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Tuesday, 8 October 2019 : 27th Week of Ordinary Time (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : Green

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, on this day we listened to the word of God from the Scripture passages speaking to us about the matter of getting what is right in our lives, namely the right focus and the right direction in life following what the Lord our God has shown us as He guides us through this journey of life. It is often that we will be reminded of making the right choices of action and to find our way to the Lord.

Today, in our first reading, taken from the Book of the prophet Jonah, we heard the mission of Jonah who was sent by God to the great city of Nineveh. Nineveh was known as the capital city of a great empire, the Assyrian Empire which for many years was the superpower in the region. Nineveh was therefore a very great city and the centrepoint of not just power, but also wealth, influence and also wickedness and corruption.

The Assyrians were known to be sinful and filled with power hungry people as they rampaged across many nations and conquered them, including that of the northern kingdom state of Israel, which they conquered and the ten tribes of the Israelites were exiled by the actions of the Assyrians. Naturally, the presentation of Nineveh in the Book of Jonah was meant to symbolise the depiction of the ultimate, great evil in the eyes of many of the faithful.

But what came to be a surprise was how the people of Nineveh reacted to what the prophet Jonah told them when he said that Nineveh would be destroyed for their sins and wickedness. They could have just dismissed what the prophet Jonah had said and went on with their lives, or they could even persecute and kill the prophet Jonah for bringing into their midst such an ill omen. Yet, they listened and believed.

Ironically this happened when the Israelites themselves refused to believe in God and in His prophets, and instead, persecuted and killed those prophets and messengers sent to them by God. It was a pagan nation and city who actually in the end believed in God’s words, sincerely and truly repentant of their sinful ways and humbling themselves before God, and that was how Nineveh was spared from destruction.

Linking this to what we have also heard in our Gospel passage today, on the encounter between the Lord Jesus and the sisters Mary and Martha, we can see that each and every one of us have been granted free will by God, with the wisdom, understanding and intelligence to make conscious choices in our respective lives on how we are going to live them so that we can find our way towards the Lord and His salvation.

Martha was very busy preparing everything, all the chores and necessary things to make the Lord’s stay comfortable and good. She certainly had a good intention in doing so, but she ended up being too preoccupied by what she had been doing and became distracted instead, forgetting that she should have remembered what the most important focus for her should have been, that is Christ Himself, as what her sister Mary did.

Mary chose the wise course of action and so did the king and the people of Nineveh. Martha had good intentions but the course of actions she chose was not right, and then for the Israelites I mentioned earlier on in contrast to the people of Nineveh, their hearts and minds were not even filled with the right intention as they had no love for God. Now, the choice is ours, brothers and sisters in Christ. Do we want to continue to walk down this path of sin and wickedness? Or do we rather walk the path shown by Christ?

On this day therefore, we are called to reflect and discern our path in life from now on. Can we choose wisely by considering the outcomes of our conscious choices in life? Can we turn away from the path of sin and disobedience against God, and follow from now on the path of redemption and reconciliation in God? Can we dedicate ourselves with a new spirit and courage to love God from now on with all of our strength?

May God continue to guide our paths and may He help us to remain focused on Him despite the many temptations and challenges we may have to face in the future. May God bless us all and our every actions and endeavours for His greater glory. Amen.

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Monday, 7 October 2019 : 27th Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of Our Lady of the Rosary (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : White

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, on this day, the seventh day in the month of October we annually celebrate the Feast of Our Lady of the Rosary, which began with the devotion to Our Lady of Victory, in commemoration of the great victory of the forces of the Christian faithful in the great battle of Lepanto against the forces of the infidels and those who persecuted the faithful and threatened Christendom at that time.

At that time, Christendom was threatened from all sides, from external forces and enemy as mentioned, as well as from internal disputes and divisions, heresies and lack of faith. But there were those who strived to put the effort to bring the Church back on its feet, as part of the Counter Reformation movement, renewing the zeal of many of the faithful and many heeded God’s call to serve Him in purifying His Church.

And when faced with the great external threat in the form of the mighty Ottoman Empire, which then was the superpower of the known world, and threatened much of Christendom, it was several brave leaders who took up the Cross and endeavoured to fight back against those who sought the destruction of the faithful. And thus, under the leadership of Pope St. Pius V and other leaders like Don Juan of Austria and many others, the Christian forces rallied itself and sought for the intercession of the Blessed Virgin for victory against their enemies through the devotion of the Rosary.

In the end, despite the great odds and supremacy of the enemy, the Christian forces prevailed in the end, and the faithful dealt a major blow on their enemies. It was also told that a great miracle occurred during the battle, as it appeared that the Blessed Mother of God was there guiding the faithful as they struggled against their enemies and helped through her intercession to bring them to a great victory.

In thanksgiving for the great victory, the day of the triumphant Battle has ever since been declared by Pope St. Pius V as a day of great celebration, initially attributed to Our Lady of Victory, but eventually developed into the celebration of Our Lady of the Rosary as how it happens today. Nonetheless, the key message of the celebration remains, in how the faithful managed to overcome their great oppressor and enemy through the help and intercession of Mary, by the devotion of the Rosary.

