Liturgical Colour : Green or Red (Martyrs)
Psalm 83 : 3, 4, 5-6a and 8a
My soul yearns, pines, for the courts of the Lord. My heart and my flesh cry out for the living God.
Even the sparrow finds a home, and the swallow a nest where she may lay her young, at Your altars, o Lord of hosts, my King and my God!
Happy are those who live in Your house, continually singing Your praise! Happy the pilgrims whom You strengthen. They go from strength to strength till they appear before God in Zion.
Liturgical Colour : Green or Red (Martyrs)
Revelations 20 : 1-4, 11 – Revelations 21 : 2
Then an Angel came down from heaven, holding in his hand the key to the Abyss and a huge chain. He seized the monster, the ancient serpent, namely Satan or the devil, and chained him for a thousand years. He threw him into the Abyss and closed its gate with the key, then secured it with locks, that he might not deceive the nations in the future until the thousand years have passed. Then he will be released for a little while.
There were thrones and seated on them were those with the power to judge. I then saw the spirits of those who had been beheaded for having held the teachings of Jesus and on account of the word of God. I saw all those who had refused to worship the beast and its image, or receive its mark on the forehead or on the hand. They returned to life and reigned with the Messiah for a thousand years. This is the first resurrection.
After that I saw a great and splendid throne and the One seated upon it. At once heaven and earth disappeared, leaving no trace. I saw the dead, both great and small, standing before the throne while books were opened. Another book, the Book of Life, was also opened. Then the dead were judged according to the records of these books, that is, each one according to his works.
The sea gave up the dead it had kept, as did death and the netherworld, so that all might be judged according to their works. Then death and the netherworld were thrown into the lake of fire. This lake of fire is the second death. All who were not recorded in the Book of Life were thrown into the lake of fire.
Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth. The first heaven and the first earth had passed away and no longer was there any sea. I saw the new Jerusalem, the holy city coming down from God, out of heaven, adorned as a bride prepared for her husband.
Liturgical Colour : Green or Red (Martyrs)
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, on this day we listened to the words of the Lord speaking to us the challenges and trials that are part of our journey as Christians and how we should keep up faith and not be afraid. This is because the Lord will always be with us and by our side no matter what, and with His guidance and strength, we shall persevere through all the challenges and trials.
In our first reading today we heard of the words from the Book of Revelations of St. John regarding the happenings of the end times as the time of reckoning and judgment is coming up on the world, and the Angels of God bearing the seven great plagues that will befall the nations and the people who refused to believe in God. At that time, the righteous and those who are still faithful in God will be persecuted and oppressed by those unbelievers, and the plagues and other signs are reminders that God is by the side of His faithful.
The Lord will not abandon His people to darkness and destruction, and He, as the Lamb of God seen in the vision of St. John, has triumphed by His Passion and Resurrection from the dead, and not even death and evil can overcome Him. For He has defeated the ultimate enemy of all, that is death, and showing to all of us that there is light and hope beyond death, and death no longer has the final say for all of us. It used to be something that we were all scared of as death is a separation from our lives in this world.
The Lord reassured us all that death that we experience is only a temporary experience and is just a mark of the new beginning of a new life with Him, when we will be reunited completely with Him and enter into the eternal glory and the eternal life that have been prepared for all of us. However, unless we believe in Him and are faithful in HIm, dedicating ourselves to Him, there will be no place for us in His eternal kingdom and glory.
And all of these relate well to what we heard from our Gospel passage today. In our Gospel passage today we heard the Lord proclaiming the revelation of what His disciples and followers as Christians would encounter soon enough, after He established His Church and they preached His Good News to the nations. They would be persecuted, oppressed, rejected and ridiculed by many of those who refused to believe in the Lord and in His message, as well as those who saw the faithful as threats to their own power and influence.
Hence, that was why Christians especially in its early centuries faced so many persecutions, initially from the Jewish authorities, the members of the Sanhedrin and the chief priests, the Pharisees and Sadducees and all those who were opposed to the Lord and His followers. And in addition, the Roman authorities and the state governments, as well as the Greeks and other pagan peoples who refused to believe in God also persecuted the faithful and made things difficult to them.
