holy saints of God

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Wednesday, 6 December 2017 : 1st Week of Advent, Memorial of St. Nicholas, Bishop (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Purple/Violet or White (Bishops)

Isaiah 25 : 6-10a

On this mountain YHVH Sabaoth will prepare for all peoples a feast of rich food and choice wines, meat full of marrow, fine wine strained. On this mountain He will destroy the pall cast over all peoples, this very shroud spread over all nations, and death will be no more. The Lord YHVH will wipe away the tears from all cheeks and eyes; He will take away the humiliation of His people all over the world : for YHVH has spoken.

On that day you will say : This is our God. We have waited for Him to save us, let us be glad and rejoice in His salvation. For on this mountain the hand of YHVH rests.

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Monday, 4 December 2017 : 1st Week of Advent, Memorial of St. John Damascene, Priest and Doctor of the Church (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : Purple/Violet or White (Priests)

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, on this day we heard that story from the Gospel passage, relating to us the moment when the Lord Jesus healed the sick servant of an army centurion, and the Lord was impressed at the faith he has in Him. In order to appreciate this story better, let us all understand the context and situation in which the interaction between Our Lord and the centurion took place.

At that time, the land of Judea, as well as Galilee and Samaria, the places where the Lord ministered to the people, were all under the dominion of the Roman Empire. It was likely that this army captain or centurion is part of the Roman legion or army stationed in the region for peacekeeping and garrison purpose. As such, the army centurion mentioned in the Gospel today might not even be a Jew.

The Jewish people living in Judea were not happy living under the Roman rule, as they had to pay taxes and obey other obligations, although the Romans did respect the Jewish customs and faith, allowing them to carry on with their lives as normal. This was why if we read through the Gospels, the Jews despised the tax collectors and even called them sinners and traitors to their people, as these people collected the taxes for the Romans.

Therefore, the Jews despised all interactions with the Romans, as well as with the pagans, Greeks and all those who do not believe in God or obey the laws of Moses. A Jewish person should not enter the house of a pagan, or else he or she will be considered unclean and unworthy. As such, if Jesus entered into the house of the army centurion, He would be considered unclean, and His enemies would have a reason with which to attack Him, for conspiring with the pagans.

The army centurion must have been aware of this fact, and that was probably the reason why he uttered the now famous words to the Lord Jesus, “I am not worthy that You should enter under my roof. Just say the word, and my servant shall be healed.” This is what each and every one of us utter at every celebration of the Holy Mass at the Agnus Dei, when the Lord is His Most Precious Body and Blood is presented to us sinners.

Knowing that we are sinners, we utter the same words as the centurion had mentioned. The army centurion knew that Jesus is the Lord, and recognising that fact and truth, and how he, as a pagan, did not deserve Jesus, a Jew, and all the more, as the Lord and Master of all, from coming into his house. Thus, he believes that, because Jesus is the Lord and God, He needed only to just utter the words, and His will would be done, and the servants would be healed.

This faith should be contrasted with the lack of faith among those whom the Lord Jesus had performed His miracles and wonders, even among His disciples and followers. The Pharisees and the teachers of the Law even demanded Jesus to show them heavenly and miraculous signs that they might believe in Him. Those people had seen the signs performed and yet still did not believe, because they have consciously chosen not to believe in God and harden their hearts against Him.

This is a reminder to all of us as Christians, that each and every one of us must learn from the faith of the army centurion. We need to be inspired by the pure faith and commitment that the army centurion showed to the Lord, believing wholeheartedly in Him rather than making excuses and doubting Him in what He is capable of doing. Many of us, unfortunately, often did not show the Lord the same faith that the centurion had shown.

Therefore, it is important that in this season of Advent, we should prepare ourselves well, heart, body, mind and soul, in our entire being, to welcome the Lord Jesus, not just merely celebrating His birth into the world, but instead, welcoming Him completely into ourselves, into our whole being. We have received the Lord in the Eucharist at the Holy Mass, but do we truly reflect on what we have received, that is nothing less than the Lord Himself?

