golden calf

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Thursday, 14 March 2013 : 4th Week of Lent (First Reading)

Exodus 32 : 7-14

Then YHVH said to Moses, “Go down at once, for your people, whom you brought up from the land of Egypt, have corrupted themselves. They have quickly turned from the way I commanded them and have made for themselves a molten calf; they have bowed down before it and sacrificed to it and said : ‘These are your gods, Israel, who brought you out of Egypt.'”

And YHVH said to Moses, “I see that these people are a stiff-necked people. Now just leave Me that My anger may blaze against them. I will destroy them, but of you I will make a great nation.” But Moses calmed the anger of YHVH, his God, and said, “Why, o YHVH, should your anger burst against Your people whom You brought out of the land of Egypt with such great power and with a mighty hand?”

“Let not the Egyptians say : ‘YHVH brought them out with evil intent, for He wanted to kill them in the mountains and wipe them from the face of the earth.’ Turn away from the heat of Your anger and do not bring disaster on Your people. Remember Your servants, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and the promise You Yourself swore : I will multiply your descendants like the stars of heaven, and all this land I spoke about I will give to them as an everlasting inheritance.”

YHVH then changed His mind and would not yet harm His people.

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Tuesday, 12 March 2013 : 4th Week of Lent (Scripture Reflection)

Today, we see Christ, who bring upon us the living water, the water that satisfies all thirsts, in His miraculous healing of the sick man, on whom He had mercy and through His mercy, the sick man was healed and cured of his afflictions.

Yet again, we hear about the Jews and their laws on the Sabbath day, that is the day when the Lord completed His creation and rested. However, we must understand, the reason, and indeed the true reason behind having such a rule of the Sabbath, for the people of Israel, God’s chosen people.

The people of Israel was indeed a rebellious people, especially during the time when they escaped from Egypt on God’s providence, and crossed the Red Sea. Already they exhibited much doubts in the very God who saved them from the slavery of Egypt since then, and even forced Aaron, Moses’ brother to make for them a ‘replacement’ god in the shape of the golden calf.

They too had rebelled against the Lord often, and like at Massah and Meribah, again doubted God and His promise of delivering them into the Promised Land of milk and honey. They even complained that their lives in Egypt, though in slavery, had been much better than the present life, their lives in the desert. They refused the Lord’s offer in fearing the Canaanites, and was punished for forty years to wander in the desert, until all those who had defied the Lord had perished, and a new generation had come forth.

It is against this background of constant rebellion, pride, and arrogance of the Israelites at the time, that the laws of the Lord, and that of the Sabbath was made, when God delivered these laws to Moses on the Mount Horeb. Over time, these laws were enshrined by the people as the basic tenets and obligations (also prohibitions) that the people had to follow, otherwise they would be expelled or exiled from the society.

Sadly however, the Law eventually becomes a huge list, supposedly numbering 613 in total, of rules and regulations, that govern many aspects of the society’s life, even to trivial manners such as washing of the hands before meals, which had to be done to the precise and minute details exactly as it was said how it must be done.

This is how the law concerning the Sabbath was also made, that as the Lord has said that no one should work or labour on that day in honour of the Lord, and to make holy that day before God, just as we now make holy our first day of the week that is Sunday, and celebrate the Mass together as one Church on Sundays, to bring ourselves and offer ourselves as the offerings of prayer to God.

Nevertheless, this law and the other rules and regulations in the Law, were not created to constrain or restrict mankind, and definitely to enslave men to these laws, as what the situation at the time of Jesus was. It was well noted that Judas Maccabee, the leader of the Maccabean revolt against the Seleucids, who tried to erase the worship of God in Israel and replaced it with pagan Greek gods, had decided with the leaders of the people that they be allowed to defend themselves on Sabbath, as the enemies had taken advantage of the Sabbath law to massacre many Israelites on the day of the Sabbath.

And King David too ate the bread for the sacrifice that is reserved only for the priests, when he and his companions were hungry. Clearly it shows that God did not create this Law to punish or enslave His beloved people, but rather to shape them and to ensure that they remain faithful to Him, by keeping His laws and keeping themselves in good order. It is not to restrain them, and as Jesus said, that the Law is made for man and not man for the Law.

Therefore, brothers and sisters in Christ, let us not be like the Israelites and be embroiled too much on societal rules, but instead, through the Church, strive to do more loving acts and good works for the benefit of others, because, in doing so, we glorify the Lord far more than mere profession of faith by words, or by fulfilling laws, rules, and regulations.

It is by making our faith alive through action, that we are justified, not enough by just how pious we are in fulfilling and adhering ‘strictly’ to laws of the Lord and men who made these laws of God into tangible laws that we see today. Nevertheless, we do still have to obey the laws and fulfill them. Jesus did not give us an excuse to do away with the laws, since did He not come to perfect the Law? and not destroy it? So that the Law that had once lost its true meaning, was given full meaning in love by Christ.