Yet, amidst all of that, many of our holy predecessors, the innumerable martyrs and saints of the Church remained firm in their faith and conviction to serve the Lord, dedicating their lives and all their efforts to follow the Lord to the very end. They endured those sufferings, trials, persecutions and challenges since they had faith that God would be with them and journeyed together with them even through the greatest sufferings and the deepest darkness and despair.
One of those saints is St. Catherine of Alexandria, one of the most famous and inspirational saints of the early Church. St. Catherine of Alexandria was a noble, born of a powerful family as her father was the governor of Alexandria in Egypt, a very important position in the Roman Empire at that time. St. Catherine was persuaded to become a Christian after receiving visions of the Lord and was convinced to embrace the Christian faith fully. And all these happened amidst one of the most bitter and brutal persecution against Christians.
It was told that St. Catherine was arrested and tortured for her Christian faith. And in the attempt to make her abandon her faith and to publicly denounce the Christian faith and truth, the Emperor made her to debate as many as fifty or more pagan philosophers, who were all unable to outsmart or debate her, unable to match her wisdom, the wisdom of God as passed on and revealed through the Holy Spirit. It was told that St. Catherine’s wisdom was such that even the Emperor’s own wife was touched, inspired and converted to the true faith.
And when all methods and ways had failed to persuade St. Catherine to abandon her faith, the desperate Emperor tried to turn her by offering her his hand in marriage. Normally, the temptation to abandon the faith to embrace marriage with the most powerful and influential person in the land would be so great. But St. Catherine resisted the offer and temptation, declaring publicly that she maintained her virginity and dedicated it to the Lord, refusing to stain her purity in any way, and neither would she abandon her faith. And thus, afterwards, she was martyred for remaining true to her faith in God.
Brothers and sisters in Christ, from the inspiring examples set by St. Catherine of Alexandria, as well as the many other examples made by the other holy men and women of God, who had chosen to walk with God and refused to abandon Him, let us all be inspired to follow their examples and walk in their footsteps even as challenges and trials are facing us and become great obstacles in our own respective journeys of faith. Let us all discern carefully our path going forward in life, that we may grow ever closer to God and in faith.
May the Lord be with us always, and may He guide us all in our journey of faith. May He strengthen us and our resolve that we may persevere and be more courageous in our pursuit of faith, and be ourselves inspiring examples of faith to one another. May God bless us all, now and always. Amen.
Liturgical Colour : Green or Red (Martyrs)
Luke 21 : 12-19
At that time, Jesus said to His disciples, “Before all these things happen, people will lay their hands on you and persecute you; you will be delivered to the synagogues and put in prison, and for My sake you will be brought before kings and governors. This will be your opportunity to bear witness.”
“So keep this in mind : do not worry in advance about what to say, for I will give you words and wisdom that none of your opponents will be able to withstand or contradict. You will be betrayed even by parents and brothers, by relatives and friends, and some of you will be put to death.”
“But even though, because of My Name, you will be hated by everyone, not a hair of your head will perish. By your patient endurance you will save your souls.”
Liturgical Colour : Green or Red (Martyrs)
Psalm 97 : 1, 2-3ab, 7-8, 9
Sing to the Lord a new song, for He has done wonders; His right hand, His holy arm, has won victory for Him.
The Lord has shown His salvation, revealing His justice to the nations. He has not forgotten His love nor His faithfulness to Israel.
Let the sea resound and everything in it, the world and all its peoples. Let rivers clap their hands, hills and mountains sing with joy.
Before the Lord, for He comes to rule the earth. He will judge the world with justice and the peoples with fairness.
Liturgical Colour : Green or Red (Martyrs)
Revelations 15 : 1-4
Then I saw another great and marvellous sign in the heavens : seven Angels brought seven plagues which are the last, for with these the wrath of God will end. There was a sea of crystal mingled with fire, and the conquerors of the beast, of its name and the mark of its name stood by it.
