Monday

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Monday, 25 July 2022 : Feast of St. James, Apostle (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : Red

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, today we celebrate the Feast of St. James the Apostle, one of the great Apostles of the Lord and member of the Twelve Apostles. He is also known as St. James the Greater to distinguish him from the other St. James, such as St. James the Just, a relative of the Lord and first Bishop of Jerusalem, or St. James the Lesser, also known as St. James, son of Alpheus. St. James was also the elder brother of St. John the Apostle and Evangelist, as one of the two sons of Zebedee, as was a fisherman at the lake of Galilee together with St. Peter, St. Andrew and his brother, St. John.

St. James was one of the first disciples and followers of the Lord, who committed himself to Him and followed Him through many important occurrences throughout the Lord’s ministry. He was often chosen together with St. Peter and his brother St. John as the three disciples who accompanied Him during important moments of His ministry, such as the resurrection of the dead young daughter of the synagogue official, during the moment of the Transfiguration of the Lord at Mount Tabor, where he, St. Peter and St. John all witnessed the Lord glorified and transfigured before their own eyes, and lastly during the time of the Agony in the Gardens of Gethsemane just before the Lord was to be betrayed and arrested.

As such, St. James was one of the Lord’s innermost circle members and closest confidants. After the Lord’s Resurrection and Ascension into Heaven, together with the other Apostles, St. James went on extensive evangelising missions and ministry, where it was told by Apostolic tradition and evidences that he went all the way to Hispania, the region now known as Spain and Portugal, where he preached the Gospels and the Lord there, and it was also there that he saw one of the first apparition of the Blessed Virgin Mary, Mother of God, who at that time was still living in Jerusalem. She miraculously appeared to St. James in Hispania, in what is known as the apparition of Our Lady of the Pillar.

It was told that St. James was facing a lot of challenges and trials in his ministry, and faced opposition and hardships on his missionary journey which left him exhausted and discouraged by what he encountered. It was then that as St. James was praying, that the Blessed Virgin appeared to him, surrounded by multitudes of thousands of Angels of God, strengthening and encouraging him. This apparition gave St. James the courage and strength to finish his mission, and made him more fervent in his efforts to reach out to the people of the region and establishing the foundations of the Church there.

Later on, St. James would return to Jerusalem, and according to the records of the Acts of the Apostles, was the first among the Twelve Apostles to be martyred, when king Herod, in trying to appease the Jewish authorities and leaders, persecuted the early Christian communities and killed St. James, who therefore died a martyr for his faith. It was later told that his remains and relics were miraculously translated to where he performed his ministry in Hispania, where now stands the great Basilica of Santiago de Compostela in northern Spain, the site of his tomb and shrine today.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, the examples of the faith of St. James the Apostle, his hard work and contributions, to the Church and to the glorification of God should serve to inspire us to do the same. And if we are not confident that we are able to do it, then we need to again examine who St. James was, a poor, illiterate fisherman from Galilee, a mere fisherman living in the periphery of the Jewish world at the time, not at all destined for greatness. He did not have the pedigree, the connections and the necessary education and background for greatness and status at that time. And yet, through him God had done so many wonderful works, that the impact is still felt even to this day.

St. James allowed God to lead him on his way, empowering and strengthening him on his journey, that by God’s providence and grace, he managed to do all the great things that he had done, in the many miracles he performed, in the communities of the faithful he had established, and the many souls that he had saved, that although his early martyrdom did not give him a long time to perform his missions, but it is undeniable that he had done so many great things, all for the greater glory of God, and it was for all these that we venerate and thank St. James the Apostle for, and why we are all inspired by his great courage and examples.

Now, are we all able to follow and commit ourselves in the same way that St. James had committed his life to the Lord? Are we willing to devote more of our time and effort in following the Lord and being His good disciples? Each and every one of us have been called and God has bestowed each one of us with variety of gifts and blessings, opportunities and chances for us all to reach out and to do His will. What matters is for us to respond to God’s call and our commitment to walk faithfully in His path. Are we willing to drink the cup that Christ and His servants had drunk, the cup of suffering? And if we suffer with Christ, we too shall be glorified with Him in triumph.

Let the examples of St. James the Apostles and all the other great holy men and women of God inspire us to do more for the greater glory of God, in fulfilling our Christian calling and our obligation to live our lives most worthily for the Lord. May God be with us always and may He strengthen us always in faith. Amen.

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Monday, 25 July 2022 : Feast of St. James, Apostle (Gospel Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Red

Matthew 20 : 20-28

At that time, the mother of James and John came to Jesus with her sons, and she knelt down, to ask a favour. Jesus said to her, “What do you want?” And she answered, “Here, You have my two sons. Grant, that they may sit, one at Your right hand and one at Your left, in Your kingdom.”

