Feast of St. Scholastica

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Tuesday, 10 February 2026 : 5th Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Scholastica, Virgin (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : White

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, today we are all reminded that we should be truly faithful and committed to God beyond just merely having superficial faith, or worse still faith that is not centred on God but on ourselves and our ego like how the Pharisees and the teachers of the Law had done in the past. All of us should learn to be humble and truly obedient to what the Lord has shown and taught us. We should not allow our pride, ego, ambition and worldly desires to influence and mislead us down the wrong path in life, simply because we cannot resist those temptations and falling ever deeper therefore into the slippery slope and path towards damnation and destruction.

In our first reading today, we heard from the Book of the Kings of Israel and Judah, we heard of the prayer which King Solomon offered to the Lord for His Providence, love and kindness to all the people and to him as King, in everything that He had done in extending His ever patient love and forgiveness to the people whom He truly loved and cared for, despite their stubbornness in constantly disobeying and rebelling against Him. God’s love did not cease just because of all that, and instead, He truly loved us all the more and went all out to seek those who had been separated and lost to Him because of their disobedience and sins.

King Solomon gave thanks to God for Him having willed to come and dwell amongst His people, as the Ark of the Covenant was brought into the grand Temple that he had built for the Lord. The Ark of the Covenant symbolised God’s Presence among His people, and that grand Temple, prepared and planned by David, Solomon’s father, and finally built and realised by Solomon himself, was meant to be the tangible centre and heart of the Kingdom of God’s people, and to where they all would come to worship the Lord their God, their Master and Creator. And King Solomon interceded on behalf of the people asking for the Lord’s mercy and forgiveness for their many sins, and for His continued presence and love among them.

Then, from our Gospel passage today, we heard from the Gospel according to St. Mark the Evangelist in which the Lord Jesus heavily criticised the Pharisees and the teachers of the Law for their way of interpreting, practicing and applying the Law and commandments of God according to their own interpretation and preferences. They were too strict and rigid in implementing the Law and its statutes, focusing so much on the externals and appearances that they neglected to understand and appreciate the true meaning and intention of the Law, and why God has given His Law and provided them to His people in the first place. God never intended for the Law to make it difficult for His people or to burden them unnecessarily.

In fact, He meant for the Law to teach and show them, to guide and lead them on how to love Him and one another in the same way that He has loved all of them. That is why we are reminded today that our faith and how we observe it must always be rooted firmly in the Lord and not be tainted and swayed by the temptations of worldly glory and ambitions like how the Pharisees had done. Those Pharisees used their piety and their way of observing the Law to be comparison and to judge against those whom they deemed to be less than worthy, which usually meant anyone else who did not practice the Law in the same manner as they had done. This is not what we should be doing as Christians, as we should be faithful and obey the Lord while also loving our fellow brethren at the same time, without any prejudice or bias.

Today, the Church celebrates the Feast of St. Scholastica, a holy and devoted woman whose life and examples had inspired many throughout the history of the Church. St. Scholastica was the fraternal twin sister of St. Benedict of Nursia according to Church tradition, who was another great saint of God and who was widely considered as the Father of Western Monasticism. St. Scholastica herself was renowned in her own way for her great piety and commitment to God, for her dedication and faith, which had inspired many others to follow her examples to a life of holiness and grace, resisting the many temptations of worldly glory, pleasures, fame and ambitions, and instead, seeking God wholeheartedly and turning themselves into the right path.

While the details on her early life was rather scant, but St. Scholastica eventually joined religious life much like St. Benedict, and she was credited with the foundation of the Benedictine nuns, which mirrored her brother’s role in founding the Benedictine monks and monasteries. St. Scholastica led a quiet and contemplative life in prayer, committing herself in prayer and study of the Scriptures, through which she inspired many other women of her time to follow the Lord in the same way, rejecting the excesses of wickedness and evils of the world, all the worldly temptations, pleasures and comforts, that they may all lead a holy life with the Lord, caring for one another in a holy community of the faithful consecrated ones to God.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, let us all therefore be inspired by the good examples, piety and faith which St. Scholastica has shown us, in all of her life and work, dedicating herself wholly to the Lord and to His path. Let us all reject the temptations of worldly power and glory, and remind ourselves that we do not end up being swayed by all those things and fall into the path of sin and evil. Let us instead deepen our relationship with God, by spending more quality time with Him, through prayer, charity and almsgiving, and by our exemplary way of life at all times. May God be with us always, and may He bless our every good works and efforts, now and forevermore. Amen.

