June 1, 2026
Memorial of Saint Justin, Martyr
Lectionary: 353
Reading 1
Beloved:
May grace and peace be yours in abundance
through knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord.
His divine power has bestowed on us
everything that makes for life and devotion,
through the knowledge of him
who called us by his own glory and power.
Through these, he has bestowed on us
the precious and very great promises,
so that through them you may come to share in the divine nature,
after escaping from the corruption that is in the world
because of evil desire.
For this very reason,
make every effort to supplement your faith with virtue,
virtue with knowledge, knowledge with self-control,
self-control with endurance, endurance with devotion,
devotion with mutual affection, mutual affection with love.
Responsorial Psalm
R. (see 2b) In you, my God, I place my trust.
You who dwell in the shelter of the Most High,
who abide in the shadow of the Almighty,
Say to the LORD, "My refuge and my fortress,
my God, in whom I trust."
R. In you, my God, I place my trust.
Because he clings to me, I will deliver him;
I will set him on high because he acknowledges my name.
He shall call upon me, and I will answer him;
I will be with him in distress.
R. In you, my God, I place my trust.
I will deliver him and glorify him;
with length of days I will gratify him
and will show him my salvation.
R. In you, my God, I place my trust.
Alleluia
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
Jesus Christ, you are the faithful witness,
the firstborn of the dead;
you have loved us and freed us from our sins by your Blood.
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
Gospel
Jesus began to speak to the chief priests, the scribes,
and the elders in parables.
"A man planted a vineyard, put a hedge around it,
dug a wine press, and built a tower.
Then he leased it to tenant farmers and left on a journey.
At the proper time he sent a servant to the tenants
to obtain from them some of the produce of the vineyard.
But they seized him, beat him,
and sent him away empty-handed.
Again he sent them another servant.
And that one they beat over the head and treated shamefully.
He sent yet another whom they killed.
So, too, many others; some they beat, others they killed.
He had one other to send, a beloved son.
He sent him to them last of all, thinking, 'They will respect my son.'
But those tenants said to one another, 'This is the heir.
Come, let us kill him, and the inheritance will be ours.'
So they seized him and killed him,
and threw him out of the vineyard.
What then will the owner of the vineyard do?
He will come, put the tenants to death,
and give the vineyard to others.
Have you not read this Scripture passage:
The stone that the builders rejected
has become the cornerstone;
by the Lord has this been done,
and it is wonderful in our eyes?"
They were seeking to arrest him, but they feared the crowd,
for they realized that he had addressed the parable to them.
So they left him and went away.
https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/060126.cfm
Commentary on 2 Peter 1:2-7
Today we begin reading from the Second Letter of
Peter. There will be just two readings, today and tomorrow.
According to the Vatican II Missal:
“Second Peter is one of the most interesting New Testament
books. Written perhaps by a later disciple of Peter, it may be the last
written book of the Bible.”
The letter begins by asserting a theme which runs through
it, namely, that the only knowledge we really need is a personal knowledge of
God and his Son, Jesus. The author is challenging the heretical teaching
of the Gnostics, who said that the only thing needed was knowledge, independent
of any behaviour. Knowledge of God and Christ necessarily leads to
following the Way of Jesus, a way of both knowing and doing.
God’s loving power has given us everything we need to live a
life that is full and meaningful, which is a life in close relationship with
him. God has made available all that we need spiritually through our
knowledge of him. No special ‘secret’ knowledge, only accessible to
initiates, is necessary for the Christian to achieve fulfilment of life.
The glory and power of God was manifest in the teaching and signs that Jesus
gave, clearly indicating his divine origin. Later in the letter, the
author will mention specifically the experience of the Transfiguration, of
which Peter was a witness.
The Gnostics, who followed a way of thinking which was a
constant challenge to the early Christians, believed that salvation depended on
having a knowledge of “mysteries”, secret revelations, only given to
them. They also tended to see evil in all material things, a kind of
distorted Platonism.
God, in his love for us, has showered us with precious
gifts, including material gifts. And, provided we abandon a world
corrupted by irrational and hedonistic desires (a false infatuation with the
material), we can become sharers in the very life of God, that life of Truth,
Goodness and Beauty. Our whole Christian life is ordered to having that
experience.
The rest of the reading lists the steps by which we develop
a well-rounded and fruitful Christian life. The foundation of our inner
goodness is our total faith and trust in God’s love and our commitment to the
Way shown to us by Jesus. That faith is supplemented and fulfilled by virtuous
behaviour which flows from it. Virtue must be accompanied by knowledge. This
means that virtue is not a mere pious veneer, but rather comes from an ever
deeper understanding and grasp of the way of life that Jesus proposes to us in
the Gospel—a Message accessible to all.
