servants of God

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(Usus Antiquior) Thirteenth Sunday after Pentecost (II Classis) – Sunday, 7 September 2014 : Epistle

Lectio Epistolae Beati Pauli Apostoli ad Galatas – Lesson from the Epistle of Blessed Paul the Apostle to the Galatians

Galatians 3 : 16-22

Fratres : Abrahae dictae sunt promissiones, et semini ejus. Non dicit : Et seminibus, quasi in multis; sed quasi in uno : Et semini tuo, qui est Christus.

Hoc autem dico : testamentum confirmatum a Deo, quae post quadringentos et triginta annos facta est lex, non irritum facit ad evacuandam promissionem.

Nam si ex lege hereditas, jam non, ex promissione. Abrahae autem per repromissionem donavit Deus. Quid igitur lex? Propter transgressiones posita est, donec veniret semen, cui promiserat, ordinata per Angelos in manu mediatoris.

Mediator autem unius non est : Deus autem unus est. Lex ergo adversus promissa Dei? Absit. Si enim data esset lex, quae posset vivificare, vere ex lege esset justitia. Sed conclusit Scriptura omnia sub peccato, ut promissio ex fide Jesu Christi daretur credentibus.

English translation

Brethren, to Abraham were the promises made, and to his descendants. He did not say, and to his descendants, as of many, but as of one, and to your descendant, which is Christ.

Now this I say, that the testament which was confirmed by God, the Law which was made after four hundred and thirty years, did not annul, and to make the promise of no effect.

For if the inheritance of the Law, it is no more of promise. Why then was the Law? It was set because of transgressions, until the descendant should come, to whom He made the promise, being ordained by angels in the hand of a Mediator.

Now a Mediator is not of one, but God is one. Was the Law then against the promises of God? God forbid. For if there had been a law given, which could give life, verily justice should have been by the Law. But the Scripture had concluded all under sin, that the promise by the faith of Jesus Christ might be given to those who believe.

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Sunday, 7 September 2014 : 23rd Sunday of Ordinary Time (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Green

Ezekiel 33 : 7-9

For your part, son of man, I have set you as a watchman for Israel, and when you hear My word, you must give them My warning.

When I say to the wicked : “Wicked man, you shall die for sure,” if you do not warn the wicked man to turn from his ways, he will die because of his sin, but I will also call you to account for his blood.

If you warn the wicked man to turn from his ways and he does not do so, he will die for his sin, but you yourself will be saved.

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Thursday, 4 September 2014 : 22nd Week of Ordinary Time (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Green

1 Corinthians 3 : 18-23

Do not deceive yourselves. If anyone of you considers himself wise in the ways of the world, let him become a fool, so that he may become wise. For the wisdom of this world is foolishness in God’s eyes. To this, Scripture says : “God catches the wise in their own wisdom.” It also says : “The Lord knows the reasoning of the wise, that it is useless.”

Because of this, let no one boast about human beings, for everything belongs to you, Paul, Apollos, Cephas – life, death, the present and the future. Everything is yours, and you, you belong to Christ, and Christ is of God.

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Wednesday, 3 September 2014 : 22nd Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of Pope St. Gregory the Great, Pope and Doctor of the Church (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : White

1 Corinthians 3 : 1-9

I could not, friends, speak to you as spiritual persons but as fleshly people, for you are still infants in Christ. I gave you milk and not solid food, for you were not ready for it and up to now you cannot receive it for you are still of the flesh. As long as there is jealousy and strife, what can I say but that you are at the level of the flesh and behave like ordinary people.

While one says : “I follow Paul,” and the other : “I follow Apollos,” what are you but people still at a human level? For what is Apollos? What is Paul? They are ministers and through them you believed, as it was given by the Lord to each of them.

I planted, Apollos watered the plant, but God made it grow. So neither the one who plants nor the one who waters is anything, but God who makes the plant grow. The one who plants and the one who waters work to the same end, and the Lord will pay each according to their work. We are fellow-workers with God, but you are God’s field and building.

