Year: 2022

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Friday, 16 September 2022 : 24th Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of Pope St. Cornelius, Pope and Martyr, and St. Cyprian, Bishop and Martyr (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Red

1 Corinthians 15 : 12-20

Well, then, if Christ is preached as risen from the dead, how can some of you say, that there is no resurrection of the dead? If there is no resurrection of the dead, then Christ has not been raised. And if Christ has not been raised, our preaching is empty, and our belief comes to nothing. And we become false witnesses of God, attesting that He raised Christ, whereas He could not raise Him, if indeed, the dead are not raised.

If the dead are not raised, neither has Christ been raised. And if Christ has not been raised, your faith gives you nothing, and you are still in sin. Also, those who fall asleep, in Christ, are lost. If it is only for this life, that we hope in Christ, we are the most unfortunate of all people. But no, Christ has been raised from the dead, and He comes before all those who have fallen asleep.

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Thursday, 15 September 2022 : 24th Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of Our Lady of Sorrows (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : White

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, today as we gather to reflect on the words of the Lord in the Scriptures we just heard, we remember that this day we celebrate the Feast of Our Lady of Sorrows, remembering the great sorrow that Mary, the Mother of our Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ, had experienced and suffered from, having witnessed everything that her Son had to suffer during His ministry, and then having to see her own Son being persecuted and tortured, betrayed by His own disciple, abandoned by others and condemned to die a most painful and humiliating death on the Cross for sins and faults that He Himself had not committed, and framed for crimes that He was not responsible for.

As with any mothers, seeing her own Son to suffer in such a manner must have been so difficult for Mary. Yet, she persevered through it all, and as sorrowful and painful it must have been for her, she remained true to her commitment to the mission entrusted to her, as the Mother of God, the Mother of the Saviour, to Whom she has dedicated much of her life to, in caring for Him since before He was even born into this world, and right up through most of His life, and unto the very foot of the Cross, where she witnessed her Son dying both as the Paschal Lamb of Sacrifice and the High Priest of all mankind, offering Himself for the salvation of all the whole world.

Mary had received premonition and warning for all these from Simeon the old prophet and servant of God who was awaiting the Messiah or Saviour of the world at the Temple of Jerusalem just as we heard in our Gospel passage today. Simeon told her how Mary would have to see her Son as a Sign for all the nations and how she would have to witness and experience great moments of pain, suffering and anguish, which he described as likened to a sword piercing her very own heart, the most loving and Immaculate Heart of Mary, the Mother of God. All those eventually came true and we knew the image of the grieving Mary, who grieved over the death of her Son.

That is why Mary has always been so attentive to us throughout history, as she continued to reach out to us, appearing in many occasions to different people, encouraging the people of God to be faithful to Him and to return to Him with regret and the desire to be forgiven from their many sins. That is because just as she has experienced losing her Son to suffering and death, and knowing that He had suffered and died for all of our sake, for our redemption and salvation, surely she did not want the sacrifice made by her Son to be wasted by us, as many of us still ignore Him and refuse to follow Him and His truth, and fail to recognise His love.

Not only that, but Mary herself has also been entrusted to each one of us as our own loving mother, as the Lord Himself as we heard in our Gospel passage today, entrusted Mary to St. John the Apostle, His beloved disciple to be his own mother, and he as the son entrusted to Mary. This is a symbolic act by which the Church and the Lord has extended the loving hands of Mary, her love and compassion, her motherly care and her attention to us, her beloved children, to each one of us as her own adopted and equally beloved precious children. We are all so fortunate that our mother even in her sorrow continues to show us her love, through which she has always hoped that we may find the salvation in her Son.

Now, brothers and sisters in Christ, what has always brought sorrow to our loving Mother’s heart is our constant disobedience and refusal to listen to the words that her Son has always spoken to us. All of us have received His truth and love, His instructions, will, Law and commandments, His teachings and ways through the Church and the Scriptures, but we often still preferred to follow our own paths in life, and those paths more often than not led us down the path of sin and ruin. Many of us have fallen on the wayside in our path towards God and His salvation, tempted and swayed by the many efforts of the devil and his allies in their works to prevent us from being reunited and reconciled with God.

That is why today, as we commemorate this Feast of Our Lady of Sorrows, let us all reflect first of all on everything that the Lord, our God and Saviour had done for our sake, in His ever enduring and wonderful love, in reaching out to us with love and in sacrificing Himself for our sake so that through Him we may have life and not perish. Then we also should remember the love that His mother Mary has shown us all, and how we have been entrusted to her as her own adopted children. She has always prayed and interceded for our sake, and wanted the best for us, ever reminding us to turn towards her Son and to be righteous and good at all times.

