July 18, 2026
Saturday of the Fifteenth Week in Ordinary Time
Lectionary: 394
Reading 1
Woe to those who plan iniquity,
and work out evil on their couches;
In the morning light they accomplish it
when it lies within their power.
They covet fields, and seize them;
houses, and they take them;
They cheat an owner of his house,
a man of his inheritance.
Therefore thus says the LORD:
Behold, I am planning against this race an evil
from which you shall not withdraw your necks;
Nor shall you walk with head high,
for it will be a time of evil.
On that day a satire shall be sung over you,
and there shall be a plaintive chant:
"Our ruin is complete,
our fields are portioned out among our captors,
The fields of my people are measured out,
and no one can get them back!"
Thus you shall have no one
to mark out boundaries by lot
in the assembly of the LORD.
Responsorial Psalm
R. (12b) Do not forget the poor, O Lord!
Why, O LORD, do you stand aloof?
Why hide in times of distress?
Proudly the wicked harass the afflicted,
who are caught in the devices the wicked have contrived.
R. Do not forget the poor, O Lord!
For the wicked man glories in his greed,
and the covetous blasphemes, sets the LORD at nought.
The wicked man boasts, "He will not avenge it";
"There is no God," sums up his thoughts.
R. Do not forget the poor, O Lord!
His mouth is full of cursing, guile and deceit;
under his tongue are mischief and iniquity.
He lurks in ambush near the villages;
in hiding he murders the innocent;
his eyes spy upon the unfortunate.
R. Do not forget the poor, O Lord!
You do see, for you behold misery and sorrow,
taking them in your hands.
On you the unfortunate man depends;
of the fatherless you are the helper.
R. Do not forget the poor, O Lord!
Alleluia
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ,
and entrusting to us the message of reconciliation.
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
Gospel
The Pharisees went out and took counsel against Jesus
to put him to death.
When Jesus realized this, he withdrew from that place.
Many people followed him, and he cured them all,
but he warned them not to make him known.
This was to fulfill what had been spoken through Isaiah the prophet:
Behold, my servant whom I have chosen,
my beloved in whom I delight;
I shall place my Spirit upon him,
and he will proclaim justice to the Gentiles.
He will not contend or cry out,
nor will anyone hear his voice in the streets.
A bruised reed he will not break,
a smoldering wick he will not quench,
until he brings justice to victory.
And in his name the Gentiles will hope.
https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/071826.cfm
Commentary on Micah
2:1-5
Today we have the first of three readings from the prophet
Micah. Micah was a contemporary of Isaiah, but we know nothing of his life
except that he came from an obscure village in the foothills of Judah.
Like the other prophets, he attacked those who exploited the poor, merchants
who cheated, corrupt judges, priests and prophets. The cities of
Jerusalem and Samaria were particular targets.
The verses we read today are directed mainly against rich
landowners who are oppressing the poor. According to the prophet, they
lie in bed wondering what their next money-making move will be. Micah, however,
describes their plans as plotting evil and planning mischief, as those:
…who devise wickedness
and evil deeds on their beds!
As soon as dawn breaks, they get up to put their plots into
action. The rich, exploiting classes continue to get rich at the expense
of the poor because they control the power structures of their society:
They covet fields and seize them,
houses and take them away…
Covetousness alone was a violation of the tenth
Commandment. Land monopoly, also denounced by Isaiah, was a chronic vice
in Judah. To protect the poor against it, a man’s inheritance, his
ancestral property, was supposed to be inviolate. According to the Law,
land was the permanent possession of a family. But the wealthy, in their
greed, were enslaving poor landowners for their debts and thus taking over the
land in payment. (We saw something of this when Queen Jezebel engineered the
death of Naboth as a way by which the king, her husband, could have the
vineyard he coveted; see the reading for Monday of Week 11 of Ordinary Time.)
