6th Week of Easter

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Thursday, 18 May 2023 : Solemnity of the Ascension of the Lord (Second Reading)

Liturgical Colour : White

Ephesians 1 : 17-23

May the God of Christ Jesus our Lord, the Father of Glory, reveal Himself to you and give you a spirit of wisdom and revelation, that you may know Him. May He enlighten your inner vision, that you may appreciate the things we hope for, since we were called by God.

May you know how great is the inheritance, the glory, God sets apart for His saints; may you understand with what extraordinary power He acts in favour of us who believe. He revealed His Almighty power in Christ when He raised Him from the dead and had Him sit at His right hand in heaven, far above all rule, power, authority, dominion, or any other supernatural force that could be named, not only in this world but in the world to come as well.

Thus has God put all things under the feet of Christ and set Him above all things, as Head of the Church which is His Body, the fullness of Him Who fills all in all.

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Thursday, 18 May 2023 : Solemnity of the Ascension of the Lord (Psalm)

Liturgical Colour : White

Psalm 46 : 2-3, 6-7, 8-9

Clap your hands, all you peoples; acclaim God with shouts of joy. For the Lord, the Most High, is to be feared; He is a great King all over the earth.

God ascends amid joyful shouts, the Lord amid trumpet blasts. Sing praises to God, sing praises! Sing praises to our King, sing praises!

God is King of all the earth; sing to Him a hymn of praise. For God now rules over the nations, God reigns from His holy throne.

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Thursday, 18 May 2023 : Solemnity of the Ascension of the Lord (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : White

Acts 1 : 1-11

In the first part of my work, Theophilus, I wrote of all that Jesus did and taught from the beginning until the day when He ascended to heaven. But first He had instructed through the Holy Spirit, the Apostles He had chosen. After His passion, He presented Himself to them, giving many signs that He was alive, over a period of forty days He appeared to them and taught them concerning the kingdom of God.

Once when He had been eating with them, He told them, “Do not leave Jerusalem, but wait for the fulfilment of the Father’s promise about which I have spoken to you : John baptised with water, but you will be baptised with the Holy Spirit within a few days.”

When they had come together, they asked Him, “Is it now that You will restore the Kingdom of Israel?” And He answered, “It is not for you to know the time and the steps that the Father has fixed by His own authority. But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you; and you will be My witnesses in Jerusalem, throughout Judea and Samaria, even to the ends of the earth.”

After Jesus said this, He was taken up before their eyes and a cloud hid Him from their sight. While they were still looking up to heaven where He went, suddenly, two men dressed in white stood beside them, and said, “Men of Galilee, why do you stand here looking up at the sky? This Jesus Who has been taken from you into heaven, will return in the same way as you have seen Him go there.”

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Wednesday, 17 May 2023 : 6th Week of Easter (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : White

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, today as we listened to the words of the Scriptures, we are all reminded to remain true to our faith in the Lord, the One and only true God, Who reigns over all things and is the Source of all things, and hence, He alone is worthy of worship and adoration. As Christians, each one of us are called to be the faithful disciples of the Lord, in doing everything we can to glorify the Lord by our lives, and to proclaim His truth and Good News to more and more people among the nations. All of us are called to entrust ourselves to the Lord more, that is to allow Him to lead us and guide us in our path, helping us all to remain firmly faithful in all of our works and deeds, in our every day living and in our every interactions with each other so that we may be good and dedicated beacons of His light and truth.

In our first reading today, as we heard from the passage of the Acts of the Apostles, we are reminded by what St. Paul told to the people of Athens, to those who were assembled in the Areopagus, the area of public discourse and discussion, regarding the nature of the pagan worship then carried out by the Greeks in general and the people of Athens in particular. St. Paul came to Athens bringing the Good News of Christ, our Lord and Saviour, as he revealed unto those people Who the Lord really truly is. He compared how the people were irrational and folly in their belief in the pagan gods and idols, in their trust and worship of beings that came out from our awe of the nature’s wonders, which were merely reflections of the glory of the true Creator and Master of all things.