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Monday, 1 September 2014 : 22nd Week of Ordinary Time (Gospel Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Green

Luke 4 : 16-30

When Jesus came to Nazareth, where He had been brought up, He entered the synagogue on the sabbath, as He usually did. He stood up to read, and they handed Him the book of the prophet Isaiah.

Jesus then unrolled the scroll and found the place where it is written : “The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me. He has anointed Me to bring good news to the poor, to proclaim liberty to captives and new sight to the blind; to free the oppressed and to announce the Lord’s year of mercy.”

Jesus then rolled up the scroll, gave it to the attendant and sat down; and the eyes of all in the synagogue were fixed on Him. Then He said to them, “Today these prophetic words come true, even as you listen.”

All agreed with Him, and were lost in wonder, while He spoke of the grace of God. Nevertheless they asked, “Who is this but Joseph’s Son?” So He said, “Doubtless you will quote Me the saying : Doctor, heal Yourself! Do here in Your town what they say You did in Capernaum.”

Jesus added, “No prophet is honoured in his own country. Truly, I say to you, there were many widows in Israel in the days of Elijah, when the heavens withheld rain for three years and six months and a great famine came over the whole land. Yet Elijah was not sent to any of them, but to a widow of Zarephath, in the country of Sidon.”

“There were also many lepers in Israel in the time of Elisha, the prophet, and no one was healed except Naaman, the Syrian.”

On hearing these words, the whole assembly became indignant. They rose up and brought Him out of the town, to the edge of the hill on which Nazareth is built, intending to throw Him down the cliff. But He passed through their midst and went His way.

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(Usus Antiquior) Twelfth Sunday after Pentecost (II Classis) – Sunday, 31 August 2014 : Homily and Scripture Reflections

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, most beloved ones in the Lord Jesus. Today, we partake together and celebrate together this Sacred occasion of the Sacrifice of our Lord Jesus together, and we are called to reflect on our lives today, on whether we have lived as what Jesus wanted from us and according to what He had told us as we heard in the Gospel today.

We heard about the famous and the well-known story and parable of the Samaritan and the man who travelled from Jerusalem to Jericho and beset by the bandits along the way. Three men passed through the same road, the priest, the Levite and the Samaritan, but out of all three, only the Samaritan stopped by and showed great mercy to the man wounded and left to die on that road.

The priest and the Levite, considered holy and sacred personas in the society of the people of God at that time, did not even stop by to care or show love and mercy to the wounded man. They pretended not to see the plight of the man and proceeded on to where they wanted to go, leaving the man to fend for himself and die a death in great suffering had the Samaritan not be there to help the man.

The Samaritan went out of his way, not just to stop by and help the man, but he even helped him to recover to full health by carrying him on his own beast of burden, on which he surely had sat upon. Therefore, we can imagine that the Samaritan was in fact walking along while the wounded man was sitting on the beast of burden. And not only that, he even paid the full fee of the man’s lodging fee in the inn and promised to come back and pay more if the man has not fully recovered yet in the allotted time.

And Jesus taught all of us to love, to love not just God but also that of our neighbours, those who are around us, with all of our hearts, with all of our strengths, with all the capacities of our minds, and with all of our abilities and in all the time we are able to spend with these brethren of ours, and of course ultimately to God. With this our faith will be real and living and will not be a dead faith.

What Jesus wanted from us is a living faith, based on the foundation of love and action. The commandments He had mentioned was the same as the Ten Commandments of God, which God had given to mankind, to His people through His servant Moses. The Ten Commandments are the ten tenets and key laws that govern how we mankind should live our lives, but all of them, are truly and is indeed about love. Loving God and one another with all of our beings and strengths.

Jesus also did not intend to belittle or make the priests and the Levites look bad by comparing their actions with that of the Samaritans. As we all should know, the Samaritans were the pariah of the society at the time, rejected by the Jews and they were seen as pagans who did not follow the faith and the way of the Lord, and this enmity had been ongoing for hundreds of years by the time of Jesus.

