Friday

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Friday, 17 July 2015 : 15th Week of Ordinary Time (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Green

Exodus 11 : 10 – Exodus 12 : 14

Moses and Aaron had worked all these marvels in the presence of Pharaoh, but YHVH had made Pharaoh obstinate and he would not let the people of Israel leave his country.

YHVH spoke to Moses and Aaron in the land of Egypt and said, “This month is to be the beginning of all months, the first month of your year. Speak to the community of Israel and say to them : On the tenth day of this month let each family take a lamb, a lamb for each house. If the family is too small for a lamb, they must join with a neighbour, the nearest to the house, according to the number of persons and to what each one can eat.”

“You will select a perfect lamb without blemish, a male born during the present year, taken from the sheep or goats. Then you will keep it until the fourteenth day of the month. On that evening all the people will slaughter their lambs and take some of the blood to put on the doorposts and on top of the doorframes of the houses where you eat.”

“That night you will eat the flesh roasted at the fire with unleavened bread and bitter herbs. Do not eat the meat lightly cooked or boiled in water but roasted entirely over the fire – the head, the legs and the inner parts. Do not leave any of it until the morning. If any is left till morning, burn it in the fire.”

“And this is how you will eat : with a belt round your waist, sandals on your feet and a staff in your hand. You shall eat hastily for it is a Passover in honour of YHVH. On that night I shall go through Egypt and strike every firstborn in Egypt, men and animals; and I will even bring judgment on all the gods of Egypt, I, YHVH!”

“The blood on your houses will be the sign that you are there. I will see the blood and pass over you; and you will escape the mortal plague when I strike Egypt. This is a day you are to remember and celebrate in honour of YHVH. It is to be kept as a festival day for all generations forever.”

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Friday, 10 July 2015 : 14th Week of Ordinary Time (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : Green

Today, dear brothers and sisters in Christ, the theme of the readings from the Scripture, is reassurance which God shows all those who believe in Him and who put their trust in Him. In the first reading from the Book of Genesis, we heard how God reassured Jacob, who was hesitant and unsure about moving to Egypt with all of his family and possessions.

In that occasion, Jacob, who had long grieved and were distraught over the loss of one of his favourite sons, Joseph, heard again the hope of seeing his son alive, when his other sons came back to him bearing the good tidings from Egypt. But in his heart, doubt and fear still existed, asking if this is not something that is not real, or that he in his old age should have remained in Canaan and not going forth on this journey to Egypt.

But God reassured him that this journey is part of His plan for him and for his descendants, and He will bring him back, and much later on, all of his descendants, back to the Land which He had promised to them since the days of Abraham their forefathers. God reassured Jacob that He will lead them and guide them, and great will be the rewards for His beloved people.

This is closely linked with the Gospel today, which if we look closely, it is about the Lord sending His disciples to the people whom they would be ministering on. He reminded them that they would be sent like sheep among wolves, to be the ones who would be sent in the midst of danger, oppression, harshness and plenty of difficulties as what would befall all those who follow the Lord and His way.

But He also reassured them at the same time, that He will be with them, and He will not leave them alone on their own, for His Spirit will be with them and will be upon them, just as He promised the sending of the Advocate, the Helper, the Holy Spirit which He had sent to all of His faithful. He will not leave us empty and alone in this journey of the faith.

God is our Hope, He is our Reassurance, our Strength and Power, and the One in whom we can totally trust everything we have to. He is patient as He is loving and forgiving, and despite all of the difficulties and challenges which we have presented Him with, through our actions and deeds, He has endured all of them, and opened for us the doorway to His mercy, providing that we make the effort to seek it.

Can we learn to put our trust in Him? For too long we have placed our trust in the power of men, and we can see where that leads us to. The power of men is feeble compared to the power of the Lord, and to trust in the power of men is indeed like what Jesus mentioned in one of His parables, those who built their houses on the foundation of sand.

That is why we fear and we do not have faith, because if we rely on our own strength, then truly we have no strong support and anchor to keep ourselves steady in this ever-challenging world. Then, all of us should indeed go forth and change our ways, that we can learn to put our complete trust in the Lord. He will bring us who are faithful to Him much goodness, and He will reunite us together, all to be in His presence forever, in eternal bliss and joy, just as on the day when Jacob saw Joseph, his beloved son, once again.

May Almighty God bless us all, and guide us in this journey, which we take as we live in this world. May He lead us to the path that leads us to Him, and help us so that in Him we may find our reassurance and our comfort. God be with us all, now and forever. Amen.

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Friday, 10 July 2015 : 14th Week of Ordinary Time (Gospel Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Green

Matthew 10 : 16-23

At that time, Jesus said to His disciples, “Look, I send you out like sheep among wolves. You must be as clever as snakes and as innocent as doves. Be on your guard with people, for they will hand you over to their courts, and they will flog you in their synagogues. You will be brought to trial before rulers and kings because of Me, so you may witness to them and the pagans.”

