Thursday of week 7 in Ordinary Time

First reading

James 5:1-6

The Lord hears the cries of those you have cheated

An answer for the rich. Start crying, weep for the miseries that are coming to you. Your wealth is all rotting, your clothes are all eaten up by moths. All your gold and your silver are corroding away, and the same corrosion will be your own sentence, and eat into your body. It was a burning fire that you stored up as your treasure for the last days. Labourers mowed your fields, and you cheated them – listen to the wages that you kept back, calling out; realise that the cries of the reapers have reached the ears of the Lord of hosts. On earth you have had a life of comfort and luxury; in the time of slaughter you went on eating to your heart’s content. It was you who condemned the innocent and killed them; they offered you no resistance.

Psalm or canticle

Psalm 48(49):14-20

This is the lot of those who trust in themselves,
 who have others at their beck and call.
Like sheep they are driven to the grave,
 where death shall be their shepherd
 and the just shall become their rulers.

With the morning their outward show vanishes
 and the grave becomes their home.
But God will ransom me from death
 and take my soul to himself.

Then do not fear when a man grows rich,
 when the glory of his house increases.
He takes nothing with him when he dies,
 his glory does not follow him below.

Though he flattered himself while he lived:
 ‘Men will praise me for all my success,’
yet he will go to join his fathers,
 who will never see the light any more.

Gospel

Mark 9:41-50

If your hand should cause you to sin, cut it off

Jesus said to his disciples:
‘If anyone gives you a cup of water to drink just because you belong to Christ, then I tell you solemnly, he will most certainly not lose his reward.
‘But anyone who is an obstacle to bring down one of these little ones who have faith, would be better thrown into the sea with a great millstone round his neck. And if your hand should cause you to sin, cut it off; it is better for you to enter into life crippled, than to have two hands and go to hell, into the fire that cannot be put out. And if your foot should cause you to sin, cut it off; it is better for you to enter into life lame, than to have two feet and be thrown into hell. And if your eye should cause you to sin, tear it out; it is better for you to enter into the kingdom of God with one eye, than to have two eyes and be thrown into hell where their worm does not die nor their fire go out. For everyone will be salted with fire. Salt is a good thing, but if salt has become insipid, how can you season it again? Have salt in yourselves and be at peace with one another.’

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