Jesus said to the brothers, “You do not know what you are asking. Can you drink the cup that I am about to drink?” They answered, “We can.” Jesus replied, “You will indeed drink My cup; but to sit at My right or at My left is not for Me to grant. That will be for those, for whom My Father has prepared it.”

The other then heard all this, and were angry with the two brothers. Then Jesus called them to Him and said, “You know, that the rulers of nations behave like tyrants, and the powerful oppress them. It shall not be so among you : whoever wants to be great in your community, let him minister to the community. And if you want to be the first of all, make yourself the servant of all. Be like the Son of Man, Who came not to be served, but to serve, and to give His life to redeem many.”

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Monday, 25 July 2022 : Feast of St. James, Apostle (Psalm)

Liturgical Colour : Red

Psalm 125 : 1-2ab, 2cd-3, 4-5, 6

When YHVH brought the exiles back to Zion, we were like those moving in a dream. Then, our mouths were filled with laughter, and our tongues with songs of joy.

Among the nations it was said, “YHVH has done great things for them.” YHVH had done great things for us, and we were glad indeed.

Bring back our exiles, o YHVH, like fresh streams in the desert. Those who sow in tears will reap with songs and shouts of joy.

They went forth weeping, bearing the seeds for sowing, they will come home with joyful shouts, bringing their harvested sheaves.

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Monday, 25 July 2022 : Feast of St. James, Apostle (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Red

2 Corinthians 4 : 7-15

However, we carry this treasure in vessels of clay, so that this all-surpassing power may not be seen as ours, but as God’s. Trials of every sort come to us, but we are not discouraged. We are left without answer, but do not despair; persecuted but not abandoned, knocked down but not crushed.

At any moment, we carry, in our person, the death of Jesus, so, that, the life of Jesus may also be manifested in us. For we, the living, are given up continually to death, for the sake of Jesus, so, that, the life of Jesus may appear in our mortal existence. And as death is at work in us, life comes to you.

We have received the same Spirit of faith referred to in Scripture, that says : I believed and so I spoke. We also believed, and so we speak. We know that He, Who raised the Lord Jesus, will also raise us, with Jesus, and bring us, with you, into His presence. Finally, everything is for your good, so that grace will come more abundantly upon you, and great will be the thanksgiving for the glory of God.

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Monday, 18 July 2022 : 16th Week of Ordinary Time (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : Green

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, as we listened to the words of the Scriptures today, we are reminded of the great issue that is facing many of us, God’s people in this world, and that is the issue of faithlessness, infidelity and the general lack of faith and commitment that many of us have exhibited and shown in our lives. Many of us have not truly believed in the Lord wholeheartedly, and many among us are lukewarm in our faith life, not living our lives in the manner that we are expected to live them as active and committed Christians. Instead of following God and His path, we chose to follow our own paths.

In our first reading today, we heard from the prophet Micah speaking the words of God to His people, who was ministering to the people of the southern kingdom of Judah during its later years of its existence. The prophet Micah brought the words of the Lord to His people, who have often disobeyed Him, erred in their ways and chose to worship the pagan idols and gods, persecuting His prophets and messengers sent to them to remind them of their wicked ways. Hence, Micah often spoke of the upcoming destruction of both Jerusalem and Judah, and also that of Samaria and the northern kingdom of Israel, all due to the people’s lack of faith and sins.

In today’s first reading passage, we heard the Lord admonishing His people for their sins, and reminding them at the same time of all that He had done for them, in liberating them from slavery in the days of their ancestors, all the blessings and graces that He had given them among many other things He did for them, and how they had spurned and rejected that love, preferring to live their lives in their own way, choosing to obey worldly ways and disobeying the Law and commandments that God has placed before them. At the same time, through Micah, God also told His people that He still loved them nonetheless, and was calling them towards reconciliation with Him.

That was when we heard the famous phrase from the Book of the prophet Micah, ‘to do justice, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God.’ That in essence, summarised what each and every one of us, as God’s beloved people, need to do in order to walk in God’s path faithfully as we have been called to do. More often than not, it was always our pride and ego which led us to disobey the Lord, His Law and commandments. That was what happened to the people of Judah and also as we heard in our Gospel passage today, to the people of the time of the Lord Jesus and His ministry.

In the Gospel today, we heard how the people asked the Lord publicly for miraculous signs, which the Lord replied to with great astonishment and disbelief, because we have to understand that, as the Lord had performed many miracles and signs, throughout all the time that He was going around Galilee and all those places He had publicly shown His power and miracles. However, the people still refused to believe in Him and they would not open their hearts and minds to welcome Him. God had shown them many signs and wonders, but because the people had hardened their hearts and closed their minds against Him, that was why they lacked faith.

