July 21, 2026
Tuesday of the Sixteenth Week in Ordinary Time
Lectionary: 396
Reading 1
Shepherd your people with your staff,
the flock of your inheritance,
That dwells apart in a woodland,
in the midst of Carmel.
Let them feed in Bashan and Gilead,
as in the days of old;
As in the days when you came from the land of Egypt,
show us wonderful signs.Who is there like you, the God who removes guilt
and pardons sin for the remnant of his inheritance;
Who does not persist in anger forever,
but delights rather in clemency,
And will again have compassion on us,
treading underfoot our guilt?
You will cast into the depths of the sea
all our sins;
You will show faithfulness to Jacob,
and grace to Abraham,
As you have sworn to our fathers
from days of old.
Responsorial Psalm
R. (8a) Lord, show us your mercy and love.
You have favored, O LORD, your land;
you have brought back the captives of Jacob.
You have forgiven the guilt of your people;
you have covered all their sins.
You have withdrawn all your wrath;
you have revoked your burning anger.
R. Lord, show us your mercy and love.
Restore us, O God our savior,
and abandon your displeasure against us.
Will you be ever angry with us,
prolonging your anger to all generations?
R. Lord, show us your mercy and love.
Will you not instead give us life;
and shall not your people rejoice in you?
Show us, O LORD, your kindness,
and grant us your salvation.
R. Lord, show us your mercy and love.
Alleluia
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
Whoever loves me will keep my word,
and my Father will love him
and we will come to him.
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
Gospel
While Jesus was speaking to the crowds,
his mother and his brothers appeared outside,
wishing to speak with him.
Someone told him, “Your mother and your brothers are standing outside,
asking to speak with you.”
But he said in reply to the one who told him,
“Who is my mother? Who are my brothers?”
And stretching out his hand toward his disciples, he said,
“Here are my mother and my brothers.
For whoever does the will of my heavenly Father
is my brother, and sister, and mother.”
https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/072126.cfm
Commentary on Micah
7:14-15,18-20
Today’s final selection from Micah consists of a lovely
prayer from a people aware of their great needs which only God can remedy. The
prophet begs God to lead his people to richer pastures, for the people of
Israel are his very inheritance:
Shepherd your people with your staff,
the flock that belongs to you…
Right now, they live:
…alone in a forest
in the midst of a garden land…
The prophet says they are living isolated in a land that is
unproductive—in the sense that they are living in a situation of desolation and
hardship after their return to Jerusalem from their exile in Babylon.
They now long for the days when they could pasture in:
…Bashan and Gilead….As in the days
when you came out of the land of Egypt,
show us marvelous things.
This was a time when they were the witnesses to all God’s
wonders on their behalf. And as in the days after they left Egypt, they long
for more wonderful signs of Yahweh’s love and power.
The prophet then appeals to God’s very nature to come to
their aid:
Who is a God like you, pardoning iniquity
and passing over the transgression
of the remnant of his possession?
This prayer is a kind of psalm of which similar examples
occur in the prophetic writings. Micah’s God is not the kind of god that others
believe in, a god who instils terror and fear. This God takes faults away and
pardons crime. This God is not vindictive; he does not cherish anger forever,
but delights in showing mercy and compassion.
Micah begs his God to have pity on his people in spite of
all that they have done:
…tread our iniquities under foot.
You will cast all our sins
into the depths of the sea.
He appeals to God to remember and to implement the covenants
of old that were made with Abraham and Jacob, covenants of faithfulness and
mercy.
Perhaps we, too, feel now (or have felt at other times) that
our lives were being lived in a kind of desert. We ask God to lead us to richer
pastures where we can experience joy and peace. As well, we should also know
that we have a God beyond compare, made known to us through the life and death
of Jesus. Through Jesus, he has given us a new life in a new covenant. As did
the people of Micah’s time, we also beg our God to wipe out all our sins and
help us to turn totally to him in love and fidelity.
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Commentary on
Matthew 12:46-50
Just before we enter the third of the great discourses on
the parables of the Kingdom, we have today’s short passage on who really
belongs to Jesus. As Jesus was speaking to the crowds his mother and other
family members arrived:
While he was still speaking to the crowds, his mother and
his brothers were standing outside, wanting to speak to him.
Matthew does not say what their words were, but we know from
another context (Mark 3:21) that they were embarrassed by what he was doing,
probably because of the way he was earning the displeasure of the authorities.
In later times, many who opted to follow Christ have been a source of
embarrassment and displeasure to their families, especially in situations where
being Christian or Catholic was a violation of state law or religious
affiliation.
When Jesus is told they are looking for him he stretches out
his hands to his followers and says that they are his “mother and brothers”.
And then he defines how one becomes one of his brothers and sisters:
…whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my
brother and sister and mother.
It is significant that Jesus’ own blood relatives are spoken
of as being “outside”; Jesus’ disciples, those who really listen to him, are
those who are ‘inside’. This is not to say that Jesus is rejecting his family;
to do so would be to contradict his own teaching of loving all unconditionally.
But he uses the situation to make a very important point—that relationship to
Jesus is based on one thing only, total commitment through Jesus to the Father.
