preparation for Easter

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Thursday, 11 February 2016 : Thursday after Ash Wednesday, Memorial of our Lady of Lourdes (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : Purple/Violet

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, today we celebrate the feast of our Lady of Lourdes, based on the apparition of the Blessed Virgin Mary, the Mother of our Lord and God, in the grotto of Lourdes in southern France to the young woman, now St. Bernadette Soubirous about a century and a half ago. Our Lady appeared to her, stating on the need for mankind to repent from their sins and to be reconciled to the Lord their God.

On that blessed and glorious occasion, our Blessed Virgin Mary, the mother of our Lord and Saviour appeared to St. Bernadette to deliver the reminder and the message to mankind, so that we the people who have long been immersed in the darkness of this world, and who have been tainted for long by the taint and corruption of sin, the sickness and disease of the flesh and the soul may be brought to healing in God through His blessed mother.

Our Lady of Lourdes appeared to St. Bernadette on one of her series of apparitions there to her, asking her to dig up a spot on the ground that she had pointed out to her, and from the ground sprang forth a spring of clear water that gushed out forth, and this water is now known by many as the water of the grotto and spring of Lourdes, which is held to have curative and healing properties, and year after year, month after month and day after day, many sick people and people seeking spiritual healing came flocking to Lourdes on pilgrimages.

But we have to be careful lest we think of these as amulets or idols through which we can gain healing or fulfilment, as all these are nothing more than means through which the Lord brought about healing on all of us mankind. And why do we need healing, brothers and sisters in Christ? Are we sick or something has happened to us? Are we not healthy, those among us who have no afflictions at all?

Today we commemorate the day of prayer for all the sick, where we commit the petitions for the healing of our body, our mind, heart and soul from all the afflictions, diseases and disabilities that had assailed us. And what are these sickness? We may be thinking only in the terms of the health issues that afflict many of us, such as cancers, diabetes, asthma, allergies and all of these problems, but we cannot forget that each and every one of us, even the healthy ones in the body are afflicted.

And what is this affliction? It is the most dangerous of all of them, that is the affliction of sin. Ever since mankind disobeyed God, sin had entered their heart, and because of sin, our souls had been tainted and corrupted, and the corruption of sin prevented us from being truly reunited with God, for sin is evil and wicked, and there can be no evil or wickedness before God.

And sin if not checked or purified from us, will become a great hurdle, a great obstacle on our path to reach out to the Lord, as it is difficult to resist the temptation to sin, and if we continue to live in the state of sin, the more difficult it is for us to escape its grip. But we do not have to worry, since our Lord Himself had provided the path for us to get to Him and escape from the threat of sin and death.

In the Scripture readings today we are all reminded of the choice we have, the choice between righteousness and wickedness, the choice between good or evil, the choice between hope and despair, the choice between light and darkness, the choice between humility and pride, the choice between temperance and greed, and ultimately, between God and ourselves, and between God and the devil.

God has shown us His mercy and His ways, and He has revealed His path and truths, and taught them to us through His Apostles, who passed down the words and teachings of our Lord Jesus through His Church, and now we all who belong to God’s Church are called to recall His goodness and mercy, and even more importantly, to remember what He had said in the Gospel today.

What is it, brothers and sisters in Christ? Jesus said that all those who are faithful to Him must take up their crosses and follow Him. If we do not take up our crosses and follow Him, then we are not His true disciples, and we cannot have any part in Him. To follow the Lord and to be a faithful Christian requires effort and the understanding that our path will not be an easy one. The world has always been against Christ, and it will be against us too.

Therefore, on this day, let us all renew our commitment to the Lord, and through the help of His blessed mother Mary, our Lady of Lourdes, may all of us find healing in Him, and through our hard works and efforts in faith, carrying and bearing our crosses in life, and through righteousness may we be healed from our afflictions, of sin and wickedness, that God will find us worthy and bless us forevermore. God bless us, now and forever. Amen.

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Thursday, 11 February 2016 : Thursday after Ash Wednesday, Memorial of our Lady of Lourdes (Gospel Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Purple/Violet

Luke 9 : 22-25

At that time, Jesus said to His disciples and added, “The Son of Man must suffer many things. He will be rejected by the elders and chief priests and teachers of the Law, and be put to death. Then after three days He will be raised to life.”

Jesus also said to all the people, “If you wish to be a follower of Mine, deny yourself and take up your cross each day, and follow Me! For if you choose to save your life, you will lose it; but if you lose your life for My sake, you will save it. What does it profit you to gain the whole world, if you destroy or damage yourself?”

