Keep yourself up

It is easy to take one’s health for granted: to skip exercising and healthy food.

So also in the spiritual realm, as Saint Paul reminds us in today’s first reading (1 Corinthians 9:16-19, 22b-27).

Every athlete exercises discipline in every way.

They do it to win a perishable crown,
but we an imperishable one.

Thus I do not run aimlessly;
I do not fight as if I were shadowboxing.
No, I drive my body and train it,
for fear that, after having preached to others,
I myself should be disqualified.

Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the living God, be merciful to me – a sinner.