preaching the faith

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Monday, 18 May 2015 : 7th Week of Easter, Memorial of Pope St. John I, Pope and Martyr (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : White or Red (Martyrs)

Acts 19 : 1-8

While Apollos was in Corinth, Paul travelled through the interior of the country and came to Ephesus. There he found some disciples whom he asked, “Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you became believers?” They answered, “We have not even heard that anyone may receive the Holy Spirit.”

Paul then asked, “What kind of baptism have you received?” And they answered, “The baptism of John.” Paul then explained, “John’s baptism was for conversion, but he himself said that they should believe in the One who was to come, and that One is Jesus.”

Upon hearing this, they were baptised in the Name of the Lord Jesus. Then Paul laid his hands on them and the Holy Spirit came down upon them; and they began to speak in tongues and to prophesy. There were about twelve of them in all. Paul went into the synagogue and for three months he preached and discussed there boldly, trying to convince them about the Kingdom of God.

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Sunday, 17 May 2015 : Seventh Sunday of Easter (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : White

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, today we celebrate the last of the seven Sundays of Easter and the beginning of the last week of the Easter season. Next Sunday will be the Solemnity of the Pentecost, when we celebrate the great ending of the season of Easter, by recalling the birth of the Church through the sending and the descent of the Holy Spirit to the Apostles and disciples of Christ.

And today we heard about how Jesus cares for all those who are under His care and protection. He prayed to His Father to bless and protect all those whom He had chosen and called, and to preserve them in His love so that they would not be lost, unless they themselves choose to be lost. This is to reflect the events that were about to happen at that time, when Judas, the faithless disciple betrayed Jesus and chose the greed of the world and money over faith to the Lord.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, all of us must understand that the fundamental part of our faith in God is to understand and comprehend the wholeness of the love of God. And this love is so great and so unconditional and selfless in nature, that for us all mankind who are used to the kind of selfish love and desires in the world, it is indeed difficult to understand the extent and nature of the love that God has for all of us.

But that is why our faith in God should be filled with the attempts by us to understand more about this love, which God had shown us, for God Himself is Love, and if we claim to know what love is, then we have to know what God has done for us. For we are all sinners and wicked in nature, through what we have done in our respective lives, be it in small or great things. And yet, God continues to love us and care for us, the love which He showed us by sending Jesus to our midst, that He may dwell among us, His beloved people and save us.

This celebration of Easter is truly a celebration of God’s love, which had been made real and concrete through Jesus, our Paschal Lamb, the Lamb of God who had willingly given Himself up to be sacrificed on the cross for us. From the cross He had offered up His Body and shed His Blood, as the perfect sacrifice for the atonement of our sins, and by His Blood and His death therefore, we have been cleansed and made holy by the Lord Himself.

At the times past, after the Exodus of the people of Israel from Egypt, the people of Israel made a covenant with the Lord their God through Moses, who offered animal sacrifices on the altar at the foot of God’s holy mountain, and the blood of the lambs and goats sacrificed were sprinkled onto the people, who then became part of God’s covenant and became partakers in His grace and blessings.

Remember then, when our Lord Jesus Christ spoke at the Last Supper, the moment when He uttered the prayers we heard in today’s Gospel? Yes, the moment when He gave the bread and wine He blessed and transformed into His own real Flesh and Blood? He said, this is My Body which is given up for you, and this is My Blood, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins and as the seal of the new Covenant which God made with us all through Jesus Christ our Lord.

The Jews who cried out for His death, asking for the crucifixion of the Saviour before Pilate, the Roman governor, spoke of how they would bear the Blood of the One they had condemned to death upon themselves and their own children, without realising the importance of these words. And often, we ourselves also overlook the importance of these words for our salvation. For this shows how by the Blood of the Paschal Lamb, Christ, we have been sanctified and consecrated to the Lord.

And unlike the blood of lambs and goats of the old days and times, this Blood is none other than the Most Precious Blood of our Lord and Saviour, and together with His Most Precious Body, we all have shared in them and become partakers in God’s new Covenant and therefore, receive the fullness of His blessings and grace. And all of us Christians that belong to the one and only Church of God, have been part of this new Covenant and sanctification that Christ mentioned, since the day of our baptism.