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Thursday, 11 February 2016 : Thursday after Ash Wednesday, Memorial of our Lady of Lourdes (Psalm)

Liturgical Colour : Purple/Violet

Psalm 1 : 1-2, 3, 4 and 6

Blessed is the one who does not go where the wicked gather, or stand in the way of sinners, or sit where the scoffers sit! Instead, he finds delight in the Law of the Lord and meditates day and night on His commandments.

He is like a tree beside a brook producing its fruit in due season, its leaves never withering. Everything he does is a success.

But it is different with the wicked. They are like chaff driven away by the wind. For the Lord knows the way of the righteous but cuts off the way of the wicked.

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Thursday, 11 February 2016 : Thursday after Ash Wednesday, Memorial of our Lady of Lourdes (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Purple/Violet

Deuteronomy 30 : 15-20

Moses said to the people of Israel, “See, I set before you on this day life and good, evil and death. I command you to love YHVH, your God and follow His ways. Observe His commandments, His norms and His laws, and you will live and increase, and YHVH will give you His blessing in the land you are going to possess.”

“But if your heart turns away and does not listen, if you are drawn away and bow before other gods to serve them, I declare on this day that you shall perish. You shall not last in the land you are going to occupy on the other side of the Jordan. Let the heavens and the earth listen, that they may be witnesses against you. I have set before you life and death, blessing and curse.”

“Therefore, choose life that you and your descendants may live, loving YHVH, listening to His voice, and being one with Him. In this is life for you and length of days in the land which YHVH swore to give to your ancestors, to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.”

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Wednesday, 10 February 2016 : Ash Wedneday, Memorial of St. Scholastica, Virgin (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : Purple/Violet

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, on this day we begin the season of Lent, the time of preparation before the great and glorious celebrations of Easter, a time for repentance, for forgiveness, and when the faithful and the whole Church unite together in fasting and abstinence, to remind ourselves that we are all sinners, unworthy and had been tainted by our disobedience against God.

The ashes today symbolised the nature of our sins, and how small we are before God, despite all of our greatness, our achievements, our talents and all the things we have accomplished and all the properties and goods we possess in this world. Remember the words of the priest, as he places the ashes on our foreheads or on our heads, that we are all man, mortal and sinners, and from dust we have come, and so to dust we shall return.

Ashes has been used since a long time ago, and also by the people of Israel as a sign of penitential intention, the desire of one to repent from one’s mistakes, as a symbol of humility and of unworthiness one feels because of one’s actions and misdeeds. And today the ashes we receive came from the palm branches used in the last year’s Palm Sunday celebration, which we also use for the same purpose, that is to remind us all that we are all penitents, all sinners seeking God’s ever loving mercy.

In the first reading today, we heard the prophet Joel who called the people of God to repent from their sins, casting aside their sinful ways and to repent before God, making a genuine change in their lives, and therefore receive the forgiveness from God, and a time of mercy when God would reunite all His people to Himself. Through the prophet Joel, we are reminded that God is compassionate and willing to forgive those who have sinned against Him.

And we must have heard about the prophet Jonah, who was sent to the city of Nineveh and its people, the capital of the mighty Assyrian Empire, to bring the words of the Lord that the city and all of its people would be destroyed because of their sins and their iniquities. And even though it was not mentioned what their sins were, but it was likely to be pagan gods, debauched lifestyle, and all the sins that the mighty Assyrians had done, in killing and causing harm to others.

And we heard how the people of Nineveh, all from the king to the lowest servants and people, all immediately stopped in their track, and they repented before God, regretting their wicked ways and asking for God to spare them the destruction and the punishment which He had intended for them. And God Who saw their sincere repentance, withheld His anger and showed His mercy to them, sparing them from the destruction which should have come their way.

In this, we see how God is loving and merciful to all of His people, even to the pagans and sinners. What is important however, is that this requires great effort and work in order for this to come into effect. Indeed, God offers His mercy generously and freely to all sinners and to all those who have wandered away from His path. But those to whom mercy had been shown, have they accepted God’s offer of mercy and have they done something to show their acceptance in sincerity?

Brothers and sisters in Christ, in these days, as we often talk about mercy, and indeed, in this year, during this special Extraordinary Jubilee Year of Mercy, many of us often have a misconception about mercy and forgiveness. And there are even those who have espoused the thoughts that God’s mercy requires no effort from those to whom mercy have been shown, or that we should show mercy to others without requiring the other party to change their way or do something about their faults.

No, this kind of mercy is false mercy, and it is not what today’s Ash Wednesday celebration is about. For true mercy requires us indeed to show genuine mercy that is accompanied with the demand for sincere and genuine effort from the penitents to change their ways, sin no more and follow the Lord with all of their heart and might from now on.

