Saturday of the Twenty-fourth Week in Ordinary Time (II)

Official Translation

Reading 1 – 1 Corinthians 15.35-37, 42-49

Brothers and sisters:
Someone will say, “How are the dead raised?”
and, “With what kind of body do they come back?”
Fool, what you plant does not come alive unless it dies.
What you plant is not the body that will come to be,
but a mere grain, perhaps of wheat, or of some other kind.

So also is the resurrection of the dead.
Planted as perishable, but raised as imperishable.
Planted in dishonor, but raised in glory.
Planted in weakness, but raised in power.
Planted an ensouled body, it is raised a spiritual body.
If there is an ensouled body, there is also a spiritual one.

So it is written, “The first human, Adam, became a living soul.”
The last Adam comes alive in the spirit.
But the spiritual is not first, but the ensouled, then the spiritual.
The first human is from the land, made of dirt.
The second human is from heaven.
As the dirt, so are those of the dirt,
and as the heavenly, so are those of the heavenly.
Just as we have borne the image of the dirt,
Let us also bear the image of the heavenly.

Responsorial – Psalm 56.10c-12, 13-14 Resp. 14

R. I will walk before God in the light of the living.

I know this, that God is for me.
In God, whose word I praise.
I have put my trust in God; I will not be afraid.
What can man do to me?

R. I will walk before God in the light of the living.

Your vows are on me, God.
I will give thank offerings to you.
For you have delivered my soul from death,
and prevented my feet from stumbling,
so that I will walk before God in the light of the living.

R. I will walk before God in the light of the living.

Gospel – Luke 8.4-15

When a great crowd came together,
and people from every city were coming to him,
he spoke in a parable: “The farmer went out to sow his seed.
As he sowed, some fell along the road,
and it was trampled underfoot, and the birds of the sky devoured it.
Other seed fell on the rock, and as soon as it grew,
it withered away, because it had no moisture.
Some other fell amid the thorns, and the thorns grew with it, and choked it.
Some other fell into the good land,
and grew, and produced one hundred times as much fruit.”
As he said these things, he called out, “Whoever has ears to hear, let them hear!”

Then his disciples asked him, “What does this parable mean?”
He said, “To you it is given to know the mysteries of the Kingdom of God,
but to the rest it is in parables, that:
'Seeing they may not see, and hearing they may not understand.’

Now the parable is this: The seed is the word of God.
Those along the road are those who hear,
then the devil comes, and takes away the word from their heart,
that they may not believe and be saved.
Those on the rock are they who, when they hear, receive the word with joy,
but these have no root, and believe for a while then fall away in time of temptation.
That which fell among the thorns, these are those who have heard,
and as they go on their way they are choked
with cares, riches, and pleasures of life, and bring no fruit to maturity.
As for that in the beautiful soil, they are those who, hearing the word,
embrace it with a beautiful and good heart, and bear fruit with perseverance.