Saturday of the Fifth Week of Lent

Official Translation

Reading 1 - Ezekiel 37.21-28

Thus says the Lord God:
Behold, I will take the children of Israel
from among the nations,
where they have gone,
and will gather them on every side,
and bring them into their own land:
and I will make them one nation in the land,
on the mountains of Israel;
and one king shall be king to them all;
and they shall be no more two nations,
nor shall they be divided into two kingdoms
anymore at all;
nor shall they defile themselves
anymore with their idols,
nor with their detestable things,
nor with any of their transgressions;
but I will save them from
all their backsliding, in which they have sinned,
and will cleanse them:
so shall they be my people,
and I will be their God.

My servant David shall be king over them;
and they all shall have one shepherd:
they shall also walk in my ordinances,
and observe my statutes, and do them.
They shall dwell in the land
that I have given to Jacob my servant,
in which your fathers lived;
and they shall dwell therein,
they, and their children,
and their children’s children, forever:
and David my servant shall be their prince forever.

Moreover I will make a covenant of peace with them;
it shall be an everlasting covenant with them;
and I will place them, and multiply them,
and will set my sanctuary among them forevermore.
My tent also shall be with them;
and I will be their God,
and they shall be my people.
The nations shall know that I am the Lord
who sanctifies Israel,
when my sanctuary shall be among them
forevermore.

Responsorial – Jeremiah 31.10, 11-12abcd, 13 Resp. 10d

R. The Lord will keep us, as a shepherd does his flock.

Hear the word of the Lord, you nations,
and declare it on the far off islands, and say,
“He who scattered Israel will gather him,
and keep him, as a shepherd does his flock.

R. The Lord will keep us, as a shepherd does his flock.

For the Lord will ransom Jacob,
and redeem him from the hand of him who was stronger.
They shall come and sing in the height of Zion,
and shall flow to the goodness of the Lord,
to the grain, and to the new wine, and to the oil,
and to the young of the flock and of the herd:

R. The Lord will keep us, as a shepherd does his flock.

Then shall the virgin rejoice in the dance,
and the young men and the old together;
for I will turn their mourning into joy,
and will comfort them, and make them rejoice after their sorrows.

R. The Lord will keep us, as a shepherd does his flock.

Gospel – John 11.45-56

Many of the Jews who came to Mary
and had seen what Jesus did,
believed in him.
But some of them went away to the Pharisees,
and told them the things which Jesus had done.
The chief priests therefore and the Pharisees
gathered the Sanhedrin, and said,
“What are we going to do?
For this man does many signs.
If we leave him alone like this,
everyone will believe in him,
and the Romans will come and take away
both our land and our nation.”

But a certain one of them, Caiaphas,
being high priest that year, said to them,
“You know nothing at all,
nor do you consider that it is advantageous for us
that one man should die for the people,
and that the whole nation not perish.”
Now he did not say this of himself,
but being high priest that year,
he prophesied that Jesus would die for the nation,
and not for the nation only,
but that he might also gather together
into one the children of God who are scattered abroad.
So from that day forward they took counsel
that they might put him to death.

Jesus therefore no longer walked openly among the Jews,
but departed from there
into the country near the wilderness,
to a city called Ephraim.
He stayed there with his disciples.

Now the Passover of the Jews was at hand.
Many went up from the country to Jerusalem
before the Passover, to purify themselves.
Then they sought for Jesus and spoke one with another,
as they stood in the temple,
“What do you think—that he is not coming to the feast?”