Regardless whether we were baptised as infants or as fully conscious adults, on the day of our baptism, we have cast aside our old life and our worldliness, and either by our conviction or by the conviction of our parents and godparents, we have made the decision to reject Satan and all of his evil and wicked lies, and vow to preserve the faith, the true faith and understanding of the Lord and His ways which have been passed down to us through the Church.

And by the waters of baptism, we are reborn anew, that is to be born again in the Lord. We have shared in the death of Christ, and we leave behind our sickened and corrupted old past, and then were raised again into a new life, sharing in our Lord’s resurrection. This is the essence of Easter and why we celebrate it with so much joy, because indeed it is inseparable from our own history of being saved in the Lord.

And then we also receive the Holy Spirit and its power and encouragement through the Sacrament of Confirmation, when our faith in the Lord is affirmed and strengthened. And we share in the Most Holy Eucharist, by receiving our Lord’s own Body and Blood, and thus become full participants and sharers in God’s Covenant that He has sealed with His own Blood and His own sacrifice on the cross.

We have all been consecrated and sanctified for the Lord, and He has chosen us all, to be loved by Him and to receive the fullness of His grace and love. As I have mentioned earlier, the Lord Himself is love, and by His love, the perfect and selfless love, He has willed for us all to repent and to change from our sinful ways, into new lives blessed by Him. And this is what had happened to us all.

But then, this then should remind us of what we need to do from now on. Christ is our Teacher, our Lord and our High Priest, and by the baptism we received, we have shared the same mission, the priestly, kingly and godly nature of our Lord. Therefore, we have a mission before all of us, that Christ Himself had entrusted to His Apostles and disciples, and therefore to all of us.

We have to carry the message of our Lord’s salvation to the nations, preaching His love and the care which He has shown us, to all the peoples, that they too may realise how great is the love that God has for them, just as He had shown us. God loves everyone, and it will indeed be very troubling if we have people who failed to be saved and rescued if it is within our power and ability to help them.

Let us therefore remember that we have been marked and chosen by our Lord to be saved, and we have been sanctified and prepared by Him, for a mission to continue His good works in this world, that is to save as many souls as possible from the darkness and sin, and from the depredations of Satan and all of his forces. Let us renew our commitments and efforts to help each other in reaching out towards salvation, and let us not be apathetic to the cries of our brethren who long to see and listen to the word of God. May God be with us all and with all of our endeavours. Amen.

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Saturday, 16 May 2015 : 6th Week of Easter (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : White

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, today’s readings told us about how Apollos, the faithful servant of God and preacher of the faith told the truth about Christ to many people of many nations among the Gentiles or the non-Jews, and how many were converted because of his works.

But he himself was not perfect, as he did not have the full revelation of truth which only the Holy Spirit could give, and he received it once he was baptised in the Spirit by the Apostles, and the fullness of the truth of God was revealed to him through the means of fellow disciples who explained the truth to him in greater detail.

And in the Gospel Jesus spoke about how He taught in parables and stories, veiling from the people the fullness of the truth, and while they understood the meaning of the stories, but the real meaning behind all of them were not revealed until the time when the Lord deemed it right to reveal them so. And a very important truth He revealed that day, that all of us should ask when we need something, and because we want to know the truth, then we all should ask about the truth.

That means, as we live this life and live our faith, we cannot be passive or complacent or lazy. Otherwise, our faith will be empty and meaningless, and then, it is easy for Satan, the evil one, to plant all of his seeds of lies and discord within us. And this is how so many people fell into heresy and sin against God, because they did not know the truth or lacking the knowledge of the truth, and yet they took matter into their own hands and in their pride, they ended up subverting and changing the truth to serve their own purposes.

We are all prone to this, and it is easy for us to the many temptations to deviate from the truth. Sometimes, we are too proud to admit that we do not know about something, and therefore, we remain in our error and in the state of lacking knowledge. And sometimes we are too proud to ask because we do not want to lower ourselves and thus lose our prestige and ego.