Do we remember what Jesus did with the woman who was caught by the Pharisees and the elders having committed adultery with another man than her husband? In that, we heard how Jesus confronted those who desired to see her dead and those who wanted to stone her, by reminding them Himself, that as fellow sinners, for all of us have sinned be it in small or great degree, they have no right to judge others on their sins, and only God truly have the right for judgment.

But Jesus also said to the woman to sin no more and urged her to follow God’s path from then on. He did not let the woman go on with her old life and with her adulterous ways, but He showed her, and also all of us, that while we cannot be judgemental and condemning upon those who have sinned, but not doing anything to bring sinners back into the light of God is also something that is very wrong.

This is why, this season of Lent is the perfect time and opportunity for all of us, the reminder that we are all sinners who have committed sin before God, and how God wants to show us His mercy and love, but many of us remained adamant in our sinful ways, and how some can be obstinate and how they can turn a deaf ear against God’s loving mercy.

This is the time for us, to help one another to seek God’s mercy and to accept His offer of mercy with the sincerity from the heart. It is our duty and obligation, brothers and sisters in Christ, to bring one another closer to the throne of our Lord’s great mercy, and to inspire one another in seeking and having genuine repentance, turning away from all of our sins, abandoning all the sinful ways we have done, and beginning a new life blessed by God.

And the Church is helping us to do this, by providing us with this time and opportunity of Lent, to prepare ourselves, body, mind, heart and soul as we head towards Easter, the season of joy and renewal. And this is why we also fast and abstain during the time of Lent, to discipline ourselves, our bodies and minds, from the temptations of the evil one, and to genuinely seek the salvation of our God through our good works and efforts in faith.

We fast on this day, to remind our bodies, that desire and greed lead us to nowhere. And rather than seeking earthly and worldly pleasures, which is temporary and preventing us to find true joy, we should restrain ourselves and use the opportunity to find the way to reach out to God, to repent from our sins and change our ways. And this is why we also abstain from the bad things that we often do as well, to remind us that while sin and sinful things may seem to be good, but they lead us nowhere else but condemnation and hell.

And as Jesus said in the Gospel today, this day is not a day of gloom and sorrow, for we indeed do not fast or abstain to gain man’s approval. It is also not to show off our own abilities and greatness. Instead, this day should be a day of great joy, but tempered with the understanding and the desire for all of us to change our ways for the better, that indeed, God had been merciful to us, and because of that, we are saved.

Therefore, let us not be gloomy today, and let us not be shy to wear the ashes on our heads. Today is the day when our faith truly goes to the open, where everyone can see the sign of the ashes on our forehead or on our heads. Wear the ashes with joy, and with the understanding that the time of mercy has come. And let us not scandalise the Lord and our faith, that in our actions today and from now on should show our sincere efforts to be forgiven from our sins. Otherwise, we will be hypocrites, and there is no place for hypocrites save for hell.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, let us change our ways of old, our sinfulness and wickedness. Let us all change ourselves for the better and get rid of our past unworthiness, all the darkness that had covered the true light inside each and every one of us. Let us show the faith and love we have for God, and let us all go forth in being good disciples and followers of our Lord, preaching His Good News through our efforts and deeds wherever we are.

May God bless our observation of Lent, that it will be a great time of renewal for us all, and may He ever strengthen the desire in our heart to love Him and to be forgiven of our sinfulness. God be with us all, now and always. Amen.

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Wednesday, 10 February 2016 : Ash Wedneday, Memorial of St. Scholastica, Virgin (Gospel Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Purple/Violet

Matthew 6 : 1-6, 16-18

At that time, Jesus spoke to the people and to His disciples, “Be careful not to make a show of your righteousness before people. If you do so, you do not gain anything from your Father in heaven. When you give something to the poor, do not have it trumpeted before you, as do those who want to be seem in the synagogues and in the streets, in order to be praised by the people. I assure you, they have already been paid in full.”

“If you give something to the poor, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, so that your gift remains really secret. Your Father, Who sees what is kept secret, will reward you. When you pray, do not be like those who want to be seen. They love to stand and pray in the synagogues or on street corners to be seen by everyone. I assure you, they have already been paid in full.”

“When you pray, go into your room, close the door, and pray to your Father Who is with you in secret; and your Father Who sees what is kept secret will reward you. When you fast, do not put on a miserable face as do the hypocrites. They put on a gloomy face, so that people can see they are fasting. I tell you this, they have been paid in full already.”

