holy martyrs

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Tuesday, 22 January 2019 : 2nd Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Vincent, Deacon and Martyr, Week of Prayer for Christian Unity (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : Green or Red (Martyrs)

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, on this day we listened to the words of the Scripture that reminded us of the need to understand what God wants each and every one of us to do as His followers and disciples, in particular given the context of today’s Scripture passages. We are called to love Him and to serve Him, as part of the Covenant which He has made for us. But ultimately, God also desires for our well-being and salvation.

In the first reading today we heard of the many favours and wonders that He has bestowed on those who have been faithful to Him, focusing on the persona of Abraham, the righteous man who has devoted himself to the Lord such that God Himself made a Covenant between Himself and all of his descendants. And the Covenant He made was such that, He has been faithful to what He has promised to Abraham, that He will bless his descendants and make them His own beloved people.

As Abraham became the father of many nations, and by virtue of our Christian faith, we have also become the spiritual children of Abraham, all of us are part of the same Covenant that God has established with him, and which He has renewed again and again throughout the centuries and ages past. He has always been faithful even though many of us mankind have been wayward and disobedient.

That was why He also gave us His laws and commandments, all with the purpose of getting us all to love Him and to put our focus on Him, and not on all the various distractions we often have in life. And one such law, as mentioned in our Gospel passage today, is the law of the Sabbath, which regulated the way the people of God should act and behave on the seventh day in the week, the Sabbath day, a day that the Lord had made holy.

The Scriptural basis of the law of the Sabbath is related to the works of the Lord Himself, Who created the universe and all the world, only to rest on one of the days, at the last day. Thus, the same day in the Jewish law and tradition is meant for the people of God to ‘rest’ from their various activities and to focus their attention on God, and God alone. That is the true intention and purpose of the Sabbath day and its related laws.

Unfortunately, the purpose and the intention of the Law had been forgotten and misunderstood by the people and their elders, as the Gospel passage had shown us. What had been given with the good intention of realigning men and their focus and attention towards God, instead became a source of great obstacle and suffering for many among the people, as the Pharisees and the teachers of the Law enforced them on the people.

Those people enforced a very strict observation of the Sabbath law to the point that the people could not do anything, even anything good and productive, and even in the matter of feeding oneself, as the disciples of the Lord did when they were hungry and picked on the grains of the wheat in the field. They have forgotten that by doing so, what they did was in fact observing the Law in the letter, but not in the spirit.

This means that they knew what the Law is, but they failed to understand and appreciate what the Law is truly about, its meaning and purpose. The Law of God is meant to bring us closer to God, to help us to focus on Him and His way, and not to distance us and make it difficult for us to follow Him. This is why, the Lord rebuked the Pharisees and the teachers of the Law for their shortsightedness.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, today we should turn towards the Lord with a new spirit and commitment to love and to serve Him with all of our strength, obeying Him by understanding that all of His laws and commandments are meant to redirect our attention and focus on Him, and away from all things that can end up causing us to fall into temptation and damnation. And today, we should model ourselves based on the examples shown by the holy servant of God, St. Vincent, holy deacon and martyr.

St. Vincent was a deacon who served the people of God in what is today Spain, in the city of Saragossa, during the difficult years of terrible persecution by the Roman Emperor Diocletian. He dedicated himself so much to his service and his faith, that even when he was arrested and forced to reject his faith, he refused to do so. His defence of his faith was so resolute and strong that it made his enemies even angrier and he suffered grievously for his dedication.

Nonetheless, St. Vincent continued to be faithful and dedicated himself to the service of God. He remained firm in his dedication, and was martyred in good faith. His examples and his courage continued to inspire many of the faithful throughout the ages. And we can also follow his good examples, by devoting our own lives to the Lord, and by knowing how much love He has given to each and every one of us.

Let us all from now on, turn towards the Lord, spending day after day of our lives with faith, doing our very best to serve the Lord. Let us devote ourselves with a new spirit and strength, from now on, each and every days of our life. May God bless us all. Amen.

