Lenten Homily

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Tuesday, 14 March 2017 : 2nd Week of Lent (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : Purple/Violet
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, on this day all of us are reminded that in all that we do in this life, in all that we say, we must be humble and be righteous, and our faith in God must be genuine. All of us Christians are expected to have these virtues with them, so as to be truly devoted to God. Our actions, our hearts, and our entire being must be attuned to the Lord.

We are reminded that we should not be like the Pharisees and the teachers of the Law who preached in one way, but practiced what they preached differently from how they have preached. In other words, they have contradicted themselves and what they said by their actions which did not reflect the words that they have spoken. They were hypocrites who did not truly believe in God, and God warned His people, all of us against following their examples.

They have not been faithful and they misused the authority which God had entrusted to them, by misleading the people and by condemning those who had come to them seeking forgiveness that came from God. They glorified themselves and sought self-satisfaction, fame and human praise, and God rebuked them for all of their waywardness.

For all of their supposed piety, their long prayers and public shows of their faith, parading before the people their piety, they were not actually serving the purpose of the Lord, but instead cared only about themselves. God had no place in their hearts, for their ego had prevented them from doing what was truly righteous and just in the sight of God. This is what all of us need to take note of, lest we also fall to the same predicament.

Now the question should come to our minds, what is the meaning of being righteous? Is being righteous equivalent to doing what the Pharisees had done, such as saying long prayers, acting good and pious before others, doing external acts of penance and abstinence? Well, doing all these things are good and they are certainly not wrong. But to be excessively focused on them and ignoring the true meaning of our faith is not something that we should do.

What does this mean? It means that whatever we do, all the things we say and do, we must do because we love the Lord our God, and let all of our actions bring glory not to ourselves but to the Lord, for we have to realise that, despite all the achievements and the greatness we mankind may accumulate in this world, all the wealth and possessions we have, we are truly nothing without the Lord our God.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, in this time and season of Lent, it is appropriate for us to spend some time to reflect on our actions, and how we spend our time during this season of penance and forgiveness. We know that we need to fast on certain days, namely on Ash Wednesday and Good Friday, and also abstain from red meat during the season and also on Fridays throughout the year, but are we doing them just because we were told to do so? Or is it because we are just going through the motions without understanding them?

It is time for us to reflect, and ask ourselves the important question, is God at the centre of our lives? Is He the reason why we live our lives in the way that we have lived them? Has He been the reason for our actions and deeds, which bring about true righteousness and justification? Or have we rather been driven by personal reasons and desires, or by ignorance and lack of understanding of our faith?

Let us all renew our commitment to the Lord this Lent, that by the time and opportunities which He had given to all of us, we may be able to draw closer to Him, and make our observances, of fasting, of abstinence, of penance, of almsgiving and all the other good and pious deeds we have carried out this season of Lent, may become more meaningful and fruitful for the sake of our justification and salvation.

May the Lord help us to live our lives more meaningfully, by making us more and more like Him in our ways, and through His dwelling in our hearts, may He transform us completely, in body, heart, mind and soul, in our whole being, to become truly His disciples, His beloved children, and those whom He had saved from the darkness of our past sins and wickedness. May God bless us all, now and forevermore. Amen.

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Monday, 13 March 2017 : 2nd Week of Lent, 4th Anniversary of the Election of Pope Francis, Vicar of Christ, Supreme Pontiff and Bishop of Rome (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : Purple
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, in today’s Scripture readings we are all reminded both of our sinfulness and also of God’s mercy, which He extends to all of His beloved children. We have sinned before the Lord, disobeying His commandments and walked away from the path which He had shown us, in pursuit of our worldly glory and other things that kept us away from Him.

But God loves each and every one of us, so much that He was willing to forgive us and He wants to welcome us back into His presence, because He is indeed merciful and filled with compassion and pity for us. He will bless us and receive us back in grace, just as He had promised us through Jesus His Son, as we heard in our Gospel passage today.

Nevertheless, we have to remember the fact that, while God is merciful, and while He extends His mercy and love freely to all of His people, but whether His mercy works on us depends solely on whether we accept that mercy, and open the doors of our hearts to welcome God and allow Him to enter into our hearts and exercise His grace of mercy in us, transforming us from the sinners that we are into people of the light.

We have hardened our hearts against God, and we did not allow God to enter into our hearts. We shut Him out and drown ourselves in our many busy dealings and concerns of the world, that we were not even able to listen to Him speaking to us in the depths of our hearts, calling us to repent from our sins and to be reconciled with Him. This is the problem that many if not most of us are facing, and the reason why many people were still incapable of reaching God’s mercy and forgiveness.

We should look upon the example of the prophet Daniel, who in our first reading today was humbly petitioning God, exposing before Him the sins of all the people who have disobeyed His commandments and were wayward in their ways. He has admitted on behalf of the people, the sins which they had committed, which brought a great shame to them, unworthy to even call God their Lord and Master.

It is this kind of humility and acceptance of one’s own sinfulness that allows God to exercise His forgiveness and mercy among us. Many of us do not only harden our hearts in pride before the Lord, but we also deny our sins, thinking that we could not have done wrong in our lives, or that we are thinking that those sins were inconsequential. We were wrong if we think in that manner, brothers and sisters, for sin, even the smallest among all forms of sin, are abhorred by God.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, in this season of Lent, as we continue to progress through this special time for repentance and forgiveness, let us all reflect deeply into our lives. Let us all commit ourselves anew to the Lord our God, promising Him that we will no longer sin as we had done before, but instead willingly embrace His love and mercy, opening the doors of our hearts to welcome Him.

