understanding the faith

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Wednesday, 23 August 2017 : 20th Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Rose of Lima, Virgin (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : Green

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, on this day we listened to the words of the Scriptures, speaking to us about the need to follow the will of God, and to do His works, for all of us have been called by God to be His workers in the plentiful and rich field of this world. This is the essence of what we have heard particularly in today’s Gospel passage, when Jesus spoke to His disciples and the people on the parable of the workers in a vineyard.

In that parable, we heard Jesus speaking about how a master of a vineyard needed workers to work in his vineyard, and therefore he went about, seeking for workers in the marketplaces and the other public places, calling the people to work in his place. In that parable, the master of the vineyard is the Lord our God, and the field or the vineyard is this world where we live in, and where the Lord is also constantly at work.

And all of the workers represent none other than each and every one of us whom God has called to be His followers and servants, to become the workers of the faith. All of us have been called to serve the Lord and to work in the rich harvest of this world, just as He Himself said on another occasion, that while the harvest is plentiful, but the labourers are few.

Why is that so? That is because while there are indeed lots of opportunities for the works of God through His Church to be fulfilled, and then there are also many souls out there who are still trapped in the darkness of sin and in the temptations and in the preoccupations of this world, but there are not many in the Church who are willing to take up the Lord’s challenge and do what we can in order to help His good works.

Many of us are lukewarm, and many of us are not enthusiastic in living our faith life actively and with devotion. And this is not what we should be doing as Christians. As true Christians, all those who have devoted themselves to the Lord, we should be active in reaching out to others who are in need of the salvation of God and also in need for our care, compassion and love.

And at the same time, many of us have become proud with ourselves, to the point of being dismissive or even looking down on others who are in need of salvation. We become like Abimelech, the son of Gideon the Judge, who was proclaimed king of the people of Israel, after having murdered all the other sons of his father in order to secure power, glory and fame all for himself. Jotham, the only surviving son of Gideon from the massacre thus denounced him in the first reading we heard today from the Book of Judges.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, this is not how we should conduct ourselves. We should be humble and accept the will of God and what He has planned for us. Indeed, as the Gospel passage showed us today, those workers who were called to work earlier complained against the master when they found out that those who were called to work at the last hour received the same pay as what they had received. They thought it was unfair for the master to have done so.

But the master was not being unfair, just as the Lord has called each one of us according to His plan and time, at the time of His own choosing, and all of us share the same reward, be it that we have been called to God’s salvation earlier or later. We have received the assurance and promise of life everlasting, true joy and happiness which we can find in the Lord alone.

Let us all not be proud, or be afflicted by greed in our life. Let us instead follow the example of the holy woman, St. Rose of Lima, whose feast we celebrate on this day. St. Rose of Lima is the first saint of the New World, the Americas, and was a devout lay member of the Dominican religious order. St. Rose of Lima devoted herself completely and thoroughly to the Lord, rejecting the pursuits of the world and all the temptations it offered to her.

St. Rose of Lima lived a very virtuous life filled with prayer and commitment to God, and wanted to become a nun, if not for her father’s stern opposition. St. Rose of Lima therefore devoted her whole life, until her death, as a layman member of the Dominican order, spending her time in prayer, and it was told that she even wore a crown of thorns as a reminder of the suffering and the sacrifice of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Let us all commit ourselves to God in the same manner as St. Rose of Lima had done in her life. Let us thoroughly devote ourselves to God through actions, words and deeds, so that in everything we do, we will always be the workers of God’s vineyard and remain faithful to Him in all things. May St. Rose of Lima and her intercession help us on this journey towards the eternal life in God. May God bless us all. Amen.

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Tuesday, 22 August 2017 : 20th Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of the Queenship of the Blessed Virgin Mary (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : White

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, today we mark the feast of the Queenship of the Blessed Virgin Mary, Mother of God, our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. This is exactly one week after the great Solemnity of the Assumption of Mary into heaven, and is a reaffirmation of the special status which Mary has in the history of salvation and in the history of this world and mankind.

For there is no greater human being than Mary, as although she remained a mere human being, but because of her great piety and her great humility, and ultimately because she has allowed herself to become the vessel of God’s salvation, obediently allowing God to perform His great works through her, she has become the mother of our God and Saviour.

As I have mentioned during the Solemnity of the Assumption, Mary was granted the singular honour amongst all other men and women, for she was lifted up bodily and soul into the glory of heaven, for she has borne the Saviour of the world, Who saved all mankind from sin and death, and therefore, it is only right that He would also save her as well.

And we all believe that Mary is now in the glory of heaven, seated at the side of her Son, the King and ruler of Heaven and all the universe. And if in the history long past, the mother of a king is considered a queen, by the virtue of the kingship of her son, even if she herself was not a royalty or noble by birth, then the same should have also applied for the case of Mary.

If she is the mother of the King of Heaven and all the Universe, then by that virtue also, she has been made a queen. And therefore rightly she had been granted the following titles by the Church, that of the Queen of Heaven, the Queen of Angels, the Queen of All Saints and the Queen of Peace, amongst many others. We honour her because of her Son, our Lord and King, and certainly just as when a king’s mother is honoured, the king is also honoured, then it is the same case with Mary, the Mother of Jesus.

