6th Week of Ordinary Time

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Thursday, 16 February 2023 : 6th Week of Ordinary Time (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : Green

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, today as we listened to the words of the Sacred Scriptures, each and every one of us are reminded yet again of God’s love, His kindness and compassion to each one of us which He has repeatedly shown again and again throughout time, and in how He gave us all the perfect gift of His love, in Jesus Christ, the Son of God, to be our Saviour and Hope. As we heard from our Scripture passages today, we are all truly blessed and beloved by God, Who made and renewed His Covenant with us all, His people, again and again, from time to time. We have been shown mercy and love, just as how God saved Noah and his family from the Great Flood, and also in how Christ, the Son of God, came into our midst to save us all from certain destruction.

In our first reading today, we continue to hear the account from the Book of Genesis, and this time, as mentioned, it is still about the time when the Great Flood occurred and wiped out almost all life on this world, except for all those who were brought into the great Ark that Noah built upon the instructions from God. All those who were inside the Ark were spared and kept alive because of the faith that Noah had in the Lord, in obeying His Law and commandments. All the other children of mankind were crushed and destroyed by the Great Flood because of their wickedness and sins, their refusal to follow God’s ways, and all of those wickedness which had accumulated and disgusted the Lord, to the point that He released the Great Flood to cleanse the whole world, as there was no more virtue and righteousness in the world back then save than what was found in Noah and his family.

God rescued Noah and brought him and his family safely through the Flood and we heard in today’s first reading passage of the moment when the Flood had finally receded from the world, and Noah and his family offered a great thanksgiving to God, to which God responded by reassuring him of His love and faithfulness, establishing a Covenant with him, and renewed His love for all of the people, all of the children of man. At the same time, however, He also highlighted that should Noah and his descendants commit sins against the Lord once again, doing what those who perished during the Great Flood had done, then they too would have to suffer for their sins and wickedness. Essentially, God reminds us all that He loves us all sinners, but He does not approve of the wickedness that we have committed.

The love which God has for each one of us is also reflected in His promise made to all of us, in how He promised not to destroy us anymore through the water or the same Flood, by placing His own bow on the clouds, which we see during and after rains, the rainbow, as a reminder to Him and to all of us of this love and the Covenant which God had made with Noah that day, and which He has constantly renewed and reestablish again and again with us. Then, God made His new and everlasting Covenant through His Son, Jesus Christ, Our Lord and Saviour, by Whose coming into the world all of us have seen the light and hope that God wants to bring into our midst, showing us all the path out of the darkness and all the temptations of sin and evils all around us.

In our Gospel passage today, that is exactly what we have heard from the story of the Lord asking His disciples about Who He truly was, as the disciples spoke about Who they thought He was, with St. Peter proclaiming courageously that the Lord Jesus was indeed the Messiah, the Holy One and Saviour that was promised from God, and the One Whom all of them and all of us have to follow. This then led to the Lord revealing that the truth was such that in His role and part in bringing about our salvation and liberation from sin, He would have to be opposed and made to suffer, to endure painful and humiliating trials and persecution at the hands of all those who refused to believe in Him and oppose His works, and finally to die a most painful and humiliating death on the Cross on our behalf, and for the sake of our salvation.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, we can clearly see just how much God has loved all of us, that He was willing to endure all of those things for us, to get us all out of the darkness and from the precipice of destruction. He put Himself at the crossfire, enduring the worst punishments for our sins, all on our behalf so that each and every one of us have the sure path out of the darkness and into the light. God has chosen to come into this world and willingly bore our many sins and burdens associated with them, so that we can be free from them, be reconciled and reunited with Him. That is all which God had done for us, all because of His ever amazing love and kindness, His attention and compassion towards us which He has never ceased to show us, despite our frequent stubborn attitude and refusal to obey Him.

That is why today all of us are reminded that we should not harden our hearts and minds, and resist Him and His love anymore. Like what St. Peter did in his moment of weakness in allowing Satan to tempt him and to speak through him, all of us must resist the temptations of worldly desires, ambitions, of our own pride and ego, and all other things that may cause us to become ever more distant from the Lord and His salvation. We have to be resolute in resisting the incessant efforts from the devil in trying to lead us to our downfall and damnation. We must remind ourselves of God’s ever enduring and present love for us, and strive to love Him therefore in the same way, rejecting the excesses of worldly pleasures and sins, and doing whatever we can to live our lives faithfully as Christians, as those who profess our faith in Jesus Christ, Our Lord and Saviour.

