holy martyrs

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Sunday, 22 January 2017 : Third Sunday of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Vincent, Deacon and Martyr, Week of Prayer for Christian Unity (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Green
Isaiah 8 : 23b – Isaiah 9 : 3

YHVH has just afflicted the land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali; but in the future He will confer glory on the way of the sea, on the land beyond the Jordan – the pagan’s Galilee.

The people who walk in darkness have seen a great light. A light has dawned on those who live in the land of the shadow of death. You have enlarged the nation; You have increased their joy. They rejoice before You, as people rejoice at harvest time as they rejoice in dividing the spoil.

For the yoke of their burden, the bar across their shoulders, the rod of their oppressors, You have broken it as on the day of Midian.

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Saturday, 21 January 2017 : 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 heard about the sacrifice of Christ our Lord, our High Priest, which He had made for our sake. He is the Lamb of God, the Lamb of sacrifice, Who had offered none other than His own Blood, His own Flesh for our sake. In order to understand this fully, the whole significance of it, we need to understand what is the meaning of sacrifice which is offered for the sake of someone’s sins.

In the Sacred Scriptures, ever since the beginning of time, the people of God, mankind had offered sacrifices to God, from the offerings of Abel and Cain, to thw offering of Noah after the Great Flood, to the offering of Abraham our father in faith, to the offering of Melchizedek, the King of Salem, to the offering of the prophets from the days of Moses to the days of the kings of Israel and Judah. All of these sacrifices are meant to honour and glorify the Lord, to offer Him worship and praise, and at the same time also for the forgiveness of one’s sins.

In the days of old, the priests were instructed by the laws which God passed down to Moses, to sprinkle some of the blood of the sacrificial lamb on the people. The blood therefore represents cleansing, the purification of one from his or her sins, and at the same time, also a renewal of the covenant which they had made with the Lord their God. The sacrifice to God is the sign of the formalisation of the covenant between God and His people, as what Abraham had done when God made the covenant with him, and which Moses then renewed as he led the people of Israel out of Egypt.

But as mentioned in the Epistle to the Hebrews, the power of the blood of goats, lambs and heifers, the offering of worldly and earthly sacrifices are limited. Such was the great extent, weight and consequences of our sins, the whole sum of the sins of all mankind, both past, present and the future, that no amount of animal sacrifices and offerings can replace them, save that of the worthy Lamb of God.

Nothing is more perfect than God, and therefore since God Himself had descended into this world as a Man, Jesus Christ, He has Himself become the Lamb of sacrifice and the High Priest at the same time, as the One Who purifies the people of God, not by other blood or sacrifices, but by His very own Blood, the perfect offering of Himself. It was the ultimate and selfless sacrifice, which overcome the sins caused by the selfishness and greed of our ancestors.

It was God’s love that made all of them possible. Otherwise, what God had done would have been incomprehensible to us. But indeed, God’s ways are not like our ways, and while we think that something is impossible for us to do, for God nothing is impossible. All things are possible for Him, including our salvation, our liberation and freedom from our sinfulness.

And yet, despite this great love shown to us by our God, there are still those who have not accepted that love, and even rejected Him, those who refused to open their hearts to welcome the Lord. Even Jesus was rejected by His own disciples and His own relatives, as we witnessed in the Gospel passage today, when His own relatives said that He was out of His mind because of what He was doing with the people.

The same therefore will happen to us, even as Jesus Himself had prophesied on how everything will turn out to be for us, all those who follow Him and walk in His ways. The world will reject that love which God had poured on it, and there will be many people who do not walk in His ways. But how do we then react to this? How do we face the challenges that will come our way? Then we really should look up the example of St. Agnes the Great, the holy martyr of the faith, whose feast we are celebrating today.

St. Agnes lived during the time of great difficulty for the Christian faith, where the Church and the faithful came under constant attacks from the Roman authorities, who were decidedly against the faith, and who persecuted many of those who profess their faith to God. It was during the reign of one of the most hostile Emperors that St. Agnes lived in, during the time of the Emperor Diocletian, infamous for his brutal persecution of Christians.

St. Agnes was born into a Roman noble family, and because of her family’s background, had had many suitors since her very young age. But she would not give in to their pursuits and evaded them, determined to maintain her virginity and purity, which she offered and dedicated to the Lord. But those men who wanted to have her were not happy being rejected, and therefore, they accused her before the authorities and reported that she was a Christian.

Later on she was persecuted, tortured and made to endure many humiliations at the hands of those who hated and rejected her. But St. Agnes did not give up and neither did she fight back, instead putting her complete trust in the Lord through prayer, she gave up her life, knowing that by doing so, she was doing the will of God, and also at the same time showing many others the inspiration and the way forward in their faith towards God.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, as we look upon the examples of St. Agnes the holy martyr, let us all from now on devote ourselves wholeheartedly to the Lord in the same manner as she had done in the past. Let us be genuine in our faith, and be ready to defend it against the opposition and challenges from the world, which will surely come our way in the future, if not already happening at the present.

