Holy Spirit

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Sunday, 5 May 2013 : 6th Sunday of Easter (First Reading)

Acts 15 : 1-2, 22-29

Some persons who had come from Judea to Antioch were teaching the brothers in this way, “Unless you are circumcised according to the law of Moses, you cannot be saved.” Because of this there was trouble, and Paul and Barnabas had fierce arguments with them. For Paul told the people to remain as they were when they became believers.

Finally those who had come from Jerusalem suggested that Paul and Barnabas and some others go up to Jerusalem to discuss the matter with the apostles and elders. Then the apostles and elders, together with the whole Church decided to choose representatives from among them to send to Antioch with Paul and Barnabas.

These were Judas, known as Barsabbas, and Silas, both leading men among the brothers. They took with them the following letter : ‘Greetings from the apostles and elders, your brothers, to the believers of non-Jewish birth in Antioch, Syria, and Cilicia. We have heard that some persons from among us have worried you with their discussions and troubled your peace of mind. They were not appointed by us.”

“But now, it has seemed right to us in an assembly, to choose representatives and to send them to you, along with our beloved Barnabas and Paul, who have dedicated their lives to the service of our Lord Jesus Christ. We send you then Judas and Silas who themselves will give you these instructions by word of mouth.”

“We, with the Holy Spirit, have decided not to put any other burden on you except what is necessary : You are to abstain from blood, from the meat of strangled animals, and from prohibited marriages. If you keep yourselves from these, you will do well. Farewell.”

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Saturday, 4 May 2013 : 5th Week of Easter (First Reading)

Acts 16 : 1-10

Paul travelled on to Derbe and then to Lystra. A disciple named Timothy lived there, whose mother was a believer of Jewish origin but whose father was a Greek. As the believers at Lystra and Iconium spoke well of him, Paul wanted Timothy to accompany him.

So he took him and, because of the Jews of that place who all knew that his father was a Greek, he circumcised him. As they travelled from town to town, they delivered the decisions of the apostles and elders in Jerusalem, for the people to obey. Meanwhile, the churches grew stronger in faith and increased in number every day.

They travelled through Phrygia and Galatia, because they had been prevented by the Holy Spirit from preaching the message in the province of Asia. When they came to Mysia, they tried to go on to Bithynia, but the Spirit of Jesus did not allow them to do this. So, passing by Mysia, they went down to Troas.

There one night Paul had a vision. A Macedonian stood before him and begged him, “Come over to Macedonia and help us!” When he awoke, he told us of this vision and we understood that the Lord was calling us to give the Good News to the Macedonian people.

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Tuesday, 30 April 2013 : 5th Week of Easter, Memorial of St. Pius V, Pope (Scripture Reflection)

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, the path to the service to God is not easy, and there will be many obstacles, but the Lord Himself will aid us in our great service to Him, through various ways, and He will never abandon us. He had shown His faith to us many times, especially to all those who love Him back too.

He gives all of us His peace, that is an everlasting peace, not the peace as we know it in this world, which is superficial peace, but true peace that transcends all our understandings, and all that we know about peace. For when we are together with Christ, we experience such a great joy and satisfaction that only God can give. This is the true peace that Christ gives us, if we would just believe in Him and put our trust entirely in Him.

Christ is always with us, even though we may think that He is no longer there. He is always with us, in our hearts, with us, and He walks with us, especially at the hardest times of our lives, when He is there, supporting us, and protecting all of us whom He loves, from harm and evil. Then let me tell you the well known story of the lone man and the Lord who walked together on the beach, and the footsteps on the sand.

A man walked on the beach with the Lord, walking side-by-side on the sandy beach, leaving their footprints behind. There are therefore two set of footprints on the sand, one of which belongs to the man, and the other which belongs to the Lord. All is fine until difficult times face the man, who then looked back at the sand, and saw only a single set of footsteps.

He then began saying bad things about the Lord and complained at how God has abandoned him in the times of his greatest need, and at bad times. But the Lord was not angry with him, and instead tell the man gently, that whenever the man is in bad times, there are only a single set of footsteps, not because God has abandoned him, but it is because God carries the man on His back, and that footsteps is the Lord’s.

My dear brothers and sisters in Christ, our God, our Lord loves us, very much, so much that He wanted to come down to us, to be human like us, and to be simple and humble servant of God’s children, and to suffer the ultimate suffering and death on the cross. The suffering of Christ is real, and the cross is real, for through the cross, we have been removed from death that is our due, because of our ancestors’ and our rebellion against the love of God.

We had been ransomed from death by the blood of the Lamb, who is Christ, and through His resurrection by God His Father, and our Father, He restored us to life, and promised, and indeed granted all of us who believe in Him, eternal life, that is true life that is of Christ, and with Christ, and in Christ, in complete and perfect union with Him who is the way, the truth, and the life.