Thus, let us all today reflect on this, on how we all should really open up ourselves to the Lord. All of us must be proactive in our faith, that if we know that we lack something that God’s grace can give, then we must really throw far, far away our ego and pride, and open ourselves to receive God’s grace and blessings, that is the truth which He wants to show us but we are often unable to grasp because of that same ego.

Let us all learn to be more humble in all things, especially before the Lord our God, and let us realise that firstly we are all sinners and then we are also lacking in the knowledge of the truth necessary to liberate us from the depredations of evil and sin. We often presume to know many things while the truth is that we know none. Let us ask the Lord to allow us to know more about how wicked we were, and indeed, how wicked we are now in our ways, and how we can change for the better.

May Almighty God bless us all, forgive us our sins and empower us with strength, courage and humility, so that we may grow ever deeper in our faith and stronger in our humility, realising our sinful ways and be truly converted to the Lord our God and walk humbly always in His ways. Amen.

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Saturday, 16 May 2015 : 6th Week of Easter (Gospel Reading)

Liturgical Colour : White

John 16 : 23b-28

At that time, Jesus said to His disciples, “Truly, I say to you, whatever you ask the Father in My Name, He will give you. So far you have not asked in My Name; ask, and receive, that your joy may be full.”

“I taught you all this in veiled language, but the time is coming when I shall no longer speak in veiled language, but will tell you plainly of the Father. When that day comes, you will ask in My Name; and it will not be for Me to ask the Father for you, for the Father Himself loves you, because you have loved Me, and you believe that I came from the Father.”

“As I came from the Father, and have come into the world, so I am leaving the world, and going to the Father.”

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Saturday, 16 May 2015 : 6th Week of Easter (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : White

Acts 18 : 23-28

After spending some time in Antioch, Paul left and travelled from place to place through Galatia and Phrygia, strengthening the disciples. A certain Jew named Apollos, a native of Alexandria, arrived at Ephesus. He was an eloquent speaker and an authority on the Scriptures, and he had some knowledge of the way of the Lord.

With great enthusiasm he preached and taught correctly about Jesus, although he knew only of John’s baptism. As he began to speak boldly in the synagogue, Priscilla and Aquila heard him; so they took him home with them and explained to him the way more accurately.

As Apollos wished to go to Achaia, the believers encouraged him and wrote to the disciples there to welcome him. When he arrived, he greatly strengthened those who, by God’s grace, had become believers, for he vigorously refuted the Jews, proving from the Scriptures that Jesus is the Messiah.

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Friday, 15 May 2015 : 6th Week of Easter (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : White

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, today we heard about joy, that is the true joy we are to find in the Lord, knowing that He is with us and that He cares for us very greatly and deeply. And it is this knowledge which can sustain us to go on in living this life filled with faith, amid the ever increasing challenges of the world. We know that the Lord is with us and never abandoning us even at the darkest moments, and this is why we can persevere with our faith.

In the first reading, we read how St. Paul encountered great difficulty during his works at the region of Achaia in Greece. He was opposed by a group of stubborn and unrepentant Jews who refused to believe in God and on top of that, they were also jealous of the influence that St. Paul had among the populace, who even converted many of the Gentiles or the non-Jews to the one true faith in God.

But despite the opposition and the persecution he faced, he remained resolute in his mission and in the convictions to carry out the works which he had been entrusted with. St. Paul and all the other Apostles were guided and protected in their missions by the Lord, who we witnessed today in the Acts of the Apostles as having been protected, albeit indirectly, by the Roman governor of Achaia, who refused to judge and condemn him for the supposed faults that he had been accused with by the Jews.

Indeed, at the end, the Apostles and the disciples of Christ faced rejection and martyrdom at the hands of those who were opposed to the Lord and His ways, but this is because by the very act of such brave death and fearless devotion to God, they proclaimed by the shedding of their blood and by their suffering, a true faith that endured even the challenges and the temptations of the world.

Remember, brethren, that despite the intense persecutions of the Church and the faithful, the Church continued to grow and prosper, and many people continued to heed the call of the Lord’s word, as the saying goes, that the blood of the holy martyrs is the seed of Christians. This is to show us that, the courage of all the holy disciples of our Lord have brought us all to salvation. For if they had been afraid to preach the truth of Christ, then none of us would have heard of it and thus have a chance for salvation.