Now, let us all look at the Rosary itself. The rosary is a form of prayer in which a series of prayers of Ave Maria or ‘Hail Mary’ as we all know it, are prayed together in a chain, forming a chain of prayers which we use the rosary chain as a guide as we pray. The word rosary itself came from the root word ‘rosa’ meaning rose in Latin, that is a symbolic representation of how we actually offer a bouquet of lovely roses to our loving mother Mary as we pray the rosary.

The rosary is shown to us by Mary herself as she appeared to St. Dominic, the founder of the Order of Preachers, many centuries ago, and centuries before the fateful battle in Lepanto. She asked St. Dominic to propagate the use of the rosary as a devotion to help in the salvation of souls. For through the prayers of the rosary, the faithful can become closer to their loving mother through their prayers, and in turn, Mary will intercede for their sake before her Son in heaven.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, Mary loves us just as much as she loves her Son, Our Lord Jesus Christ, and that is because she had been entrusted to us by the Lord Himself from His Cross to be our mother, as He entrusted her to St. John, His disciple, representing the whole body of the Church. And vice versa therefore, we have also been made to be her adopted sons and daughters. Which mother then does not love her own children?

She does not want us to fall into sin that eventually lead us into damnation and separation from her Son, Our Lord and God. That is why through the Rosary, our blessed mother wants to help us to reconnect spiritually to God through her. She wants us to deepen our relationship with God through prayer and through contemplation. Through better relationship with God we can develop stronger faith and be more resistant to the temptations of the world.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, on this day we listened to the Lord’s call through His blessed mother calling us to a greater devotion and closer relationship with Him through His mother. On this day we are called to remember how through our close interaction and relationship with God through Mary we can be brought into a new existence in God and also receive His grace and blessings as those who won at Lepanto by the grace of God has shown us all. And we ourselves are in constant spiritual struggle and warfare, against the devil and the fallen angels who are trying to drag us into sin and hell with them.

Therefore in this month of October, the Marian month of the Rosary, let us all spend the time to pray more fervently especially that of the devotion of the rosary, so that we may grow to love God more and attune ourselves to Him more, and be more capable of resisting the temptations to sin in our daily living. And let us all trust in God more deeply for everything, knowing that He has loved us all these while and will not let us all to fall into eternal damnation through sin.

May the Lord, through His blessed mother Mary, who is also our loving mother, continue to love us all dearly and guide us to Himself in our journey of faith throughout life. Let us all deepen our spirituality and connection to God through His mother Mary by our devotion of the holy rosary daily that we may be triumphant in this constant struggle for our souls in the constant and daily spiritual warfare. May God bless us all, now and forevermore. Amen.

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Sunday, 6 October 2019 : Twenty-Seventh Sunday of Ordinary Time (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : Green

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, on this Sunday we listened to the words of God speaking to us into our hearts and minds, reminding us all that we must have that sincere and genuine faith in God, or else we will not be able to live our lives as how God wants us to live them. We must trust in the Lord in all things and put our lives before Him, dedicating ourselves to His cause and obeying His will at all times.

In our first reading today, taken from the Book of the prophet Habakkuk, we heard firstly of the supposed anger and distress of the people as voiced in conversation to God, to show how the people thought that God had not listened to their prayers and left them to endure suffering and bitterness in life. And this was made in the context of the prophet Habakkuk being active in his ministry during the early years of Babylonian Empire, which in a few decades would end up destroying Jerusalem and Judah, and brought the people into exile for many years.

At that time, the people of God were beset by many problems and were faced with many enemies, and they and their kingdom were already waning in power, far from the once glorious days of King David and King Solomon. The prophet Habakkuk as recorded throughout his book in fact spoke of the rise of the Babylonians, as a premonition for the ending days of the kingdom of Judah and the coming of the time of humiliation for God’s people, the destruction of their Temple and their enslavement once again in exile.

But this is where then God through the prophet Habakkuk wanted His people to know that it does not mean that if things did not go according to the plans of the people then it means that God does not care about His people or that He has forgotten about them. On the contrary, it means that everything is within God’s plan and will, and not how we want it to be. This is what God presented to us clearly today in that first reading passage, that if we have not received providence we need or grace we hope for, then we ought to be patient and remember that everything occurs in God’s time, not ours.

Impatience is caused by the desire in us that goes on unchecked and the temptation for us to get the right answers and things we want, which if we embrace then can lead to further impatience, unhappiness and sufferings. And why is this so? That is because we are never going to be satisfied by those things alone. They are mere distractions from the true happiness and treasure which we should see in our life, and which can be found in God alone.

It was the unbridled and uncontrolled desires of the people which led them to disobey God and to grumble against Him as mentioned in our Psalm today, where we heard that at the last part of the verses, the incident of Massah and Meribah was mentioned. At that time, the people of Israel were on their way from Egypt to the land promised by God to them. But as they continued to progress through the journey, they grumbled more and more, refusing to listen to God and even complaining that God was leading them to their deaths.

The people of Israel were impatient and they were also overcome by their own human desires, the greed and wants inside them. As a result, they sought for worldly satisfaction, wanting a good lifestyle that they could not wait to have. And instead of trusting God, they chose to turn to pagan gods and idols, and followed the words and desires of men rather than to listen to God and to the words that His servant Moses had spoken before them.

