Day: December 8, 2015

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Friday, 11 December 2015 : 2nd Week of Advent, Memorial of Pope St. Damasus I, Pope (Gospel Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Purple/Violet or White (Popes)

Matthew 11 : 16-19

At that time, Jesus said to His disciples and to the people, “Now, to what can I compare the people of this day? They are like children sitting in the marketplace, about whom their companions complain : ‘We played the flute for you, but you would not dance. We sang a funeral song, but you would not cry!'”

“For John came fasting, and people said, ‘He is possessed.’ Then the Son of Man came, He ate and drank, and people said, ‘Look at this Man! A glutton and drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners!’ Yet the outcome will prove Wisdom to be right.”

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Friday, 11 December 2015 : 2nd Week of Advent, Memorial of Pope St. Damasus I, Pope (Psalm)

Liturgical Colour : Purple/Violet or White (Popes)

Psalm 1 : 1-2, 3, 4 and 6

Blessed is the one who does not go where the wicked gather, or stand in the way of sinners, or sit where the scoffers sit! Instead, he finds delight in the Law of the Lord and meditates day and night on His commandments.

He is like a tree beside a brook producing its fruit in due season, its leaves never withering. Everything he does is a success.

But it is different with the wicked. They are like chaff driven away by the wind. For the Lord knows the way of the righteous but cuts off the way of the wicked.

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Friday, 11 December 2015 : 2nd Week of Advent, Memorial of Pope St. Damasus I, Pope (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Purple/Violet or White (Popes)

Isaiah 48 : 17-19

Thus says YHVH, your Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel : I, YHVH, your God, teach you what is best for you; I lead you in the way that you must go. Had you paid attention to My commandments, your peace would have been like a river, your righteousness like the waves of the sea.

Your descendants would have been like the sand, and those born of your stock like its grains, their names never cut off nor blotted out from My presence.

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Thursday, 10 December 2015 : 2nd Week of Advent (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : Purple/Violet

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, on this day we heard the words of the Holy Scriptures, which revealed to us the promise that God had made with us mankind, that He will save us by His coming and by the rescue that He will bring us from all the darkness and the wickedness in the world. And what He wanted is to let us know how His salvation has come upon us, and that there will be great things to come awaiting us at the end of our journeys.

It was through John the Baptist that the world who had awaited for a long time for the arrival of its deliverance, the arrival of the Messiah, listened for the first time the message of hope and also at the same time a warning and a reminder, a call towards repentance and redemption, that mankind who were once sinners and rejected from the grace and the presence of God, were reunited in love with Him.

Indeed, many of us might have lost hope in waiting for the salvation that was promised by our God, and we continued to suffer persecutions, difficulties and challenges, especially if we profess ourselves to be faithful to the Lord and follow His ways. Many of us do not realise that God is working His graces and blessings through us, and by our own actions, we have made it possible for ourselves to attain the salvation in our God.

What does this mean, brothers and sisters in Christ? This means that the Lord Who had made Himself manifest in the world, visible and known to all, has shown us the way to go, that is the path which we are to take if we would like to achieve the salvation of our souls. He has shown us the path and the way, such that all that remains now is really how to execute and work in this.

We have to realise that many of us do call ourselves Christians, but we do not really know what it means to be one. We have heard the Word of God, received His teachings, and we have also professed our faith before Him, but we should really ask ourselves, are these enough? No, it is not enough. Our faith must be much more than just these, for we all should know that faith without good works and actions are meaningless and empty.

God is in fact calling all of us today, just as He had done so in the past, to be more proactive and committed to Him by our works and actions, that we no longer just believe in Him, but we also act on our faith so that our faith becomes an inspiration to others, and through our faith, we spread God’s Good News to the whole world and bring His salvation to all the peoples.

In this season of Advent, we are preparing ourselves for Christmas, the celebration of the birth of our Lord Jesus Christ, our Saviour into this world. But we have to realise that the best way to prepare for Christmas is not in buying all the decorations and putting them up, that is not in the best Christmas tree we make or the best gifts we wrap for the occasion.

Rather, the best way to prepare for Christmas is through a renewal of our faith and a greater understanding of the role which our Lord and Saviour had come into this world to reveal to us, that we too have our parts to play in the works of salvation. The best way to prepare for Christmas is our commitment to work more for the sake of the Lord, in calling others and as many people as possible, to return to the Lord, and by our actions, guided and rooted in faith, we may bring inspiration to all of them to also walk faithfully in our God.

May our Almighty God bless us and keep us in His grace, and may He help us to realise that there are still so many things that we can do in order to bring His Good News into this darkened world, that through us and through our works, we may help to bring salvation to as many souls as possible. May God be gracious to us and bless us always. Amen.