FOURTEENTH SUNDAY AFTER PENTECOST

 

FOURTEENTH SUNDAY AFTER PENTECOST

DOUBLE / GREEN
God made the human body sacred and
beautiful, the procreator with God of new life, the instrument by which
Christ redeemed all mankind, the essential implement of zealous
apostles, the very temple of the Trinity, destined to be resurrected and
glorified. On earth, however, the body is not to be idolized or
pampered, not to be served as a domineering tyrant. Left to itself, each
bodily instinct seeks its own satisfaction, often to the harm of the
whole person. Restraint controls the body and frees the soul for joy in
living Christian ideals.

INTROIT Ps. 83:10-11
O God, our Protector, look, and gaze
upon the face of Your Christ. Better indeed is one day in Your courts
than a thousand elsewhere.

Ps. 83:2-3. How lovely is Your dwelling place, O Lord of hosts! My soul yearns and faints for the courts of the Lord.
V. Glory be . . .

COLLECT
Keep Your Church, O Lord, in Your
everlasting mercy. Without Your assistance our human nature is bound to
fall, so help us to shun whatever is harmful and guide us towards those
things that will aid our salvation. Through our Lord . . .

EPISTLE Gal. 5:16-24
Brethren: Walk in the Spirit: and you
shall not fulfill the lusts of the flesh. For the flesh lusteth against
the spirit: and the spirit against the flesh: For these are contrary one
to another: so that you do not the things that you would. But if you
are led by the spirit, you are not under the law.

Now the works of the flesh are manifest: which are fornication, uncleanness, immodesty, luxury,

Idolatry, witchcrafts, enmities,
contentions, emulations, wraths, quarrels, dissensions, sects, Envies,
murders, drunkenness, revellings, and such like. Of the which I foretell
you, as I have foretold to you, that they who do such things shall not
obtain the kingdom of God.

But the fruit of the Spirit is,
charity, joy, peace, patience, benignity, goodness, longanimity,
Mildness, faith, modesty, continency, chastity. Against such there is no
law. And they that are Christ's have crucified their flesh, with the
vices and concupiscences.


GRADUAL Ps. 117:8-9
It is better to trust in the Lord than to confide in man.
V. It is better to have confidence in the Lord than to rely on princes.

Alleluia, alleluia! V. Ps. 94:1
Come, let us praise the Lord with joy, let us sing joyfully to God our Saviour. Alleluia!

GOSPEL Matt. 6:24-33
At that time, Jesus said to His disciples: "No
man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one, and love
the other: or he will sustain the one, and despise the other. You cannot
serve God and mammon. "Therefore
I say to you, be not solicitous for your life, what you shall eat, nor
for your body, what you shall put on. Is not the life more than the
meat: and the body more than the raiment? Behold the birds of the air,
for they neither sow, nor do they reap, nor gather into barns: and your
heavenly Father feedeth them. Are not you of much more value than they?
And which of you by taking thought, can add to his stature one cubit? "And
for raiment why are you solicitous? Consider the lilies of the field,
how they grow: they labour not, neither do they spin. But I say to you,
that not even Solomon in all his glory was arrayed as one of these. And
if the grass of the field, which is to day, and to morrow is cast into
the oven, God doth so clothe: how much more you, O ye of little faith? "Be
not solicitous therefore, saying: What shall we eat: or what shall we
drink, or wherewith shall we be clothed? For after all these things do
the heathens seek. For your Father knoweth that you have need of all
these things. Seek ye therefore first the kingdom of God, and his
justice, and all these things shall be added unto you."

OFFERTORY ANTIPHON Ps. 33:8-9
The Angel of the Lord shall encamp around those who fear him, and shall deliver them. Taste and see how good is the Lord.

SECRET 
O Lord, grant that this offering of the
Sacrifice of salvation may take away our sins and appease Your majesty.
Through our Lord . . .


COMMUNION ANTIPHON Matt. 6:33
"Seek first the kingdom of God, and all other things shall be given you besides," said the Lord.

POSTCOMMUNION 
May Your Sacrament ever cleanse and strengthen us, O God, and lead us to eternal salvation. Through our Lord . . .