14th Week of Ordinary Time

by

Friday, 12 July 2019 : 14th Week of Ordinary Time (Psalm)

Liturgical Colour : Green

Psalm 36 : 3-4, 18-19, 27-28, 39-40

Trust in YHVH and do good; dwell in the land and live on it. Make YHVH your delight; and He will grant your heart’s desire.

YHVH watches over the lives of the upright; forever will their inheritance abide. They are not crushed in times of calamity; when famine strikes, they still are satisfied.

Do good and shun evil, so that you will live secure forever. For YHVH loves justice and right, and never forsakes His faithful ones. The wicked, instead, will perish, and their breed will be cut off.

YHVH is the salvation of the righteous; in time of distress, He is their refuge. YHVH helps them, and rescues them from the oppressor; He saves them, for they sought shelter in Him.

by

Friday, 12 July 2019 : 14th Week of Ordinary Time (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Green

Genesis 46 : 1-7, 28-30

Israel left with all he owned and reached Beersheba where he offered sacrifices to the God of his father Isaac. God spoke to Israel in visions that he had during the night. “Jacob! Jacob!” “Here I am,” he said. “I am God, the God of your father. Do not be afraid to go to Egypt, for there I will make you into a great nation. I will go with you to Egypt and I will bring you back again and Joseph’s hand will close your eyes.”

Jacob left Beersheba and the sons of Israel carried Jacob their father with their little children and their wives in the wagons that Joseph had sent to fetch him. They also took their flocks and all that they had acquired in Canaan. And so it was that Jacob came to Egypt and with him all his family, his sons and his grandsons, his daughters and his granddaughters, in short all his children he took with him to Egypt.

Jacob sent Judah ahead to let Joseph know he was coming and that he would soon arrive in the land of Goshen. Joseph got his chariot ready in order to meet Israel his father in Goshen. He presented himself, threw his arms around his father and wept on his shoulder for a long time. Israel said to Joseph, “Now I can die, for I have seen your face and know you are alive.”

by

Thursday, 11 July 2019 : 14th Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Benedict, Abbot (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : White

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, on this day we listened to the words of the Scripture speaking to us about the exchange between Joseph and his brothers, as the former wanted to keep Benjamin as a hostage as part of a ploy he planned to test his brothers. Judah spoke up passionately in defence of his brothers and also Benjamin, pleading for Joseph to release Benjamin. At that time, they did not know yet who Joseph actually was.

The brothers defended Benjamin who was accused of stealing from the Regent of Egypt, that is Joseph, and they showed concern that their father Israel would die if Benjamin was to be arrested and taken away, and they also kind of showed regret having sent Joseph off earlier on, abandoning him to the hands of the slavers of Midian. And Joseph was touched by all the love that the brothers showed to each other, so much so that he was overwhelmed by his emotions and eventually revealed himself to his brothers.

And in the end, the twelve brothers were united once again, and Joseph, the brother once thought lost, was reunited with his other brothers, and eventually this good news came to Israel who was left behind in Canaan. Ut was a happy ending for the bitter pain that the family had to endure, especially for Israel, who had to accept the painful fact of his beloved son’s death earlier on.

It is then for this same reason that God in our Gospel passage today, through His Son, Our Lord Jesus Christ, sent out His disciples to the many places He was about to visit, to prepare His way for him and to call on the people to repent from their sins and to be willing to accept the Good News and the truth of God. Through this, the Lord wanted to reconcile His people to Himself, and to gather them back from being scattered away in the darkness of the world.

However, at the same time, just as it was difficult for the sons of Israel to be reunited, the Lord also revealed to His disciples that they would encounter challenges and difficulties along the way, people who would reject them and refuse to believe in them, those who were stubborn and hardened in heart. But at the same time, He also reassured them that He would be with them, and those who refused to believe essentially had rejected salvation on their own volition.

All of us are therefore also called to go forth and be witnesses of the truth of God, by virtue of our Christian baptism and therefore membership of the Church. As members of God’s Church, all of us are called to be examples and role models in faith so that by our good examples and living faith, many others will also come to believe in God through us and our actions. There will indeed be challenges along the way, but we should not easily give up our efforts just because of those.

Today, let us be inspired by the good and faithful example of St. Benedict of Nursia, also known as St. Benedict the Abbot, who was famous for his inspiration for what would eventually become the Benedictine religious order, and also for his rigorous and disciplined rule, the Rule of St. Benedict, which became a model for many other religious orders and faithful communities in how they lead a life of faith.

St. Benedict of Nursia was a Roman noble who was intelligent and bright, and yet, was disappointed with the immorality he discovered when he went to Rome to further his studies. Eventually, he retired away from the city and found a place of solitude, where gradually he developed a hermit-like lifestyle of solitude and prayer, and more and more people came to join him. That was how the Benedictines first came to be, a gathering of men who wanted to seek God through prayer and internal peace.

