Sunday Mass

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Sunday, 18 November 2018 : Thirty-Third Sunday of Ordinary Time, Memorial of the Dedication of the Basilica of St. Peter and the Basilica of St. Paul Outside the Wall, World Day of the Poor (Second Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Green

Hebrews 10 : 11-14, 18

So, whereas every priest stands, daily, by the Altar, offering, repeatedly, the same sacrifices, that can never take away sins, Christ has offered, for all times, a single sacrifice for sins, and has taken His seat at the right hand of God, waiting, until God puts His enemies as a footstool under His feet.

By a single sacrifice He has brought those who are sanctified to what is perfect forever. So, if sins are forgiven, there is no longer need of any sacrifice for sin.

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Sunday, 18 November 2018 : Thirty-Third Sunday of Ordinary Time, Memorial of the Dedication of the Basilica of St. Peter and the Basilica of St. Paul Outside the Wall, World Day of the Poor (Psalm)

Liturgical Colour : Green

Psalm 15 : 5 and 8, 9-10, 11

O Lord, my inheritance and my cup, my chosen portion – hold secure my lot.

I keep the Lord always before me; for with Him at my right hand, I will never be shaken.

My heart, therefore, exults, my soul rejoices; my body too will rest assured.

For You will not abandon my soul to the grave, nor will You suffer Your Holy One to see decay in the land of the dead.

You will show me the path of life, in Your presence the fullness of joy, at Your right hand happiness forever.

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Sunday, 18 November 2018 : Thirty-Third Sunday of Ordinary Time, Memorial of the Dedication of the Basilica of St. Peter and the Basilica of St. Paul Outside the Wall, World Day of the Poor (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Green

Daniel 12 : 1-3

At that time, Michael will rise, the Great Commander who defends your people. It shall be a time of anguish as never before, since the nations first existed until this very day. Then, all those, whose names are written in the book, will be saved.

Many of those who sleep in the Region of the Dust will awake, some to everlasting life but others to eternal horror and shame. Those who acquired knowledge will shine, like the brilliance of the firmament; those who taught people to be just will shine, like the stars, for all eternity.

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Sunday, 11 November 2018 : Thirty-Second Sunday of Ordinary Time (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : Green

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, in this Sunday’s Scripture readings we are reminded that as Christians, in following God, we must always be generous in giving, and not to be stingy or greedy, in keeping all that we have to ourselves. This is shown through the reading taken from the story of the prophet Elijah and the widow of Zarephath, the passage from the Epistle of St. Paul to the Hebrews relating to us the loving sacrifice of Christ, and finally the story of the giving of the old woman who gave two copper coins to the Temple in our Gospel passage today.

First of all, the story of the prophet Elijah and the faithful widow of Zarephath happened at the time when the whole of Israel and the region was suffering from a great drought and famine, where rain did not fall for several years. Without rain the crops could not grow, and hence man and cattle alike suffered in great hunger. And this came about because of the great sins which the people of Israel and their king had committed before God.

The king of Israel at that time, king Ahab, was notorious among the many other kings of Israel, then ruling only the northern half of the divided kingdom of David and Solomon. Many of the kings of the northern kingdom were wicked in their actions and lives, and did not obey God as they should have done. As a result they led the people to sin, and king Ahab was noted as the one who was particularly wicked, especially due to the influence of his queen, Jezebel.

King Ahab further spread the worship of the pagan gods such as Baal, Asherah and many other Canaanite gods that the Israelites were exposed to from their neighbours. And the king also persecuted the faithful and those whom God sent to help save His people, that is the prophets. He also persecuted the prophet Elijah, who had to flee the persecution for the king and his forces were after his life.

As the sign of divine displeasure at the wickedness which all of Israel at that time, the prophet Elijah showed a sign, by which there was to be no rain throughout the land for three years, for the sins committed by Israel and its king. And it was in this state of the land in drought and famine that the interaction between the prophet Elijah and the widow of the city of Zarephath took place.

Zarephath itself was a small town in Sidon, in the land which was not considered as part of the land of Israel. It was the land of the Phoenicians, and likely that widow was not an Israelite. At that time, a non-Israelite person was usually considered as a pagan, as unbelievers who did not believe in God. They were often looked at with disdain and dismissed as unworthy by the Israelites who took pride in their status as the chosen race and people of God.

Interestingly, this is parallel to what we have heard in our Gospel passage today, regarding the moment when the Lord Jesus and His disciples were ar the Temple of God, and saw how an old woman placed a mere two pieces of copper coins, which had a very small value at that time, as compared to the rich people, who put in a lot of offerings and rich gifts to the Temple of God. And consequently, people must have paid attention to what those rich men had been doing, and ignored or even looked down on the old woman who gave so little in comparison.

