Liturgical Colour : Green or Red (Martyr)
Psalm 97 : 1, 2-3ab, 3cd-4
Sing to the Lord a new song, for He has done wonders; His right hand, His holy arm, has won victory for Him.
The Lord has shown His salvation, revealing His justice to the nations. He has not forgotten His love nor His faithfulness to Israel.
The farthest ends of the earth all have seen God’s saving power. All you lands, make a joyful noise to the Lord, break into song and sing praise.
Liturgical Colour : Green or Red (Martyr)
Romans 1 : 1-7
From Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ, an apostle called and set apart for God’s Good News, the very promises He foretold through His prophets in the Sacred Scriptures, regarding His Son, who was born in the flesh a descendant of David, and has been recognised as the Son of God endowed with Power, upon rising from the dead through the Holy Spirit.
Through Him, Jesus Christ, our Lord, and for the sake of His Name, we received grace and mission in all the nations, for them to accept the faith. All of you, the elected of Christ, are part of them, you, the beloved of God in Rome, called to be holy : May God our Father, and the Lord Jesus Christ, give you grace and peace.
Liturgical Colour : Green or Red (Martyrs) or White (Priest)
Forgive and you shall be forgiven. Have mercy and mercy will be shown to you. Show love and love will be shown to you. Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, as we heed the readings today, this is the common theme that we all can and should certainly be able to pick up and identify, as a common virtue of our faith in Christ. Christ in today’s Gospel taught His disciples how to pray to God, and that prayer, as we are all familiar with, is the Lord’s Prayer, Pater Noster, or our Father.
That prayer is a simple and yet perfect prayer, and indeed how all prayers should be. Prayers is less about glorifying ourselves before God, and even less still a litany of wishes and desires that we often request or even demand from God. How many of us have been angry at God for not fulfilling our wishes, which we constantly include in our prayers?
Prayer is truly about opening oneself to God and to His eternal love, that is to let Him embrace us with the warmth of His love, that we are made perfect once again in love. That is the essence of prayer and the essence of our loving dedication to God who is our Father. Prayer is a line of communication between Him and us, as a medium through which we do not just speak, but also listen, to the words of the Lord being spoken within our hearts.
Too often the noise of this world prevents us from being able to listen to the word of God, and we become preoccupied in our own worldly dealings, in our own emotions and prejudices, in that we end up trusting our own judgments more than we trust or believe in the wise judgments of the Lord. That is also the essence of today’s readings, in that, we need to be able to overcome those personal prejudices and ill emotions within our hearts, that we will be able to make a reasonable judgment.
Indeed, remember that in fact we are not in a proper place to judge, not even ourselves, since as many sins as we can see in others around us, there are often in fact even more sins within us that we cannot see. To judge others for their sins and to condemn them for those sins is not right, for if we judge them for those, surely we will be judged too, for our own, equally if not more numerous sins.
That is why the Lord reminded Jonah of this fact, of the need for one to be merciful and forgiving, for the virtue of mercy and forgiveness is abundant, and out of them, love will be born. Love cannot exist if we do not first show mercy and forgiveness, especially to those who had wronged us, and to those who had caused us pain and suffering.
It is important that we as the followers and children of the Lord, to be chain-breakers. Why so? Which chains are we talking about? It is the chain that binds our heart and shut it tight, hardening it against the love of God and preventing us from sharing our love with our brethren around us. These chains are sin and worldly temptations that bind us to themselves and to hell, preventing us from being saved.
Indeed, we need to be loving and forgiving at the same time in our lives in this world, in our calling as the disciples of Christ, the One who is Love. We cannot remain bound to those chains we had talked about, and rather, we must break free, both from our own chains of sin, or break free the chains that bound others, that all of us will be loved by God for eternity.
Today we commemorate the feast of St. Denis, the bishop of Paris in the Roman province of Gaul, at where is now known as France. He was a zealous servant of God who lived upright and just life, during the time of great persecutions against the Church and the faithful. The Emperor Decius reigned at the time St. Denis was martyred for his faith. Decius was known to be strongly opposed to the Church and to the faith in God, and ordered one of the most vicious and brutal of all the persecutions of Christians by the state.
St. Denis and some people who were condemned to die with him were beheaded on a hill in what is today Paris, and yet, a miracle happened. It was told that St. Denis did not die even though his head had been cut off from his body. St. Denis picked up his head and walked for several miles, preaching and testifying the greatness of the Lord, made evident in the miraculous occasion of St. Denis himself. He only died when he reached a spot where he was then buried, and where now stands a basilica erected in the honour of his name, that is the Basilica Cathedral of St. Denis in Paris.
Today we also honour St. John Leonardi, an Italian priest living during a time of trouble for the Church and for Christendom, at a time when the Reformation rebels were spreading wildly their heresies and teachings across Europe and gained sizable following. St. John Leonardi was devoted to the people of God, especially the weak and the poor, and did many charitable acts to help and love them.
He also spread the devotion to the Blessed Virgin Mary and promoted the observation of the Liturgy of the Hours, a dedication of one’s prayer in daily basis, as well as the Adoration of the Most Holy Eucharist. Not limited to that, St. John Leonardi also established the religious order of the Clerks, who took part in and contributed to the effort in stemming the Protestant heresies.