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Tuesday, 10 February 2026 : 5th Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Scholastica, Virgin (Gospel Reading)

Liturgical Colour : White

Mark 7 : 1-13

At that time, one day, the Pharisees gathered around Jesus, and with them were some teachers of the Law who had just come from Jerusalem. They noticed that some of His disciples were eating their meal with unclean hands, that is, without washing them.

Now the Pharisees, and in fact all the Jews, never eat without washing their hands, for they follow the tradition received from their ancestors. Nor do they eat anything, when they come from the market, without first washing themselves. And there are many other traditions they observe; for example, the ritual washing of cups, pots and plates.

So the Pharisees and the teachers of the Law asked Him, “Why do Your disciples not follow the tradition of the elders, but eat with unclean hands?” Jesus answered, “You shallow people! How well Isaiah prophesied of you when he wrote : ‘This people honours Me with their lips, but their heart is far from Me. The worship they offer Me is worthless, for what they teach are only human rules.’ You even put aside the commandment of God to hold fast to human tradition.”

And Jesus commented, “You have a fine way of disregarding the commandments of God in order to enforce your own traditions! For example, Moses said : Do your duty to your father and your mother, and : Whoever curses his father or his mother is to be put to death. But according to you, someone could say to his father or mother, ‘I already declared Corban (which means “offered to God”) what you could have expected from me.’”

“In this case, you no longer require him to do anything for his father or mother; and so you nullify the word of God through the tradition you have handed on. And you do many other things like that.”

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Tuesday, 10 February 2026 : 5th Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Scholastica, Virgin (Psalm)

Liturgical Colour : White

Psalm 83 : 3, 4, 5 and 10, 11

My soul yearns; pines, for the courts of YHVH. 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 YHVH of Hosts, my King and my God!

Happy are those who live in Your House, continually singing Your praise! Look upon our shield, o God; look upon the face of Your Anointed!

One day in Your courts is better than a thousand elsewhere. I would rather be left at the threshold in the house of my God than to dwell in the tents of the wicked.

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Tuesday, 10 February 2026 : 5th Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Scholastica, Virgin (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : White

1 Kings 8 : 22-23, 27-30

Then Solomon stood before the Altar of YHVH in the presence of all the assembly of Israel. He raised his hands towards heaven and said, “O YHVH, God of Israel, there is no God like You either in heaven or on earth! You keep Your Covenant and show loving kindness to Your servants who walk before You wholeheartedly.”

“But will God really live among people on earth? If neither heavens nor the highest heavens can contain You, how much less can this House which I have built! Yet, listen to the prayer and supplication of Your servant, o YHVH my God; hearken to the cries and pleas which Your servant directs to You this day. Watch over this House of which You have said, ‘My Name shall rest there.’ Hear the prayer of Your servant in this place.”

“Listen to the supplication of Your servant and Your people Israel when they pray in this direction; listen from Your dwelling place in heaven and, on listening, forgive.”

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Monday, 10 February 2025 : 5th Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Scholastica, Virgin (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : White

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, today as we all listened to the words of the Lord contained in the Sacred Scriptures, all of us are reminded of the love of God which has been given to us, in His Creation of this whole world and universe, of everything present around us, our world and all the good things in it. Ultimately, we also recall our own gift of life, the most wonderful gift of this life which we have received from the Lord Himself through His Spirit, the Spirit of Life, giving us all the life that we are now experiencing and which we have gained by the great love that God has for each and every one of us. It was God’s love that made everything possible for us, even our lives and existence, for without His love, none of us would have existed and lived.

In our first reading today, we heard the account from the beginning of the Book of Genesis where the account of the Creation of the Universe was told to us, detailing how God created all things at the moment of Creation in the beginning of time, making all things to be as they exist to this day. We heard the first half of these events of Creation, as God created what we are all familiar with, beginning with Light, and then the world itself, and all the celestial bodies and structures, showing to us that God is truly the Lord and Master of all the whole Universe. Of course some would debate on whether God really created the world and the whole Universe in just seven days, but in truth, the Scriptures never truly said that God finish the Creation in seven literal days.

One possible point of view is that, from the perspective of the storyteller and from those inspired by the Lord to write this account, the event took place over seven days, while the actual event might have spanned millennia and even millions of years, thus reconciling the view of how the Universe exists according to scientific beliefs and evidences and our Christian faith in the Creation of the Universe. After all, there are many things that Science and our understanding of this world and universe cannot explain, as we are limited in our capabilities to comprehend things that are truly beyond our imagination and ability to understand the true and full reality of this world and Universe around us. This is something that we have to keep in mind, just as we all also realise the nature of our own mortality, how our lives are all belonging to God, and have been given to us by God.

