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First reading: Hebrews 12:18-19,21-24
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What you have come to is nothing known to the senses: not a blazing fire, or a gloom turning to total darkness, or a storm; or trumpeting thunder or the great voice speaking which made everyone that heard it beg that no more should be said to them. The whole scene was so terrible that Moses said: I am afraid, and was trembling with fright. But what you have come to is Mount Zion and the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem where the millions of angels have gathered for the festival, with the whole Church in which everyone is a ‘first-born son’ and a citizen of heaven. You have come to God himself, the supreme Judge, and been placed with spirits of the saints who have been made perfect; and to Jesus, the mediator who brings a new covenant and a blood for purification which pleads more insistently than Abel’s.
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Responsorial Psalm: Psalm 47(48):2-4,9-11
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O God, we ponder your love within your temple.
The Lord is great and worthy to be praised
in the city of our God.
His holy mountain rises in beauty,
the joy of all the earth.
O God, we ponder your love within your temple.
Mount Zion, true pole of the earth,
the Great King’s city!
God, in the midst of its citadels,
has shown himself its stronghold.
O God, we ponder your love within your temple.
As we have heard, so we have seen
in the city of our God,
in the city of the Lord of hosts
which God upholds for ever.
O God, we ponder your love within your temple.
O God, we ponder your love
within your temple.
Your praise, O God, like your name
reaches the ends of the earth.
With justice your right hand is filled.
O God, we ponder your love within your temple.
Alleluia, alleluia!
I call you friends, says the Lord,
because I have made known to you
everything I have learnt from my Father.
Alleluia!