Church fathers

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Friday, 18 October 2019 : Feast of St. Luke, Evangelist (Psalm)

Liturgical Colour : Red

Psalm 144 : 10-11, 12-13ab, 17-18

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

That all may know of Your mighty deeds, Your reign, and its glorious splendour. Your reign is from age to age; Your dominion endured, from generation to generation.

Righteous is YHVH 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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Friday, 18 October 2019 : Feast of St. Luke, Evangelist (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Red

2 Timothy 4 : 10-17b

You must know, that Demas has deserted me, for the love of this world : he returned to Thessalonica. Crescens has gone to Galatia and Titus to Dalmatia. Only Luke remains with me. Get Mark and bring him with you, for he is a useful helper in my work. I sent Tychicus to Ephesus.

Bring with you the cloak I left at Troas, in Carpos’ house, and also the scrolls, especially the parchments. Alexander, the metalworker, has caused me great harm. The Lord will repay him for what he has done. Distrust him, for he has been very much opposed to our preaching.

At my first hearing in court, no one supported me; all deserted me. May the Lord not hold it against them. But the Lord was at my side, giving me strength, to proclaim the word fully, and to let all the pagans hear it.

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Thursday, 17 October 2019 : 28th Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Ignatius of Antioch, Bishop and Martyr (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : Red

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, on this day through the Sacred Scriptures all of us are reminded of the salvation which God has brought into this world through His Son, Our Lord Jesus Christ, Whom He sent into the world to be its Saviour as He Himself has promised and which promises had been renewed again and again, from time to time, through the many prophets that God sent to His people.

God has loved us all from the beginning of time, even when we have gone astray and fell into sin, by the temptations of the world. God wants us all to be forgiven and healed, made whole and reconciled with Him. But it is us mankind who often refused to listen to Him and preferred to continue walking down our wrong and mistaken path which ended up in us getting ever more and more distant from Him. And one way of how this has happened is because we mankind misunderstood the Law He has given us.

God gave the Law to His people and revealing His love to them because through the Law He wanted them all to order their lives and to return to righteousness, abandoning all that are sinful and wicked, embracing only what is right and true in God’s eyes. The Law of God is a guide through which God wanted His people to be able to discover His love and to love Him wholeheartedly, and therefore, share that same love with their fellow brothers and sisters.

The essence of that love for God and for our fellow men is enshrined in the Ten Commandments, the heart and focal point of the Law which God has revealed through Moses. But the people failed to understand this and the meaning of the Law, and instead, they were preoccupied with the other matters and details of the Law, the rules and regulations and prescriptions which according to the Jewish tradition number some six hundred and thirteen.

And the Pharisees at that time took great pride in supposedly obeying and adhering strictly to all those rules and regulations, customs and practices, looking down on the rest of the people whom they thought to be less pious and less worthy than they were. And they also imposed the strict observance and practices on the rest of the people, persecuting all those who did not comply with their preferences.

But in doing so, they have in fact forgotten about the true intent and purpose of the Law, and of all things, they were the ones who were supposed to be custodians and teachers of the Law, and therefore guide the people to the truth of God. Their failure to embody the Law as it should have been was the reason why the Lord rebuked and criticised the Pharisees and their actions, which were done mostly for self-preservation and glory rather than for responsible and for the right intentions.

That is why today we are all called to reflect on our lives thus far and how we have lived them. Have we been truly faithful to God in all things and at all times? Or have we instead allowed our pride, ego and desire to corrupt us and to make us to sin as the Pharisees had done? Let us recall God’s great love for each and every one of us, and His willingness to forgive us and to be reconciled with us so that we may indeed find our way to be worthy again of God.

And let us all be inspired by the examples shown by a courageous man of God and disciple of the Lord, who was one of the early Church fathers, namely St. Ignatius of Antioch whose feast day we are celebrating today. St. Ignatius of Antioch was one of the early leaders of the Church, being the successor of St. Peter who founded the See of Antioch prior to his establishment of the See of Rome. St. Ignatius would continue the good works that St. Peter had started.

St. Ignatius dedicated his life to his ministry and spent much effort in caring for his flock even amidst terrible and brutal persecutions against the Church and the faithful, writing extensively to the larger Church community encouraging them to keep the faith. He was eventually arrested and brought to Rome, where according to Apostolic tradition, he was brought into the Colosseum with other Christians and had ravenous beasts released at them. Nonetheless he remained steadfast and welcomed his martyrdom with faith.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, we should also devote ourselves to God, love Him and be faithful to Him just as St. Ignatius of Antioch had done. Let us ask for the intercession of St. Ignatius that God will continue to strengthen our faith so that we may draw closer to Him and grow deeper in our love and relationship with Him. May God bless us all and remain with us always. Amen.

