Roman Africa

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Friday, 28 August 2015 : 21st Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Augustine, Bishop and Doctor of the Church (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : White

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, on this day, we celebrate the feast of a great pillar of the Church, one of its original and among the greatest of the Doctors of the Church, because of his numerous and countless contributions to both the Church and to the faithful as a whole, in leading them to Christ. He is St. Augustine of Hippo, a great man and a great saint, and yet with an interesting origin and story of his life, in how he became such a great servant of God.

Yesterday, we celebrated the feast of St. Monica, his mother, a holy woman completely devoted to the Lord and to her family, particularly that of her son, St. Augustine himself. And we have to understand where they came from and what were their lives like, so that we can understand and benefit most from today’s sharing of the Scriptures and the lives of the saints.

St. Augustine of Hippo was born in a noble Roman family, between a rich Roman nobleman named Patricius who was a pagan worshipper, and St. Monica, his mother, who was already a Christian, and one who was truly devoted to the Lord. St. Augustine lived in a family well connected and in position to enjoy all the favours and benefits of worldly life, and therefore, he got the best education and treatment, and grew to be an educated person and a philosopher.

But all these could not satisfy St. Augustine, as he desired for something more to fill the emptiness in his heart. And so, influenced by his peers and friends at that time, he fell into the company of those who believed in the syncretic and pagan religion of Manichaeanism, where he gave in to the Manichaean ways and teachings of hedonism and worldliness, involving himself with various forms of the pleasures of the flesh.

Nonetheless, even though St. Augustine had started on a path towards sin and therefore towards ruination, it was the hard effort and ceaseless tears and prayers from his mother, St. Monica, who eventually turned St. Augustine back into the light. Firstly, his own father decided to be baptised on his deathbed and accepted fully the Lord Jesus as his Lord and Saviour, and then St. Augustine himself also realised the errors of his ways and repented.

St. Augustine went on to be a teacher, and growing more and more disillusioned with the ways and falsehoods of Manichaeanism, where he did not manage to find true satisfaction, he eventually gave himself to be baptised as well, as a member of the Church, and the prayers which his mother had made for his sake. And thereafter, St. Augustine dedicated himself to the service of God.

And by his many works, including the publications, the City of God and the Confessions which he had written, as well as various other discourses and traditions passed down to us by the other Church fathers, this once great sinner had indeed been transformed completely by the will and by the grace of God to be a great tool for the salvation of mankind and for the deliverance of mankind from our sins.

In today’s Scripture readings we also heard how Jesus told the people the parable of the five wise women and the five careless and foolish women. Many of us knew this story, but do we truly understand its significance? The wise women and the foolish women represent all of us, while the bridegroom represents the Lord who will come again even as He had promised all of us.

The examples of St. Augustine of Hippo should have shown us that all of us have a choice in this life, and this choice is for us to follow either the Lord and His ways, or whether we follow our own whims and our own heart’s desires. God always gives us opportunities, one after another, for He is loving as well as merciful, and despite all of our sins and wickedness, we still have the Lord on our side, holding us and keeping us against the tides of darkness rising against us.

Nevertheless, we should not take this for granted. The Lord loves all of us, for we are indeed the greatest and the most treasured and loved of all the things that God had created, but this does not mean that He just let us all be with all the things we are doing, or condoning all of our sins and wickedness. He continues to watch over us, and it is painful for Him to see how we continue to live in sin and in direct disobedience and rebellion against Him.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, let us all learn from the examples of St. Augustine of Hippo and many other saints, who were once sinners and then they turned their lives around, and sought out a new life in God. This is also an inspiration for all of us to do the same. No one was born perfect, and no one was blameless, except for our Lord Jesus Himself. All of us made mistakes in some parts of our lives, but what matters, is whether we take those mistakes to task and learn from them.

May Almighty God be our help and our guide, as we walk in the footsteps of St. Augustine of Hippo, that we may also be like him and many other great saints, who took the step to get out of their past sinfulness, repent from those sins, and follow the Lord in all their ways, and by their righteousness, they were brought into eternal glory and life promised by our Lord. May God bless us all. Amen.

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Friday, 28 August 2015 : 21st Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Augustine, Bishop and Doctor of the Church (Gospel Reading)

Liturgical Colour : White

Matthew 25 : 1-13

At that time, Jesus said to the people and to His disciples, “This story throws light on what will happen in the kingdom of heaven : Ten bridesmaids went out with their lamps to meet the bridegroom. Five of them were careless, and the others were sensible.”

“The careless bridesmaids took their lamps as they were, and did not bring extra oil. But those who were sensible, brought with their lamps flasks of oil. As the bridegroom delayed, they all grew drowsy and fell asleep. But at midnight, a cry rang out, ‘The bridegroom is here, come out and meet him!'”

