Second Saturday of Lent

Saints, Feasts, and Readings for 03/30/2024

Saints and Feasts: Second Saturday of Lent; John Climacus the Righteous, author of The Divine Ladder of Ascent; Sosthenes, Apollos, Cephas, Caesar, & Epaphroditos, the Apostles of the 70; Zacharias the New Martyr

Fast Day (Wine and Oil Allowed)

Epistle Reading: Hebrews 3:12-16
BRETHREN, take care lest there be in any of you an evil, unbelieving heart, leading you to fall away from the living God. But exhort one another every day, as long as it is called “today,” that none of you may be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin. For we share in Christ, if only we hold our first confidence firm to the end, while it is said, “Today, when you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion.” Who were they that heard and yet were rebellious? Was it not all those who left Egypt under the leadership of Moses?

Gospel Reading: Mark 1:35-44
At that time, Jesus went out to a lonely place, and there he prayed. And Simon and those who were with him pursued him, and they found him and said to him, “Everyone is searching for you.” And he said to them, “Let us go on to the next towns, that I may preach there also; for that is why I came out.” And he went throughout all Galilee, preaching in their synagogues and casting out demons. And a leper came to him beseeching him, and kneeling said to him, “If you will, you can make me clean.” Moved with pity, he stretched out his hand and touched him, and said to him, “I will; be clean.” And immediately the leprosy left him, and he was made clean. And he sternly charged him, and sent him away at once, and said to him, “See that you say nothing to any one; but go, show yourself to a priest, and offer for your cleansing what Moses commanded, for a proof to them.”