Begin the week in peace

Today’s first reading (Philippians 2:1-4) is a wonderful exhortation to Church unity:

Complete my joy
by being of the same mind, with the same love,
united in heart, thinking one thing.
Do nothing out of selfishness or out of vainglory;
rather, humbly regard others
as more important than yourselves,
each looking out not for his own interests,
but also everyone for those of others.

Today’s Gospel (Luke 14:12-14) calls us to true generosity:

When you hold a banquet,
invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind;
blessed indeed will you be
because of their inability to repay you.
For you will be repaid at the resurrection of the righteous.

Both of these readings need to be remembered and to be lived, yet we should not fail to hold onto today’s Responsorial Psalm (Psalm 131:1b-3): words of God’s love and peace that are good to remember and repeat as we begin our day and begin our week.

LORD, my heart is not proud;
nor are my eyes haughty.

I do not busy myself with great matters,
with things too sublime for me.

Rather, I have stilled my soul,
hushed it like a weaned child.

Like a weaned child on its mother's lap,
so is my soul within me.

Israel, hope in the LORD,
now and forever