33rd Sunday of the Year

33rd Sunday of the Year

November 19, 2023

Year A

Commentary

Discover the deeper meaning and connections found in this week's readings, through these great commentaries written by our priests.

The Word

Explore this week's readings and hear what God is saying to us through His Word.

Liturgy notes

Find out more about how we can mark this special day in our liturgy.

Music

See our music recommendations for the liturgy.

Commentary

Fr Gaston Forbah

The main theme of this weekend is Christ, the Head of His Household. By this, we are reminded that we belong to Christ’s family, the Church. This in a way prepares us for next weekend’s celebration in which we shall worship Christ, as the King of the Universe.

Jesus treats his family, the church, with impeccable love and tenderness. He is close to the Church just as a faithful husband is close to his beloved bride.

  • We who are members of Jesus family, the Church (CCC 1267) need to reciprocate Jesus’ tender love and care just as a loyal wife will love her caring husband.
  • With devotion, we need to be at the service of Christ our head, just as a dutiful wife will always do her work with eager hands, hold out her hand to the poor and open her arms to the needy (Cf. 1st Reading).
  • Our loyalty to Christ our head needs to also reflect that of faithful servants whose goal is to support their master’s vineyard to flourish and who are ready to give their master what is his due (Cf. Gospel Reading).
  • Christ our head will also come back to take us into his heavenly glory, and this will happen at a time we cannot predict (Cf. 2nd Reading).
  • He wants us not to worry about the when and how of his return, but only to focus on living as people of the light; and so manifest the qualities that reflect the light of God: truth, love, peace, justice and mercy.

Let the following words of Christ our head, guide us: “Even if you have to die, says the Lord, keep faithful, and I will give you the crown of life” (Cf. Opening Prayer & Alleluia Verse).

Liturgy notes

Fr Anthony Fyk

When we consider the word ‘devoted’ many ideas may come to our minds. To be devoted is to be very loving or loyal to someone or something. It may be towards someone such as a friend, our parents, a spouse, or a child or children. At the same time, it may be towards an interest or hobby of sorts such as a sport, going on walks, music, gardening, cooking, and studies. Today’s Collect and Prayer over the Offerings refers to be being devoted to God, the highest form of loving and loyalty we should aim towards in this life. We pray today that we may have the constant gladness of being devoted to God. For in being devoted towards God, we find our full and lasting happiness. Human beings, made in the image and likeness of God, have the capacity, or we may say, are programmed for him. We are made for a relationship for him, and we find our ultimate purpose and meaning of life in him. “Our hearts,” wrote St Augustine, “are restless, until they rest in him.” When our lives are ordered towards God, the author of all that is good, we find true and lasting happiness and peace in our lives. Being devoted towards God is living our lives in his presence and following the golden commandments of loving him and our neighbour, knowing that he is our origin and ultimate end. In our participation in the liturgy, we are encountering the Divine and are being ordered towards Him, with his grace, to our end, our everlasting happiness. As today’s Communion Antiphon highlights for us – “To be near God is my happiness, to place my hope in God the Lord.”

Music recommendations

Hymns have been chosen from the Laudate Hymnal:

Centre of My life, 423

All that I am 600

Now let us from this table arise 647

To Jesus' Heart, all burning 800

All my hope on God is founded 959

Any questions?

Do you have questions about the liturgy and how we are called to participate in it? Explore how the Church councils, saints, and popes have answered this key question and many more.

Discover the Mass

Every movement of the Mass is rich in meaning but we can become over-familiar with it. Rediscover the Mass and explore how it relates to the Exodus story, where many of its rituals come from, and how it makes Jesus present to us today.