Just as the cross is real, the resurrected and Risen Lord is real too, and it is in His resurrection that we placed our complete faith, that through Him we are redeemed and chosen by God to live forever in eternal bliss in His love.

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, our mission today is to continue the works of the holy Apostles and disciples of the Lord, that through us, the Good News of our Lord will continue to spread and reach many, especially those who did not yet have the chance to receive the message, and those to whom the Word of God had been an annoyance.

Never give up to spread the Good News, to all people, to all nations. We have to persevere for the sake of the salvation of our brethren, our fellow brothers, children of the same, One True, and real God. God walks among us today, and He is within us. His real Presence in the Eucharist that we receive in the Mass allow Him to make our own beings into His Holy Temples, where He resides, and through Him, we receive the Holy Spirit that empowers us.

Be renewed by the Holy Spirit, and by the great zeal for the love for God and all His people. Today we also commemorate the feast day of Pope St. Pius V, a great reformer of the Church, who lived at the difficult times of the early modern era Church, when the Church was assailed by multiple opponents and difficulties, from the Protestant ‘reformers’ and from the Muslim threat of the growing Ottoman Empire. Many true Christians and children of God were martyred during these difficult and turbulent times.

Yet Pope St. Pius V did not give up, and he continued to persevere, with complete trust in the divine providence, to whom He entrusted the Church of God, and eventually God showed that He indeed supported the Church, just like how the Lord supported the man in his difficult times, that he only saw a single set of footsteps. And therefore, the Lord walks with the Church, and He protected the Church of God through that difficult time, and eventually the Christians scored a major victory against the Muslim Ottomans at Lepanto, and crushed their oppression on many Christians forevermore, which Pope St. Pius V commemorated by establishing the feast of Our Lady of the Rosary.

Many souls too returned to salvation through the Church, and many returned to the true faith in God. Through his completion of the Counter-Reformation reforms and the Council of Trent, he helped to rejuvenate the Church and return the faith into a strong and glorious position once again.

Therefore, dear brothers and sisters in Christ, let us remember today, that our God is with us, and that He loves us, and He will always want to protect us, if we remain faithful to Him. Be faithful, and be courageous, and let God do wonders with our life. Let us follow in the courageous examples of Pope St. Pius V, that we can also be light to the nations, to be like the disciples of Christ, to bring the Good News and salvation to all mankind. Pope St. Pius V, pray for us. Amen.

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Monday, 29 April 2013 : 5th Week of Easter, Memorial of St. Catherine of Siena, Virgin and Doctor (Gospel Reading)

John 14 : 21-26

“Whoever keeps My commandments is the one who loves Me. If he loves Me, He will also be loved by My Father; I too shall love Him and show Myself clearly to Him.”

Judas – not Judas Iscariot – asked Jesus, “Lord, how can it be that You will show Yourself clearly to us and not to the world?” Jesus answered him, “If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word and My Father will love him; and we will come to him and make a room in his home.”

“But if anyone does not love Me; he will not keep My words; and these words that you hear are not Mine, but the Father’s who sent Me. I told you all this while I was still with you. From now on the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My Name, will teach you all things, and remind you of all that I have told you.”

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Saturday, 27 April 2013 : 4th Week of Easter (First Reading)

Acts 13 : 44-52

The following Sabbath almost the entire city gathered to listen to Paul, who spoke a fairly long time about the Lord. But the presence of such a crowd made the Jews jealous. So they began to oppose with insults whatever Paul said.

Then Paul and Barnabas spoke out firmly, saying, “It was necessary that God’s word be first proclaimed to you, but since you now reject it and judge yourselves to be unworthy of eternal life, we turn to non-Jewish people. For thus we were commanded by the Lord : ‘I have set you as a light to the pagan nations, so that you may bring My salvation to the ends of the earth.’

Those who were not Jews rejoiced when they heard this and praised the message of the Lord, and all those destined for everlasting life believed in it. Thus the Word spread throughout the whole region.

Some of the Jews, however, incited God-fearing women of the upper class and the leading men of the city, as well, and stirred up an intense persecution against Paul and Barnabas. Finally they had them expelled from their region.

The apostles shook the dust from their feet in protest against this people and went to Iconium, leaving the disciples filled with joy and Holy Spirit.

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Thursday, 25 April 2013 : 4th Week of Easter, Feast of St. Mark the Evangelist (Scripture Reflection)

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, today we commemorate the feast day of one of the greatest pillars of our Church and our faith. For without him, we would be missing one of the four Gospels, that is the Gospel of Mark. St. Mark was not part of the Twelve originally chosen by Christ, but he was mentored by the apostles, especially St. Paul, and later on wrote one of the four Gospels inspired by the Holy Spirit.

