Mass Readings For Tomorrow (Readings, Gospel, and Reflection)
Liturgical Calendar
Thursday, November 20, 2025: Thursday of the Thirty-third Week in Ordinary Time
Readings and Gospel
Reading I:
1 Maccabees 2:15-29
Alleluia:
Psalm 95:8
Gospel:
Luke 19:41-44
Liturgical vestments: Green
Thursday, November 20, 2025: Readings & Responsorial Psalm & Gospel
Mass Readings for Tomorrow – Preparing Our Hearts
As we look ahead to tomorrow’s Mass Readings, we are invited to prepare our hearts to receive God’s word more deeply. Each reading, whether from the Old Testament, the Psalms, the Epistles, or the Gospel, is a message of love, guidance, and encouragement for our journey of faith.
Tomorrow’s readings remind us that God is always speaking to us—through His prophets, His apostles, and above all, through His Son, Jesus Christ. As we anticipate the Gospel passage, we reflect on how Christ’s words continue to call us to conversion, to deeper trust, and to a more profound love for God and neighbor.
Taking time to meditate on the Mass Readings for Tomorrow helps us to enter the Eucharistic celebration with open hearts. It allows us to be more attentive, more receptive, and more transformed by His grace. Let us ask the Holy Spirit to illuminate our minds and prepare our souls, so that when we hear God’s word proclaimed at Mass, we may not only listen but truly live it.
🙏 Lord, open our hearts to Your word, and let it bear fruit in our lives. Amen.
Reading I
1 Maccabees 2:15-29
The officers of the king in charge of enforcing the apostasy
came to the city of Modein to organize the sacrifices.
Many of Israel joined them,
but Mattathias and his sons gathered in a group apart.
Then the officers of the king addressed Mattathias:
“You are a leader, an honorable and great man in this city,
supported by sons and kin.
Come now, be the first to obey the king’s command,
as all the Gentiles and the men of Judah
and those who are left in Jerusalem have done.
Then you and your sons shall be numbered among the King’s Friends,
and shall be enriched with silver and gold and many gifts.”
But Mattathias answered in a loud voice:
“Although all the Gentiles in the king’s realm obey him,
so that each forsakes the religion of his fathers
and consents to the king’s orders,
yet I and my sons and my kin
will keep to the covenant of our fathers.
God forbid that we should forsake the law and the commandments.
We will not obey the words of the king
nor depart from our religion in the slightest degree.”
As he finished saying these words,
a certain Jew came forward in the sight of all
to offer sacrifice on the altar in Modein
according to the king’s order.
When Mattathias saw him, he was filled with zeal;
his heart was moved and his just fury was aroused;
he sprang forward and killed him upon the altar.
At the same time, he also killed the messenger of the king
who was forcing them to sacrifice,
and he tore down the altar.
Thus he showed his zeal for the law,
just as Phinehas did with Zimri, son of Salu.
Then Mattathias went through the city shouting,
“Let everyone who is zealous for the law
and who stands by the covenant follow after me!”
Thereupon he fled to the mountains with his sons,
leaving behind in the city all their possessions.
Many who sought to live according to righteousness and religious custom
went out into the desert to settle there.
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
If today you hear his voice,
harden not your hearts.
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
As Jesus drew near Jerusalem,
he saw the city and wept over it, saying,
“If this day you only knew what makes for peace–
but now it is hidden from your eyes.
For the days are coming upon you
when your enemies will raise a palisade against you;
they will encircle you and hem you in on all sides.
They will smash you to the ground and your children within you,
and they will not leave one stone upon another within you
because you did not recognize the time of your visitation.”
Reflection
“To confess my personal feelings, when I reflect on all these blessings I am overcome by a kind of dread and numbness at the very possibility of ceasing to love God and of bringing shame upon Christ because of my lack of recollection and my preoccupation with trivialities.” (Saint Basil the Great)
"The true God, who comes to meet us in the disarming docility of love" (Benedict XVI)
“… When Jerusalem comes into view he weeps over her and expresses once again his heart's desire: "Would that even today you knew the things that make for peace! But now they are hid from your eyes." (Catechism of the Catholic Church, n 558)
Saint of the Day
St Gelasius became Pope in 496, and during his four-year reign fought against paganism and heresy, writing treatises against Manicheanism, Monophysitism, and Pelagianism, among others. Some of his principles in ecclesiastical matters were taken up by the Second Vatican Council.
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