Let us work conscientiously to restrain ourselves, our pride, our desire and all the temptations to sin which had led us astray. Let us use this time and opportunity that God had granted to us in order to work towards our redemption and salvation in God. It is time for us to turn our back against our old ways of sin, and to begin anew in faith in the Lord. This is what we must do, so that we will be worthy of God’s forgiveness, so that while we are sinners, but God will absolve from us our sins, and transform us into righteous people in His presence.

May the Lord bless us all and help us to go through this season of Lent filled with joy knowing that we have the hope of forgiveness and everlasting life by what He had promised us all who remain true and faithful to Him. Let us humbly seek Him with repentance and regret for all of our past transgressions and sins. May God forgive us all our sins and bring us to the glory of the everlasting life. Amen.

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Saturday, 11 March 2017 : 1st Week of Lent (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : Purple/Violet
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, on this day each and every one of us are reminded that as Christians, we have the obligation to love one another, and foremost of all, to love God with all of our hearts, with all of our strengths and might. This is what God had commanded us to do, and which we must do wholeheartedly and sincerely in our daily lives.

It is the heart and the true purpose of the Law of God. God has loved us so much that He wants us all to be like Himself, to be like Him Who is love. And His love is perfect and impartial, and He gives His love freely to all. And therefore, because God is love, so therefore His Law is also the Law of love. He has given His laws to His people so that through these laws, they may learn about love, and also how to love sincerely with their hearts.

But as the time went on, many misunderstood and misinterpreted God’s laws. They used them for their own purposes, to advance their own causes and to gain advantages for themselves. This is what the Pharisees and the teachers of the Law had done. Instead of bringing love to the people of God, the laws of the Lord became a source of burden and difficulty for the people, for they had been applied without proper understanding of its true meaning and intent.

And many took the laws and commandments of God at its face value, not realising and appreciating what these laws are truly about. The first and most important of all the commandments that God had given us His people is truly very basic and very simple, that all of us have to love God with all of our might, with all of our strength and conviction, and with our entire and whole beings. It is to follow in what God had first done unto us, giving us His unconditional love by creating us out of love for us, and by granting us His grace of life and His love.

Many of us in the world today love in the way that is not in accordance with what the Lord had taught us to do. We love because we often seek returns from the love which we have given. We love others because we know that those people will love us back and give us back in return what we have given them first, and sometimes we even demand that more should be returned to us than what we give.

That is what happened to our society and communities today, even in the love present between our families and our couples in marriages. We love because it is a conditional and transactional love, desiring for reward and returns on what we have done. This is why we have also become overly engrossed with appearances, with external beauty, desiring pleasures of the flesh, improper sexual conducts, and all the things which led to the perversion of love.

Do we all realise that when we do all these, what we have in us is not love? It is in fact desire and human greed that we have in us, loving only ourselves and caring only for our own needs. It is this selfish love and caring for oneself that had led to the breakdown of many relationships and families, and at the same time, distancing ourselves from the Lord our God.

In the Gospel passage today, all of us as Christians are challenged to overcome this status quo. We are all challenged to break free from this habit of selfishness and greed. We are all called to follow none other than the Lord our God Himself in His examples, in how He has loved us all unconditionally. And what better example there is than the loving sacrifice of Christ?

In this time and season of Lent, we are all called to reflect on the examples of Christ, Who has loved all of His beloved people, and most importantly, as He Himself said in the Gospel today, that true love, and indeed Christian love, is to love all others unconditionally and without desire for returns or rewards. And this includes loving even all those who do not love us, all those who have hurt us and hated us.

And above all else, Christ has Himself done what He had preached, loving all His enemies, forgiving them even from the cross, as He was hung on it dying from His suffering. He forgave all of them from their sins and all that they had inflicted on Him. Are we able to love in the same manner as Christ our Lord had loved? This is a challenge that all of us as Christians should take up on during this time of Lent.

Let us all reflect on this, brothers and sisters in Christ. Let us think in what way we are able to obey the Lord more faithfully by following the examples of our Lord Jesus Christ, Who had shown us all how to love and how to obey the Lord and His will. He Himself had obeyed His Father to the very end, and therefore, all of us who believe in Him ought to do the same as well.

May this season of Lent be truly a time of conversion for us, that all of us who have once been unloving, wicked and selfish may be turned into loving, forgiving and compassionate children of God our Father, following His examples in being selfless and true in our love for each other, just as how we love Him with all of our hearts, minds and strengths. God bless us all. Amen.

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Friday, 10 March 2017 : 1st Week of Lent (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : Purple/Violet
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, on this day we are all reminded by the passages from the Sacred Scriptures that while righteous and good deeds bring about justification and salvation in God, wickedness and evil deeds, sins in whatever forms they are, bring about destruction and condemnation for even the smallest of sins has no place in the presence of our God.

This is particularly fitting considering that this season of Lent that we are going through now is a season of repentance, of forgiveness for our sins, and of a renewal of hearts and minds. It is a time for us to reevaluate our lives, our actions, words and deeds. It is a time for us to ask ourselves, have we been justified in our actions, and have we been worthy through all of our deeds? Or have we instead done what is abhorrent and wicked in the presence of God?

All of these are reminders for us, as we live through our lives, lest that we forget and fall astray into sin and darkness. It is very easy for us to fall into temptations to sin, and as a result, fall into sin and become corrupted in heart, mind and soul. In the first reading today, taken from the Book of the prophet Ezekiel, we are reminded that even the righteous ones can fall into sin, and by the corruption of their sins, they will be judged.

