Mass Readings

Wednesday, February 25, 2026

Wednesday of the first week of Lent

Weekday · Lent · Cycle A · Year II · Purple

Reading I

Jonah 3:1-10

And the word of the Lord came to Jonah the second time saying:

Arise, and go to Ninive, the great city: and preach in it the preaching that I bid thee.

And Jonah arose, and went to Ninive, according to the word of the Lord: now Ninive was a great city of three days' journey.

And Jonah began to enter into the city one day's journey: and he cried and said: Yet forty days and Ninive shall be destroyed.

And the men of Ninive believed in God: and they proclaimed a fast, and put on sackcloth from the greatest to the least.

And the word came to the king of Ninive: and he rose up out of his throne, and cast away his robe from him, and was clothed in sackcloth, and sat in ashes.

And he caused it to be proclaimed and published in Ninive, from the mouth of the king and of his princes, saying: Let neither men nor beasts, oxen, nor sheep taste anything: let them not feed, nor drink water.

And let men and beasts be covered with sackcloth, and cry to the Lord with all their strength, and let them turn every one from his evil way, and from the iniquity that is in their hands.

Who can tell if God will turn, and forgive: and will turn away from his fierce anger, and we shall not perish?

And God saw their works, that they were turned from their evil way: and God had mercy with regard to the evil which he had said that he would do to them, and he did it not.

Responsorial Psalm

Ps 51:3-4, 12-13, 18-19

Have mercy on me, O God, according to thy great mercy. And according to the multitude of thy tender mercies blot out my iniquity.

Wash me yet more from my iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin.

Create a clean heart in me, O God: and renew a right spirit within my bowels.

Cast me not away from thy face; and take not thy holy spirit from me.

For if thou hadst desired sacrifice, I would indeed have given it: with burnt offerings thou wilt not be delighted.

A sacrifice to God is an afflicted spirit: a contrite and humbled heart, O God, thou wilt not despise.

Gospel

Luke 11:29-32

And the multitudes running together, he began to say: This generation is a wicked generation. It asketh a sign: and a sign shall not be given it, but the sign of Jonas the prophet.

For as Jonas was a sign to the Ninivites; so shall the Son of man also be to this generation.

The queen of the south shall rise in the judgment with the men of this generation and shall condemn them: because she came from the ends of the earth to hear the wisdom of Solomon. And behold more than Solomon here.

The men of Ninive shall rise in the judgment with this generation and shall condemn it; Because they did penance at the preaching of Jonas. And behold more than Jonas here.

About These Readings

Scripture text from the Douay-Rheims Bible (Challoner revision, 1899), which is in the public domain. The Mass readings appointed for today follow the Lectionary for Mass approved for the dioceses of the United States.

Psalm verses follow the Vulgate numbering in the Douay-Rheims, which may differ by one chapter and a few verses from the Hebrew numbering used by the modern Lectionary. The substance of each Psalm is the same.

Read today’s NAB readings at USCCB ↗