May the Lord help us all to remain committed to Him, and may He empower each and every one of us to live in faith, and to give ourselves to Him, that in all the things we say, we do and we act, we will always bring glory to Him and be found worthy of Him. Let us appreciate what the Lord had done for us, because He has loved us, and by that love, He has saved us by His own death on the cross. May God bless us all. Amen.

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Saturday, 21 January 2017 : 2nd Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Agnes, Virgin and Martyr, Week of Prayer for Christian Unity (Gospel Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Red
Mark 3 : 20-21

At that time, Jesus and His disciples went home. The crowd began to gather again and they could not even have a meal. Knowing what was happening, His relatives came to take charge of Him, “He is out of His mind,” they said.

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Saturday, 21 January 2017 : 2nd Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Agnes, Virgin and Martyr, Week of Prayer for Christian Unity (Psalm)

Liturgical Colour : Red
Psalm 46 : 2-3, 6-7, 8-9

Clap your hands, all you peoples; acclaim God with shouts of joy. For the Lord, the Most High, is to be feared; He is a great King all over the earth.

God ascends amid joyful shouts, the Lord amid trumpet blasts. Sing praises to God, sing praises! Sing praises to our King, sing praises!
God is King of all the earth; sing to Him a hymn of praise. For God now rules over the nations. God reigns from His holy throne.

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Saturday, 21 January 2017 : 2nd Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Agnes, Virgin and Martyr, Week of Prayer for Christian Unity (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Red
Hebrews 9 : 2-3, 11-14

A first tent was prepared with the lampstand, the table and the bread of the Presence, this is called the Holy Place. Behind the second curtain, there is a second sanctuary called the Most Holy Place.

But now Christ has appeared as the High Priest with regard to the good things of these new times. He passed through a sanctuary more noble and perfect, not made by hands, that is, not created. He did not take with Himself the blood of goats and bulls but His own Blood, when He entered once and for all into the sanctuary after obtaining definitive redemption.

If the sprinkling of people defiled by sin with the blood of goats and bulls or with the ashes of a heifer provided them with exterior cleanliness and holiness, how much more will it be with the Blood of Christ? He, moved by the eternal Spirit, offered Himself as an unblemished victim to God and His Blood cleanses us from dead works, so that we may serve the living God.

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Friday, 20 January 2017 : 2nd Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of Pope St. Fabian, Pope and Martyr and St. Sebastian, 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 are reminded of the new covenant which God had made with us all, His people, that is with all of mankind. And He had made all of these through the mediation of Christ, Who is the Mediator of the new covenant, by which all of us are to receive salvation and grace, because Christ Himself had done the amazing and unimaginable deed of laying down His own life for the sake of our salvation.

Through Him, God had placed into our hearts the truth about Himself, what He had revealed to the whole world about His salvation. He had sent us His Holy Spirit, through Whom the truth is placed into our hearts, so that all of us who have believed in Him, and received the Holy Spirit will understand fully what it means for us to follow the Lord our God, and to walk in His ways.

However, this is also where we need to take note how in the Gospel passage today, it was mentioned that Jesus called His disciples, the primary twelve members among them in particular. They are known as the Twelve Apostles, whose names we are certainly quite familiar with. They were called by Jesus, together with the other Apostles and disciples, to be His witnesses and helpers in the good works He was bringing into the world for our salvation.

Through this, we can see how God needs our help to continue His good works in this world, as the works He has started are certainly not yet complete. All these works are still ongoing, and there are even more things to be done. There are many people who have yet to witness and experience the truth of the Lord, and there are many others who have yet to receive the Good News unlike us.

The works of the Apostles, who preached and witnessed for the Lord are still ongoing, as we are the ones who are now called to be the modern day disciples and witnesses of our God and of our faith in Him. Through us God will make His truth known to all, that He establishes a new covenant with us, and by that we are altogether saved. It is up to us then to lead others, our brethren, to walk on this path towards God’s salvation and grace.

And how do we do that, brothers and sisters in Christ? The saints Pope St. Fabian and St. Sebastian whose feasts we are celebrating today, had shown many others what it meant to be a disciple of Christ, and what are to be expected from us if we are to take His side and defend our faith in Him. They lived during times of great difficulty for the faith, when being a Christian meant that one could be prosecuted and arrested by the state, and persecution of the Church and the faithful were rampant.

