had grown strong
by reason of the arms, men, and abundant possessions
taken from the armies they had destroyed;
that they had pulled down the Abomination
which he had built upon the altar in Jerusalem;
and that they had surrounded with high walls
both the sanctuary, as it had been before,
and his city of Beth-zur.

When the king heard this news,
he was struck with fear and very much shaken.
Sick with grief because his designs had failed, he took to his bed.
There he remained many days, overwhelmed with sorrow,
for he knew he was going to die.

So he called in all his Friends and said to them:
"Sleep has departed from my eyes,
for my heart is sinking with anxiety.
I said to myself: 'Into what tribulation have I come,
and in what floods of sorrow am I now!
Yet I was kindly and beloved in my rule.'
But I now recall the evils I did in Jerusalem,
when I carried away all the vessels of gold and silver
that were in it, and for no cause
gave orders that the inhabitants of Judah be destroyed.
I know that this is why these evils have overtaken me;
and now I am dying, in bitter grief, in a foreign land."

Responsorial Psalm

Psalm 9:2-3, 4 and 6, 16 and 19

R. (see 16a) I will rejoice in your salvation, O Lord.
I will give thanks to you, O LORD, with all my heart;
I will declare all your wondrous deeds.
I will be glad and exult in you;
I will sing praise to your name, Most High.
R. I will rejoice in your salvation, O Lord.
Because my enemies are turned back,
overthrown and destroyed before you.
You rebuked the nations and destroyed the wicked;
their name you blotted out forever and ever.
R. I will rejoice in your salvation, O Lord.
The nations are sunk in the pit they have made;
in the snare they set, their foot is caught.
For the needy shall not always be forgotten,
nor shall the hope of the afflicted forever perish.
R. I will rejoice in your salvation, O Lord.

Alleluia Verse

See 2 Timothy 1:10

R. Alleluia, alleluia.
Our Savior Jesus Christ has destroyed death
and brought life to light through the Gospel.
R. Alleluia, alleluia.

Gospel

Luke 20:27-40

Then some Sadducees arrived. These people claim that there is no resurrection.

They asked Jesus this question:

“Master, the law Moses told us, ‘If anyone dies, leaving a wife but no children, his brother must take the wife and any child born to them will be regarded as the child of the deceased.’

Now, there were seven brothers: the first married but died without children.

The second married the woman, but also died childless.

And then the third married her, and in the same way, all seven died without children.

Last of all, the woman died.

On the day of the resurrection, to which of them will the woman be a wife? For all seven had her as a wife.”

And Jesus replied:

“Taking a husband or a wife is proper for people of this world,

but for those who are considered worthy of the world to come and of resurrection from the dead, there is no more marriage.

Besides, they cannot die, for they are like angels. They are sons and daughters of God because they are born of the resurrection.

Yes, the dead will be raised, as Moses revealed at the burning bush when he called the Lord the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.

For God is a God of the living, not of the dead, for to him everyone is alive.”

Some teachers of the law then agreed with Jesus:

“Master, you have spoken well.”

They didn’t dare ask him anything else.

Prayers of the Faithful

– That we may keep up the good fight against all that is deadly to Christian life: dehumanizing kinds of labor, suppression of freedom, paralyzing fear, lack of love and compassion, we pray:

– That all suffering and dying people may share in our resurrection faith and find strength in the knowledge that God loves them in life and beyond death, we pray:

– That our beloved dead may live on in the life they gave us, in the faith they passed on to us and in the good we do, we pray:

Prayer over the Gifts

God of the living,
in these signs of bread and wine
we celebrate the memory of Jesus, your Son.
He died for us,
but he is now alive here among us
as our risen Lord.
Strengthen us with his body and blood
and give us a great respect for our own body
in which we hope to rise one day.
Like your Son, may we use it
to serve and love and thank you
and to reach out to our neighbor
by the power of Jesus Christ our Lord.

Prayer after Communion

God of the living,
you want us to live even beyond death
as fully human and complete persons,
and yet totally transformed by your love
that makes us your daughters and sons.
Give us the quiet but firm faith
that life is meaningful and worthwhile
and that death is not the end
but the beginning of a new way of living.
May this certainty encourage us
to share our hope with those
to whom life makes little sense.
We ask this through Christ our Lord.

Blessing

We are people of hope and joy, for Christ is risen. We are sure that we too shall rise with him one day. This is why our hope in God’s love and life is indestructible. May Almighty God bless you, the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

REFLECTIONS

22 November 2025

St Cecilia

Luke 20:27-40

Faith Beyond This World

In today’s Gospel, the Sadducees approach Jesus with a question meant not to learn, but to mock. They did not believe in the resurrection, so they posed a riddle about a woman who married seven brothers — hoping to make belief in life after death sound absurd. But Jesus responds with calm authority, revealing a deeper truth: heaven is not an extension of earthly life — it is a new and transformed existence in God’s love.

The Sadducees’ mistake was to limit God’s power to what they could understand. They imagined heaven in earthly terms, relationships in human categories, and life only within the boundaries of this world. Jesus reminds them — and us — that God “is not the God of the dead, but of the living.” His love transcends death, and those who belong to Him will live forever.

This truth is beautifully mirrored in the life of St Cecilia, virgin and martyr. Her faith was not confined to earthly comfort or human reasoning. Even in persecution, she sang to the Lord in her heart, confident that the life she would lose in this world would be gained eternally in heaven. Her courage flowed from the same conviction Jesus proclaimed — that love endures beyond death.

As we honour St Cecilia, the patroness of sacred music, let us pray that we live with hearts attuned to eternity. May our words and actions, our joys and sufferings, all become part of that eternal hymn which never ends — the song of those who live forever in the God of the living.

Where is the Woman’s Voice?

On the hypothetical case (which was not hypothetical at all, given the then practice) that the Pharisees brought before Jesus to debate the issue of the resurrection, there is one element missing: Where is the voice of the woman in the story? Whereas the law mandated that the woman be married to the dead husband’s brothers one after the other, we do not find any provision for listening to the woman’s voice, how she felt about the successive deaths of her husbands, and if she wished to continue the practice. It is as if she were a dead entity already with no resurrection in sight. We need to apply what Jesus says today – that God is God of the living – to life after death as well as to life before death, to breathe life into those silenced by the society.

23 November 2024

Living in the light of God’s eternal promise of resurrection

Today’s Gospel brings us face-to-face with the Sadducees, influential leaders who rejected the idea of resurrection. They present Jesus with a seemingly absurd scenario: a woman marries seven brothers, each of whom dies without leaving her a child. They ask, “In the resurrection, whose wife will she be?” They intend to mock the concept of resurrection, portraying it as illogical and impossible.

But Jesus sees through their question and responds with clarity and authority. He explains that life after resurrection transcends our earthly realities. In the resurrection, relationships are transformed; we won’t be bound by earthly customs like marriage. Instead, we will be fully alive as children of God, sharing a new lifecompletely filled with God’s eternal love. Jesus invites us to see resurrection not as an extension of life here, but as a wholly new way of being with God.

Jesus reminds us of God’s everlasting connection with His people. He highlights a bond that transcends mortality by referring to Himself as the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Although these patriarchs have departed from earthly existence,theypersist in God’s presence. Jesus unveils a deep truth: God’s love is so enduringand powerful that it transcends death, infusing life into places where we perceive only deaths and endings.

As a community, this message renews our faith in God’s power to bring life from death. It assures us that our hope is not in a temporary promise but in an unending, divine love. In Christ, we are promised this eternal life, a life where we will dwell with God forever. May we hold fast to this hope, embracing the love that triumphs over all things, even death itself.