Daily Bible Readings Wednesday January 7 2009 Christmas Weekday

January 7 2009 Wednesday Christmas Weekday
Saint of the Day – St. Raymond of Penyafort

About the sources used. The readings on this site are from the Haydock Bible according to the daily Lectionary readings for the American Roman Catholic Church. The Haydock Bible contains traditional Catholic commentary and is free from copyright. Due to verse numbering differences and pastoral deletions in the actual Lectionary, these readings may at times vary from the actual readings.

Official Readings of the Liturgy at – http://www.usccb.org/nab/readings/010709.shtml

1 John 4:11-18
Haydock New Testament

Dearly beloved, if God hath so loved us, we ought to love one another. No man hath seen God at any time. If we love one another, God abideth in us, and his charity is perfected in us. By this we know that we abide in him, and he in us: because he hath given us of his Spirit: And we have seen, and do testify, that the Father hath sent his Son, the Saviour of the world.

Whosoever shall confess that Jesus is the Son of God, God abideth in him, and he in God. In this is the charity of God perfected with us, that we may have confidence in the day of judgment: because as he is, we also are in this world. Fear is not in charity: but perfect charity casteth out fear; because fear hath pain: and he that feareth is not perfect in charity.

Responsorial Psalm 71:1-2, 10, 12-13 (Ps 72 NAB)
DR Challoner

Give to the king thy judgment, O God,
and to the king’s son thy justice:
To judge thy people with justice,
and thy poor with judgment.
The kings of Tharsis and the islands shall offer presents:
the kings of the Arabians and of Saba shall bring gifts:
For he shall deliver the poor from the mighty:
and the needy that had no helper.
He shall spare the poor and needy:
and he shall save the souls of the poor.

The Holy Gospel of Jesus Christ According to Saint Mark 6:45-52
Haydock New Testament

And immediately he obliged his disciples to go up into the ship, that they might go before him over the water to Bethsaida: whilst he dismissed the people. And when he had dismissed them, he went up to the mountain to pray. And when it was late, the ship was in the midst of the sea, and he alone in the land. And seeing them laboring in rowing, (for the wind was against them) and about the fourth watch of the night he cometh to them, walking upon the sea; and he would have passed by them. But they seeing him walking upon the sea, thought it was an apparition, and they cried out. For they all saw him, and were troubled. And immediately he spoke with them, and said to them:

Have a good heart, it is I; fear ye not.

And he went up to them into the ship, and the wind ceased. And they were far more astonished within themselves. For they understood not concerning the loaves: for their heart was blinded.

Haydock Commentary 1 John 4:11-18
Notes Copied From Haydock Commentary Site

• Ver. 12. No man hath seen God at any time. No mortal man hath seen God and the perfections of his divine Majesty in such a manner as the blessed in heaven, but we have powerful motives to love and serve him, and to love our neighbour for his sake. Wi.
• Ver. 17. The charity of God (which may either signify the love by which we love God, or by which God loves us) perfected with us, or in us, and so possesseth our souls, as to give us an humble confidence of our salvation, when we shall appear before his tribunal at the day of judgment: because as he is, we also are in this world. These words are differently expounded. They may signify, that as this world by his grace are always loving him and our neighbour, and increasing in this love, which gives us a confidence of our salvation. Or they may bear this sense, that as Jesus Christ was suffering in this world for us, so we are suffering for his sake. Wi.
• Ver. 18. Fear is not in charity, &c. By the fear, which a perfect charity and love of God excludes, we may understand a fear of temporal losses in this world, of the loss of goods, of banishment, of torments, of death itself, which the love of God made so many glorious martyrs contemn; or an anxious servile fear of punishment in the next world, for the more perfect charity and the love of God is, so much the more doth it banish this imperfect and servile fear; but as perfect charity does not exclude a love, and constant desire of loving God as our last end, for whose enjoyment we were created, so it does not exclude a fear of displeasing, offending, and losing him by sin. Wi. — Perfect charity, or love, banisheth human fear, that is, the fear of men; as also all perplexing fear, which makes men mistrust or despair of God’s mercy; and that kind of servile fear, which makes them fear the punishment of sin more than the offence offered to God. But it no way excludes the wholesome fear of God’s judgments, so often recommended in holy writ, nor that fear and trembling with which we are told to work out our salvation. Phil. ii. 12. Ch.

Haydock Commentary Mark 6:45-52

• Ver. 45. The apostles were in a desert place belonging to Bethsaida, which probably was divided from it by some bay or creek, that ran into the land; and Christ only ordered them to pass over this to the city, where he might afterwards have joined them, when he had sent away the people. But in their passage a great storm arose, and they were driven by an adverse wind to the open sea, towards Capharnaum; or, probably, when they found the wind so violent, afraid of shipwreck if they neared the shore, they rowed out to sea. This reconciles the seeming discrepance of S. Mark and S. John, when notwithstanding the directions Christ had given his disciples to go before him to Bethsaida, we find them going to Capharnaum. Rutter.
• Ver. 48. Thus the divine mercy often seems to desert the faithful in the height of tribulation, but God only acts thus, that he may try their patience, and reward them more abundantly. Nic. de Lyra.
• Ver. 52. They understood not concerning the loaves;[3] i.e. they did not reflect how great a miracle that was which Christ had lately wrought, otherwise they would not have been so much surprised at his walking upon the sea. Wi.