May the Lord continue to guide us and strengthen us in our journey of faith through life so that we may ever walk faithfully and righteously amidst the many temptations to sin and may we all be good examples and role models, inspiration and strength to one another. May God bless us always and remain with us, guiding us throughout our every good endeavours and efforts, through every good and faithful deeds in life, now and always, forevermore. Amen.

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Thursday, 16 February 2023 : 6th Week of Ordinary Time (Gospel Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Green

Mark 8 : 27-33

At that time, Jesus set out with His disciples for the villages around Caesarea Philippi; and on the way He asked them, “Who do people say I am?” And they told Him, “Some say You are John the Baptist; others say You are Elijah or one of the prophets.”

Then Jesus asked them, “But you, who do you say I am?” Peter answered, “You are the Messiah.” And He ordered them not to tell anyone about Him. Jesus then began to teach them that the Son of Man had to suffer many things and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests and the teachers of the Law. He would be killed, and after three days rise again.

Jesus said all this quite openly, so that Peter took Him aside and began to protest strongly. But Jesus turning around, and looking at His disciples, rebuked Peter, saying, “Get behind Me, Satan! You are thinking not as God does, but as people do.”

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Thursday, 16 February 2023 : 6th Week of Ordinary Time (Psalm)

Liturgical Colour : Green

Psalm 101 : 16-18, 19-21, 29 and 22-23

O Lord, the nations will revere Your Name, and the kings of the earth Your glory, when the Lord will rebuild Zion and appear in all His splendour. For He will answer the prayer of the needy and will not despise their plea.

Let this be written for future ages, “The Lord will be praised by a people He will form.” From His holy height in heaven, the Lord has looked on the earth to hear the groaning of the prisoners, and free those condemned to death.”

Your servants’ children will dwell secure; their posterity will endure without fail. Then the Name of the Lord will be declared in Zion, and His praise in Jerusalem, when the peoples and the kingdoms assemble to worship Him.

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Thursday, 16 February 2023 : 6th Week of Ordinary Time (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Green

Genesis 9 : 1-13

God blessed Noah and his sons and he said to them, “Be fruitful, multiply and fill the earth. Fear and dread of you will be in all the animals of the earth and in all the birds of the air, upon everything that creeps on the ground and all the fish of the sea. They are given to you. Everything that moves and lives shall be food for you; as I gave you the green plants, I have now given you everything. Only you shall not eat flesh with its life, that is its blood.”

“But I will also demand a reckoning for your lifeblood. I will demand it from every animal; and from man, too, I will demand a reckoning for the life of his fellow man. He who sheds the blood of man shall have his blood shed by man; for in the image of God has God made man. As for you, be fruitful and increase. Abound on the earth and be master of it.”

God spoke to Noah and his son, “See I am making a covenant with you and with your descendants after you; also with every living animal with you : birds, cattle, that is, with every living creature of the earth that came out of the Ark. I establish My covenant with you. Never again will all life be cut off by the waters of a flood, and never again will there be a flood to destroy the earth.”

God said, “This is the sign of the covenant I make between Me and you, and every animal living with you for all future generations. I set My bow in the clouds and it will be a sign of the covenant between Me and the earth.”

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Wednesday, 15 February 2023 : 6th Week of Ordinary Time (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : Green

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, today as we listened to the Lord through the words of the Sacred Scriptures, we are all reminded again that God has always shown His love, kindness and compassion towards us, and He has kindly reached out to us, and blessed us all, especially those who are faithful to Him. God has always cared for us and He has never abandoned or forsaken us, despite our own frequent disobedience against Him and despite our stubbornness in doing what is against His will and His path, in indulging in worldly pleasures and temptations, leading to us constantly sinning against Him. God has always wanted to reach out to us and heal us from our afflictions, especially that of sin.

