for the greater glory of God

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Monday, 1 June 2015 : 9th Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Justin, Martyr (Psalm)

Liturgical Colour : Red

Psalm 111 : 1-2, 3-4, 5-6

Alleluia! Blessed is the one who fears the Lord, who greatly delights in His commands. His children will be powerful on earth; the upright’s offspring will be blessed.

Wealth and riches are for his family, there his integrity will remain. He is for the righteous a light in darkness. He is kind, merciful and upright.

It will be well with him who lends freely, who leads a life of justice and honesty. For the righteous will never be moved; he will be remembered and loved forever.

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Monday, 1 June 2015 : 9th Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Justin, Martyr (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Red

Tobit 1 : 3 and Tobit 2 : 1b-8

I, Tobit, have walked in the ways of truth and justice all the days of my life; I have given many alms to my brethren and to those of my countrymen who were deported with me to Nineveh, a city in the country of the Assyrians.

At the feast of Pentecost, the sacred feast of the Seven Weeks, they prepared a good meal for me and I sat down to eat. I saw the many dishes and said to my son : “Go and bring as many as you can find of our relatives who are in need and who remember the Lord. I will wait here for them.”

When Tobias returned, he said : “Father, one of ours has been strangled and thrown into the public square.” Before I ate anything, I hurried out and carried this man into the house and waited till sunset to bury him. When I returned home I washed myself and ate my food in sorrow. I remembered the prophecy which Amos uttered against Bethel : ‘Your feasts will be turned into mourning. All your songs will be turned into lamentations,’ and I wept.”

After sunset I went out and, after I had dug a trench, I buried the man. My neighbours mocked me, saying : “He no longer fears to be put to death for doing that; he had to flee but look he is again burying the dead.”

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Sunday, 31 May 2015 : Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity, Trinity Sunday, and Feast of the Visitation of the Blessed Virgin Mary (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : White

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, on this great and solemn day, we celebrate together the wonderful occasion of the Trinity Sunday, on which day we commemorate and reflect together the very centre tenet of our faith, that is our faith in the Lord our God who is only One, but exists in Three Divine Persons, separate and equal to one another, and united with the perfect bond of love, in Oneness of God, the Triune Unity, Trinity that is bound together as one indissoluble Unity.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, this is the mystery of our Faith, which we all understand and indeed have to believe if we are to call ourselves as Christians. We believe that there is only one God, who created all the universe, all things that we know of, and all the living ones including us mankind.

And we also believe, that this one God has three different Aspects, all distinct from each other, namely the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, but which is united perfectly in love, as God that is only One. One but three, and three but one, this is the greatest mystery of our Faith, and yet it is also the centre of our faith.

For many ages, people have tried to bend this truth to their own selfish desires, by failing to understand the fullness of this mystery of the Trinity. Some trying to contend that because such feat is impossible, then God cannot be Three but One at the same time, and therefore, apostasy and heresy began to appear, apparently condemning the true Faith as those who worshipped many gods, because they thought that God is only one.

And therefore, the same people also did not recognise Jesus Christ, the Son of God as divine and Lord. Some thought that He was merely a creature, a creation of God, which means that He was no more than just a Man. And some also doubted the presence and the existence of the Holy Spirit. All these failed to understand how God works, and if they had read the Scriptures more deeply and carefully, they would have discovered the truth.

Just as we heard in the first reading from the Book of Deuteronomy, Moses spoke about God who created us, and who had cared for us so much with His boundless love, that no being had ever done the same before and after. And all these had its roots back to the foundation of the world and the whole universe, at the moment of creation, when God created everything out of nothingness, as narrated in the Book of Genesis.

The very first pages and the very first verses of the Holy Bible itself would have told us clearly of the nature of God, take for example, the whole account of the creation of the universe and the earth in the first two chapters of the Book of Genesis. There was once nothing, and the Spirit of God was in everything in that nothingness, and then, God willed everything into being, by His words, that is the words that leave His mouth and carried out His will into being.

The Spirit of God is in everything and by the Word, made everything to be. Remember that we believe that the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father and through the Son? This is how exactly it works. God the Father willed creation into being, and that will is made clear through His Word that proclaimed it to all the universe, and that Word is the Son, if we read the first chapter of the Gospel of St. John.

And the Spirit is then sent to all things, to make all things be, and to give life to all things. Remember what God said when He was about to create mankind in His image? He said, “Let Us make mankind in Our image, in Our likeness.” This is yet another proof of how God is a Trinity and yet a Unity, united in their actions in creating all things, included us all mankind.

God the Father created us with His will, and He achieved that by the Word He spoke, which is the Son, through which He let all creations to know His will, and by the Holy Spirit He made all things to be. The Three Divine Persons, Father, Son and Holy Spirit all working together as one in perfect harmony. They cannot be separated from each other, and without one of the Trinity, the Divinity is not complete.