“All the maidens woke up at once, and trimmed their lamps. Then the careless ones said to the sensible ones, ‘Give us some oil, for our lamps are going out.’ The sensible ones answered, ‘There may not be enough for us and for you. You had better go to those who sell, and buy some for yourselves.'”

“They were out buying oil when the bridegroom came, and those who were ready went with him to the wedding feast, and the doors were shut. Later the other bridesmaids arrived and called out, ‘Lord, Lord, open to us!’ But he answered, ‘Truly I do not know you.”

“So stay awake, for you do not know the day nor the hour.”

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Friday, 28 August 2015 : 21st Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Augustine, Bishop and Doctor of the Church (Psalm)

Liturgical Colour : White

Psalm 96 : 1 and 2b, 5-6, 10, 11-12

The Lord reigns; let the earth rejoice; let the distant islands be glad. Justice and right are His throne.

The mountains melt like wax before the Lord, the Lord of all the earth. The heavens proclaim His justice, all peoples see His glory.

You who love the Lord, hate evil, for He preserves the lives of His faithful, He delivers them from their foes.

He sheds light upon the upright, and gladness upon the just. Rejoice in the Lord, you who are blameless, and give praise to His holy Name.

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Friday, 28 August 2015 : 21st Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Augustine, Bishop and Doctor of the Church (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : White

1 Thessalonians 4 : 1-8

For the rest, brothers, we ask you in the Name of Jesus, the Lord, and we urge you to live in a way that pleases God, just as you have learnt from us. This you do, but try to do still more. You know the instructions we gave you on behalf of the Lord Jesus : the will of God for you is to become holy and not to have unlawful sex.

Let each of you behave towards his wife as a holy and respectful husband, rather than being led by lust, as are pagans who do not know God. In this matter, let no one offend or wrong a brother. The Lord will do justice in all these things, as we have warned and shown you. God have called us to live, not in impurity but in holiness, and those who do not heed this instruction disobey, not a human, but God Himself who gives you His Holy Spirit.

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Thursday, 27 August 2015 : 21st Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Monica (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : White

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, on this day we commemorate the feast day of a saint whom many of us may not be familiar with, as we are likely to be more familiar with her son, St. Augustine the Great, or known also as St. Augustine of Hippo, one of the greatest saints of the Church. But without the actions and the hard works of the holy woman, whose life was dedicated both to the Lord and to her own son, St. Augustine of Hippo would not have been great and so influential.

St. Monica, the mother of St. Augustine of Hippo was a very devoted mother and a faithful servant of God, and it was her tireless and continuous dedication to St. Augustine, her ceaseless prayers for his conversion that has brought about such great merits and good things upon the faithful and upon the souls that were lost but then were brought to the salvation in God.

St. Monica showed us the examples of being a good role model for the faithful, and how mothers should be, devoting themselves to the Lord and to their families, not giving up on any of them should any of them fell into sin and darkness. She continued to pray for his conversion, for St. Augustine in his youth was a great sinner, which fell into the many wicked ways of the world, engaging in debauchery and various sins horrible in the eyes of the Lord.

She prayed for him, and eventually her prayers and her faithful devotion to her son helped him to see the light and helped him to set his path on the path to righteousness and to salvation in God. And from then on, the great sinner was turned into a great tool for the salvation of many, as St. Paul had done before St. Augustine was born.

In this, as we see in the Scriptures today, especially the Gospel, when the Lord Jesus shared the parable on the wise and wicked servants and stewards, whose actions were contrasted to each other, as representative of what we are celebrating today. The master is the Lord, and the stewards represent all of us, and indeed we all have a choice, on whether we should be a faithful and wise servant, or whether we should follow the path of the wicked and lazy servant.

St. Augustine once walked in the path of the wicked servant, filling himself with all the pleasures of the world and disregarded the ways of the Lord, being lost in a world of desire and hedonism, embracing false gods and idols, and lazing himself in a world of ignorance and in pursuit of worldliness. And many of us also walk in the same path, even now, and we are truly heading for trouble, for indeed, the parable reminds us that the master, our Lord can come back at any time, especially at times we do not expect.

And therefore, we should remember that, the lesson which we can learn today, is that God shows His mercy and love in myriads of ways, and one example which He had given is the example of St. Augustine of Hippo, as great saints were once great sinners too. What matters is that, those sinners chose the right path, repented from their sins and walked once again on the path of righteousness towards the Lord.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, inspired by the examples and by the dedication shown by St. Monica, we too should follow in her footsteps, in how we care for our own brethren who we see around us and beyond. Let us all be concerned about those around us who are still living in the darkness of the world, and who are still like St. Augustine in his youth.

