July 4, 2012
Wednesday of the Fourteenth Week in Ordinary Time
We hope that today is a good day.
Today's Bible story based on the calendar of the Catholic Church.
http://www.catholicnewsagency.com/calendar.php
Most of these contents are things of The World English Bible.
http://ebible.org/web/
We hope that everyone in the peace of the Lord.
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+ Saints:
St. Ulric of Augsburg
St. Elizabeth of Portugal
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+ First Reading: Amos 5:14-15, 21-24
14 Seek good, and not evil,
that you may live;
and so Yahweh, the God of Armies, will be with you,
as you say.
15 Hate evil, love good,
and establish justice in the courts.
It may be that Yahweh, the God of Armies, will be gracious to the remnant of Joseph.
21 I hate, I despise your feasts,
and I can't stand your solemn assemblies.
22 Yes, though you offer me your burnt offerings and meal offerings,
I will not accept them;
neither will I regard the peace offerings of your fat animals.
23 Take away from me the noise of your songs!
I will not listen to the music of your harps.
24 But let justice roll on like rivers,
and righteousness like a mighty stream.
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+ Psalm: Psalms 50:7-13, 16bc-17
7 Hear, my people, and I will speak;
Israel, and I will testify against you.
I am God, your God.
8 I don't rebuke you for your sacrifices.
Your burnt offerings are continually before me.
9 I have no need for a bull from your stall,
nor male goats from your pens.
10 For every animal of the forest is mine,
and the livestock on a thousand hills.
11 I know all the birds of the mountains.
The wild animals of the field are mine.
12 If I were hungry, I would not tell you,
for the world is mine, and all that is in it.
13 Will I eat the flesh of bulls,
or drink the blood of goats?
16b What right do you have to declare my statutes,
that you have taken my covenant on your lips,
17 since you hate instruction,
and throw my words behind you?
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+ Gospel: Matthew 8:28-34
28 When he came to the other side, into the country of the Gergesenes, ‡ two people possessed by demons met him there, coming out of the tombs, exceedingly fierce, so that nobody could pass that way.
29 Behold, they cried out, saying, "What do we have to do with you, Jesus, Son of God? Have you come here to torment us before the time?"
30 Now there was a herd of many pigs feeding far away from them.
31 The demons begged him, saying, "If you cast us out, permit us to go away into the herd of pigs."
32 He said to them, "Go!"
They came out, and went into the herd of pigs: and behold, the whole herd of pigs rushed down the cliff into the sea, and died in the water.
33 Those who fed them fled, and went away into the city, and told everything, including what happened to those who were possessed with demons.
34 Behold, all the city came out to meet Jesus. When they saw him, they begged that he would depart from their borders.
‡8:28: NU reads "Gadarenes"
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+ Today's Reading: ネヘミヤ記(9:1-2、5-21)
1 Now in the twenty-fourth day of this month the children of Israel were assembled with fasting, and with sackcloth, and earth on them.
2 The seed of Israel separated themselves from all foreigners, and stood and confessed their sins, and the iniquities of their fathers.
5 Then the Levites, Jeshua, and Kadmiel, Bani, Hashabneiah, Sherebiah, Hodiah, Shebaniah, and Pethahiah, said, "Stand up and bless Yahweh your God from everlasting to everlasting! Blessed be your glorious name, which is exalted above all blessing and praise!
6 You are Yahweh, even you alone. You have made heaven, the heaven of heavens, with all their army, the earth and all things that are on it, the seas and all that is in them, and you preserve them all. The army of heaven worships you.
7 You are Yahweh, the God who chose Abram, and brought him out of Ur of the Chaldees, and gave him the name of Abraham,
8 and found his heart faithful before you, and made a covenant with him to give the land of the Canaanite, the Hittite, the Amorite, and the Perizzite, and the Jebusite, and the Girgashite, to give it to his seed, and have performed your words; for you are righteous.
9 "You saw the affliction of our fathers in Egypt, and heard their cry by the Red Sea*,
10 and showed signs and wonders against Pharaoh, and against all his servants, and against all the people of his land; for you knew that they dealt proudly against them, and made a name for yourself, as it is this day.
11 You divided the sea before them, so that they went through the midst of the sea on the dry land; and you cast their pursuers into the depths, as a stone into the mighty waters.
12 Moreover, in a pillar of cloud you led them by day; and in a pillar of fire by night, to give them light in the way in which they should go.
13 "You came down also on Mount Sinai, and spoke with them from heaven, and gave them right ordinances and true laws, good statutes and commandments,
14 and made known to them your holy Sabbath, and commanded them commandments, and statutes, and a law, by Moses your servant,
15 and gave them bread from the sky for their hunger, and brought forth water for them out of the rock for their thirst, and commanded them that they should go in to possess the land which you had sworn to give them.
16 "But they and our fathers dealt proudly and hardened their neck, didn't listen to your commandments,
17 and refused to obey, neither were they mindful of your wonders that you did among them, but hardened their neck, and in their rebellion appointed a captain to return to their bondage. But you are a God ready to pardon, gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and abundant in loving kindness, and didn't forsake them.
18 Yes, when they had made them a molten calf, and said, 'This is your God who brought you up out of Egypt,' and had committed awful blasphemies;
19 yet you in your manifold mercies didn't forsake them in the wilderness: the pillar of cloud didn't depart from over them by day, to lead them in the way; neither the pillar of fire by night, to show them light, and the way in which they should go.
20 You gave also your good Spirit to instruct them, and didn't withhold your manna from their mouth, and gave them water for their thirst.
21 "Yes, forty years you sustained them in the wilderness. They lacked nothing. Their clothes didn't grow old, and their feet didn't swell.
*9:9: or, Sea of Reeds
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