Passion of our Lord Jesus Christ

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Monday, 27 April 2015 : 4th Week of Easter (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : White

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, today we continue on the theme of our Lord as our Good Shepherd, the One who truly knows us in and out, and He is truly the only One who really cares about us and loves us all with all of His heart. And it is only through Him that salvation and life can be attained, and nowhere else. And that is why, He said that He is the gate, and all of His sheep pass through that gate.

And He does not discriminate between peoples, or have favourites on certain races and groups. All are equally loved by Him and all stands equal in His presence. What matters to God is not our background, our birth and our status in this world, but rather, how much we love Him and devote our attention and love for Him. This is what God wants from us, and thus it is indeed what truly matters.

As the first reading from the Acts of the Apostles showed us, some of the disciples of Jesus criticised Peter, and later on also the other Apostles like St. Paul, for having worked among the non-Jews or the Gentiles, and dwelled with them, ate with them and doing things with them. For the Jews, brought up in their rigid faith system since the days of Moses, this was anathema and forbidden.

The Jews took great pride in their ‘privileged’ status as the chosen people and the chosen race of God, being the direct descendants of Jacob, and the children of Abraham. They often looked down on the pagans and other races, those considered as not belonging to the Jewish race and faith, and they prized their status more than anything else. This is the background for understanding why some of the Jewish disciples acted the way they did.

But God, who is our Shepherd, does not care about that. He gave His salvation and the life He had brought us to everyone. He did not die for a particular group of people, but for everyone. What matters is for us to walk in His path and follow Him. If we do not do as He had instructed us to do, and if chose to follow our own whim and desires, then we can have no part with Him.

It is just like sheep following the shepherd, and if the sheep does not follow the shepherd, that sheep will be lost and will likely meet a cruel and painful end, at the hands of the wolves and other calamities may befall it. The sheep cannot be far from its shepherd, and neither can it survive without the shepherd. The shepherd gives the sheep his love, care and attention, and the sheep cherish them all.

Thus, let us all reflect on this fact, that our Lord is our Shepherd, the Way, the Truth and the Life, as He Himself had said. If we follow Him with all of our heart, then we have life in us, and if we do not do so, then we also do not take part in the salvation which He had given us and offered us freely. Thus, this is indeed the time for us to see into our own lives, if we had indeed been faithful to our Lord and Shepherd, who tirelessly put His effort to bring us all back into perfect unity with Him.

May Almighty God bless all of us, forgive us all our sins, and guide us in this life, as our Lord and Shepherd, that in the end, all of us may find our way to Him and be saved. God bless us all. Amen.

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Monday, 27 April 2015 : 4th Week of Easter (Gospel Reading)

Liturgical Colour : White

John 10 : 1-10

At that time, Jesus said to the Jews, “Truly, I say to you, anyone who does not enter the sheepfold by the gate, but climbs in some other way, is a thief and a robber. But the shepherd of the sheep enters by the gate. The keeper opens the gate to him and the sheep hear his voice; he calls each of his sheep by name and leads them out.”

“When he has brought out all his own, he goes before them, and the sheep follow him for they know his voice. A stranger they will not follow, but rather they will run away from him, because they do not recognise a stranger’s voice.”

Jesus used this comparison, but they did not understand what He was saying to them. So Jesus said, “Truly, I say to you, I am the gate of the sheep. All who came were thieves and robbers, and the sheep did not hear them. I am the gate. Whoever enters through Me will be saved; he will go in and out freely and find food.”

“The thief comes to steal and kill and destroy, but I have come that they may have life, life in all its fullness.”

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Monday, 27 April 2015 : 4th Week of Easter (Psalm)

Liturgical Colour : White

Psalm 41 : 2-3 and Psalm 42 : 3, 4

As a deer longs for flowing streams, so my soul longs for You, o God. My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. When shall I go and see the face of God?

Send forth Your light and Your truth; let them be my guide, let them take me to Your holy mountain, to the place where You reside.

Then will I go to the altar of God, to God, my gladness and delight. I will praise You with the lyre and harp, o God, my God.