And to us, Mary has a special place in our faith, because she is the greatest and first among all the saints, the holy men and women of God. She is the one closest to her Son in heaven, and as she has proven from time to time, in her various apparitions, she is always constantly thinking about each and every one of us, mankind, as she is our mother who cares for us, just as she cared for her Son, Jesus. Jesus our Lord Himself has entrusted us to her from the cross, as He laid there dying to fulfil the salvation He promised to us mankind.

Mary is our greatest intercessor, and she is always pleading for our sake, that God may have mercy on us. She has shown us all the examples of how to be faithful and obedient to the will of God, and by following her examples, we will be able to draw closer to her Son, and thus will be worthy to receive His salvation and eternal glory. And through her various apparitions, Mary always reminded us mankind to seek her Son and to repent from our sinful ways.

Therefore, brothers and sisters in Christ, as today we rejoice in Mary, our mother and Queen, let us all ask for her intercession, that she will continue to pray for our sake, and implore her Son to forgive us our trespasses, that through her words and intercession, God may be moved to guide us to the path towards righteousness. And then, let us also strive to do our best to imitate the examples of Mary in faith, that we may learn to give ourselves completely and dedicate our whole being to the Lord.

May the Lord bless us always, and remain with us, and may through the intercession of His blessed mother Mary, Queen of Heaven, Queen of All Saints, Queen of Angels, Queen of Peace, and through the intercession of all the other holy saints and martyrs, all of us may be brought ever closer to God’s love and grace, and be forgiven from our sins when we repent with sincerity and commitment to live a new life filled with faith. Amen.

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Monday, 21 August 2017 : 20th Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of Pope St. Pius X, Pope (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : White

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, on this day we heard about how God was with His people throughout their time in the land granted to them by God. But the people of Israel had not always been faithful, and they lapsed again and again into sin, disobeying God and His commandments. They worshipped the pagan gods and idols of their neighbours, Baal and Ashtaroth, and they abandoned the God Who had brought them out of slavery in Egypt and cared for them with His love.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, why is that so? The people of Israel had settled down in the land of Canaan, after the long journey of the Exodus, staying at a land blessed by God, rich and overflowing with milk and honey, where each of the agricultural products and crops the people grew produced rich harvests. They lived in a state of grace and joy, and they enjoyed the many good fruits of the world. But that led them to become decadent and then made them to drift away from the path of the Lord.

The Israelites had with them the laws and the commandments of God, and yet, they eventually failed to remain faithful to those laws and commandments. Why was that so? They had those laws, and they had the leaders, the priests and the elders to guide them to the path of God through the interpretation and obedience to those laws. But those laws would be of no use if the Lord was not truly in the hearts and minds of the people.

That is because if the people did obey the laws and the commandments, but if they did not truly live in accordance to those commandments and believe in them in their hearts wholeheartedly, that was why they easily fell into the temptations of the devil. They were easily swayed by worldly things, and the allures of pagan worship that included revelry and worldly pleasures thus attracted them. They found it too difficult for them to obey the strict commandments of God.

That is what the Gospel passage today has also told us, as it showed us the moment when a young man met and asked the Lord Jesus, about what he ought to be doing in order to receive eternal life. He has obeyed all the laws and commandments of God, as prescribed through the laws of Moses, and further explained and enforced by the Pharisees and by the teachers of the Law.

However, it is indeed possible for someone to obey the Law and at the same time, not truly having a strong commitment and devotion to God. When the Lord Jesus told him that he ought to let go of all the things he had and possessed, and gave them for the sake of the poor before following Him, the young man became very sad and dejected, and he walked away in sorrow. Why is that so? Because to him, his material possessions and wealth worth to him so greatly, that he was not able to be separated from them, even just the thought of it sorrowed him so.

How many of us are like him, brothers and sisters? How many of us are incapable of separating ourselves from our worldly possessions and concerns, ending up in us sacrificing our relationship with God. We end up being so preoccupied with our work, with our pursuit for worldly glory, fame, money and all those things, that they ended up becoming the new idols in our life, like that of Baal and Ashtaroth that deceived and swayed the Israelites to the path of sin.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, all of us have to turn away from all these temptations and false idols of our life. We may think that as Christians we believe in God and worship Him. Yet, if we spend so much of our time trying to accumulate these worldly possessions, and adore them so much, is it not that we have made them to be idols that we worship besides God?

It is important for us all to learn to put aside all these distractions, and we can perhaps learn from the examples of the holy saint whose feast we celebrate today, that of Pope St. Pius X, the holy Pope and saint, known also as the Pope of the Holy Eucharist, for his great dedication to the Lord and for his attempts to bring the Lord in the Eucharist closer to the people, by allowing people at a younger age to receive Him.

But Pope St. Pius X was also remembered for his dedication to the people, as well as his dedication to his family. He was a dedicated parish priest for many years, and he helped many people to overcome their problems and brought them back to the Lord. And as a bishop and later as the Patriarch of Venice, he continued to devote himself to the people, caring for them and remaining humble in all things.

Despite his privileges and position, he never tried to accumulate power, glory and fame upon himself, but instead, he continued the devote himself to do the works of God, and continue to bring glory to God. And he did not forget the kindness of those who were dear to him, especially to his mother, whom he cared for even unto the day of her passing.