Just as their descendants at the era of the prophet Habakkuk would do, the people of God trusted more in their own human power, intelligence and strength rather than trusting in God as they should have. They wanted things to go their way and became angry and disillusioned when they could not get what they wanted. Yet in this, we can clearly see how they were imposing themselves on God and demanding things that they did not deserve in the first place.

In our Gospel passage today, the Lord Jesus put it bluntly before His disciples and the people whom He taught, that truly each and every one of us, no matter how powerful or great we are, ultimately we are merely the servants of God, His creatures and people, who are at His mercy at all times. But God’s love for us is so great that indeed, He wants to take care of us and provide for us in our respective lives. Nonetheless, God does this in the way He wills it and at the time of His own choosing.

And it is a reminder for us to avoid making excessive expectations in life, thinking that things will go our way or the way we wanted it to be. If we expect too much, in the end we will be left with nothing but disappointments, regrets and anger. This is exactly what the devil wants to lead us into, by tempting us with all those temptations and desires so that we will fall deeper and deeper into our wicked ways and disobey God through sin.

Yet it is also how our world today operates, in a society often obsessed with expectations, standards and ideals. We are often preoccupied so much on what we want that we forget what life truly is all about. Our life in truth is not about trying to accumulate as much wealth, fame or other good things in life, and neither it is a way for us to indulge ourselves in the many tempting things surrounding us, the temptations of money, fame, glory and other sorts of worldly pleasures.

Instead, our life should be enriched in faith and it should be holy just as Our Lord is holy. We should make best use of our life’s existence to bear witness to the truth of God by our every actions and deeds, by our words and dedication even in small and little things in our lives. We should grow lesser in our pride and in ego, in our ambition and desires and instead, we ought to grow stronger and firmer in our humility and in our love for God.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, on this day we are called to reflect on our lives and discern how we should live our lives from now on. We are called to turn ourselves from trusting only in our own human strengths and capabilities into trust in God with all of our hearts and with all of our strength. We have to realise that ultimately, there is no way that we can survive just with our own capabilities without God.

And we also have to understand that in the end, God’s will shall be done and not ours. God is the beginning and the end for everything that we are, and everything that we are belong to God and God alone. Brothers and sisters in Christ, are we able to live our lives from now on with greater humility and with greater commitment, turning towards Him with all of our hearts and minds? Are we able to follow Him and trust Him wholeheartedly, now and always?

May the Lord continue to guide us all in this journey, and may He strengthen us in our resolve to live a good and virtuous life from now on as faithful Christians, as those whom God considers to be His own beloved children and as those whom He will bless forever with eternal glory and blissful life in perfect grace and love. May God be with us always, now and forevermore. Amen.

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Saturday, 5 October 2019 : 26th Week of Ordinary Time (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : Green or White (Saturday Mass of Our Lady)

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, on this day we listened to the words of God speaking to us about the love which He has for us all His people, and the assurance which He has given to His people that He will bless them and protect them, even if they had fallen into sin and disobeyed Him and suffered because of all of that. God is ever loving, merciful and compassionate, but then at the same time, we should not take this generosity and love for granted.

He has always taken care of us, but we are often too busy and distracted from being able to understand and appreciate this generous love God has given us. Instead, we tried to find our happiness, joy and satisfaction in the many other things in this world, following the temptations and falsehoods spread by the evil one instead of looking for the truth. But we must realise that following the path of the devil will not bring us any good things in the end, only destruction and eternal regret.

In our Gospel passage today, the Lord Himself confidently proclaimed before all of His disciples, that He has seen the downfall of Satan, struck down in defeat, falling from Heaven into his downfall. And this is spoken because first of all, the Lord Himself had struck down Satan at the beginning for his prideful rebellion against Him, as mentioned in the Book of Revelations, how he even convinced a third of the Heavenly Hosts in his rebellion, those who would become the fallen angels and demons.

At that time, Satan was unable to achieve his goals and was defeated together with his forces, and were thrown out of Heaven. Knowing that he had no way to defeat God Who is Almighty and All-Powerful, he instead targeted us, the ones whom God loves, by tempting us and trying to pull us away from God and into the damnation and annihilation that Satan and the fallen angels themselves had been sentenced to.

We see just how much his temptations and efforts had led to many souls, throughout the ages, to fall into those temptations and therefore sinned against God. He tempted them with many pleasures of this world, the joy of having many worldly possessions and things, wealth and money, fame and glory, status and standing within the community, among many others. And all these distracted us from being able to find the path towards God.

And we also have certainly heard how the devil even tried to tempt the Lord Jesus, when He came into the world to be our Saviour. The devil likely did not know the full purpose and intention of the Lord’s coming, but he still tried nonetheless, tempting the Lord Jesus with satisfaction of food for the stomach, when he asked Jesus to turn the stone into bread, pandering to the greed in us, and then also with pride and our desire for attention when he brought Jesus up to the Temple’s parapets and asked Him to jump from there, and also when he showed the whole glory and power of the earth’s kingdoms that he would give if only the Lord Jesus worshipped him as god.