They had been given the celestial harps and they sang the song of Moses the servant of God and the song of the Lamb : Great and marvellous are Your works, o Lord, God and Master of the universe. Justice and truth guide Your steps, o King of the nations.
Lord, who will not give honour and glory to Your Name? For You alone are holy. All the nations will come and bow before You, for they have now seen Your judgments.
Liturgical Colour : Green or Red (Martyrs)
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, on this day we listened to the words of the Scripture beginning the narrative from the Book of the prophet Daniel, a prophet who was brought into exile in Babylon during his youth in the ending days of the kingdom of Judah just before the destruction of the city of Jerusalem and Solomon’s Temple of God. Daniel and his companions were brought to the faraway land, uprooted from their homes and families, and made to serve the King of Babylon and his ministers.
Such was the humiliation and suffering that they all had to suffer, humiliated of having lost their homeland and later on to hear how the city of God, Jerusalem and its Temple were razed and destroyed by the Babylonians, its treasures and riches carried off to the Babylonian kingdom, all the sacred vessels once used to worship God became instead the profane drinking cups of the kings and their nobles as described in the latter part of the Book of Daniel.
Amidst such a situation, it must have been difficult for Daniel and his companions, another three Israelites named Hananiah, Mishael and Azariah, also known by their Babylonian names of Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego, to remain faithful to God and not to bend their knees to the pressures and demands of the Babylonians and their kings. Yet, that was exactly what they did, in remaining true to their faith even in such difficult conditions.
They gave their all to God, and in doing their best in whatever that God has led them into, in serving the king of Babylon and his ministers, in doing their best as the servants, and by the grace of God, they became the favoured servants of the king, and especially Daniel was honoured for his great wisdom and ability to interpret the king’s dreams while none other could do so. But, they would not budge when the king demanded that everyone, including them to bow down their knees to worship a golden statue that king Nebuchadnezzar built in his own likeness.
They had nothing on them, no wealth and no pride, no more than memory of the humiliation of their country and people, the destruction of their holy city and Temple, and yet, they gave their love and faith to God. In our Psalm today, we heard part of the song which Azariah the other two companions of Daniel sang when they were thrown into the blazing furnace by the order of the king when they openly defied the king’s demands to worship his golden statue.
They praised God Who had been with them all those while and reiterated their faith and love for Him. They sang of His glorious majesty in the presence of the king and all gathered from within the flame, apparently unharmed and an Angel of God by their side, as seen by the king and all. The king and everyone were astonished, and because of what happened, the king decided to destroy the golden statue that he had just built, and restored the three companions of Daniel to their previous honoured positions.
We see how God was always with His faithful ones, and for those who truly trust in Him and gave their all, they did not fear because they knew that God would be always by their side even amidst sufferings and challenges, even through martyrdoms and painful deaths. That is the same sentiment and example that the Lord Jesus highlighted in our Gospel passage today, as we heard another well-known story of the widow’s mite.
In that occasion, a poor widow came to the Temple bearing two small copper coins as offerings to God, while many rich men came to offer plentiful of offerings that were far greater than the poor widow’s offering. Yet, she offered and gave from her own shortage and limitations, and as a result, she gave from the deepest love in her heart. She is the epitome of what true Christian discipleship is, and like the prophet Daniel and his companions, she had given her all to God.
Now, brothers and sisters in Christ, this is what each and every one of us need to do as well. We need to do our best to serve the Lord with all of our strength, and to give the best for Him from the depths of our hearts. And today we have yet another example to look up to, in the person of St. Catherine of Alexandria, a holy woman and saint whose feast we celebrate today. St. Catherine of Alexandria was a faithful disciple of the Lord who went through a particularly brutal persecution under the pagan Roman Emperor Maxentius.
St. Catherine defended her fellow faithful when that Emperor persecuted Christians throughout his realm, rebuking him for his actions and stood up for the Lord. The Emperor tried to oppose her with the best pagan philosophers and thinkers of the time, but none of them were able to outshine her wisdom, and the Emperor in his anger made this faithful woman to undergo bitter suffering and torture. When the Emperor’s own wife and other women came to see St. Catherine in her suffering, it was told that even they converted and were martyred along as well.