Pope St. Fabian was the leader of the Universal Church and the faithful both across the Roman Empire and all Christendom, as well as in the city of Rome, the capital of the Roman Empire. The Roman Emperor at the time, the Emperor Decius was particularly hostile against Christians and their faith, and he ordered a distinctively brutal persecution against them.

As the leader of the flock of God, Pope St. Fabian did not fear the threat of persecution and suffering. Instead, he continued to minister courageously to the people of God, going from places to places and minister to those who need help. Eventually he was arrested and tortured, and as an example to all the other Christians, the Emperor Decius sentenced the faithful saint to death, and thus, in doing what he had been called to do, Pope St. Fabian met his end in glorious martyrdom.

Then, St. Sebastian was a soldier in the employ of the Roman Emperor, told to be a courageous man whose skill earned him a place in the contingent of the Imperial guardsmen. The Emperor at that time, Diocletian was also renowned infamously for his brutal persecution of the Christian faith and the faithful. All the Roman soldiers were ordered to offer sacrifices to the Emperor, who was then treated as a living god, and those who refused to do so were persecuted.

St. Sebastian courageously refused to offer sacrifices to the Emperor as ordered, because he stood by faithfully to his Christian faith. He refused to obey the Emperor’s orders even though he fully knew that doing so would bring about the wrath of the Emperor and would almost certainly mean his death. He did not want to compromise his faith and kept strongly to the faith which he had in the Lord.

And thus, by his courage, he was tortured and put to death, after a long and miraculous process where we were told that he was shot with arrows but did not die because of the Lord’s intervention, before finally he was martyred with a sword. Through their examples, Pope St. Fabian and St. Sebastian had shown us all that being a Christian require commitment and courage, and real action instead of inaction.

We, as the modern day successors of the Apostles and disciples of our Lord Jesus Christ should be role models for our brethren, and become genuine and real witnesses for Him, even though persecution, challenges and difficulties may come in our way to hinder us and stop us from doing whatever it is that we want to do for this purpose. Let us all pray, brothers and sisters in Christ, that God will give us the courage and strength to do so.

Let us all follow in the footsteps of the holy saints and martyrs who had gone before us, and who have left behind their illustrious examples for us to follow. Let us all follow in the footsteps of Pope St. Fabian and St. Sebastian in their total commitment to the Lord and their courageous faith. And finally, let us all continue to pray for the unity of all Christians that all those who believe in God may come together and be reunited in the Church of Christ under the leadership of His Vicar, our Pope. May God bless us all, now and forevermore. Amen.

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Friday, 20 January 2017 : 2nd Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of Pope St. Fabian, Pope and Martyr and St. Sebastian, Martyr, Week of Prayer for Christian Unity (Gospel Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Green or Red (Martyrs)
Mark 3 : 13-19

At that time, Jesus went up into the hill country, and called those He wanted and they came to Him. He appointed twelve to be with Him, and He called them ‘Apostles’. He wanted to send them out to preach, and He gave them authority to drive out demons.

These are the Twelve : Simon, to whom He gave the name Peter; James, son of Zebedee, and John his brother, to whom He gave the name Boanerges, which means ‘men of thunder’; Andrew, Philip, Bartholomew, Matthew, Thomas, James son of Alpheus, Thaddeus, Simon the Canaanean, and Judas Iscariot, the one who betrayed Him.

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Friday, 20 January 2017 : 2nd Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of Pope St. Fabian, Pope and Martyr and St. Sebastian, Martyr, Week of Prayer for Christian Unity (Psalm)

Liturgical Colour : Green or Red (Martyrs)
Psalm 84 : 8 and 10, 11-12, 13-14

Show us, o Lord, Your unfailing love and grant us Your saving help. Yet Your salvation is near to those who fear You, and Your Glory will dwell in our land.

Love and faithfulness have met; righteousness and peace have embraced. Faithfulness will reach up from the earth while justice bends down from heaven.

The Lord will give what is good, and our land will yield its fruit. Justice will go before Him, and peace will follow along His path.

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Friday, 20 January 2017 : 2nd Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of Pope St. Fabian, Pope and Martyr and St. Sebastian, Martyr, Week of Prayer for Christian Unity (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Green or Red (Martyrs)
Hebrews 8 : 6-13

Now, however, Jesus enjoys a much higher ministry in being the Mediator of a better covenant, founded on better promises. If all had been perfect in the first covenant, there would have been no need for another one. Yet God sees defects when He says : The days are coming – it is the word of the Lord – when I will draw up a new covenant with the people of Israel and with the people of Judah.

It will not be like the covenant that I made with their ancestors on the day I took them by the hand and led them out of Egypt. They did not keep My covenant, and so I Myself have forsaken them, says the Lord. But this is the covenant that I will make with the people of Israel in the days to come : I will put My law into their minds and write them on their hearts. I will be their God and they will be My people.