We need to see how the Lord Jesus rebuked Satan for his efforts in tempting Him, resisting and rejecting his efforts and advances, staying completely faithful to the mission which His Father has entrusted to Him. The Lord said that God alone should be worshipped as the one and only true God, and we must have trust in His words and obey His will. Ultimately, we have to realise that for all the good things that the devil presents to us, just as he did to the Lord Jesus, all of those things are temporary and illusory.

It means that all those good things of this world, which the world has often tempt us with, in our society obsessed with excessive consumerism and hedonistic lifestyles, they are all distractions that we need to learn to control and resist, to refuse the distractions of the devil, who made his path to look more appealing and good for us, even though the end is nothing less than eternal darkness and despair of damnation.

Instead, let us all spend this day reflecting on our own way of life, and how we can be more committed and faithful to the Lord despite the challenges we may face in this journey of faith, so that we may choose the right course of action in each and every moments of our lives, by choosing the side of the truth and by accepting the cross of Christ as we walk down this journey of faith. Let us all grow ever more faithful and be closer to the Lord and be good inspirations for one another, in strengthening our faith in God and in resisting the temptations and the efforts of the devil to destroy us.

May the Lord continue to guide us in our journey, and may He grant us the strength and commitment to be able to walk courageously and faithfully from now on, to devote our time, effort and attention to serve God with all of our hearts, with all of our minds and all of our strength. Amen.

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Friday, 4 October 2019 : 26th Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Francis of Assisi (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : White

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, on this day all of us through the Scripture passages which we have heard today are reminded of what it means for us to be Christians, in that each and every one of us ought to obey the Lord and follow His path, and not to fall into the temptations present in this world and end up therefore falling into sin as what the Scripture passages had presented to us this day.

In our first reading today, we heard the lamentations of the people of God as represented by the prophet Baruch, in which he spoke of the sins which the people of Israel had committed all the many years after God had shown so much love, care and concern for them, after He had brought them out of their slavery and suffering in Egypt into a land overflowing with milk and honey and full of prosperity, making them into a powerful and glorious nation.

And yet, those people rejected God and went to seek the pagan idols and gods instead, abandoning the Law and the commandments God had given them for the wicked ways of the world. They disobeyed God and committed sinful acts and deeds before Him for many, many years, and yet, God still patiently tried to bring them back to Him and to reconcile them to Him through His messengers and prophets.

The lamentations and the words spoken by the prophet Baruch were yet another reminder to the people of God just how much they have erred and lived in a state of sin for all those years. And this is what is also echoed in our Gospel passage today, in which the Lord Jesus spoke up against the cities of Galilee, of Capernaum, Chorazin and Bethsaida, when He rebuked those cities for their lack of faith.

And this rebuke was made in the context of how those cities, which were the ones mainly occupied by the Jewish people in Galilee, had not welcomed the Lord and accepted Him as they should have, and even as the Lord performed miraculous deeds and taught among the people there, they still doubted Him, unlike that of the other places in Galilee and even in Samaria where the Lord were welcomed and the people there listened to His message of truth and believed.

The Lord put it very clearly and bluntly that those who reject Him will only have condemnation in the end for them, and they will suffer because of their conscious abandonment of God’s love and grace. God has done so much, again and again to help them and to provide for them from time to time, because of His enduring love for us that remain strong even when we have disappointed Him so much, because He does not want us to be destroyed.

As we can see, all of us should appreciate just how much God has loved us all, and we should therefore do our best to love Him and to serve Him wholeheartedly by having a conversion of heart, mind, body and soul, so that while once we were deeply rooted in sin and wickedness, now we may turn ourselves into the true and faithful children of God. And today, we should therefore be inspired by the examples and the life of St. Francis of Assisi, the renowned saint and founder of the Franciscan order whose feast we are celebrating today.

St. Francis of Assisi was born as Giovanni di Pietro di Bernardone, the son of a wealthy merchant Pietro di Bernardone in Middle Ages Italy. At that time, the father of St. Francis wanted him to be the successor of his career and business as a rich silk merchant, and therefore provided the young St. Francis with plenty of good education and excellent worldly upbringing intended to prepare him for the role.

He lived a high life and a life filled with all sorts of luxury, but gradually he became disillusioned with all the wealth, glory and privileges he had, as told by the few encounters he had with the poor, which began to affect St. Francis’ outlook on the world and his own life’s calling. Eventually, he received God’s calling through several occurrences as he began to withdraw himself from the usual worldly indulgences, and began to turn towards the Lord with faith.

It was told that as he passed through an abandoned chapel of San Damiano, he heard God’s calling to restore His church, which the young St. Francis took literally as a calling to repair the abandoned and ruined chapel. St. Francis quietly took some of his father’s wares and sold them to get the necessary funds to repair the chapel, but the priest in charge of the chapel refused to accept the ill-gotten money.

Nonetheless, St. Francis had to hide from his father’s anger and sought protection from the local bishop. When the father of St. Francis demanded that St. Francis returned what he had cost him, and even wanted to make him to renounce his rights to his inheritance, St. Francis surprisingly took off all the garments from his body and returned them back to his father, naked and empty as he was on the day of his birth.