Both these saints and their companions had been devoted to their cause, their calling, and committed themselves fully to both the Lord and His beloved people. Therefore, should we then not do the same? Our calling in life is to love, that is to love both the Lord and to love one another, that in love, we truly become worthy of being called the children of God, who is Love. If we instill love in one another, that love will grow to encompass us, and we will grow to love even more, and then, we will truly be worthy to be called God’s children, of God who is love.
May the Lord continue to bless us and strengthen us with His love, caring for us and providing for us, that we will always ever be covered by His grace and blessings. God bless us all. Amen.
Liturgical Colour : Green or Red (Martyrs) or White (Priest)
Luke 11 : 1-4
One day Jesus was praying in a certain place, and when He had finished, one of His disciples said to Him, “Lord, teach us to pray, as John also taught his disciples.”
And Jesus said to them, “When you pray, say this :
Father, may Your Name be held holy, may Your kingdom come; give us each day the kind of bread we need, and forgive us our sins, for we also forgive all who do us wrong; and do not bring us to the test.”
Liturgical Colour : Green or Red (Martyrs) or White (Priest)
Psalm 85 : 3-4, 5-6, 9-10
Have mercy on me, o Lord, for I cry to You all day. Bring joy to the soul of Your servant, for You, o Lord, I lift up my soul.
You are good and forgiving, o Lord, caring for those who call on You. Listen, o Lord, to my prayer, hear the voice of my pleading.
All the nations You have made will come; they will worship before You, o Lord, and bring glory to Your Name. For You are great, and wonderful are Your deeds; You alone are God.
Liturgical Colour : Green or Red (Martyrs) or White (Priest)
Jonah 4 : 1-11
But Jonah was greatly displeased at this, and he was indignant. He prayed to YHVH and said, “O YHVH, is this not what I said when I was yet in my own country? This is why I fled to Tarshish. I knew that You are a gracious and merciful God, slow to anger and full of love, and You relent from imposing terrible punishment.”
“I beseech You now, YHVH, to take my life, for now it is better for me to die than to live.” But YHVH replied, “What right have you to be angry?”
Jonah then left the city. He went to a place east of it, built himself a shelter and sat under its shade to wait and see what would happen to Nineveh. Then YHVH God provided a castor-oil plant and made it grow up over Jonah to give shade over his head and to ease his discomfort. Jonah was very happy about the plant.
But the next day, at dawn, God sent a worm which attacked the plant and made it wither. When the sun rose, God sent a scorching east wind; the sun blazed down upon Jonah’s head, and he grew faint. His death wish returned and he said, “It is better for me to die than to live.”
Then God asked Jonah, “Do you have a right to be angry about the castor-oil plant?” Jonah answered, “I am right to be angry enough to wish to die.”
YHVH said, “You are concerned about a plant which cost you no labour to make it grow. Overnight it sprang up, and overnight it perished. But Nineveh has more than a hundred and twenty thousand people who cannot distinguish right from left and they have many cattle as well. Should I not be concerned for such a great city?”
Liturgical Colour : Green or Red (Martyrs) or White (Mass of our Lady)
Beloved brother and sisters in Christ, today we continue to listen to the reality of the Lord’s mission in this world, that is to be betrayed by His beloved, to be forsaken, rejected, and finally to suffer death although He is innocent, that through His death, all may gain eternal life in Him.
The Lord had come to be the Saviour of all, the One who bring forth the light of God into the darkened world, and into the darkened hearts of men. Through His coming and saving works, He had brought the hopelessness of mankind in the face of death and sin, into a new dawn of hope, the hope in He who died for all that they may live.
Dear brethren, as the Lord Himself had said, He came into the world to ransom His people, to deliver them from the fate they were to suffer for eternity, all for following the devil and listening to his lies instead of the truths of God. He ransomed all of us, from the hands of the devil, our slavemaster, not through gold, silver, or any form of material possessions and money, but through His own Most Precious Blood, the Blood of the Lamb.
That Blood is blood that saves and purifies, and which washes us clean from the filth of our sins and faults, making us perfect again in the eyes of God. That once we who were unworthy of God and His kingdom, now be made worthy and ready to be accepted again. The Blood shed from the innocent and purest lamb of all, the Lamb of God, Jesus Christ.
He did not resist at all when the chief priests and the Pharisees captured Him and tortured Him. He was indeed like a lamb being led to the slaughter, never complaining and in complete obedience to the will of God, the Father of all. Jesus is our Paschal Lamb, the One who offered Himself as the perfect and acceptable sacrifice to the throne of God.
That He was willing to suffer in place of us for the punishments intended to us, to bear that cross for our sake, and to bear all the humiliations imaginable, just that we may have hope and be saved, should have awakened us from our slumber, from our ignorance, yes, ignorance from the love of God most kind and forgiving,
Without Him, there can be no hope, and without His suffering, all of us will suffer, suffer from the consequences of our sins and of our wayward ways, away from the Lord our God. It is in the suffering of Christ that He shared our sufferings and bore it upon Himself, that we are freed from the weight of that yoke, the yoke of sin. And in His glorious resurrection, He lifted us all up from our old ways, from our old slavery to death, into a new life that He guaranteed through His own resurrection, as One who had conquered death.