Pope St. Pius X encouraged the faithful to have a strong faith and devotion to the Lord, encouraging them to seek for personal holiness in their lives. He encouraged and promoted the traditions of the faith and ensured that the people of God would be able to grow closer to their Lord by returning to the true teachings of the Church, which he ensured by the reformulation of the laws of the Church and the establishment of the first ever Canon Law of the Church, to weed out the excesses of the Church and the faith, and to return to the true faith of their forefathers.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, Pope St. Pius X and the other holy saints and martyrs of God have lived their lives in commitment to the Lord, devoting all of their efforts and works to bring glory to God. There will indeed be lots of opposition, challenges and temptations when we do so, as we walk in the path of God. There will be plenty of moments when we will be pulled to the left and right, even by those who are dear and close to us, tempting us and even pressuring us to abandon our journey towards the Lord.

Our holy and devoted predecessors have experienced all of these, and so we are likely to experience them as well. Shall we now heed these examples, the piety and devotion which the holy saints, especially Pope St. Pius X had shown? Let us all walk in their footsteps, and throw away from our lives, the false idols of human greed, money, possessions, worldly fame and glory, and let us all reorientate ourselves and turn wholeheartedly to the Lord. Pope St. Pius X, pray for us, that all of us will be forgiven by God and be brought into His ever loving embrace. Amen.

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Sunday, 20 August 2017 : Twentieth Sunday of Ordinary Time (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : Green

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, on this Sunday we listened to the words of the Sacred Scriptures speaking to us a very important message which all of us should heed, that we as Christians will be better able to appreciate our faith and understand it. It is about God calling all of His people to His salvation, to receive the mercy, forgiveness and love from His own hands, through their repentance and coming to Him.

This is the theme of this Sunday’s Scripture passages, that God as the Lord of all the nations and all the peoples are calling us to follow Him, that no matter what race belong to, what background or nationality we have, and no matter whether we are rich or poor, powerful or weak, famous or unknown, all these do not matter at all before the Lord. What matters is that, all of us mankind are considered by God to be His children, His beloved ones, and He wants us all to be reconciled to Him.

In the Gospel passage today, we heard of the interaction between the Lord Jesus and a Canaanite woman, or a Syro-Phoenician woman, as that woman came not from the land of Judea, where the Jewish people live, and neither did she belong to the nation of the Jews, not counted among the direct descendants of Jacob or Israel. And as the woman begged the Lord Jesus to heal her daughter who had been tormented by a demon, it must have seemed very strange indeed that the Lord Jesus would refuse her request.

And even more so, He also seemingly denigrated her and mocked her by saying the words such as, ‘It is not right to take the bread from the children, and throw it to the puppies, or dogs.’ Did Jesus just compare the woman to a mere animal as opposed to a human being? Were we right in what we have just listened to? Was there a mistake in the writing of the Scriptures and the Gospels?

No, brothers and sisters in Christ, this is not the case. In fact, this is where we should take note of the real intention of the Lord as He said those words to the Canaanite woman, in front of His disciples and the people. As the Lord Who knows everything in the minds and in the hearts of His people, Jesus clearly know what it is that the woman believed in, and how she would respond to His words. And Jesus wanted to show His disciples and the people, how foolish it is for them to believe in what they were believing in at that time.

For you see, that the Jewish people at that time believed that they were the ones whom God had chosen just as their ancestors have been God’s chosen people, from the time of Abraham to his descendants, and then to the time of the Exodus from Egypt and finally to the time of the kingdom of Israel and Judah. They were the descendants of the Israelites and the people of Judah, and therefore, they were very proud of their heritage and history.

However, over time they ended up becoming proud and egoistic about their special privileges and status, and they looked down on the other peoples, those pagan peoples living around them, treating them as inferior to themselves, and even as those who are not worthy of the love and grace of God. They considered those people to be hopeless and without any opportunity to be saved by God. They became exclusivist in their faith and closed the doors of the faith from others.

That was why they showed that attitude, the haughtiness and the lack of respect for others, which the Lord Jesus wanted to point out to the people, through His interaction with the Canaanite woman. What Jesus showed the people through His own words was that they often thought that they alone were worthy of God’s goodness and salvation, and that they treated others literally like that of dogs, or less than humans, as Jesus showcased it perfectly through His interaction with the woman.

At that time, for someone of Jewish origin to sit together or be around a Gentile, or a non-Jew was considered to be inappropriate. The Jews did not want to have anything to do with the Gentiles, and rejected them and dismissed the faith that they actually had in the Lord. The Jews were not even allowed to enter into the house of the Gentiles and also to the house of those considered as sinners.

That was why the army centurion, likely to be a Gentile or non-Jew, kindly requested the Lord to just say the word to heal his servant, as he considered himself unworthy to have a Jew like Jesus to enter his house, considered taboo at that time among the Jewish society. And in the same manner, the Pharisees and the teachers of the Law criticised Jesus severely when He went to eat in the house of tax collectors and prostitutes.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, yet, those people forgot that God is not just God over the people of Israel, but in fact, He is God over all of mankind, over the entire race of man. He is the Lord and Master of all, and He created all of us out of love, without exception. Otherwise, why would He create us in the first place if He does not love us or have concern about us?