From then on, St. Francis of Assisi embraced fully his faith in God and lived his life as a penitent in Assisi, eventually gathering like-minded men to begin the foundations of what would eventually known as the Order of the Friars Minor or better known after its founder as the Franciscan Order. Through his efforts in founding the Franciscan Order, St. Francis of Assisi inspired countless others to follow the Lord with a renewed zeal and commitment.

St. Francis showed all of us what it means for us to focus our lives’ attention and effort on the Lord, in order for us to become His true disciples. He resisted the temptations of worldly glory, for money and possessions, for fame and for wealth, for glory and for the pleasures of the body, and instead sought for the greatest treasure that can be found in God alone. Are we able to do the same with our own lives, brothers and sisters in Christ?

It does not mean that we should abandon everything we have or sell everything we have and give them to the poor, but rather, we must resist the urge, desire and temptation to focus our lives on the wrong pursuit for more money, glory, fame and worldly things, and instead, make good use of those blessings we have received for the good of others and for the greater glory of God. Let us all reflect on this, and discern how we can better serve God through our lives from now on.

May the Lord continue to bless us all and guide us, and may He empower each and every one of us to become true Christians in the mould of St. Francis of Assisi, our role model in faith. May the Lord be with us always, now and forevermore. Amen.

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Thursday, 3 October 2019 : 26th Week of Ordinary Time (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : Green

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, today we listened to the Lord speaking to us through the words of the Scripture in which He told us about the mission which each and every one of us have been entrusted with, in reaching out to the world as witnesses of our faith in God. He has called on each and every one of us to be the bearers of His truth and the best way to do this is through our own actions in our daily life.

And He reassured us all as well that He is always with us throughout the journey of our life, standing by us and providing for us in whatever we need. He will always be with those who have been faithful to Him, and He will certainly remember them and bless them. However, at the same time, He also wants us all to know that our path may not be an easy one, as challenges and difficulties will be inevitable at some point or another.

In the Gospel passage today, as the Lord sent forth His disciples to go before Him in preaching the Good News and delivering His message to the peoples He Himself was to go, He reminded them all firstly of the trials and challenges that they would face, eventually even after the Lord has suffered, died, risen in glory and ascended into Heaven. The disciples of the Lord would face many rejections and oppressions from their enemies and all those who refused to believe.

And yet, He reassured them that while He was sending them like sheep among wolves, but He would be with them, and they would not be alone. He would guide them and protect them, and He advised them on what they ought to do, whether the people welcomed them and the message they brought to them, or whether those people refused to believe and rejected the disciples.

And therefore, we ourselves will also likely encounter moments when we have to endure rejection and persecution for standing up for our faith and for being faithful to God. There will be many moments when we will end up feeling stressed or pressured because of this rejection and the opposition even from those whom we may know or close to us, from our own family members and from among our own friends.

But we must not be disheartened by it, just as the prophet Ezra told the people in our first reading today, in which he read the Law of God to the assembled Israelites after they have returned from exile in Babylon back to their own homeland. The people initially felt bad and terrible, having known how wicked they and their ancestors had been in disobeying God’s laws, and yet, the prophet reminded them that God still loved all of them.

God cares for each and every one of us, His beloved people, without exception. God has always placed us close to His heart and He will not forget us, even after all that we have done, our sins and stubborn disobedience, our constant rebelliousness and refusal to believe in Him. But He wants us to repent from our sinful ways and turn away from those wickedness, and embrace Him wholeheartedly from now on.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, are we able to renew our faith and commitment in God? Are we able to trust Him with our whole life and learn to put our faith in Him without hesitation? That is why we need to transform our lives and turn to God with all of our heart from now on, committing ourselves to a new life that is no longer filled with sin and wicked desires of the world, but instead centred on the love of God.

Let us all be genuine and faithful witnesses of our faith in God, by devoting ourselves, our time, effort and attention on Him, and by practicing what we truly believe in, in each and every parts of our daily lives, that is in all of our words, actions and deeds. Let us all be true in our faith in God and trust in Him, and help one another to be more faithful, each and every days of our lives. May God be with us all and may He continue to bless us and our good endeavours. Amen.

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Wednesday, 2 October 2019 : 26th Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of the Holy Guardian Angels (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : White

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, on this day we listened to the words of the Scripture speaking to us about the protection and love which God, Our Lord and Master has given us all of these while, not letting us to go into the harm’s path, as mentioned in our first reading today, in the Book of Exodus in which God reassured His people that He sent His Angels to guide them, to protect them from their enemies and to lead them to freedom.

And it is befitting that today we celebrate the Feast of the Holy Guardian Angels, as each and every one of us have been provided with an Angel by God to be our guide and our protector, to be the one resisting the temptation of the evil one and his wicked allies in a constant spiritual warfare and struggle. The Guardian Angels are our protectors that is always by our side, even if we cannot see or feel them.

They are always by our side when the devil and the fallen angels strike at us, pulling at us and tempting us to fall into sin. They are the voices of reason and wisdom in our hearts and in our minds, keeping us strong despite the strong temptations and challenges that we have to constantly face at all times. The devil is always busy at work trying to make us fall, and certainly he will do everything within his capability to destroy us.

