September 5, 2026
Saturday of the Twenty-second Week in Ordinary Time
Lectionary: 436
Reading 1
Brothers and sisters:
Learn from myself and Apollos not to go beyond what is written,
so that none of you will be inflated with pride
in favor of one person over against another.
Who confers distinction upon you?
What do you possess that you have not received?
But if you have received it,
why are you boasting as if you did not receive it?
You are already satisfied; you have already grown rich;
you have become kings without us!
Indeed, I wish that you had become kings,
so that we also might become kings with you.
For as I see it, God has exhibited us Apostles as the last
of all,
like people sentenced to death,
since we have become a spectacle to the world,
to angels and men alike.
We are fools on Christ’s account, but you are wise in Christ;
we are weak, but you are strong;
you are held in honor, but we in disrepute.
To this very hour we go hungry and thirsty,
we are poorly clad and roughly treated,
we wander about homeless and we toil, working with our own hands.
When ridiculed, we bless; when persecuted, we endure;
when slandered, we respond gently.
We have become like the world’s rubbish, the scum of all,
to this very moment.
I am writing you this not to shame you,
but to admonish you as my beloved children.
Even if you should have countless guides to Christ,
yet you do not have many fathers,
for I became your father in Christ Jesus through the Gospel.
Responsorial Psalm
R. (18) The Lord is near to all who call upon him.
The LORD is just in all his ways
and holy in all his works.
The LORD is near to all who call upon him,
to all who call upon him in truth.
R. The Lord is near to all who call upon him.
He fulfills the desire of those who fear him,
he hears their cry and saves them.
The LORD keeps all who love him,
but all the wicked he will destroy.
R. The Lord is near to all who call upon him.
May my mouth speak the praise of the LORD,
and may all flesh bless his holy name forever and ever.
R. The Lord is near to all who call upon him.
Alleluia
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
I am the way and the truth and the life, says the Lord;
no one comes to the Father except through me.
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
Gospel
While Jesus was going through a field of grain on a sabbath,
his disciples were picking the heads of grain,
rubbing them in their hands, and eating them.
Some Pharisees said,
“Why are you doing what is unlawful on the sabbath?”
Jesus said to them in reply,
“Have you not read what David did
when he and those who were with him were hungry?
How he went into the house of God, took the bread of offering,
which only the priests could lawfully eat,
ate of it, and shared it with his companions?”
Then he said to them, “The Son of Man is lord of the sabbath.”
https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/090526.cfm
Commentary on 1
Corinthians 4:6-15
In the reading which continues from yesterday’s passage,
Paul has been describing himself and Apollos as stewards or managers of God’s
message. The focus should be totally on the message rather than on the
messengers (also good advice for today’s Church!). As Paul says elsewhere, the
messengers are just leaking vessels, vessels of brittle clay. The Corinthians
therefore should not be taking sides and pitting one messenger against another,
accepting one and rejecting the other. They have no right to be doing such a
thing. They should keep to “what is written”. This may refer to Scripture or
the written traditions and teachings that had been passed on to them.
The Corinthians themselves can only make judgements based on
the teaching they were given, and they should not act as if their ideas were
their own. Paul says:
Already you have all you want! Already you have become
rich! Quite apart from us you have become kings!
There is a strong element of irony and sarcasm here as Paul
points out their arrogance coupled with their spiritual poverty, in comparison
with those by whom they were taught. He wishes it could be otherwise so Paul
could share in their riches, but the sad fact is that those riches do not
exist.
And in spite of their calling to be apostles, missionaries
and teachers, Paul and his fellow evangelisers seem to be at the very bottom of
the social ladder:
…God has exhibited us apostles as last of all…
It is as if Paul and the other evangelisers were numbered
last in the line of condemned men called to fight for their lives in the
gladiatorial arena and on display before the whole world.
There is more irony as Paul mockingly compares his position
with the imagined superiority of the Corinthians:
We are fools for the sake of Christ, but you are sensible
people in Christ. We are weak, but you are strong. You are honored, but we are
dishonored.
The fact was, as he had reminded them earlier, they were
neither learned nor powerful nor influential. They came from the lower strata
of their society.
