commitment

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Saturday, 19 April 2014 : Easter Vigil of the Lord’s Resurrection, Easter Triduum (Fourth Reading)

Liturgical Colour : White

Isaiah 54 : 5-14

For your Maker is to marry you : YHVH Sabaoth is His Name. Your Redeemer is the Holy One of Israel : He is called God of all the earth. For YHVH has called you back as one forsaken and grieved in spirit. Who could abandon His first beloved? says your God.

For a brief moment I have abandoned you, but with great tenderness I will gather My people. For a moment, in an outburst of anger, I hid My face from you, but with everlasting love I have had mercy on you, says YHVH, your Redeemer.

This is for Me like Noah’s waters, when I swore that they would no more flood the earth; so now I swear not to be angry with you and never again to rebuke you. The mountains may depart and the hills be moved, but never will My love depart from you nor My covenant of peace be removed, says YHVH whose compassion is for you.

O afflicted city, lashed by storm and unconsoled, I will set your stones with turquoise, your foundations with sapphires. I will crown your wall with agate, make your gates crystal, and your ramparts of precious stones. All your children will be taught by YHVH, and they will prosper greatly. Justice will be your foundation; tyranny and the fear of oppression will never come near you.

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Saturday, 19 April 2014 : Easter Vigil of the Lord’s Resurrection, Easter Triduum (Second Reading)

Liturgical Colour : White

Genesis 22 : 1-18

Some time later God tested Abraham and said to him, “Abraham!” And he answered, “Here I am.” Then God said, “Take your son, your only son, Isaac, whom you love, and go to the land of Moriah and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains I shall point out to you.”

Abraham rose early next morning and saddled his donkey and took with him two of his young men and his son Isaac. He chopped wood for the burnt offering and set out for the place to which God had directed him. On the third day Abraham looked up and saw the place in the distance, and he said to the young men, “Stay here with the donkey. The boy and I will go over there to worship and then we will come back to you.”

Abraham took the wood for the burnt offering and laid it on Isaac his son. He carried in his hand the fire and the knife. As the two of them went on together, Isaac spoke to Abraham, his father, “Father!” And Abraham replied, “Yes, my son?” Isaac said, “The fire and the wood are here, but where is the lamb for the sacrifice?” Abraham replied, “God Himself will provide the lamb for the sacrifice.”

They went on, the two of them together, until they came to the place to which God had directed them. When Abraham had built the altar and set the wood on it, he bound his son Isaac and laid him on the wood placed on the altar. He then stretched out his hand to seize the knife and slay his son. But the angel of YHVH called to him from heaven, “Abraham! Abraham!”

And he said, “Here I am.” “Do not lay your hand on the boy; do not harm him, for now I know that you fear God, and you have not held back from Me your only son.”

Abraham looked around and saw behind him a ram caught by its horns in a bush. He offered it as a burnt offering in place of his son. Abraham named the place ‘The Lord will provide.’ And the saying has lasted to this day. And the Angel of YHVH called from heaven a second time, “By myself I have sworn, it is YHVH who speaks, because you have done this and not held back your son, your only son, I will surely bless you and make your descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and the sand on the seashore.”

“Your descendants will take possession of the lands of their enemies. All the nations of the earth will be blessed through your descendants because you have obeyed Me.”

 

Alternative Reading (shorter version)

 

Genesis 22 : 1-2, 9a, 10-13, 15-18

Some time later God tested Abraham and said to him, “Abraham!” And he answered, “Here I am.” Then God said, “Take your son, your only son, Isaac, whom you love, and go to the land of Moriah and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains I shall point out to you.”

They came to the place to which God had directed them. He then stretched out his hand to seize the knife and slay his son. But the angel of YHVH called to him from heaven, “Abraham! Abraham!” And he said, “Here I am.” “Do not lay your hand on the boy; do not harm him, for now I know that you fear God, and you have not held back from Me your only son.”

Abraham looked around and saw behind him a ram caught by its horns in a bush. He offered it as a burnt offering in place of his son. And the Angel of YHVH called from heaven a second time, “By myself I have sworn, it is YHVH who speaks, because you have done this and not held back your son, your only son, I will surely bless you and make your descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and the sand on the seashore.”

“Your descendants will take possession of the lands of their enemies. All the nations of the earth will be blessed through your descendants because you have obeyed Me.”

