Friday 3 November 2023

Today is Friday 3 November, in the 30th week of Ordinary time.

The community of Taizé sing, Dominus Spiritus est, The Lord is the Spirit; the Spirit gives life. God is the source of all life, the one in whom we live and move and have our being.

As I look around me now, at the people around me, can I sense God’s presence? Can I sense God’s Holy Spirit here? In these people? In me?

Dominus spiritus est
Spiritus autem vivificat
Spiritus autem vivificat
The Lord is the Spirit
The Spirit gives life




Today’s reading is from the Gospel of Luke.

Luke 14:1-6

On one occasion when Jesus was going to the house of a leader of the Pharisees to eat a meal on the sabbath, they were watching him closely. Just then, in front of him, there was a man who had dropsy. And Jesus asked the lawyers and Pharisees, ‘Is it lawful to cure people on the sabbath, or not?’ But they were silent. So Jesus took him and healed him, and sent him away. Then he said to them, ‘If one of you has a child or an ox that has fallen into a well, will you not immediately pull it out on a sabbath day?’ And they could not reply to this.

Today’s reading comes from one of the “disastrous dinner parties” that you come across in Luke’s gospel, when Jesus finds himself at table with those who seem to disapprove of him. Have you noticed that when “Sabbath” and “Pharisees” appear in the same sentence, there is always going to be trouble? Spend a moment reflecting on that tension, between Jesus and the Pharisees…


“They were watching him closely”. How do you imagine this moment in the scene?


Now listen as the passage is read a second time for you. Why do you think Jesus’ opponents were “silenced”? Watch the moment play out in your mind…

Finally, see if you can gather together all the thoughts that have come to you during this time of prayer, and turn them into a petition to God.

Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit. As it was in the beginning, is now and ever shall be, world without end. Amen.