Daily Bible Readings Friday May 16 2008 6th Week of Ordinary Time

May 16 2008 Friday 6^th Week of Ordinary Time

About the sources used. The readings on this site are not official for the Mass of Roman Rite of the Catholic Church in the USA, but are from sources free from copyright. They are here to present the comparable readings alongside traditional Catholic commentary as published in the Haydock Bible for your own personal study. Readings vary depending on your local calendar.

Official Readings of the Liturgy at – http://www.usccb.org/nab/readings/051608.shtml – Note. The Official Liturgical readings may not match the current NAB you may have.

The Catholic Epistle of St James 2:14-24, 26
Haydock New Testament
Note to reader. I am including verse 25 in italics, which is excluded from the Mass readings for pastoral reasons.

What shall it profit, my brethren, if a man say he hath faith, but hath not works? Shall faith be able to save him? And if a brother or sister be naked, and want daily food, And one of you say to them: Go in peace, be you warmed and filled: yet give them not those things that are necessary for the body, what shall it profit? Even so faith, if it have not works, is dead in itself. But some men will say: Thou hast faith, and I have works: shew me thy faith without works; and I will shew thee my faith by works.

Thou believest that there is one God. Thou dost well: the devils also believe and tremble. But wilt thou know, O vain man, that faith without works is dead? Was not Abraham, our father, justified by works, offering up Isaac, his son, upon the altar? Seest thou that faith did co-operate with his works: and by works faith was made perfect? And the Scriptures was fulfilled, saying: Abraham believed God, and it was reputed to him to justice, and he was called the friend of God. Do you see that by works a man is justified, and not by faith only? And in like manner also Rahab, the harlot, was not she justified by works, receiving the messengers, and sending them out another way?

For as the body without the spirit is dead, so also faith without works is dead.

Responsorial Psalm 111:1-6 (Ps 112 NAB/Hebrew)
DR Challoner Text Only

Blessed is the man that feareth the Lord:
he shall delight exceedingly in his commandments.
His seed shall be mighty upon earth:
the generation of the righteous shall be blessed.
Glory and wealth shall be in his house:
and his justice remaineth for ever and ever.
To the righteous a light is risen up in darkness:
he is merciful, and compassionate and just.
Acceptable is the man that sheweth mercy and lendeth:
he shall order his words with judgment:
Because he shall not be moved for ever.

The Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ According to Saint Mark 8:34–9:1
Haydock NT
Note: The Latin Vulgate and derivative works follow the only numbering system here whereby this discourse ends at the end of Ch 8 instead of carrying over into the Transfiguration story. All other Bibles that I have follow the same number as the NAB.

And calling together the multitude with his disciples, he said to them:

If any man will follow me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me. For whosoever will save his life, shall lose it; and whosoever shall lose his life for my sake, and for the gospel, shall save it. For what shall it profit a man, if he gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? Or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul? For whosoever shall be ashamed of me, and of my words in this adulterous and sinful generation, the Son of man also shall be ashamed of him, when he shall come in the glory of his Father with the holy Angels.

And he said to them:

Amen, I say to you, that there are some of them that stand here, who shall not taste death, till they see the kingdom of God coming in power.