God loves each and every one of us, and wants everyone to love Him with equal intensity and zeal. In fact, as the Gospel showed us, the love and faith which the supposedly pagan and non-Jewish Canaanite woman was greater than the faith which many of the Israelites had shown towards Jesus. While many of the Jews were skeptical and some were even downright hostile in opposition against Jesus, His teachings and His truths, the woman put herself completely in the hands of God, trusting that Jesus would hear her and heal her daughter. This shows that what matters is faith, and not one’s origins or backgrounds.

The same applied to the army centurion, and many other cases of the Gentiles and the pagans who came to love and be faithful towards God, even exceeding beyond what the Jewish people themselves had done. In this manner, God wanted to show them, and also all of us, that He does not favour anyone by the manner of their racial background, by their appearances, status, or by their worldly standings, or by their connections, but rather, by the faith which the people have in Him, and by the righteousness that they have shown in life.

God wants to remind each and every one of us, that we must not be shortsighted in life, that we become prejudiced against others just because we think that we are better than so and so because of our wealth, riches, power, privileges and all the other things that led us to be biased and be prejudiced against our brethren. This is what we must not do, brothers and sisters in Christ, because as Christians all of us are called to love one another equally as fellow brothers and sisters, children of the same God.

This is important as in our world today, as it had been in the past, mankind have caused great grievances and sufferings because of their prejudice and hatred, bias and anger against each other. We have seen how people used race and background as an excuse to oppress others, to impose one’s will on another, and to exploit and manipulate those who are weak, less fortunate and less powerful. We have seen just how the NAZIs and the many other wicked organisations in our history had committed blatant and great injustice against all humanity, in their genocidal pursuits, destroying the livelihood of others in the name of their prejudices.

And we have certainly heard of what had just happened very recently in the city of Charlottesville in the United States of America, where violent riot had arisen because of the actions of those who championed prejudice and injustice in order to advance their own selfish and irresponsible desires. We heard about those who used racism, prejudice and hatred against people of different backgrounds and beliefs, even those who do not shy away from violence while doing so.

And what should we do then, brothers and sisters in Christ? Perhaps the Scripture readings we heard today and the recent events are reminders sent to us by God, in order to tell us that as Christians it is our duty and obligation to stand up against all these attitudes and wickedness, against all those who have shown prejudices, biases and racist or divisive acts in their lives. We cannot be silent or be ignorant against all these people, and we cannot remain quiet in the face of those who cause suffering on others because of their wicked and distorted way of life.

At the same time, we should also inspect our own lives and recall our actions and deeds in life. Have we been prejudiced against others because we thought that we are better than them? Have we ever been angry against others as we saw them receive things we did not have, because we thought they did not deserve it and we deserved it better than them? If we have done all these, then perhaps it is time for us to move on and turn away from all those jealousies, prejudices and hatred, and instead embrace each other in love, peace and harmony.

Let us all from now on be bearers of God’s love into this world, reminding ourselves always that God loves each and every one of us without exception, and all of us are created and considered equal before Him. Let us all not be filled with our ego, our pride and haughtiness, thinking that we are in any way superior to others, but instead let us be loving and be compassionate to others, especially those who are struggling in their faith. Let us stand up to be different from those who advocated hatred and prejudice, and pray for them, that God may change their darkened hearts into new hearts filled with love. May God bless us all and bring us to grow ever stronger in our faith in Him. Amen.

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Saturday, 19 August 2017 : 19th Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. John Eudes, Priest (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

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

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, on this day we heard of the pact which the people of Israel swore before Joshua, the leader appointed by God to lead Israel, on his deathbed, that they would be faithful to the Lord, their God, and they would reject the worship of the pagan gods and idols. They vowed before God Himself that they and their descendants would continue to worship YHVH, their God, forever and would not turn away from Him.

Yet, as history would have proven, the people of Israel did not keep their promise and broke their vow, which they made before God Himself, as they were tempted by worldly pleasures and false promises, the temptations made by the devil to lure them away from the path of salvation towards the Lord. They turned away from God and instead worshipped the pagan idols, and abandoning His laws, they turned to debauchery and wickedness.

We may be wondering what it is that made them to do all those things, turning away from the goodness of God. They blatantly and openly rebelled against God Who had provided for them all their needs, and Who had defended them from their enemies and gave them fertile lands and riches of the land promised to them. God Himself made a Covenant with them, and promised that prosperity, peace and harmony would be their lot forever.

It was their greed, their human and worldly desires that had led them astray from God. The devil manipulated those wicked desires and the greed in their hearts, the ego that he found there, to turn them away from God, by the sweet lies and false promises of power, worldly glory, fame, influence, wealth and more. They were too engrossed in worldly concerns that led them to fall into sin and into rebellion against God.

Then, we come to the Gospel passage which we heard today, when the Lord Jesus rebuked His disciples who prevented the people who wanted to bring their children to Him. He wanted the children to come to Him, to be with Him and to listen to Him, and He even praised those children and asked that His disciples follow their examples, having the same faith as the children had shown to the Lord.

Why is that so, brothers and sisters in Christ? That is because the faith of a child is pure and genuine, without the taints and corruptions of our human greed and desires, without the corruptions of our ego and emotions. If we have seen a child before, when the child believe in something, he or she will have pure belief in his or her innocence, before he or she is corrupted by the desires of the world, the desire for worldly goods and pleasures.