Then, in our Gospel passage today, taken from the Gospel according to St. Mark the Evangelist, we heard of the works of the Lord at the Lake of Galilee or the Lake of Gennesaret where He called His first disciples, the fishermen Simon, Andrew, James and John. It was there that many people came flocking to Him, seeking for Him to heal their sick ones, or their own infirmities. It was told to us how He patiently cared for all of them, curing them and helping all those who had been downtrodden and afflicted. Through Jesus Christ, the Son of God, Who became incarnate in the flesh and appearing before us as the Son of Man, God made Himself approachable and tangible in His love, with Christ as the perfect manifestation of His love in this world amongst us all.

From what we have heard today in this Gospel passage, we are being reminded yet again of the great love which the Lord has for each and every one of us, His most generous love and kindness, that He has manifested Himself in His own Creation, embracing our own human flesh and existence that He had once brought into reality through His Word, so that by this incarnation all of us may come to share in the joy and love of Our Creator, and interact with Him personally in a most tangible way. And not only that, as we all know, the Lord has come into our midst so that He might gather all of us back to Him, all of His scattered lost sheep, as our loving Good Shepherd and loving Father, Who desires that each one of us come back to Him and repent from our sins and transgressions.

And He did all these through His Son, Jesus Christ, by Whom He has manifested His love as mentioned, and through Whose most loving and selfless sacrifice on the Cross He has united all of our sufferings to Himself, and bore the brunt of our many sins upon His own shoulders so that by His wounds and death, all of us might be brought into salvation, as through the outpouring of His Most Precious Blood, He has cleansed all the taints and corruptions that sin had afflicted upon us. God created all of His Creation, this whole Universe all perfect and good without blemish, and by our disobedience against God, we have allowed sin to enter into our midst, corrupting this perfect existence that is our beings. But God Who truly loves all of us has provided us with the perfect means to be free from this corruption, which He had done through His Son, Our Lord and Saviour.

Today, the Church also celebrates the Feast of St. Scholastica, who was known as the twin sister of the other well-known man of God, St. Benedict of Nursia. St. Scholastica was born with his brother in a wealthy Roman family in Nursia in Italy, and as she grew up, like that of his brother who embraced the calling to religious and consecrated life, St. Scholastica also embraced the same call, establishing a community of religious women mirroring what her brother had done in establishing a community for men seeking a contemplative and prayerful life in God. Both of them lived their lives with great love and devotion to God, becoming great role models and inspirations to everyone around them. St. Scholastica eventually passed away before St. Benedict, and according to St. Benedict’s own account, he saw the soul of his sister ascending into Heaven, back to God’s loving Presence.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, as God’s beloved people, those whom He has created out of love, let us all realise how fortunate all of us have been to be loved in such a great manner by God, our Creator, and we ought to show Him our gratitude by loving Him in the same manner that He has loved us all first. We should also always strive to live our lives worthily and virtuously, filled with God’s grace and love, His truth and justice. We must not allow sin and darkness to corrupt us and lead us down the path towards ruin and destruction, but we ought to resist those temptations, keeping in mind that each one of us are meant to live and exist in the state of grace, as God has created us all, pure and blameless, free from the corruption of sin.

May the Lord our loving God, Father and Creator continue to be with us always, and may He empower each one of us to walk ever more faithfully in His Presence from now on, doing our best to take good care of everything that He has created, this world and everyone around us. May all of us, as His disciples and followers, be good examples and inspirations for one another so that we may help lead more and more souls towards the salvation in God. May God bless us always, our every good deeds and endeavours, all for His greater glory. Amen.

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Monday, 10 February 2025 : 5th Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Scholastica, Virgin (Gospel Reading)

Liturgical Colour : White

Mark 6 : 53-56

At that time, having crossed the lake, Jesus and His disciples came ashore at Gennesaret, where they tied up the boat. As soon as they landed, people recognised Jesus, and ran to spread the news throughout the countryside.

Wherever He was, they brought to Him the sick lying on their mats; and wherever He went, to villages, towns or farms, they laid the sick in the marketplace, and begged Him to let them touch just the fringe of His cloak. And all who touched Him were cured.