This knowledge leads to self-control. Many of those
infected by Gnosticism, which put all emphasis on the acquisition of secret
knowledge, believed that self-control was completely unnecessary.
Knowledge, not behaviour, was the source of salvation. The Christian
belief is quite different. The deeper our knowledge of God and Jesus, the
more our whole lives, including our behaviour, are affected. We do good,
not because we have to, or force ourselves to, but because we want to.
Our behaviour flows naturally from our insight into what is true and good.
Self-control, in turn, leads to endurance, to perseverance
even in the face of either competing attractions or painful obstacles.
Endurance in turn is supported by devotion, which implies a deep warm-hearted
commitment and not just a dogged stubbornness. Devotion leads to mutual
affection. To be a Christian is not to go alone to God, but in
companionship with others who share the same vision. This mutual affection then
blossoms into love, that outgoing, unconditional desire for the well-being of
the brother and sister.
This is a very different picture from the purely
head-centred intellectualism of the Gnostic which can only end in a cold
isolationism, with little regard for the well-being of the world in which we
live. In contrast, we Christians are convinced our world is the place in which
to find and love our God.
Among other things, the author here is warning us against
any form of elitism, which is a constant threat to our understanding of the
Christian life. Such an elitism can lead to the formation of groups which
lay claim to a higher level of Christian living and look down on
‘outsiders’. The beauty of the gospel is that it can be grasped
adequately by even the illiterate. (Perhaps that message was brought home
some years ago when the founder of Opus Dei and scholar, Fr Josemaría Escrivá,
was beatified together with Canossian Sister Josephine Bakhita, who had
formerly been a slave in Latin America and had no formal schooling whatever.)
That does not mean we should not do all we can to have a
deeper understanding of our faith. If we have the intellectual capacity
to do so, we should. A great scandal among us is the ignorance of many
educated Catholics about Scripture, theology and spirituality. At the same
time, we also have to affirm that the very highest levels of mystical prayer
are accessible to those with no education at all. Knowing Jesus is a lot
more important than knowing a lot about him.
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Commentary on Mark 12:1-12
This will be our last week of readings from Mark’s Gospel.
We are now in chapter 12 and fast approaching the climax of Jesus’ life and
mission. This chapter is marked by a growing conflict between Jesus and the
religious and political leaders of his own people. The chapter begins today
with a parable (or, more accurately, allegory) directed towards that
leadership. Its meaning was very clear to those who heard it.
It tells the story of a man who planted a vineyard, fitted
it out with all that was necessary and then let it out to tenants to cultivate.
It is clear that the owner is God, the vineyard is Israel and the tenants the
people of Israel. The words of Jesus echo very closely a similar image in a
poem by the prophet Isaiah:
I will sing for my beloved
my love song concerning his vineyard:
My beloved had a vineyard
on a very fertile hill.
In Isaiah’s image the vines only produce sour grapes.
In Jesus’ story there are evidently good harvests. The
problem arises when the owner sends his servants to collect what belongs to him
of the harvests. One after the other, the servants are driven away, beaten up
or even killed. It is a clear reference to the way that God’s people treated
the many prophets which God had sent to them.
In exasperation, the owner decides to send his only son,
expecting that they will at least respect him. But no, the tenants argue that
by killing the only heir, the vineyard will inevitably become their property.
When the son (Jesus) arrives, they seize him, kill him and throw him out of the
vineyard (a reference to Jesus being crucified outside the walls of Jerusalem).
Jesus then says:
What then will the owner of the vineyard do? He will come
and destroy the tenants and give the vineyard to others. Have you not read this
scripture:
‘The stone that the builders rejected
has become the cornerstone;
this was the Lord’s doing,
and it is amazing in our eyes’?”
Jesus is rejected by the leaders and by many (but not all)
of his own people. The Gentiles will be invited to take their place and will be
more than happy to fill it.
The words Jesus quoted from Psalm 118 can apply either to
himself or the Gentiles. Jesus, the rejected and crucified one, becomes the
cornerstone. Or, the despised Gentiles become the recipients of God’s love and
grace and the cornerstone of the new Christian communities.
Clearly, this story did nothing to endear Jesus to the
leaders. They would have (as foretold by the story they had just heard) seized
him, but they were afraid of the crowd (also Jews) who stood in awe of Jesus,
his words and works.
