Faith > Sunday’s readings
Sunday's Readings: Mothering Sunday
Exodus 2.1-10 or 1 Samuel 1.20-end; Psalm 34.11-20 or 127.1-4.2; Corinthians 1.3-7 or Colossians 3.12-17; Luke 2.33-35 or John 19.25b-27 IF LAST week’s Gospel was one of the longest in the lectionary, this one must be the…
Sunday's readings: 3rd Sunday of Lent
Exodus 17.1-7; Psalm 95; Romans 5.1-11; John 4.5-42 THIS Gospel is the longest set for a principal service outside Passiontide. Length alone tells us that the message must be important, must be taken as a whole, and must be…
Sunday’s Readings: 2nd Sunday of Lent
Genesis 12.1-4a; Psalm 121; Romans 4.1-5, 13-17; John 3.1-17JOHN the Evangelist does not do homely chit-chat. I cannot imagine him (or the other Evangelists) reporting a conversation between Jesus and his followers about the…
Sunday’s Readings: 1st Sunday of Lent
Genesis 2.15-17, 3.1-7; Psalm 32; Romans 5.12-19; Matthew 4.1-11OUT of the 66 books of the Bible, 27 are in the New Testament. I know that now because, when it was a question on the quiz programme, Only Connect, I…
Sunday’s Readings: 2nd Sunday before Lent
Genesis 1.1-2.3; Psalm 136 (136 1-9, 23-end); Romans 8.18-25; Matthew 6.25-endONE scholar encourages us to savour the “combination of sapiential insight and apocalyptic vision in the anxieties passage”. But his shorthand —…
Presentation of Christ in the Temple (Candlemas)
Malachi 3.1-5; Psalm 24; Hebrews 2.14-end; Luke 2.22-40MOST reflections on the Presentation of Christ in the Temple (also called Candlemas) focus on Simeon and Anna. Through this baby — among all the babies who must have…
The Conversion of St Paul
Jeremiah 1.4-10; Psalm 67; Acts 9.1-22; Matthew 19.27-endAS I prepared to write about the conversion of Paul, I was tempted to comment on Acts 9 as well as the Gospel, even though, for the past two-and-a-bit years, I have…
Sunday's Readings: 2nd Sunday of Epiphany
Isaiah 49.1-7; Psalm 40.1-12; 1 Corinthians 1.19; John 1.29-42 ALL four Gospels record John the Baptist’s declaration: “Among you stands one whom you do not know, the one who is coming after me” (John 1.26). Unique to this…
The Baptism of Christ, 1st Sunday of Epiphany
Isaiah 42.1-9; Psalm 29; Acts 10.34-43; Matthew 3.13-endTHE Baptism of Christ, taken with the Epiphany, sets the pattern for each new year of our discipleship. Last week, the identity of the Christ-child was made known to the…
The Epiphany
Isaiah 61.1-6; Psalm 72 (1-9) 10-16; Ephesians 3.1-12; Matthew 2.1-12THE festival of the Epiphany preserves its Greek name in the Western Church. By the second century, it was beginning to be kept as a feast on 6 January. It…
