First Reading — Genesis 49:29-32; 50:15-26a
Responsorial Psalm — Psalm 105:1-2, 3-4, 6-7
Eusebius of Caesarea
On 104:4–5
In Psalm 104 [LXX], David, when referring to the stories of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, the very men who were his godly ancestors, who lived before Moses' day, calls them Christs, only because they all received the outpouring of the Holy Spirit. And when he tells how they were hospitably received by foreigners, and how they learned that God was their Savior when plots were devised against them, following Moses' account, he names them prophets also and Christs, before Moses had been born and before he had laid down the rule that such men should be anointed with oil.
Gospel — Matthew 10:24-33
Hilary of Poitiers
On 10:24
For the Lord, the Light eternal, the Captain of the faithful, the Parent of immortality, set before His disciples this solace of the sufferings that should come upon them, that we should embrace it as our glory when we are made like to our Lord in suffering; whence He says, The disciple is not above his master, nor the slave above his lord.
On 10:26
Therefore neither threatening, nor evil speaking, nor power of their enemies should move them, seeing the judgment-day will disclose how empty, how nought all these were.
On 10:28
Therefore they ought to inculcate constantly the knowledge of God, and the profound secret of evangelic doctrine, to be revealed by the light of preaching; having no fear of those who have power only over the body, but cannot reach the soul; Fear not those that kill the body, but cannot kill the soul.
On 10:29
Figuratively; That which is sold is our soul and body, and that to which it is sold, is sin. They then who sell two sparrows for a farthing, are they who sell themselves for the smallest sin, born for flight, and for reaching heaven with spiritual wings. (vid. Ps. 124:7.) Caught by the bait of present pleasures, and sold to the enjoyment of the world, they barter away their whole selves in such a market. It is of the will of God that one of them rather soar aloft; but the law proceeding according to God’s appointment decrees that one of them should fall. In like manner as, if they soared aloft they would become one spiritual body; so, when sold under sin, the soul gathers earthly matter from the pollution of vice, and there is made of them one body which is committed to earth.
On 10:29
For it is an unworthy task to number things that are to perish. Therefore that we should know that nothing of us should perish, we are told that our very hairs are numbered. No accident then that can befal our bodies is to be feared; thus He adds, Fear not, ye are better than many sparrows.
On 10:29
Or this, ye are better than many sparrows, teaches that the elect faithful are better than the multitude of the unbelieving, for the one fall to earth, the other fly to heaven.
On 10:32
This He says in conclusion, because it behoves them after being confirmed by such teaching, to have a confident freedom in confessing God.
On 10:32
This teaches us, that in what measure we have borne witness to Him upon earth, in the same shall we have Him to bear witness to us in heaven before the face of God the Father.