Daily Readings for November 16, 2018

1st READING

Love makes many demands in our relationship with God and with others. Let us remain within the bounds of what it means to love Him and one another. The commandments give us guidelines of what is permissible and what is not. Through the commandments, God guides us in the ways of truth. Let us open our minds and hearts as we reflect on them.

2 John 4-9

4 [Chosen Lady:] I rejoiced greatly to find some of your children walking in the truth just as we were commanded by the Father. 5 But now, Lady, I ask you, not as though I were writing a new commandment but the one we have had from the beginning: let us love one another. 6 For this is love, that we walk according to his commandments; this is the commandment, as you heard from the beginning, in which you should walk. 7 Many deceivers have gone out into the world, those who do not acknowledge Jesus Christ as coming in the flesh; such is the deceitful one and the antichrist. 8 Look to yourselves that you do not lose what we worked for but may receive a full recompense. 9 Anyone who is so “progressive” as not to remain in the teaching of the Christ does not have God; whoever remains in the teaching has the Father and the Son.

P S A L M 

Psalm 119:1, 2, 10, 11, 17, 18

R: Blessed are they who follow the law of the Lord!

1 Blessed are they whose way is blameless, who walk in the law of the Lord. (R) 2 Blessed are they who observe his decrees, who seek him with all their heart. (R) 10 With all my heart I seek you; let me not stray from your commands. (R) 11 Within my heart I treasure your promise that I may not sin against you. (R) 17 Be good to your servant, that I may live and keep your words. (R) 18 Open my eyes, that I may consider the wonders of your law. (R) 

GOSPEL 

The vulture is a bird that gathers around the carcasses of dead animals. Like the vulture, sin will build on sin. We need to be vigilant against temptation because when we welcome one temptation, we open the door for a second one and more. The more we “play with sin,” the more we will fall under its spell and into its arms of death.

GOSPEL ACCLAMATION 

Stand erect and raise your heads because your redemption is at hand. 

Luke 17:26-37

26 Jesus said to his disciples: “As it was in the days of Noah, so it will be in the days of the Son of Man; 27 they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage up to the day that Noah entered the ark, and the flood came and destroyed them all. 28 Similarly, as it was in the days of Lot: they were eating, drinking, buying, selling, planting, building; 29 on the day when Lot left Sodom, fire and brimstone rained from the sky to destroy them all. 30 So it will be on the day the Son of Man is revealed. 31 On that day, someone who is on the housetop and whose belongings are in the house must not go down to get them, and likewise a person in the field must not return to what was left behind. 32 Remember the wife of Lot. 33 Whoever seeks to preserve his life will lose it, but whoever loses it will save it. 34 I tell you, on that night there will be two people in one bed; one will be taken, the other left. 35 And there will be two women grinding meal together; one will be taken, the other left.” 36-37 They said to him in reply, “Where, Lord?” He said to them, “Where the body is, there also the vultures will gather.”