Gospel (Mk 6,17-29) - At that time, Herod had sent to arrest John and had put him in prison because of Herodias, wife of his brother Philip, because he had married her. In fact, John said to Herod: "It is not lawful for you to have your brother's wife with you." For this reason Herodias hated him and wanted to have him killed, but she could not, because Herod feared John, knowing him to be a just and holy man, and watched over him; When he listened to him, he was very perplexed, but he listened to him willingly. However, the propitious day came, when Herod, on his birthday, held a banquet for the highest officials of his court, the army officers and the notables of Galilee. The daughter of Herodias herself entered, she danced and pleased Herod and the guests. Then the king said to the girl: "Ask me whatever you want and I will give it to you." And he swore to her several times: "Whatever you ask of me, I will give it to you, even if it were half of my kingdom." She went out and said to her mother, "What should I ask?" She replied: «The head of John the Baptist». And immediately she, running into the king, made her request, saying: "I want you to give me now, on a platter, the head of John the Baptist." The king, made very sad, because of the oath and the guests at the table did not want to refuse her. And immediately the king sent a guard and ordered John's head to be brought to him. The guard went and beheaded him in prison and brought his head on a platter and gave it to the girl and the girl gave it to her mother. When John's disciples learned what had happened, they came and took his body and placed it in a tomb.

The commentary on the Gospel by Monsignor Vincenzo Paglia

The Church, since ancient times, has remembered not only the birth of the Baptist but also the day of his death, which occurred at the hands of Herod, who preferred to listen to the whim of a woman with a bad heart rather than the harsh but true and healthy word of the prophet. John the Baptist is the last, the greatest of the prophets, the one who prepares the Advent of the Messiah. His rigor contrasts the habit of bending everything to his own interest; essentiality helps us get rid of the superfluous; his hope reminds us that we cannot recognize Jesus without preparing our hearts, without facing the desert of the heart and of many places in the world. The Baptist had preached justice and conversion of the heart. And he had entered the king's soul. In contrast, Herodias was increasingly displeased with the prophet's preaching and she hated him. Unfortunately, Herod did not continue to listen to the word of the prophet and the fear that he also felt for the reproach that was directed at him did not lead him to continue listening to reach the point of conversion. It is the bitter experience of rejecting preaching that inevitably leads to the hardening of the heart to the point of becoming wicked. Every priority was overwhelmed: the word given was more important than the life of the prophet. And Herod decided to have the Baptist beheaded. From Herod's perverted heart, murder and the attempt to make evil triumph over good were born. The behavior of those who flocked to the Jordan to listen to the Baptist was different: they went there recognizing that they were sinners in need of forgiveness, change, salvation. Not listening to the voice of the prophet, not taking into account his words that exhort or correct, means decapitating that Word, making his pressing invitation to welcome the Lord ineffective. We don't go looking for a reed blown by the wind in the desert, that is, one of the many images we look at without understanding; we are not even looking for a man wrapped in soft robes, because these men are in the palaces of kings like the many false reassurances of well-being. Let us allow ourselves to be questioned by the one who shows us the Lord present in the world.