Back then, the Greeks including the Athenians, and much of the Greco-Roman world believed in a myriad of gods and idols, with deities linked to the natural phenomenon like the sky, lightning, earth itself, fire and storm, the sea, the weather and many other things. Like what St. Paul himself had experienced earlier, with St. Barnabas, he was mistaken by some people during his missionary journey as the manifestations of the Greek pagan pantheon, Zeus and Hermes, the chief of the Greek gods and the messenger of the gods respectively. Those gods acted and behaved just like how humans behaved, as those of us who are familiar with the Greek and Greco-Roman mythology and pantheon would have known how those gods had competitions and rivalry with each other, carried out adulterous and immoral acts, becoming angry over trivial matters among other examples.

Why was that so, brothers and sisters in Christ? That was because those gods came forth from the imagination and the collective knowledge of the people who worshipped them, and they behaved therefore in the manner of those who have worshipped and followed them as well. Essentially, they were not true gods and true beings, but rather, manifestations of the people’s own desires and sometimes twisted beliefs and lack of knowledge of the truth. Hence, St. Paul spoke to the Athenians regarding their folly of following all those artificial and unreal gods and idols, and told them that the One Whom they all ought to be worshipping, is none other than the One and only True God, the same One Who has manifested Himself in this world in the Person of Our Lord Jesus Christ, the Saviour of all mankind.

Now, how does this then relate to us? All of us have been called to the same Christian faith that those faithful and dedicated Apostles and servants of God have faithfully upheld. They have all committed themselves to a new life in accordance with God and following the one true God that St. Paul had preached about and proclaimed to the people of Athens. All of us are called and expected to live our lives in the same way, to uphold the Christian truths and the teachings of the Lord at all times, so that our every words, actions and deeds may truly be reflective of our belief and faith in the Lord. As Christians, each and every one of us have the solemn obligation and need to proclaim the truth of God through our lives and works, in everything that we say and do, so that in all of those, we may truly glorify God and made Him known to more and more people.

In our Gospel passage today, we heard yet again of the Lord’s reassurance to all of His disciples that He would send unto them the Holy Spirit to guide and help them down their path, to lead them to the right path and to help them to find their way and journey back towards the Lord. Each one of us are reminded that the Lord has always been with us, providing us throughout our journey and helping us whenever we needed help, in various ways. We have to therefore entrust ourselves in the Lord and to follow the path that He has shown us, so that we may truly be workers of the truth, to proclaim the Good News of God and to live our lives ever more worthily of the Lord Who has revealed Himself and His love to us, blessing us all with His wisdom and truth, with all the success and the growing spread of the Church and its evangelising mission to the world.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, as we now get closer to the time of the Pentecost and hence the end of this joyful and glorious Easter season, let us all therefore do our part in being good and exemplary, faithful and committed servants of the Lord, such that in everything that we have done and are going to in our lives, we will be able to inspire many others by our faithful examples and by our dedication. Let us all be truly faithful to God, and turn away from the many distractions and temptations present all around us, some of which we have turned into the new idols of our lives, the idol of worldly greed and desires, the idol of power and influence, which made us to be distracted and separated ever further from the love of God. Let us all remember to put our faith and trust in the Lord, our most loving God and Saviour.

May the Risen Lord, our Saviour, Jesus Christ, our most loving God and Good Shepherd, be with us always, be with His Church, and may the Holy Spirit be our inspiration, strength and guide. May the Lord bless our every works and good efforts for His greater glory, and may He help us all to persevere through all the hardships and challenges that we may have to face in this world. May He, the One and only True God, shine the light of His truth and love to the whole of this darkened world. Amen.

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Wednesday, 17 May 2023 : 6th Week of Easter (Gospel Reading)

Liturgical Colour : White

John 16 : 12-15

At that time, Jesus said to His disciples, “I still have many things to tell you, but you cannot bear them now. When He, the Spirit of Truth comes, He will guide you into the whole truth. He has nothing to say of Himself, but He will speak of what He hears, and He will tell you of the things to come.”

“He will take what is Mine and make it known to you; in doing this, He will glorify Me. All that the Father has is Mine; because of this, I have just told you that the Spirit will take what is Mine, and make it known to you.”

