Month: March 2025

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Why do the readings change during some Sundays of Lent?

During the third, fourth and fifth Sundays of Lent, some years the readings change from its corresponding liturgical cycle to readings from cycle A, why is this change? In order to answer this question, we must go back to two moments in the life of our Lord Jesus Christ where He leaves us a responsibility, one of them is on Thursday when he celebrated the Passover meal with his disciples, Jesus, took bread, blessed it, broke it and distributed it to his disciples, saying to them “This is my body, which will be given for you; do this in memory of me.” (Luke 22:18-20), and it is because of these words that we celebrate the Mass, the readings of which our Holy Mother Church has established in three annual cycles.

Between these words and the following ones that we must evaluate, the passion, death, and resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ occurs. His death and resurrection are the most important events in Christian theology. They form the point in Scripture where Jesus gives His ultimate demonstration that He has power over life and death, so He has the ability to give people eternal life.

The second moment comes from the words that our Lord pronounces after his resurrection: “Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the holy Spirit” (Matthew 28:19), this is the call to our mission of evangelization.

When there are people who wish to enter the Catholic Church and receive these three sacraments, the church brings us readings from the Gospel of St. John during these Sundays, to focus on the spiritual journey of those who are preparing to be received into the Catholic faith, emphasizing themes of healing, conversion, and the promise of eternal life.

These readings are part of one of the rites of Christian initiation known as scrutinies. The first scrutiny focuses on Jesus’ encounter with the Samaritan woman at the well, which symbolizes the thirst for spiritual truth and the offering of Christ as living water.

The second scrutiny focuses on Jesus’ healing of the man born blind, emphasizing the gift of sight and overcoming spiritual darkness, since Christ is the light of the world.

The third scrutiny presents Jesus raising Lazarus from the dead, representing Christ’s power over death and the promise of eternal life through Jesus Christ who is the way, the truth, and the life.

Let us rejoice when we hear these readings outside of their liturgical cycle, for this means that we are fulfilling the mission that our Lord Jesus Christ entrusted to us before His ascension into heaven: to evangelize people of all nations and to make them disciples of our Lord.

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What kind of disciple of Christ do I want to be?

As Christians we have heard the parable of the sower: “A sower went out to sow. And as he sowed, some seed fell on the path, and birds came and ate it up. Some fell on rocky ground, where it had little soil. It sprang up at once because the soil was not deep, and when the sun rose it was scorched, and it withered for lack of roots. Some seed fell among thorns, and the thorns grew up and choked it. But some seed fell on rich soil, and produced fruit, a hundred or sixty or thirtyfold” (Matthew 13:3-8)

Now, what does this parable tells me today? What kind of disciple of Christ do I want to be? Am I like that seed that falls on the road, that hearing the word of God at mass, but once I leave the church, I am already judging my neighbor and forget the Gospel? Am I one of those who receive the word with joy, but as soon as my faith is questioned, I have doubts and walk away? Am I one of those who receive the teachings of Jesus Christ with enthusiasm, but the trivialities of the world do not allow me to practice them and I leave them aside? Or am I like that seed that falls on fertile ground, and that I bear fruit with my actions for the glory of the Lord a hundred, sixty or thirty times one?

Let us remember the words of our Lord Jesus Christ, “every good tree bears good fruit, and a rotten tree bears bad fruit. A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a rotten tree bear good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit will be cut down and thrown into the fire. So by their fruits you will know them.” (Matthew 7:17-20)

Let us always be fertile soil for the seed of the Gospel, let us proclaim the good news with our words and actions, so that we can be a tree that bears good fruit and that by that good fruit we are to be known.