Speak Lord: source of all that is good…

You know how you are supposed to imitate us: now we were not idle when we were with you, nor did we ever have our meals at anyone’s table without paying for them; no, we worked night and day, slaving and straining, so as not to be a burden on any of you. This was not because we had no right to be, but in order to make ourselves an example for you to follow.

We gave you a rule when we were with you: do not let anyone have any food if he refuses to do any work. Now we hear that there are some of you who are living in idleness, doing no work themselves but interfering with everyone else’s. In the Lord Jesus Christ, we order and call on people of this kind to go on quietly working and earning the food that they eat.

2 Thessalonians 3:7-12

The Second reading at Mass on Sunday, the 33rd Sunday in Ordinary Time, reminds us that there is a purposefulness in life, and that we have a responsibility to live to that.

There are many blessings that come our way.  But simply to take and not to give, not to share, is to betray the communion of love to which God invites us.

• How do you contribute to the common good?

Carvings in Museum of Liverpool. (c) 2016, Allen Morris