October 25, 2003, Wednesday of the 29th week in ordinary time.

A reading from the letter of St. Paul to the Romans.

Brothers and sisters, sin must not reign over your mortal bodies so that you obey their desires.

And do not present the parts of your bodies to sin as weapons for

wickedness, but present yourselves to God as raised from the dead to life, and the parts of your

bodies to God as weapons for righteousness. For sin is not to have any power over you, since you are not

under the law but under grace. What then? Shall we sin because we are not under the law but under grace?

Of course not. Do you not know that if you present yourselves to someone as obedient slaves,

you are slaves of the one you obey, either of sin, which leads to death, or of obedience,

which leads to righteousness? But thanks be to God that, although you were once slaves of sin, you have become obedient from

the heart to the pattern of teaching to which you were entrusted. Freed from sin, you have

become slaves of righteousness. The Word of the Lord.

The Responsorial Psalm. The Word of the Lord. The response, orial Psalm. The response is, our help is in the name of the Lord.

Had not the Lord been with us, let Israel say, had not the Lord been with us, when men rose up against us?

Then would they have swallowed us alive, when their fury

was inflamed against us? Our help is in the name of the Lord. Then would the waters have

overwhelmed us, the torrent would have swept over us, over us then would have swept the raging waters. Blessed be the Lord who did not

leave us a prey to their teeth. Our help is in the name of the Lord. We were rescued like a bird

from the fowler's snare. Broken was the snare, and we were freed. Our help is in the name of the Lord who made heaven and earth.

Our help is in the name of the Lord.

A reading from the Holy Gospel according to Luke.

Jesus said to his disciples,

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