Friday of the Second week of Advent

First Reading: Isaiah 48:17-19
Responsorial Psalm: Psalm 1:1–2, 3, 4 and 6
Gospel: Matthew 11:16-19

First Reading
Isaiah 48:17-19
Thus says the Lord, your Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel: “I am the Lord your God, who teaches you to profit, who leads you in the way you should go. Oh that you had paid attention to my commandments! Then your peace would have been like a river, and your righteousness like the waves of the sea; your offspring would have been like the sand, and your descendants like its grains; their name would never be cut off or destroyed from before me.”

The word of the Lord.

Responsorial Psalm
Psalm 1:1–2, 3, 4 and 6
R. He who follows you, Lord, will have the light of life.

Blessed indeed is the man who follows not the counsel of the wicked, nor stands in the path with sinners, nor abides in the company of scorners, but whose delight is the law of the Lord, and who ponders his law day and night.
R. He who follows you, Lord, will have the light of life.

He is like a tree that is planted beside the flowing waters, that yields its fruit in due season, and whose leaves shall never fade; and all that he does shall prosper.
R. He who follows you, Lord, will have the light of life.

Not so are the wicked, not so! For they, like winnowed chaff, shall be driven away by the wind. for the Lord knows the way of the just, but the way of the wicked will perish.
R. He who follows you, Lord, will have the light of life.

Gospel
Matthew 11:16-19
At that time: Jesus said to the crowds: “To what shall I compare this generation? It is like children sitting in the market places and calling to their playmates, “‘We played the flute for you, and you did not dance; we sang a dirge, and you did not mourn.’ For John came neither eating nor drinking, and they say, ‘He has a demon.’ The Son of Man came eating and drinking, and they say, ‘Look at him! A glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners!’ Yet wisdom is justified by her deeds.”

The Gospel of the Lord.