🌿 Friday, March 13, 2026
The Greatest Commandment

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Friday of the Fourth Week of Lent • Day of Abstinence • Year A • Beads of Joy Blog II

✝️ Today's Mass Readings

First Reading: Hosea 14:2-10

Responsorial Psalm: Psalm 81:6-8, 8-9, 10-11, 14, 17

Gospel: Mark 12:28-34

📖 The Gospel - Mark 12:28-34

A scribe approaches Jesus with the most important question in all of Jewish law: Which commandment is the first of all? And Jesus answers without hesitation. Love God with your whole heart, soul, mind, and strength. Love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments, He says elsewhere, the whole law and the prophets depend.

🙏 Gospel Reflection

I love this moment in Mark's Gospel because of what happens at the end. The scribe listens to Jesus's answer and says, " You are right." And you are wise. And love is worth more than all the burnt offerings and sacrifices in the world. And Jesus looks at him and says, "You are not far from the kingdom of God." Not far at all.

You are not far from the kingdom. How many people are walking around right now who are not far? They are good people. They are kind people. They have a sense of God. They understand that love matters more than religion for its own sake. And they are so close. So close to stepping all the way in.

Hosea gives us one of the most beautiful invitations in all of Scripture today, return to the Lord your God. Say to Him: take away our guilt, accept what is good. We will offer the fruit of our lips. He will heal our infidelity. He will love us freely. In Hosea, God sounds like the prodigal's father again, watching the road, ready to run, lavish with His healing the moment we turn.

The two great commandments are not a burden. They are a description of the life we were made for: Loving God, and loving others. Everything else, every rosary bead, every fast, every act of charity, every Lenten discipline, is in service of those two things. When they are the center, everything else falls into place.

💭 Reflection Question

Of the two great commandments, love of God and love of neighbor, which one is your stronger instinct, and which one do you tend to neglect? What would it look like this Lent to give more of yourself to the one that doesn't come as naturally?

📿 Today's Rosary - The Sorrowful Mysteries

Today's Focus Mystery: The Scourging at the Pillar

Jesus, who commanded love of God and neighbor with the whole heart, was Himself scourged by those same neighbors He came to save. He did not stop loving them in that moment. He fulfilled the commandment perfectly and completely, even there, even then. As you pray these beads today, let His love in suffering school your love in your own daily trials.

🌹 Our Lady of Fatima - Today's Connection

The two great commandments, love of God and love of neighbor, are the heartbeat of everything Our Lady asked for at Fatima. Her requests for prayer, for sacrifice, for the conversion of sinners, these are love of God and love of neighbor expressed in the language of a mother's urgent heart. The Rosary itself is structured around these two loves; we come to God through Mary, and we intercede through her for our neighbors. As you pray your beads today on this Friday of abstinence, let every decade be an act of both loves at once.

🕊️ Closing Prayer

Lord, You said all the law hangs on these two things, love of You and love of neighbor. Let that be the only law I am trying to fulfill today. Strip everything else away and leave me with just these two. With my whole heart, my whole soul, my whole mind and strength, I love You, Jesus. And I choose to love the person in front of me. Amen.



©2026 James Dacey, Jr., OFS

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Want to know more about My Spiritual Journey?
Read My Story: An Invitation To Read My Story - My Testimony

Location: Tonawanda, NY 14150, USA

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