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Tuesday, 22 January 2019 : 2nd Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Vincent, Deacon and Martyr, Week of Prayer for Christian Unity (Gospel Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Green or Red (Martyrs)

Mark 2 : 23-28

At that time, one Sabbath Jesus was walking through grainfields. As His disciples walked along with Him, they began to pick the heads of grain and crush them in their hands. Then the Pharisees said to Jesus, “Look! They are doing what is forbidden on the Sabbath!”

And He said to them, “Have you never read what David did in his time of need, when he and his men were very hungry? He went into the house of God, when Abiathar was High Priest, and ate the bread of offering, which only the priests are allowed to eat, and he also gave some to the men who were with him.”

Then Jesus said to them, “The sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath. So the Son of Man is Master even of the Sabbath.”

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Tuesday, 22 January 2019 : 2nd Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Vincent, Deacon and Martyr, Week of Prayer for Christian Unity (Psalm)

Liturgical Colour : Green or Red (Martyrs)

Psalm 110 : 1-2, 4-5, 9 and 10c

Alleluia! I thank the Lord with all my heart in the council of the just, in the assembly. The works of the Lord are great and pondered by all who delight in them.

He lets us remember His wondrous deeds; the Lord is merciful and kind. Always mindful of His covenant, He provides food for those who fear Him.

He has sent His people deliverances and made with them a covenant forever. His holy Name is to be revered! To Him belongs everlasting praise.

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Tuesday, 22 January 2019 : 2nd Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Vincent, Deacon and Martyr, Week of Prayer for Christian Unity (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Green or Red (Martyrs)

Hebrews 6 : 10-20

God is not unjust and will not forget everything you have done for love of His Name; you have helped and still help the believers. We desire each of you to have, until the end, the same zeal for reaching what you have hoped for. Do not grow careless but imitate those who, by their faith and determination, inherit the promise.

Remember God’s promise to Abraham, God wanted to confirm it with an oath and, as no one is higher than God, He swore by Himself : I shall bless you and give you many descendants. By just patiently waiting, Abraham obtained the promise.

People are used to swearing by someone higher than themselves and their oath affirms everything that could be denied. So God committed Himself with an oath in order to convince those who were to wait for His promise that He would never change His mind.

Thus we have two certainties in which it is impossible that God be proved false : promise and oath. That is enough to encourage us strongly when we leave everything to hold to the hope set before us. This hope is like a steadfast anchor of the soul, secure and firm, thrust beyond the curtain of the Temple into the sanctuary itself, where Jesus has entered ahead of us – Jesus, High Priest forever in the order of Melchizedek.

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Monday, 21 January 2019 : 2nd Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Agnes, Virgin and Martyr, Week of Prayer for Christian Unity (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : Red

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, on this day we are reminded by the Scriptures of the path and the way which the Lord, our God has shown us, calling upon us to follow Him, and to walk in His footsteps. As St. Paul mentioned in his Epistle to the Hebrews, Jesus is our Eternal and True High Priest, the One Who has offered the perfect offering beyond any other offerings, that is His own Most Precious Body and Blood, for the sake of our salvation.

He has come upon this world, willingly in the form and in the full body of Man, that He could accomplish what He Himself has promised to us all through His many prophets, that He would save us all, His beloved ones, from the consequences of our sins and our unfaithfulness, that should have landed us into eternal damnation and eternal death in hell. God did not want this to happen to us, as He still loves us after all, and He wants us to have the chance to be saved.

But salvation cannot come just very easily, as the obstacles presented by none other than sin, are truly very, very great indeed. It is not just the obstacles presented by sin itself, but also the temptations that are ever present around us that keep pulling us into sinning even more and more, causing us to fall even deeper into the trap which the devil and his forces have prepared for us. Unless we make the conscious effort to resist those temptations, we will easily be dragged again and again into sin.

And this is where the Lord came into this world bearing His truth and the revelation about His saving grace. He explained to us in detail through His disciples, by means of parables which He later explained and by the wisdom of the Holy Spirit, of what each and every one of us will need to do as a member of God’s Church. He presented the stark reality before us, that many of us may have to suffer persecution and difficulties just because we are siding with the Lord and walking in His path.

That is, in essence the meaning of what He had mentioned in the Gospel passage today, by the means of the parable of the new and old cloth, and the new and old wineskins with the new and old wine. The Pharisees and the teachers of the Law criticised the Lord and His disciples because they did not practice fasting as often done at that time according to the Jewish customs and traditions of the laws of Moses. But the Lord, using the two parables explained why His disciples did not do so.

