Eleventh Sunday in Ordinary Time (B)

Official Translation

Reading 1 – Ezekiel 17.22-24

Thus says the Lord GOD:
I will also take of the
lofty top of the cedar;
I will crop off from the topmost
of its young twigs a tender one,
and I will plant it on
a high and lofty mountain:
in the mountain heights of Israel
I will plant it;

and it shall produce boughs,
and bear fruit, and be a goodly cedar:
and under it shall dwell
all birds of every wing;
in the shade of its branches
shall they dwell.

All the trees of the field shall know that
I, the Lord, have brought down the high tree,
have exalted the low tree,
have dried up the green tree,
and have made the dry tree to flourish;
I, the Lord, have spoken and will do it.

Responsorial – Psalm 92.2-3, 13-14, 15-16 Resp. 2a

R. It is a good thing to give thanks to the Lord.

It is a good thing to give thanks to the Lord,
to sing praises to your name, Most High;
to proclaim your loving kindness in the morning,
and your faithfulness every night,

R. It is a good thing to give thanks to the Lord.

The righteous shall flourish like the palm tree.
He will grow like a cedar in Lebanon.
They are planted in the house of the Lord.
They will flourish in the courts of our God.

R. It is a good thing to give thanks to the Lord.

They will still produce fruit in old age.
They will be full of sap and green,
to show that the Lord is upright.
He is my rock, and there is no unrighteousness in him.

R. It is a good thing to give thanks to the Lord.

Reading 2 – 2 Corinthians 5.6-10

Brothers and sisters:
We are always confident
and know that while we are
at home in the body,
we are absent from the Lord;
for we walk by faith, not by sight.

We are courageous, I say,
and are willing rather
to be absent from the body,
and to be at home with the Lord.
Therefore also we make it our aim,
whether at home or absent,
to be well pleasing to him.
For we must all appear
before the judgment seat of Christ;
that each one may receive things
according to what they have done in the body,
whether good or evil.

Gospel – Mark 4.26-34

Jesus said to the crowds,
“The Kingdom of God is
like when a human
casts seed on the earth,
and sleeps and rises
night and day,
and the seed springs up and grows,
they know not how.
For the earth bears fruit:
first the blade, then the ear,
then the full grain in the ear.
But when the fruit is ripe,
immediately they put in the sickle,
because the harvest has come.”

He said, “To what will we compare
the Kingdom of God?
Or with what parable will we illustrate it?
It is like a grain of mustard seed,
which, when it is sown in the earth,
is smaller than the other seeds
that are on the earth,
yet when it is sown, grows up,
and becomes greater than all the plants,
and puts out great branches,
so that the birds of the sky
can lodge under its shadow.”
With many such parables
he spoke the word to them,
as they were able to hear it.
Without a parable he did not speak to them;
but privately to his own disciples
he explained everything.