8 October 2025 (Wednesday) / Wednesday of week 27 in Ordinary Time / Wednesday of the Twenty-seventh Week in Ordinary Time

8 October 2025 (Wednesday)

Wednesday of week 27 in Ordinary Time.

Wednesday of the Twenty-seventh Week in Ordinary Time.

Readings from the Bible of the Roman Catholic Church:

First Reading: Jonah 4: 1-11
Responsorial Psalm: Psalms 86: 3-6, 9-10
Alleluia: Romans 8: 15
Gospel: Luke 11: 1-4

First Reading : Jonah 4:1‐11

Jonah was very indignant; he fell into a rage. He prayed to the Lord and said, ‘Ah, Lord, is not this just as I said would happen when I was still at home? That was why I went and fled to Tarshish: I knew that you were a God of tenderness and compassion, slow to anger, rich in graciousness, relenting from evil. So now, Lord, please take away my life, for I might as well be dead as go on living.’ The Lord replied, ‘Are you right to be angry?’ Jonah then went out of the city and sat down to the east of the city. There he made himself a shelter and sat under it in the shade, to see what would happen to the city. Then the Lord God arranged that a castor‐oil plant should grow up over Jonah to give shade for his head and soothe his ill‐humour; Jonah was delighted with the castor‐oil plant. But at dawn the next day, God arranged that a worm should attack the castor‐oil plant – and it withered. Next, when the sun rose, God arranged that there should be a scorching east wind; the sun beat down so hard on Jonah’s head that he was overcome and begged for death, saying, ‘I might as well be dead as go on living.’ God said to Jonah, ‘Are you right to be angry about the castor‐oil plant?’ He replied, ‘I have every right to be angry, to the point of death.’ The Lord replied, ‘You are only upset about a castor‐oil plant which cost you no labour, which you did not make grow, which sprouted in a night and has perished in a night. And am I not to feel sorry for Nineveh, the great city, in which there are more than a hundred and twenty thousand people who cannot tell their right hand from their left, to say nothing of all the animals?’

Responsive Psalm : Psalm 85(86):3‐6,9‐10

You, O Lord, have mercy and compassion.

You are my God, have mercy on me, Lord, for I cry to you all the day long. Give joy to your servant, O Lord, for to you I lift up my soul.

You, O Lord, have mercy and compassion.

O Lord, you are good and forgiving, full of love to all who call. Give heed, O Lord, to my prayer and attend to the sound of my voice.

You, O Lord, have mercy and compassion.

All the nations shall come to adore you and glorify your name, O Lord: for you are great and do marvellous deeds, you who alone are God.

You, O Lord, have mercy and compassion.

Alleluia: Romans 8: 15
R. Alleluia, alleluia.
15 You have received a spirit of adoption as sons through which we cry: Abba! Father!
(14. All who are guided by the Spirit of God are sons of God;
15. for what you received was not the spirit of slavery to bring you back into fear; you received the Spirit of adoption, enabling us to cry out, 'Abba, Father!').
R. Alleluia, alleluia.

Gospel : Luke 11:1‐4

Once Jesus was in a certain place praying, and when he had finished, one of his disciples said, ‘Lord, teach us to pray, just as John taught his disciples.’ He said to them, ‘Say this when you pray: ‘“Father, may your name be held holy, your kingdom come; give us each day our daily bread, and forgive us our sins, for we ourselves forgive each one who is in debt to us. And do not put us to the test."'

For our reflection today:

This Gospel presents Jesus to us absorbed in prayer, a little apart from his disciples. When he had finished, one of them said to him: "Lord, teach us to pray" (Lk 11: 1). Jesus had no objection, he did not speak of strange or esoteric formulas but very simply said: "When you pray, say: "Father' ", and he taught the Our Father (cf. Lk 11: 2-4), taking it from his own prayer in which he himself spoke to God, his Father. St Luke passes the Our Father on to us in a shorter form than that found in the Gospel according to St Matthew, which has entered into common usage. We have before us the first words of Sacred Scripture that we learn in childhood. They are impressed in our memory, mould our life and accompany us to our last breath. They reveal that "we are not ready-made children of God from the start, but that we are meant to become so increasingly by growing more and more deeply in communion with Jesus. Our sonship turns out to be identical with following Christ". This prayer also accepts and expresses human material and spiritual needs: "Give us each day our daily bread; and forgive us our sins" (Lk 11: 3-4). It is precisely because of the needs and difficulties of every day that Jesus exhorts us forcefully: "I tell you, ask, and it will be given you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For every one who asks receives, and he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened" (Lk 11: 9-10). It is not so much asking in order to satisfy our own desires as, rather, to keep a lively friendship with God who, the Gospel continues, "will give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!" (Lk 11: 13). Every time we say the Our Father our voices mingle with the voice of the Church, for those who pray are never alone. (Pope Benedict XVI, Angelus, Castel Gandolfo, 25 July 2010)

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