The faith, piety and love which St. Benedict had for God is truly an inspiration to each and every one of us as Christians, for through his examples, many have been inspired to follow a better and holier way of life, turning away from sin and the temptations to sin, embracing instead the noble and true path of the Lord. Let us also be inspired by their examples and lead a better, more Christian way of life from now on in our own lives.

May the Lord be with us, and may He continue to guide us, through the inspiration and examples of St. Benedict, that we may grow ever closer to God and we may be more faithful in all things we say and do. May God bless us all and our good endeavours, now and forevermore. Amen.

by

Thursday, 11 July 2019 : 14th Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Benedict, Abbot (Gospel Reading)

Liturgical Colour : White

Matthew 10 : 7-15

At that time, Jesus said to His disciples, “Go, and proclaim this message : The kingdom of Heaven is near. Heal the sick, bring the dead back to life, cleanse the lepers, and drive out demons. Freely have you received, freely give. Do not carry any gold or silver or money in your purses. Do not take a travelling bag, or an extra shirt, or sandals, or a walking stick : workers deserve to be compensated.”

“When you come to a town or a village, look for a worthy person, and stay there until you leave. When you enter the house, wish it peace. If the people are worthy people, your peace will rest on them; if they are not worthy people, your blessing will come back to you.”

“And if you are not welcomed, and your words are not listened to, leave that house or that town, and shake the dust off your feet. I assure you, it will go easier for the people of Sodom and Gomorrah on the day of judgment, than it will for the people of that town.”

by

Thursday, 11 July 2019 : 14th Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Benedict, Abbot (Psalm)

Liturgical Colour : White

Psalm 104 : 16-17, 18-19, 20-21

Then YHVH sent a famine and ruined the crop that sustained the land; He sent a man ahead of them, Joseph, who was sold as a slave.

His feet in shackles, his neck in irons; till what he foretold came to pass, and YHVH’s word proved him true.

The king sent for him; set him free; the ruler of the peoples released him. He put him in charge of his household and made him ruler of all his possessions.

by

Thursday, 11 July 2019 : 14th Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Benedict, Abbot (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : White

Genesis 44 : 18-21, 23b-29 and Genesis 45 : 1-5

Judah then went forward and said, “My lord, allow your servant to speak. Do not be angry with your servant, although you are equal to Pharaoh himself. The last time you questioned your servants saying : ‘Have you a father or a brother?’ We said to my lord : ‘We have an aged father who had a child in his old age. His brother is dead and he is the only one left of his mother’s children. And his father loves him.'”

“Then you said to us : ‘Bring him down so that I can see him for myself, if your youngest brother did not come with you, you would not be admitted to my presence.’ All this we said to our father on returning there. So when he told us to come back and buy a little food, we said : ‘We cannot go down again unless our youngest brother is with us. We shall not be admitted to the lord’s presence unless our brother is with us.'”

“Then my father said : ‘You know that my wife had two children. One went away from me and has surely been torn to pieces since I have not seen him anymore. If you take this one from me and something happens to him you will bring my gray hair in sorrow to the grave.'”

Now Joseph could no longer control his feelings in the presence of all those standing by and he called out, “Leave my presence, everyone!” And only his brothers were with him when Joseph made himself known to them. He wept so loudly that the Egyptians heard and the news spread through Pharaoh’s house.

Joseph said to his brothers, “I am Joseph. Is my father still alive?” And his brothers could not answer because they were terrified at seeing him. Joseph said, “Come closer,” and they drew nearer. “I am Joseph your brother, yes, it is me, the one you sold to the Egyptians. Now do not grieve or reproach yourselves for selling me, because God has sent me before you to save your lives.”

by

Wednesday, 10 July 2019 : 14th Week of Ordinary Time (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : Green

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, on this day we listened to the words of the Scripture speaking to us about the tale between Joseph, the son of Jacob or Israel and his brothers in Egypt at the time when the whole world experienced a widespread famine, and Joseph, having been abandoned by his brothers many years before, had become the powerful Regent of Egypt. And the brothers of Joseph came to him without knowing who he actually was, and Joseph recognised who they were.

There is some sorts of parallel today, in what we heard in the first reading from the Book of Genesis and the Gospel passage from the Gospel of St. Matthew, as the Gospel passage recounted to us the moment when the Lord Jesus chose His twelve chief disciples, the ones who later on would be known as the Twelve Apostles. In both, there are twelve individuals involved, in the first reading being the twelve sons of Israel, and in the Gospel, the twelve disciples of Jesus.

The number twelve has a particular significance in the Bible as it represents the completeness of things, as the whole nation of Israel eventually came from these twelve sons of Jacob, becoming the twelve tribes of Israel. And the reunion between Joseph and his brothers in today’s passage was also no less symbolic and significant, if we understand the intention of why the Lord called His Twelve Apostles.

Since the time of ancient Israel, the twelve tribes of Israel have been torn apart many times, because of their disagreements and conflicts between them, and the division would become permanent when the ten northern tribes formed the separate kingdom of Israel and the remaining two tribes of Judah and Benjamin formed the kingdom of Judah after the death of king Solomon.