Thus, in this manner, God is calling all of us to imitate the faith of the children, who came to Jesus to love Him and to seek Him. He called us to love Him unconditionally and wholeheartedly as the children has loved Him, and not burdened by the desires and the temptations of the world. Otherwise, we might end up like the Israelites who were tempted and swayed to abandon the Lord their God because of those temptations.

Perhaps we should also heed the examples of the life of St. John Eudes, a holy priest and servant of God whose feast day we celebrate today. St. John Eudes was a French priest who was renowned for his preaching and works among the people of God, especially among sinners and prostitutes. He helped to establish the religious congregation of the Sisters of Charity of the Refuge to provide for those prostitutes and sinners who desired to be reconciled with God.

In addition, he also established another religious congregation, the Congregation of Jesus and Mary, which would be named after him, as the Eudists, who helped to build up the formation of faith amongst the priests and the seminarians, and through which works, he encouraged the strong devotion to the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus, together with contemporaries such as St. Margaret Mary Alacoque.

The devotion which those holy saints had to the Lord and His blessed mother Mary should be an inspiration to all of us, that we should also show the same kind of devotion and love, that in all the things we say and do, we will always seek to love God and devote ourselves to Him, rejecting the temptations of worldly power, wealth, fame, glory and all the other things that Satan has placed on our path towards God to make us fall down and falter.

Let us all therefore commit ourselves anew to Him, and seek to love Him with greater zeal and devotion from now on, and let our love be like that of the love which the faithful children have given to the Lord Jesus, that we too may be worthy to be called, the children of God. May God be with us all, always, and may St. John Eudes and the holy saints of God intercede for us always. Amen.

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Friday, 18 August 2017 : 19th Week of Ordinary Time (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : Green

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, on this day the Lord reminds us through the Scripture passages we heard, of the love that God had shown to His people throughout the time when He showed forth His might to care for them and their ancestors, freeing them from the Egyptians, and in how He led them through the desert towards the lands promised to them, destroying their enemies before them and guarding them with love.

Through Joshua, His servant, God reminded His people of His love, and all that He had done for them. He reminded them of the Covenant which He had created with them and their ancestors. Yet, as we know throughout the time of the Exodus people of God had not always been faithful to Him, and have been wayward in multiple occasions, worshipping pagan gods and idols, and disobedient against God. They have indulged in worldly pleasures and forgotten His laws and commandments.

They have hardened their hearts against Him, and refused to listen to Him, preferring to follow their own paths rather than to walk in the path shown to them by God, including in the matter of marriage and family. Ever since the beginning of time, when God first created man, He had created them man and woman, and decreed that man should join with woman, and become therefore united and blessed in a union blessed by God.

But the Israelites could not resist the temptations of worldly pleasures and the flesh, and they succumbed to their desires. That was why they committed acts of adultery and wickedness, of sexual impropriety and aberrations, disregarding the sanctity of the holy marriage in which their families have been bound in and blessed by God. As a result, they have sinned against God, and God wanted to remind them through Joshua what He had done for them, and thus want them to live in accordance with His will, to be righteous and upright in their actions and deeds.

How is this relevant to us, brothers and sisters in Christ? In our world today we are inundated with the temptations of pleasures and worldly allures through which we are swayed and pressured to abandon our faith in God, and instead indulging in the desires of our flesh and bodies. We live at a time when the sanctity of marriage is no longer respected or preserved. And many among us Christians have lost our faith in God and fell into the corruption of sin and worldliness.

All of us are called as Christians to stand up for our faith, and for all that we believe in, including the need to live righteously in accordance with the laws of God. When the world demands that we conform to its ways and customs, we must be ready and willing to be different, to be beacons of light to those who are living in the darkness, so that by our actions and deeds, we will be able to lead others onto the path towards God’s salvation.

And today, we have also heard in the Gospel, that God called some among us to be chosen by Him, to be His servants, abandoning the prospects of marriage, as they chose to follow the Lord and become His priests, the members of the holy order of priests and bishops, all those who have dedicated themselves wholeheartedly to serve the Lord and His people. Their challenges are even greater than ours, the trials and temptations are even more difficult to endure than ours.

Yet, they are the ones whom God had called to be the ones through whom He would work His wonders among His people. They are the ones who have been called and chosen, and while the pains, sorrows and difficulties are aplenty, but their works and labours lay the foundation for the salvation of many souls. Without the hard work and the sacrifices made by our priests, by all those who have dedicated themselves to service to God, there would have been many more souls lost to the damnation in hell.

Let us all therefore pray for our priests, that the Lord will keep them holy and devoted to their missions, and then for we ourselves, we also have the need to live an upright and righteous life, committed to obey the Lord and His will. It is by our working together and commitment to help the good works together as one Church of God, that we will be drawing closer to the Lord, and therefore be worthy of the grace and the blessings which He will bestow on all those who are faithful to Him.

May God bless us all, and may He empower each and every one of us to live in accordance with His will, reminding all of us of the time when He has blessed us generously in this life, and how He has loved us and showed us His mercy and compassion whenever we have fallen into sin and disgrace, that by His persistence, He has endeavoured to make us to turn away from our sins, and to repent from our wickedness, that we may eventually be reunited with Him, to enjoy forever the eternal joy in His presence. Amen.