And that is how St. Patrick taught about the concept of God who is One and yet Three, as he evangelised to the then pagan peoples of Ireland, by using the symbol of the three-leaf clover, now one of the important symbols of that country. The three-leaf clover is also an important and widely used symbol to represent the Holy Trinity. Just as the three-leaf clover has three parts all connected together to form the whole body of the clover, and that they are not separable, or otherwise, it is no longer a ‘three-leaf’ clover, then it is the same with the Holy Trinity.

And just like a flame has three properties, of its matter, the shape and form of flame itself, the light that emanates out of the flame, and then the heat of the flame itself, it is the same with the Trinity. Without any one of these three properties, a flame is no longer a flame, and yet any of them represents the flame itself. No one can deny after seeing the light of a flame, or feeling the heat of the flame, or touching the matter of the flame itself can deny that it is a flame, and yet, each properties are distinct from each other.

Thus this is the great mystery of our Faith, is it not brothers and sisters? And yet, this is what we believe, and what we always profess and believe in, every time we mention the Holy Trinity in the Creed. I believe in God the Father Almighty, and then in His son, our Lord Jesus Christ who died for us on the cross and who will judge the living and the dead at the end of time, and then in the Holy Spirit, the Giver of Life. 

Brothers and sisters in Christ, do we really mean what we say, every time we utter the words of the Creed? Or do we just repeat it meaninglessly and without understanding like a robot? It is important that we understand how important is our Lord for us, how much He had done for us, and just as the astonished Moses mentioned in the first reading we had today, indeed God had done so much for us.

God the Father had created us from nothingness, and from the dust He formed us and gave us life. And when we erred and went into sin, He ceaselessly loved us and cared for us, hoping for us to repent and change our ways so that we may not fall into eternal damnation. And He sent us none other than His Son, the Word of God made flesh, our Lord Jesus Christ, so that, by the offering of Himself, His own Flesh and Blood, He made us all partakers of the new Covenant He established with us, and those who believe in Him therefore has the path to eternal life.

And last of all, He sent us His Holy Spirit, proceeding from the Father and through the Son, to give us a new life, to renew in us the strength and courage in our faith, so that we may truly be brave to choose to walk with the Lord and obey Him in all things despite the opposition of the world. All these showed God’s care and love for us, that the Three parts of the Trinity all working together to secure our redemption and liberation from the darkness and deliverance into the Light.

May on this day, on this solemn feast of the Most Holy Trinity, all of us be awakened to realise the love which the Lord, our Creator, our Nurturer and our Saviour has for us, and enable us to walk righteously in His path from now on, that we may reject all forms of sin and cast out all forms of wickedness from our hearts. May the Most Holy and Blessed Trinity be glorified and be praised forevermore, in heaven and on earth. Glory to God, the Undivided Unity and the Trinity of Father, Son and Holy Spirit, ever loving God of us all. Amen.

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Sunday, 31 May 2015 : Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity, Trinity Sunday, and Feast of the Visitation of the Blessed Virgin Mary (Gospel Reading)

Liturgical Colour : White

Matthew 28 : 16-20

At that time, the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain where Jesus had told them to go. When they saw Jesus, they bowed before Him, although some doubted.

Then Jesus approached them and said, “I have been given all authority in heaven and on earth. Go, therefore, and make disciples from all nations. Baptise them in the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teach them to observe all that I have commanded you. I am with you always, even to the end of this world.”

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Sunday, 31 May 2015 : Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity, Trinity Sunday, and Feast of the Visitation of the Blessed Virgin Mary (Second Reading)

Liturgical Colour : White

Romans 8 : 14-17

All those who walk in the Spirit of God are sons and daughters of God. Then, no more fear : you did not receive a spirit of slavery, but the Spirit that makes you sons and daughters and every time we cry, “Abba! (this means Dad!) Father!”, the Spirit assures our spirit that we are sons and daughters of God.

If we are children, we are heirs, too. Ours will be the inheritance of God and we will share it with Christ; for if we now suffer with Him, we will also share Glory with Him.

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Sunday, 31 May 2015 : Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity, Trinity Sunday, and Feast of the Visitation of the Blessed Virgin Mary (Psalm)

Liturgical Colour : White

Psalm 32 : 4-5, 6 and 9, 18-19, 20 and 22

For upright is the Lord’s word and worthy of trust is His work. The Lord loves justice and righteousness; the earth is full of His kindness.

The heavens were created by His word, the breath of His mouth formed their starry host. For He spoke and so it was, He commanded, and everything stood firm.

But the Lord’s eyes are upon those who fear Him, upon those who trust in His loving kindness, to deliver them from death and preserve them from famine.

In hope we wait for the Lord, for He is our help and our shield. O Lord, let Your love rest upon us, even as our hope rests in You.

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Sunday, 31 May 2015 : Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity, Trinity Sunday, and Feast of the Visitation of the Blessed Virgin Mary (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : White

Deuteronomy 4 : 32-34, 39-40

Moses said, “Ask of the times past. Inquire from the day when God created man on earth. Ask from one end of this world to the other : Has there ever been anything as extraordinary as this? Has anything like this been heard of before? Has there ever been a people who remained alive after hearing as you did the voice of the living God from the midst of the fire?”