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Thursday, 17 October 2019 : 28th Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Ignatius of Antioch, Bishop and Martyr (Gospel Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Red

Luke 11 : 47-54

At that time, Jesus said to the teachers of the Law, “A curse is on you, for you build monuments to the prophets your ancestors killed. So you approve and agree with what your ancestors did. Is it not so? They got rid of the prophets, and you build monuments to them!”

“For that reason the wisdom of God also said : I will send prophets and Apostles and these people will kill and persecute some of them. But the present generation will have to answer for the blood of all the prophets that has been shed since the foundation of the world, from the blood of Abel to the blood of Zechariah, who was murdered between the altar and the Sanctuary. Yes, I tell you, the people of this time will have to answer for them all.”

“A curse is on you, teachers of the Law, for you have taken the key of knowledge. You yourselves have not entered, and you prevented others from entering.”

As Jesus left that place, the teachers of the Law and the Pharisees began to harass Him, asking Him endless questions, setting traps to catch Him in something He might say.

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Thursday, 17 October 2019 : 28th Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Ignatius of Antioch, Bishop and Martyr (Psalm)

Liturgical Colour : Red

Psalm 129 : 1-2, 3-4, 5-7a

Out of the depths I cry to You, o YHVH, o YHVH, hear my voice! Let Your ears pay attention to the voice of my supplication.

If You should mark our evil, o YHVH, who could stand? But with You, is forgiveness, and for that You are revered.

I waited for YHVH, my soul waits; and I put my hope in His word. My soul expects YHVH more than watchmen, the dawn. O Israel, hope in YHVH.

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Thursday, 17 October 2019 : 28th Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Ignatius of Antioch, Bishop and Martyr (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Red

Romans 3 : 21-30a

But, now it has been revealed, altogether apart from the Law, as it was already foretold in the Law and the prophets : God makes us righteous by means of faith in Jesus Christ, and this is applied to all who believe, without distinction of persons.

Because all have sinned and all fall short of the glory of God; and all are graciously forgiven and made righteous, through the redemption effected in Christ Jesus. For God has given Him to be the Victim, Whose Blood obtains us forgiveness, through faith.

So God shows us, how He makes us righteous. Past sins are forgiven, which God overlooked till now. For, now, He wants to reveal His way of righteousness : how He is just, and how He makes us righteous, through faith in Jesus. Then, what becomes of our pride? It is excluded. How? Not through the Law and its observances, but through another Law, which is faith. For we hold, that people are in God’s grace, by faith, and not because of all the things ordered by the Law.

Otherwise, God would be the God of the Jews; but is He not God of pagan nations as well? Of course He is, for there is only one God.

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Sunday, 13 October 2019 : Twenty-Eighth Sunday of Ordinary Time (Second Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Green

2 Timothy 2 : 8-13

Remember Christ Jesus, risen from the dead, Jesus, Son of David, as preached in my Gospel. For this Gospel I labour, and even wear chains like an evildoer, but the word of God is not chained. And, so, I bear everything, for the sake of the chosen people, that they, too, may obtain the salvation given to us, in Christ Jesus, and share eternal glory.

This statement is true : If we have died with Him, we shall also live with Him; If we endure with Him, we shall reign with Him; If we deny Him, He will also deny us; If we are unfaithful, He remains faithful for He cannot deny Himself.

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Saturday, 21 September 2019 : Feast of St. Matthew, Apostle and Evangelist (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Red

Ephesians 4 : 1-7, 11-13

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, just as one hope is the goal of your calling by God. One Lord, one faith, one baptism; one God, the Father of all, Who is above all, and works through all, and is in all.

But to each of us, divine grace is given, according to the measure of Christ’s gift. As for His gifts, to some, He gave to be Apostles; to others, prophets, or even evangelists; or pastors and teachers. So, He prepared those who belong to Him, for the ministry, in order to build up the Body of Christ, until we are all united, in the same faith and knowledge of the Son of God. Thus, we shall become the perfect Man, upon reaching maturity, and sharing the fullness of Christ.

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Saturday, 14 September 2019 : Feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Red

Numbers 21 : 4b-9

The people were discouraged by the journey and began to complain against God and Moses, “Why have you brought us out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? There is neither bread nor water here and we are disgusted with this tasteless manna.”

