Twentieth Sunday in Ordinary Time (A)
Woman, you have great faith
The Word This Week
Today is one of those occasions when, even though the second reading is not chosen to correspond to the theme of the Gospel and first reading, it does in fact fit very well. Indeed, much of the letter to the Romans is explained in this Sundays Liturgy of the Word: the whole theme is summed up in this: the Messiah came first of all to the people of Israel, to whom the promises were made in the past - but it could not remain there. The good news had to be taken to the ends of the earth, so that all peoples, indeed the whole of creation could welcome the Messiah and take a place in the
Notes for Readers
First
You will have to be careful with this reading: there are some difficult technical words which a congregation might not catch, such as integrity, manifest, Sabbath, covenant, holocausts. Take special care to read them clearly. The whole point of this piece of Scripture is to confirm that righteous foreigners can take their place on Gods holy mountain. The first paragraph acts as a prelude to this announcement: in the long sentence underline Foreigners and what will happen to them: These I will bring to my holy mountain. In the sentence about sacrifices, perhaps you should emphasise it thus: ...their sacrifices will be accepted. Similarly, emphasise the last words: ...for all the peoples.
Second
Be careful with the first line: pagans for Paul is not a negative term, as it is for us today. The next line makes this clear: I am proud of being sent... Paul develops the idea that has been present in this letter from the beginning: how to reconcile the two groups involved in the mystery of salvation: the pagans and the people of
Wordsearch
Click on the link to get this week's Gospel based Wordsearch. Feel free to copy and paste it into your parish publications.