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Friday, 18 April 2014 : Good Friday of the Lord’s Passion, Easter Triduum (Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : Red

Brothers and sisters in Christ, today we celebrate Good Friday, the day when Jesus Christ our Lord, laid down His life for us by dying on the cross in atonement for our sins, and suffering the effects and the punishments for our sins, He was tortured and scourged for the consequences of our sins, and He died so that we will not suffer the ultimate consequence of sin, that is death.

Jesus was the suffering servant mentioned in the first reading today taken from the Book of the prophet Isaiah. Jesus was the Son of God, mighty and all powerful, but for our sake and for His love, He was willing to go through all those sufferings and great pains in our place. Remember always, brethren, every time we look at the cross and the crucifix, that He died for us.

Many nowadays have no more regards for God and His love, and this is because we have lost our sensitivity to His love and in our worldliness and our lifestyles, we centre ourselves more and more on our ego and our desires, no longer witnessing and realising the great love and mercy which God had extended to us, with no greater example than that of the death of Jesus, His own Son, on the cross for us.

In today’s situation, in our world, many have abandoned God and sought refuge in other places and found other sources of inspiration and belief outside of God. That is the sad truth about humanity, and more and more are leaving God for the refuge in the pleasures and goodness of this world, and they depend more and more on their human wisdom and understanding rather than on the love and wisdom of God.

Why? Why is this so, brothers and sisters in Christ? Why such violent rejection of the Lord and His love that had been shown through the cross? That is because mankind had sealed themselves off from God’s love, and instead of understanding and appreciating the love of God in them, they grew distant and apathetic to love, not just God’s love, but also love in general.

Again, why so? This is in fact because we lack faith, we lack hope, and we lack love. We fail to realise that God loves us so much, that He gave it all through Jesus and His death on the cross. We think of God as someone who is distant and wrathful, because He hates our sins and trespasses, and yet we failed to realise that as much as He hates our sins, even more it is that He loves us more than He hates the sins we commit.

On the other extreme of course, this does not mean that we should take advantage of God’s love for us by continuing to commit sins without cease, but indeed the Lord’s mercy and love is an opportunity for us to cast away our past sinfulness and mistakes and accept the fullness of God’s forgiveness. We must not close the doors of our hearts to God’s mercy.

Yes, brethren, for we have to always remember that God makes His mercy and forgiveness available to all freely, if we are just to accept this mercy with all of our hearts. We often fear God more than we love Him, and to many of us, God is not real and close, and this is the heart of the problem. Mankind has closed their hearts to God, and concerned only about themselves.

We are sinners, and we should have deserved death for our disobedience and rebelliousness, and yet God resolved to rescue us, even while we are still sinners and lived in sin. Every time we look at Jesus on the cross, hanging between the heaven and the earth, we see the One who loves us so much that even for unworthy servants like us, He was willing to save us by His own death.

The cross that Jesus bore was our sins, the collections of our faults, mistakes, failures and rebelliousness, which have added up to such a great weight that Jesus had to bore. And as mentioned in the first reading, the wounds and the piercing that Christ endured are all because of our sins too. Every sin we committed in our lives, be it small or big, they all cause great pains to the Lord, who yet bore those pains and sorrows with Him as He walked on the way to His death.

See how much God cares for us, for if not for His love, He would not have bothered to even worry about us, and less so to suffer all the scourges and humiliations for us. Therefore today we celebrate this occasion of Good Friday because we rejoice in the goodness of God, and how much good He had brought upon us this day. For He cast away the pall of death from our eyes and enable us to hope once again.

For once we were condemned to death and after Jesus died for us on the cross, the way to God that was once closed is once again open for us. Through His death, Jesus became the bridge that link all of us back to the Father, the way through which is the only way back to God the Father who loves us. All this was because Jesus died for us.

Again I want to reiterate how much God truly loves us. Jesus prays for us daily, and when He was in His suffering and Passion, He entreats God with His prayers for our sake, and cared only about us, and as St. Paul said in the second reading, that God listened to His prayers, and because of that, we are saved. Jesus prays for us all the time, and He cares for us and thinks about us, even as He carried up that great burden on His shoulders towards Calvary.