We are also taught the value of humility and accepting God’s divine providence and mercy today. Christ asked the sick man, “Do you want to be healed?” This shows that God gives His love and blessings freely, only if we ask Him, and forgiveness will be given to us if we are sincere and if we truly humble ourselves before God, we are sure to receive His welcoming embrace and healing, as what had happened to the sick man.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, let us then pray for humility, that despite all our human achievements and greatness, and worldly strengths, we will remain humble, and will use our best resources for the purpose of helping those others around us who need them, and those who are in great disadvantaged, those who are hated, and those who are prejudiced against. Pray too for those who had persecuted the righteous, like what happened when the Jews persecuted Jesus and His followers. That they too will learn about the true wonder of God, and repent from their sinful ways. Amen.

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Tuesday, 12 February 2013 : 5th Week of Ordinary Time (Scripture Reflection)

Christ reminds us today that what justifies us is not the externals, or rather I would say, not just the externals, but even more important is the internal. If our soul is not clean, and we do not keep ourselves pure in heart and filled with the love of God, we will not be able to justify ourselves before God, even if we do all the rites correctly and follow all the traditions. Christ today is not about abolishing all traditions and rites, as arguably many who misunderstood and misinterpreted these words of the Lord as the abhorrence against all sorts of tradition, including the Apostolic Tradition of our own Holy Roman Catholic Church, would believe, and therefore would even attack the Church Christ has established, just because we keep the Tradition and follow closely the teachings passed down to us from the Apostles.

What Christ meant was that, we should not and indeed must not follow traditions blindly. Tradition is good, and indeed it is necessary, but to follow the tradition just because for the sake of following it or just because it is there is ultimately empty. What Christ wants is that we understand the Traditions, and follow the Tradition with the correct heart and alignment of our being towards God through these traditions. For these Traditions, unlike those of the extreme Laws made by the Jewish leaders at that time, should serve to make one closer to God, by the correct orientation of our hearts towards Him, through greater understanding of our faith, through the Tradition!

The Jews has a total of 613 laws that was crafted from the laws given by God to Moses in the Mountain of the Lord, Mount Horeb. These laws govern many things in the Jewish community, from etiquette, marriage, and even to simple matters like the washing of hands and eating utensils as mentioned in today’s Gospel passage. However, strict adherence to these laws, including that of the Sabbath often mentioned, has made man actually subservient to these laws, being no more than just slaves to the Tradition these elders created from the laws of God given to Moses.

These laws, while they were good, they were there because of the rebellious nature of the people of Israel against God at that time. Remember that while Moses was up on the mountain, the people of Israel revolted and forced Aaron to build for them a golden calf for them to worship as their god. This and many other instances of disobedience has caused the Lord to be tough against the people of Israel, all out of His love for them, desiring their salvation, and did not wish them to falter again and fall into hell due to them worshipping pagan gods instead of the One, True God.

However, Christ had come, not to abolish all the laws and Tradition, but rather to perfect them. He was there to make the understanding of these Tradition and laws much clearer to us. For in Christ, the greatest thing is love, and nothing is greater than love, either one’s love for God, or one’s love for his or her brethren. It is in the love of God that we have to base our Tradition, and He was set to make all the rules and Laws truly pure again, that is to have these laws solely for the purpose of glorifying God and to make all of us closer to God, and not instead make us slaves to these laws and be suppressed by them.

For God, who had created the world, the entire universe, had created mankind, in His image, to be the greatest and the most beloved of all His creations. To us, He has given authority over all creation, and over the world. These laws are there, because as administrators of this world, we must be responsible administrators, and use the resources given to us wisely. Otherwise, being weak as we are, we would readily succumb to greed and wanting for more and more. Ever since Adam and Eve fell into sin at the Garden of Eden, mankind had been subject to the sin of greed and avarice, to desire more and more from what is given to them by God, even to the extent of causing suffering and death to their fellow men. This is what the Lord does not want from us, as He wants us to rule over creation, but rule responsibly and wisely.

Therefore, brothers and sisters in Christ, we who have received the Good News of the Lord, and who through the Apostolic Tradition and teachings passed down to us from the Apostles through our bishops and priests, should strive to follow and understand the Sacred Tradition and the faith that we have, utilising both in our race and journey towards the Lord. For faith without nurturing will not grow, and through the beauty of the Tradition, manifested in the Liturgy of the Church, we can grow deeper in faith, if we open ourselves to understanding more on the Liturgy and the Tradition we have.

This is why, brothers and sisters in Christ, it is important for us to appreciate the Liturgy, to seek to fully understand every rites and parts of our Liturgy in the Mass and other celebrations, and to fully participate through our greater understanding, that whenever we attend the Mass, as frequently as we can do so, we will grow ever greater in our faith and love of the Lord, so much that not only that we are brought closer to the Lord who created us, and who loves us so much to send His Son, Jesus Christ to explain to us about the Traditions, and to shed more light to us so that we can understand our faith in Him better through these Sacred Traditions and rites; but also to be good and responsible stewards of this world and its resources, as given by God to be our right, but also to be our responsibility to take care of.

Let us therefore pray that all of us will be able to grow deeper in our understanding of the Liturgy of the Church, and through it the Sacred Tradition and teachings given to us through the Apostles, and finally to grow ever deeper in our love and passion for the Lord. May God always bless all of us, all the days of our life. Amen!