The reason is because of the incompatibility of the old ways of the world and the new ways of the Lord, which was represented by the incompatible pairing between the old wineskin with the new wine, or vice versa between new wineskin and the old wine, or the old cloth that is incompatible with new cloth that is patched onto it when there is a tear on the old cloth. This incompatibility comes about because of the misunderstanding of the intentions and meanings of the Law of God.

God’s people had forgotten what it means to love God, and in many of their customs and practices, their faith had become empty, meaningless and nominal only, as they did not have God at the centre and as the focus of their lives. God had been sidelined for many worldly temptations, of the sins of pride, ambition, greed, gluttony and many others, where even many among the Pharisees and the teachers of the Law became hypocrites, professing to believe in God and yet not doing what they had to do, that is to love God with all of their hearts and strength.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, the Lord brought with Him a new way, one that is leading us directly towards the salvation in Him. This is the only way by which we can be saved, and that is through the true obedience and adherence to the Law of God. This is done by turning away completely from sin, by humbling oneself and focusing our whole lives on God, Who then becomes the centre of our lives and the focus of everything that we say and do in our respective lives.

But at the same time, we must also be aware that following this path that Christ has shown us will be filled with obstacles and challenges, not least from the same temptations that we have to face each and every days of our life, but also even opposition from the world and even from those who are close and dear to us. And this is what St. Agnes the holy virgin and martyr had shown us, whose feast is celebrated on this day every year.

St. Agnes was a young woman and virgin, who dedicated her life to God and also her virginity. She was born into a noble and wealthy family during the years of the Roman Emperor Diocletian. She had many suitors who tried to get her to marry them, but she refused their advances, because she wanted to keep herself chaste and pure, especially as many of those who sought her were pagans. But her Christian faith got the attention of the authorities, who at that time under the Emperor’s orders, carried out a particularly brutal persecution of the faithful.

St. Agnes was tortured and had to endure great sufferings throughout her period in incarceration and prison, and yet she did not give up her faith and remained strong in her conviction to love and serve the Lord through her life. When those who opposed her tried to have people to defile her, it was told that God protected her and all who wanted to defile her virginity were immediately struck blind.

Eventually, St. Agnes was martyred by the sword when she was not even harmed by the flames as her opponents tried to burn her on the stake. But her courageous faith and commitment to the Lord remained as a great inspiration to the faithful for many ages afterwards. She showed us how although there will indeed be likely many challenges that we have to face as faithful followers of Christ, but it is possible for us to commit ourselves to Him and remain upright despite those challenges.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, let us all therefore imitate the examples of St. Agnes and the many other holy men and women of God, from now on in our own lives. May the Lord be with us always, and may He give us the strength to follow Him and to commit ourselves to Him, each and every days of our life, following Christ, Our Lord and Saviour. Amen.

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Monday, 21 January 2019 : 2nd Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Agnes, Virgin and Martyr, Week of Prayer for Christian Unity (Gospel Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Red

Mark 2 : 18-22

At that time, one day, when the Pharisees and the disciples of John the Baptist were fasting, some people asked Jesus, “Why is it that both the Pharisees and the disciples of John fast, but Yours do not?”

Jesus answered, “How can the wedding guests fast while the Bridegroom is with them? As long as they have the Bridegroom with them, they cannot fast. But the day will come when the Bridegroom will be taken from them, and on that day they will fast.”

“No one sews a piece of new cloth on an old coat, because the new patch will shrink and tear away from the old cloth, making a worse tear. And no one puts new wine into old wineskins, for the wine would burst the skins, and then both the wine and the skins would be lost. But new wine, new skins!”

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Monday, 21 January 2019 : 2nd Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Agnes, Virgin and Martyr, Week of Prayer for Christian Unity (Psalm)

Liturgical Colour : Red

Psalm 109 : 1, 2, 3, 4

The Lord said to my Lord, “Sit at My right hand till I make Your foes Your footstool.”

From Zion the Lord will extend Your mighty sceptre and You will rule in the midst of Your enemies.