Today we celebrate the feast of St. John of Damascus, a renowned saint who lived in Syria more than a millennia ago. St. John of Damascus was a priest who wrote extensively about the faith and whose devotion to God was truly remarkable. Despite the challenges he often encountered in his life, work and mission, he continued to devote himself day after day, to a life of prayer and charitable works, which encouraged many of the Christians in his area, living under difficult conditions.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, let us today make a renewed effort to live faithfully in accordance with our faith, following in the footsteps of the army centurion and our holy predecessors, the saints and blesseds of the Church. Let us all be true disciples of Our Lord in actions and deeds, and be genuine in our love for Him. After all, He has endeavoured to come to us, in the flesh, and even then, to suffer and die on the cross for the sake of our salvation.

May the Lord be with us always, and may He continue to guide us on our path, so that eventually we may be faithful in the same manner as the army centurion, whose faith in Him is so great that he placed his complete trust in His words alone, and also in the footsteps of all the saints, particularly St. John of Damascus, whose feast we celebrate this day. May God bless us forevermore. Amen.

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Monday, 4 December 2017 : 1st Week of Advent, Memorial of St. John Damascene, Priest and Doctor of the Church (Gospel Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Purple/Violet or White (Priests)

Matthew 8 : 5-11

At that time, when Jesus entered Capernaum, an army captain approached Him, to ask His help, “Sir, my servant lies sick at home. He is paralysed and suffers terribly.” Jesus said to him, “I will come and heal him.”

The captain answered, “I am not worthy to have You under my roof. Just give an order and my boy will be healed. For I myself, a junior officer, give orders to my soldiers. And if I say to one, ‘Go!’ he goes; and if I say to another, ‘Come!’ he comes; and if I say to my servant, ‘Do this!’ he does it.”

When Jesus heard this, He was astonished; and said to those who were following Him, “I tell you, I have not found such faith in Israel. I say to you, many will come from east and west and sit down with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob at the feast in the kingdom of heaven.”

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Monday, 4 December 2017 : 1st Week of Advent, Memorial of St. John Damascene, Priest and Doctor of the Church (Psalm)

Liturgical Colour : Purple/Violet or White (Priests)

Psalm 121 : 1-2, 3-4a, 4b-5, 6-7, 8-9

I rejoiced with those who said to me, “Let us go to the house of YHVH!” And now we have set foot within your gates, o Jerusalem!

Jerusalem, just like a city, where everything falls into place! There the tribes go up.

The tribes of YHVH, the assembly of Israel, to give thanks to YHVH’s Name. There stand the courts of justice, the offices of the house of David.

Pray for the peace of Jerusalem : “May those who love you prosper! May peace be within your walls and security within your citadels!”

For the sake of my relatives and friends I will say, “Peace be with you!” For the sake of the house of our YHVH, I will pray for your good.

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Monday, 4 December 2017 : 1st Week of Advent, Memorial of St. John Damascene, Priest and Doctor of the Church (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Purple/Violet or White (Priests)

Isaiah 2 : 1-5

The vision of Isaiah, son of Amoz, concerning Judah and Jerusalem. In the last days, the mountain of YHVH’s house shall be set over the highest mountains and shall tower over the hills. All the nations shall stream to it, saying, “Come, let us go to the mountain of YHVH, to the house of the God of Jacob, that He may teach us His ways and we may walk in His paths. For the teaching comes from Zion, and from Jerusalem the word of YHVH.”

“He will rule over the nations and settle disputes for many people. They will beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation will not raise sword against nation; they will train for war no more. O nation of Jacob, come, let us walk in the light of YHVH!”

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Thursday, 16 November 2017 : 32nd Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Margaret of Scotland and St. Gertrude, Virgin (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : Green or White (Saints or Holy Virgins)

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, today all of us are warned by the Lord through His words in the Scriptures, against believing in the false ways and wrong guidance of the false messengers and prophets of God. There will be plenty of those who mislead others with signs of nature and whatever it is that our feeble human intellect and understanding try to perceive, not realising that the will of God and His plans cannot be perceived by our senses alone.

That is why, even at this time, there are plenty of people out there who seek to mislead the people for their own selfish interests, for personal ambitions and self-glorifications, as there were those who even claimed that they were the messengers of God, or even the Lord Himself, coming down from heaven, as the Second Coming long promised. But all these are frauds, and we must not believe in them.