In our first reading today, taken from the Book of Genesis, we heard of the aftermath of the Great Flood which happened to the whole entire world in the days of Noah, one of the early man, who was spared with his family through the Ark that God had told him to construct to safeguard and protect himself and his family. Contextually, we must understand that Noah and his family alone were still considered righteous and worthy among all the multitudes of people that existed back then. The rest of mankind were so wicked and corrupt, afflicted by the original sin of our disobedience and also of the sin of Cain, who murdered his own brother Abel, that God decided to cleanse the whole world with the Great Flood. Noah was instructed to build the Ark, which safeguarded him and his family, and many living things that God sent two by two into the Ark.

The people of God, instead of repenting from their sins, mocked and laughed at Noah, and refusing to believe in God. Hence, they were doomed by their own stubbornness and refusal to obey the Lord, His Law and commandments. Noah and his family faithfully obeyed the Lord, and followed Him in whatever He told them to do, and hence, they were saved from the destruction and gained safety in the Ark during the period of great calamity and destruction of the Flood. They were brought to the new world, cleansed by the Flood, in which they were the only survivors among all the children of mankind. Noah offered sacrifices to God, while God reassured him and all of us that He shall always remember His love for us, and not destroy us anymore by the Flood. The rainbow that appears after the rain is a reminder to God and to all of us of this promise.

This does not mean that God no longer pay attention or heed the wickedness of our sins. Instead, He showed us that despite our disobedience against Him and our persistent attachment to sin, He still loved us nonetheless and wanted to be reconciled with us. That was why He kept on sending us assistance, help and encouragement throughout all the way, and He did not abandon us all in the midst of the darkness all around us. He still kindly reached out to us and called upon us to follow Him, and to repent from our sins. He called on us to turn away from all the temptations and the sins that could have brought us deeper and deeper into the path towards damnation, and He wants us all to embrace His love, mercy and compassion, by which He has sent unto us His own beloved Son to be our Saviour.

That is what we have heard in our Gospel passage today, as we heard of the account of how the Lord Jesus, the Son of God, our Saviour, healed a blind man from his blindness, opened his eyes and made him to be able to see once again. Through that action, the Lord had restored the man who had been afflicted and suffered, and helped him to regain once again his joy and vision, and this is actually really fitting with what we have just discussed earlier on. That is because due to sin, each and every one of us have also become blinded, distracted and kept away from being able to see the truth of God and His love. Just like the blind man who was afflicted with his physical blindness, sin which is an affliction that affects our souls, our hearts, minds and our whole beings, has corrupted us and kept us away from being able to see the righteousness and love of God.

That is why God wants to embrace us and heal us just as He has once healed the blind man and many others, to bring us out from the darkness of sin, to lead us out from the corruption and the dangers of sin. The Lord has shown us His love and kindness, and touched our lives with His most compassionate mercy, so that all of us may have hope once again, and be filled again with joy, the joy and light of the Lord’s glory and resurrection, and of knowing that through Him, all of us have the assurance of eternal life and true joy. All of us are reminded that the path of sin leads to damnation and destruction, while the path of righteousness in God leads to the true happiness that one can gain in the Lord and through Him alone.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, let us all therefore do our best to commit ourselves anew to the Lord, at every opportunities provided to us and in every possible areas where God has called us to do His will. Let us all draw ever closer to God and be committed to walk down the path of His righteousness and light, like Noah and his family had done, and like how God’s faithful servants, the innumerable saints, martyrs and all the other holy men and women of God had done all throughout the whole history. We are all called to be true to our faith in the Lord, to be filled with zeal and fervour in how we live our lives, that we may indeed be true Christians in all things and be good and inspirational role models to each other, and help inspire more and more people to be good disciples and followers of the Lord as well.

May God continue to strengthen and guide us in our journey so that each and every one of us may always be courageous and strong, in persevering in faith despite all of the challenges facing us, and despite all the trials and hardships that we have to endure throughout our journey of faith in life. May God bless our every efforts, good works and endeavours, now and always, all for His greater glory, and for the salvation of the world. Amen.

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Wednesday, 15 February 2023 : 6th Week of Ordinary Time (Gospel Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Green

Mark 8 : 22-26

At that time, when Jesus and His disciples came to Bethsaida, He was asked to touch a blind man who was brought to Him. He took the blind man by the hand and led him outside the village. When He had put spittle on his eyes and laid His hands upon him, He asked, “Can you see anything?”