Why He used the Samaritans is in fact with a clear purpose to chide and rebuke the faithful, who were so proud of their faith, and who were feeling so righteous just because they thought they have the faith that they used their faith as a justification to condemn and persecute those others whom they deemed to be unworthy. And Jesus rebuked those who had been so proud of their faith and did so little to live according to that faith.

The examples would be the Pharisees, the teachers of the Law and the elders, who are together in the similar group as the priests and the Levites. These people were very honoured and respected in the society because they were supposedly the stewards and guardians of the law and the precepts of the Lord. Yet these people instead of truly living out the faith through their actions and deeds, they persecuted and oppressed the people by numerous rules and punishments so as to burden them and yet they did not make the people any more worthy than they had been.

We too, brothers and sisters in Christ, have to reflect on our own lives, whether we have done our part to live according to our faith, or whether we have not done so. We need to be proactive and active in our faith, that is in every words we speak, in every deeds that come from our hands and limbs, we must proclaim the Lord and thus show to all who see us, that we truly are belonging to God.

Let us all work together, and work consciously so that we may live this life we have on earth faithfully, casting out all impropriety and evil, and filling our lives and our hearts with good deeds and desire only to seek the Lord, He who is our loving God and Father, and the One who will judge us according to our actions. We should follow the footsteps of the Samaritan, in walking the extra mile to help one another, especially if we see someone in need around us, and when we are in the position to help. Let us never ignore the plea of those who seek for help.

May Almighty God awaken in us the spirit of love, that is both the love we have for Himself and for our brethren around us. And may He also awaken in us the spirit of pity and mercy, that we may be merciful to those suffering around us and forgive those who have wronged us. May God be with us all, all the days of our life. God bless us all. Amen.

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(Usus Antiquior) Twelfth Sunday after Pentecost (II Classis) – Sunday, 31 August 2014 : Epistle

Lectio Epistolae Beati Pauli Apostoli ad Corinthios – Lesson from the Epistle of Blessed Paul the Apostle to the Corinthians

2 Corinthians 3 : 4-9

Fratres : Fiduciam talem habemus per Christum ad Deum : non quod sufficientes simus cogitare aliquid a nobis, quasi ex nobis : sed sufficientia nostra ex Deo est : qui et idoneos nos fecit ministros novi testamenti : non littera, sed spiritu : littera enim occidit, spiritus autem vivificat.

Quod si ministratio mortis, litteris deformata in lapidibus, fuit in gloria; ita ut non possent intendere filii Israel in faciem Moysi, propter gloriam vultus ejus, quae evacuatur : quomodo non magis ministratio Spiritus erit in gloria?

Nam si ministratio damnationis gloria est, multo magis abundat ministerium justitiae in gloria.

English translation

Brethren, such confidence we have through Christ towards God. Not that we are sufficient to think anything of ourselves, as of ourselves; but our sufficiency is from God. Who also had made us fit ministers of the new testament, not in the letter, but in the spirit, for the letter killed, but the spirit quickened.

Now, if the ministration of death, engraven with letters upon stones was glorious, so that the children of Israel could not steadfastly behold the face of Moses, for the glory of his countenance, which is made void. How shall not the ministration of the spirit be rather in glory?

For if the ministration of condemnation is glory, much more ministration of justice abounded in glory.

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Sunday, 31 August 2014 : 22nd Sunday of Ordinary Time (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Green

Jeremiah 20 : 7-9

YHVH, You have seduced me and I let myself be seduced. You have taken me by force and prevailed. I have become a laughingstock all day long; they all make fun of me, for every time I speak I have to shout, “Violence! Devastation!”

YHVH’s word has brought me insult and derision all day long. So I decided to forget about Him and speak no more in His Name. But His word in my heart becomes like a fire burning deep within my bones. I try so hard to hold it in, but I cannot do it.

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Saturday, 30 August 2014 : 21st Week of Ordinary Time (Scripture Reflections)

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

Brothers and sisters in Christ, today we celebrate the word of God, in which we are reminded of the need to be proactive in our faith and in how we live our lives, depending also on the graces and wisdom which He had granted us mankind, so that we may grow further and develop what He had given to us and entrusted to us. Yes, so that we may be like the hardworking and good servants rather than becoming like the useless and lazy servant.