We tend to be awed by worldly greatness, grandeur, glory and all the things that stimulate our physical senses. However, all these can be distractions in our path, as there will then be those who lead others down the wrong path, by depending on the false glory of the world, trusting in their human power and talents instead of placing their trust in God.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, instead of depending on our own human wisdom, intellect, understanding and power, we should put our trust and faith in God, and in His divine Wisdom, which He has imparted to us through the gift of the Holy Spirit, dwelling in our hearts. Thus, the Wisdom of God Himself exists within us. However, many of us ignore God’s Wisdom and instead trust more in our own human instincts, intellects and judgments.

The Wisdom of God is often ignored because we are too preoccupied with the world, all its noise and distractions. The Wisdom of God lies deep in our hearts, buried underneath all the distractions of life. And therefore, how do we then find this Wisdom? It is by learning to focus ourselves amidst the busy schedules and distractions of this life, discerning deep in our hearts, that the Wisdom of God will be able to show us the way.

What do we need to do in order to achieve this? We need to deepen our relationship with God through prayer, by quieting our hearts and minds, focusing them towards God. By doing this, we will be able to discern carefully what we need to do in this life, that we will be able to draw closer to God and walk in accordance with His will.

Let us all follow the examples of St. Margaret of Scotland and St. Gertrude, the two saints whose feast we celebrate today. St. Margaret of Scotland was the Queen of Scotland, and was mother to several kings of Scotland. She was well known for her great piety and exemplary lifestyle. She was very charitable in her life, giving generously to the poor and the sick throughout her kingdom.

And by that examples, St. Margaret of Scotland had inspired many others, including her husband the king, her sons and children. She has a great prayer life and personal devotion to the Lord, and therefore, surely she has allowed God’s Wisdom to be her guide, and this is reflected in her lifestyle and efforts as well.

Meanwhile, St. Gertrude, also known as St. Gertrude the Great, was a renowned mystic and Benedictine nun, who was remembered and known for her many works of the faith, her many writings about her visions and mystical experiences, through total surrender to God, and deep spiritual relationship with Him. She devoted herself thoroughly to God, and also was known for her deep devotion to the Most Sacred Heart.

The examples of these two saints should be inspirations for all of us, to put our trust in the Lord’s Wisdom and path, rather than to trust our own limited and error-prone wisdom, intellect and instincts. Let us renew therefore, our commitment to the Lord, and our desire to love Him and serve Him through our every actions in life.

May the Lord be with us always, and may He continue to bless all of our endeavours in life. May God bless us all. Amen.

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Thursday, 16 November 2017 : 32nd Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Margaret of Scotland and St. Gertrude, Virgin (Gospel Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Green or White (Saints or Holy Virgins)

Luke 17 : 20-25

At that time, the Pharisees asked Jesus when the kingdom of God was to come. He answered, “The kingdom of God is not like something you can observe, and say of it, ‘Look, here it is!’ or ‘See, there it is!’ for the kingdom of God is within you.”

And Jesus said to His disciples, “The time is at hand, when you will long to see one of the glorious days of the Son of Man, but you will not see it. Then people will tell you, ‘Look there! Look here!’ Do not go with them, do not follow them. As lightning flashes from one end of the sky to the other, so will it be with the Son of Man; but first He must suffer many things, and be rejected by this generation.”

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Thursday, 16 November 2017 : 32nd Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Margaret of Scotland and St. Gertrude, Virgin (Psalm)

Liturgical Colour : Green or White (Saints or Holy Virgins)

Psalm 118 : 89, 90, 91, 130, 135, 175

O YHVH, Your word stands forever, firmly fixed in the heavens.

Your faithfulness lasts throughout the ages – as long as the earth You created.

Your ordinances last to this day, for all things are made to serve You.

As Your words unfold, light is shed, and the simple-hearted understand.

Favour me with Your smile and teach me Your statutes.

Long may I live, to sing Your praise, may Your ordinances always be my help!

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Thursday, 16 November 2017 : 32nd Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Margaret of Scotland and St. Gertrude, Virgin (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Green or White (Saints or Holy Virgins)

Wisdom 7 : 22 – Wisdom 8 : 1

Because Wisdom, who designed them all, taught me. In her is a spirit that is intelligent, saintly, unique, manifold, subtle, active, concise, pure and lucid. It cannot corrupt, loves what is good and nothing can restrain it; it is beneficent, loving humankind, steadfast, dependable, calm though Almighty. It sees everything and penetrates all spirits, however intelligent, subtle and pure they may be.