St. Catherine of Alexandria gave everything for the Lord’s sake, even her own life, not holding back even when the pagan Emperor in desperation tried to get her by trying to woo her in marriage, as beautiful as St. Catherine was even after she was tortured. She remained firm in her dedication and committed herself and her virginity before God and the Emperor, by which then she was martyred after a long time of suffering, and became a great inspiration for many Christians after her time.
Brothers and sisters in Christ, we are all called to follow in the footsteps of St. Catherine of Alexandria, to imitate the love of the widow who gave her all to God, and also the dedication of Daniel and his fellow companions who remained true to their faith in God amidst all the challenges they had to face. Let us all thus strive to be true Christian disciples and do our very best to serve the Lord with all of our hearts and to give Him everything that we are, and committing ourselves to Him from now on. May He continue to bless us all and guide us in this journey, that we may draw ever closer to Him. Amen.
Liturgical Colour : Green or Red (Martyrs)
Luke 21 : 1-4
At that time, Jesus looked up and saw rich people putting their gifts into the treasury of the Temple. He also saw a poor widow, who dropped in two small coins. And He said, “Truly, I tell you, this poor widow put in more than all of them. For all of them gave an offering from their plenty; but she, out of her poverty, gave all she had to live on.”
Liturgical Colour : Green or Red (Martyrs)
Daniel 3 : 52a, 53, 54, 55, 56
Blessed are You, Lord, God of our fathers, be praised and exalted forever.
Blessed are You in the Temple of Your sacred glory; Your praises are sung forever.
Blessed are You, on the throne of Your kingdom; honoured and glorified forever.
Blessed are You, Who fathom the depths, Who are enthroned on the Cherubim; praised and exalted forever.
Blessed are You, in the firmament of heaven; praised and glorified forever.
Liturgical Colour : Green or Red (Martyrs)
Daniel 1 : 1-6, 8-20
In the third year of Jehoiakim’s reign as king of Judah, king Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon besieged Jerusalem. The Lord delivered into his hands king Jehoiakim of Judah, and some of the vessels from the Temple of God as well. These he carried off, to the land of Shinar, and placed in the treasure house of his god.
King Nebuchadnezzar ordered his chief eunuch Ashpenaz to bring in some of the Israelites from the royal family and the nobility : young men without physical defect, handsome, intelligent and wise; well-informed, quick to learn and understand; and suitable for service in the king’s palace.
They were to be taught the language and literature of the Chaldeans. They were allotted a daily portion of food and wine from the king’s table; and were to be trained for three years, after which, they were to enter the king’s service. Among these were young men of Judah : Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael and Azariah.
As Daniel was resolved not to make himself unclean with the king’s food or wine, he begged the chief eunuch to spare him this defilement. By the grace of God, the chief eunuch had been sympathetic to Daniel. But he was afraid of the king, so he said, “If the king, who has allotted your food and drink, sees that you look more emaciated than the other young men of your age, he might think ill of me. It will put my life in danger to give in to your wish.”
Daniel then turned to the steward whom the chief eunuch had put in charge of Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael and Azariah. “Please test your servants for ten days. Give us only vegetables to eat and water to drink, and see how we look in comparison with the young men who eat food from the king’s table. Then treat us in accordance with what you see.”
The steward agreed and tested them for ten days, at the end of which, they looked healthier and better fed than any of the young men who ate the king’s food. So the steward continued to give them vegetables instead of the choice food and wine. To these four youths God gave wisdom and proficiency in literature, and to Daniel the gift of interpreting visions and dreams.
At the end of the period set by the king for the youths’ training, the chief eunuch presented them to Nebuchadnezzar. The king talked with them and found none to equal Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael and Azariah. These four became members of the king’s court. In any matter of wisdom and discernment about which the king consulted, he found them ten times better than all the magicians and enchanters in his whole kingdom.
petercanisiusmichaeldavidkang 