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Wednesday, 17 May 2023 : 6th Week of Easter (Psalm)

Liturgical Colour : White

Psalm 148 : 1-2, 11-12, 13, 14

Alleluia! Praise the Lord from the heavens; praise Him in the heavenly heights. Praise Him, all His Angels; praise Him, all His heavenly hosts.

Kings of the earth and nations, princes and all rulers of the world, young men and maidens, old and young together.

Let them praise the Name of the Lord. For His Name alone is exalted; His majesty is above earth and heaven.

He has given His people glory; He has a praise to His faithful, to Israel, the people close to Him. Alleluia.

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Wednesday, 17 May 2023 : 6th Week of Easter (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : White

Acts 17 : 15, 22 – Acts 18 : 1

Paul was taken as far as Athens by his escort, who then returned to Beroea with instructions for Silas and Timothy to come to him as soon as possible. Then Paul stood up in the Areopagus hall and said, “Athenian citizens, I note that in every way you are very religious. As I walked around looking at your shrines, I even discovered an altar with this inscription : To an unknown God. Now, what you worship as unknown, I intend to make known to you.”

“God, Who made the world and all that is in it, does not dwell in sanctuaries made by human hands, being as He is Lord of heaven and earth. Nor does His worship depend on anything made by human hands, as if He were in need. Rather it is He Who gives life and breath and everything else to everyone.”

“From one stock He created the whole human race to live throughout all the earth, and He fixed the time and the boundaries of each nation. He wanted them to seek Him by themselves, even if it were only by groping for Him, succeed in finding Him. Yet He is not far from any one of us. For in Him we live and move and have our being, as some of your poets have said : for we too are His offspring.”

“If we are indeed God’s offspring, we ought not to think of divinity as something like a statue of gold or silver or stone, a product of human art and imagination. But now God prefers to overlook this time of ignorance and He calls on all people to change their ways. He has already set a day on which He will judge the world with justice through a Man He has appointed. And, so that all may believe it, He has just given a sign by raising this Man from the dead.”

When they heard Paul speak of a resurrection from death, some made fun of him, while others said, “We must hear you on this topic some other time.” At that point Paul left. But a few did join him, and believed. Among them were Dionysius, a member of the Areopagus court, a woman named Damaris, and some others. After this, Paul left Athens and went to Corinth.

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Tuesday, 16 May 2023 : 6th Week of Easter (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : White

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, today as we listened to the words of the Lord contained within the Sacred Scriptures in which we have received today, all of us are encouraged and strengthened by the words and the stories of how the Lord had guided, protected and provided for His people in their hour of need. We are constantly being reminded again and again, that the Lord is always with us, by our side, guiding and helping us to go through the journey of our lives, as we follow Him faithfully and as we walk in His presence, carrying out His will and doing our part as Christians, that is as those whom God had called and chosen, and all of us who have accepted Him as our Lord, Saviour and King. Each and every one of us are truly fortunate because all the great love that God has always shown us.

In our first reading today, taken from the Acts of the Apostles, we heard of how St. Paul and St. Silas, one of his partners in missionary works across the Mediterranean region, faced great trouble in Philippi in the then Roman Greece, as they were despised by the slave owners of the region, who found their messages of Christian hope and emancipation, of the coming of the Lord’s help and assistance, and the equality between all mankind a truly dangerous one, as that had turned more and more of their own slaves into the Christian faith, and not few among those slave owners must have thought that there was a chance that the slaves might even turn against their own masters or disobey them because of the teachings of the Christian missionaries.

Hence, we heard how the two of them were put in prison after they were flogged and made to suffer, and they suffered, although not for long, because the Lord was always with all of His disciples, and He would aid and help them in their time and hour of need, according to His will. It was not the time for St. Paul or St. Silas yet to suffer prison for a long time or martyrdom back then, and hence, as we heard, an earthquake happened, which broke open their prison and made many others to be free as well. The jailor was so afraid of the repercussions of what had happened, that he almost took his own life if not for the intervention from the two disciples, who convinced him not to do so. And not just that, the jailor and his whole family was even convinced and became members of the Church, gotten baptised because of this event.