And yet, we see in both circumstances, we see how those who were proud and filled with ego, faltered in the end, and compared to the ones who were looked down upon, ostracised, marginalised and discredited against, the latter ones were the ones who were in truth, truly faithful to the Lord. They put their faith and trust in the Lord and gave generously from whatever it was that they had, even those that they needed for themselves to survive on.

Surely as was in the case of the widow of Zarephath, she did have and show her reservations, and she was indeed afraid that she did not even have enough for herself and for her son to eat one last meal, when the prophet Elijah asked her for some flour and oil to make him a bread to eat. But in the end, she chose to trust in God and in the words of the prophet Elijah. She took the flour and oil and obeyed God even if that meant taking something from what she could have made for herself and her son one last meal.

Like the poor old woman in the Temple, the widow of Zarephath chose to trust in God wholeheartedly and gave even from her poverty. For the widow of Zarephath, she gave whatever food she could provide for the sustenance of God’s servant, Elijah, and for the old woman in the Temple, she gave everything that she could give, possibly most of her wage and possessions, for the Lord.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, have we been touched by the examples of these courageous women, who were counted among those who were always maltreated, ignored and ostracised from within our own communities? And ultimately, the best of all, as mentioned in the Epistle of St. Paul to the Hebrews, the Jewish Christians, that the Lord Himself has given everything, in ultimate obedience to His Father.

How is that so? Through the suffering that Our Lord Jesus Christ willingly endured for our salvation, He has placed Himself in complete trust to the will of His Father, despite the enormous and unimaginable sufferings and pains that He had to endure for our sake. Ultimately His even more unimaginably great love for each and every one of us is the reason why He was ready to take up the burden of the cross.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, let us all therefore do the same with ourselves, and learn to put our trust in God, by not fearing to give and share what we have for the greater glory of God, by sharing these blessings we have, in loving our fellow men and caring for those who are needy. If we do this, and if we have love for our fellow men, then we are doing what Christ Himself had done, and in doing so, we obey the Lord and love Him in the best way possible, remembering His own words, “that whatever you have done for the least among you, you have done it unto Me.”

Let us all therefore learn to love God with a new zeal and effort from now on. Let us turn to Him with our whole heart, imitating the great faith and dedication that the widow of Zarephath and the old woman in the Temple had shown us. Let us remember, that if we give it all to the Lord, and not worrying about the various concerns we may have over giving of ourselves to God, the Lord Himself will provide for us, as He did with the widow of Zarephath.

May the Lord bless us always, and may He continue to guide us in our path at all times. May He remain by our side, strengthening us and keeping us in His loving embrace, each and every moments of our lives. May God bless us all, now and forevermore. Amen.

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Sunday, 11 November 2018 : Thirty-Second Sunday of Ordinary Time (Gospel Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Green

Mark 12 : 38-44

At that time, as Jesus was teaching, He also said to His disciples, “Beware of those teachers of the Law, who enjoy walking around in long robes and being greeted in the marketplace, and who like to occupy reserved seats in the synagogues, and the first places at feasts. They even devour the widow’s and the orphan’s goods while making a show of long prayers. How severe a sentence they will receive!”

Jesus sat down opposite the Temple treasury, and watched the people dropping money into the treasury box; and many rich people put in large offerings. But a poor widow also cane and dropped in two small coins. Then Jesus called His disciples and said to them, “Truly I say to you, this poor widow put in more than all those who gave offerings. For all of them gave from their plenty, but she gave from her poverty, and put in everything she had, her very living.”

Alternative reading (shorter version)

Mark 12 : 41-44

Jesus sat down opposite the Temple treasury, and watched the people dropping money into the treasury box; and many rich people put in large offerings. But a poor widow also cane and dropped in two small coins.

Then Jesus called His disciples and said to them, “Truly I say to you, this poor widow put in more than all those who gave offerings. For all of them gave from their plenty, but she gave from her poverty, and put in everything she had, her very living.”

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Sunday, 11 November 2018 : Thirty-Second Sunday of Ordinary Time (Second Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Green

Hebrews 9 : 24-28

Christ did not enter some sanctuary made by hands, a copy of the True One, but Heaven itself. He is now in the presence of God, on our behalf. He had not to offer Himself many times, as the High Priest does : he, who, may return every year, because the blood is not his own. Otherwise, He would have suffered many times, from the creation of the world.

But no; He manifested Himself only now, at the end of the ages, to take away sin by sacrifice, and, as humans die only once, and afterward are judged, in the same way, Christ sacrificed Himself, once to take away the sins of the multitude. There will be no further question of sin, when He comes again, to save those waiting for Him.

