St. Frances Xavier Cabrini, Virgin 

＊＊＊ 1st Reading ＊＊＊

2 John 4-9

 I rejoiced greatly on meeting some of your children

Who live in accordance with the truth, according to the command we have received from the Father. And now, I ask you, Lady—I write to you not a new commandment but that which we had from the beginning—I ask you: let us love one another.

 This is love: to walk according to his commandments. And this is the commandment: that you walk in love as you have learned from the beginning. Many deceivers have gone out into the world, people who do not acknowledge that Jesus is the Christ who came in the flesh.

They are impostors and antichrists. Take care of yourselves that you do not lose the fruit of your labors, but receive a perfect reward. Everyone who goes beyond and does not remain within the teaching of Christ does not have God. The one who remains in the teaching has both the Father and the Son.

 

Ps 119 1, 2, 10, 11, 17, 18

Blessed are they who follow the law of the Lord!

 

＊＊＊＊ Gospel ＊＊＊＊

Luke 17:26-37

As it was in the days of Noah, so will it be on the day the Son of Man comes.   Then people ate and drank; they took husbands and wives. But on the day Noah entered the ark, the flood came and destroyed them all.   

Just as it was in the days of Lot: people ate and drank, they bought and sold, planted and built.   But on the day Lot left Sodom, God made fire and sulfur rain down from heaven which destroyed them all.   So will it be on the day the Son of Man is revealed.

 On that day, if you are on the rooftop, don’t go down into the house to get your belongings, and if you happen to be in the fields, do not turn back.   Remember Lot’s wife.   Whoever tries to save his life will lose himself, but whoever gives his life will be born again.

 I tell you, though two men are sharing the same bed, it may be that one will be taken and the other left.   Though two women are grinding meal to­gether, one might be taken and the other left.”  Then they asked Jesus, “Where will this take place, Lord?” And he answered, “Where the body is, there too will the vultures gather.”

 

Gospel Reflection：

In the first reading, the Apostle has met with some of the elect lady’s children (or some members of the particular Church addressed), probably in one of his Apostolic visits to some Church in Asia Minor. Their Christian life delighted him and apparently prompted him to write this letter.

What St. John had witnessed is that some of the children proved their adherence to the truth by their daily conduct. So the Epistle begins with the assurance of joy at the conduct of those to whom it is addressed.

Eat……married…..planted….all the ordinary occupations and enjoyments of life are repeatedly mentioned in the gospel. Though the antediluvian world and the cities of the plain were awfully wicked, it is not their wickedness, But their worldiness, their unbelief and indifference to the fture their unpreparedness, that is here held as a warning.