The lord be with you. A reading of the holy gospel according to Saint Luke. And this is the continuation of the narrative we've been reading for the last few days. Now, when Elizabeth's time for delivery arrived, she gave birth to a son, because this is the mother of John the Baptist. Her neighbors and relatives.
See, wasn't a private affair. Her neighbors and her relatives, upon hearing that the Lord had extended his mercy to her, remember she was a woman advanced in age and had been sterile all her life. Here she is having a baby now. So, when all of them had assembled for the circumcision of the child on the eighth day, they intended to name the boy after his father Zachariah. Remember Zachariah had been struck mute.
At this his mother intervened saying, no, the boy is to be called John. Her relatives pointed out to her, to Elizabeth, none of your relatives has that name. Then, using signs, they asked the father what he wanted the boy named. Zechariah signaled for a writing table tablet and wrote the words, his name is John. This astonished everybody.
At that moment, the mouth of Zacharias was opened and his tongue loosed, and he began to speak in praise of God. Fear descended upon all in the neighborhood, throughout the hill country, that these happenings began to be recounted. Now listen to the last detail. All who heard him stored these things in their hearts saying, what will this child be? And was not the hand of the Lord upon him?
This is the gospel of the Lord.