Let us all pray for them, and let us also show them the path to the Lord by our action. May our loving God and merciful Father forgive us all our sins, and help us all to find our way to Him. May God bless us all in our endeavours. Amen.

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Thursday, 27 August 2015 : 21st Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Monica (Gospel Reading)

Liturgical Colour : White

Matthew 24 : 42-51

At that time, Jesus said to the people and to His disciples, “Stay awake then, for you do not know on what day your Lord will come. Obviously, if the owner of the house knew at what time the thief was coming, he would certainly stay up and not allow his house to be broken into. So be alert, for the Son of Man will come at the hour you least expect.”

“Imagine a capable servant, whom his master has put in charge of his household, to give them food at the proper time. Fortunate indeed is that servant, whom his master will find at work when he comes. Truly I say to you, his lord will entrust that one with everything he has.”

“Not so with the bad servant who thinks, ‘My master is delayed.’ And he begins to ill-treat his fellow servants, while eating and drinking with drunkards. But his master will come on the day he does not know, and at the hour he least expects. He will dismiss that servant, and deal with him as with the hypocrites. There will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.”

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Thursday, 27 August 2015 : 21st Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Monica (Psalm)

Liturgical Colour : White

Psalm 89 : 3-4, 12-13, 14 and 17

You turn humans back to dust, saying, “Return, o mortals!” A thousand years in Your sight are like a day that has passed, or like a watch in the night.

So make us know the shortness of our life, that we may gain wisdom of heart. How long will You be angry, o Lord? Have mercy on Your servant.

Fill us at daybreak with Your goodness, that we may be glad all our days. May the sweetness of the Lord be upon us; may He prosper the work of our hands.

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Thursday, 27 August 2015 : 21st Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Monica (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : White

1 Thessalonians 3 : 7-13

What a consolation for us, brothers and sisters, in the midst of our troubles and trials, this faith of yours! It is a breath of life for us when you stand firm in the Lord. How can we thank God enough for all the joy that we feel before God because of you? Day and night we beg of Him to let us see you again, that we may complete the instruction of the believers.

May God our Father and Jesus our Lord prepare the way for us to visit you. May the Lord increase more and more your love for each other and for all people, as He increases our love for you. May He strengthen you internally to be holy and blameless before God, our Father, on the day that Jesus, our Lord, will come with all His saints.

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Thursday, 28 August 2014 : 21st Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Augustine of Hippo, Bishop and Doctor of the Church (Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : White

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, today we celebrate the feast of one of the greatest saints of the Church, that is St. Augustine of Hippo, one of the four original and the greatest among the Doctors of the Church. His mother, St. Monica was the saint whose feast day we celebrated just yesterday. This is to indicate it very clearly to us, of the close bond and link that existed between these two saints, particularly what St. Monica had done for the sake of St. Augustine her son.

St. Augustine was a great sinner, and in his youth, he led a life filled with vices and evil. He pursued the pleasures of the flesh and body, and all the desires of the world, as he thirsted for knowledge and satisfaction in things he thought as those that might be able to satisfy what he needs. Yet, he was not able to gain what he sought, although he tried to find it through immersing himself in philosophy and in gaining the knowledge of the world.

In this pursuit as well, St. Augustine of Hippo was influenced by those around him to follow the teachings of the false prophet Mani, who founded the Manichaean heresy. Manichaeanism was a very popular teaching among the philosophers, hedonists and all those who sought refuge from the increasingly ubiquitous teachings of the Christian faith, which these people despised.

St. Augustine therefore embarked on a very wrong path in his youth, and despite constant urging and persuasion by his mother, St. Augustine continued to adamantly walk on the path of sin and evil, giving himself away to the forces of Satan working in the world through his falsehoods and lies. Yet, St. Monica, the mother of St. Augustine did not give up on him, and she ceaselessly prayed and hoped for his conversion to the truth and repentance.

And indeed, all of the hard works of St. Monica and all of her prayers did not go unheard. The Lord who worked in His mysterious ways brought St. Augustine to accept the truth, and eventually he left his past sins and sinful way of life, and ever since, followed only the Lord and lived according to His ways only. Thus, through the persistence and prayers of his mother, a great saint and thinker of the Church was born anew.

The lesson we can gain here at this point is that, in line with the reading we heard today from the Old and the New Testaments, when we live our lives and our faith, we must always be ready and be vigilant, so that we would not fall into the traps and lies set up by the evil one and his forces. The coming of the kingdom of God in the second coming of our Lord Jesus Christ had been foretold by the Apostles and through the revelations of faith, and Jesus Himself stressed that He will come again.