But we should not be afraid, for the Lord through His Angels has always taken care of us and as the Lord mentioned in our Gospel passage today, those Angels are always constantly in contact with God, and God Who knows everything will know all that is happening to us, and He sends us His help through many means including that of the Angels who are constantly out and about fighting against the forces of evil all around us.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, on this day, we are called to reflect on our own lives and how we have lived them thus far. Have we been following the suggestions and the advices given to us by the Guardian Angel each one of us have on our side or have we instead given in to the temptations of the devil and his fellow fallen angels, those who have always tempted us and tried to bring us down with them?

Today, we are all called to be more attuned to the presence of our Guardian Angels who is always out and about taking care of each and every one of us. God has given them to be by our side, to care for us and to love us, so that all of us, God’s beloved ones can truly be safe and protected from the evil ones. Have we realised just how much they have done for our sake, in protecting us all these while?

Let us all strive therefore to be as what the Lord has said to His disciples in our Gospel passage today, to have the faith like the faith of little children. Let us all do our best to be faithful, and it means that we should be sincere in our faith and commitment to God as those children truly loved the Lord wholeheartedly. When we have been exposed to the many corrupt temptations of this world, then our love for God has been affected and our attention on Him has been diverted.

That is why we have not been able to dedicate ourselves wholeheartedly, because we prefer to listen to the sweet lies and the tempting words of Satan rather than to listen to God and His truth. We shut our hearts and minds against Him, and even though our Guardian Angels have been reminding us, we prefer to listen to the devil instead. Perhaps we should really reflect on what we should be doing from now on.

Let us all pray and ask our Guardian Angels to protect us and to take care of us, that they will protect us from the attacks by the evil one, who is always out there trying to snatch us from the hands of the Lord. Let us all be closer to our Guardian Angels and be thankful always for their constant protection and the love which they had shown us all these while.

O Holy Guardian Angels, God’s wonderful protectors, protect us from the attacks by the enemy, by those who seek our destruction. O Holy Guardian Angels, continue to love us as you have done all these while and intercede for our sake, and ask the Lord to bless us and guide us in our journey of faith. Amen.

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Tuesday, 1 October 2019 : 26th Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Therese of the Child Jesus, Virgin and Doctor of the Church, Patroness of all Missionaries and the Missions (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : White

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, on this day we mark the beginning of the Extraordinary Mission Month as promulgated by Pope Francis earlier last year and it is fitting that this month of October begins with the feast of the Patroness of all Missionaries and Missions, namely St. Therese of Lisieux, also known as St. Therese of the Child Jesus, a great visionary and saint, and through her many excellent writings, a great Doctor of the Church and inspiration to all of us.

St. Therese of Lisieux was a Discalced Carmelite nun who was renowned for her ‘Little Way’ or the ‘Little Way of St. Therese of Lisieux’, which is why she was also known as the ‘Little Flower of Jesus’. St. Therese of Lisieux faced a lot of difficulties during the early years of her life and in embracing her calling into religious life as even though she was raised in a pious and virtuous family, her parents being just recently canonised as saints as well, St. Louis Martin and St. Marie-Azelie Guerin, but she had a frail condition and health.

Nonetheless, this did not stop St. Therese of Lisieux from listening to God’s call and embracing her calling, which in a way inspired her own family to also embrace their calling, as eventually the siblings of St. Therese of Lisieux also embraced and committed themselves to religious life like St. Therese had been. She received many visions throughout her life, from the Lord and His blessed Mother Mary, both before and after she joined the religious life.

That was how she began to journal her experiences and wrote extensively about those spiritual experiences and her thoughts, which made her own incredible piety and devotion to God even more amazing. She spent a lot of time praying for priests and many of the people whose faith were weak and lukewarm, hoping that through her prayers those people would be fortified further in their own faith and devotion to God.

And despite the tough circumstances and conditions she had to bear as a member of the strict Carmelite order, and the bullying and challenges she actually experienced during her years in the service of God, St. Therese continued to devote herself to God ever more strongly through prayer and through her love for her community, and by her examples and inspiring faith, eventually many would be strengthened in their own faith and others became converts through her many works and writings.

Truly, this is the essence of what missionary work is all about, and the Lord in our Gospel passage today wants to remind us of both our obligation as Christians as well as how we should approach this responsibility we now have in being witnesses of our faith and as missionaries of the Gospels of Christ. We must not be afraid to embrace God with all of our strength and love Him with all of our abilities as St. Therese of Lisieux had done.

And we should not think that it is impossible for us to devote ourselves just because we think that we are unworthy or incapable of doing what our holy predecessors had done. To be a good missionary does not need us to do great and wonderful deeds, or to perform miracles and doing seemingly superhuman feats. We tend to think too much, worry too much and have too many things in our minds and in the end, our fears, worries and uncertainties will become our undoing.

In today’s Gospel and also through the life and philosophy of St. Therese of Lisieux, we are all called to change our mindset and perspective of life, in how we should devote ourselves to the Lord. We are called to reflect on what it means for us to welcome the Lord like that of little children and how to love Him like those children had loved Him. A children’s love and faith are pure, and they are pure because they have not yet been corrupted by worldly desires and thoughts.