St. Mark established the Church in Alexandria, then capital of Egypt, and from there the faith blossomed in Egypt and throughout the eastern Mediterranean, establishing the strong base from which much of the Church was born from. He became the first bishop of Alexandria, and from him, came a long series of bishops and later Patriarchs of Alexandria, the most important descendant of which is what we today know as the Coptic Orthodox Church, our brethren in faith.

The Gospel of St. Mark, although at sixteen chapters may be the shortest of the four Gospels, but was full with fundamental truths about the mission of Christ and His nature as our Messiah and our Lord. It is also the earliest written Gospel of the four. Mark concentrated on the nature of Christ as the Messiah who suffer, who suffer persecution and later death, and yet was raised again in glory for the salvation of mankind.

In today’s Gospel reading taken from the last chapter of Mark’s Gospel, Jesus commanded His disciples to go make disciples of all the nations, to spread the Good News to all mankind, to the ends of the earth. He gave this mission to the disciples, to spread all the teachings He had given and said to the apostles during His life on this world, and through the Gospels, all the nations would hear the Good News of the Lord, and believe in the One whom God the Father had sent.

Jesus’ mission is still relevant to us today. Even though the faith in our Lord had been indeed spread throughout the world to the ends of earth, but today, there is an even greater need for more people to take up the mission to become evangelisers of the Lord’s message. Let us take up that mission and follow the example of the Evangelists like St. Mark. And just like St. Mark, who wrote the Gospel, and also preached the Good News with his fellow brethren at the time, there are just many ways to evangelise to other people.

Evangelisation does not just mean speeches, speeches, and talks. Yes, words of mouth are important, and people do tend to listen to speeches and words, but remember that not everyone is endowed with good ability of speech. Yes, the Holy Spirit would provide and would give us the strength and courage indeed to tell the people of the Good News, but evangelisation can also be done through action, through simple gestures and works, and we will not even need to venture far to evangelise.

Simply look around us, at our own family, our parents, our siblings, and our children. Even among our friends, there are bound to be ample opportunities for evangelisation to occur. There are many even among those who are faithful to God, who had been lax in their faith, and who became ‘Sunday Catholics’. Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, we have the power given to us by the Holy Spirit, to make a difference in the lives of our fellow men. Let us not let it go to waste, and utilise the gift of the Holy Spirit which the Lord has passed down to the Apostles, and from them, through our priests, to us.

We are called to be the messenger of the Lord’s message, and as disciples and servants of our God. Let us go forth and bring forth the light of Christ in this darkened world of ours. Beginning from those near to us, to all the nations till the ends of the earth. St. Mark the Evangelist, and the holy Apostles and saints of God, pray for us. Amen.

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Thursday, 25 April 2013 : 4th Week of Easter, Feast of St. Mark the Evangelist (Gospel Reading)

Mark 16 : 15-20

Then He told them, “Go out to the whole world and proclaim the Good News to all creation. The one who believes and is baptised will be saved; the one who refuse to believe will be condemned. Signs like these will accompany those who have believed : in My Name they will cast out demons and speak new languages; they will pick up snakes, and if they drink anything poisonous, they will be unharmed; they will lay their hands on the sick, and they will be healed.”

So then, after speaking to them, the Lord Jesus was taken up into heaven and took His place at the right hand of God. The Eleven went forth and preached everywhere, while the Lord worked with them and confirmed the message by the signs that accompanied it.

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Wednesday, 24 April 2013 : 4th Week of Easter, Memorial of St. Fidelis of Sigmaringen, Priest and Martyr (First Reading)

Acts 12 : 24 – Acts 13 : 5a

Meanwhile the word of God was increasing and spreading. Barnabas and Saul carried out their mission and then came back to Jerusalem, taking with them John, also called Mark.

There were at Antioch – in the Church which was there – prophets and teachers : Barnabas, Symeon known as Niger, Lucius of Cyrene, Manaen who had been brought up with Herod, and Saul. On one occasion while they were celebrating the Lord and fasting, the Holy Spirit said to them, “Set apart for Me, Barnabas and Saul to do the work for which I have called them.”

So, after fasting and praying, they laid their hands on them and sent them off. These then, sent by the Holy Spirit, went down to the port of Seleucia and from there sailed to Cyprus. Upon their arrival in Salamis they proclaimed the word of God in the Jewish synagogue.