This is an important reminder that we all need to be constantly be vigilant against the lures of sin, and we cannot be complacent in our faith and in our lives. It does not mean that if we have become Christians, then we are safe and certain in our struggle against sin. Sin can come back and afflict us at any time whenever we are unprepared and lacking in vigilance.

That is precisely why we practice fasting and abstinence during this season of Lent. Through fasting and abstinence, we restrain ourselves, our desires and the desires of our flesh, the vulnerabilities of our hearts and minds, so that we may resist the temptation to sin and to do whatever is not right in the sight of God and men alike. We do not fast and abstain to be seen and to be praised by others around us. On the other hand, we fast and abstain because we want to free ourselves from the lures of the sins that are surrounding us.

Discipline is very important in our lives and in our faith. We must have that rigour and commitment in doing what is right and just in the sight of God. It is normal for us to endure temptations and the pull to do what are contrary to the ways of the Lord, but if we try our best and resist, we will certainly be able to remain truly good and righteous despite all the forces of those who are arrayed against us.

On the other hand, we are also reminded that God is ever full of mercy, compassion, love and forgiveness. He will not abandon His beloved people to the darkness, and He will not let sinners to perish without ever having the hope of reconciliation and reunion with Him. That is why in the same passage from the Book of the prophet Ezekiel, God also gives hope to all those who have sinned, which is truly all of us mankind, that if only we turn away from our sins, we will be saved.

In this season of Lent, all of us sinners are called to repentance and redemption in God. All of us are called to turn our back to sin, to all the things which we have committed, all the wicked actions and deeds we have done. We are all called to do penance before God and men alike, doing deeds and actions that are good, as a penance for all of our sins, and as a sign that we have truly regretted our sins and genuinely desiring forgiveness from God.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, let us all during this time and opportunity given to us by God, turn towards Him and commit ourselves anew to Him. Let us no longer sin and resist the temptation to sin. Let us throw away our pride, our arrogance, our selfishness and all the things that have separated us from God. Let us help one another to persevere in our journey, so that all of us will remain to be true to our faith in God, and we remain worthy of Him to the end of it all, when God will glorify all those who have kept their faith in Him.

May God bless us all and be with us in our daily lives, and may all of us through this holy and penitential season of Lent find a renewal in our faith. Let us draw closer to God, and let us always walk in His ways, holy and blessed, all the days of our lives. Amen.

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Thursday, 9 March 2017 : 1st Week of Lent, Memorial of St. Frances of Rome (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : Purple/Violet
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, on this day we heard from the Scriptures firstly about the tale of Queen Esther of Persia, a Jewish woman who during the time of the exile managed to gain the favour of the Persian ruler and was made as his Queen. At that time, the Jewish people were scattered throughout the Empire of the Persians, and while some of them had returned to the Promised Land, but many were still around in other places.

There were many people who resented the Jewish people, for they were different from all the other people. While the other people worshipped many gods and did not have laws guiding their morality and behaviour, the Jewish people after the time of the exile worshipped the Lord, the one and only God as their Lord, and they followed again the laws of their ancestors as it was in the time of Moses.

At that time, Haman the Amalekite, a sworn enemy of the Israelites plotted harm and destruction upon the entire race of Israel, using the connections he had with the Persian ruler to bring about harm to the whole people of Israel. Haman brought about what in his mind is the sure annihilation of the entire people of God, but through Esther the Queen, God in His own mysterious ways had brought His salvation to His people.

Esther prayed wholeheartedly before God in today’s first reading. She humbled herself, fasted and fervently asking God to intercede for the sake of His people. She poured out her heart’s concerns and asked God to help with the predicament that was befalling her people, the Israelites, facing sure destruction and annihilation by the plotting of their enemies

This is what Jesus mentioned in our Gospel passage today, that we need only to ask, and we shall receive; seek, and we shall find; knock and the door will be opened to us. In that passage, Jesus told us about the love which God our Father has for all of His people, His children, everyone whom God had created out of His love. As a loving Father, He will help us and will bless us in whatever way He can, and He will not abandon us in our time of need.

During times of difficulty and persecution, some of us may be wondering, why is it that God remain silent and seemingly did nothing in order to help us. But we have to realise that God is always with us, and He is always there for us, even when we are unable to see Him or when we do not realise that He is there with us. God never abandons us, even when we have often abandoned Him.

Eventually, Queen Esther’s prayers together with that of Mordecai, her uncle’s prayers, as well as the prayers and petitions of the people were heard, and God exercised His power, protecting all those whom He loved, and through Esther, God reversed all those that the enemies of God’s people intended to befall the people of God unto themselves. He rescued all of them and brought them out of their predicament.

Today, all of us also celebrate the feast day of St. Frances of Rome, a holy and devout woman living during the Medieval era Italy, a renowned member of the Benedictine religious order, being a Benedictine oblate member and well known for her extensive charitable activities among the people who were poor, sick and suffering in her community and society.

St. Frances of Rome devoted herself thoroughly and wholeheartedly to help those who were suffering in her community, even though she herself also suffered a lot during her time in this world, having lost her family members to the difficulties and challenges of the world, to diseases and wars. But she placed her complete trust in the Lord, and she did not let her sorrows to overcome her, but instead, using the experiences to keep her going on in life.

The examples of St. Frances of Rome reminds each and every one of us that when we suffer and face anguish and despair, God is always with us. He is suffering together with us, bearing our crosses together with His. After all, He had borne all the burdens of our sins upon Himself, so that through what He had done, dutifully and obediently to the will of God His Father, all of us may be saved.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, let us all during this time of Lent strengthen our faith and devotion to God, so that despite all the difficulties and challenges we may face in life, we will not succumb to despair and temptation. Let us all trust the Lord our God, Who will help us in our time of need, and Who will strengthen and empower us in our moments of weakness. O Lord, our God, have mercy on us and show Your love to Your people. Amen.