We have to open ourselves to God’s love and understand how much He truly is concerned for all of us. Certainly He would not want any of us to suffer eternal separation of death caused by our sins, that we end up in hell. That is why, brethren, we must never fear the Lord or His anger, but instead we have to give it our all, to seek His mercy and be truly repentant of our sinfulness. In this way, then the Lord will be able to work His mercy and we shall be forgiven.

May this Good Friday be a good opportunity for all of us to wake up from our deep slumber in the darkness and realise once again the great love and concern that the Lord had shown us. Let us turn our sight towards the Lord on the cross, and look at He who had died for us, and then make a commitment that we will always love He who had first loved us, that He gave His life for us, that we may not die but live! Amen.

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Friday, 18 April 2014 : Good Friday of the Lord’s Passion, Easter Triduum (Psalm)

Liturgical Colour : Red

Psalm 30 : 2 and 6, 12-13, 15-16, 17 and 25

In You, o Lord, I take refuge, may I never be disgraced; deliver Me in Your justice. Into Your hands I commend My Spirit; You have redeemed Me, o Lord, faithful God.

I have become an object of reproach for My foes, a horror for My neighbours, a fear to My friends. Those who see Me in the streets flee from Me. I am like the dead, unremembered; I have become like a broken pot, thrown away, discarded.

But I put My trust in You, o Lord, I said : “You are My God;” My days are in Your hand. Deliver Me from the hand of My enemies, from those after My skin.

Make Your face shine upon Your servant; save Me in Your love. Be strong and take courage, all you who hope in the Lord.

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Thursday, 17 April 2014 : Chrism Mass on Maundy Thursday (Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : White

Brothers and sisters in Christ, in this Holy Mass we celebrate the occasion of the Chrism Mass, during which the holy oils used for baptism, confirmation, and the anointing of the sick are blessed. This oil is called chrism, and is the reason why this Mass is called Chrismal Mass.

On this occasion, priests and those who dedicated themselves to God in holy orders renew their vows and devotions to God, and united with the bishop, the shepherd, renew their commitment to the service of God and to the service of His people.

They have been called to be the holy priests of God, the ministers of the Lord Most High as the anointed and ordained ones of God. Through the laying of the hand and the anointing with the holy oils blessed today, the priests share in the same ministry as the priests of Israel of old, and also ultimately in the High Priesthood of Jesus.

Through the ministry of the priests, the ministry of Jesus in this world is continued, just as the Apostles had been charged to carry on the works of Christ and spread the Good News to all the ends of the earth. Hence, the bishops, priests and other servants of the Lord also continue this good work of the Lord.

Much had been entrusted to the servants of the Lord and much had been granted to them. The same that had been given to Christ as the Saviour and Redeemer indeed, as written in the Book of the prophet Isaiah. The authority to forgive sins and to heal the sick and their infirmities, and the authority over spirits has been given to them and they are empowered to be the shepherds of God’s peoples.

But remember, brothers and sisters in Christ, that we too have been anointed with oil of the chrism on the day of our baptism, and also after we have been confirmed in the faith through the Sacrament of Confirmation. Therefore, we too take part in and share in the same mission that God had appointed His disciples for, to bring renewal and the light of Christ to all mankind.

Brethren, today therefore, as we celebrate the blessing of the chrism, we have to remember that we too have our calling and our mission entrusted by God to us, that is to help guide one another and reach out to those who are lost and away from the salvation in God. This is our mission, which had been given to us since the day of our baptism, when God claimed us as His own.

We do not have to do great things in order to fulfill this mission. What we have to do is simple steps, and things that we can indeed make a difference of, in the life of those around us. Who are these if not for our own families and friends, and all those dear and known to us? Our mission is to bring them to the light of God if they have wandered off into the darkness.

Hence, in order to do that, we have to first be aware of our actions and our deeds, that in whatever we do, we will always do the will of God and remain always in His grace. May the Lord guide us and our acts, that we will be ever faithful and committed to God. Amen.

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Tuesday, 15 April 2014 : Tuesday of Holy Week (Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : Purple/Violet

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, the day when we will celebrate the Passion and death of Jesus Christ our Lord is coming sooner and sooner, and accordingly today the readings appropriately show this imminence, how Judas the betrayer is about to betray Jesus and the imminence of the coming of the Lord’s salvation.

