Readings for Celebrating Advent

“Because you have done this,
    you will be cursed
    more than any domesticated animal
    and more than any wild animal.^[b]
On your belly you shall go
    and dust you shall eat
    all the days of your life.
¹⁵ And I will put hostility
    between you and between the woman,
    and between your offspring^[c] and between her offspring;^[d]
he will strike you on the head,
    and you will strike him on the heel.”