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Wednesday, 8 March 2017 : 1st Week of Lent, Memorial of St. John of God, Religious (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : Purple/Violet
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, on this day we listened from the Scriptures the reading from the Book of the prophet Jonah as our first reading. In that passage we heard how Jonah was sent to the city of Nineveh, then the capital of the great Assyrian Empire, the conqueror of the northern kingdom of Israel and also of many other nations, to proclaim God’s sentence of destruction upon that city and all those who lived in it, because God was angry at their sins and wickedness.

Jonah proclaimed the decree of the Lord in the streets of Nineveh, and many people heard it, and they believed in him. Even the Assyrian king also believed in him, and immediately ordered all of his servants and subordinates to proclaim a great fast and penitential actions throughout the entire city. The whole population, from the king to his nobles and to the lowest of all the people mourned and humbled themselves before God.

They wore sackcloth and stopped all of their merrymaking, the sign of their regret and penance for their sins and wickedness. They hoped that God would change His mind and not destroy them as He had intended. And indeed, God saw what they had done, and God saw the sincerity of their actions, and He held back the punishment that He had intended upon them and did not punish them. The whole city of Nineveh and its entire population was spared from annihilation.

In this all of us have received the assurance from God Himself, that He will not punish those who have desired to seek forgiveness from Him for their sins and mistakes, and He will reconcile all those who have repented from their sins, and welcome them back into His grace and love. God loves each and every one of us, brothers and sisters in Christ, for He is our loving Father and Creator. Will He not forgive us our sins if we sincerely seek Him to forgive us those sins?

This is then contrasted in the Gospel passage today with the occasion when Jesus rebuked the people of Israel to whom He had been sent to, because they had hardened their hearts against the Lord and had not believed in Him when He had performed before them many miraculous signs and wonders, as shown in how they tested Him and doubted Him, asking Him for heavenly signs.

We must be wondering if they were blind or ignorant, considering that if we read through the Gospels, they have witnessed so many good deeds and miracles that Jesus had performed among them, with the sick, healing the blind and the deaf, opening their eyes and ears, making mute people talk, casting out demons and evil spirits from the possessed, even making dead people to return to life. All these things are deeds that no man can do, and which only God is able to do, and yet, despite the undeniable facts, they refused to believe.

The Pharisees and the teachers of the Law, first of all, refused to believe in Jesus despite being arguably the ones who witnessed the most of the miracles which Jesus had performed in this world. They in fact even persecuted Him and accused Him of wrongdoing just because He went to people like the tax collectors and prostitutes, who they deemed as sinful people, as those who were unclean and wicked, unworthy of God’s salvation.

But they failed to see that these people desired to be saved, and they humbled themselves before God, admitting to all their sinfulness and openly rebuking themselves from their sins, just as Zaccheus the tax collector had done before Jesus and the people who were with them. And they repented in the same manner as the people of Nineveh had done, and as a result, they received the forgiveness from God, and they were indeed ahead of the Pharisees and the rest of the people on their way towards the salvation in God.

Those who would not repent, who refused the offer of God’s mercy, doubted His truth and questioned His authority will not be forgiven from their sins. For the fundamental truth and reality remains that while God is rich in His mercy and generous in His love, but there will be no mercy, forgiveness and love if we His people reject His offer of mercy and love.

A genuine repentance is required, that we should all turn away from our sins. This is the message which the Church keeps on reminding us throughout this penitential season of Lent, a time of forgiveness, a time for repentance, and a time to turn ourselves away from our sins and to return wholeheartedly to the Lord our God. It is a time for us to reject our sinful past and embrace a new future in the Lord.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, today we should also follow in the examples of the holy saint, St. John of God, a holy religious whose life was an inspiration for many, so that we may know how we can be better Christians, and through this time of Lent, we may be converted to the way of the Lord and abandon our ways of sin. St. John of God was once an orphan, who turned into a soldier in the military and would later on turn to become a selfless carer of many people who were sick both physically and spiritually.

St. John of God was born into a poor family and lost his family at a young age. Orphaned at that young age, he joined the military and became a soldier fighting in wars common at that time. But he was disillusioned with the life that he had, both as a soldier and later on as he was discharged from the military after he had been wrongly accused of a crime that he did not commit.

Eventually he was converted to the faith after having listened to the sermon of St. John of Avila, calling all the people of God to give up on their sinful ways of life, chastising themselves and repenting genuinely before God seeking for forgiveness, and that was what he actually did at that time. In time to come, he was wholly transformed by the experience, and he became committed to serve the poor and the needy, living a thoroughly loving and charitable Christian life.

He would spend the rest of his life ministering to the sick, the poor and those who were destitute and without hope, and inspiring many others to follow in his own examples, and eventually leading to the formation of the Order of Hospitallers or Brother Hospitallers, committed to serving the people of God in their needs, both physically and spiritually. Many good deeds have been borne out of the works of these pious and devout people, who followed in the footsteps of their founder, St. John of God.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, in the similar way, our lives can also be transformed in the similar manner as how St. John of God had been transformed in his life. All of us are indeed sinners, as all saints were once also. However, saints are made when those sinners acknowledged just how sinful they were, and made the conscious decision and effort to reject those sins and to turn away from those sins, completely back towards the Lord.