Let us all therefore ask our beloved Mother Mary, Our Lady of Sorrows, to continue to love us patiently and to not be sorrowful anymore, by our commitment and desire to repent from our sins and by our efforts to live our lives with faith from now on, making good use of all the opportunities given to us, in each and every moments to be exemplary in life and to inspire one another to follow the Lord and to be ever faithful always. May God be with us always and may His blessed Mother, Mary, Our Lady of Sorrows, our Mother, pray for us always. Amen.

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Thursday, 15 September 2022 : 24th Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of Our Lady of Sorrows (Gospel Reading)

Liturgical Colour : White

John 19 : 25-27

At that time, near the cross of Jesus stood His mother, His mother’s sister Mary, who was the wife of Cleophas, and Mary of Magdala. When Jesus saw the mother, and the disciple whom He loved, He said to the mother, “Woman, this is your son.”

Then He said to the disciple, “This is your mother.” And from that moment the disciple took her to his own home.

Alternative reading

Luke 2 : 33-35

At that time, the father and mother of Jesus wondered at what was said about the Child. Simeon blessed them, and said to Mary, His mother, “Know this : your Son is a Sign; a Sign established for the falling and rising of many in Israel, a Sign of contradiction; and a sword will pierce your own soul, so that, out of many hearts, thoughts may be revealed.”

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Thursday, 15 September 2022 : 24th Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of Our Lady of Sorrows (Psalm)

Liturgical Colour : White

Psalm 30 : 2-3a, 3bc-4, 5-6, 15-16, 20

In You, o YHVH, I take refuge, may I never be disgraced; deliver me in Your justice. Give heed to my plea, and make haste to rescue me.

Be a Rock of refuge for me, a Fortress for my safety. For You are my Rock and my Stronghold, lead me for Your Name’s sake.

Free me from the snare that they have set for me. Indeed You are my Protector. Into Your hands I commend my spirit; You have redeemed me, o YHVH, faithful God.

But I put my trust in You, o YHVH, I said : “You are my God.” My days are in Your hand. Deliver me from the hand of my enemies, from those after my skin.

How great is the goodness which You have stored for those who fear You, which You show, for all to see, to those who take refuge in You!

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Thursday, 15 September 2022 : 24th Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of Our Lady of Sorrows (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : White

Hebrews 5 : 7-9

Christ, in the days of His mortal life, offered His sacrifice with tears and cries. He prayed to Him, Who could save Him from death, and He was heard, because of His humble submission. Although He was Son, He learnt, through suffering, what obedience was, and, once made perfect, He became the Source of eternal salvation, for those who obey Him.

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Wednesday, 14 September 2022 : Feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : Red

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, today we mark the Feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross, celebrating the three moments in history related to the Holy Cross of Our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. This day we mark the moment when the True Cross, the actual Cross on which the Lord was hung and nailed on, was discovered by St. Helena, the mother of the Roman Emperor Constantine the Great. It also marked the occasion of the Dedication of the Basilicas and churches built by the same Emperor Constantine on the Mount Calvary in Jerusalem. Lastly, it also marked the moment when the True Cross reentered Jerusalem in great triumph after having been captured by the Persian Sassanians three centuries after it had been discovered.

Essentially, in terms of historical significance, today’s Feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross marked the moments when the true Faith and the Cross of Christ was triumphant over the forces of the world, such as the moment when the Christian faith and Church finally triumphed against those arrayed against them, as they were officially tolerated and the persecutions against them rescinded by the same Emperor Constantine the Great through the Edict of Milan. It was a moment of triumph that roughly coincided with the rediscovery of the True Cross of Our Lord and Saviour at the site of Mount Calvary. It was also another moment of triumph when the forces of Christendom triumphed over the pagan Sassanians, and reclaimed the True Cross from the enemy.

However, this Feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross is much more than just all of that. The most important triumph that this Feast celebrates today is the great triumph that Our Lord and Saviour has won for all of us, as He raised His Cross and was Himself raised on it, for the salvation of all the whole world, of all mankind, of all of God’s beloved children. Through His Cross, Our Lord Jesus Christ has shown us the perfect manifestation of God’s love as well as the perfect obedience of Man, through which God reached out to us and Man reached out to Him, with Christ forming the important Bridge through His Cross, reconnecting us and God.

In our first reading today we heard the story of what happened when the Israelites rebelled against God in the desert, and we heard about the bronze serpent of Moses which was crafted to help the Israelites. At that time, the rebellious Israelites disobeyed God such that the Lord sent fiery serpents to strike at them as punishment for their sins, disobedience and wickedness. Many died from those fiery serpents and their bites, and the people begged the Lord for forgiveness and mercy. It was then that the Lord told Moses to craft that bronze serpent as a sign of God’s salvation and mercy, and all those who saw that bronze serpent after being bitten did not perish.