Yours is royal dignity from the day You were born in holy majesty. Like dew from the womb of the dawn, I have begotten You.

The Lord has sworn, and He will not take back His word : “You are a Priest forever in the order of Melchizedek.”

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Monday, 21 January 2019 : 2nd Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Agnes, Virgin and Martyr, Week of Prayer for Christian Unity (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Red

Hebrews 5 : 1-10

Every High Priest is taken from among mortals and appointed to be their representative before God to offer gifts and sacrifices for sin. He is able to understand the ignorant and erring for he himself is subject to weakness. This is why he is bound to offer sacrifices for his sins as well as for the sins of the people.

Besides, one does not presume to take this dignity, but takes it only when called by God, as Aaron was. Nor did Christ become High Priest in taking upon Himself this dignity, but it was given to Him by the One Who says : You are My Son, I have begotten You today. And in another place : You are a Priest forever in the priestly order of Melchizedek.

Christ, in the days of His mortal life, offered His sacrifice with tears and cries. He prayed to Him Who could save Him from death, and He was heard because of His humble submission. Although He was Son, He learnt through suffering what obedience was, and once made perfect, He became the source of eternal salvation for those who obey Him. This is how God proclaimed Him Priest in the order of Melchizedek.

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Saturday, 29 December 2018 : Fifth Day within Octave of Christmas, Memorial of St. Thomas Becket, Bishop and Martyr (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : White

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, on this day we listened to the words of the Scripture speaking to us about the Law and the commandments of God, His precepts that He has revealed and given to us, for our benefit and for our salvation. God has given us this Law to guide us and to help us on our way, that we can remain strong in our faith, and not be lost to the sways and the temptations of the world, the temptations and pressures for us to sin.

God intends for us to be reconciled with Him, and to be with Him once again, in His grace. He presented before us the way to Himself, and reminding us again and again, to obey Him and to listen to Him, and through those, He guided us through the perilous and difficult path towards His salvation, and many amongst us fell into the traps of sin, the temptations of the devil who is always constantly at work trying to pull us into damnation.

Unfortunately, as history had shown, despite the laws and commandments that God had given to His people, but many among them failed to understand and appreciate the real purpose and meaning of the Law. The most obvious example was shown in the Gospels, as the actions and philosophy of the Pharisees and the teachers of the Law at the time of the Lord Jesus showed us. Those people claimed to be faithful, righteous and devout before others, but in reality, they were not.

The Pharisees and the teachers of the Law championed the way that required the people of God to live following a very strict and harsh application of the laws of Moses, where the people were expected to obey all the commandments, the precepts, the rules and regulations that were written in the Book of the Torah, as preserved from the time of Moses, the traditions and customs that were added along the way by the elders up to that time.

Yet, despite having outwardly showed piety and devotion to God, but in their hearts and minds, they did not give place to God. That was why, at the same time, many among them refused to listen to the Lord’s truth, when He came into their midst, even performing miracles and speaking words of God’s wisdom, revealing before them what the prophets had once spoken about, all being fulfilled in Christ.

That was because of the pride and ego that were in their hearts, which filled them up and prevented them from opening their hearts to God’s love. For they did obey the Law and follow the precepts of God, but they did so without knowing what the Law is actually all about. And the Law is in fact, all about love, just as Christ has revealed before us all, through His disciples. The essence and the heart of the Law is love, loving God and then loving one another.

And God is love, and He gave us the perfect example of His love, by giving us the perfect and best gift that nothing can surpass. He gave us His beloved Son, Who willingly emptied Himself from glory and majesty, and taking up the humble appearance of Man, born in the poorest conditions, in a dirty stable in Bethlehem, as a King Who was to save His people, and yet not with the power of arms and might, but with love, love that surpasses everything else.

That is why He presented before us, what the Law truly means, that is first and foremost, love for God, like the love which Christ as the Son has for His Father, as example for each and every one of us to follow. Instead of loving ourselves and being selfish, He emptied Himself and gave Himself so completely for the love of God His Father, and for the love He has for each and every one of us. He bore all the sufferings and pains, all of our sins, so that by His suffering and death, we may live.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, today’s Scripture readings and what we have just discussed, all spoke of how we should follow the Law of God, with understanding and appreciation of its meaning and purpose, by doing what the Lord Himself had shown us. We must first of all, love God with all of our strength, with all of our ability, and place Him as the first and foremost in our respective lives. And then, we must also love our fellow brethren in the same way, and as much as we love ourselves.