On the other hand, what Paul says of himself was largely
true. He proceeds to give a litany of the trials and hardships he and his
companions have to go through to fulfil their mission of proclaiming Christ to
the world:
To the present hour we are hungry and thirsty, we are
naked and beaten and homeless, and we grow weary from the work of our own
hands.
Paul and his companions worked hard to support themselves.
For example, we know that Paul supported himself as a tent-maker.
But following the teaching and example of their Master, they
turn the other cheek to all the abuse showered on them:
When reviled, we bless; when persecuted, we endure; when
slandered, we speak kindly. We have become like the rubbish of the world, the dregs
of all things, to this very day.
And as it seems to be implied, some of this abuse comes from
the Corinthians themselves.
Paul is saying all this not to shame or condemn them, but
“to admonish you as my beloved children”, and to help them realise the real
meaning of the gospel they have been called on to embrace. They may have
“ten-thousand guardians in Christ”, but they should remember they have only one
father, only one person who originally established the gospel among them and
that person is Paul:
Indeed, in Christ Jesus I fathered you through the
gospel.
All too often we hear Church leaders and pastors being
criticised, sometimes with justification. But we do need to remember that, from
top to bottom, we are a Church of flawed people. And so, we should keep in mind
what Paul says—namely, that what we really need to focus on is the Message
rather than the messengers. Some people abandon the Message on the basis of the
behaviour of one or two messengers. Sometimes this is a rationalisation for not
accepting the Message. We might remember Jesus’ words about being too conscious
about the splinter in the eye of the other while there is a large beam of wood
in our own. Messengers have had their shortcomings since the very beginning.
Just look at Peter and Paul. The gospel, too, is addressed equally to all and
the same fidelity is required of every member and not more from some and less
from others.
Commentary on Luke
6:1-5
Yet another confrontation between Jesus and some Pharisees
is described in today’s Gospel. Following immediately, as it does, after the
parable about the patch and the wineskins (Luke 5:33-39), it confirms what
Jesus said about the gap between the traditionalists and his vision.
He and his disciples were walking through a cornfield and it
was a Sabbath day. The disciples were plucking heads of grain, rubbing them in
their hands and eating them. The Sabbath did not forbid walking short
distances. And custom did not forbid ‘gleaning’, that is, taking grain left
over by reapers. It did forbid reaping and threshing. Only a very narrow-minded
interpretation could have described plucking as reaping and rubbing between the
hands as threshing, but that seems to be what is happening here.
The disciples are asked:
Why are you doing what is not lawful on the Sabbath?
Jesus answers very quickly and to the point. He makes no
reference to the narrow-minded legalism that his critics reveal, the ‘old
wineskin’ mentality. Instead, he throws at them an incident from the past.
David and his men were hungry so they went into the house of God and, with his
approval, ate the holy bread of the Presence which only the priests were
allowed to eat (1 Sam 21:6). Each Sabbath, twelve loaves of fresh bread were set
on a table in the Holy Place. The stale bread was eaten by the priests.
As king, David put himself above the law. Both David’s and
the disciples’ actions involved godly men doing something forbidden by law.
However, it is never a violation of a law to do what is good and to save life
(eating for survival). In that sense both David and the disciples were within
the spirit, though not the letter, of the law.
And Jesus, too, is above the law:
The Son of Man is lord of the Sabbath.
Jesus has the authority to overrule man-made laws concerning
the Sabbath, particularly as interpreted by the Pharisees. This does not mean,
of course, that Jesus (or even God for that matter) will do anything he feels
like doing. Jesus will never go against anything that involves the True or the
Good; with his Father he is the Source of all that is true and
good.
But many of the Jewish laws (like civil laws) are ‘positive
law’. In themselves, they involve matters which are neither good nor bad. In
itself, it is neither good nor bad to stop at a green light or go through a red
one. It is neither good nor bad of itself to abstain from work on the Sabbath.
What makes these acts good or bad is the deeper good of which they are a sign.
That deeper good may sometimes involve their non-observance. Hunger and
survival may over-ride a rule to fast. In a matter of extreme urgency it may be
necessary to drive (safely) through a red light. The letter of the law is
violated, but not the good it intends.