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Monday, 27 April 2015 : 4th Week of Easter (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : White

Acts 11 : 1-8

News came to the Apostles and the brothers and sisters in Judea that even foreigners had received the Word of God. So, when Peter went up to Jerusalem, these Jewish believers began to argue with him, “You went to the home of uncircumcised people and ate with them!”

So Peter began to give them the facts as they had happened, “I was at prayer in the city of Joppa when, in a trance, I saw a vision. Something like a large sheet came down from the sky and drew near to me, landing on the ground by its four corners. As I stared at it, I saw four-legged creatures of the earth, wild beasts and reptiles, and birds of the sky.”

“Then I heard a voice saying to me : ‘Get up, Peter, kill and eat!’ I replied, ‘Certainly not, Lord! No common or unclean creature has ever entered my mouth.'”

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Sunday, 26 April 2015 : Fourth Sunday of Easter, Good Shepherd Sunday, Vocation Sunday (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : White

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, today we celebrate the Fourth Sunday of Easter, but also known more commonly as the Good Shepherd Sunday and as the Vocation Sunday. On this day, as we have heard from the readings of the Sacred Scriptures, the readings all highlight the nature of our Lord as the One True Shepherd, who is the Good Shepherd, the only One who truly loves us and cares for us unconditionally.

And from this the entire history of our salvation came about. God is our Shepherd and we are all His sheep, who roam in this world, that is the pasture of the Lord, the world as the range which He had created for us all His sheep. And we are like wayward sheep, who did not listen to the voice of the shepherd, and therefore we were lost, and we could not find our way back to safety.

God can just ignore us and pretend not to care about us. After all, He is the Lord of all things who is all perfect by Himself, and He has no need for others. But He loves all of us as His own, and He is our Father, who cares for all of His children greatly. He created us not so that He can dispose of us. Instead, His love for us is so great, that St. John in our second reading mentioned that for that great love, He had sent us such a great redemption, that He sent Himself, in the form of Jesus, His Son, as the Saviour to redeem all mankind from their fate of certain destruction.

The Good Shepherd cares about all of His sheep, and our Lord therefore cares for all of us greatly. He does not want us to fall prey to the wolves, that is Satan and his allies. That was why He did what He had done, that is to give Himself to us, as the Guide and Leader to lead us back to the right path to salvation. The shepherd guides the sheep so that they will find their way to the green pasture and not lost.

Therefore, today we reflect on our Lord as our Shepherd, the One whom we should heed always and follow. We have to aim our gaze always at Him and not be distracted by other things in the world. Why is this very important? That is because we are really very easily distracted by the many dark things in this world, and we are very easily persuaded to abandon our Shepherd and follow the whim of our own desires.

Ever since our first ancestors first succumbed to their desire, the want for knowledge and their greed for earthly desires, we have been made vulnerable to the same desires, and if we allow ourselves to be overcome and controlled by our desired, then that is where we shall fall, and we shall fall into damnation together with Satan and his angels if we are not careful.

Ever since Satan had been cast out of heaven and brought down low for his failed attempt to take over the throne of heaven out of his pride and vanity, he had resented all that God had created and crafted. And the greatest of all God’s creations is us mankind, whom therefore he tried to destroy as well, and the best way to do so, is by causing us to rebel against God as well, just as he had once done before and which he had done ever since.

Thus, it is like the wolves who desire to take the sheep away from the shepherd. They would surround the flock of sheep and wait for the opportune moment for some of the sheep to linger and stray beyond the flock, and then snatch them and destroy them. This is Satan’s aim, trying to snatch us away from the salvation which God had promised us, and which He had purchased with His own Body and Blood.

Remember that Jesus said that the Good Shepherd lays down His life and thus dies for His sheep? That was exactly what Jesus had done. He barred the wolves, that is Satan and his allies from coming through to get us. He protected us and shielded us, all because of His infinite love for all of us, and His everlasting desire to see us saved from the pain and suffering caused by our sins.

And thus we were indeed saved by our Lord, and we have been made whole again. But this does not mean that we are completely out of danger and harm’s path. Even though the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross have given mankind the salvation and the path to liberation from death and into life, but we require an active effort and participation in the work of salvation for us to be saved.

