24 October 2025 (Friday) / Friday of week 29 in Ordinary Time or Saint Antony Mary Claret, Bishop / Friday of the Twenty-ninth Week in Ordinary Time/ Saint Anthony Mary Claret, Bishop, Religious Founder / Ordinary Weekday/ Saint Anthony Mary Claret, Bishop, Religious Founder

24 October 2025 (Friday)

Friday of week 29 in Ordinary Time or Saint Antony Mary Claret, Bishop.

Friday of the Twenty-ninth Week in Ordinary Time/ Saint Anthony Mary Claret, Bishop, Religious Founder.

Ordinary Weekday/ Saint Anthony Mary Claret, Bishop, Religious Founder.

Readings from the Bible of the Roman Catholic Church:

First Reading: Romans 7: 18-25
Responsorial Psalm: Psalms 119: 66, 68, 76, 77, 93, 94
Alleluia: Matthew 11: 25
Gospel: Luke 12: 54-59

First Reading : Romans 7:18‐25

I know of nothing good living in me – living, that is, in my unspiritual self – for though the will to do what is good is in me, the performance is not, with the result that instead of doing the good things I want to do, I carry out the sinful things I do not want. When I act against my will, then, it is not my true self doing it, but sin which lives in me. In fact, this seems to be the rule, that every single time I want to do good it is something evil that comes to hand. In my inmost self I dearly love God’s Law, but I can see that my body follows a different law that battles against the law which my reason dictates. This is what makes me a prisoner of that law of sin which lives inside my body. What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body doomed to death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord!

Responsive Psalm : Psalm 118(119):66,68,76‐77,93‐94

Lord, teach me your statutes.

Teach me discernment and knowledge for I trust in your commands. You are good and your deeds are good; teach me your statutes.

Lord, teach me your statutes.

Let your love be ready to console me by your promise to your servant. Let your love come and I shall live for your law is my delight.

Lord, teach me your statutes.

I will never forget your precepts for with them you give me life. Save me, for I am yours since I seek your precepts.

Lord, teach me your statutes.

Alleluia: Matthew 11: 25
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
25 Blessed are you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth; you have revealed to little ones the mysteries of the Kingdom.
(25. At that time Jesus exclaimed, 'I bless you, Father, Lord of heaven and of earth, for hiding these things from the learned and the clever and revealing them to little children.
26. Yes, Father, for that is what it pleased you to do.
27. Everything has been entrusted to me by my Father; and no one knows the Son except the Father, just as no one knows the Father except the Son and those to whom the Son chooses to reveal him).
R. Alleluia, alleluia.

Gospel : Luke 12:54‐59

Jesus said to the crowds: ‘When you see a cloud looming up in the west you say at once that rain is coming, and so it does. And when the wind is from the south you say it will be hot, and it is. Hypocrites! You know how to interpret the face of the earth and the sky. How is it you do not know how to interpret these times? ‘Why not judge for yourselves what is right? For example: when you go to court with your opponent, try to settle with him on the way, or he may drag you before the judge and the judge hand you over to the bailiff and the bailiff have you thrown into prison. I tell you, you will not get out till you have paid the very last penny.’

For our reflection today:

“Times change and we Christians must constantly change”. Pope Francis repeated this message throughout the Mass he celebrated on Friday morning in the Chapel of Santa Marta. It is a call to act “without fear”, to act “with freedom”, to avoid tranquillizing conformism, to be “steadfast in the faith in Jesus, steadfast in the truth of the Gospel”, but to “constantly move according to the signs of the times”.

Pope Francis started his reflection by referring to the day’s Readings, from the last part of the liturgical year, and particularly to the Letter to the Romans. “We have pointed out”, he recalled, “how Paul preached with such great intensity the freedom that we have in Christ”. This, he said, “is a gift, the gift of freedom, the freedom that has saved us from sin, that made us free”, that made us “children of God like Jesus; that freedom which brings us to call God ‘Father’”. The Pope added that “to attain this freedom we must open ourselves up to the power of the Spirit and really understand what is happening within us and around us”. And while in “recent days, last week”, we focused “on how to distinguish what happens within us: what comes from the good Spirit and what does not come from him”, in other words, the discernment of what “happens within us”, in the day’s Liturgy the Gospel passage from Luke (12:54-59) urges us instead “to look outside”. It impels us to “reflect on how we evaluate the things that happen around us”.

We need to ask ourselves “how do we judge: are we able to judge?”. Pope Francis said that “we have the capacity” and that Paul himself “tells us that we will judge the world: we Christians will judge the world”. The Apostle Peter says something similar when “he calls us the chosen people, the holy priesthood, the nation chosen for holiness”. In short, the Pope explained, we Christians “have the freedom to judge what happens around us”. He warned, however, that “in order to judge we must really know what is happening around us”. The Pope then posed a question: “how can one do this, what the Church calls ‘knowing the signs of the times’?”.

In this regard, the Pope noted that “times change. It is truly Christian wisdom to recognize these changes, to be familiar with the different times, to know the signs of the times”, to distinguish between “the meaning of one thing and another”. Naturally, the Pope said, this “is not easy, because we hear so many comments: ‘I heard that this happened here, or that happened there; I read this, they told me that.”. However, he quickly added, “I am free, I must make my own judgement and understand what all this means”. He said that “this is a task we usually don’t do. Instead, “we conform, we become tranquillized with ‘they told me; I heard; people say; I read.’, and we remain comfortable”. Instead we should ask ourselves: “What is the truth? What is the message that the Lord wants to give me with that sign of the times?”.

As customary, the Pope also proposed some practical suggestions “for understanding the signs of the times”. First and foremost, he said, “silence is necessary: to be quiet, to watch and observe. And afterwards to think within ourselves. For example: why are there so many wars now? Why did this thing happen? And to pray”. Therefore: “silence, reflection and prayer. Only then can we understand the signs of the times and what Jesus wants to tell us”.

In this sense there are no excuses. Though each of us may be tempted to say: “But, I have not studied much. I did not go to university nor even to secondary school.”, Jesus’ words leave no room for doubt. He does not say: “Watch how the academics act, how the doctors and intellectuals act”. On the contrary, he says: “Look to the farmers, to the humble: in their simplicity they understand that when the rain comes, the grass grows; they are able to distinguish wheat from weeds”. As a result “that simplicity — if accompanied by silence, reflection and prayer — will enable us to understand the signs of the times”. Because, he reiterated, “times change and we Christians must continually change. We must change, steadfast in the faith in Jesus Christ, steadfast in the truth of the Gospel, but our approach must constantly move according to the signs of the times”.

To conclude, the Pope returned to his initial thought. “We are free”, he said, “through the gift of freedom that Jesus Christ gave us. But our task is to examine what is happening within us, to discern our feelings and our thoughts, and to analyze what is happening around us, to discern the signs of the times”. How can we do this? “With silence, reflection and prayer”. (Pope Francis, Santa Marta, 23 October 2015)

Jonathan Fabian Ginunggil,
Most High Servant,
Jesus, Mary, Joseph Ministry of Love (Blessed  and Saints and the Nine Choirs of Angels)