But often, we are too quick to blame Judas and pile all responsibilities and blame for the suffering and death of Christ on Judas, the traitor. We are quick to also blame the Jews, who were themselves the people of God, with the blame for the death of Christ. This is why, it is important for us to know, what is the true meaning of this celebration of the Holy Passion of our Lord.

As mentioned in the first reading, God has sent His servant, who is none other than Jesus His Son, to be the One through whom the salvation in God is made readily available for all peoples of all nations. Jesus came bearing the Good News and the fulfillment of the Law of God and through a single, final act, decisively end the hold of sin and death on mankind.

Yes, that act was the Holy Passion that our Lord Jesus went through, carrying the cross that is our sins and our rebelliousness against the love of God, our waywardness and all of our unworthiness. And yet He carried it with love to the hill of suffering, Golgotha, and laid over there His life down for us. And thus the salvation of God was made available for all mankind, and those who accept Him will be saved.

And that brings us to our role in this salvific mission of Jesus. Whose sins and burdens were that in the cross that Jesus bore? Was that the sin of Judas, the sins of the Jews, or the sins of the Pharisees and the chief priests? No! That is not all, for the sins that Jesus bore, were, are, and will be our sins, past, present and in the future.

Every single act of sin and disobedience that we committed and which we are committing, and which we may commit in the future all add up to the burden that our Lord carried on the way to Calvary, on the way to His death. Every single sin that we have, no matter how small it is, is another wound and pain that we inflict on Jesus who suffered and died for us, out of His love for us.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, we are all like Judas, and the spirit of unworthiness and sin like that which was present inside Judas, was also in us. We have to remember that we often betray the Lord and spurn His love, all for the price of worldly happiness and goodness. How is that different from Judas betraying and selling his Lord for a mere thirty pieces of silver?

Shall we all reflect on this and make use of this good opportunity to change our lives for the better? Let us no longer follow the footsteps of Judas, of Satan in their rebelliousness before God, but let us from now on, dedicate ourselves to love God, to give our all to the Lord, that we may no longer live in the darkness but instead bask in the light of God and His love.

Let us sin no more, and commit ourselves to the will of God and from now on, let us no longer betray our Lord, hurt our Lord, and burden Him any longer with our sins, but let us accept the outpouring of His love, from His loving heart that constantly bleed for us out of His concerns for us. May God bless us and keep us always in His grace and love. Amen.

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Thursday, 10 April 2014 : 5th Week of Lent (Psalm)

Liturgical Colour : Purple/Violet

Psalm 104 : 4-5, 6-7, 8-9

Look to the Lord and be strong; seek His face always. Remember His wonderful works, His miracles and His judgments.

You descendants of His servant Abraham, you sons of Jacob, His chosen ones! He is the Lord our God; His judgments reach the whole world.

He remembers His covenant forever, His promise to a thousand generations, the covenant He made with Abraham, the promise He swore to Isaac.

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Tuesday, 8 April 2014 : 5th Week of Lent (Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : Purple/Violet

Brothers and sisters in Christ, we see today how great is the love that God our Father has for us. We have rebelled a lot against Him and spurned His love much like the people of God had done long ago as they journeyed through the desert towards the Promised Land. God promised them something great and eternal happiness for them if they walked in His path, and yet, they made complaints after complaints because what they seek is pleasure, that is the joys of the world, the pleasure of food and the flesh, and not true pleasure and happiness that only God can give.

The people of God showed their ingratitude and lack of faith, even to the point of worshipping a golden calf in place of their loving God. That is why God showed them His wrath, sending fiery serpents to destroy them for their rebelliousness. Yes, this event showed that, even though our God is a loving God, but He also hates all forms of sin, because God is good, and He us diametrically opposite to sin, which is the progenitor of all that is evil.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, does that mean we should see God as One to be feared? No! In fact, if we fear God because of His wrath without understanding first the reason of His wrath, we will likely end up getting further and further from Him, and thus sink into the sea of death. Yes, God hates sin and all of its unholy spawns, pride, greed, anger, hatred, and many others, but at the same time God also loves us, and even more than He hated our sins.

That is why He continued to pour out His love to His people even after they had repeatedly disobeyed Him and spurned His love and sought instead the pagan gods and earthly pleasures. He never gave up on any of us, even to the most obstinate and hard-hearted. He continues to offer us daily, at all times, the hope and opportunity at salvation, which He Himself offered through the sacrifice of His own Son, Jesus on the cross.