The shepherd knows his sheep and he knew them all by name. And thus, our Good Shepherd, our Lord Jesus Christ also knew us all, each and every single one of us. And He calls on us to join Him and walk with Him. Now, the issue is, are we willing to put in the effort to walk with Him and walk in His path? It may seem to be easy, but I can assure you that it will not be the case.

The world is the domain of the evil one and his allies, and therefore, the ways of this world are inherently not compatible with the ways of Christ our Lord. Thus, if we follow Him and walk in His footsteps, it is likely that we will encounter difficulties, opposition and ridicule. Remember, brethren, that Christ Himself had shown us an example, by enduring all the ridicule, all the persecution and rejection of the world, on His way to Calvary bearing the cross that is our sins.

Therefore, Christ had left us all a great gift, that is His Church, the union of all the faithful together as one people, united with Him in a spiritual Body of the faithful by the sharing of the Eucharist, which He left behind as the centre of the efforts which He had started to call back all the wayward souls and sheep of His flock, to return to His loving and caring embrace.

And He had also placed for us, shepherds to take care of us, to be His representatives, under the leadership of the chief shepherd of all, from St. Peter to his successors as the Vicars of Christ, the chief representative of our Lord, the One and True Shepherd of all in this world. The priests, all the members of the ordained ministry, the holy orders, including all the bishops and all whom have given themselves to fulfill God’s calling and to become His servants, we celebrate today on this occasion as well.

Thus, today is also Vocation Sunday, a day when we remember all those who have been called to vocation in the Lord, to take up a life of dedication to the Lord and His people, to be the shepherds to guide the flock of God on their way to God. Let us pray for them, that they will remain always strong amidst the difficulties and challenges that certainly will come their way.

But let us also not forget that on this day, we too should also heed the Lord’s call, especially those of us who are young and have not known what we are to do with our own lives. Let us pray that all the young men whom God had chosen and called to His service, may discern and find their path and purpose in life, and when the time comes, to become the shepherds of God’s people, accepting the heavy but fulfilling responsibility which God had entrusted them with.

O Lord, our Good Shepherd, our Master and our God, be with us always and love us always. And allow the love and devotion for You to grow ever stronger in our hearts. Help us to guide one another on our way to You, so that none of the sheep of Your flock may be lost. Be with our priests and all those who have dedicated themselves to Your service, and be with those whom You have called. Be with us always too, now and forever. Amen.

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Sunday, 26 April 2015 : Fourth Sunday of Easter, Good Shepherd Sunday, Vocation Sunday (Gospel Reading)

Liturgical Colour : White

John 10 : 11-18

At that time, Jesus said to the Jews, “I am the Good Shepherd. The Good Shepherd gives His life for the sheep. Not so the hired hand, or any other person who is not the shepherd, and to whom the sheep do not belong. They abandon the sheep as soon as they see the wolf coming; then the wolf snatches and scatters the sheep. This is because the hired hand works for pay and cares nothing for the sheep.”

“I am the Good Shepherd. I know My own and My own know Me, as the Father knows Me and I know the Father. Because of this, I give My life for My sheep. I have other sheep which are not of this fold. These I have to lead as well, and they shall listen to My voice. Then there will be one flock, since there is one Shepherd.”

“The Father loves Me, because I lay down My life in order to take it up again. No one takes it from Me, but I lay it down freely. It is Mine to lay down and to take up again : this mission I received from My Father.”

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Sunday, 26 April 2015 : Fourth Sunday of Easter, Good Shepherd Sunday, Vocation Sunday (Second Reading)

Liturgical Colour : White

1 John 3 : 1-2

See what singular love the Father has for us : we are called children of God, and we really are. This is why the world does not know us, because it did not know Him.

Beloved, we are God’s children and what we shall be has not yet been shown. Yet when He appears in His glory, we know that we shall be like Him, for then we shall see Him as He is.

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Sunday, 26 April 2015 : Fourth Sunday of Easter, Good Shepherd Sunday, Vocation Sunday (Psalm)

Liturgical Colour : White

Psalm 117 : 1 and 8-9, 21-23, 26 and 28-29

Alleluia! Give thanks to the Lord, for He is good, His loving kindness endures forever. It is better to take refuge in the Lord than to trust in the help of humans. It is befter to take refuge in the Lord than to trust in the might of princes.

