Jesus knows all this, yet he still sends us to take the Gospel to this difficult world.

But he also promises us his assistance: he asks us not to worry!

＊＊＊ 1st Reading ＊＊＊

Hosea 14:2-10

  Return to your God Yahweh,

O Israel! Your sins have caused your downfall.  Return to Yahweh with humble words. Say to him, “Oh you who show compassion to the fatherless forgive our debt, be appeased. Instead of bulls and sacrifices, accept the praise from our lips.

 Assyria will not save us: no longer shall we look for horses nor ever again shall we say ‘Our gods’ to the work of our hands.”   I will heal their wavering and love them with all my heart for my anger has turned from them.   I shall be like dew to Israel like the lily will he blossom.

Like a cedar he will send down his roots;  his young shoots will grow and spread. His splendor will be like an olive tree, his fragrance, like a Lebanon cedar.   They will dwell in my shade again, they will flourish like the grain,

they will blossom like a vine, and their fame will be like Lebanon wine.

 What would Ephraim do with idols, when it is I who hear and make him prosper? I am like an ever-green cypress tree; all your fruitfulness comes from me.  Who is wise enough to grasp all this? Who is discerning and will understand? Straight are the ways of Yahweh: the just walk in them, but the sinners stumble.

 

     

Ps 51:3-4, 8-9, 12-13, 14 & 17

My mouth will declare your praise.

 

＊＊＊＊ Gospel ＊＊＊＊    

Matthew 10:16-23

Look, I send you out like sheep among wolves. You must be clever as snakes and innocent as doves.   Be on your guard with respect to people, for they will hand you over to their courts and they will flog you in their syna­gogues.   You will be brought to trial before rulers and kings because of me, and so you may witness to them and the pagans.

 But when you are arrested, do not worry about what you are to say and how you are to say it; when the hour comes, you will be given what you are to say.   For it is not you who will speak; but it will be the Spirit of your Father in you.

 Brother will hand over brother to death, and a father his child; children will turn against parents and have them put to death.   Everyone will hate you because of me, but whoever stands firm to the end will be saved.

When they persecute you in one town, flee to the next. For sure, you will not have gone through all the towns of Israel before the Son of Man comes.

 

  Gospel Reflection：

The Take Over

I have often marveled at the grace with which every Christian martyr, without exception, has approached their death; the powerful words they speak which stun even their opponents. One of my most favored groups of young martyrs, my elder brothers in faith, are the 51 Claretian martyrs the “martyr seminary” in Vic (Spain), nearly all of them being late teens or young adults.

They had the choice to opt out of martyrdom; but they didn’t they had the choice to hate, but they wouldn’t. And the kind of words they spoke in their last moments! They wrote to the Congregation: “We all die happy with no regrets or misgivings. We all die praying to God that our blood not be shed in vengeance.”

It is humanly impossible to speak so. That gives out the truth: at such moments, even for the weakest of us, the words will be given. It will not be we who speak, but the Spirit of Christ. There is no doubting it.