ad maiorem dei gloriam

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Monday, 27 July 2015 : 17th Week of Ordinary Time (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Green

Exodus 32 : 15-24, 30-34

Moses then returned and came down from the mountain carrying in his hand the two slabs of the Statement, slabs written on both sides, back and front. These slabs were the work of God and the writing graven on the slabs was the writing of God.

When Joshua heard the noise of the people who were shouting he said to Moses, “There is a sound of war in the camp.” But Moses answered, “It is not a victory song, nor the cry of defeat that I hear, but the sound of singing.”

When he drew near to the camp and saw the calf and the dancing, his anger burst forth and he threw the slabs from his hands and shattered them against the base of the mountain. Then he seized the calf they had made and burned it in the fire, grinding it into a powder that he scattered over the surface of the water, and this he made the Israelites drink.

Moses said to Aaron, “What did these people do to you that you brought such a great sin on them?” And Aaron said, “Do not let your anger be roused. You know this people and how evil they are. They said to me : ‘Make us gods to go before us; as for this Moses, the man who brought us out of Egypt, we do not know what has happened to him.’ I then said to them that whoever had gold was to give it over to me. I threw it in the fire and out came this calf!”

The next day Moses said to the people, “You have committed a very grave sin, but now I am going up to YHVH; perhaps I will obtain pardon for your sin.” So Moses went towards YHVH and said, “Ah! This people has committed a very great sin; they made a god out of gold. And now please forgive their sin… if not, blot me out of the book You have written.”

YHVH said to Moses, “Whoever has sinned against Me, I will blot him out from My book. Go now! Lead the people where I told you. My Angel will walk before you and on the day of punishment I will punish them for their sin.”

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Sunday, 26 July 2015 : Seventeenth Sunday of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Joachim and St. Anne, Parents of the Blessed Virgin Mary (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : Green

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, on this day, we heard the Scripture readings which spoke of our Lord as a loving God who is caring and loving for all of His people, and who gave them all that they need, food and nourishment, so that they may live, be filled and satisfied without hunger or worry. In this, we see how much God has loved us, which He manifested through His many works.

In the first reading, we heard how Elisha the prophet fed a hundred man with a mere twenty loaves of bread. His servant did not believe that such a feat was possible, and he asked him, “How can we feed a hundred men with this?” But Elisha showed his servant that what for man is impossible, is possible for God, and the hundred men ate until they were full with loaves left over.

And certainly we can see the clear link with our Gospel today, that when Jesus taught the huge multitudes of people coming to listen to Him, He fed the five thousand men and countless thousands more of women and children, with just five loaves and two fishes. The disciples of Jesus were similarly astounded at first, and even asked the same question as what Elisha’s servant had asked, but God again showed His love and made the whole people to eat until full with twelve full baskets of leftover bread.

In all these things, certainly if our eyes are open, if our ears can listen, and if our hearts are opened, then surely we should be able to see how great is the love which our Lord had shown us, not just in what we have just heard, but in our daily lives, in every things we have enjoyed which had come from the Lord. It is often that we do not realise the extent of the many things we have enjoyed which without the Lord and His love for us, it would not have been possible.

And God had not just given us tangible food as in loaves and fishes to eat and be satisfied with, but even much more than that. Remember that Jesus rebuked Satan when he tempted Him with food when He fasted for forty days in the desert? He said that men did not live on bread alone, but on every words that came from the mouth of God.

This went on to show how God nourishes us not just with the food of the earth, that is to fill our stomachs, but also gives us the nourishment and food for the soul, that is His words and teachings, which He had revealed through His prophets and servants, and last of all, which He revealed in all its fullness, through Jesus, the Word Himself made flesh for all to witness and see.

And then last of all, God gave Himself as the ultimate nourishment of all, through the sharing of His own Body and His own Blood for all to receive and have life in them. For He said that ‘My Body is real food and My Blood is real drink, and although your ancestors who ate the bread of heaven, or manna died in the desert, those who eat of My Body and drink of My Blood will have eternal life.’ Such is the promise which God had given to all who partake and share in Him and His nourishing gift for us.