None of them will have to teach one another or say to each other : Know the Lord, for they will know Me from the least to the greatest. I will forgive their sins and no longer remember their wrongs. Here we are being told of a new covenant; which means that the first one had become obsolete, and what is obsolete and ageing is soon to disappear.

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Thursday, 29 December 2016 : 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 are all reminded by the readings from the Holy Scriptures that we just heard, that in order for us to be disciples of Christ, it is required that we should obey the Lord and fulfil His commandments, and not pretending to believe in Him, and yet in our actions we are corrupt, wicked and contrary to what the Lord had taught us to do.

God Himself has come into the world through Jesus Christ, His only begotten Son, born of the Blessed Virgin Mary, His mother. And this is the perfect manifestation of His laws and commandments, which are made perfect and fulfilled through Christ. That is because the laws and commandments of God are the commandments of love. And God Himself is love, and through Christ, He has shown each and every one of us what love truly means.

And why is this so? God Himself has become Man willingly out of His love for us. For Him to assume the humble and mere flesh of our humanity is not something that is just insignificant or easily done. How many of us are willing to part with all the greatness, glory and inheritance that we have, for the sake of another person? And how many of us are willing to forsake everything and die for the sake of another person? And indeed, how many of us are willing to do so for the sake of evil and wicked people?

That was what Christ had exactly done. As St. Paul said in his Epistle, very few would have wanted or be willing to die for the sake of another person, even if that person was an upright and good person. Less so would anyone be willing to suffer and die, if that person is a wicked person and a sinner. But that was what Christ had done for us, willingly bearing the cross and our sins, and dying on the cross for us sinners, so that we who believe in Him may live.

And He showed us obedience to the law of God, by obeying the will of His Father perfectly. He did not let His human weaknesses and the temptations of the flesh to bring Him down. He put His complete trust in His Father’s will, and because of that, we are all saved. The chief priests and the elders could not understand why He did not try to save Himself while He had saved many others, mocking Him from below His cross. That was because they were unable to understand His ways, as they were people of this world and had been corrupted by the ways of this world.

And what is that? Perhaps by looking at the life and examples of the great saint whose memory we cherish and celebrate today, we will be better able to understand how we really ought to be living as Christians, and not as the people of this world. St. Thomas Becket was the Archbishop of Canterbury and thus was the Primate of England and the chief of the Catholic bishops in the kingdom of England, about nine centuries ago.

He was once the chancellor to the king of England, the right hand man of the king, who was entrusted by the king with much power and authority, and was involved in much worldliness and the pursuits of power and the flesh, imitating the behaviours of the nobles and the kings of those days. And everything changed the moment when the king appointed him to be the successor to the Archbishop of Canterbury, expecting him to be as loyal to him as he had been as his chancellor.

But St. Thomas Becket had a great conversion and change of heart, as he became a devout and ardent defender of the faith from then on, to the irritation and annoyance of the king and his nobles. Expecting a submissive and obedient Archbishop of Canterbury and Church, instead, the king got obstacles and challenges as he attempted to undermine the Church and increase his own worldly authority and power.

Tension arose as St. Thomas Becket was increasingly conflicted against the king and his nobles on the other side. But St. Thomas Becket did not fear the world and its opposition, and he held fast to the strong faith he had in the Lord, and when a noble was accused of murdering a man of God, who was indeed a priest, St. Thomas Becket excommunicated the noble despite opposition from the king and the nobles.

Eventually, some nobles, with tacit approval from the king, assassinated St. Thomas Becket, murdered him as he celebrated the Holy Mass. This was met with a huge outcry from the populace and the Church throughout Europe, and the nobles were excommunicated and were forced to undergo penance and carry out service to the Church for many years as penance, and even the king had to publicly shame himself for his role in the murder of this holy saint. But, the legacy of St. Thomas Becket and his examples continue to this very day.

From what he had done in his life, we see how we Christians should be like, that is to reject our worldliness and all the forms of temptations of the flesh, of greed, power, ambition, desire for human glory and fame, all which brought us to corruption and sin, and incompatible with God’s ways. As I have said at the beginning of this discourse today, we must not pay lip service for our faith to the Lord, meaning that we cannot be Christians and yet our actions show contrary to that faith.

Let us all dedicate ourselves anew to the Lord this Christmas, remembering once again what is the purpose of our lives as Christians, to serve God with all of our heart, obeying Him with all of our body, mind, heart and soul just as Jesus has obeyed the will of His Father, and willingly die out of love for our salvation. Let us all remember our Lord Who have come in the human flesh as Jesus our Lord, through Whom we receive every blessings and grace. May God be with us all, and may St. Thomas Becket intercede for us sinners. Amen.