Therefore, let us all spend this season of Lent in penance and repentance, turning away from our sins, and doing what is good for others and for God. Let us show mercy and love in all of our actions, and do our best to change our sinfulness into righteousness. Let us open our hearts to welcome God and His mercy, and not be stubborn as the Pharisees and the people at Jesus’ time had been, but repent, as the people of Nineveh had, and then, God will judge us to be righteous and give us the reward of eternal life. May God be with us all. Amen.

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Tuesday, 7 March 2017 : 1st Week of Lent, Memorial of St. Perpetua and St. Felicity, Martyrs (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : Purple/Violet
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, on this day we listened to the words of the Sacred Scriptures speaking to us about prayer and its importance, as well as how we ought to pray to the Lord our God, that is with sincerity and genuine intention, and not to serve our own selfish purposes and desires. Prayer is important for our internal spiritual development, and our relationship with God. And it is important that in this season of Lent, we have a prayerful Lent.

Why is this so? That is because it is quite often that many of us when we pray, we do not truly understand what a prayer really is. We think that prayer is a source of help for us when we are desperate and are in need, and that is where we begin to demand for God to act through our prayers. We make a long list of demands and requests to God, thinking that prayer is a source of help for us, and God will definitely listen to us and accede to our request.

But that is clearly very wrong, brothers and sisters in Christ. God is indeed loving and compassionate, but He is not someone for us to demand something from. He will give us what we need, and what He thinks is right for us, at His own time and at His own will. Many of us when we do not get what we want through prayer, then we become angry at God, and then that is when many of us left God behind, thinking that He was not there for us.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, through prayer all of us should and must come closer to God and grow ever more faithful to Him, but that is when we use prayer not as a medium through which we demand the Lord to do something for our lives, for that is not what prayers are for. What is prayer? In truth prayer is the conversation that we have and which we make with the Lord our God.

And being a conversation, a prayer is a two-way dialogue between us and God. It is often that we do the talking all the time, asking God for things, or bombarding Him with our worries and petitions, but we shut God out from our hearts, because we are too focused on ourselves and our needs. And we failed to realise that in the silence and depth of our hearts, God is speaking to us, revealing to us His will and what it is that He wants from us.

This is where we should emulate the example of the prophet Samuel, whose in his youth was visited by the Lord Who spoke to him in his sleep, calling him to speak to him. Samuel, upon the guidance of his mentor Eli, the Judge, spoke to God, ‘Speak Lord, for Your servant is listening’, and God then spoke to him, revealing His intentions to Samuel. How many of us can follow the example of Samuel, in letting God to come in and speak to us in our hearts? Or are we too busy to even take note that God wants to speak to us?

He wants us to love Him just as He had first loved us. He wants each and every one of us to repent from our sins and change our ways, to learn to forgive each other, as we said in the prayer we learnt from Jesus Himself, that we ask God to ‘forgive our trespasses and sins, just as we have forgiven those who have trespassed and sinned against us.’

Therefore, in this season of Lent, it is important that each and every one of us learn to pray right, to learn how to communicate with God properly through prayer, and how we should live our earthly lives that we may be always filled with grace and God’s love. This is a time of renewal and conversion, a time for reconciliation with our God. Let us all listen to the Lord speaking inside our hearts, and learn to take a brief pause in our hectic daily life, so that we may know what God wants to do with our lives.

Let us perhaps follow in the example of St. Perpetua and St. Felicity, the holy martyrs in the early days of the Church, who were martyred for their faith because they refused to reject the Lord, and despite the temptations to abandon their faith and receive life. St. Perpetua was a noblewoman who became attracted by the Christian faith, in opposition to her father and relatives, who wanted her to reject her newfound faith.

She was arrested and put in prison, and her relatives visited her and persuaded her to abandon her faith so that she could be freed and resumed her old life of privilege, but she refused to do so, and despite many attempts to torture her, all of the methods failed, and no harm would come to her. St. Perpetua was imprisoned along with St. Felicity, a slavewoman who also believed in the Lord, and also some others of the faithful.

When the time came for them to embrace death, they willingly let their earthly lives go, and bravely stood up for their faith to the very end, not hesitating to preserve their earthly existence, but instead becoming role models and examples, inspiration and strength for many other Christians who witnessed and listened to their fates. In the same manner as well, all of us Christians living today can learn from these two holy and venerable women.

This season of Lent is a time for us to reject wickedness and evil ways, to free ourselves from bondage to sin and to all of our worldly concerns, just as St. Perpetua, St. Felicity and their companions had done. It is a time for us to dedicate ourselves anew to the Lord our God, and to turn ourselves completely and fully to Him, and to entrust ourselves wholly to Him.

Indeed, as St. Perpetua and St. Felicity had shown us in their own lives, that there will be difficult and challenging times, when there will be harsh opposition and vicious persecution against all those who have followed the Lord and believed in Him, but if we are to give up and surrender ourselves to the demands of those who seek our downfall, then we will truly perish, but if we persevere, we shall rejoice and receive the eternal glory promised to us by Christ.

Therefore, brothers and sisters in Christ, let us all during this season of Lent commit ourselves to a life of holiness, filled with love and grace. Let us all live a more devoted and holy life, filled with prayer, so that we will not only be ready to celebrate the upcoming Holy Week and Easter season, but even more importantly that we will be ever ready and be ever worthy for the time when the Lord comes again in His glory. Amen.

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Monday, 6 March 2017 : 1st Week of Lent (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : Purple/Violet
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, on this day as we listened to the words of the Scriptures, we are all reminded that as those whom God had chosen to be His own people, much as the Israelites had been, each and every one of us had been bound by His laws and precepts, as first of all God revealed to His people in the desert, which we heard today in the Book of Leviticus, our first reading.

