Friday of the First Week of Lent Reading

Reading 1: Ez 18:21-28

Responsorial Psalm: Ps 130:1-2, 3-4, 5-7a, 7bc-8

Gospel: Mt 5:20-26

This Friday the Church shows no signs of letting up on her choice of radical Lenten readings! Perhaps the common thread between the first reading and the Gospel can be expressed like this: God desperately wants us to realize how utterly self-destructive our sin is. It is from this perspective that we can understand not only God’s justice but also His mercy. Sacred Scripture tells us that “mercy triumphs over judgment” (Jas 2:13), but this does not mean that mercy negates justice. Rather, God’s justice is itself an expression of His mercy.

One thinks here of the epigraph above the threshold of Dante’s Inferno, where the netherworld is described as being the product of “the highest wisdom and the primal love.”2 Even hell is a result of God’s mercy. Nonetheless, the first reading is careful to note that God does not derive any pleasure from the death of the wicked. He earnestly seeks our repentance, and He is constantly calling us to come out of ourselves.

Sin is so inherently egocentric that it inevitably distorts our value system and can even lead us to become frustrated with God and His precepts. Thus the challenge God poses to us in the book of Ezekiel is a pertinent one: “Is my way not just? Is it not your ways that are not just?” (Ezek 18:25). So often we make excuses for our bad behavior, but in the Gospel for today Jesus makes clear that the divine patience will not last forever. We are called to something higher than ourselves. So, let us call on the Divine Mercy and make that our firm resolve this day.

How can I grow in my devotion to the message of Divine Mercy proclaimed by St. Faustina Kowalska, St. John Paul II, and others?

Reference:

Journey Through Lent: Reflections on the Daily Mass Readings by Clement Harrold