Friday, February 20
Friday after Ash Wednesday – Year A
First Reading – Isaiah 58:1-9
“Cry aloud, spare not, lift up your voice like a trumpet; declare to my people their transgression, to the house of Jacob their sins. Yet they seek me daily, and delight to know my ways, as if they were a nation that did righteousness and did not forsake the ordinance of their God; they ask of me righteous judgments, they delight to draw near to God. ‘Why have we fasted, and you see it not? Why have we humbled ourselves, and you take no knowledge of it?’ Behold, in the day of your fast you seek your own pleasure, and oppress all your workers. Behold, you fast only to quarrel and to fight and to hit with wicked fist. Fasting like yours this day will not make your voice to be heard on high. Is such the fast that I choose, a day for a man to humble himself? Is it to bow down his head like a rush, and to spread sackcloth and ashes under him? Will you call this a fast, and a day acceptable to the Lord? “Is not this the fast that I choose: to loose the bonds of wickedness, to undo the thongs of the yoke, to let the oppressed go free, and to break every yoke? Is it not to share your bread with the hungry, and bring the homeless poor into your house; when you see the naked, to cover him, and not to hide yourself from your own flesh? Then shall your light break forth like the dawn, and your healing shall spring up speedily; your righteousness shall go before you, the glory of the Lord shall be your rear guard. Then you shall call, and the Lord will answer; you shall cry, and he will say, Here I am. “If you take away from the midst of you the yoke, the pointing of the finger, and speaking wickedness.”
Responsorial Psalm – Psalm 51:3-4, 5-6, 18-19
℟ A heart contrite and humbled, O God, you will not spurn.
For I know my transgressions, and my sin is ever before me.
Against you, you only, have I sinned, and done that which is evil in your sight, so that you are justified in your sentence and blameless in your judgment.
℟ A heart contrite and humbled, O God, you will not spurn.
Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity, and in sin did my mother conceive me.
Behold, you desire truth in the inward being; therefore teach me wisdom in my secret heart.
℟ A heart contrite and humbled, O God, you will not spurn.
Do good to Zion in your good pleasure; rebuild the walls of Jerusalem,
then will you delight in right sacrifices, in burnt offerings and whole burnt offerings; then bulls will be offered on your altar.
℟ A heart contrite and humbled, O God, you will not spurn.
Verse Before the Gospel – Amos 5:14
Seek good, and not evil, that you may live; and so the Lord, the God of hosts, will be with you, as you have said.
Gospel – Matthew 9:14-15
Then the disciples of John came to him, saying, “Why do we and the Pharisees fast, w but your disciples do not fast?” And Jesus said to them, “Can the wedding guests mourn as long as the bridegroom is with them? The days will come, when the bridegroom is taken away from them, and then they will fast.
Revised Standard Version, Second Catholic Edition, Ignatius Press, Copyright ⓒ 2006.