God charged them to be righteous, just and upright in all of their deeds, to be holy just as God Himself is holy, for they are the people of God, and to exercise love, mercy and compassion in all the things that they say and do, and not to cause harm, pain, suffering and anguish for others around them, as what mankind normally always liked to do.

God had called His people from the world, and He sanctified them and made them holy, and He placed His laws before them, so that they would continue to be different from the ways of the world around them. And therefore, all of us have also been called to do the same, to be different from what the world has deemed to be acceptable to it, to be a true and devoted Christian, in all of our deeds.

And indeed, in this season of Lent, it is the perfect time for us to do so, as it is the time for us to take a step back and reflect on our own lives. It is a time for change and conversion, for us to reevaluate our lives and reorientate them so that while once we may have lived in a state of sin, now we may be able to walk righteously and justly in the way of the Lord.

Therefore, during this season of Lent all of us are called to be generous with our love and mercy, to forgive all those who have wronged us and those who have caused us pain and suffering. We are called to share our love and blessings with all those who have little or none of these, that they too may experience the love of God, and enjoy what we all enjoy in this life.

It is a reality that there are many people who suffer in this world today, because of the greed of man, because of jealousy and hatred, because of all the negativities and evil that are present in our hearts. All of them had brought about all the injustice, the evil and the sufferings we know. As Christians, there are many things which we are able to do in order to help others who have no one else to help them.

However, it is also important that we also take note of what our Lord Jesus had told His disciples in our Gospel passage today. In that passage we heard about the famous Last Judgment sermon by the Lord Jesus, Who foretold before all at that time, what would transpire at the moment of the Last Judgment, which we at present are also looking forward to.

In the Last Judgment, those who have been found to be righteous and just in all of their deeds, caring and loving for the poor and for the less fortunate, those who have shown compassion and mercy upon others will receive their reward from God, as those whom God had found to be worthy to be the recipients of His everlasting and glorious inheritance, the blessed eternal life in fullness of bliss with Him.

However, all those whom God had rejected and cast aside because of their sins had been made such, not just because they had committed acts and deeds that were wicked and evil before God, but also when they have the capacity of doing something that is right and good, and then did nothing and remained idle, while others around them were seeking for help and succour from their troubles.

That’s right, brothers and sisters in Christ, sin before God is not just that of the sin of action, but also the sin of omission. What does this mean? It means that if we are perfectly capable of doing something that is right and good, something that will help others around us, and yet we consciously refused to do so, because of various reasons, but all of which are selfish reasons, because we are lazy, because we are doubtful and unwilling to step beyond our comfort zone, then we will be condemned precisely because of our failure to do what is required of us.

Therefore, brothers and sisters in Christ, in this season of Lent, let us make best use of the time given to us, so that we may exercise prudence in our actions, and be moved to do what God had asked us to do. Let us turn our back from our past ways of sin, and embrace God’s forgiveness and mercy, while at the same time being loving and merciful ourselves, extending our helping hands upon others who need our help.

Let us be generous to give of ourselves to the poor, to the lonely, to all those who have been rejected by others, and to all those who are still living in the darkness of sin. Let us help one another, and be the bearers of God’s light in our world today, so that our light may dispel the darkness of sin, and purified from our sins, may we all be worthy to enter into the heavenly kingdom of God, and receive from Him, the crown of everlasting glory. May God be with us all, bless us all in our actions, and help us to have a fulfilling and blessed time of Lent. Amen.

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Sunday, 22 March 2015 : Fifth Sunday of Lent (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : Purple/Violet

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, on this day we celebrate the last Sunday of Lent, the fifth of the five Sundays we celebrate during this Lent. On this day we are presented with what God has done for our sake. He has established with us all a new and everlasting covenant or pact, which binds both us and Himself, and sealed with none other than the worthy Blood of the Lamb, the Lamb of God, that is Jesus Christ our Lord.

While the first covenant of God with men was broken because of our ancestors’ disobedience, when Adam and Eve first disobeyed the Lord by eating the forbidden fruit, mankind had been cast out from the benefits of the covenant which God had forged with them. We were never meant to suffer the consequences of sin and suffering death, as the Lord created us so that He may love us and bless us abundantly, and we were to be loved by Him all the days of our life, living in perfect bliss and harmony in heaven.

But yet, we chose to disobey and in our greed and selfishness, we abandoned the goodness which we were to receive and keep, and instead, for a taste of knowledge, we have chosen to place our lot with the devil who was cast down, cursed and condemned. And so, death becomes a part of our lives, and we become subject to it, mortal and as people rejected by the Lord.

Despite all of this, however, God still loves us all greatly, and by no means that He had abandoned us to death. And that is why, even though He had wiped out most of mankind at the time of Noah because of their wickedness, He had called Noah and his family and saved them through the Ark. Noah and his family were righteous and upright, and therefore they did not deserve death. Those who died in the Flood died because they deserved it.

God made a covenant with Noah, and Noah offered sacrifices on the Mount Ararat where he came out of the Ark after the Flood ended. God placed His bow on the sky, which we now know as the rainbow, as the proof of His covenant and faithfulness to His promise. Have God reneged from His promise since then? No, certainly not. He never used water or flood to destroy mankind once again. And we are reminded of this every time the rain ends and the rainbow appears in the skies above us.

It was us mankind who once again disobeyed Him and rebelled against Him, preferring to follow our own path, succumbing to our desires and our greed. And that was shown at the tower of Babel, where men aspired to be like God and to build a tower surpassing all others and reaching up to heaven. God punished them by confusing their languages and they were not able to satisfy their greed and hubris, and they were all scattered around the world.