YHVH then sent fiery serpents against them. They bit the people and many of the Israelites died. Then the people came to Moses and said, “We have sinned, speaking against YHVH and against you. Plead with YHVH to take the serpents away.”

Moses pleaded for the people and YHVH said to him, “Make a fiery serpent and set it on a standard; whoever has been bitten and then looks at it shall live.” So Moses made a bronze serpent and set it on a standard. Whenever a man was bitten, he looked towards the bronze serpent and he lived.

Alternative reading

Philippians 2 : 6-11

Though He was in the form of God, He did not regard equality with God as something to be grasped, but emptied Himself, taking on the nature of a servant, made in human likeness, and in His appearance found as a Man.

He humbled Himself by being obedient to death, death on the cross. That is why God exalted Him and gave Him the Name which outshines all names, so that at the Name of Jesus all knees should bend in heaven, on earth and among the dead, and all tongues proclaim that Christ Jesus is the Lord to the glory of God the Father.

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Friday, 13 September 2019 : 23rd Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial or St. John Chrysostom, Bishop and Doctor of the Church (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : White

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, on this day we heard from the Word of God in the Scriptures the need for us all to be humble in our faith and to be aware of our own shortcomings and weakness, of our own vulnerabilities and unworthiness before God. And that is why, through what we have heard in our Scripture readings today we are called to examine our lives and our attitude all these while.

In the Gospel passage today we heard of the famous parable that the Lord Jesus used, the parable of the splinter and the plank in order to highlight why it is so important for us all to be in touch and to be aware of our own shortcomings and vulnerabilities, and to be humble despite the temptations to do otherwise. The Lord stated how the Pharisees and the teachers of the Law were behaving in the way as if they were focusing on the splinter in the other persons’ eyes while being ignorant of the plank in their own.

For the context of what the Lord had spoken to the people, the Pharisees and the teachers of the Law were those who took great pride in their privileges and the honour and respect that were given to them based on their knowledge and education background, their intellect and in depth knowledge of God’s laws and the customs of the Israelites, preserved through the many generations.

But in their preoccupation with status, glory and worldly fame, they ended up focusing on the wrong things in life. Many of them ended up guarding their status and fame with great jealousy, and when the Lord Jesus came into their midst, naturally they saw Him with great suspicion and anger, and tried their best to undermine and disturb His works and ministry among the people.

They also tended to look down on other people, especially all those whom they deemed to be unworthy and as sinners. They easily condemned those they deemed as sinners particularly the tax collectors and prostitutes, those who were suffering from diseases such as leprosy and also disabilities like blindness and paralysis. But amidst all of that, they forgot that they themselves were sinners too.

The Lord wanted to show all of us that we must first be aware of our own shortcomings and mistakes, our sinfulness and unworthiness before we are quick to point out those shortcomings in others. And that is why we should not be quick to judge with sinister and wicked intentions in our minds and hearts just because we think highly of ourselves or be too proud or be filled with too much of ego.

Rather, as St. Paul mentioned in his Epistle to St. Timothy, part of our first reading today, all of us must have God as our source of strength and providence, as our backbone and pillar of strength. All of us should seek to put God first and foremost before all, and seek Him as the source of our faith and power that allow us to walk faithfully in His path despite the challenges and temptations to do otherwise.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, let us all then look at the examples set by a holy man of God, St. John Chrysostom, whose feast we celebrate on this day. St. John Chrysostom was the Archbishop of Constantinople and a very influential leader of the Church and Church father in the early days of the Church remembered for his great sermons and teachings of the faith among the people against heresies and falsehoods.

And St. John Chrysostom was also remembered for his great stand and commitment to God in the opposition to the abuse of worldly power and human ambitions, serving God faithfully despite the challenges that he had to face throughout his life and ministry. He had to go through many years of trouble, both before and during his tenure as the Archbishop of Constantinople. But he did not give up or allow those challenges to prevent him from remaining resolute and true to his faith.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, let us all today reflect on the courage shown by St. John Chrysostom and so many others of our holy and devout predecessors. Let us all look upon their inspirations and their commitment to God, and think of how we ourselves can be more faithful to God in each and every moments of our life. Let us all turn towards God with greater fidelity and with greater commitment and love from now on, and be ever closer to Him and be ever more filled with love in all things. May God bless us always, now and forevermore. Amen.