St. Callistus 1, pope & martyr 

＊＊＊ 1st Reading ＊＊＊   

Romans 3:21-30

 But, now it has been revealed

Altogether apart from the Law, as it was already foretold in the Law and the Prophets:   God makes us righteous by means of faith in Jesus Christ, and this is applied to all who believe, without distinction of per­sons.   

Because all have sinned and all fall short of the Glory of God;   and all are graciously forgiven and made righteous through the redemption effected in Christ Jesus.  For God has given him to be the victim whose blood obtains us forgiveness through faith.

So God shows us how he makes us righteous. Past sins are forgiven which God overlooked till now.   For now he wants to reveal his way of righteousness: how he is just and how he makes us righteous through faith in Jesus.

 Then what becomes of our pride? It is excluded. How? Not through the Law and its observances, but through another law which is faith.   For we hold that people are in God’s grace by faith and not because of all the things ordered by the Law.   

Otherwise, God would be the God of the Jews; but is he not God of pagan nations as well?   Of course he is, for there is only one God and he will save by faith the circumcised Jews as well as the uncircumcised nations.

 

Ps 130:1b-2, 3-4, 5-6ab

With the Lord, there is mercy, and fullness of redemption.

 

＊＊＊＊ Gospel ＊＊＊＊

Luke 11:47-54

 A curse is on you, for you build memorials to the prophets your ancestors killed. So you approve and agree with what your ancestors did. Is it not so? They got rid of the prophets, and now you can build!”

 (The Wisdom of God also said,) “I will send prophets and apostles and this people will kill and persecute some of them. But the present generation will have to answer for the blood of all the prophets that has been shed since the foundation of the world, from the blood of Abel to the blood of Zechariah, who was murdered between the altar and the sanctuary. Yes, I tell you, the people of this time will have to answer for them all.

A curse is on you, teachers of the Law, for you have taken the key of knowledge. You yourselves have not entered, and you prevented others from entering.”

 As Jesus left that place, the teachers of the Law and the Pharisees began to harass him, asking him endless questions, setting traps to catch him in something he might say.

 

Gospel Reflection：

The experts of whom Jesus rebukes in this gospel are the Pharisees and the teachers of the law. these are religious leaders of the time. To sustain their importance in the Jewish society, they often made a great mystery of the meaning of the law.

The following of God is simple and plain, but their profits and privileges depended upon giving the impression that it was difficult. Hence they domesticate the law and interpret it for the people as they please.

Not only this , but they also manufacture reputations out of the shortcomings of their ancestors. Their fathers murdered the prophets out of their hard-headedness.

Now they (the sons were busy building monuments for these murdered prophets pretending to dissent from their fathers’ action. But Jesus unmasks their pretense for what it is: worthless hypocrisy. The evil feeling lingers even until now. By rejecting Jesus and His teaching, they are not only cutting themselves off from God but prevent others as well.