But God yet wanted to give them a chance, and He saw in one person, a faith in Him which surpassed all others. And that man was Abram, whom God chose and called from the country of his ancestors, to travel to the land which He intended to give to him if he remained faithful. And indeed, he was faithful, and he followed everything that God had commanded him, and even up to sacrificing and offering his own son, Isaac.

Abram was rewarded for his faith, and not only that God did not take Isaac, as He was only testing his faith, but he was made to be the father of many peoples and many nations. And for even those who are not counted among his descendants, he was made to be their father in faith, for he was counted among those who were the first to show righteousness and faith to God.

God made His covenant with Abram, whom He renamed Abraham as part of that covenant, and Abraham again offered sacrifices of animals as the seal for that covenant, the binding agreement that bound both God and Abraham as well as all of his descendants. But again, his descendants were not faithful to that covenant and agreement. They preferred to go their own path and committed all sorts of wickedness, despite the various and repeated reminders sent to them through the many prophets and servants of God.

Some remained faithful to the Lord, but many did not. And the few who were faithful were often harassed and persecuted by those who did not keep their faith. They were forced and persuaded to abandon their faith for the ways of the world, often even at the threat of death. But many persevered and resisted the pull of the world and the temptations of Satan.

And while we continued to rebel against His will and stay in our waywardness, God remains faithful, and He sends to us the One who was to create that new covenant which will be the final and perfect covenant that will last for all time. Christ is that Mediator of the New Covenant, the everlasting promise which God has promised to us, that to all of us He has promised eternal joy and eternal life, the freedom and liberation from death.

It is sin, our disobedience and rebelliousness which have bound us to death, for death is the consequence of sin. For in God is life, and it is He who holds the reins of life and death. If we do not hold fast to our faith in the Lord, then we will likely lose our hold on Him, and if we have no part in Him, then we would have no life, for death is the only thing that we can look forward to.

But our Lord had shown us that there is life beyond death, that is the life with our Lord, which we also know as the life in the world to come, as we always mention as we took our Creed at the Sunday Masses. And we have to look at the story of how Jesus resurrected Lazarus from the dead. He brought back Lazarus from the dead, so that He can show how death does not have the final say over us.

Many of us fear death, and indeed it can be said that everyone is afraid of dying, but we are afraid because we are not sure what is to happen with us after that, and we are afraid because we think that when we die, we will lose all the things we have in this world. We cannot let go of the things we have, be it possessions, money, wealth, the fame we have accumulated, the prestige and position of honour which we have attained in the society.

And if we do not trust in the Lord, that is why we also fear death, because we see it as the end to our good life in this world. That is why we also fear when we age, because we see ageing as being drown closer and closer to death. And this is where the very problem lays. Ever since the beginning, we mankind are always selfish and concerned only about ourselves. That is why our ancestor sinned, why they grumbled and complained against the Lord whenever things do not go their way, because they think only of how to please themselves and to satisfy their desires.

In this holy season of Lent, the time of preparation for the Holy Week and Easter, we all should really find the time and opportunity to withdraw from our hectic schedules and works, and to think through our priorities in this life. Have we truly placed our complete and full trust in the Lord? Have we been truly faithful to the covenant which He had established with all of us? He had sealed it with none other than with His own Precious Blood.

Only the Blood of the Lamb of God, our Lord Jesus Christ, is worthy to absolve all of our sins, the accumulative burden of our sins, of all mankind past, present and future, that when we have been freed from the shackles of sin, then we too shall be freed from the bonds of death. Our mortal bodies may be subjected to death, but our soul is eternal, and the Lord who is Lord over life and death will raise up all of His faithful ones to life, body and soul, to be with Him, and to receive the eternal bliss and happiness initially intended for us when He first created us.

It is the time for us all to make a clear decision, on whether we prefer to continue with our usual way of life, giving in to the pull and to the temptations of the good things in life, or whether we prefer to take the more difficult path, of allowing  God to enter into our lives, knowing that by following Him we will face difficulties and even rejection from the world, or by giving in to our desires, where we shall have life as we wanted it, but we greatly risk if not assured of the rejection by our Lord and therefore eternal damnation.

Jesus Himself had shown us all the way to go. He is our High Priest who offered for the sake of us all, the perfect sacrifice of Himself, laying down His life and baring down Himself, stretched on the cross. It was not by His great might, power or strength that He had won a victory and pardon for us, but rather through His humility and obedience to the will of His Father, our Lord in heaven. And through that, He gathered all of  us scattered in the world, and make us to be one people through His Church, that is His Body.

The same therefore will apply to us. If we are faithful to Him, and walk in His path, God will bless us and lift up from us the punishment for our sins, that is eternal death. He will give us a new life, and the promise of everlasting life, united with Him and all the other righteous ones in heavenly glory. If we decide to follow the path of our unfaithful and rebellious ancestors, then we have to be ready to suffer the consequences.

Let us all today renew the faith which we have in the Lord, and let us also take this opportunity to renew our commitment to do good in our lives, be it in terms of building up our relationship with God, or in loving one another genuinely and caring for them, rather than to keep to ourselves and rather than trying to satisfy our endless desires and wants.

Let us seek genuine conversion to our Lord and be renewed greatly in our faith and devotion to Him. Seek not what is temporary in the world, but seek what is everlasting in heaven. It is better for us to suffer in this world for a while rather than to suffer for eternity in the world that is to come. May Almighty God bless us all always, forgive us all our sins and bring us to His promise of everlasting life. Amen.

