ORDINARY TIME OF THE YEAR

The liturgical cycle of the Church on Weekdays is divided into two years named Year 1 and Year 2; whereas on Sundays there are three years A, B and C. While the first reading in Years 1 and 2 on Weekdays are different, the Gospel reading in both years is the same. Often there is no connection between the first reading and the Gospel on Weekdays like there is on Sundays. This is because on Weekdays the Church reads continuously from a book of the Old Testament or from a letter in the New Testament. This is the main reason why I have not dealt with the first reading and concentrated only on the Gospel.

For the first nine out of the thirty-four weeks in ordinary time, the Church reads from the Gospel of Mark. From the tenth till the twenty-first week, the Gospel reading is from Matthew and from the twenty-second week till the thirty-fourth week the Gospel reading is from Luke.

It is important to have some background of each of the three Gospels so that the texts that are read on each day can then be understood more completely.

I will therefore give a summary of each of the three Gospels before we can begin reading from them.