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Sunday, 11 November 2018 : Thirty-Second Sunday of Ordinary Time (Psalm)

Liturgical Colour : Green

Psalm 145 : 6c-7, 8-9a, 9bc-10

The Lord is forever faithful; He gives justice to the oppressed and gives food to the hungry. The Lord sets the prisoners free.

The Lord gives sight to the blind, the Lord straightens the bent. The Lord loves the virtuous, but He brings to ruin the way of the wicked. The Lord protects the stranger.

He sustains the widow and the orphan. The Lord will reign forever, your God, o Zion, from generation to generation. Alleluia!

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Sunday, 11 November 2018 : Thirty-Second Sunday of Ordinary Time (First Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Green

1 Kings 17 : 10-16

So Elijah went to Zarephath. On reaching the gate of the town, he saw a widow gathering sticks. He called to her and said, “Bring me a little water in a vessel that I may drink.”

As she was going to bring it, he called after her and said, “Bring me also a piece of bread.” But she answered, “As YHVH your God lives, I have no bread left, but only a handful of flour in a jar and a little oil in a jug. I am just now gathering some sticks so that I may go in and prepare something for myself and my son to eat – and die.”

Elijah then said to her, “Do not be afraid. Go, and do as you have said. But first make me a little cake of it and bring it to me. Then make some for yourself and your son. For this is the word of YHVH, the God of Israel, ‘The jar of meal shall not be emptied nor shall the jug of oil fail, until the day when YHVH sends rain to the earth.’”

So she went and did as Elijah told her; and she had food for herself, Elijah and her son from that day on. The jar of flour was not emptied nor did the jug of oil fail, in accordance with what YHVH had said through Elijah.

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Sunday, 4 November 2018 : Thirty-First Sunday of Ordinary Time (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : Green

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, on this Sunday, the readings from the Scriptures are about God’s Law, and the need for us all to listen to the Law of God, to accept them and to put them into practice in our own lives, but with good understanding and appreciation of what the Law is all about, and this is important because otherwise, we will end up falling into the same trap into which the Pharisees and the teachers of the Law had fallen into.

What does this mean, brothers and sisters in Christ? It means that we should not follow the hypocrisy of the Pharisees and the teachers of the Law who professed to believe in the Law and in fact, as the ones who regulated and enforced the Law, and yet, they did not know what is the true meaning and significance of the Law. Many of them observed the Law for the wrong reason and with the wrong intention.

The Pharisees and the teachers of the Law stressed a very strict application of the laws of Moses, which can be found in the book of Exodus and Leviticus in the Old Testament, as well as the traditions and practices which had been handed down the generations of the people of Israel. There were in total six hundred and thirteen set of laws, rules and regulations that the people of God had to obey and fulfil, down to the smallest details of how one should live their lives.

These laws had to be understood in the context of history and how the law came to be. The Law was given to the people of God, Israel, as part of the Covenant that God established with them, just right after He liberated them from their slavery at the land of Egypt. God gave them the Law through Moses, which showed them various aspects of how they ought to live and survive through the difficult and challenging times, at the time when Israel was still trying to find its identity and place among the nations.

For once, the Israelites were then a stubborn and obstinate bunch of people, who frequently and repeatedly rebelled against the Lord, as was evident from the accounts of the Exodus from Egypt. They had to endure a forty years detour and wait before they were allowed to enter the Promised Land of Canaan, after even though God had reassured them and showed them His providence and love throughout their journey, they chose willingly to abandon God and give in to their fears instead.

They failed to trust God, many times, as shown how just right after they were liberated from Egypt, they gave in to temptation, making a golden calf to be god for them, when Moses went up the mountain of Sinai to receive God’s commandments and Law. They grumbled and had many qualms, when the Lord had fed them daily with manna, the bread of Angels from heaven, and with large birds providing them with meat, and sweet, good tasting water from the rock.

Thus, in order to discipline a people that was so stubborn and obstinate, God gave them the Law in order to remind them to turn away from all their sins and wickedness, and for them to rediscover their love for God, by following the precepts and the rules of the Law. However, although the intention of the Law was good and the early application of the Law was meaningful, but in time, the elders, the priests and eventually the Pharisees and the teachers of the Law at the time of Jesus misunderstood and misinterpreted the Law, in its practice, meaning and intention.

They took the Law as a list of punitive regulations to be enforced among the people of Israel, and used them as benchmark of who was to be considered as faithful and who was to be considered as unfaithful. In time to come, this ended up creating divisions in the society, with the Pharisees, the teachers of the Law and the priests claiming themselves to be pious and good because of their observance of the Law, and looking down on the others, whom to them, were not as pious as they were.