To be a Christian, a disciple, is to enter into this new
relationship with God and with others. All other bonds, including those of blood,
take a second place or are to be understood in the light of this bonding to God
first of all and above all.
It would be wrong to conclude that Jesus was rejecting his
own mother here. Yet what he says applies to her as much as to anyone else.
Mary is measured by her commitment to the Father and the Son, who is also her
Son. That commitment was clearly made when she accepted to be the mother of
Jesus:
Here am I, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me
according to your word. (Luke 1:38)
It was a commitment that was still being kept as she stood
in grief at the foot of her Son’s cross. Mary was certainly on the ‘inside’.
Let us ask her today that we too may always be ‘insiders’.
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https://livingspace.sacredspace.ie/o2163g/
Tuesday, July 21,
2026
Ordinary Time
Opening Prayer
Lord, be merciful to Your people.
Fill us with Your gifts and make us always eager to serve You in
faith, hope and love.
You live and reign with the Father and the Holy Spirit, one God,
for ever and ever. Amen.
Gospel Reading – Matthew 12: 46-50
While Jesus was speaking to the crowds, his
mother and his brothers appeared outside, wishing to speak with him. Someone
told him, "Your mother and your brothers are standing outside, asking to
speak with you." But he said in reply to the one who told him, "Who
is my mother? Who are my brothers?" And stretching out his hand toward his
disciples, he said, "Here are my mother and my brothers. For whoever does
the will of my heavenly Father is my brother, and sister, and mother."
Reflection
•
The family of Jesus. The relatives reached the
house where Jesus was. They have probably come from Nazareth. From there up to
Capernaum there is a distance of forty kilometers. His mother also comes with
them. They do not enter, but they send a messenger: "Your mother and Your
brothers are standing outside, asking to speak with You." Jesus’ reaction
is clear: "Who is My mother? Who are My brothers?" And stretching out
His hand toward His disciples, He said, "Here are My mother and My
brothers. For whoever does the will of My heavenly Father is My brother, and
sister, and mother." To understand the meaning of this response it is
helpful to look at the situation of the family in the time of Jesus.
•
In the old Israel, the clan, that is, the large
family (the community), was the basis for social living together. It was the
protection of families and of the people, the guarantee of possession of the
land, the principal vehicle of the tradition, and the defense of identity. It
was the concrete way on the part of the people of that time to incarnate the
love of God and love toward neighbor. To defend the clan was the same as to
defend the Covenant.
•
In Galilee at the time of Jesus, because of the
system established during the long periods of government of Herod the Great (37
BC to 4 BC) and of his son Herod Antipas (4 BC to 39 AD), the clan (the
community) was becoming weaker. The taxes to be paid, both to the government
and to the Temple, the debts which were increasing, the individualistic
mentality of the Hellenistic ideology, the frequent threats of violent
repression on the part of the Romans and the obligation to accept the soldiers
and give them hospitality, the ever growing problem of survival, all this
impelled the families to block things out and to think only of their own needs.
This closing up was strengthened by the religion of the time. For example: one
who gave his inheritance to the Temple could leave his parents without any
help. This weakened the fourth commandment which was the backbone of the clan (Mk
7: 8-13). Besides this, the observance of the norms of purity was a factor of
marginalization for many people: women, children, Samaritans, foreigners,
lepers, possessed people, tax collectors or publicans, the sick, the mutilated
and paraplegics.
•
Thus, concern with the problems of one’s own
family prevented the people from meeting in community. Now, in order that the
Kingdom of God manifest itself in community living, the people had to overcome
the narrow limits of the small family and open themselves again to the large
family, to the community. Jesus gave the example. When His own family tried to
take possession of Him, He reacted and extended the family: "Who is My
mother? Who are My brothers?" And stretching out His hand toward His
disciples, He said, "Here are My mother and My brothers. For whoever does
the will of My heavenly Father is My brother, and sister, and mother." He
created a community.
•
Jesus asked the same thing of those who wanted
to follow Him. Families could not close themselves off from the larger
community. The excluded and the marginalized had to be accepted in life with
others, and in this way feel accepted by God (Lk 14: 12-14). This was the way
to attain the objective of the Law, which said “There must, then, be no poor
among you” (Dt 15: 4). Like the great Prophets of the past, Jesus tried to
consolidate community life in the villages of Galilee. He restored the profound
meaning of the clan, of the family, of the community, as an expression of the
incarnation of the love toward God and toward neighbor.
Personal Questions
•
To live faith in the community. What place and
what influence does family and community have in my way of living my faith?
•
Today, in large cities, overcrowding promotes
individualism which is contrary to life in community. What am I doing to
counteract this evil?
•
There are many forms of community today, and
some of these are dysfunctional. We have online communities, gangs (which are a
form of community), lobbies, clubs, social and business societies, and so on. How
do I bring the attitude of Jesus to these other communities I might be a member
of?
•
How broadly do I define what is my community?
Why?
Concluding Prayer
I waited, I waited for Yahweh, then He stooped to me and heard
my cry for help.
He put a fresh song in my mouth,
praise of our God. (Ps 40: 1, 3)
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