Liturgical Colour : Green

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, today as we all listened to the words of the Sacred Scriptures we are reminded of the need for all of us to turn away from our disobedience and sins against God, from all the wicked and dark ways we have done in our respective lives. We are reminded that as God’s chosen and beloved people, all of us ought to do what we have been shown by the Lord Himself, in being exemplary in our words, actions and deeds, to do what the Lord Himself had taught us to do, in all His Law, commandments and precepts. And this is what we are constantly being reminded of as we listened to the words of the Lord contained in these Scripture passages, reminding us that we should be good examples and inspirations for our brethren around us, and not to bring scandal to our faith instead.

In our first reading today, we heard from the passage taken from the Book of the prophet Baruch where the Lord spoke to His people through Baruch, His prophet, whom He had sent to the people of the southern kingdom of Judah at the same time of the ministry of the prophet Jeremiah. Biblical and historical evidences pointed out to the prophet Baruch being a good friend, follower and secretary of Jeremiah, another great prophet who had been sent by God to warn His people in Judah for their wickedness and lack of faith in God. The prophet Baruch stated clearly this very fact before the people, stating how the people of Judah had veered off from the path that they should have walked, and they had disobeyed and disregarded the Law and the commandments of their Lord and Master.

That was also why the people of Judah were facing such difficulties and predicaments, reminding them of the blessings and curses which the Lord had made to His people since the days and times of their Exodus from Egypt, as recorded in the Torah, where the Lord would bless His people if they were to obey and follow His Law and commandments, and on the other hand, curses and sufferings would be their lot should they disobey and disregard what the Lord Himself had placed before them. And by the time of the ministry of the prophet Baruch and Jeremiah, the kingdom of Judah was already in the last days of its existence, hammered all around by its enemies and was on the last moments before Judah and Jerusalem itself would be destroyed by the Babylonians.

Then, from our Gospel passage today, taken from the Gospel according to St. Luke the Evangelist, we heard of the passage where the Lord Jesus was famously berating and criticising openly the cities of the region of Galilee where He often ministered and performed miracles in, such as Capernaum, Bethsaida and Chorazin. All those cities were the cities where the Jewish people, the descendants of the Israelites dwelled in within the land of Galilee. The Lord had performed many miracles in those places, and yet, still despite all of that, He still often faced a lot of obstacles, challenges and stubborn oppositions to His teachings and works, particularly from among the Pharisees and the teachers of the Law, those who rigidly adhered to their version and interpretations of the Law that they refused to listen to what the Lord brought upon them.

It was the pride, arrogance and haughtiness of those Pharisees and teachers of the Law which had prevented them from truly being able to listen and to appreciate what the Lord had wanted to tell them all through His miracles and actions. Those Pharisees and teachers of the Law were so preoccupied and so fanatical in their beliefs and in their way of observing the Law of God, that as another extreme against what the people of Judah had done in the time of the prophet Baruch and Jeremiah, they had ended up idolising their own version of the Law, and even their own piety and sense of superiority over the others, that blocked and prevented them from truly understanding what the Lord actually wanted them to do with His Law and commandments.

Instead of making the Law and commandments of God more accessible and understandable by the people as they should have done, and instead of helping God’s people, especially the most marginalised ones, those who have been neglected and lost to Him, to be able to come back to the Lord’s loving Presence and embrace His mercy as He intended them to be, as the shepherds of the flock of the Lord. The Pharisees and the teachers of the Law ought to help guide and lead those who have been lost to the Lord to Him, and instead, they made it even more difficult for those people to come seek the Lord and to be reconciled with Him as they ostracised those people even more and were even more biased and prejudiced against them.

And the Lord pointed out the contrast and the irony, that the people of the places where the so-called pagans and unbelievers lived in, like in Tyre and Sidon, they would actually believe in the Lord, in His signs, miracles and works, when the Jewish people and their leaders refused to do so. That was indeed the reality, as many among the followers of the Lord, both in the early Church and afterwards, came from among the Gentiles, or the non-Jewish people. Some of the Jewish people including the Apostles themselves and their companions did convert, as were quite a number among the Pharisees themselves, but vast majority of the early Christians came from many non-Jewish origins. They all believed in the Lord and put their trust and faith in Him, as we all also have done this day.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, today as we listened to these passages from the Sacred Scriptures, let us all consider carefully our paths forward in life so that we may indeed be worthy of what the Lord Himself has entrusted to us, all that He has promised and assured us with. If we are truly faithful to Him in the most wholesome way, and not merely being superficial in faith, then surely and eventually, we will be blessed by the Lord and we will be worthy of Him, unlike those leaders whom the Lord Himself had criticised for their hypocrisy and lack of genuine faith. May the Lord continue to guide and strengthen each and every one of us in faith, in each and every moments of our lives, and may He continue to bless us all in everything that we do, now and always. Amen.