“When you fast, wash your face and make yourself look cheerful, because you are not fasting for appearances or for people, but for your Father Who sees beyond appearances. And your Father, Who sees what is kept secret, will reward you.”

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Wednesday, 10 February 2016 : Ash Wedneday, Memorial of St. Scholastica, Virgin (Second Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Purple/Violet

2 Corinthians 5 : 20 – 2 Corinthians 6 : 2

So we present ourselves as ambassadors in the Name of Christ, as if God Himself makes an appeal to you through us. Let God reconcile you; this we ask you in the Name of Christ. He had no sin, but God made Him bear our sin, so that in Him we might share the holiness of God.

Being God’s helpers we beg you : let it not be in vain that you received this grace of God. Scripture says : At the favourable time I listened to you, on the day of salvation I helped you. This is the favourable time, this is the day of salvation.

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Wednesday, 10 February 2016 : Ash Wedneday, Memorial of St. Scholastica, Virgin (Psalm)

Liturgical Colour : Purple/Violet

Psalm 50 : 3-4, 5-6a, 12-13, 14 and 17

Have mercy on me, o God, in Your love. In Your great compassion, blot out my sin. Wash me thoroughly of my guilt; cleanse me of evil.

For I acknowledge my wrongdoings and have my sins ever in mind. Against You alone have I sinned; what is evil in Your sight I have done.

Create in me, o God, a pure heart; give me a new and steadfast spirit. Do not cast me out of Your presence nor take Your Holy Spirit from me.

Give me again the joy of Your salvation and sustain me with a willing spirit. O Lord, open my lips, and I will declare Your praise.

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Wednesday, 10 February 2016 : Ash Wedneday, Memorial of St. Scholastica, Virgin (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Purple/Violet

Joel 2 : 12-18

YHVH says, “Yet even now, return to Me with your whole heart, with fasting, weeping and mourning. Rend your heart, not your garment. Return to YHVH, your God – gracious and compassionate.”

YHVH is slow to anger, full of kindness, and He repents of having punished. Who knows? Probably He will relent once more and spare some part of the harvest from which we may bring sacred offerings to YHVH, your God.

Blow the trumpet in Zion, proclaim a sacred fast, call a solemn assembly. Gather the people, sanctify the community, bring together the elders, even the children and infants at the breast. Let the bridegroom leave his bed, and the bride her room.

Between the vestibule and the altar, let the priests, YHVH’s ministers, weep and say : Spare Your people, YHVH. Do not humble them or make them an object of scorn among the nations. Why should it be said among the peoples : Where is their God?

YHVH has become jealous for His land; He has had pity on His people.

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Friday, 3 April 2015 : Good Friday of the Lord’s Passion (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : Red

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, today is Good Friday, which we all know is the celebration of that momentous occasion when all of mankind were brought out of the hopelessness and despair of the darkness of the world and into the new hope because of one singular act of God, who made it all possible, through what Jesus Christ had done. It is exactly by His obedience to God His Father and by laying down His life on the cross, that He had brought us mankind to salvation.

That is why today is a good day, the Good Friday, for it is because of what had happened on this day that changed our fate. For once we had expected only suffering and death, and we feared death because it brings us nothing but anguish, sorrow, difficulties, uncertainties and many others, and because of what Christ had done on the cross for us, now we can look forward and head to the world that is to come, one that lies beyond death, and one that is of hope and joy.

There are indeed several aspects to the crucifixion of our Lord Jesus Christ, and there are several dimensions and significance that all of us should be aware of. And on this occasion when we commemorate that moment of the crucifixion, is the most appropriate moment for us to reflect on the significance of this to our own lives, and to our own faith in God.

We most likely know of the fact that when Christ carried that burden of the cross, He was in fact carrying the burdens of our sins. We most likely should also know that, based on what we have commonly heard in catechisms and teachings of the Church, that because He carried for us the burdens and punishments for sins, in place of us, then that was why we who believe in Him have been made free from the consequences of the sins we had committed.

However, the significance extended even much deeper beyond what we often knew, and indeed, the crucifixion, the suffering of our Lord Jesus Christ, was the culmination of God’s grand plan to rescue us mankind, the pinnacle of the entire Holy Scriptures and all the things in them. God has planned our salvation and liberation from sin from the very beginning of time, a very, very long time ago, and in Christ, all those plans and promises were completed perfectly.

God had made Himself into Man through Jesus, assuming the flesh of a lowly and humble Man, so that in doing so, He might reverse what mankind had erred at the beginning, starting from the first man, Adam, who disobeyed the Lord’s commandments together with Eve, his wife, and ate the forbidden fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil. They were persuaded and tempted by Satan to listen to their own desires rather than to listen to and to obey the Lord.