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Thursday, 17 August 2017 : 19th Week of Ordinary Time (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : Green

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, on this day we listened to the Word of God speaking to us, in the Gospel passage today, about the parable of the servant who was forgiven his debts and yet refused to forgive others their debts to him. This is a reminder for all of us Christians that we must be ever generous and rich with mercy, forgiveness and compassion in all of our actions, in how we interact and relate with one another in our daily lives.

God is ever merciful, and in the Gospel passage today, the Lord Jesus compared Him with the lord of the servants, who forgave his servant who owed him a great debt, when the servant begged to be forgiven and given more time to pay off his debts. The lord had pity on his servant despite the debt being one that was substantial in size, and erased the entirety of the debt from him.

That was what the Lord had done with His people Israel, whose story we listened to in our first reading taken from the Book of Joshua. The people of Israel, led by Joshua, finally reached the Promised Land and crossed through the River Jordan to enter into the land promised to them and to their ancestors. But they did not reach that stage in their journey without much pain and suffering, as the disobedience of their parents' generation had led to the forty years journey through the desert, as the people of God received a just punishment for their lack of faith in God.

Yet, God still loved them and cared for them, or otherwise He could just have destroyed them without mercy, as He created all of them, and just as easily as He had made them, He could have also unmade them and destroyed them with the mere thoughts of His will. That was not however what the Lord had chosen to do with Israel, and certainly not what He had also chosen to do with all of us mankind, all of us sinners who have disobeyed Him from the time when Adam and Eve first sinned against God.

For all of us are like the servant whose debts had been forgiven by the master and lord of the servant. We have sinned against God, and sin is the debt which all of us have owed the Lord our God. With the debts of sin which we have, we have been sundered from the grace of God and made unworthy, and those debts of sin demanded our payment, and the punishment of the debt of sin is death. But God is merciful and loving towards us, forgiving us our sins through none other than by the loving sacrifice of Jesus our Lord on the cross.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, if God has forgiven us so great as sins as what we have committed before Him, just as the lord of the servant who have erased the huge debt of the wicked servant, then all of us should also forgive the same debt which others owe unto us. We must not walk in the footsteps of the wicked servant, who had been forgiven from his huge debts but refused to forgive another who owed him a much smaller debt.

Brethren, I invite each and every one of us to look deep into our hearts and remember in our minds, of each of the moments and times when we were angry at others around us, at our fellow brothers or sisters, when we fail to forgive each other, because of the grudges that we keep in our hearts and the hatred that we preserve in our minds. We easily become angry at each other and hate our brethren over simple and trivial matters, over worldly possessions and goods.

This is why many of us Christians cannot move forward in our journey of faith, simply because we are like the wicked servant who cannot learn to forgive and to let go the slights and the inconveniences which others have caused us. We have not followed the examples of the Lord Who have forgiven us our many trespasses and faults, and therefore, we end up failing in our faith life like that of the wicked servant.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, so what is it that we need to do in order to overcome this issue? All of us need to learn to forgive just as the Lord had forgiven us, and learn to show mercy and compassion as the Lord had first shown us His mercy and compassion. We have to mean it when we pray the Lord's Prayer, as we say the words, 'Forgive us our trespasses just as we forgive those who trespassed against us.'

Therefore, brethren, let us all draw closer to the Lord and imitate ever more closely His love and mercy in our words, actions and deeds, so that in everything we say and do, we will always do what the Lord had taught us to do, and be true Christians in all things. May the Lord bless us all in our endeavours and bring us to righteousness and eternal glory with Him. Amen.

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Wednesday, 16 August 2017 : 19th Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Stephen of Hungary (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : Green or White (Saints)

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, on this day we listened to the continuation of the story of when Israel went through the Exodus from Egypt and the journey through the desert, finally reaching the land which had been promised to them and to their ancestors, a rich and bountiful land overflowing in milk and honey, the Land of Canaan.

We heard how God led His people into the Land of Canaan, fulfilling the promise which He had made with His servants Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. He has delivered all of His people into He wished them to be, and provided for them as long as they remained true and faithful to Him. Yet, as we all know, they were not always faithful, but instead were constantly disobedient and fallen into sin, worshipping the pagan gods and idols, and in not obeying the commandments God had given them.

Then, in the Gospel today, all of us heard about the Lord Jesus Who spoke to His disciples on the matter of those who have sinned and made fault against us, and how we ought to deal with them. The Lord wants all these to be reconciled with us, and to be made to recognise their errors and mistakes, and gave His Church the authority to decide on whether the person, having repented his mistakes, could be reconciled, or instead, having refused to listen, kept them outside of the salvation and grace of God.

Through the Scripture readings today, God wanted to remind us that in order for us to reach out to Him and to find our way to His salvation, we should work together and remain together in the Church, and not to be separated from Him. For it is through His Church that God had blessed us and guided us, on the way and journey towards our salvation.

When two or more are gathered in His Name, He will be present and will bless all those gathered in His Name. However, for many of us, the problem lies in the fact that too many of us are too proud and too egoistic to work with each other, with each of us wanting to have it our own way, and not having a common consensus with others around us.