Instead of bringing mankind closer to God as He intended, the Law was misused by those mentioned earlier, in keeping people away from God, by their judgmental attitude towards those whom they considered to be inferior to them in the matter of faith. They looked down on tax collectors, prostitutes and all others who suffered physical disabilities, such as blindness, paralysis and epilepsy.

To the Pharisees and the teachers of the Law, those sicknesses and professions are signs of them being cursed and unworthy of God’s love and grace. To them, they were the only ones who were worthy of God, and all others had to obey the way of the Law they prescribed to, or else, they too would be cast out from God’s grace. They espoused a very exclusivist attitude and perspective of the Law, one that is not focused on God, but on themselves, their ego, pride and desire.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, this is why, we need to appreciate and understand the true meaning and intention of God’s Law, which He has revealed unto us, through none other than His Son, Our Lord Jesus Christ, Who revealed the truth of God to all of us, His people. This is summarised succinctly in the Gospel passage we heard today, revealing to us the whole truth about what God intends to do with us through His Law.

And the heart and intention of the Law is love, and because of that, through the Law, God wants His people to rediscover the love which they ought to have for Him, and which they also ought to have for one another. The Lord came into this world, in order to dispel all the erroneous and false ways of the past elders and teachers of the Law, who had misinterpreted the Law of God and enforced an unjust and undue pressure on the people because of their misuse of the Law.

The Lord challenged all those who heard Him, to break free from that misunderstanding and the wrong ways in which they have done, in fulfilling the obligations of the Law. Instead of being self-centred and self-serving as the Pharisees and the teachers of the Law had been, we are called to refocus our attention to the Lord. The laws, rules and regulations that has been given to us, now renewed through the Church, must not be seen as burden or formalities that we need to fulfil in order to gain ourselves righteousness.

Otherwise, that is why, even within our Church today, there are many who did what the Church had commanded us to do, and yet, in their hearts and minds, God did not truly have a place in them. Indeed, it is possible for someone to act justly and piously in accordance with the Law and the Church rules and regulations, and yet, for the same person to have little or no love for God. That was how most of the Pharisees and the teachers of the Law acted, practicing the Law without understanding the spirit of the Law.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, that is why today, we are all called to turn ourselves wholeheartedly to the Lord once again, by rediscovering for ourselves what it truly means for us to be Christians. We must have love in us, and this is important as love is at the centre of our Christian faith and livelihood. Without love, for God and for others, then we will have no real and genuine faith in us.

The Lord Himself said that no matter how wonderful the things and the talents that we have, no matter what abilities we have, or even if we are able to speak in the tongue of Angels, but we have no love in us, then everything is meaningless. Without love, there can be no faith, for without love, how can we then believe in God Who is all about love? We call ourselves as Christians because we believe in Christ, Who is the personification of God’s ultimate love for us.

Let us all love one another just as the Lord Himself has loved us. Look at the example of Our Lord Jesus, Who gave Himself and His life for us, dying on the cross for our sake, willingly bearing the sins of ours because of His love for us, that He does not want us to be eternally separated from Him because of those sins. The Lord Jesus obeyed His Father’s will, and loved His Father, and because of that, He also loved us. In the perfect love which God has shown us, the perfect love between the Father, Son and the Holy Spirit, all of us are called to emulate this love in our own living.

Let us grow deeper in the understanding of our faith, the practices and customs of our faith, and all that the Church had given us through its teachings, the commandments of God and the laws of the Church. Let us appreciate better how we can grow ever more in our love for God through these, by meaningful and genuine participation in the life of the Church, from active participation in regular Holy Mass, and many other forms of our Christian worship.

May the Lord continue to guide each and every one of us, that through His Law of love, we may be able to find our way to Him, and be able to turn ourselves to Him, that we may love Him ever more wholeheartedly from now on. May God bless us all, now and forevermore. Amen.

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Sunday, 4 November 2018 : Thirty-First Sunday of Ordinary Time (Gospel Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Green

Mark 12 : 28b-34

At that time, a teacher of the Law came up and asked Jesus, “Which commandment is the first of all?”

Jesus answered, “The first is : Hear, Israel! The Lord, our God is One Lord; and you shall love the Lord, your God, with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind and with all your strength. And after this comes a second commandment : You shall love your neighbour as yourself. There is no commandment greater than these two.”

The teacher of the Law said to Him, “Well spoken, Master; You are right when You say that He is one, and there is no other besides Him. To love Him with all our heart, with all our understanding and with all our strength, and to love our neighbour as ourselves is more important than any burnt offering or sacrifice.”

Jesus approved of this answer and said, “You are not far from the kingdom of God.” And after that, no one dared to ask Him any more questions.