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Monday, 10 February 2025 : 5th Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Scholastica, Virgin (Psalm)

Liturgical Colour : White

Psalm 103 : 1-2a, 5-6, 10 and 12, 24 and 35c

Bless the Lord my soul! Clothed in majesty and splendour; o Lord, my God, how great You are! You are wrapped in light as with a garment.

You set the earth on its foundations, and never will it be shaken. You covered it with the ocean like a garment, and waters spread over the mountains.

You make springs gush forth in valleys winding among mountains and hills. Birds build their nests close by and sing among the branches of trees.

How varied o Lord, are Your works! In wisdom You have made them all – the earth full of Your creatures. Bless the Lord, my soul!

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Monday, 10 February 2025 : 5th Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Scholastica, Virgin (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : White

Genesis 1 : 1-19

In the beginning, when God began to create the heavens and the earth, the earth had no form and was void; darkness was over the deep and the Spirit of God hovered over the waters.

God said, “Let there be light”; and there was light. God saw that the light was good and He separated the light from the darkness. God called the light ‘Day’ and the darkness ‘Night’. There was evening and there was morning : the first day.

God said, “Let there be a firm ceiling between the waters and let it separate waters from waters.” So God made the ceiling and separated the waters below it from the waters above it. And so it was. God called the firm ceiling ‘Sky’. There was evening and there was morning : the second day.

God said, “Let the waters below the sky be gathered in one place and let dry land appear. And so it was. God called the dry land ‘Earth’, and the waters gathered together he called ‘Seas’. God saw that it was good.

God said, “Let the earth produce vegetation, seed-bearing plants, fruit trees bearing fruit with seed, each according to its kind, upon the earth.” And so it was. The earth produced vegetation : plants bearing seed according to their kind and trees producing fruit which has seed, according to their kind. God saw that it was good. There was evening and there was morning : the third day.

God said, “Let there be lights in the ceiling of the sky to separate day from night and to serve as signs for the seasons, days and years; and let these lights in the sky shine above the earth.” And so it was. God therefore made two great lights, the greater light to govern the day and the smaller light to govern the night; and God made the stars as well. God placed them in the ceiling of the sky to give light on the earth and to separate the light from the darkness. God saw that it was good. There was evening and there was morning : the fourth day.

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Saturday, 10 February 2024 : 5th Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Scholastica, Virgin (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : White

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, today all of us are reminded once again that in God alone that we can have true hope and strength, fulfilment and satisfaction, and we must not allow the desires and ambitions of the world to mislead us down the path of wickedness and ruin. We must always strive to put God at the centre and as the focus of our whole lives, or else, we may end up being swayed, coerced and pushed into the wrong path in life, the path of rebellion and sin against God. We have to be firm in faith, be strong and vigilant in each and every moments of our lives that we can remain in God’s grace, and not fall into the path of evil like what the Scriptures had highlighted to us in the story of King Jeroboam of Israel.

In our first reading today, we heard the story of Jeroboam, the King of Israel, whom God had entrusted with the rule over ten out of the twelve tribes of the Israelites, after King Solomon’s disobedience had led him to sin against God. That led to the division of the kingdom of Israel after the death of King Solomon. Ten out of the twelve tribes of Israel, except that of Judah, from where the House of David hailed from, and Benjamin, rebelled against Rehoboam, Solomon’s son and successor as king of Israel. Hence, the northern kingdom of Israel and the southern kingdom of Judah were formed, led respectively by Jeroboam and Rehoboam. However, as we heard in our reading passage today, Jeroboam grew fearful of the possibility that all those under his rule might betray him and return back to their past allegiance to the House of David.

This was because at that time, the great Temple of God which King Solomon had built and established in Jerusalem as the House of God is the place where all the Israelites ought to go to worship God, and hence, despite the division of the kingdom, the people in the northern kingdom ruled by Jeroboam still went to Jerusalem regularly and periodically, which brought to the fear and jealousy of Jeroboam, who was worried that the rule of his kingdom, his power and dominion would slip from his hands because of the people being reminded of the glorious rule of King David and King Solomon whenever they went to Jerusalem and visited the City of God and the Holy Temple which Solomon had built there to worship God. Hence, as we heard, Jeroboam built his own rival temples, and set up two golden calves as idols in Bethel and Dan, at the extremities of his kingdom.