This is one of those stories where we can be tempted to sit
in judgement on those who rejected Jesus. But we are not reading it today for
that purpose. Rather we are being asked whether we are listening to the word of
God as it comes to us in the various people that God sends into our lives. How
much better are we than the scribes and Pharisees? How often do we rationalise
ourselves out of doing what God clearly wants us to do? What welcome do we give
to God’s messengers? Do we even recognise them when they come? Maybe
today—right now—would be a good time to listen more carefully than we normally
do.
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https://livingspace.sacredspace.ie/o2092g/
Monday,
June 1, 2026
9th Week in
Ordinary Time
Opening Prayer
Father, your love never fails. Hear our call.
Keep us from danger and provide for all our needs.
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 - Mark 12:1-12
Jesus went on to speak to the priests, the scribes and the
elders in parables, 'A man planted a vineyard; he fenced it round, dug out a
trough for the winepress and built a tower; then he leased it to tenants and
went abroad.
When the time came, he sent a servant to the tenants to
collect from them his share of the produce of the vineyard. But they seized the
man, thrashed him and sent him away empty handed. Next he sent another servant
to them; him they beat about the head and treated shamefully. And he sent
another and him they killed; then a number of others, and they thrashed some
and killed the rest.
He had still someone left: his
beloved son. He sent him to them last of all, thinking, "They will respect
my son." But those tenants said to each other, "This is the heir.
Come on, let us kill him, and the inheritance will be ours."
So they seized him and killed him and threw him out of
the vineyard. Now what will the owner of the vineyard do? He will come and make
an end of the tenants and give the vineyard to others. Have you not read this
text of scripture: The stone which the builders rejected has become the
cornerstone; this is the Lord's doing, and we marvel at it?'
And they would have liked to arrest him, because they realized
that the parable was aimed at them, but they were afraid of the crowds. So they
left him alone and went away.
Reflection
•
Jesus is in Jerusalem. It is the last week of
his life. He has returned to the portico of the Temple (Mk 11: 27), where he
now begins the direct confrontation with the authority. Chapters 11 and 12
describe the diverse aspects of this confrontation: (a) with the men buying and
selling in the Temple (Mk 12: 11-26), (b) with the priests, elders and the
Scribes (Mk 11: 27 and 12: 12), (c) with the Pharisees and the Herodians (Mk
12: 13-17), (d) with the
Sadducees (Mk 12: 18-27), and (e) once
again with the Scribes (Mk 12: 28-40). Finally at the end the confrontation
with all of them, Jesus comments on the widow’s mite (Mk 12: 41-44). Today’s
Gospel describes part of the conflict with the priests, elders and the Scribes
(Mk 12: 1-12). All these confrontations make the disciples and us understand more clearly
which is Jesus’ project and which is the intention of those who have
power.
•
Mark 12: 1-9: The parable
of the vineyard: the direct response of Jesus to men of power. The
parable of the vineyard is a summary of the history of Israel. A beautiful
summary taken from the Prophet Isaiah (Is 5: 1-7). Through this story, Jesus
gives an indirect response to the priests, Scribes and elders who had asked
him: What authority have you for acting like this? Who
gave you authority to act like this?" (Mk 11: 28). In this
parable Jesus (a) reveals the origin of his authority: he is the Son, the heir
(Mk 12: 6); (b) he denounces the abuse of the authority of the tenants, that
is, of the priests and of the elders who were not concerned about the people of
God (Mk 12: 3-8); (c) He defends the authority of the prophets, sent by God,
but massacred by the tenants of the vineyard! (Mk 12: 2-5); (d) He unmasks the
authority which manipulates religion and kills the son, because they do not
want to lose the source of income which they have succeeded to accumulate for
themselves, throughout the centuries (Mk 12: 7).
•
Mark 12: 10-12: The
decision of men of power confirms the denunciation made by God. The
priests, the Scribes and the elders understood very well the meaning of the
parable, but they were not converted. Rather, they maintained their own project
to arrest Jesus (Mk
12: 12). They rejected “the corner stone” (Mk 12: 10), but they do not
have the courage to do it openly, because they fear the people. Thus, the
disciples have to know what awaits them if they follow Jesus!
•
The men of power at
the time of Jesus: In chapters 11 and 12 of the Gospel of Mark we
see that there are some men today: priests, elders and Scribes (Mk 11, 27); not
of tomorrow: Pharisees and Herodians (Mk 12: 13); not of day after tomorrow:
Sadducees (Mk 12: 18).
