Daily Reading for Wednesday April 5, 2023

Reading 1, Isaiah 50:4-9
Responsorial Psalm, Psalms 69:8-10, 21-22, 31, 33-34
Gospel, Matthew 26:14-25

Reading 1, Isaiah 50:4-9

4 Lord Yahweh has given me a disciple’s tongue, for me to know how to give a word of comfort to the weary. Morning by morning he makes my ear alert to listen like a disciple.

5 Lord Yahweh has opened my ear and I have not resisted, I have not turned away.

6 I have offered my back to those who struck me, my cheeks to those who plucked my beard; I have not turned my face away from insult and spitting.

7 Lord Yahweh comes to my help, this is why insult has not touched me, this is why I have set my face like flint and know that I shall not be put to shame.

8 He who grants me saving justice is near! Who will bring a case against me? Let us appear in court together! Who has a case against me? Let him approach me!

9 Look, Lord Yahweh is coming to my help! Who dares condemn me? Look at them, all falling apart like moth-eaten clothes!

Responsorial Psalm, Psalms 69:8-10, 21-22, 31, 33-34

8 I am estranged from my brothers, alienated from my own mother’s sons;

9 for I am eaten up with zeal for your house, and insults directed against you fall on me.

10 I mortify myself with fasting, and find myself insulted for it,

21 To eat they gave me poison, to drink, vinegar when I was thirsty.

22 May their own table prove a trap for them, and their abundance a snare;

31 for this will please Yahweh more than an ox, than a bullock horned and hoofed.

33 For God listens to the poor, he has never scorned his captive people.

34 Let heaven and earth and seas, and all that stirs in them, acclaim him!

Gospel, Matthew 26:14-25

14 Then one of the Twelve, the man called Judas Iscariot, went to the chief priests

15 and said, ‘What are you prepared to give me if I hand him over to you?’ They paid him thirty silver pieces,

16 and from then onwards he began to look for an opportunity to betray him.

17 Now on the first day of Unleavened Bread the disciples came to Jesus to say, ‘Where do you want us to make the preparations for you to eat the Passover?’

18 He said, ‘Go to a certain man in the city and say to him, “The Master says: My time is near. It is at your house that I am keeping Passover with my disciples.” ‘

19 The disciples did what Jesus told them and prepared the Passover.

20 When evening came he was at table with the Twelve.

21 And while they were eating he said, ‘In truth I tell you, one of you is about to betray me.’

22 They were greatly distressed and started asking him in turn, ‘Not me, Lord, surely?’

23 He answered, ‘Someone who has dipped his hand into the dish with me will betray me.

24 The Son of man is going to his fate, as the scriptures say he will, but alas for that man by whom the Son of man is betrayed! Better for that man if he had never been born!’

25 Judas, who was to betray him, asked in his turn, ‘Not me, Rabbi, surely?’ Jesus answered, ‘It is you who say it.’