First Reading

1 John 3:1-10

We are children of God

Think of the love that the Father has lavished on us,

by letting us be called God’s children;

and that is what we are.

Because the world refused to acknowledge him,

therefore it does not acknowledge us.

My dear people, we are already the children of God

but what we are to be in the future has not yet been revealed;

all we know is, that when it is revealed

we shall be like him

because we shall see him as he really is.

Surely everyone who entertains this hope

must purify himself, must try to be as pure as Christ.

Anyone who sins at all

breaks the law,

because to sin is to break the law.

Now you know that he appeared in order to abolish sin,

and that in him there is no sin;

anyone who lives in God does not sin,

and anyone who sins

has never seen him or known him.

My children, do not let anyone lead you astray:

to live a holy life

is to be holy just as he is holy;

to lead a sinful life is to belong to the devil,

since the devil was a sinner from the beginning.

It was to undo all that the devil has done

that the Son of God appeared.

No one who has been begotten by God sins;

because God’s seed remains inside him,

he cannot sin when he has been begotten by God.

In this way we distinguish the children of God

from the children of the devil:

anybody not living a holy life

and not loving his brother

is no child of God’s.