God loves us that much, and He has His merciful eyes and heart always set upon us. He never abandoned us, because it is we who has abandoned Him instead. He gave the bronze serpent to Moses, that when it was lifted up, those who were bitten by the fiery serpents and saw it will not die but live. The same thing applies to all of us, that all who looks up to Christ crucified on the cross, will not face death, that is the destruction of our soul, but live eternally with God.

Yes, just as Jesus explained to Nicodemus, that just as the bronze serpent was lifted in the desert for the rescue and salvation for all those nearing death from disobeying God, so the Son of Man, Jesus Himself too had to be raised up high for all to see, that all who look upon Him and believe, will not die either, but gain life eternal. And yet, honestly, how many of us truly look up on the crucified Christ and believe in Him, and in His love?

Jesus Christ suffered for us, was tortured for us, and ultimately died for us on the cross, because of His love, God’s love for us all, His children who had sinned against Him and thus deserving death. And desiring not our futile death, He sent us helpers after helpers, and assistance after assistance. And finally, He gave us Jesus, His own Son and the Word of God made flesh, to be our Saviour. Yes, that all who believe in Him and look at Him will be saved.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, let us all from today on, reflect on our own lives, whether they have been obedient and aligned to God and His will, or whether we have stayed away and disobeyed Him through our words, deeds or actions. We have to reflect on our lives, that we may realise our conditions and needs before it us too late for us. Let us therefore, aspire and commit ourselves to seek God and His mercy.

Let us from now on, commit ourselves to always look at the crucified Christ, the One who has died for us and to be thankful for that sacrifice through which, we are saved. Let us never spurn God’s love again, but resolve ourselves to be ever closer to God our Father who loves us so much, that He sent us Jesus, to save us from death. May God be with us all. Amen.

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Tuesday, 8 April 2014 : 5th Week of Lent (Gospel Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Purple/Violet

John 8 : 21-30

Again Jesus said to them, “I am going away, and though you look for Me, you will die in your sin. Where I am going you cannot come.”

The Jews wondered, “Why does He say that we cannot come where He is going? Will He kill Himself?” But Jesus said, “You are from below and I am from above; you are of this world and I am not of this world. That is why I told you that you will die in your sins. And you shall die in your sins, unless you believe that I am He.”

They asked Him, “Who are You?”; and Jesus said, “Just what I have told you from the beginning. I have much to say about you and much to condemn; but the One who sent Me is truthful and everything I learnt from Him, I proclaim to the world.”

They did not understand that Jesus was speaking to them about the Father. So Jesus said, “When you have lifted up the Son of Man, then you will know that I am He and that I do nothing of Myself, but I say just what the Father taught Me. He who sent Me is with Me and has not left Me alone; because I always do what pleases Him.”

As Jesus spoke like this, many believed in Him.

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Monday, 7 April 2014 : 5th Week of Lent, Memorial of St. John Baptist de la Salle, Priest (Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : Purple/Violet

Brothers and sisters in Christ! Today’s scripture readings very clearly highlight the truth, how in our lives in this world, we often forsake the Lord and His ways for the temporary pleasures of the flesh and of the world. We let our emotions and sin to cloud our judgments and to affect our actions and deeds. In that way we preferred the ways of Satan and his rebelliousness rather than the truth and love that is in God.

In today’s first reading, we see how the two most respected people among the entirety of the people of God, the two appointed elders of the people of God, were actually the ones who brought sin and destruction upon the people, by judging as guilty an innocent woman, all because so that they could hide the sin that they had planned to commit with her. If the Spirit of God had not acted through Daniel, the young prophet, an innocent life would have been lost.

And in today’s Gospel reading, we heard the well-known story how Jesus dealt with the woman caught in adulterous behaviour, how He did not condemn her for her sins, and in fact called upon the people who wanted her dead, to reflect upon their own sinfulness and not to be judgmental, for they themselves were subjects to the same judgment of God for they all have sinned.

Today we are all called to holiness and new life, that is a life filled with the love of God, and blessed by God’s presence, that we no longer indulge ourselves in our sinful ways and manners of life, and instead commit ourselves to do the will of God and immerse ourselves in the way of the Lord, as Jesus had told the sinful woman, ‘Do not sin anymore.’