Therefore, our love for God must also be pure and unconditional just as how He Himself has loved us first. God has not reserved or held back His love towards us at all, and He gave us everything through Christ, His Son, Who suffered grievously and died on the Cross for the sake of our salvation. And as St. Therese of Lisieux famously put in her ‘Little Way’ as I mentioned earlier, that is for us to be faithful to God, it does not need us to be great or to do superhuman feats.

Rather, what we need to do, according to St. Therese of Lisieux, is to become small and humble, recognising our faults and shortcomings that we may empty ourselves of ego, pride and desires so that we may truly be able to love God and give ourselves to Him wholeheartedly, and doing this in a manner that we take a small, little step one at a time, and not a giant leap. Ultimately, all those small little steps will add up together and become a great progress for us in our journey of faith.

Therefore, brothers and sisters in Christ, we are all called today to be missionaries of our faith, to become the witnesses of Christ, in every little and small things we do in our lives, in everything that we say and we do, in all of our interactions with our fellow brethren, that we should commit ourselves to the path of righteousness and do only what pleases God from now on. Let us all be inspirations for one another and encourage one another to live more faithfully from now on.

May the Lord continue to bless us all and guide us in our journey of faith, and may He empower us all to live more courageously in His presence. May God be with us always, now and forevermore. Amen.

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Monday, 30 September 2019 : 26th Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Jerome, Priest and Doctor of the Church (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : White

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, on this day we listened to the words of the Scriptures reminding us about the matter of welcoming God into our midst, as we heard in our Gospel passage today, of the Lord speaking to His disciples on how they should welcome Him like that of a little child. And He made this comparison because a young child’s faith, unlike that of adults, is truly pure and genuine and not masked by other worldly desires.

That is why He reminded His disciples that they should welcome Him in the manner that those little children have welcomed Him. In that occasion, when the people brought little children to the Lord, His disciples wanted to prevent them and push the children away from Him, but the Lord rebuked them for doing something like that. For He wanted them to know that the Lord truly loves everyone without exceptions and His love for them is such that no one should ever be prevented from coming to Him.

And in the same way, we should not let ourselves to be prevented from coming towards God and loving Him, although the reality is such that we often keep God away from us and this is caused by our own preoccupations and attachments to the many temptations and desires present in this world. We are often too busy thinking about other things to be able to think about God or to love Him, because we love ourselves and the world so much more than we love Him.

That is why many of us are struggling in our faith, and we are unable to love God as we should have loved Him. We are unable to reach out to God with the fullness of sincerity and genuine love, as long as we allow ourselves to be tempted and pulled away from God’s loving and tender care. But God has always continued to love us all regardless, and He has always been faithful to the Covenant which He had made with us all.

In what He revealed to us all through His prophet Zechariah in our first reading today, we have heard just how much He loves each and every one of us, His beloved people, and how He wants to restore us and to bless us tremendously once again. God has always thought about us and committed Himself to us all by giving us again and again the wonders of His love, and there is no greater gift than the gift of His own beloved Son, Our Lord Jesus Christ.

For through Christ, God has given us all the surety of salvation and new life in Him. Through Christ, God has showed us all what it truly means to love, and to love generously and tenderly, giving us His all in love, even if it means for Him to take up the unimaginably heavy burden of the Cross and enduring all those sufferings just so that He can save us from certain destruction because of our sins.

Are we able to love God in the same way that He has loved us all? Perhaps we should look at the examples set by His saints, those who have lived and gone before us, leading the path for us in holiness. And today we celebrate the feast of St. Jerome, a great saint and a very important Church father, one of the very influential leaders of the early Church, as one of the original Doctors of the Church.

St. Jerome was renowned for his great dedication to God, spending many years and decades in solitary isolation, loving God and devoting himself in prayer to God through an ascetic lifestyle. And it was also then that St. Jerome completed the Latin translation of the Scriptures, from the Greek Septuagint Scriptures into what would eventually be known as the Latin Vulgate Bible.

Through his many years of dedication to the Lord, St. Jerome showed us all what it truly means to love God with all of his heart and strength, and it was indeed certainly not easy, as he had to endure so many challenges, temptations and difficulties throughout his life. Yet, he made the effort to resist those temptations and strive to love God as best as he could. Are we able to do the same in our own lives, brothers and sisters in Christ?

Let us all draw closer to God and let us love Him sincerely from our hearts, doing our very best to serve Him and to be His beloved children once again. May the Lord continue to bless us in all of our endeavours and may He continue to guide us in our journey of faith. Amen.

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Sunday, 29 September 2019 : Twenty-Sixth Sunday of Ordinary Time, Feast of the Holy Archangels Michael, Gabriel and Raphael (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : Green

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, on this Sunday, all of us are all called to live a holy and virtuous life that is centred not on worldly possessions and the many temptations present in this world, but rather on God alone. We have to remember this at all times, lest those same temptations pull us into the wrong path, as the evil one is always ever ready and ever busy to strike at us with all of his capabilities.

In our first reading today, we heard the words of the prophet Amos being directed at the Israelites conveying the anger of God at those people because of their refusal to believe in Him and His prophet, their refusal to listen to those whom God had sent into their midst to remind them to follow His path. They have hardened their hearts and closed their minds to God, and they preferred to live in sin and worshipped pagan idols and gods instead of the One and only True God they should have been worshipping.