The man, who was beginning to see, replied, “I see people! They look like trees, but they move around.” Then Jesus laid His hands on his eyes again and the man could see perfectly. His sight was restored and he could see everything clearly. Then Jesus sent him home, saying, “Do not return to the village.”

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Wednesday, 15 February 2023 : 6th Week of Ordinary Time (Psalm)

Liturgical Colour : Green

Psalm 115 : 12-13, 14-15, 18-19

How can I repay the Lord for all His goodness to me? I will lift up the cup of salvation and call on the Name of the Lord.

I will fulfil my vows to the Lord in the presence of all His people. It is painful to the Lord to see the death of His faithful.

I will carry out my vows to the Lord in the presence of His people, in the courts of the house of the Lord, in your midst, o Jerusalem.

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Wednesday, 15 February 2023 : 6th Week of Ordinary Time (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Green

Genesis 8 : 6-13, 20-22

At the end of the forty days Noah opened the window of the Ark that he had built and let the raven out. This went off and kept flying to and fro until the waters had dried up from the earth.

Then Noah let out the dove to see if the waters were receding from the earth. But the dove could not find a place to set its foot and flew back to him in the Ark for the waters still covered the surface of the whole earth. So Noah stretched out his hand, took hold of it and brought it back to himself in the Ark.

He waited some more days and again sent the dove out from the Ark. This time the dove came back to him in the evening with a fresh olive branch in its beak. Then Noah knew the waters had receded from the earth. He waited seven more days and let the dove loose, but it did not return to him any more.

In the year six hundred and one, in the first month, on the first day of the month, the waters dried up from the earth. Noah then removed the covering from the Ark and looked out and saw that the surface of the earth was dry. Noah built an altar to YHVH and, taking some of all the clean animals and all the clean birds, he offered burnt offerings on it.

YHVH smelled the pleasing aroma and said to Himself : “Never again will I curse the earth because of man, even though his heart is set on evil from childhood; never again will I strike down every living creature as I have done. As long as the earth lasts, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night, shall not cease to be.”

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Tuesday, 14 February 2023 : 6th Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Cyril, Monk and St. Methodius, Bishop, Patron Saints of Europe (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : White

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, today as we are all reminded both of the dangers and the threats of sin and evil present all around us, and at the same time we are also reassured through what we have heard in the Scripture passages today, of the guidance, help and providence which God has given us, just as the examples highlighted of the past, our predecessors should inspire and strengthen our faith and resolve to follow the Lord wholeheartedly and faithfully, entrusting ourselves completely and wholeheartedly to the cause of the Lord, and to be ever righteous, good and worthy of Him in all of our lives.

In our first reading today, we heard of the well-known story of the time when God sent a Great Flood to wipe out almost the entire race of mankind and other living things, due to the great wickedness of many of them who refused to believe in Him, and their continued disobedience and rebellion against the Lord and His Law. All of these great wickedness had come into the world due to the disobedience of man against God’s will and commandments, and then as we have just heard earlier in yesterday’s readings, on the murder of Abel by Cain, his own brother, the temptations of pride, ego, worldly sins and wickedness, all of these had led mankind further and further down the path towards evil and damnation.

As we heard in that passage from the Book of Genesis today, God was determined to save the only ones among the people who were still righteous and obedient to the will of the Lord, namely Noah and his family. That was how Noah was instructed by God to construct the immense Ark by which he would save not only his own family but also the living things all over the world, which God had chosen to spare amidst the destruction that He would bring to cleanse the world from all the wickedness, sins and evils. God showed how He treasured those whom He loves and cares for, those who are faithful to Him, while those who refused to obey Him and continued to live in sin, will suffer the just consequences for their wickedness.

We heard how the Ark saved Noah and his family amidst all the destruction of the Great Flood. The other people laughed at Noah when he built the Ark and refused to listen to his warnings and heedings, and hence, no one else save from Noah and his family were saved from the Flood. The whole world was covered with the wrath of God’s Flood, and was cleansed from all the wickedness that had afflicted it throughout. Noah was saved in the Ark, and when the Flood receded, we heard how God promised Noah and his descendants, that is all of us, that He would never again destroy the world and us with the water, with the rainbow as the sign of this promise. That is the story how rainbow appears after the rain, as reminders to both God and us of what had happened once.