The new Adam, that is Christ, has been the One who showed mankind, all of us, that it is possible to resist and reject the temptations of our flesh and of Satan. It is possible indeed for us all to refuse the malicious offers of the evil one, but indeed only if we follow what Christ had done. He listened to the Lord, who is His Father, He refused to listen to the sweet lies of Satan and to give in to human desires and wishes.

He is God, Almighty and All-Powerful, All-Knowing and Ever-Present. There is nothing in this world that is impossible for Him. If He wanted it, He could have had it easy, refusing the cross and the suffering, letting us all to perish because of our sins. And yet, He did not do that, firstly because He loves us all so much, to the point that He was willing to go through the most horrendous and greatest of sufferings just so that we may be brought to freedom from our sins and their consequences.

He obeyed the will of the Father, and even though He was tempted during His moments of agony in the Garden of Gethsemane, He obeyed and pushed on, out of His infinite and undying love for all of us. And His perseverance brought us much goodness, the liberation from the bonds of sin. God gave His only Son, for this very purpose, and He showed us as the new Adam, that mankind has the choice and the potential to change their fate, and to reject the rebellious ways of our ancestors.

And we can indeed compare this moment, the new covenant and Passover of the Lord, with the ancient and first Passover, when the people of Israel were liberated from their slavery under the Egyptians and their Pharaohs. At that night, before they were freed, they were told to eat the Passover meal, where the Passover lamb whose blood had been used to mark their houses and the flesh as the food for the people, had been given as sacrifice for their liberation.

That night was different from every other night, and at every Passover, the Jews commemorated that moment, including at the Last Supper, when Jesus had the Passover meal with His disciples. At that night however, it was indeed very different from any other night, and from any observation of the Passover. It was because instead of the usual celebration of the Passover, Jesus gave His own Body and Blood as the sacrificial offering, offered freely by the Lamb of God, through whom then He liberated us all from the true slavery, that is the slavery by our sins.

So, just as the people of Israel were set free, we have also been set free by our Lord through the cross. The cross of Christ represents the symbol of hope for us all, that by the Lord’s power, the power and poison of death had been destroyed forever. At the time of Moses, when the people of Israel were journeying through the desert, they rebelled against the Lord and as a punishment, God sent fiery and poisonous serpents that killed many of them.

Moses pleaded for the mercy of God, and God instructed him to craft a bronze serpent mounted on a tall staff, so that all who saw it may not die but live. And as Jesus told to Nicodemus, that just as the bronze serpent was lifted up and people who saw it were saved, so thus He, the Lamb of God, would also be lifted up high on the cross, that all who believe in Him and His cross, will be saved.

The cross, on which Christ hung from, is a clear reminder of that act of ultimate selflessness and ultimate love which our Lord had shown us, but it is also a reminder of what we need to do on our side, in order to fulfill the covenant, the new covenant which God had sealed with His own Blood and His own sacrifice on the cross. It is love that we should do and commit to in our lives.

The cross is made of two bars, joined together, namely the vertical and the horizontal bars. This is to remind us that act of love, that is when we love, we cannot separate the two important acts of love we need to do, firstly to our God, and then to our brethren, our neighbours around us, our fellow men. The vertical bar represents the love which we should have for our Lord, who had loved us so much first, so much so that He was willing to sacrifice Himself and suffer all the consequences of our sins, for the sake of us lowly humans, sinners and unrepentant rebels.

But it will not be complete, if we also do not love those who are around us. This is represented by the horizontal bar of the cross. A cross will not be complete without the vertical or the horizontal bar. This is to show us that we cannot just love ourselves and others without loving God and loving what He had done for us out of live, and neither can we just love God and ignore others who are around us. There are many people out there who are ostracised, rejected and unloved daily, and if we have the capacity to love, then why not?

Brothers and sisters in Christ, as we commemorate this important moment, let us all reflect on our own actions, whether we have loved God with all of our hearts and with all of our strength, as well as loving our fellow brothers and sisters, without bias and without prejudice. It is what we should do. Remember also that every time we come for the Mass, we share together the meal of the Last Supper of the Apostles, where our Lord Jesus Christ transformed the bread and wine into the substance of His own Body and Blood.

Therefore, we all in the Eucharist also share the same Body and Blood of our Lord, who had given them freely, so that we who worthily receive them, receive also Him, who dwells in us, justifies us, and allow us to receive the heavenly grace of salvation and eternal life, which Christ had made possible by His suffering and death on the cross. Let us all today therefore commit ourselves to be better servants and followers of our Lord. Amen.