•
-Priests: They were the ones in charge of the
worship in the Temple, where the tenth part of the income was collected. The
High priest occupied a central place in the life of the people, especially
after the exile. He was chosen among the families who had more power and who
were richer.
•
-Elders or Chiefs of the people: They were the
local chiefs, in the villages and in the cities. Their origin was the heads of
the ancient tribes.
•
-Scribes or Doctors of the Law: they were those
in charge of teaching. They dedicated their life to the study of the Law of God
and taught the people how to observe the Law of God in all things. Not all the
Scribes followed the same line. Some of them were with the Pharisees, others
with the Sadducees.
•
Pharisees: The word “pharisee” means “separated.” They fought in order that by means of
the perfect observance of the Law of purity, people would succeed to be pure,
separated, and holy as the Law and
Tradition
demanded! By means of the exemplary witness of their life
within the norms of the time, they
governed in almost all the villages of Galilee.
•
-Herodians: this was a group bound to Herod
Antipas of Galilee who governed from 4 BC until 39 AD. The Herodians formed
part of an elite class who did not expect the Kingdom of God in the future, but
who considered it
already present in Herod’s kingdom.
•
Sadducees: They were an elite aristocratic class
of rich merchants or owners of large estates. They were conservative. They did
not accept the changes defended by the Pharisees, for example, faith in the
Resurrection and the existence of the angels.
•
Synedrium: This was the Supreme Tribunal of the
Jews with 71 members among high priests, elders, Pharisees and Scribes. It had
the role of great power before the people and represented the nation before the
Roman authority.
Personal Questions
•
Sometimes, as it happened to Jesus, have you
felt controlled by the authority of your country, at home, in your family, in
your work or in the Church? Which was your reaction then?
•
What does this parable teach us concerning the
way of exercising authority? And you, how do you exercise your authority in the
family, in the community and in your work?
Concluding Prayer
Integrity and generosity are marks
of Yahweh for he brings sinners back to the path.
Judiciously he guides the humble, instructing the poor in his
way. (Ps 25: 8-9)
Justin (100-165) was an early Christian apologist (i.e. a
defender of the Christian faith against heresies and false beliefs). His works
represent the earliest surviving Christian apologies of significance. Most of
what we know about the life of Justin comes from his own writings, although
they have to be read with some caution.
He was born at Flavia Neapolis (ancient Shechem in Judaea
and now modern-day Nablus). He called himself a Samaritan, but his father and
grandfather were probably Greek or Roman and he was brought up a non-believer.
It seems that Justin had property, studied philosophy, converted to
Christianity about the age of 30, and devoted the rest of his life to teaching
what he considered the true philosophy, still wearing his philosopher’s gown to
indicate that he had attained the truth. It is thought he travelled widely and,
having spent some time in Ephesus, ultimately settled in Rome as a Christian
teacher.
The earliest mention of Justin is found in the Oratio
ad Graecos by Tatian, who calls him “the most admirable Justin”.
Irenaeus speaks of his martyrdom and of Tatian as his disciple. He quotes him
twice. Tertullian, in his Adversus Valentinianos, calls him a
philosopher and martyr and the earliest antagonist of heretics. Hippolytus and
Methodius of Olympus also mention or quote him. Eusebius of Caesarea deals with
him at some length and gives a list of his writings. Among his writings are the
‘apology’ (i.e. defence) Against Marcion and a Refutation
of All Heresies. Both of these writings are now lost. Other writings are
the Dialogue with Trypho, the First Apology and
the Second Apology.
In the opening of the Dialogue, Justin relates
his vain search among the Stoics, Peripatetics, and Pythagoreans for a
satisfying knowledge of God; his finding in the ideas of Plato ways to attain
the contemplation of the Godhead; and his meeting on the seashore with an
elderly man who told him that only by divine revelation could blessedness be
attained, that the prophets had conveyed this revelation to humanity, and that
their words had been fulfilled. Through his own studies he became convinced of
the truth of their teachings. And the daily life of Christians, and the courage
of the martyrs, convinced him that the accusations thrown against them were
false.
From him we have one of the earliest descriptions of how
baptism was administered and of the rite of the Eucharist. According to church
tradition, Justin suffered martyrdom with six others—five men and one woman—in
Rome under the Emperor Marcus Aurelius, when Rusticus was prefect of the city
(between 162 and 168).
His relics are said to be housed in the church of St John
the Baptist in Sacrofano, a few kilometers north of Rome. Pope Leo XIII had a
Mass and an Office composed in his honour and set his feast day on April 14. It
is now celebrated on June 1.
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