“But when you are arrested, do not worry about what you are to say, or how you are to say it; when the hour comes, you will be given what you are to say. For it is not you who will speak, but the Spirit of your Father in you. Brother will hand over brother to death, and a father his child; children will turn against parents and have them put to death.”

“Everyone will hate you because of Me, but whoever stands firm to the end will be saved. When they persecute you in one town, flee to the next. I assure you, you will not have gone through all the towns of Israel before the Son of Man comes.”

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Friday, 10 July 2015 : 14th Week of Ordinary Time (Psalm)

Liturgical Colour : Green

Psalm 36 : 3-4, 18-19, 27-28, 39-40

Trust in the Lord and do good, dwell in the land and live on it. Make the Lord your delight, and He will grant your heart’s desire.

The Lord watches over the lives of the upright; forever will their inheritance abide. They are not crushed in times of calamity; when famine strikes, they still are satisfied.

Do good and shun evil, so that you will live secure forever. For the Lord loves justice and right, and never forsakes His faithful ones. The wicked instead will perish and their breed will be cut off.

The Lord is the salvation of the righteous; in time of distress, He is their refuge. The Lord helps them, and rescues them from the oppressor; He saves them for they sought shelter in Him.

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Friday, 10 July 2015 : 14th Week of Ordinary Time (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Green

Genesis 46 : 1-7, 28-30

Israel left with all he owned and reached Beersheba where he offered sacrifices to the God of his father Isaac. God spoke to Israel in visions that he had during the night, “Jacob! Jacob!” “Here I am,” he said. “I am God, the God of your father. Do not be afraid to go to Egypt, for there I will make you into a great nation. I will go with you to Egypt and I will bring you back again and Joseph’s hand will close your eyes.”

Jacob left Beersheba and the sons of Israel carried Jacob their father with their little children and their wives in the wagons that Joseph had sent to fetch him. They also took their flocks and all that they had acquired in Canaan. And so it was that Jacob came to Egypt and with him all his family, his sons and his grandsons, his daughters and his granddaughters, in short all his children he took with him to Egypt.

Jacob sent Judah ahead to let Joseph know he was coming and that he would soon arrive in the land of Goshen. Joseph got his chariot ready in order to meet Israel his father in Goshen. He presented himself, threw his arms around his father and wept on his shoulder for a long time. Israel said to Joseph, “Now I can die, for I have seen your face and know you are alive.”

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Friday, 3 July 2015 : Feast of St. Thomas, Apostle (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : Red

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, on this day we celebrate the feast of one of the Twelve Apostles, namely that of St. Thomas, known also as St. Thomas Didymus or the Twin, whom many of us would know from the Gospels, as the doubting disciple, who did not believe and indeed refused to believe that Jesus had risen from the dead.

St. Thomas had always been a doubtful disciple, even before the suffering and death of Jesus. When at one moment Jesus mentioned that He ought to go back to Judea despite opposition and plotting by the Pharisees and the teachers of the Law, St. Thomas commented that they ought to go forth and follow Him, so they could die together with Him. He made such a comment because of his lack of faith, and the doubt in his heart.

And similarly therefore, he refused to believe when the other disciples told him about the resurrection of Christ from the dead, when he was not there while Christ appeared to them the first time after His resurrection. It was indeed noteworthy what he said in that occasion, that unless he saw with his own eyes and touched with his own hands and fingers the very wounds on the Body of Christ, then he would not believe.

Why is this so, brothers and sisters? It is part of our human nature as well, to demand tangible and real explanation for phenomena and things that we do not understand. We want to touch it first, feel it first, and be able to experience it first with our senses, and then only then we believe in something, and even so, we are still often filled with doubt and uncertainty.

And that comes to the problem which our world is facing today, as more and more people refused to believe in the Lord, because they thought that He does not exist, and that He is not real, just because they were unable to see Him, or touch Him, or interact with Him directly, in a way that we normally interact between one another. So, some of us think that God does not exist, and therefore drift away from His path towards salvation and into the uncertainties of the world.

This is our vulnerability, trying to reason and find proof of the existence of God, without realising that God has always been present with us, and indeed, without Him, there would not have been life in us. If we truly know love, and if we truly have love in us, then we would have known God being present in and around us. For God Himself is love. And the manifestation of that love is none other than by the sending of His Son, Jesus, to be our Saviour.

Jesus came into the world, manifesting the love of God which He had given us. And even at that time, those who saw His miracles and works refused adamantly to believe in Him, including the Pharisees and the teachers of the Law, who have seen so many of His works and yet continued to oppose Him. Better was the faith of St. Thomas, who at least believed when Jesus finally appeared to him and showed him the truth about Himself and His resurrection.