In each and every one of us, God had given many gifts in various ways, some more than others in certain things and some less than others in certain things, and while some have more, some have less than others. But regardless of the amounts, the Lord had given us something, blessings and graces He gave us, no matter how small or how big they are.

This is perfectly represented by Jesus through His telling of the parable of the servants with the silver talents. There were three servants who were given five talents of silver, two talents of silver and one talent of silver respectively, and they exactly represented all of us who had been given the gifts and blessings of God in the form of our abilities, talents and other gifts that we had been endowed with, no matter how great or small they are.

But what is important here is to reflect on the words and the true meaning of the parable which Jesus had told us through His disciples, on why it is so important for us not to be passive and be ridden with inaction, as these are great sins, the sins of omission. For it is not just the sin of action that is truly debilitating against the soul when we committed something evil and foul in the presence of God, but when we fail to do something when we clearly have the means and ability to do it, then we also commit a sin.

The key here is to understand that it is not when we have less then we deserve to be punished or anything of the sort. The servant who had been given the one talent could have been praised and be rewarded as well, had he not hidden his one silver talent in fear of losing it or in fear of retribution from his master and instead if he had invested it and worked on it, he would have received his due reward.

How does this relate to us then? We often fear to use our talents to be of use to others, and to work and do good works as well as good deeds using whatever abilities and gifts that God had given us. And when we were baptised and accepted as the member of the Body of Christ, the Church, God had given us even more gifts, the gift of faith, the gift of hope and the gift of love. However, these gifts are mere seeds that will only grow and become powerful tools for the Lord to works His wonders in this world if we take action and do something to use them for the good of all around us.

Remember the parable of the sower and the seeds that fell on different locations and conditions? The seeds will only grow well and produce bountiful returns of thirty, sixty, hundredfold and more if they fall on the rich soil. And this cannot be automatic for all of us. We have to work and toil hard just like all farmers do, so that the seeds may grow healthy and strong. A good heart and a favourable environment, represented by the rich soil is necessary, but even this require work on our part, and after that, we still need to toil and work hard till the harvest season.

That means, we have to be actively engaged in living our faith. We must be open to others, in terms of opening our hearts filled with this faith, hope and love so that others too may benefit from them and therefore stand to gain from what we are doing. Thus, in our words, our actions and deeds must reflect the nature of ourselves, that is as the children of God, who is Love, and thus we must have love, and hope, and faith in all of the things we do and say.

It is only then that we will be able to grow our faith, hope and love, and all of the various gifts God had given us, so that just like the faithful and good servants, their silver talents grow and multiply as they invested them, so do our gifts and our strength in God. And therefore, the Lord who sees all that we do will reward us and keep us in His love and grace.

May Almighty God bless us on this day, and strengthen us that we may continue to persevere amidst the difficulties of this world and commit ourselves to greater acts of faith, hope and love, so that all those around us may benefit from them and we too may be found worthy of the everlasting heaven. God be with us all. Amen.

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Monday, 25 August 2014 : 21st Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Louis and St. Joseph Calasanz, Priest (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Green or White (Priests)

2 Thessalonians 1 : 1-5, 11b-12

From Paul, Sylvanus and Timothy, to the church of the Thessalonians which is in God our Father and in Christ Jesus, the Lord. May grace and peace be yours from God the Father and Christ Jesus, the Lord.

Brothers and sisters, we should give thanks to God at all times for you. It is fitting to do so, for your faith is growing and your love for one another increasing. We take pride in you among the churches of God because of your endurance and your faith in the midst of persecution and sufferings.

In this the just judgment of God may be seen; for you must show yourselves worthy of the kingdom of God for which you are now suffering. May He, by His power, fulfill your good purposes and your work prompted by faith. In that way, the Name of Jesus our Lord will be glorified through you, and you through Him, according to the loving plan of God and of Christ Jesus the Lord.