That occasion is mirrored in our Gospel passage today when we heard of the exchange between the Lord Jesus and Nicodemus, the Pharisee who was sympathetic to Him and His teachings. The Lord spoke of the parallel between what happened back then and what He Himself would have to undergo, as He would be raised up as the Son of Man, before all the people much as how the bronze serpent was raised up by Moses before the whole people of Israel. And just as how the bronze serpent showed the salvation, mercy, compassion and forgiveness from God for His people, sparing them from the fiery serpents, thus, the Lord has also showed the infinite love of God through His crucifixion and His Cross.

The Lord has shown us His enduring and patient love, made manifest through His Son, and this was made possible because He loved us so much that He willingly emptied Himself and took up the appearance and essence of our humanity, by being born of His mother Mary, becoming the Son of God incarnate in the flesh, and becoming the Son of Man. Through His incarnation in the flesh, God made His love visible and tangible for us, and by His voluntary sacrifice on the Cross, the show of God’s ultimate love, all of us have witnessed and received the manifestation of that undying love. By suffering and dying on the Cross, He made us all sharers in His salvation, and die to our sins, and by His glorious Resurrection, He shared with us the new life, free from sin that we shall enjoy for eternity.

Not only that, but as I mentioned earlier, Christ by His humble submission to His Father’s will has shown us all mankind how we can be truly faithful to the Lord, and breaking free from the chains of sin and wickedness that had enslaved us, and how we can gain freedom from death through Christ and His assurance of salvation and new life for us. While the first Adam faltered and failed when tested by the devil, and succumbed to the temptations of his desires, ending up with sin that corrupted us all, Our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ as the New Adam showed us that we should not and cannot bow down to those temptations or to the devil, and we should instead seek the Lord and commit ourselves to Him wholeheartedly.

That is why the devil, Satan, and all of his fallen allies, the evil spirits and demons despised and feared the Holy Cross, because that tool of humiliation that was once used for the worst of criminals, as means for great suffering and humiliation, has become the means by which God saved His beloved people, and through His Holy Cross, the Lord has cast a devastating blow upon the devil and all of his forces, and broke their dominion over us forever, showing us the sure path to freedom from sin and death, and into eternal life. This is why today we mark that glorious triumph of the Holy Cross over the forces of sin, evil and death.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, as we reflect on the significance and importance of today’s Feast, its meaning and purpose, and how it has shown us the salvation of God and the triumph of His Cross, let us all also reflect and ponder upon our own lives. Let us all look upon the Lord on His Cross, the Crucifix, and discern how each and every one of us can be better disciples of His. We cannot continue to live our lives with apathy towards our faith, ignorance or lukewarmness, in how we practice our Christian faith and beliefs. We should not be hypocrites, and should not forget the love and compassion that God has always generously shown us.

Let us all look upon He Who has been crucified for us upon the Holy and Glorious Cross. Let us all glorify and praise Him more and more each day, by our own worthy and grace-filled lives, dedicating ourselves in each and every moments to love and serve the Lord ever more with our every living moments, with all of our might and strength. May the Lord, through His triumphant Cross, continue to guide us forward to the path towards eternal life. May God bless us always, now and forevermore. Amen.

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Wednesday, 14 September 2022 : Feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross (Gospel Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Red

John 3 : 13-17

At that time, Jesus said to Nicodemus, “No one has ever gone up to heaven except the One Who came from heaven, the Son of Man. As Moses lifted up the serpent in the desert, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, so that whoever believes in Him may have eternal life.”

“Yes, God so loved the world that He gave His only Son that whoever believes in Him may not be lost, but may have eternal life. God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world; instead, through Him the world is to be saved.”

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Wednesday, 14 September 2022 : Feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross (Psalm)

Liturgical Colour : Red

Psalm 77 : 1-2, 34-35, 36-37, 38

Give heed, o My people, to My teaching; listen to the words of My mouth! I will speak in parables; I will talk of old mysteries.

When He slew them, they repented and sought Him earnestly. They remembered that God was their Rock, the Most High, their Redeemer.

But they flattered Him with their mouths; they lied to Him with their tongues, while their hearts were unfaithful; they were untrue to His Covenant.

Even then, in His compassion, He forgave their offences and did not destroy them. Many a time He restrained His anger, and did not fully stir up His wrath.

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Wednesday, 14 September 2022 : Feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Red

Numbers 21 : 4b-9

The people were discouraged by the journey and began to complain against God and Moses, “Why have you brought us out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? There is neither bread nor water here and we are disgusted with this tasteless manna.”