Many of us want our own point of view to be taken up by others, and we want our own ways and thoughts to be accepted over that of others. Yet, that is exactly when we begin to drift away from God's salvation and into the hands of the devil. The devil is always ever busy trying to pull us away from the path towards salvation, and he is always trying to seduce and to tempt us through manipulations of our pride and human desires, by playing at our ego.

That is how so many people have fallen into heresy and became separated from God's Church, because each of them have thought that their ways were the correct ways, while the true teachings of the Lord passed down through His Church were not. The Lord has blessed them and yet, they chose to walk down their own path, thinking that their own way merited better than the true path shown by the Lord through His Church.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, on this day, it is important that we should reaffirm our faith in the Lord, and renew our commitment to Him, that we should always stand firm in the true teachings of the Church, and not to give in to our ego, our pride, and our stubbornness, as what many others had done throughout history. Instead, we should learn to be humble, to always seek God's wisdom and know what it is that He wants us to do in our lives.

Let us all follow the examples of St. Stephen of Hungary, the saint whose feast we celebrate today. St. Stephen of Hungary was the first Christian king of Hungary, whose rule was remembered for his benevolence, righteousness and for the great piety which he had shown in his life, dedicating his rule and his nation to the Lord and to His Church. He helped to establish many Christian churches and institutions throughout the entire kingdom of Hungary, bringing more and more people to the salvation in God.

And even though he is the king, the supreme ruler of the land, but that did not make him proud or haughty, or thinking that he does not have any higher authority to obey. Indeed, St. Stephen obeyed the Lord and the teachings of the Lord as espoused and kept through His Church, and he helped to ensure that the laws of God are kept throughout his lands.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, let us all follow the examples of St. Stephen of Hungary, in his faith and dedication to the Lord, and in his humility and obedience to God, despite all the temptations of worldly power and all other things that would surely have come along with his position and privileges. Let us all no longer be distracted by the attempts of the devil in trying to subvert us and to turn us away from God.

May the Lord help us all, that we may draw ever closer to Him, so that we may find that path towards redemption, and that together as one Church, we may receive the eternal glory that He has promised all of us His faithful ones, remembering that He had once fulfilled the promise He made to His servants, bringing His people to the land He bestowed on them. May God bless us all. Amen.

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Tuesday, 15 August 2017 : Solemnity of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : White

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, on this day we celebrate a great feast and solemnity of the Church, honouring the Blessed Mother of God, Mary, most holy and ever virgin, the one whom God had entrusted to be the one to bear the Saviour of the world, and therefore, she was special among every other human beings, as one set aside by God to be the instrument of His salvation through Jesus Christ, her Son.

We must be wondering why is it that we as Catholics and as Christians celebrate and honour Mary as such? Why is it that we glorify her above every other human beings, even though she herself is also a human just like us? There are many out there who because of their misunderstandings and lack of knowledge about what we truly believe, about Mary and many other tenets of our faith, had criticised the holy Catholic faith, charging us falsely with idolatry of Mary.

Yet, if one truly understands what our faith is really about, they will indeed immediately see the errors of their ways and beliefs, and turn themselves to our faith. They will give honour to Mary, the mother of our Lord and God, Jesus Christ as we all have done. That is not because we glorify her as an equal to God or as a goddess in her own right, but rather because of her position as the mother of our Lord, God and Saviour.

In the historical times, especially from the traditions of the kingdom of Israel, the position of the mother of the king of Israel is a significant one, as what is also common in the other kingdoms and states in history. The queen mother has a significant place of honour, not because of her own authority and power, but because she is the mother of the king, the one who bore the king into the world, and the one who took care of the growth of the king.

If we honour our own mother, love her, and are grateful for all that she has done for us, in bringing us up, caring for us, and if we want to thank her and give her the best that we can give her, then it is the same case for the king, as shown in the time of the old kingdom of Israel, particularly shown as Solomon, the king, honoured his mother, Bathsheba greatly and put her place in a position of honour just beside his throne.

And thus, in the same manner, is it not then the same for the mother of our Lord and God, the King of all kings and the Master of the entire universe? Surely the Lord Jesus also honours His mother just as all of us honour our own mothers, and surely He has also given her a position of honour in heaven, close to His own throne, just as the kings of the ages past and the kings of Israel had honoured their own mothers?

This is the first reason why we celebrate this day, to honour the Mother of our God. However, that is not the only and main reason why we honour Mary. Indeed, on this day, the Scripture passages from the Vigil Mass and today's Mass focus on the role that Mary played as the bearer of the Messiah and the bearer of the One Who has established a new Covenant between God and mankind, sealed by His loving sacrifice on the cross.

Therefore, as the bearer of the Lord Jesus, the New Covenant He had established with us mankind, Mary is the new Ark of the Covenant, just as the first Ark of the Covenant bore inside it the Covenant of God, in the form of His laws, passed down through Moses, the manna that is the symbol of God's love in feeding His people throughout their journey through the desert. And in Jesus, is found God's laws and love personified, for He is the Law and He is Love.

If we read the Scriptures at the time of the Old Testament, the Ark of the Covenant is a very precious and holy container of God's Law, which mortal eyes cannot ordinarily look upon or touch with bare hands, such that it was veiled from sight by a veil, and carried upon its poles to avoid touching the Ark directly. The Ark itself represents God's holy Presence in this world, and therefore, in the Temple of Jerusalem, it is placed in the innermost and holiest of all its places, the Holy of Holies.