Haydock Commentary James 2:14-26
Notes copied from Haydock Commentary Site

• Ver. 14, &c. Shall faith be able to save him? He now comes to one of the chief points of this epistle, to shew against the disciple of Simon , the magician, that faith alone will not save any one. We may take notice in the first place, that S. James in this very verse, supposes that a man may have faith, a true faith without good works. This also follows from v. 19. where he says: Thou believest that there is one God: thou dost well. And the same is evident by the words Jo. xii. 42. where it is said, that many of the chief men also believed in him, (Christ) . . . but did not confess it, that they might not be cast out of the synagogue. Now that faith alone is not sufficient to save a man, S. James declares by this example: If any one say to the poor and naked, go in peace, be you warmed and filled, and give them nothing, what shall it profit? Even so faith, if it have not works is dead, &c. i.e. such a faith, though it be not lost and destroyed, yet it remains in a soul that is spiritually dead, when it is not accompanied with charity and grace, which is the life of the soul, and without which faith can never bring us to eternal life. In this sense is to be understood the 20th and 26th verses of this chapter, when faith is again said to be dead without good works. This is also the doctrine of S. Paul, when he tells us that a saving faith is a faith that worketh by charity, Gal. v. 6. When he says, that although faith were strong enough to remove mountains, a man is nothing without charity. 1 Cor. xiii. 2. When he teacheth us again, that not the hearers of the law are just before God, but the doers of the law shall be justified. S. John teacheth the same (1 Jo. iii. 14.) He that loveth not, remaineth in death. But of this elsewhere. Wi. — Grotius in this place makes a very candid and remarkable profession of his faith, very different from that of his associates in the pretended reformation, called Solifideans: “There are some who say, ‘My works indeed are not as they ought to be,’ but my faith is firm, my salvation is therefore out of danger. This opinion, which has sprung up in this our unhappy age, and recommends itself under the name of reformed doctrine, ought to be opposed by every lover of piety, and all who wish well to their neighbour’s salvation . . . . no faith has ever availed any man, unless it were accompanied by such works as he had time and opportunity to perform.” His words are: “Opera quidem mea non recta sunt, sed fides recta est, ac propterea de salute non periclitor . . . . Renata est hoc infelici sæculo ea sententia et quidem sub nomine repurgatæ doctrinæ, cui omnes qui pietatem et salutem proximi amant, se debent opponere . . . . cœterum nulla cuiquam fides profuit, sine tali opere, quale tempus permittebat,” &c. In vain do we glory in our faith, unless our lives and works bear testimony of the same. Faith without charity is dead, and charity cannot exist without good works. He who bears the fruits of Christian piety, shews that he has the root, which is faith what the soul is to the body. See the remainder of this chapter.
• Ver. 18. Some men will say: Thou hast faith, and I have works. Shew me thy faith, &c. He confutes the same error, by putting them in mind that one can shew that he has faith, which is an interior virtue, only by good works, and that good works in a man shew also his faith; which is not to be understood, as if good works were merely the marks, signs, and effects of faith, as some would pretend, but that good works must concur with faith to a man’s salvation by an increase in grace. Wi.
• Ver. 19. The devils also believe, and tremble. S. James compares indeed faith without other virtues and good works, to the faith of devils: but comparisons must never be stretched farther than they are intended. The meaning is, that such a faith in sinners is unprofitable to salvation, like that of devils, which is no more than a conviction from their knowledge of God; but faith which remains in sinners, is from a supernatural knowledge, together with a pious motion in their free will. Wi.
• Ver. 21. Was not Abraham . . . justified by works? We may observe, that S. James here brings the very same examples of Abraham and Rahab, which it is likely he knew some had miscontrued in S. Paul, as if the great apostle of the Gentiles had taught that faith alone was sufficient to salvation. But S. Paul neither excludes good works done by faith, when he commends faith, excluding only the works of the law of Moses, as insufficient to a true justification. See Rom. iii. 27. And S. James by requiring good works does not exclude faith, but only teacheth that faith alone is not enough. This is what he clearly expresseth here in the 22nd and in the 24th verse. Man, says he, is justified, and not by faith only. And (v. 22.) seest thou that faith did co-operate with Abraham’s works, and by works faith was made perfect. In fine, we must take notice, that when S. James here brings example of Abraham offering his son Isaac, to shew that he was justified by works, his meaning is not that Abraham then began first to be justified, but that he then received an increase of his justice. He was justified at least from his first being called, and began then to believe and to do good works. It is true his faith was made perfect, and his justice increased, when he was willing to sacrifice his son. Wi.

Haydock Commentary Mark 8:34-39

• Nothing from the Haydock here. The passage itself is pretty self-explanatory to everyone who recognizes the prosperity gospel as false, but if you want some good commentary on this how about heading over to Catechetics Online and check out the Catena Aurea for this passage which is, as usual, excellent.
• For Mark 9:1 CLICK HERE – The commentary should help you understand why they ran one discourse over into the next chapter since it precedes the Transfiguration which is a glimpse of Jesus’ glory for Peter, James and John.