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Tuesday, 23 April 2013 : 4th Week of Easter, Memorial of St. Adalbert, Bishop and Martyr (Scripture Reflection)

The Church is growing, in just barely years after the death and resurrection of Christ our Lord, the number of Christians grew exponentially. They were called Christians because they were of Christ, because they declared the life and death of Christ, and His resurrection, that brought hope of salvation to all mankind, that all who believe in Him may be saved.

Christians are unique because we believe in God, in a sacred and Holy Trinity, of God the Father, Jesus the Son, and the Holy Spirit, in an indivisible union of the Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit. One God undivided with three natures, that complements one another, each being perfect on their own. We believe in Christ and in His teachings, because He came from the Father, and being the Son, He is one with the Father.

Now that Christ had risen from the dead, and liberated all mankind from the slavery of sin by Satan, and that He has returned to the Father, we can no longer see Him physically in this world, and yet, Christ’s presence is unmistakably clear in our world today, that despite the world’s hatred for Christ and His truth, He remained in our world ever since the day of the apostles, through the teachings that the apostles passed down to us through our priests and the ministers of the Lord’s Gospel.

We believed in Christ because of His good works and His ultimate work for the sake of us, that is His death on the cross. Had He not been of God, and one with God, His sacrifice would have been in vain, since the blood of mortal man has no power to save mankind from their fate of death, for having rebelled against the Lord, but because Christ is of God, and is God, His death made us all worthy of God by the shedding of the Precious Blood of the Lamb of God.

God our Father had given us all to Christ His Son, and as He Himself has said that no one that the Father has given Him was lost, and therefore, we, who had been saved, if we remain faithful to God and Christ His Son, we will gain eternal life in heaven with God. It is this promise of redemption and salvation that gave so many people a new reason for their life, and a new impetus for life, a new sense of purpose that drove them to embrace the Lord.

For without the Lord, we are nothing, and without the Lord we are empty. That is why our bodies, without a good soul anchored in the Lord, is just an empty husk of flesh, and a soul without God in it, is an empty and meaningless soul. God who gave us life through the Spirit He breathed into us when He created us made us perfect only if we keep Him always in our hearts.

Too often we forget about the Lord, and went on about our daily lives and schedules, and in the noisy world of our lives, we simply shut the Lord out, shut His soft whispers and words, and instead, involved ourselves with worldly distractions and desires, instead of listening to the Lord. No, this should not be the way. We should always keep the Lord at the centre of our lives, and put our ears, our minds, and our hearts ever ready to listen to Him and what His will is.

Today, we also commemorate the feast day of St. Adalbert, a bishop, and a martyr, who lived in the late first millennium, and who was martyred in his attempts to convert the pagans in Prussia. He converted many in Poland, Hungary, and the Baltic nations, bringing to many pagan peoples, the true faith and light of Christ, that many received salvation through the tireless preaching of St. Adalbert. He tirelessly worked for the sake of Christ, and spread the Gospel in many mission areas in Central and Eastern Europe, and did not show fear against the pagans and their beliefs. He was martyred for standing fast to his faith in Christ, in his attempts to bring Christ to them.

Therefore, dear brothers and sisters in Christ, let us return to the Lord, and place Him into the most important part of our lives once again, and that when the hectic schedules of our daily lives begin to take over us, let us remember to take a step back and remember the Lord, and keep Him always in our mind.

Do not let this world and its temptations deviate us from our true path, that is towards God. May God almighty strengthen us and our faith in Him, and allow us to listen at all times to His will, He who is our Good Shepherd, He who has chosen us and made us worthy, and He who had died for the sake of all of us. Let us follow the example of St. Adalbert, who worked hard and ceaselessly for the sake of God and the spreading of his Good News. Through his efforts, many who were chosen by God were saved. St. Adalbert, pray for all of us, and may God bless us all. Amen.

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Tuesday, 23 April 2013 : 4th Week of Easter, Memorial of St. Adalbert, Bishop and Martyr (First Reading)

Acts 11 : 19-26

Those who had been scattered because of the persecution over Stephen travelled as far as Phoenicia, Cyprus, and Antioch, telling the message, but only to the Jews. But there were some natives of Cyprus and Cyrene among them who, on coming into Antioch, spoke also to the Greeks, giving them the Good News of the Lord Jesus. The hand of the Lord was with them so that a great number believed and turned to the Lord.

News of this reached the ears of the Church in Jerusalem, so they sent Barnabas to Antioch. When he arrived and saw the manifest signs of God’s favour, he rejoiced and urged them all to remain firmly faithful to the Lord; for he himself was a good man filled with Holy Spirit and faith. Thus large crowds came to know the Lord.

Then Barnabas went off to Tarsus to look for Saul and when he found him, he brought him to Antioch. For a whole year they had meetings with the Church and instructed many people. It was in Antioch that the disciples were first called Christians.