Just yesterday, we celebrated the great solemnity of the Ascension when we commemorate the great ascension of Jesus our Lord into the glory of heaven. And before He went to heaven, He placed a charge and commandment to all of His disciples, which remain true even unto this day. This is so that all of them would go forth into the world and boldly preach the Gospel and the Good News of salvation to all the peoples, so that everyone from every corners of the world may hear them and be saved.

Therefore, we are all truly called to continue the missionary and evangelising works of the holy Apostles and disciples of our Lord who had predeceased us, and yet their works remained clearly represented by what we have today in the Church of God. If we have received God’s salvation through the Church and the words which had been passed down to us, then we ought to also pass on the same faith to all those who have yet to hear them.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, let us all renew our commitment and devotion to the Lord. Let us all not be distracted and deterred by the challenges and the problems that will face us if we are to walk faithfully in the way of our Lord. Instead, let us think about the fate of our brethren around us if we had not lift a finger and put in the effort to help them escape the depredations of the evil one and darkness.

May Almighty God bless us and strengthen us in our faith, so that we may be ever more devoted to Him, and may He awaken in us the sense of care and love for our fellow brethren, so that we may follow suit in the footsteps of the holy Apostles in guiding each other to the Lord, through devoted actions and deeds rooted in the true faith. God bless us all, now and forever. Amen.

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Friday, 15 May 2015 : 6th Week of Easter (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : White

Acts 18 : 9-18

One night, in a vision, the Lord said to Paul, “Do not be afraid, but continue speaking and do not be silent, for many people in this city are Mine. I am with you, so no one will harm you.” So Paul stayed a year and a half in that place, teaching the word of God among them.

When Gallio was governor of Achaia, the Jews made a united attack on Paul and brought him before the court. And they accused him, “This man tries to persuade us to worship God in ways that are against the Law.”

Paul was about to speak in his own defense when Gallio said to the Jews, “If it were a matter of misdeed or vicious crime, I would have to consider your complaint. But since this is a quarrel about teachings and divine names that are proper to your own law, see to it yourselves : I refuse to judge such matters.” And he sent them out of the court.

Then the people seized Sosthenes, a leading man of the synagogue, and beat him in front of the tribunal; but Gallio paid no attention to it. Paul stayed on with the disciples in Corinth for many days; he then left them and sailed off with Priscilla and Aquila for Syria. And as he was no longer under a vow he had taken, he shaved his head before sailing from Cenchreae.

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Thursday, 14 May 2015 : Solemnity of the Ascension of the Lord and Feast of St. Matthias, Apostle (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : White

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, today we celebrate the great solemnity of our Lord’s Ascension to the heavenly glory, to claim His seat at the right hand of God, the end of His earthly ministry, by which He had liberated us all mankind from the depredations of evil and the tyranny of sin. The Ascension is the final act in God’s glorious works to liberate all of us and make us whole again, and the final proof that indeed Jesus is the Lord, the Messiah, God and Man who had come upon us to free us.

Just as the Resurrection provides us hope of a new life, then the Ascension is a foretelling of our own fate if we remain faithful to the Lord and it shows us what will happen to us as well, at the end of days. We know that since ages past, that there had been several individuals who did not suffer death, because of their faith and righteousness. The Patriarch Enoch, one of the first sons of man was lifted up from this world and walked in it no more, because he was righteous before God.

And Elijah the prophet also was taken up in flaming chariots in the sight of his successor Elisha, as a clear sign of God’s favour for all of his hard work and dedications in his many years of preaching God’s word and calling for the repentance of sinners. And the Ascension of our Lord Jesus Christ is even greater than all those mentioned, for He rose up to heaven on His own power and might.

The Ascension has many meanings, of which first it shows us the triumph of the forces of good, the Lord and all the faithful against all evil, for this decadent and darkened world cannot hold against us, for our Lord had shown us the path to break free from that darkness. As such, it is a proof that we have triumphed against evil and sin, as exemplified by the Resurrection and the Ascension confirms it. The Lord ascended in great triumph and glory, and so shall be our glory and triumph when it is our time to ascend in glory because of our faithful life.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, the Ascension also affirms that our Lord Jesus Christ is both Man and God at the same time. There were detractors and unfaithful ones, even unto this day, who believed that Jesus is mere man and nothing more, or that He is God and Divine only, and not a man. All these were inadequate and false beliefs that did not do justice to the truth about Christ our Lord.

