Catholic Mass Readings and Reflection July 04, 2026
Saturday – 13th Week in Ordinary Time
04th June 2026 (Saturday)
Psalter: Week 1
Here are the Catholic Mass readings and a daily reflection for Saturday, July 3, 2026, the Feast of Saint Thomas the Apostle. Today Paul says we are built into one temple on the apostles, and in the Gospel Thomas moves from hard doubt to the highest confession of faith in all the Gospels.
Readings of the Day
First Reading: Amos 9:11-15
Thus says the Lord: “In that day I will raise up the booth of David that is fallen and repair its breaches, and raise up its ruins and rebuild it as in the days of old, that they may possess the remnant of Edom and all the nations who are called by my name,” declares the Lord who does this. “Behold, the days are coming,” declares the Lord, “when the ploughman shall overtake the reaper and the treader of grapes him who sows the seed; the mountains shall drip sweet wine, and all the hills shall flow with it. I will restore the fortunes of my people Israel, and they shall rebuild the ruined cities and inhabit them; they shall plant vineyards and drink their wine, and they shall make gardens and eat their fruit. I will plant them on their land, and they shall never again be uprooted out of the land that I have given them,” says the Lord your God.
Psalm 85:9, 11-12, 13-14
R/. The Lord speaks of peace for his people.
Gospel Acclamation
V/. Alleluia
R/. Alleluia
V/. My sheep hear my voice, says the Lord; and I know them, and they follow me.
R/. Alleluia
Gospel: Matthew 9:14-17
At that time: The disciples of John came to Jesus, saying, “Why do we and the Pharisees fast, but your disciples do not fast?” And Jesus said to them, “Can the wedding guests mourn as long as the bridegroom is with them? The days will come when the bridegroom is taken away from them, and then they will fast. No one puts a piece of unshrunk cloth on an old garment, for the patch tears away from the garment, and a worse tear is made. Neither is new wine put into old wineskins. If it is, the skins burst and the wine is spilled and the skins are destroyed. But new wine is put into fresh wineskins, and so both are preserved.”
Daily Gospel Reflection
Saturday – 13th Week in Ordinary Time
Main Point: John’s disciples ask Jesus a question about fasting. He does not answer it with rules. He answers with a wedding. Joy has a season, and so does sorrow, and wisdom knows which one it is standing in.
1. John’s disciples come with a fair question. They fast, and the Pharisees fast. So why do the followers of Jesus not fast? It sounds like a complaint about discipline. It is really a question about why these people seem so glad.
2. Jesus does not give them a rule. He gives them a wedding. Can the guests mourn while the bridegroom is still with them? Of course not. You do not fast at a feast. You do not weep at a wedding. The time you are in decides what you do.
3. Catch what He calls Himself. The bridegroom. In the Old Testament, the bridegroom of Israel was always God. So Jesus answers a question about fasting by quietly saying who He is. God has come to the wedding, and the wedding is now.
4. Then He adds a hard line, and we read past it too fast. “The days will come when the bridegroom is taken away, and then they will fast.” He is looking ahead to the cross. There will be a time for fasting. Just not while joy itself is standing in the room.
5. This is the heart of it. Fasting is not the goal. Love is the goal. Fasting serves love in the season of waiting and sorrow. Feasting serves love in the season of His presence. The same heart does both, each in its time.
6. Then come the two small pictures. No one sews new cloth onto an old garment, because the new patch shrinks and tears the old. No one pours new wine into old skins, because the wine ferments, the brittle skins burst, and both are lost.
7. Here is the detail most readers miss. We hear this as Jesus throwing out the old to bring in the new. But look at His last line. “New wine is put into fresh skins, and so both are preserved.” Both. He does not want the old destroyed. He wants containers supple enough to hold what He is pouring.
8. That is the real warning. The problem was never the old faith of Israel. The problem is a heart gone stiff. A rigid heart cannot stretch around something new from God. He is not asking us to throw away the past. He is asking us to stay soft enough to grow.
9. This is the thread to Amos. God promises to raise up the fallen house of David, to rebuild the ruins and replant the land. He does not start over from nothing. He restores the old and makes it new. New wine in the old vineyard, and both are saved.
My Practice: Where has your heart gone stiff? Find the place where you have decided you already know everything God could ask of you. That hardness cannot hold new wine. So name one habit, one grudge, one fixed opinion you have never let Him touch, and hold it loosely today. Stay soft. And learn the harder wisdom Jesus teaches here. There is a time to fast and a time to feast, and the saint is the one who can tell which season he is in, and answer it with love.
Read tomorrow’s Catholic Mass readings and reflection for July 05, 2026, the Fourteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time, or revisit yesterday’s reflection for the Feast of Saint Thomas the Apostle.
Thank You 🙏🙏🙏