This does not mean however that sin has no more consequences afterwards. Sin is still afflicting us, and through disobedience and sin, many more people since the days of Noah would fall into sin, right up to the present day. The Lord however did not give up on us and continued to love us and care for us, as He sent us His promised salvation in Jesus Christ, His own beloved and begotten Son, Who gave Himself to us, walking in our midst and reaching out to us, encouraging and strengthening us with the concrete show of God’s love and compassionate mercy. Through Him, we have seen yet again the proof of God’s ever enduring and persistent love for all of us. He has shown us His love as mentioned the Gospel passage today, by His feeding of the multitudes and many thousands of people.

At the same time, He also warned His disciples of the ‘yeast of the Pharisees’ and the ‘yeast of Herod’, which were actually reminders to them and also all of us to be ever vigilant against the temptations and allures of sin which are always present all around us. If we are not careful, we may end up falling into the same pride, ego and ambitions which became the downfall of many of the Pharisees, who refused to believe in the Lord because they hardened their hearts and minds, and remained in their stubborn refusal to believe. Meanwhile, the ‘yeast of Herod’ is a reminder for all of us not to allow the vices of worldly pleasures, the corruption of the sins of the flesh to mislead and corrupt us down the wrong path in life. We have to resist those temptations to sin and remain virtuous, good and worthy of God all the time, remembering all the good things and the love that God has lavished on us.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, hence today let us all discern our path in life very carefully, minding the examples shown to us from the time of Noah and the Great Flood, to the sins of the Pharisees and Herod which the Lord warned His disciples against, and all the loving actions that God had done for us. Let us all also heed upon the good examples set by our holy predecessors, namely the great saints and brothers, St. Cyril and St. Methodius, the Patron Saints of Europe and great missionaries of the Christian faith, renowned for their great commitment to the spreading and proclamation of the Good News of God amidst the Slavic peoples, who were still mostly pagan back then, and by whose works, many of them eventually turned to the Christian faith and embracing the Lord as their Saviour and God.

They spent a lot of time and effort to evangelise in various places, and at the same time also developing the alphabets for the Slavic peoples that will eventually be known as the Glagolitic and the Cyrillic alphabets, and they also spent a lot of energy in reaching out to many people, both the rulers and the commoners alike, in introducing God and His truth to all of them. God has truly done His many great and wonderful works amongst His people through St. Cyril and St. Methodius. He has led them all to do His great deeds, and He has strengthened us all through their great inspiration and actions as our great role models. Can we all follow the Lord faithfully in the same way that St. Cyril and St. Methodius had done, brothers and sisters?

Let us all hence draw ever closer to the Lord, and let us continue to dedicate our time, our lives, actions and efforts to glorify the Lord by our lives, by our every words, actions and works in every time and in every opportunities provided to us. Let us all continue to follow the Lord wholeheartedly, distancing ourselves from sin and from the temptations to sin and to disobey the Lord, reminding ourselves and one another each time, to continue to walk the path of God’s righteousness and love, at all times. May God be with us always, and may He bless us in our every good works and endeavours. Amen.

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Tuesday, 14 February 2023 : 6th Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Cyril, Monk and St. Methodius, Bishop, Patron Saints of Europe (Gospel Reading)

Liturgical Colour : White

Mark 8 : 14-21

At that time, the disciples had forgotten to bring more bread, and had only one loaf with the in the boat. Then Jesus warned them, “Keep your eyes open, and beware of the yeast of the Pharisees and the yeast of Herod.” And they said of one another, “He saw that we have no bread.”

Aware of this, Jesus asked them, “Why are you talking about the loaves you are short of? Do you not see or understand? Are your minds closed? Have your eyes that do not see and ears that do not hear? And do you not remember when I broke the five loaves among five thousand? How many baskets full of letfovers did you collect?”

They answered, “Twelve.” “And having distributed seven loaves to the four thousand, how many wicker baskets of leftovers did you collect?” They answered, “Seven.” Then Jesus said to them, “Do you still not understand?”