In a sense, what we have heard in the occasion of the earthquake was truly very symbolic indeed. As it did not just physically broke the chains holding the disciples, but also that of the many other people that were imprisoned with them. And with regards to the jailor himself and his whole family, this represented the breaking of the chains of sin and evil that had held them up, dominated them and kept them from the salvation in God. The Lord was not just protecting His faithful ones, but He even used the opportunity to open up the doors to more people who came to believe in Him because of the misfortune that had faced His disciples, and what was a hard time for the disciples of the Lord, became even yet another opportunity for the salvation of more souls.

In our Gospel passage today, we heard the Lord Jesus speaking to His disciples, in which He reassured them that the Helper, the Holy Spirit, would come upon them, and would guide all of them. He told them beforehand that although they would not see Him anymore eventually, as He would go and ascend, returning to His heavenly Throne after He died and then risen from the dead, but He would always be with them, guiding and protecting them all, through the Holy Spirit that would encourage, strengthen and help them on their path to righteousness and to fulfil His will and commands, in doing whatever that He had told and guided them all to do. The Lord wants us all to know this as well, so that each and every one of us may come to know that He has given us so much to help and lead us down the path that He has called us to walk in.

Now, brothers and sisters in Christ, how do we then walk in the path of the Lord? We have to come and spend the time to listen to the words of the Lord speaking in our hearts and minds, and open ourselves to the guidance of the Holy Spirit present within us all. That also means each one of us should trust the Lord ever more in our lives, following Him wholeheartedly each day and at every moments. All of us are reminded that in the Lord alone we will have true hope and consolation, and as we recall how He had guided many of His servants throughout the history of the Church, all of us are therefore called to renew and deepen our faith in Him. Can we do this, brothers and sisters in Christ? Many of us have become apathetic and lukewarm in faith, and we are reminded that we should rekindle the strong and genuine love that we should have in the Lord.

This day, having heard all these from the word of God and more, let us all hence turn towards the Lord, our most loving God with renewed conviction and faith. Let us all embrace the Lord with renewed dedication and commitment to Him, and let us strive to seek Him and to walk down the path that He has shown us, embracing the love and compassion that He has always given us all these while. Let us be strengthened with hope and be encouraged by the examples of the Holy Apostles and disciples of the Lord. Let us not easily be disheartened especially if we faced hardships and persecutions by the world, oppressions and challenges from those who disagree with us and refuse to believe in the Lord like us. Instead, let us all make use of every opportunities to allow the Lord to lead and guide us ever more, as we continue walking down the path that He has led us all into.

May the Risen Lord, our Saviour, Jesus Christ, our most loving God and Good Shepherd, be with us always, be with His Church, and may the Holy Spirit be our inspiration, strength and guide. May the Lord bless our every works and good efforts for His greater glory, and may He help us all to persevere through all the hardships and challenges that we may have to face in this world. Amen.

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Tuesday, 16 May 2023 : 6th Week of Easter (Gospel Reading)

Liturgical Colour : White

John 16 : 5-11

At that time, Jesus said to His disciples, “But now I am going to the One Who sent Me, and none of you asks Me where I am going; instead you are overcome with grief, because of what I have said.”

“Believe Me, it is better for you that I go away, because as long as I do not leave, the Helper will not come to you. But if I go away, it is to send Him to you, and when He comes, He will vindicate the truth before a sinful world; and He will vindicate the paths of righteousness and justice.”

“What is the world’s sin, in regard to Me? Disbelief. What is the path of righteousness? It is the path I walk, by which I go to the Father; and you shall see Me no more. What is the path of justice? It is the path on which the prince of this world will always stand condemned.”

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Tuesday, 16 May 2023 : 6th Week of Easter (Psalm)

Liturgical Colour : White

Psalm 137 : 1-2a, 2bc-3, 7c-8

I thank You, o Lord with all my heart, for You have heard the word of my lips. I sing Your praise in the presence of the gods. I bow down towards Your holy Temple and give thanks to Your Name.

For Your love and faithfulness, for Your word which exceeds everything. You answered me when I called; You restored my soul and made me strong.

You save me from the wrath of my foes, with Your right hand You deliver me. How the Lord cares for me! Your kindness, o Lord, endures forever. Forsake not the work of Your hands.