It is when we do not do this, but instead succumb to the temptations of our pride, ego and greed, that we end up sinning against God. Today, we celebrate the feast of a saint, whose devotion and love for God, whose faith and commitment to serve Him, caused him to suffer and to die in martyrdom when he stood by his faith against those who sought to attack the Church and who wished to follow their own ego, pride and greed.

Today we celebrate the feast of St. Thomas Becket, a famous saint and bishop who was the Archbishop of Canterbury and thus, the Primate of England, the most important bishop and leader of the Church in the British isles. St. Thomas Becket, prior to his reign as the Archbishop of Canterbury, was once a powerful noble, who was a good and close friend to king Henry II of England, and was appointed as the Chancellor of England, a position that is probably just second to the king in the secular realm.

King Henry II then appointed St. Thomas Becket as the Archbishop of Canterbury, hoping that keeping the highest ranked clergy in his realm close to him, as one of his closest confidants, the king and his fellow nobles could benefit financially and from other collaborations because of this appointment. However, little did king Henry II realised or could have predicted that St. Thomas Becket had a change of heart and conversion after taking up the role of the Archbishop of Canterbury.

Amidst the struggle and controversies between the Church and the state, especially with matters of state jurisdiction and control over the Church, and the appropriation of properties and the right of nobles and the king over the Church matters, St. Thomas Becket stood up for his fellow churchmen, and defended the rights of the Church against the egoistic and corrupt desires of the nobility and the king.

As a result, the growing tension between the Archbishop and the king eventually resulted in the action taken by four nobles with tacit support from the king, in assassinating St. Thomas Becket right at his Cathedral, and thus making him a martyr of the Church, who died defending his faith and the rights of the Church of God, against those who sought to attack it for corrupt purposes.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, we have seen how St. Thomas Becket went through a conversion of heart and being, from one who lived his life of pleasure and debauchery, into a courageous and committed defender of the faith, who did not fear even going against the mighty and the powerful in his love for God and for His people, the flock whose souls were entrusted under his care. We too can follow in his examples and imitate his commitment to the Lord.

Today therefore, let us all reflect on our own lives, and see in which area that we have failed to live up to our expectation to observe the Law of God, not just in words and in paying lip service like what many of the Pharisees, the teachers of the Law, king Henry II and his nobles had done, but with pure and genuine love for God as St. Thomas Becket and many other holy men and women of God had done. May the Lord be with us all, and bless us in our effort to live more worthily of Him, day after day. Amen.

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Saturday, 29 December 2018 : Fifth Day within Octave of Christmas, Memorial of St. Thomas Becket, Bishop and Martyr (Gospel Reading)

Liturgical Colour : White

Luke 2 : 22-35

When the day came for the purification according to the law of Moses, they brought the Baby up to Jerusalem, to present Him to the Lord, as it is written in the law of the Lord : Every firstborn male shall be consecrated to God. And they offered a sacrifice, as ordered in the law of the Lord : a pair of turtledoves or two young pigeons.

There lived in Jerusalem at this time a very upright and devout man named Simeon; the Holy Spirit was in him. He looked forward to the time when the Lord would comfort Israel, and he had been assured, by the Holy Spirit, that he would not die before seeing the Messiah of the Lord. So he was led into the Temple by the Holy Spirit at the time the parents brought the Child Jesus, to do for Him according to the custom of the Law.

Simeon took the Child in his arms, and blessed God, saying, “Now, o Lord, You can dismiss Your servant in peace, for You have fulfilled Your word and my eyes have seen Your salvation, which You display for all the people to see. Here is the Light You will reveal to the nations, and the glory of Your people Israel.”

His father and mother wondered at what was said about the Child. Simeon blessed them, and said to Mary, His mother, “Know this : your Son is a Sign, a Sign established for the falling and rising of many in Israel, a Sign of contradiction; and a sword will pierce your own soul, so that, out of many hearts, thoughts may be revealed.”