YHVH then sent fiery serpents against them. They bit the people and many of the Israelites died. Then the people came to Moses and said, “We have sinned, speaking against YHVH and against you. Plead with YHVH to take the serpents away.”

Moses pleaded for the people and YHVH said to him, “Make a fiery serpent and set it on a standard; whoever has been bitten and then looks at it shall live.” So Moses made a bronze serpent and set it on a standard. Whenever a man was bitten, he looked towards the bronze serpent and he lived.

Alternative reading

Philippians 2 : 6-11

Though He was in the form of God, He did not regard equality with God as something to be grasped, but emptied Himself, taking on the nature of a servant, made in human likeness, and in His appearance found as a Man.

He humbled Himself by being obedient to death, death on the cross. That is why God exalted Him and gave Him the Name which outshines all names, so that at the Name of Jesus all knees should bend in heaven, on earth and among the dead, and all tongues proclaim that Christ Jesus is the Lord to the glory of God the Father.

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(Usus Antiquior) Exaltation of the Holy Cross (II Classis) – Wednesday, 14 September 2022 : Offertory, Secret Prayer of the Priest, Preface, Communion and Post-Communion Prayer

Liturgical Colour : Red

Offertory

Tradition of the Faith

Protege, Domine, plebem Tuam per signum Sanctae Crucis ab omnibus insidiis inimicorum omnium : ut tibi gratam exhibeamus servitutem, et acceptabile fiat sacrificium nostrum, Alleluja.

English translation

Through the sign of the Holy Cross, protect Your people, o Lord, from the snares of all enemies, that we may pay You a pleasing service, and our sacrifice be acceptable, Alleluia.

Secret Prayer of the Priest

Jesu Christi, Domini nostri, Corpore et Sanguine saginandi, per quem Crucis est sanctificatum vexillum : quaesumus, Domine, Deus noster; ut, sicut illud adorare meruimus, ita perreniter Ejus gloriae salutaris potiamur effectu. Per eumdem Dominum nostrum Jesum Christum Filium Tuum, qui Tecum vivit et regnat in unitate Spiritus Sancti Deus, per omnia saecula saeculorum. Amen.

English translation

Being about to be fed with the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ our Lord, through Whom the banner of the Cross was sanctified, we beseech You o Lord, our God, that, as we have had the grace to adore it, so we may forever enjoy the effect of its salutary glory. Through the same Lord Jesus Christ, Your Son, who with You lives and reigns in the unity of the Holy Spirit, God, world without end. Amen.

Preface of the Holy Cross

Vere dignum et justum est, aequum et salutare, nos Tibi semper et ubique gratias agere : Domine, Sancte Pater omnipotens, aeterne Deus : Qui salutem humani generis in ligno Crucis constituisti : ut, unde mors oriebatur, inde vita resurgeret : et, qui in ligno vincebat, in ligno quoque vinceretur : per Christum, Dominum nostrum.

Per quem majestatem Tuam laudant Angeli, adorant Dominationes, tremunt Potestates. Caeli caelorumque Virtutes ac beata Seraphim socia exsultatione concelebrant. Cum quibus et nostras voces ut admitti jubeas, deprecamur, supplici confessione dicentes :

English translation

It is truly meet and just, right and profitable for us, at all times, and in all places, to give thanks to You, o Holy Lord, Father Almighty, Eternal God, You Who had established the salvation of mankind in the wood of the Cross, that from whence death came into the world, thence a new life might spring, and that he who by a tree overcame, by a tree might be overthrown. Through Christ our Lord.

Through Whom the Angels praise, the Dominations adore, the Powers, trembling with awe, worship Your majesty, which the heavens, and the forces of heaven, together with the Blessed Seraphim joyfully do magnify, and You do command that it be permitted to our lowliness to join with them in confessing You and unceasingly to repeat :

Communion

Tradition of the Faith

Per signum Crucis de inimicis nostris libera nos, Deus noster.

English translation

Through the sign of the Cross deliver us from our enemies, o our God.

Post-Communion Prayer

Adesto nobis, Domine, Deus noster : et, quos Sanctae Crucis laetari facis honore, ejus quoque perpetuis defende subsidiis. Per Dominum nostrum Jesum Christum Filium Tuum, qui Tecum vivit et regnat in unitate Spiritus Sancti Deus, per omnia saecula saeculorum. Amen.

English translation

May You be with us, o Lord, our God, and as You had made us rejoice in honour of the Holy Cross, defend us also by its perpetual assistance. Through our Lord Jesus Christ, Your Son, who with You lives and reigns in the unity of the Holy Spirit, God, world without end. Amen.