Liturgical Colour : Green or White (Bishops)

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, today as we all listened to the words of the Sacred Scriptures, we are all reminded that each and every one of us should not allow the temptations of the world, the temptations of our pride, desire and any other obstacles from preventing us to reach the Lord and His salvation. The reality is such that many of us are often distracted by the temptations of our worldly ambitions, desires and by the many attachments we have to the things around us in this world. This is why we suffer from the consequences of our disobedience, our immersion in the actions that have led us into the path of sin. And unless we repent from those sins, then we may end up losing everything in eternal damnation in Hell.

In our first reading today, we heard from the Book of Genesis of the story of the Tower of Babel, that well-known story of how God confused the language of mankind, resulting in the numerous languages that we have today. In the past, all mankind spoke a common language, which made sense as we all came from the same origin, but our hubris, ambition, pride and greed all had led to us thinking that we can surpass God and have the ambition to reach up to Heaven itself, by building that great Tower of Babel. As such, God punished us and our hubris, ambition and pride by confusing the unity of our language, that gift of unity and understanding which He had given us all through His Holy Spirit, and which, once withdrawn, therefore, we are no longer united in our wicked purpose to attain what is not ours.

Through this incident, God wants us all to know that there is nothing that we do that can be possible without God being part of the equation, and without God, we are truly nothing. It is because of God that we have the power, ability and the means to achieve whatever it is we have accomplished throughout history and throughout our human existence and all the civilisation we have all around us. But this punishment is not something that is meant to last forever, as God showed how He can reverse this as He did in sending His Holy Spirit upon His disciples at the event of Pentecost Sunday, fifty years after the Lord’s Resurrection. And as we all know from the Pentecost, the exact reverse of what happened at the Tower of Babel occurred, with the disciples being given the gift of tongues, able to perceive, understand and speak various languages even when many of them were uneducated and illiterate prior to this.

Then, in our Gospel passage taken from the Gospel according to St. Mark the Evangelist, we heard the Lord Jesus speaking to His disciples and indirectly also to all of us as His disciples and followers, reminding us that if we want to truly follow Him and commit ourselves to His path, then all of us must make the effort to abandon our worldly attachments, desires and all the other ambitions, desires for pleasures, fame and glory, all the things of the world which can distract and prevent us from truly being able to commit ourselves to God. After all, if we are divided in our focus and attention, between the Lord and our worldly ambitions and desires, how can we truly follow and obey the Lord faithfully as we all should have done?

That is why the Lord reminded each and every one of us that we have to make a choice and stand in our faith, to be committed wholeheartedly to Him, and not to allow any kinds of worldly temptations to pull us away from the path of righteousness. It is easy for us to fall into the wrong path otherwise, and the Lord succinctly put it with His words, ‘What good is it to gain the whole world, while destroying your soul?’ reminding us through His disciples at that time that we should always be ready to deny ourselves and our ambitions and desires while making the effort to follow Him, and the fact that no earthly treasures, glory or riches can match the true treasures that we will find only in the Lord alone. There is nothing in this world that can truly satisfy us, or which will last us forever.

Today, the Church also celebrates the Feast of St. Peter Damian, a renowned servant of God who has lived his life in great dedication to God and who has contributed immensely to the Church and to the benefit of the faithful and holy people of God. Although he was born into a noble family, but his family was poor and he initially had a rather terrible life in his younger years because his relatives mistreated him. Eventually, the young St. Peter Damian managed to be sponsored for his education and he advanced rapidly in his academics, that according to history, he already became a famous canon lawyer and teacher in his early twenties. He then devoted himself to religious life, becoming a Benedictine monk and priest, committing himself thoroughly to God and His Church.

St. Peter Damian would then go on to serve the Church firstly as an exemplary religious and then as a dedicated reformer, helping the Church in the process of its reforms especially against the corrupt practices and influences that had crept in and affected many, both the clergy and the laity alike at the time. He was closely involved in the process of reforms, encouraging the Pope and the other church leaders to take action against those who brought scandal to the Church so that they would no longer bring about confusion and division in the Church and among the faithful. He was made a Cardinal of the Holy Roman Church by Pope Stephen IX, and as Papal envoy and legate, was actively involved in some of those reform processes. Through his commitment and works which lasted to the end of his life, many decades of faithful service to God, St. Peter Damian truly showed us all how we should follow the Lord wholeheartedly as His disciples and followers.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, as we have heard from our Scripture readings today and from the life and inspiration of St. Peter Damian, our holy predecessor, we are all reminded to be focused on the Lord at all times, distancing ourselves from worldly ambitions, temptations and all the things that can lead us astray into the wrong path in life. Let us all learn to be humble as our predecessors, especially that of St. Peter Damian and how he had shown this through his life and examples, and be truly committed to the Lord, in doing whatever we can to contribute to the good works of the Church in everything we do. Let us all always be active in contributing our time and effort as always, and do our part to glorify the Lord by our lives. Amen.