For it is through His suffering on the way to Calvary, by the scourging of many lashes, by the nails that pierced His hands and legs, and thus by His death on the cross that He had shed His Body and poured out His Blood for all of us to share, so that for all those for whom Christ had died for, that is for all mankind, we may receive Him and He will dwell in us, so that He may nourish us and give us a new and blessed life, no longer afflicted by our past sinfulness and wickedness.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, having seen all these, have we realised again how much God has loved and cared for us? And most importantly, how have we reacted to the love which God had given us? Have we shown gratitude and thanks to Him? Have we uttered even a word of thanks, and not just from our mouth but from the depths of our hearts?

The word thank you is something which we may take for granted, and which is in fact a very difficult word to utter with meaning and with proper purpose. How many of us actually give thanks for something good which had been done by others upon us? How many of us are grateful for every blessings and good things that come our way? Certainly many of us would see that in many occasions, we have not give due thanks for what we have enjoyed.

And how much more we should therefore thank our Lord, for He has given us so much, providing us all that we need, the nourishment of the flesh as well as the soul, and the blessing of everlasting life which God had given us who share in His Body and Blood, which is the Eucharist. He is God our Father, who cares for us like a parent caring for his or her child.

And today we also commemorate the feast of St. Joachim and St. Anne, who are the parents of the Blessed Virgin Mary, the mother of our Lord Jesus Christ. It was under their tutelage and loving care that Mary was brought up to be such a pious and devoted child of God, who then became an example to all of us as the mother of our God and the one closest to her Son in heaven, our greatest intercessor.

Their loving care of Mary, which in turn is also shown by Mary to Jesus her Son, should remind us of the love which our Lord had poured and lavished upon us. But the question remain the same, as we should ask ourselves, how many of us are grateful to what our parents had done for us? How many of us had given proper and due thanks to them who had given and sacrificed so much for our sake?

Therefore, let us all ponder on this, and think of how we can honour and give thanks to our Lord, who had cared for us, He, our Father, whose thoughts and gaze are always fixed upon us all the days of our lives. It does not mean anything if we do not mean what we say when we give thanks to Him and to others, as words are easy to come out with, but in order to be truly capable of showing thanks for all who have given us good things, especially that of our Lord, it must come from the heart.

May Almighty God, our Father, Lord and Saviour help us all to realise the great extent to which He had blessed us and granted us goodness in all things, that deep in our hearts a great sense of gratitude may swell and we may give thanks due to be given to He who had provided us with everything that we need, nourishments for our body, spirit and soul, so that we have nothing lacking and be fully satisfied. Let us from now on be thankful for every single moments of our lives, for every breath that we take, which is also a gift from God. May we be forever devoted to Him, our Lord and Father. Amen.

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Sunday, 26 July 2015 : Seventeenth Sunday of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Joachim and St. Anne, Parents of the Blessed Virgin Mary (Gospel Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Green

John 6 : 1-15

At that time, Jesus went to the other side of the Sea of Galilee, near Tiberias, and large crowds followed Him, because of the miraculous signs they saw, when He healed the sick. So He went up into the hills and sat down there with His disciples. Now the Passover, the feast of the Jews, was at hand.

Then lifting up His eyes, Jesus saw the crowds that were coming to Him, and said to Philip, “Where shall we buy bread so that these people may eat?” He said this to test Philip, for He Himself knew what He was going to do. Philip answered Him, “Two hundred silver coins would not buy enough bread for each of them to have a piece.”

Then one of Jesus’ disciples, Andrew, Simon Peter’s brother, said, “There is a boy here who has five barley loaves and two fish; but what good are these for so many?” Jesus said, “Make the people sit down.” There was plenty of grass there, so the people, about five thousand men, sat down. Jesus then took the loaves, gave thanks, and distributed them to those who were seated.

He did the same with the fish, and gave them as much as they wanted. And when they had eaten enough, He told His disciples, “Gather up the pieces left over, that nothing may be lost.” So they gathered them up and filled twelve baskets with bread, that is, with pieces of the five barley loaves left over by those who had eaten.