And the key message is that this coming of the Lord at the end of time will be sudden and without our prior knowledge, and no one can know the day or time, until when it is already too late for us if we have not done our preparations in this life. We have been given many opportunities in this life, but we often miss them or pretend that we do not care or that those do not concern us at all. At thus, similarly, when death comes to claim us at the end of our lives, which will also be sudden and without our knowledge, it will also be too late for us.

And that was exactly why St. Monica prayed so hard for the sake of her son, and how much she worked to help bring her son to salvation. That is because if the time comes and we have not yet repented and turned away from our sinful ways, then it is truly too late for us. No amount of work or anything done beyond that point can save us, and we will end up like the rich man in the story of Lazarus and the rich man, where the rich man died and suffered for eternity in hell, with no more hope of salvation and the final judgment had been cast on him.

The readings from today also highlighted on the need for us to prepare ourselves well, to sanctify ourselves in the Lord and lead a holy and dedicated life, casting out all impurities and sins away from our bodies and souls. We need to cast away our pride and our desires, so that our lives may be more closely aligned to the will of God, and to what the way of the Lord tells us. St. Paul mentioned that just as our Lord is holy, we who have been saved in Him and who believe in Him must also be holy like Him, or otherwise we would have no part in His promised salvation.

To those of us who believe and put our trust in God, we will not be disappointed, for the Lord Himself would grant us fulfillment and blessings of His grace to the brim of our souls and beings, that we will be completely satisfied and empowered, providing that we put our trust and faith in the Lord, and ask Him always for His providence and help.

I would therefore also like to share with you on this feast day of St. Augustine, the story of how St. Augustine is now often associated with a seashell. This was in fact because, one day, St. Augustine was walking on the seashore, contemplating and thinking about the great mystery of the Lord and His divinity, as well as the nature of the Holy Trinity. Then he saw a young boy with a seashell, trying to carry all the seawater in the world with the seashell and pouring it into a hole in the sand.

St. Augustine asked the young boy what he was doing, and he commented on the futility of such an attempt to empty all the seas using the seashell into such a small hole in the sand. But then the boy replied to St. Augustine, saying that the same is happening for the quest of mankind to understand and uncover the fullness of the mysteries and the truth about the Lord. If the sea and all its waters represent the mysteries and truths of the Lord, then that small hole is indeed our limited and flawed intelligence and understanding.

It was likely that the Lord Himself or an angel appeared to St. Augustine in the form of the small boy, in order to remind mankind, that they ought to put their trust in the will and in the wisdom of God rather in their own limited human intellect, which was not able to comprehend the fullness of the truth about God. By understanding and realising this, St. Augustine of Hippo continued to work harder and harder to bring the Lord’s teachings and good works for the sake of the salvation of many souls.

Therefore, brothers and sisters in Christ, let us grow more and more aware of the life that we lead now, and whether we are suitably prepared for the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ by examining and deliberating on the kind of actions we have used in this life, the kind of words that we have used in life and in how we converse with one another, and ultimately the kind of love which we show one another, or the lack of love in our actions.

Let us help one another, inspired by what St. Monica had done for her son, St. Augustine, and if we have fallen into sin and darkness along the way, then let us rise again just as St. Augustine had risen from the darkness of the world into the light of Christ and begin anew in the Lord. Let us cast away all evils and impurities from our lives, and be ever vigilant and ready for the coming of our Lord, that when He comes again, He may find us ready and worthy of Him.

May Almighty God be with us, guide us on our way, that we may follow in the footsteps of St. Augustine of Hippo, the sinner turned into a great saint and pillar of the Church, who brought many souls into salvation, so that we too may help one another to reach the throne of our Lord’s merciful heart and be saved. God bless us all. Amen.

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Thursday, 28 August 2014 : 21st Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Augustine of Hippo, Bishop and Doctor of the Church (Gospel Reading)

Liturgical Colour : White

Matthew 24 : 42-51

Stay awake then, for you do not know on what day your Lord will come. Obviously, if the owner of the house knew at what time the thief was coming, he would certainly stay up and not allow his house to be broken into. So be alert, for the Son of Man will come at the hour you least expect.

Imagine a capable servant, whom his master has put in charge of his household, to give them food at the proper time. Fortunate indeed is that servant, whom his master will find at work when he comes. Truly I say to you, his lord will entrust that one with everything he has.

Not so with the bad servant, who thinks, ‘My master is delayed.’ And he begins to ill-treat his fellow servants, while eating and drinking with drunkards. But his master will come on the day he does not know, and at the hour he least expects. He will dismiss that servant, and deal with him as with the hypocrites. There will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.