King Jeroboam promoted the worship of those golden calf idols and discouraged the people of his kingdom from going to Jerusalem to worship God there as they should have done. Not only that, but he also appointed his own priests, which according to the Scriptures and tradition, were not from among the Levites as the Law of God had dictated. These violations of the Law of God and Jeroboam’s own disobedience against God kind of mirror that of Solomon’s own disobedience and sins. And in both cases, they were all due to the inability of mankind to resist the temptations of their own desires, their ambitions and the allures of worldly glory, pleasures and power, of all the things which we have highlighted and discussed earlier on.

Then, in our Gospel passage today, we heard of the moment when the Lord miraculously fed a multitude of many thousands of people with merely seven pieces of bread. The Lord had pity on all the people who had come to listen to His teachings and to bring their sick ones for healing. After all the time they had spent in the wilderness with the Lord and His disciples, we heard how they all had become hungry and without food, and the Lord told His disciples to help provide them all with food. That was how then the Lord Jesus miraculously multiplied the seven loaves of bread given to Him, that were enough for everyone present to have their complete fill, and still having seven whole full baskets of leftovers. This is a reminder to each and every one of us that in God alone lies true satisfaction and happiness, which the world cannot truly provide us.

And unlike the actions of King Solomon and King Jeroboam, especially that of the latter which we have discussed just earlier, the Lord Jesus acted out of love for others, humility and obedience, in doing what His Heavenly Father had entrusted to Him to do, and in not boasting about His ability and power, unlike that of the kings mentioned. The Lord did not allow the temptations of worldly glory, ambition, fame, pride, arrogance or jealousy to mislead Him down the wrong path, and He showed us all the loving nature of Our Lord and King, and how precious each and every one of us are to Him. All of us are God’s beloved people, whom He has treasured and cared for all these while, and we should not take this for granted. We should also strive to live our lives in the manner how He has taught and shown us, and not to follow the wrong examples of our predecessors.

Today, the Church celebrates the Feast of St. Scholastica, a holy and devoted woman whose life and examples had inspired many throughout the history of the Church. St. Scholastica was the fraternal twin sister of St. Benedict of Nursia according to Church tradition, who was another great saint of God and who was widely considered as the Father of Western Monasticism. St. Scholastica herself was renowned in her own way for her great piety and commitment to God, for her dedication and faith, which had inspired many others to follow her examples to a life of holiness and grace, resisting the many temptations of worldly glory, pleasures, fame and ambitions, and instead, seeking God wholeheartedly and turning themselves into the right path.

While the details on her early life was rather scant, but St. Scholastica eventually joined religious life much like St. Benedict, and she was credited with the foundation of the Benedictine nuns, which mirrored her brother’s role in founding the Benedictine monks and monasteries. St. Scholastica led a quiet and contemplative life in prayer, committing herself in prayer and study of the Scriptures, through which she inspired many other women of her time to follow the Lord in the same way, rejecting the excesses of wickedness and evils of the world, all the worldly temptations, pleasures and comforts, that they may all lead a holy life with the Lord, caring for one another in a holy community of the faithful consecrated ones to God.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, let us all therefore be inspired by the good examples, piety and faith which St. Scholastica has shown us, in all of her life and work, dedicating herself wholly to the Lord and to His path. Let us all reject the temptations of worldly power and glory, and remind ourselves that we do not end up being swayed by all those things and fall into the path of sin and evil. Let us instead deepen our relationship with God, by spending more quality time with Him, through prayer, charity and almsgiving, and by our exemplary way of life at all times. May God be with us always, and may He bless our every good works and efforts, now and forevermore. Amen.

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Saturday, 10 February 2024 : 5th Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Scholastica, Virgin (Gospel Reading)

Liturgical Colour : White

Mark 8 : 1-10

At that time, soon afterward, Jesus was in the midst of another large crowd, that obviously had nothing to eat. So He called His disciples and said to them, “I feel sorry for these people, because they have been with Me for three days and now have nothing to eat. If I send them to their homes hungry, they will faint on the way; some of them have come a long way.”

His disciples replied, “Where, in a deserted place like this, could we get enough bread to feed these people?” He asked them, “How many loaves have you?” And they answered, “Seven.” Then He ordered the crowd to sit down on the ground. Taking the seven loaves and giving thanks, He broke them, and handed them to His disciples to distribute.

And they distributed them among the people. They also had some small fish. So Jesus said a blessing, and asked that these be shared as well. The people ate and were satisfied, and they picked up the broken pieces left over, seven baskets full. Now those who had eaten were about four thousand in number.

Jesus sent them away, and immediately got into the boat with His disciples, and went to the region of Dalmanutha.