Liturgical Colour : Green or White (Saturday Mass of our Lady)
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, on this day we heard about how St. Paul mentioned to the faithful and the Church in Colossae in Greece, that they have been saved by the work and by the grace of God, and even though they were once delinquents, rebels and sinners, who disobeyed the Lord and lived in great wickedness, but God had made ourselves redeemed through His Son, Jesus Christ, by His sacrifice on the cross for us.
Brothers and sisters in Christ, we have to realise the great love and mercy that God had given to us. He had given us a new opportunity and a new chance to redeem ourselves from our faults and mistakes. And He wants us all to be loved and to be saved, and for Him no one should go alone on His own, rejected, hungry and downtrodden. He wants us all to be loved and cared, and He wants to forgive us our sins if we sincerely look for redemption.
That is why in the Gospel today, we heard of His confrontation with the Pharisees and the teachers of the Law. The Pharisees and the teachers of the Law were so transfixed on their laws, rules and regulations, so that they failed to realise and understand the true meaning, purpose and importance of the Law of God. The Law is a gift from God for us all mankind as a guide and a path for us to follow so that by walking with the Law, we may remain true to the Lord and be found righteous and worthy of being with our Lord once again.
The Pharisees and the teachers of the Law instead looked at the Law as something to be blindly obeyed and followed, even without proper understanding. They focused on external appearances and fulfilment of the Law without transformation of the heart, the mind and the soul. They enforced the laws of the sabbath day, where everyone was not supposed to do any work or activity, but they did so for the sake of enforcing it, and not understanding the true intention.
God did not intend for the Sabbath to oppress the people and making it a burden for them. Instead, His intention to instate such a rule is to help the people to coordinate and regulate themselves that out of their busy daily schedules, we may find the way to love our God and devote ourselves to Him, and spend some time with Him, speaking with Him, knowing Him and understanding His will rather than being preoccupied so much with our lives and our worldliness.
Ironically, the Pharisees and the teachers of the Law who insisted so much on enforcing the laws of the sabbath were themselves the ones who became preoccupied with themselves and worldly concerns. They wanted to be seen as holy and pious when they went about doing whatever they could to fulfil the Law’s obligations. But in fact, they were dooming themselves for failing to understand God’s true intention, and in doing so they also led the people into ruin by their false ways.
The same often happen to us all as well, and we often lose the understanding of the bigger picture of our lives for the sake of fulfilling our own ego and our own desires. It is our selfishness that is often our greatest enemy and our greatest obstacle. And today, we celebrate the feast of a holy woman, whose life had been an inspiration for countless people, and whose actions had brought a new hope to countless people who had no hope.
Blessed Mother Teresa of Calcutta was born an Albanian, and in her young age the desire to serve the Lord and His people grew in her heart, and she joined the missionaries and devoted herself to a life of celibacy and service. She went on to India and served there for the rest of her life. As we all should know from all that we had heard about her, she would go on to serve the poor people in Calcutta.
She established the Missionaries of Charity, a religious congregation devoted to the service of the least and the poorest in the society, those who had been rejected and without love, those who were suffering and on the brink of death. She brought hope to the destitute and those who thought that everything was hopeless to them. This is exactly what God had done for us, remember? He lifted us up out of the pit and the darkness, and He brought us a new hope and into the eternal life He promised to all of us.
Therefore, as we remember the examples of Blessed Mother Teresa of Calcutta, what she had done and how she devoted herself to the poor and the downtrodden without worry for herself, let us all also realise, first that God is loving and merciful, and He truly cares for all of us, and He wants all of us to be saved and redeemed from our sins and wickedness. We would have fallen into hell and eternal suffering for sure, if God did not come and help us.
Then, we have to realise that we have to let go of our own ego and die to our own selfishness if we are to be able to truly be the disciples and followers of the Lord. It was the selfishness of the Pharisees and the teachers of the Law that made them as hypocrites in their faith, as they served themselves first and thought only of making themselves look great at the expense of righteousness and genuine faith.
Let us all follow in the footsteps of Blessed Mother Teresa of Calcutta and the many other holy saints of God, and let us all show love, care and concern for others around us. Let us all show more concern and effort to bring all of us to true and genuine life filled with the love of God, and care for one another. May Almighty God, our Lord and loving Father be with us always, love us and may He guide us always to the right path, to love Him with all of our hearts. Amen.
petercanisiusmichaeldavidkang 