Today, we celebrate the feast of several saints, first of which is St. Wenceslas or Wenceslaus, one of the first kings of Bohemia in the early Medieval era Germany, one of the first converts to the faith in that nation, which just a generation before was the nation of pagans and barbarians who ransacked many of Christendom’s countries. Even at the time of St. Wenceslaus, there were still strong pagan elements in the country, opposed to him and his rule as a Christian ruler.
Nevertheless, St. Wenceslaus remained faithful and committed to the cause of the Lord, and was known to be a good and caring ruler, who cared especially for the poor and the oppressed among his people, and worked hard to help spread the faith in the country where he ruled. This of course resulted in opposition to build up from the pagan elements in the society and among the nobles.
St. Wenceslaus was martyred for the faith, when he was murdered on his way to the church by his brother and his noble supporters. While his brother was a Christian himself, but many of the nobles who supported him were not, and they resented St. Wenceslaus’ attempts to bring the faith to them. Therefore, in the defense of his faith, St. Wenceslaus had given his life, and his blood, for the sake of the Lord, for the spreading of the Gospel and the salvation of his people.
St. Lawrence Ruiz or Lorenzo Ruiz and his companions are the other saints whom we commemorate on this day, also as martyrs of the faith, shedding their blood for the sake of the Lord. St. Lawrence Ruiz is the first saint of the Philippines, who was martyred with several others in Japan. He was born in the Philippines during the early seventeenth century, when Spain owned the Philippines. He lived a relatively normal life until he was falsely accused of a crime, which prompted him to hide in exile, which happened to be in a ship bound for Japan.
St. Lawrence Ruiz arrived in Japan at a time of very great difficulty for any of the faithful of the Lord. Although just decades before Japan was truly a ripe ground for evangelisation, which saw hundreds of thousands converted into the faith, during the time of St. Lawrence Ruiz in Japan, the new Tokugawa shogunate government had changed their policy against Christians from tolerance and warmth into an open and vicious persecution.
Christians everywhere in Japan were threatened to abandon their faith or lose their lives through harsh torture and pain. Many recanted their faith following these threats, but equally many persevered in their faith and ended up being martyred, through various methods like crucifixion, beheading, and burning, many of them cruel and painful in nature.
St. Lawrence Ruiz and his companions were also captured and subjected to these torturous methods, and were asked to abandon their faith in God. They resisted and remained staunch in their undying faith to God. They forsake their earthly life in order to obtain the life in heaven, which is eternal, from the Lord.
Therefore, brothers and sisters in Christ, after listening to the life stories of these courageous and faithful martyrs of the Lord, who did not shy from even risking their lives for the true faith, and recalling the very sacrifice Jesus had endured on the cross for our salvation, let us then, brethren, be proactive in our faith, no longer sitting down and let what God has given us go to waste, and instead, let us bravely take up our crosses, as the martyrs and saints had done, and go to proclaim to the whole world, the salvation of our Lord, offered to all those who believe in Him.
May the Lord continue to empower and strengthen us, in our mind, body, and speech, that we will be able to be strong and courageous bearers of His holy Gospels, the bearer of the Good News of salvation, inspired by the examples of the holy saints and martyrs, St. Wenceslaus, St. Lawrence Ruiz and his companions. God bless us all. Amen.
Liturgical Colour : Green or Red (Martyrs) or White (Mass of our Lady)
Luke 9 : 43b-45
But while all were amazed at everything Jesus did, He said to His disciples, “Listen, and remember what I tell you now : The Son of Man will be betrayed into the hands of the men.”
But the disciples did not understand this saying; something prevented them from grasping what He meant, and they were afraid to ask Him about it.
Liturgical Colour : Green or Red (Martyrs) or White (Mass of our Lady)
Jeremiah 31 : 10, 11-12ab, 13
Hear the word of YHVH, o nations, proclaim it on distant coastlands : He who scattered Israel will gather them and guard them as a shepherd guard His flock.
For YHVH has ransomed Jacob, and redeemed him from the hand of his conqueror. They shall come shouting for joy, while ascending Zion.
Maidens will make merry and dance, young men and old as well. I will turn their mourning into gladness, I will give them comfort and joy for sorrow.
Liturgical Colour : Green or Red (Martyrs) or White (Mass of our Lady)
Zechariah 2 : 5-9, 14-15a
Raising my eyes again, I saw a Man with a measuring line in His hand. I asked, “Where are You going?” He answered, “I am going to measure Jerusalem, to find its width and its length.”
As the angel who spoke to me came forward, another angel met him and said, “Run and tell this to that young man : ‘Jerusalem will remain unwalled because of its multitude of people and livestock.’ For this is the word of YHVH : I Myself will be around her like a wall of fire, and also within her in Glory.”
“Sing and rejoice, o daughter of Zion, for I am about to come. I shall dwell among you,” says YHVH. “On that day, many nations will join YHVH and be My people.”
petercanisiusmichaeldavidkang 