The prophet Amos worked and ministered to the people during the last years of the northern kingdom of Israel, which was referred to in the first reading passage today as ‘Samaria’, which was the capital of the northern kingdom of Israel. It was a foreboding and warning to those people that should they continue to live in sin and refused to change their ways, they would see the end of their kingdom and had to endure exile, as how it actually happened in the end.

And this is related to what we have heard in our Gospel passage today, in which the Lord Jesus used the parable of Lazarus and the rich man to highlight how important it is for us to live a truly God-centric life and resist the many temptations found in this world. In that well-known parable we heard how the Lord Jesus told His disciples the story of a rich man and a poor man named Lazarus, who was always by the gate of the house of the rich man, hungry and suffering while the rich man feasted and dressed well every single day.

Through this parable, the Lord wanted us all to know that it is not that He is against us having wealth or that being wealthy is something that is sinful and wrong, but rather, it is our unhealthy and dangerous attachment to those worldly possessions, be it wealth in any forms, in money and other goods of pleasures, even in matter of dress and food that we must be wary of. Those goods on their own are not evil or bad by nature.

In fact, having greater wealth and possessions is actually a blessing from God, that God has given us more and provided us with greater blessings in our own unique way. However, we must also remember what the Lord Himself also said in another different occasion, that ‘To those who have been given a lot, a lot is also then expected from them’. This means that the more blessings we have received from God, the more that we are actually challenged to make good use of them.

The very fact that Lazarus, the poor man stayed at the gate of the rich man’s house day after day, again and again showed just how oblivious the rich man and his household had been to the plight of Lazarus. The rich man and his household partied and celebrated without end, with all the goodness the world could have offered, enjoying to the fullest all of earth’s wonderful pleasures, satisfying themselves in great excess.

That poor man did not ask for much, just for food to alleviate his hunger and basic human needs and dignity. Yet, no one would give him what he deserved, and left him all alone to suffer until the day he died and went into heaven in the presence of God and Abraham, his forefather. Then as mentioned, the rich man also died, and he went into the eternal suffering in hell, suffering as the Lord said because during life, he had done what is wicked and enjoyed life as it was, while Lazarus suffered so greatly.

Being rich is truly not something that is inherently evil or bad. God does not despise the rich and the powerful as I have just mentioned. But when we misuse what God has given to us and blessed us with for our own selfish purposes, just as the prophet Amos spoke against the Israelites for their wicked and unjust actions towards one another, then we have committed a great sin against God.

But this is something that each and every one of us must always be wary about, as the temptations are always there, pulling us into the path of disobedience and sin. By our exposure to sin, and by the frailty of our body, mind and flesh, we are naturally predisposed to various desires, be it for wealth, money, for worldly things and possessions, for glory and power, for other pleasures of this world, to satisfy our own selfish desires.

This is where we must always stand ready to resist those temptations, which Satan and all the evil forces ever present around us are always ready to push onto us, trying to lure us away from the path of righteousness. And this is where in our second reading today, taken from the Epistle of St. Paul to St. Timothy, the Apostle reminded us that each and every one of us must strive to be holy and godly, and strive to resist all the negative emotions and temptations that threaten to take us away from God.

And looking again at the parable of Lazarus and the rich man, let us remember and realise just how futile our pursuits for worldly things and glories have been. For all of his wealth and power, his popularity and all the fame he had, the rich man was left with nothing when he entered into death and thrown into hell. In the end, he was just left by himself, in despair and total hopelessness, and no matter what he is doing and how he want to get out, once he is in hell, there is absolutely no hope for him, for he has rejected God completely and refused His love totally.

Satan purposely wants us to indulge in all those wicked things, and to be tempted to sin so that we will in the end lose everything, and he will never cease to tempt us and to push us into sin, and we should resist his efforts and seek for help in this constant battle raging daily for our souls. And today, as it happens, we celebrate the Feast of the Holy Archangels, St. Michael, St. Gabriel and St. Raphael.

Today, let us all ask for the help and protection from the three Holy Archangels, who is always ready to help us with the legions of Angels and our own Guardian Angels to protect us all from the attacks of the evil ones. But we also have to make the conscious effort to resist those temptations and realise that we have to hold onto the right things in life, that is not the false joys and happiness in worldly things, but rather to trust in God.

Let us all therefore make best use of whatever God has blessed us with, for the benefit of our fellow men and not be selfish like the rich man or the Israelites of the time of prophet Amos, who put themselves, their ego and pride ahead of their love for God and for their fellow men. Let us seek to be humble in all things and love God and place Him at the very centre of our lives and our existences. Let us not be ignorant of the needs and the plight of those who are less fortunate than us, but instead, let us be generous in sharing whatever happiness, joy and blessings we have received from God.

May the Holy Archangels, St. Michael, St. Gabriel and St. Raphael protect us all and may they intercede for us and be our guardians in this constant, daily spiritual warfare that we may emerge triumphant, keeping ourselves away from unworthy and wicked attachments to false pleasures, joys and temptations of this world so that in all things we may become ever closer to God and be worthy of His promised inheritance and glory. Amen.