“Never has there been a God who went out to look for a people and take them out from among the other nations by the strength of trials and signs, by wonders and by war, with a firm hand and an outstretched arm. Never has there been any deed as tremendous as those done for you by YHVH in Egypt, which you saw with your own eyes.”

“Therefore, try to be convinced that YHVH is the only God of heaven and earth, and that there is no other. Observe the laws and the commandments that I command you today, and everything will be well with you and your children after you. So you will live long in the land which YHVH, your God, gives you forever.”

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Saturday, 30 May 2015 : 8th Week of Ordinary Time (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : Green

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, we have heard today of the doubt of the Pharisees, and how they doubted the works and the authority of Jesus, when He taught in the Temple, by challenging Him to provide the origins of His teaching authority, which came to clash with the authority with which the Pharisees themselves had taught.

The Pharisees were jealous with the popularity of Jesus, who from time to time again proved to be able to draw big masses of people who clamoured and wished to hear the truth which Christ had brought into the world. The Pharisees taught as with they were judging the people, by asserting how they were right and that the people whom they taught were wrong. Well, Jesus did the same too, but when He taught them, His teaching was such that it was done with true and clear authority.

It is indeed like what we heard from the first reading from the Book of the prophet Sirach or Ecclesiastes, on the nature of revelation of God’s truth in us. It is like a people who had longed for something good and then saw what they want. Truly, once they saw it, they would do all in what they are able to in order to find it and get hold of it. And thus, the same too happened with the people who longed for the truth, and having been oppressed for a long time under the lies of the world.

The moment they see the truth which Christ brought, it was like a great Light which pierced the darkness of the world, and which pierced the darkness that had once veiled our eyes. What Christ had taught, is done with true authority and rings true in our hearts, because deep within all of us, we have that desire to love the Lord and to follow what is right.

The Pharisees refused to listen and believe, because they have that one weakness which all of us also have and share among us, that is our pride. The human pride is one of the greatest obstacles that prevented us from being truly faithful and devoted to the Lord. It prevented us from being able to introspect into ourselves to look at our shortcomings and weaknesses, which we truly ought to seek the Lord who could have helped us to redress the issue.

Therefore, one of the first thing that we must do is, to throw far, far away our pride and to learn humility, that is the readiness and willingness to listen to others, and not least of all, but in fact the most important is, for us to be able to listen to the Lord, our loving God. We are often too distracted with the variety of things, temptations and other things in the world, and all these noise prevented us from truly hearing the word of God, which He spoke softly inside our hearts.

We often miss this because we are unable to perceive the subtlety of the Lord speaking to us because we are so occupied with the things of this world. We are too busy with ourselves to even pay attention to Him and to spare some thoughts to Him. That is why we have the tendency to always think that firstly, we are always right. We always blame others first in all things.

Can we learn to dispose our ego and cast away our pride? If we are unable to do so, then I fear that the word of truth, that is the word of God will be drowned in the ocean of ego and human desires. If we want to move forward in the path towards salvation and eternal life, then the only way is by growing deeper in our spirituality, and most importantly, by nurturing our prayer life. If we are able to pray regularly and frequently with genuine intention, then we will be able to communicate more efficiently with our Lord and know what is His truth.

Let us learn to take a break from all the distractions and noise in the world, and learn to quieten ourselves down, so that we may find the voice of God in us, and speak with Him in the silence of our hearts. Let us devote ourselves ever more to the Lord our God. God bless us all. Amen.

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Saturday, 30 May 2015 : 8th Week of Ordinary Time (Gospel Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Green

Mark 11 : 27-33

At that time, Jesus and His disciples were once again in Jerusalem. As Jesus was walking in the Temple, the chief priests, the teachers of the Law and the elders came to Him and asked, “What authority do You have to act like this? Who gave You authority to do the things You do?”

Jesus said to them, “I will ask you a question, only one, and if you give me an answer, then I will tell you what authority I have to act like this. Was John’s preaching and baptism a work of God, or was it merely something human? Answer Me.”

And they kept arguing among themselves, “If we answer that it was a work of God, He will say, ‘Why then did you not believe him?'” But neither could they answer before the people that the baptism of John was merely something human, for everyone regarded John as a prophet.

So they answered Jesus, “We do not know,” and Jesus said to them, “Neither will I tell you what authority I have to act as I do.”

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Saturday, 30 May 2015 : 8th Week of Ordinary Time (Psalm)

Liturgical Colour : Green

Psalm 18 : 8, 9, 10, 11

The Law of the Lord is perfect : it gives life to the soul. The word of the Lord is trustworthy : it gives wisdom to the simple.

The precepts of the Lord are right : they give joy to the heart. The commandments of the Lord are clear : they enlighten the eyes.

The fear of the Lord is pure, it endures forever; the judgments of the Lord are true, all of them just and right.

They are more precious than gold – pure gold of a jeweller; they are much sweeter than honey which drops from the honeycomb.