When the people see the miracle which Jesus had performed, they said, “This is really the Prophet, the One who is to come into the world.” Jesus realised that they would come and take Him by force to make Him king; so He fled to the hills by Himself.

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Sunday, 26 July 2015 : Seventeenth Sunday of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Joachim and St. Anne, Parents of the Blessed Virgin Mary (Second Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Green

Ephesians 4 : 1-6

Therefore I, the prisoner of Christ, invite you to live the vocation you have received. Be humble, kind, patient and bear with one another in love. Make every effort to keep among you the unity of Spirit through bonds of peace. Let there be one body and one spirit, for God, in calling you, gave the same Spirit to all.

One Lord, one Faith, one baptism. One God, the Father of all, who is above all and works through all and is in all.

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Sunday, 26 July 2015 : Seventeenth Sunday of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Joachim and St. Anne, Parents of the Blessed Virgin Mary (Psalm)

Liturgical Colour : Green

Psalm 144 : 10-11, 15-16, 17-18

All Your works will give You thanks; all Your saints, o Lord, will praise You. They will tell of the glory of Your kingdom and speak of Your power.

All creatures look to You to be fed in due season; with open hand You satisfy the living according to their needs.

Righteous is the Lord in all His ways, His mercy shows in all His deeds. He is near those who call on Him, who call trustfully upon His Name.

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Sunday, 26 July 2015 : Seventeenth Sunday of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Joachim and St. Anne, Parents of the Blessed Virgin Mary (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Green

2 Kings 4 : 42-44

A man came from Baal-shal-ishad bringing bread and wheat to the man of God. These were from the first part of the harvest, twenty loaves of barley and wheat. Elisha told him, “Give the loaves to these men that they may eat.”

His servant said to him, “How am I to divide these loaves among one hundred men?” Elisha insisted, “Give them to the men that they may eat, for YHVH says : They shall eat and have some left over.” So the man set it before them; and they ate and had some left, as YHVH had said.

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Saturday, 25 July 2015 : Feast of St. James, Apostle (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : Red

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, on this day we celebrate together the feast of the Holy Apostle of our Lord Jesus Christ, St. James, also known as St. James the Greater to distinguish him from another St. James, the Lesser, who was one of the relatives of Christ. St. James the Greater was one of the Twelve, the principal disciples of our Lord in the spreading of the Good News of the Gospel, and among the first to be martyred for the Lord’s sake.

In the readings today we heard how in the Gospel, the mother of both St. James and St. John begged Jesus for favour and power for her sons, not knowing that for the Lord, the terms of this world do not hold weight at all. The other disciples of Jesus grumbled at what they saw as an attempt to gain favour over them, and they bickered over it, but the Lord Jesus rebuked them and reminded them that true greatness and power lies not in human favour and fame, nor in prestige or worldly power, but in humility and in leading by example, by a committed and devoted service to one another, that the greater a person is, the more humble and dedicated that person must be.

In the first reading, we heard how St. Paul exhorted the faithful of the Church in Corinth of the treasure that is in us, the true treasure contained within our beings. The treasure within a container of clay is truly a metaphor, showing how we have in our bodies, made by God from mere dust and earth, have inside a true treasure, that is the Holy Presence of our Lord Himself, who had decided to dwell within us.

And by sharing in the treasure which is in us, we have been made to share in the death and resurrection of our Lord Himself. And by His death, we have also died to our sins and to our old life filled with sins, while by His resurrection in glory and return into life, He had brought us all into a new life as well, one that is no longer bound by sin and death, nor by the wickedness of our past sins, but with a new hope of eternal happiness in God.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, all these remind us that human life and all the glories and joys of this world are just temporary, and they do not last. Eventually, all the good things of this world must go, and the things we have accumulated in this world will not follow us to the world that is to come. Therefore, just as Jesus had reminded His disciples, we too should come to realise this fact, that to follow the Lord, we have to shed ourselves of the excessive pleasures of the flesh and worldly goodness.

And then the Lord also mentioned what would be the challenges for all of those who follow after Him, and that is the cup of suffering which He has drunk and shared with all of us, that is to have a share of His cross. St. James and St. John at first did not understand what the Lord spoke to them about, but eventually they would come to understand, that following Jesus would mean that they would encounter challenges and obstacles from all those who have refused to believe in the Lord and gave themselves into temptation.