It was the same attitude which they had shown the Lord in the past as well. The people to whom the prophet Micah spoke to also hardened their hearts against God, and all of these were because they were too proud to admit their mistakes and imperfections. The people at the time of the Lord Jesus, particularly those belonging to the intellectual and societal elite, the Pharisees and the teachers of the Law, all were too proud to admit that they could have been wrong, and they constantly asked the Lord to prove Himself, because to them, they had placed themselves in that mindset, that the Lord, His actions and teachings were wrong while they were right.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, if we allow ourselves to be swayed by our pride and ego, our selfish attitude and more, then it will be easy for us to fall into the wrong paths, as our predecessors had done. That is why through what we have heard in our Scripture passages today, we are all reminded to get rid from ourselves all traces of this pride and ego, this attitude which prevented us from reaching out towards the Lord and finding the path towards Him. We have to instead humble ourselves before God and before one another, and cultivate in ourselves the strong desire to love the Lord and to commit ourselves to Him. We have to open our hearts and minds to welcome the Lord into our midst.

Let us hence do our best in our lives, to live our lives full of faith, with virtue and justice, and to walk with humility in the path that God has shown us. Let us allow God to lead us down the right path, and allow Him to bring us into His eternal kingdom, by our exemplary and faithful lives. May God bless us all and our good works, efforts and endeavours, now and always. Amen.

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Monday, 18 July 2022 : 16th Week of Ordinary Time (Gospel Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Green

Matthew 12 : 38-42

At that time, some teachers of the Law and some Pharisees spoke up, “Teacher, we want to see a sign from You.” Jesus answered them, “An evil and unfaithful people want a sign; but no sign will be given them except the sign of the prophet Jonah. In the same way, as Jonah spent three days and three nights in the belly of the whale, so will the Son of Man spend three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.”

“At the judgment, the people of Nineveh will rise with this generation, and condemn it; because they reformed their lives at the preaching of Jonah, and here, there is greater than Jonah. At the judgment, the Queen of the South will stand up and condemn you. She came from the ends of the earth to hear the wisdom of Solomon; and here, there is greater than Solomon.”

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Monday, 18 July 2022 : 16th Week of Ordinary Time (Psalm)

Liturgical Colour : Green

Psalm 49 : 5-6, 8-9, 16bc-17, 21 and 23

I lie prostrate in the midst of lions that greedily devour people; their teeth are pointed spears and arrows; their tongues, sharpened swords. Be exalted, o God, above the heavens! Your glory be over all the earth!

Not for your sacrifices do I reprove you, for your burnt offerings are ever before Me. I need no bull from your stalls, nor he-goat from your pens.

What right have you to mouth My laws, or to talk about My covenant? You hate My commands and cast My words behind you.

Because I was silent while you did these things, you thought I was like you. But now I rebuke you and make this charge against you. Those who give with thanks offerings honour Me, but the one who walks blamelessly, I will show him the salvation of God.

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Monday, 18 July 2022 : 16th Week of Ordinary Time (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Green

Micah 6 : 1-4, 6-8

Listen to what YHVH said to me, “Stand up, let the mountains hear your claim, and the hills listen to your plea.” Hear, o mountains, YHVH’s complaint! Foundations of the earth, pay attention! For YHVH has a case against His people, and will argue it with Israel.

“O My people, what have I done to you? In what way have I been a burden to you? Answer Me. I brought you out of Egypt; I rescued you from the land of bondage; I sent Moses, Aaron and Miriam to lead you.”

“What shall I bring when I come to YHVH and bow down before God the Most High? Shall I come with burnt offerings, with sacrifices of yearling calves? Will YHVH be pleased with thousands of rams, with an overabundance of oil libations? Should I offer my firstborn for my sins, the fruit of my body for my wrongdoing?”

“You have been told, o man, what is good and what YHVH requires of you : to do justice, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God.”

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Monday, 11 July 2022 : 15th Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Benedict, Abbot (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : White

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, today as we listened to the words of the Scriptures, we are all reminded to be truly faithful to the Lord our God, in all of our actions and deeds. Each and every one of us as Christians ought to strive to live our lives and deepen our spirituality, our relationship with God, so that all of us may grow ever better in our Christian living and in our obedience to God. All of us are called and challenged to live our lives full of Christian truth and discipleship, obedience to the Law and commandments of God, in following the Lord wholeheartedly, doing everything as God had told us to. We are all called to be genuine Christians and true disciples of the Lord.

In our first reading today, we heard from the Book of the prophet Isaiah, the words of the Lord to the people through Isaiah, the warning for all those who have committed sins against God. God warned all of them that their sins were known to Him, and those sins would be their undoing unless they turned away from them and repent from them. The Lord was referring to Sodom, which in fact by that time had been a wasteland for a long time since it was destroyed in the rain of brimstone from Heaven, together with Gomorrah. This reference to Sodom was in fact a reference to the sins of the people, which are just like the sins of the people of Sodom and Gomorrah in the past.