I thank You for having answered me, for having rescued me. The stone rejected by the builders has become the cornerstone. This was the Lord’s doing and we marvel at it.

Blessed is He who comes in the Lord’s Name! We bless You from the house of the Lord. You are my God, and I give You thanks. You are my God, and I give You praise. Give thanks to the Lord, for He is good; His steadfast love endures forever!

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Sunday, 26 April 2015 : Fourth Sunday of Easter, Good Shepherd Sunday, Vocation Sunday (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : White

Acts 4 : 8-12

Then Peter, filled with the Holy Spirit, spoke up, “Leaders of the people! Elders! It is a fact that we are being examined today for a good deed done to a cripple. How was he healed? You and all the people of Israel must know that this man stands before you cured through the Name of Jesus Christ the Nazarean. You had Him crucified, but God raised Him from the dead.”

“Jesus is the stone rejected by you the builders which has become the cornerstone. There is no salvation in anyone else, for there is no other Name given to humankind all over the world by which we may be saved.”

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Saturday, 25 April 2015 : Feast of St. Mark, Evangelist (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : Red (Apostles and Evangelists)

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, today we celebrate the feast day of one of the Four Great Evangelists, the four writers of the Holy Gospels. Today is the feast of St. Mark, one of the important Apostles of Jesus, who went with St. Paul in his travels of preaching the faith, and eventually founded the See of Alexandria in Egypt, now known as the Patriarchate of Alexandria, which can trace their founding from St. Mark himself.
The significance of this day cannot be separated from what we heard from the Gospel, which highlighted the very important mission which Christ had placed on our shoulders, which He entrusted to all those who have placed their trust in Him. This mission is for us to preach the Good News to all the peoples all around the world, all the way to the ends of the earth.

This mission calls us to evangelise the Gospels to those who have yet to hear the Word of God and the Good News, so that all of them may hear them and be saved as well. We cannot deny this mission nor can we ignore it, for it is this mission has been entrusted to all of us who have been baptised in the Name of our Lord. And this mission continues even to this day, as all of us still have the need to proclaim the word of God’s salvation to all the peoples.

Had the Apostles kept to themselves and did not proclaim the salvation in Jesus Christ because they were afraid of all those who were out to persecute them, then there would have been no Church, and at least not the Church that we know of and are accustomed to. All of the greatness of the Church, in terms of its reach and works, are all possible because of the courageous acts and deeds of the Holy Apostles and disciples who braved even death and destruction to bring about salvation to all peoples.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, today we are all called to walk in the footsteps of the Apostles and all the holy saints, that we may also be able to carry the cross of Christ, by becoming His mouthpiece and witnesses to all the nations. Now the question is if we are ready to bear that cross and do what we are expected to do as the members of God’s Church and as the partakers of the Lord’s work of mercy and salvation of all mankind.

St. Mark had written all these testimonies, so that all of us may be aware of what our faith truly is, and how we ought to live it out faithfully and not just with empty proclamations. Therefore, similarly, we too should also heed it through real and concrete actions, to show that we truly belong to the Lord our God. As in our first reading today, St. Peter exhorted the faithful to don the vest of humility as part of their lives, and be sober and alert against the temptations and corruptions of the devil. This shows us that we must indeed be devoted to the Lord via real and genuine love, and not just with empty faith.

There are many temptations in this world, brothers and sisters, and very often, these have taken their toll on us, by turning us in rebellion against God and by turning our hearts and eyes away from His truth and His ways, and we rather follow our own way. This is the great trouble that is facing our world today, and there is something indeed which we can do in order to make it better.

Can we make use of this great opportunity, which God offers us daily, so that we may wholeheartedly change our ways and abandon our ways of sin and disobedience, and become better disciples of our Lord. Remember, brethren, that people will likely only believe in us and in whatever we preach to them, if we have practiced what we preached in our own actions and deeds.

May Almighty God give us courage and strength, the wisdom and the eloquence of speech, as well as a faithful heart and devoted mind, so that we may, by our examples, lead many more people and save more souls through the same salvation which our Lord Jesus Christ offered us freely for our forgiveness. God bless us all and may He help to keep us safe. Amen.