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Sunday, 15 March 2015 : Fourth Sunday of Lent, Laetare Sunday (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : Purple/Violet or Rose (Laetare Sunday)

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, today is the fourth Sunday of Lent, and by tradition, it is also called Laetare Sunday, from the first word in the Introit or the opening theme of the Mass, ‘Laetare, Jerusalem’ or ‘Rejoice, o Jerusalem’. Thus, just as during the season of Advent we celebrate the Gaudete Sunday, in this season of Lent, we also have this short intermezzo or ‘break’ from the penitential nature of this season, and we reflect for a while on the theme of ‘joy’.

That is why, today the vestments used are of rose colour, similar as that of Gaudete Sunday, to represent the more uplifting and cheerful nature of this celebration as compared to the much more sombre and humble nature of the rest of this Lenten season. And from this, we should indeed ask ourselves, what is this joy that we are celebrating today, and why now, in the middle of this season of penitence and preparation for Easter?

That is because it is part of the preparation of our minds, hearts and bodies for the coming of the celebration of the greatest mysteries of our Faith, that we should know of the outcome of our penitence and repentance, that is the joy of the liberation from all the harms and the threats that await us as long as we remain in the state of sin. And this has been aptly summarised and shown through the readings of the Holy Scriptures chosen for this day.

In the first reading we have from different years the readings that represent hope that triumphed over despair, and the dawn of a new hope for the people of God afflicted and living in darkness and in lives filled with troubles. They told of how the people of Israel, who have been destroyed and defeated by their enemies, and with the Babylonians razing even Jerusalem, destroying its Holy Temple, have been succoured by God who never forgot about them.

God sent them salvation through the person of Cyrus, the first King and ruler of the Persian Empire who defeated the Babylonians and liberated the people of Israel after having spent many years and decades in bitter exile away from their homeland.  They were sent back and led back to their ancestral land, and they were reestablished there in great joy and happiness.

Them we also heard how the prophet Samuel, the prophet and judge of Israel anointed David to be the king over all of Israel, to replace the first king, Saul, who had erred from his ways and who did not keep faithful the commandments of the Lord, and who had led the people in error as well, causing them to sin. Thus, God also sent a deliverance to His people through David, liberating them from their troubles and suffering into joy and happiness.

With the anointing of David, the golden era of Israel would come, where after the Israelites had often been troubled and even enslaved by their enemies around them, and after Saul the first king himself was slain by the Philistines, David would lead Israel to defeat all of their enemies and rule over them, and peace and prosperity would last throughout the rest of his reign and that of Solomon, his son.

And all these led to the ultimate help and rescue which our Lord had given us, the true joy and happiness that surpass any other joy and happiness. For there is no greater joy than for us to be reunited with our loving God and Father. We have been long separated from Him because of our sins and wickedness, and because of that we too have been doomed to destruction and despair, but because God loves us so much that He was willing to come Himself to help us overcome that sin and despair, and because of that hope and joy arise within us, not to be quelled by despair anymore.

Christ Himself mentioned to Nicodemus, the righteous and faithful Pharisee, that just as Moses once lifted up the bronze serpent high on a staff to save those people who had been bitten by fiery serpents, that all who have seen it would not not die and live, then the same was also done by our loving Lord, who allowed Himself to be raised up on the cross, hung between heaven and earth, surrendering it all, so that all of us who believe in Him will not die but receive everlasting life, as well as true joy and happiness.

Such indeed is the great love that our Lord has for us, that He was willing to endure so many things and so great a suffering, mockery and torture, even unto a humiliating death on the cross, in order to save all of us, unworthy and rebellious as we are. Therefore, it is imperative that we all understand God’s love for us, and we have to know what is true joy, and what our aim should be in this life.

In this season of Lent, it is a perfect time for us to stop our hectic life schedules for a moment, that we will be able to find a time to look deep into our own lives, and reflect upon our actions and deeds. It is a time for us to reevaluate our lives’ priorities and focus. What is true joy and happiness for us? What is it that all of us should aim for in life? Is it power, wealth, worldly happiness and pleasures? Or is it true and genuine love, that is the same love which our Lord had shown us?

Many of us are not happy in our lives. We are not able to attain true happiness because we do not know what it is really. Many of us think that money can bring us happiness and good life, and so we slaved ourselves to working many hours and pushing ourselves so hard in order to earn more money, but at the end of the day, can we buy love and attention with money? Most likely not, and even if we manage to get these, it is likely that these would not last.

Thus, as we reflect on the joy that we ought to celebrate today, we have to realise that our true joy come with our salvation by God, who had devoted Himself so much for our sake, so that we are given a new hope in our great despair. While once it has looked very bleak for us, that we have been condemned because of our sins, but now we know that through Christ, there is hope for a new life that is what God intended for us.

Let us all therefore dedicate ourselves to change our way of life, changing the focus we have in life, that instead of seeking for temporal joy, and happiness that would not last, we instead seek eternal joy and happiness. Money, fame and all worldly things cannot give us real joy, but real joy is when we love one another, helping those who are in need of something, be it basic needs of life, or even love, care and attention.

As we continue to prepare ourselves during this Lenten season, let us pray that our loving God may help us to find our way in this life, so that we may endeavour to seek our joy in the Lord. Let us focus our attention on the Lord and not be distracted by the concerns of this world, and by all the temptations of the flesh and of the world, all of which promise us temporary joy but risk us everlasting despair and sorrow. Do not seek what does not bring us true satisfaction, which only God can give. God bless us all. Amen.