of John fast, but yours do not?” Jesus answered, “How can the wedding guests fast while the
bridegroom is with them? As long as they have the bridegroom with them, they cannot fast. But
the day will come, when the bridegroom will be taken from them, and on that day they will fast.
“No one sews a piece of new cloth on an old coat, because the new patch will shrink and tear
away from the old cloth, making a worse tear. And no one puts new wine into old wine skins, for
the wine would burst the skins, and then both the wine and the skins would be lost.
But new wine, new skins!”

Reflect

“New persons.” We are called to be kinder in our words and actions. This also means that we
are challenged to become more responsible, carrying out the tasks we need to accomplish.
When we are entrusted with a greater responsibility, we need to gauge how much resources
we have for us to carry out our tasks. In our faith journey, the tasks set for us to do is our
mission. To accomplish our mission in life, we need to strengthen our inner resources more
than the external ones. In the first reading, Saul, who was anointed as the first king of Israel,
has now been rejected. Saul disobeyed the Lord. Such disobedience resulted from his
lack of inner resources to see what needs to be changed. Saul appeared to be the same
person as he was before becoming a king. He could have attuned his life to the special office
given to him but he did not. The Gospel tells of Jesus’ teaching about the new wine which
must be placed in new wine skins. If we have inner resources, like the ability to give up our
old self, we would become new persons worthy of the newness of God’s grace.

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