Then the Lord also made references to the people’s offerings and sacrifices. This was actually referring to their hypocrisy and lack of faith. They might still be doing their rituals and worship, which they offered at the Temple in Jerusalem, but it had become superficial and lacking in genuine faith and love for God. The people of God had not done what they should have, in loving God wholeheartedly as they had not obeyed His Law and commandments, and merely paid lip service to Him. Their offerings and sacrifices were made with equal sincerity and fervour to God as they did with the pagan idols and gods. They did not truly believe in God with all their heart and might, and were more concerned by worldly matters and desires than to serve God.

Hence, the prophet Isaiah was sent to the people with the message to remind them all to turn back towards God wholeheartedly, and abandon their sinful and lukewarm attitude in following God. This is something that the Lord had always done to His people, giving them reminders and help, encouragement and strength, although He always encountered stiff and stubborn resistance from many of them who were unwilling to walk in the path that the Lord had shown them, and many of His prophets had to suffer rejection and hardships throughout their ministries and lives in the world.

In our Gospel passage today, we heard from the Gospel of St. Matthew in which the Lord told His disciples presenting to them the reality of His coming into the world and how the disciples might have to face sufferings, hardships and persecutions much as how the prophets had faced in the past. This was because contextually at that time, the people generally expected that the coming of the Messiah or the Saviour and Holy One that God had promised to them ought to be accompanied with a lot of rejoicing, happiness and deliverance from the wickedness and evils of the world.

The people often expected that the Messiah, the Son of David would be the One to lead them all in a great campaign and rebellion to free them from the tyranny and dominion of their Roman oppressors and overlords. They expected the Messiah to be a new King over them, ruling over the restored Kingdom of Israel. But the reality is such that, the Lord’s coming would in fact create divisions and tribulations for His followers, all because of the stubbornness and the same resistance that the world had often shown Him and His messengers. The truth that Christ brought with Him to this world would tear even families and friends apart, and that would have caused divisions and struggles, even amongst the most ardent of the faithful.

Hence, through all these each and every one of us are reminded that being Christians is not something that is trivial or easily done. There may often be a lot of sacrifices and efforts needed for us to be truly faithful to God. That is why we are all called to be truly faithful to God and not just merely paying lip service or formality as what the Israelites in Judah had done by the time of the prophet Isaiah. All of us should commit ourselves to a new life dedicated to God, and in our every actions and deeds, we should be genuinely filled with the desire to love God and with the desire to embrace His methods and ways. All of us ought to be exemplary in our lives and actions at all times.

Today, we also can look up upon the examples set by the famous St. Benedict of Nursia, whose feast day we are celebrating this day. St. Benedict of Nursia was the renowned founder of the Benedictine religious order and one of the most prominent proponent of monasticism in Western Christendom. He was renowned for his Rule of St. Benedict and the propagation of monastic life in various parts of Christendom, in which many people were called to a new life and existence, inspiring many people with the search for holiness in life, for prayerful contemplation as one of the many ways to live one’s life faithfully in serving God.

St. Benedict inspired many others through his sincere desire to seek and love the Lord, embracing a life of contemplative prayer and holiness, in a monastic community formed from those who shared the same desire and insight, and hence answered God’s call for them to live their Christian lives most meaningfully and purposefully. St. Benedict and his life examples should therefore also inspire each one of us to seek to live our lives worthily as Christians from now on. We are all called to be faithful witnesses of the Lord and exemplary disciples of His, so that through us many more people may come to believe in God and be saved as well.

May the Lord continue to guide and strengthen us so that each and every one of us may persevere in faith and grow ever closer to Him, through each moments and opportunities we have in life, in serving and glorifying His Name. Amen.

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Monday, 11 July 2022 : 15th Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Benedict, Abbot (Gospel Reading)

Liturgical Colour : White

Matthew 10 : 34 – Matthew 11 : 1

At that time, Jesus said to His disciples, “Do not think that I have come to establish peace on earth. I have not come to bring peace, but a sword. For I have come to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. Each one will have as enemies, those of one’s own family.”

“Whoever loves father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me. And whoever loves son or daughter more than Me, is not worthy of Me. And whoever does not take up his cross and follow Me, is not worthy of Me. Whoever finds his life will lose it; but whoever loses his life, for My sake, will find it.”

“Whoever welcomes you, welcomes Me; and whoever welcomes Me, welcomes Him Who sent Me. The one who welcomes a prophet, as a prophet, will receive the reward of a prophet; the one who welcomes a just man, because he is a just man, will receive the reward of a just man.”

“And if anyone gives even a cup of cold water to one of these little ones, because he is My disciple, I assure you, he will not go unrewarded.”

When Jesus had finished giving His twelve disciples these instructions, He went on from there to teach and proclaim His message in their towns.