Wisdom, in fact, surpasses in mobility all that moves, and being so pure pervades and permeates all things. She is a breath of the power of God, a pure emanation of the glory of the Almighty; nothing impure can enter her. She is a reflection of eternal light, a spotless mirror of God’s action and an image of His goodness.

She is but one, yet Wisdom can do all things and, herself unchanging, she renews all things. She enters holy souls, making them prophets and friends of God, for God loves only those who live with Wisdom. She is indeed more beautiful than the sun and surpasses all the constellations; she outrivals light, for light gives way to night, but evil cannot prevail against Wisdom.

Wisdom displays her strength from one end of the earth to the other, ordering all things rightly.

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Wednesday, 15 November 2017 : 32nd Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Albert the Great, Bishop and Doctor of the Church (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : Green or White (Bishops)

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, on this day all of us are called to reflect through the Scripture passages that first of all, God is just and impartial, and He does not discriminate based on any criteria, be it race, language, culture or background and status. All of us are equal before God, without any distinction or prejudice, and He loves each one of us with the same degree of love.

In the first reading today, God reminds us that He loves each and every nations, every races and every peoples, instead of favouring just one nation, as what the Israelites at the time of Jesus tended to believe about themselves. They are just the first ones that God called, through their forefather Abraham. Eventually, God is calling all peoples of all the nations towards Himself. All will be judged by the virtue of their good deeds as well as by the wickedness of their sins.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, we have not been faithful for much of the time, as we tend to stray away due to the many temptations in this life. This is what have brought down many of us into sin. And sin will lead us eventually to eternal damnation should we remain unrepentant for our sins and mistakes, our disobedience against God. We have to keep this in mind, because sin is the greatest obstacle on our path as we journey towards the Lord.

And all mankind are predisposed and vulnerable to sin, ever since our first ancestors fell into sin by their disobedience. They disobeyed God and chose to follow the lies of Satan instead. As a result, sin corrupted many people, and indeed, sin is a disease of the soul, afflicting many and bringing many people into danger for their souls. By right, our just end will be death, which is the consequence of sin.

However, God does not want us to fall into this status. He wants each one of us to be reconciled to Him and to be healed from the disease of sin afflicting them. That is why in the Gospel today, we heard how Jesus took pity on all those who were afflicted with disease, and healed them all from their sickness. Similarly therefore, God wants us to be freed from the chains that are our sins, which we are suffering from.

Nonetheless, as we heard from the Gospel passage, out of the ten lepers, only one of them returned to the Lord Jesus to thank Him and worship Him, for having cured him from his predicament. The others did not notice, or did not realise, or simply did not care that they had to give thanks to God for all that He had done for them. This is one flaw which many of us Christians are also often to blame for, our lack of gratitude for God’s love and grace.

How many of us live our lives, without realising the grace by which we are inhaling our every breaths? Our very lives are gifts to us from God, and we live by the grace of His will. Indeed, in life we will encounter some bad times just as we should also have some good times. Yet, many of us are quick to judge that we fall into bad times because God has abandoned us, and we became angry at Him.

Thus, all of us Christians must be thankful for whatever God has blessed us with. Some of us may have been given more, while others have been given less. But this should not end up becoming source of conflict or contention between us. Rather, we should share the blessings we have with one another, especially with those who have little or none with them. Let us not ignore the plight and the cries of the poor, the hungry, the lonely and all those who are in need of our help.

St. Albert the Great, a member of the Dominican Order and bishop, whose feast we celebrate today, was also well remembered for his love, care and attention to the people, especially those entrusted to him as their shepherd. He travelled through his diocese on foot, traversing great distances to meet his people, listening to them and caring for them, especially those who are in need.

St. Albert the Great showed us all an example of how each and every one of us as Christians must behave and act in our lives. We should follow their examples and walk along their path, as these people have been faithful in their lives. Now the question is, are we able to do as we are expected as Christians?

God Who sees our charity and genuine love for our brethren, as well as our devotion to His cause will reward us in the end of it all, each according to our every deeds. Let us all strive to be truly faithful in all things and in all occasions towards the Lord our God. May the Lord help us and guide us in our life journey, that we will ever draw closer to Him. Amen.