And then they would take over the house as well, presumably as collateral for a
debt that had not been repaid. In this way, the already rich landowners
could increase their ownings with the least outlay (and the greatest
injustice). It all sounds so contemporary!
But the prophet warns that they are not going to get away
with their exploitation of the poor and weak for long:
Now, I am devising against this family an evil
from which you cannot remove your necks…
Little do they know that the invader is about to strike and
carry off everyone, both rich and poor, into bitter exile:
On that day [the rich]
shall take up a taunt song against you
and wail with bitter lamentation
and say, “We are utterly ruined;
the Lord alters the inheritance of my people;
how he removes it from me!
Among our captors he parcels out our fields.”
Micah says that oppressing classes, the monopolists, will be
excluded from the division of the land in the restored kingdom:
Therefore you will have no one in the Lord’s assembly
to allot you a piece of land.
They will be cut off from all the promises of the covenant
people. “To allot you a piece of land” is an allusion to the initial
distribution of the land of Palestine among the Israelites when they entered
the Promised Land. The appropriate punishment of those greedy for land
will be loss of their land to their enemies, a loss that will be irrevocable.
But in “the Lord’s assembly”, in the Kingdom that is to
come—that Kingdom of justice and peace—there will be a true sharing out in
which all will get their due share. However, there will be no share for
those who greedily tried to monopolise all material wealth into their own hands
and brought suffering on the poor and needy.
Our societies today are no strangers to the exploitation of
the poor by the already rich. It can be one individual against another,
one society against another, one nation against another, or even one continent
against another. Sometimes, such exploitation may even be according to
the law and be defended in court, but the injustice remains. In spite of
unprecedented prosperity, we live in a world of scandalous inequality.
Let us always work to change it.
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Commentary on
Matthew 12:14-21
Jesus is becoming a figure of controversy. We saw
yesterday how he was accused by Pharisees of condoning the breaking of the
Sabbath on the part of his disciples. Far from apologising, Jesus
defended his followers and implied that he himself was greater than the
Law. Immediately afterwards he went to a synagogue and, in spite of a
challenge about healing on the Sabbath, went ahead and cured a man with a
“withered hand” (Matt 12:9-13). At the end of this story, Matthew says:
But the Pharisees went out and conspired against him, how
to destroy him. (Matt 12:14)
He was seen as a severe threat to their authority—and this
is where our reading begins today.
Jesus was fully aware of their plotting and so he
disappeared from sight for a while. We should be clear that Jesus did not
go out of his way to confront and attack people. Still less was his
behaviour deliberately designed to create trouble for himself. There are people
like that; they go out of their way to make trouble for others and for themselves.
Jesus never behaved in such a way. He did not want to attack or be
attacked by people. He did not deliberately engineer his own sufferings
and death, quite the contrary. So now, as things get hot for him, he
withdraws for a while.
At this point, Matthew (remember, he is writing for a Jewish
readership) shows how Jesus’ behaviour corresponds to a prophecy in the Old
Testament—something he does a number of times in his Gospel. He quotes the
passage from the prophet Isaiah (42:1-4), and it shows Jesus as full of the
Spirit of God campaigning for justice for peoples everywhere.
He is the servant whom God has chosen, “in whom my soul
delights”. He is no demagogue shouting from a soapbox:
He will not cry out or lift up his voice
or make it heard in the street…
He moves around quietly and, at the same time, is tolerant
and understanding of the weak. His behaviour is described as gentle and kind,
so that:
…a bruised reed he will not break,
and a dimly burning wick he will not quench…
We, too, are called to live and proclaim the gospel without
compromise, but to do so without any taint of arrogance or bullying. At the
same time, we need to show patience and understanding for those who are not yet
ready to answer Jesus’ call.
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https://livingspace.sacredspace.ie/o2157g/
Saturday, July 18,
2026
Ordinary Time
Opening Prayer
God our Father,
Your light of truth guides us to the way of Christ.
May all who follow Him reject what is contrary to the Gospel.