If Jesus is just mere man, then what He had done for us would be for nothing. For the death of a mere man would not be sufficient to atone for the combined sins of all mankind, whose wickedness had built up to such a great extent, that only the One and only God, whom through Jesus, was incarnated into Man, and as both God and Man, He went through the sufferings and the pains, which are supposed to be our punishment, for all of our sins, so that, by bearing our sins, He brought us free from all the burdens of those sins.

And the Ascension proves this, just as the Transfiguration before the suffering and death of Christ showed a brief glimpse into this reality and truth. While it was only Peter, James and John who were at the mountain with Jesus at the time of His Transfiguration, more disciples, if not all of them were at the place and moment when Jesus ascended into His glory in heaven. This proves beyond doubt, that not only that He has conquered death by His resurrection, but that He truly came down from heaven and was returning to the place where He came from.

And how is this important and relevant for us all? That is because before He ascended into heaven, Jesus reminded the disciples of the one very, very important mission which He had entrusted to them and to the whole Church of God. This mission is that His word, the revelations of truth that He had brought into the world, the way to salvation, may be preached and taught to all peoples, to all mankind throughout the world.

All of us Christians who belong to the Church of God and who had been baptised in the Name of the Most Holy Trinity of Father, Son and Holy Spirit must go forth to the nations to preach to them the message which Christ had brought into this world, and which His herald, St. John the Baptist had also delivered, that is repentance of sinners, that men may abandon their sinful ways and embrace fully the ways that Christ had taught them, and which we now keep in faith through the Church.

Thus, as we celebrate the occasion of today’s glorious Ascension of our Lord Jesus Christ into heaven, let us all remember that all of us also will enjoy the same experience, if we are all faithful to the Lord and obey Him in all of His commands. The glory of heaven and true joy are ours, if we follow the Lord and do all of the things that He had commanded us to do, and this is that we ought to call on the others who have yet to hear the word of God, so that they may be saved too.

Remember that just earlier I mentioned some of the righteous ones whom God had saved from death and brought into the heavenly glory? This is to show us that, although indeed we will all as mortals still suffer the effects of physical death, but that death for all the faithful will be nothing more than a passing moment and a transition between the imperfect world and life that we have now, with the world that is to come.

Do we all realise that it has been too long for us to stay hidden in this darkness and how long we have been suppressed by the sins and the wickedness that we have committed thus far in life? Let us therefore throw away these shackles of sin and unworthiness, which prevent us from truly realising the great potential that lie within each and every one of us. We have a duty and a responsibility, brethren, and it is indeed time now for us to act.

Let us all go forth and practice what we believe in, so that our faith will no longer remain just as a mere belief, but also brought completely into concrete and real action, so that all who sees us will know that we believe in God, and therefore, they too may believe by what we have done. And because we have done what is righteous before God, and bring others to Him as well, then the glory of our Lord’s Resurrection and Ascension will also be ours, and eternal life and the glory of heaven will be our just reward.

May Almighty God, the Ascended Christ, who went forth to prepare the places for His righteous ones, continue to guide us and bless us, so that we truly can merit to be counted among those whom He chose out of the nations, to be reunited with Him in the glories and wonders of eternal life in heaven, filled with true joy and happiness. God be with us all. Amen.

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Thursday, 14 May 2015 : Solemnity of the Ascension of the Lord and Feast of St. Matthias, Apostle (Gospel Reading)

Liturgical Colour : White

Mark 16 : 15-20

At that time, Jesus told His disciples, “Go out to the whole world and proclaim the Good News to all creation. The one who believes and is baptised will be saved; the one who refuses to believe will be condemned.”

“Signs like these will accompany those who have believed : in My Name they will cast out demons and speak new languages; they will pick up snakes, and if they drink anything poisonous, they will be unharmed; they will lay their hands on the sick, and they will be healed.”