When the northern kingdom was overrun and destroyed by the Assyrians and then followed on by the destruction of the southern kingdom by the Babylonians, the tribes and the people of Israel were scattered all over the place, and later on, all over the world. It was just like the separation that happened between Joseph and his brothers, when the jealousy of the latter made them to plot to abandon Joseph to the slavers of Midian.

And what did the Lord Jesus called His Twelve Apostles for? He called them all first with the mission to go to the towns of the Israelites, to the lost sheep of Israel, to gather them all back to the fold of the Lord, essentially to reunite all the scattered people and the tribes of the Lord. When He told them not to go to the pagan territories, it was not that the Lord was biased against the non-Jews and the pagans, but it was because at that time, the primary objective was for the Word of God to be preached to the people whom God had first called.

Therefore, after this mission has been completed, with the suffering, death and resurrection of Our Lord, and subsequently when the Lord commanded His Apostles and disciples to go forth to the nations and baptise them in the Name of the Father, Son and the Holy Spirit, the mission of the Apostles were expanded to include the evangelisation of the Gentiles or the non-Jewish people, but with the same intention.

And this intention is for them all to bring together all the scattered flock of the Lord, from all peoples and from all the nations, all who have been scattered and separated from God because of their sins. Sin has been the cause of the sundering of the love between God and mankind, and many have been lost to the Lord because of their sins. It is now up to us, brothers and sisters in Christ, as the ones who now bear the same responsibility that the Apostles had once borne, for us to carry on their mission and reach out to all those who have not yet heard of God’s truth.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, let us all therefore reflect in what way each and every one of us will be able to dedicate ourselves more closely to the Lord, and in what way we will be able to contribute through our own actions and examples, in living our lives with genuine faith so that many more will come to believe in God through us.

May the Lord continue to guide us in our path, and may He continue to bless us all in all of our endeavours from now on. May He strengthen us and encourage us to live ever more faithfully from now on, and give us the wisdom and strength to carry on living as true Christians. Amen.

by

Wednesday, 10 July 2019 : 14th Week of Ordinary Time (Gospel Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Green

Matthew 10 : 1-7

At that time, Jesus called His Twelve disciples to Him, and gave them authority over unclean spirits, to drive them out, and to heal every disease and sickness.

These are the names of the Twelve Apostles : first Simon, called Peter, and his brother Andrew; James, the son of Zebedee, and his brother John; Philip and Bartholomew; Thomas and Matthew, the tax collector; James, the son of Alphaeus, and Thaddaeus; Simon, the Canaanite, and Judas Iscariot, the man who would betray Him.

Jesus sent these Twelve on mission, with the instruction : “Do not visit pagan territory and do not enter a Samaritan town. Go, instead, to the lost sheep of the people of Israel. Go, and proclaim this message : The kingdom of Heaven is near.”

by

Wednesday, 10 July 2019 : 14th Week of Ordinary Time (Psalm)

Liturgical Colour : Green

Psalm 32 : 2-3, 10-11, 18-19

Give thanks to YHVH on the harp and lyre, making melody and chanting praises. Amid loud shouts of joy, sing to Him a new song and play the ten-stringed harp.

YHVH frustrates the plans of the nations and brings to nothing the peoples’ designs. But His plan stands forever, and His heart’s design, through all generations.

But YHVH’s eyes are upon those who fear Him, upon those who trust in His loving kindness; to deliver them from death and preserve them from famine.

by

Wednesday, 10 July 2019 : 14th Week of Ordinary Time (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Green

Genesis 41 : 55-57 and Genesis 42 : 5-7a, 17-24a

When the land of Egypt began to suffer from the famine, the people came to Pharaoh for bread. But Pharaoh told all the Egyptians, “Go to Joseph and do as he tells you.” When the famine had spread throughout the land, Joseph opened all the storehouses and sold grain to the Egyptians for the famine was indeed severe over the land.

As the famine had worsened throughout the whole world, people came from other countries to buy grain from Joseph. So the sons of Israel were among those going to buy grain, for there was famine in Canaan. It was Joseph, as governor of the land, who sold the grain to all the people. When his brothers arrived they bowed before him, with their faces to the ground.

Joseph recognised his brothers but did not make himself known and so he put them in prison for three days. On the third day Joseph said to them, “I will help you save yourselves, for I am a man who fears God. If you are sincere, let one of your brothers remain prisoner in the house of the guard where you now are, and the rest of you take the grain to save your families from famine. Then you will bring back your youngest brother; so the truth of what you say will be proved and your lives spared.”

They did as they were ordered and said among themselves, “Alas! We are guilty because of the way we treated our brother when he pleaded with us for mercy, but we did not listen. That is why this trouble has come upon us.” Reuben answered them, “Did I tell you not to sin against the boy. But you did not listen and now we are brought to account for his blood.”

Now they did not know that Joseph understood them as there was an interpreter between them. As for Joseph, he withdrew and wept.