22nd Sunday in Ordinary Time
August 28, 2022
First Reading: Sirach 3:17-18, 20, 28-29
17 My son, perform your tasks in meekness; then you will be loved by those whom God accepts. 18 The greater you are, the more you must humble yourself; so you will find favor in the sight of the Lord. 20 For great is the might of the Lord; he is glorified by the humble. 28 The affliction of the proud has no healing, for a plant of wickedness has taken root in him. 29 The mind of the intelligent man will ponder a parable, and an attentive ear is the wise man’s desire.
3 But let the righteous be joyful; let them exult before God; let them be jubilant with joy! 4 Sing to God, sing praises to his name; lift up a song to him who rides upon the clouds; his name is the LORD, exult before him! 5 Father of the fatherless and protector of widows is God in his holy habitation. 6 God gives the desolate a home to dwell in; he leads out the prisoners to prosperity; but the rebellious dwell in a parched land. 9 Rain in abundance, O God, thou didst shed abroad; thou didst restore thy heritage as it languished; 10 thy flock found a dwelling in it; in thy goodness, O God, thou didst provide for the needy.
Second Reading: Hebrews 12:18-19, 22-24
18 For you have not come to what may be touched, a blazing fire, and darkness, and gloom, and a tempest, 19 and the sound of a trumpet, and a voice whose words made the hearers entreat that no further messages be spoken to them. 22 But you have come to Mount Zion and to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to innumerable angels in festal gathering, 23 and to the assembly of the first-born who are enrolled in heaven, and to a judge who is God of all, and to the spirits of just men made perfect, 24 and to Jesus, the mediator of a new covenant, and to the sprinkled blood that speaks more graciously than the blood of Abel.
1 One sabbath when he went to dine at the house of a ruler who belonged to the Pharisees, they were watching him. 7 Now he told a parable to those who were invited, when he marked how they chose the places of honor, saying to them, 8 “When you are invited by any one to a marriage feast, do not sit down in a place of honor, lest a more eminent man than you be invited by him; 9 and he who invited you both will come and say to you, `Give place to this man,’ and then you will begin with shame to take the lowest place. 10 But when you are invited, go and sit in the lowest place, so that when your host comes he may say to you, `Friend, go up higher’; then you will be honored in the presence of all who sit at table with you. 11 For every one who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted.” 12 He said also to the man who had invited him, “When you give a dinner or a banquet, do not invite your friends or your brothers or your kinsmen or rich neighbors, lest they also invite you in return, and you be repaid. 13 But when you give a feast, invite the poor, the maimed, the lame, the blind, 14 and you will be blessed, because they cannot repay you. You will be repaid at the resurrection of the just.”
Reflection for the day: “If God seems at times to be slow in responding, it is because He is preparing a better gift. He will not deny us. We well know that the long-awaited gift is all the more precious for the delay in its being granted … Ask, seek, insist. Through this asking and seeking you will be better prepared to receive God’s gift when it comes. God withholds what you are not yet ready for. He wants you to have a lively desire for His greatest fits. All of which is to say, pray always and do not lose heart.” — St. Augustine
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