And as Jesus had told His disciples, indeed, we are all truly blessed, for we have believe in Him, even though we have not seen Him, heard Him or touched Him. We believe in Him, because deep inside, we know that, we live by His grace and love, and His tender love and care is always around us, surrounding us and is with us, and to all those who are faithful to Him, He will bless and give all His promised salvation and entry into the eternal life in bliss prepared for us.

Let us all learn from the examples of St. Thomas the Apostle and the many other faithful disciples of our Lord, who remained true to Him despite all the difficulties and challenges. May this be our destination in life, the goal we ought to look out for. May God be with us always, now and forever. Amen.

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Friday, 3 July 2015 : Feast of St. Thomas, Apostle (Gospel Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Red

John 20 : 24-29

At that time, Thomas the Twin, one of the Twelve, was not with them when Jesus came. The other disciples told him, “We have seen the Lord.” But he replied, “Until I have seen in His hands the print of the nails, and put my finger in the mark of the nails and my hand in His side, I will not believe.”

Eight days later, the disciples were inside again and Thomas was with them. Despite the locked doors Jesus came and stood in their midst and said, “Peace be with you!” Then He said to Thomas, “Put your finger here, and see My hands; stretch out your hand, and put it into My side. Do not be an unbeliever! Believe!”

Thomas then said, “You are my Lord and my God.” Jesus replied, “You believe because you see Me, do you not? Happy are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe.”

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Friday, 3 July 2015 : Feast of St. Thomas, Apostle (Psalm)

Liturgical Colour : Red

Psalm 116 : 1, 2

Alleluia! Praise the Lord, all you nations; all you peoples, praise Him.

How great is His love for us! His faithfulness lasts forever.

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Friday, 3 July 2015 : Feast of St. Thomas, Apostle (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Red

Ephesians 2 : 19-22

Now you are no longer strangers or guests, but fellow citizens of the holy people : you are of the household of God. You are the house whose foundations are the Apostles and prophets, and whose cornerstone is Christ Jesus.

In Him the whole structure is joined together and rises to be a holy temple in the Lord. In Him you too are being built to become the spiritual sanctuary of God.

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Friday, 26 June 2015 : 12th Week of Ordinary Time (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : Green

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, on this day, we heard about how Jesus cured a leper from his illness, making him whole once again and liberating him from the shame and curse which had once been upon him. And in the first reading, God renewed His promise and covenant with Abraham, His chosen one, that through the son He had promised Abraham, He would make His servant great and mighty among mankind.

Today’s Scripture readings therefore all spoke about the love and care with which God had showered us His many blessings and graces throughout these ages. God is willing to bless and cherish Abraham, His chosen one who had faithfully walked in His ways and followed completely His precepts and laws. The faithful shall indeed receive their just reward from the Lord.

And the leper was also made clean and healthy again through his faith, which he had shown to Jesus, by his genuine and sincere dedication of trust and love to the Lord. The leper did not fear persecution or rebuke from the Lord, for he knew that the Lord in Whom he trust will succour him and bring him out of his misery. Those who hold firm in their faith in God will never be disappointed.

On this day, we are called to remember once again the faith of Abraham, our father in faith. He was the father of many nations, because God blessed him, for he has abandoned everything to follow the Lord with all of his heart and his might. He has abandoned his relatives, his wealth and inheritance, his homeland and everything he had, because he had heard the Lord calling him and promising him even greater things if only he was faithful.

It is this ability to be faithful and devoted to God despite the challenges, difficulties and temptations that God found to be excellent in Abraham, as were in the many other holy men and women throughout the ages. And it was the same kind of faith that made the leper to deserve God’s mercy and healing, as it had been given to the army centurion, whose faith was so great that he refused to have Jesus come to his home because he was unworthy of Him.

It was the same faith that the Syro-Phoenician woman exhibited when she begged Jesus to heal her daughter, not even minding the supposed ‘insult’ when Jesus told her that the gifts He brought were not to be shared with non-Jews like her. It was this same faith that saved the woman who suffered from haemorrhage for twelve years, who believed that if she could just touch the fringe of Jesus’ cloak, then she would be healed.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, these are just some well-known examples of how God is caring and loving, and to all those who keep their faith firm in Him, will have a firm foundation in Him and will not be shaken. On the other hand, those who do not put their trust in God and those who has no faith in God will be shaken, for their foundation is worldly goods and wealth, which can be destroyed.

How is this relevant for us, brethren? It is a gentle reminder for us that we ought to build up for ourselves the everlasting treasures in heaven and not to build for ourselves a repository of the treasure that will not last in this world. Our lives must not be filled with selfishness, jealousy and desire, in that we should not be myopic in our sight, and focus only on our own heart’s desires in life. Instead, we must find ways to renew our commitment and faith in God.

Let us get rid from ourselves wanton and unnecessary desires that kept us away from truly being able to have faith in God. May God help us in this endeavour and bless us always, so that we may be ever closer to Him, and may our faith in Him be forever stronger and firmer. Amen.