As noted in the Jerusalem Bible, “some manuscripts
of Luke contain a very pertinent [but likely spurious] saying at this point”:
On the same day, seeing a man working on the Sabbath day,
Jesus said to him: ‘Friend, if you know what you are doing, you are blessed;
but if you do not know, you are accursed as a breaker of the Law’.
That is a sentiment that goes with new wine and new
wineskins. If truth and goodness are not violated by doing or not doing
something, can we say there is sin or evil there?
https://sacredspace.com/commentary
Saturday,
September 5, 2026
Ordinary Time
Opening Prayer
Almighty God,
every good thing comes from You.
Fill our hearts with love for You, increase our faith, and by Your constant
care protect the good You have given us.
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 - Luke 6: 1-5
While Jesus was going through a field of grain on a sabbath,
his disciples were picking the heads of grain, rubbing them in their hands, and
eating them. Some Pharisees said, “Why are you doing what is unlawful on the
sabbath?” Jesus said to them in reply, “Have you not read what David did when
he and those who were with him were hungry? How he went into the house of God,
took the bread of offering, which only the priests could lawfully eat, ate of
it, and shared it with his companions?” Then he said to them, “The Son of Man
is lord of the sabbath.”
Reflection
The Gospel today speaks about the conflict concerning the
observance of the
Sabbath– Saturday. The observance
of the Sabbath was a central law, one of the Ten Commandments. This was a very
ancient Law, the value of which was stressed after the Exile. During the Exile,
the people had to work seven days a week from morning until evening, without
any provisions to meet and meditate on the Word of God, to pray together and to
share faith, their problems and their hopes. Therefore, there was an urgent
need to stop at least one day a week to get together and encourage one another
during the very difficult time of the exile. Otherwise, they would have lost
their faith. It was then that faith was reborn and the observance of Saturday
was re-established.
•
Luke 6: 1-2: The cause of the conflict. On
Saturday the disciples were walking across the cornfields, and they were
picking ears of corn. Matthew 12: 1 says that they were hungry (Mt 12: 1). The
Pharisees invoke the bible to say it was a transgression of the law of the
Sabbath: Why do you do what is not permitted on the Sabbath?” (cf. Ex 20:
8-11).
•
Luke 6: 3-4: Jesus’ response. Immediately Jesus
responds recalling that David himself also did things which were prohibited,
because he took the sacred bread from the temple and gave it to the soldiers to
eat because they were hungry (I Sam 21: 2-7). Jesus knew the bible and referred
to it to show that the arguments of others had no foundation. In Matthew,
Jesus’ response is more complete. He not only recalls the story of David but
also quotes the legislation which permits the priests to work on Saturday, and
He quotes the prophet Hosea: “Mercy is what pleases me, not sacrifice.” He
quotes a biblical text or a historical text, a legislative text, and a
prophetic text (cf. Mt 12: 1-18). At that time there was no printed bible as we
have today. In each community there was only one bible, handwritten, which
remained in the synagogue. If Jesus knew the bible so well, it means that in
the 30 years of his life in Nazareth He participated intensely in the life of
the community, where every Saturday the scriptures were read. We still lack the
same familiarity with the bible and the same participation in community that
other had then.
•
Luke 6: 5: The conclusion for all of us. Jesus
ends with the following statement: The Son of Man is master of the Sabbath! The
Lord of Saturday! Jesus, Son of Man, who lives in intimacy with God, discovers
the meaning of the bible not from outside, but from inside. He discovers the
meaning starting at the roots, beginning with His intimacy with the author of
the bible, who is God Himself. Because of this, He calls Himself Master of the
Sabbath. In the Gospel of Mark, Jesus revitalizes the law of Saturday, saying,
“Saturday was instituted for man and not man for Saturday.”
Personal Questions
•
How do you spend Sunday, which is our “Sabbath”?
Do you go to Mass because it is an obligation in order to avoid sin, or to be
with God?
•
Jesus knew the bible almost by heart. What does
the bible represent for me?
Concluding Prayer
My mouth shall always praise Yahweh, let every creature bless
His holy name for ever and ever. (Ps 145: 21)
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