So then, after speaking to them, the Lord Jesus was taken up into heaven and took His place at the right hand of God. The Eleven went forth and preached everywhere, while the Lord worked with them and confirmed the message by the signs that accompanied it.

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Wednesday, 13 May 2015 : 6th Week of Easter, Memorial of our Lady of Fatima (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : White

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, today we celebrate the feast day of our Lady of Fatima, the ninety-eighth anniversary since the mother of our Lord Jesus Christ appeared to three young children at Fatima in Portugal almost a hundred years ago, in a series of apparitions where she revealed to them the messages of utmost importance, seeking for the repentance and conversion of the world, and the consecration of Russia to her, which was at that year, precisely at that very moment, was about to fall into the long darkness of communism.

This feast of our Lady of Fatima is a reminder for all of us yet again, how we have been given so many reminders and opportunities to repent and change from our sinful and wicked ways, and the one who had appeared so many times to us so that this may happen, is none other than the loving mother of our Lord, that is Mary, the ever faithful mother of us all. She appeared to us and reminded us from time to time, in her many apparitions, to reveal to us the truth about our sins and about the love and mercy that God is willing to show all those who repent from their sins.

Why does Mary care so much about us, brethren? And why is she our mother when she is clearly the mother of Jesus, our Lord and God? To understand this, we have to understand what happened at the very last moment of Jesus’s earthly life when He was on the cross. While He fulfilled the very act of perfect love by which He redeemed all of us and gave us new hope of life, He entrusted His mother to John, His beloved disciple, and then in the same way, He also entrusted His disciple to Mary, His mother.

This can be easily overlooked, but in that single moment, God had entrusted us all and gave us the very best gift He could give us, that is of His own mother, who in her selfless dedication and love, had cared for Him with ultimate patience and care since His birth, and then on that day, to follow His Son on the way to His suffering and death on the cross, which is for our sake.

Imagine the sorrow and the sadness that assaulted the heart of Mary, as she watched her own beloved Son, as He was mocked, ridiculed, rejected, scourged, carried that heavy and painful cross, fell on the ground three times, having His hands and legs pierced by the nails, lifted up for all to see, and eventually died on the cross. All these, our Lord Jesus Christ had done, so that through Him, we may be saved and not suffer the consequences of our sins, that is death and hell.

Which mother would just ignore the plight and the cries of her children? Therefore, in the same way, Mary, whom God had made to be our mother as well, cares for us deeply and she is concerned for the state of our souls, which if nothing is done, we are truly prone to fall deeper into our sinfulness and the darkness that surround us, so that we are forever lost to the Lord.

And this is what God, and therefore, His mother Mary do not want to happen. He died for us so that we may be saved, and not suffer the eternal death in hell because of our sins. This is why, we have our best ally and friend with us, Mary, our mother, who ceaselessly prays for our sake, with all the other saints and with all of the angels, particularly each of our guardian angels, that we may be awakened from our slumber in the darkness and make the effort to come back into the light.

Thus, our faithful devotions to our Lady of Fatima is a constant reminder for us to keep our own lives in check, so that in all the things we act, say and do, we will always do them in accordance with the will of God, and remain righteous and just in all of our ways without exception. Remember, brethren, that Mary is always interceding for our sake, near to the throne of Jesus, her Son our Lord and God. She weeps for us whenever we commit sin, and rejoices whenever we repent from those same sins.

Let us all therefore put in great effort to fulfill what our Lord mentioned in the Gospel passage we heard today, that if we listen to His words and does His will in all that we do, say and act, then we truly are worthy to be called His friends, His family and as people that belongs to Him alone, and thus, if we are worthy, then the fullness of God’s grace and blessings will be with us, and happiness as well as joy will be with us and never depart from us again.

O, our Lady of Fatima, blessed Mother of our Lord Jesus Christ, who had appeared to the children at Fatima calling for the repentance of sinners and the conversion of the world, pray for us all always, so that we may always heed the word of God in all that we do, and abandon all sorts of evil and wickedness. Remember that what matters for us in this life, is the state of our soul, and let us not seek the suffering and damnation of hell, but let us together with our blessed mother Mary, enjoy forever the glory of heaven. God bless us all. Amen.