And St. James who would spread the Gospel to the faraway lands, including what is now Spain and Portugal, the place where his most famous shrine at Santiago de Compostela is located, would encounter martyrdom at the hands of King Herod Agrippa, the king of Judea, who killed St. James in order to please the Jewish authorities and to increase his own prestige.

Thus through death, St. James would share in the suffering of Christ, having faithfully served Him through the spreading of the Good News of the Gospel to the far ends of the earth. And by shedding earthly glories and worldly fame, he has gained the true treasure which can only be found in the Lord, that is the glory of heaven and the joy of the world that is to come, an eternity of true happiness.

All of us should be inspired by what we have witnessed in the life and works of St. James and that of the other holy Apostles, martyrs and saints. We all should walk in their footsteps and be more like them. Remember, the greater we are, the humbler we should become. This is so that we will not fall into the traps of our own pride and arrogance, which is often our greatest undoing.

It was pride, greed and hunger for what we often covet, such as power, greatness, human fame and praise that had led many of us to sin and to fall into darkness, and that was what had brought Satan down from his glory days as the mighty angel of heaven but drunk with power and with his own vanity. Let us all learn to overcome our own desires to seek the temporary pleasures of the flesh, and aim higher to seek the true treasure that is our Lord and His love.

May Almighty God bless all of us, strengthen us in faith, and awaken in all of us the ever stronger desire to love Him and devote ourselves to Him in complete faith and dedication. God bless us all. Amen.

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Saturday, 25 July 2015 : Feast of St. James, Apostle (Gospel Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Red

Matthew 20 : 20-28

At that time, the mother of James and John came to Jesus with her sons, and she knelt down, to ask a favour. Jesus said to her, “What do you want?” And she answered, “Here You have my two sons. Grant that they may sit, one at Your right hand and one at Your left, when You are in Your kingdom.”

Jesus said to the brothers, “You do not know what you are asking. Can you drink the cup that I am about to drink?” They answered, “We can.” Jesus replied, “You will indeed drink My cup, but to sit at My right or at My left is not for Me to grant. That will be for those, for whom My Father has prepared it.”

The other ten heard all this, and were angry with the two brothers. Then Jesus called them to Him and said, “You know that the rulers of the nations act as tyrants over them, and the powerful oppress them. It shall not be so among you : whoever wants to be more important in your community shall make himself your servant. And if you want to be the first of all, make yourself the servant of all. Be like the Son of Man who has come, not to be served but to serve, and to give His life to redeem many.”

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Saturday, 25 July 2015 : Feast of St. James, Apostle (Psalm)

Liturgical Colour : Red

Psalm 125 : 1-2ab, 2cd-3, 4-5, 6

When the Lord brought the exiles back to Zion, we were like those moving in a dream. Then our mouths were filled with laughter, and our tongues with songs of joy.

Among the nations it was said, “The Lord has done great things for them.” The Lord had done great things for us, and we were glad indeed.

Bring back our exiles, o Lord, like fresh streams in the desert. Those who sow in tears will reap with songs and shouts of joy.

They went forth weeping, bearing the seeds for sowing, they will come home with joyful shouts, bringing their harvested sheaves.

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Saturday, 25 July 2015 : Feast of St. James, Apostle (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Red

2 Corinthians 4 : 7-15

However, we carry this treasure in vessels of clay, so that this all-surpassing power may not be seen as ours but as God’s. Trials of every sort come to us, but we are not discouraged. We are left without answer, but do not despair; persecuted but not abandoned, knocked down but not crushed.

At any moment we carry in our person the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be manifested in us. For we, the living, are given up continually to death for the sake of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may appear in our mortal existence. And as death is at work in us, life comes to you.

We have received the same spirit of faith referred to in Scripture that says : I believed and so I spoke. We also believe and so we speak. We know that He who raised the Lord Jesus will also raise us with Jesus and bring us, with you, into His presence. Finally, everything is for your good, so that grace will come more abundantly upon you and great will be the thanksgiving for the glory of God.