The key to salvation is for us all to be able to recognise first that we are sinners, and we are all faulty at one point in our lives, and we are imperfect, and therefore, flawed as we are, we are bound to commit sin and other acts displeasing to God. But it is also equally important that we realise how loving our God is towards us all, the most beloved ones of His creations.

It is indeed true that God hates sin, and He hates all forms of darkness and evils, that were born out of disobedience to His will. Nevertheless, He loves us even more than the hatred He has for our sins. But this love will not manifest itself if we keep ourselves locked and separated from His love, if we refuse to acknowledge that we are sinners, and that we need to repent. Only through the understanding of one’s sinfulness and accepting that we need God’s mercy that we can get closer to God and towards salvation in Him.

Sin keeps us away from the goodness of God and it even deviates us in our path, that we veer off the path towards God and instead we walk on towards doom and destruction. That was what happened to the two elders who tried to commit sin with Susanna, the faithful woman, and ended up sinning even greater by committing themselves ever deeper into their sinfulness.

They sin because they keep themselves in their sinfulness, and instead of acknowledging that they were sinners and committing themselves to repentance and new life, they became fearful and selfish, and they committed even greater sins in the process, condemning the innocent to death, while seeking freedom for themselves who had sinned, at the price of the blood of the innocent.

The same the Pharisees and the chief priests had done to the Holy and Innocent One of God, none other than Jesus, who was condemned to the death because of their jealousy and insecurity. They themselves said that it would be better for one man, that is Jesus, to die rather than the whole nation. In reality, they are concerned not for the nation, but only for themselves, for the wealth and the position that they had enjoyed as the leaders of the people, corrupted by their own power.

This is what we should not do, and we should not be like them. We should not be swayed by the allures of power and we should not give in to our selfishness and pride, that we become like the Pharisees. We have to be humble and be open to the love of God as I have often mentioned. Jesus called us to be loving children of God, and He wanted us to be saved. That is why, He forgave the adulterous woman, not just because He loves us, but because He also sees the hope in us.

Yes, the Lord sees the hope in us, and He desires for us all to be reunited with Him. Even the greatest of sinners have hope of salvation, again providing that they open up themselves to accept the Lord’s infinite mercy. That is the key ingredient of salvation, that we too should be receptive to God’s mercy and love. We cannot harden our hearts and refuse to allow the Lord to enter our hearts.

God offered us His salvation, if we want to accept Him and listen to Him. And today we have a role model whose model we can follow and aspire to, as what he has done in this life is to show us, how to be like Christ and to follow Christ in His ways. Yes, that person is St. John Baptist de la Salle, the missionary priest and patron saint of Christian schools and education.

St. John Baptist de la Salle is particularly dear and known to me, because he is the patron saint of my Alma Mater, and when I was in that school, I learnt a lot about who St. John Baptist de la Salle was. He is the main patron of the Lasallian congregation, consisting of brothers and community of devoted religious called the Brothers of Christian Schools. What is the significance?

This is because St. John Baptist de la Salle dedicated himself to the poor children, the last, the lost and the least of the society. He emulated and followed what Jesus had taught us and His disciples. St. John Baptist de la Salle shows that we have to be merciful and loving to others, especially to those who lack love in them, and to those who have sinned. That was what Jesus had done to the prostitute, forgiving her from what she had done.

St. John Baptist de la Salle shows us that we need to be genuine in loving and giving of ourselves to others if we are to be truly good disciples of the Lord. We cannot be hypocrites who look highly upon ourselves and look down on others when we ourselves too are lowly sinners. Let us not be like the Pharisees who condemned others whom they deem to be unworthy of salvation.

We have to preach love and forgiveness that Jesus had taught His disciples, keeping in mind that it is important for the neglected and the lost ones, including all of us, to be able to get in touch with God and His generous offer of forgiveness. No one is beyond God’s salvation and mercy, and especially to those who are the last, the lost and the least.

Let us therefore help one another and open the path for others to also reach out to God. Let us not be prideful, hate-filled and jealous, but instead love one another genuinely and tenderly. May the Lord bless us all, for all eternity. God bless us all with His love, and that we too may love sincerely and with all of our hearts. Amen.