We ask this through our Lord Jesus
Christ, Your Son, who lives and reigns with You and the Holy Spirit, one God,
for ever and ever. Amen.
Gospel Reading - Matthew 12: 14-21
The Pharisees went out and took counsel
against Jesus to put him to death. When Jesus realized this, he withdrew from
that place. Many people followed him, and he cured them all, but he warned them
not to make him known. This was to fulfill what had been spoken through Isaiah
the prophet: Behold, my servant whom I have chosen, my beloved in whom I
delight; I shall place my Spirit upon him, and he will proclaim justice to the
Gentiles. He will not contend or cry out, nor will anyone hear his voice in the
streets. A bruised reed he will not break, a smoldering wick he will not
quench, until he brings justice to victory. And in his name the Gentiles will
hope.
Reflection
The Gospel today has two parts: (a) describes
the various reactions of the Pharisees and of the people who listen to the preaching
of Jesus; and (b) describes what Matthew sees in these reactions: the
fulfillment of the prophecy of the Servant of Yahweh, announced by Isaiah.
•
Matthew 12: 14: The reaction of the Pharisees:
they decide to kill Jesus. This verse is the conclusion of the previous
episode, in which Jesus challenges the malice of the Pharisees, by curing the
man who had a withered hand (Mt 12: 9-14). The reaction of the Pharisees was to
hold a Council meeting against Jesus. Thus, they come to the breaking of the relationship
between the religious authority and Jesus. In Mark, this episode is much more
explicit and provocative (Mk 3: 1-6). He says that the decision to kill Jesus
was not only that of the Pharisees, but also of the Herodians (Mk 3: 6). Altar
and throne joined together against Jesus.
•
Matthew 12: 15-16: The reaction of the people:
to follow Jesus. When Jesus learned the decision of the Pharisees, He went away
from the place where He was. People follow Him. Even knowing that the religious
authority has decided to kill Jesus, the people do not go away from Jesus, but
rather they follow Him. Many followed Him and He cured them all but warned them
not to make Him known. People know how to discern. Jesus asks them not to
spread the news, not to say what He is doing. A great contrast! On the one
side, the conflict of life and death, between Jesus and the religious
authority, and on the other the movement of the people who were desirous of
encountering Jesus! They were, above all, the marginalized and the excluded who
presented themselves to Jesus with their illness and their infirmities. They,
who were not accepted in society or in the religious field, were accepted by
Jesus.
•
Matthew 12: 17: The concern of Matthew: Jesus is
our Messiah. This reaction, different from that of the Pharisees and of the
people, moved Matthew to see here the realization of the prophecy of the
Suffering Servant. On the one hand, the Servant was persecuted by the authority
which insulted Him and spat on His face, but He does not turn back. He presents
His face hard as a rock, knowing that He will not be disappointed (Is 50: 5-7).
On the other hand,
the Servant is sought and expected by the
people. The crowd coming from far is waiting for His teaching (Is 42: 4). This
is exactly what is happening to Jesus.
•
Matthew 12: 18-21: Jesus fulfills the prophecy
of the Servant. Matthew presents the entire first Canticle of the Servant. Read
the text slowly, thinking of Jesus and the poor who today are excluded:
“Look! My Servant whom I have chosen;
My beloved in whom My soul delights,
I will send My Spirit upon Him, and He will proclaim
justice to the nations; He will not brawl or cry out; His voice is not heard in
the streets, He will not break a bruised reed, or snuff the faltering wick.
Until he has made justice victorious; in
him the nations will put their hope.”
Personal Questions
•
Do you know of any case in which the religious
authority, in the name of religion, decided to persecute and kill people who,
like Jesus, did good to people?
•
In our community are we servants of God for the
people? What do we lack?
Concluding Prayer
How precious, God, is Your faithful love.
So the children of Adam take refuge in the shadow of Your
wings.
They feast on the bounty of Your house, You let them drink
from Your delicious streams. (Ps 36: 7-8)
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