Friday, October 16, 2026
Friday of the Twenty-eighth week in Ordinary Time
Luke 12:1-7
Listen to the whole reading — MP3
First reading
Ephesians 1:11-14
in whom also we were assigned an inheritance, having been foreordained according to the purpose of him who does all things after the counsel of his will; to the end that we should be to the praise of his glory, we who had before hoped in Christ. In him you also, having heard the word of the truth, the Good News of your salvation—in whom, having also believed, you were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit, who is a pledge of our inheritance, to the redemption of God’s own possession, to the praise of his glory.
Responsorial psalm
Psalms 33:1-2,4-5,12-13
Rejoice in the Lord, you righteous! Praise is fitting for the upright. Give thanks to the Lord with the lyre. Sing praises to him with the harp of ten strings. For the Lord’s word is right. All his work is done in faithfulness. He loves righteousness and justice. The earth is full of the loving kindness of the Lord. Blessed is the nation whose God is the Lord, the people whom he has chosen for his own inheritance. The Lord looks from heaven. He sees all the sons of men.
Gospel
Luke 12:1-7
Meanwhile, when a multitude of many thousands had gathered together, so much so that they trampled on each other, he began to tell his disciples first of all, “Beware of the yeast of the Pharisees, which is hypocrisy. But there is nothing covered up, that will not be revealed, nor hidden, that will not be known. Therefore whatever you have said in the darkness will be heard in the light. What you have spoken in the ear in the inner rooms will be proclaimed on the housetops. “I tell you, my friends, don’t be afraid of those who kill the body, and after that have no more that they can do. But I will warn you whom you should fear. Fear him, who after he has killed, has power to cast into Gehenna. Yes, I tell you, fear him. “Aren’t five sparrows sold for two assaria coins? Not one of them is forgotten by God. But the very hairs of your head are all counted. Therefore don’t be afraid. You are of more value than many sparrows.
Lectio
There is a quiet consistency running underneath these readings — a God who sees, who counts, who remembers. Paul tells us we were sealed, marked as God's own possession, a pledge already given. The psalmist says the Lord looks down from heaven and sees all the children of men. And Jesus, in the middle of a crowd so dense they were trampling one another, insists that not one sparrow is forgotten, that even the hairs of our head are numbered. This is not surveillance. It is intimacy. To be counted like this is to be cherished, held in a gaze that misses nothing precisely because it loves everything.
And so the warning against the yeast of the Pharisees — hypocrisy — lands differently than it might at first. Jesus is not scolding us for having hidden places. He is telling us they are already known, already loved, already brought into the light of that patient gaze. The whole exhausting project of the double life, the inner room where we say one thing and the housetop where we perform another, collapses in the presence of a God who has already seen and stayed. Hypocrisy is only frightening if we believe we are alone with our secrets. We are not.
Three times in this passage Jesus says do not be afraid. He knows how tightly fear and pretense are braided together — how much of our masking comes from a terror that if we were truly seen, we would be found wanting. The remedy is not to try harder to be transparent, but to trust the One already looking. You are of more value than many sparrows. That is the ground on which the mask can finally fall.
Where in your life right now are you saying one thing in the inner room and another on the housetop — and what fear is keeping that division in place?
If you truly believed God has already seen the thing you most want to hide and has not turned away, what is one word or act of honesty you could offer someone today?
Saint of the day
St. Marguerite d'Youville, Religious (1701-1771)
Ora reads this aloud, every morning, free. Ora