Therefore, that is why the Lord created His Ark of the New Covenant, Mary as holy and precious, because she bore in her womb, in her very own body, the New Covenant of God, in Jesus Christ. And there lies not the two slabs of rock on which God wrote His Law, but the Law Himself, for God Himself had taken the flesh of Man, and descended into this world, the Real Presence of His Being in this world, contained within the womb of Mary, who therefore became the New Ark.

That was why Mary was conceived without the taint of original sin, immaculate and pure, set aside from among all the other mankind. For the original Ark was made by human hands using the precious metals and materials adorning the container of God's original Covenant. But, there can be no better Ark than the creation of God, perfect and good, as all of us humans have been crafted by none other than God Himself.

It was just that we have been tainted and corrupted by sin, and we have been made unworthy by those wickedness and sins. That is the reason why God, accordance to our faith and belief, as per the knowledge passed down to us from the time of the Apostles, created Mary immaculate and free from those sins, making her the perfect vessel for the Messiah and Saviour, Lord of lords and King of kings, as the Ark of the New Covenant.

That is thus the second reason why we honour Mary, as the greatest of all the saints and all human beings, that while she is still human and not divine, yet, because of her special place in the story of our salvation, she deserves the honour being not just the Mother of God, but also because of the virtue of that position, also the new Ark, of the New Covenant of God in Jesus Christ.

And Mary remained true and righteous throughout her life, living in accordance with what the Lord commanded and willed her to do. She submitted humbly to the will of God, made known to her through the Archangel Gabriel in Nazareth, and become therefore the Mother of God by her humble acceptance. And she walked faithfully, caring for her Son, and following Him even to the foot of the cross, seeing Him as He laid there, hung on the cross, dying for the sake of us all mankind.

Mary therefore, as I have just mentioned, is the greatest of all the saints, and is our greatest intercessor in heaven. She is also our role model in life, an example for us to follow in faith and in how we ought to dedicate ourselves to the Lord. This is all the more reason why we love Mary, and why we honour her, just as her own Son loved her and honoured her greatly.

And because of that, we come to the reason why we rejoice and celebrate in today's Solemnity, that of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary into heaven. First of all, we must be clear at what the Assumption is truly about. The Assumption does not equate with the Ascension of our Lord Jesus, a common misconception had by many, as in the Ascension, our Lord ascended in His own glory and by His own power into heaven, while in the Assumption, by the grace of God, Mary was assumed or taken up into heaven, in the body and soul.

The reason for the Assumption is none other than because all mankind have suffered death as a consequence for their sins and wickedness, and there is no one who can escape death. And while Christ is without sin, He willingly accepted death to free all of us mankind from the threat of eternal death, through His sacrifice on the cross.

And because He wanted to free mankind from death caused by their sins and their disobedience, it is only proper and right that He would want His own mother, who was conceived without sin, and had been righteous throughout her whole life, and as the holy Ark of the New Covenant, to be free from death, and not to fall into the same death that had claimed many others because of their sins. And hence, He gave her the grace, to be assumed body and soul into heaven, at the end of her earthly life.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, the Lord Himself also said that the same thing will happen to us at the end of time, at the time of the Last Judgment when all of us will be brought up, in our glorified body and soul, into the eternal glory of heaven with God. Thus, as we celebrate this Solemnity of the Assumption today, it is also a foreshadowing of what will happen to us in the end, should we walk faithfully in the presence of God, and live in accordance with His will just as Mary had done.

On this joyful day, therefore, as we rejoice together with the whole Church, and honour the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary, let us all renew our commitment to live in accordance with the will of God, imitating the examples shown upon us by Mary herself, in how she devoted her whole life and committed herself thoroughly to the Lord, no matter what difficulties and challenges she had to face, even the pain and sorrow of seeing her own Son being tortured and crucified.

Let us all change our lives and turn ourselves completely to the Lord, shedding off our sinful ways of life and all the wickedness and selfishness we have committed in life thus far, so that we may truly be worthy of the Lord, and in the end, we will also be worthy of living an eternity of joy and happiness, when the Lord will bring us up in body and soul to His heavenly glory at the end of time.

Let us ask for the intercession of our Blessed Mother Mary, she who has been assumed into heaven, and upon whom the Lord had bestowed the honorary title of the Queen of Heaven, the queen mother of all the universe, for she is indeed the closest to the throne of her Son in heaven, and as she had made known to us through her various apparitions, she is always constantly praying for us, for all of us sinners still living in this world. O Blessed Virgin Mary, Assumed into your glory in heaven, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death. Amen.

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Monday, 14 August 2017 : 19th Week of Ordinary Time, Memorial of St. Maximilian Kolbe, Priest and Martyr (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : Red

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, on this day first listened to the words of God, telling us in the first reading from the Book of Deuteronomy, that all of the people of God ought to believe in the Lord wholeheartedly and obey Him in all of His Laws. That is because He is truly good, and His ways are righteousness and justice. He is the source of all good in this world, and everyone who follows the Lord should live in accordance with His will.

Then, all of us heard about the Gospel passage today, from the Gospel of St. Matthew, in which the disciple of Jesus, St. Peter was asked by the temple tax collectors on whether his Master paid the temple tax or not. Then Jesus told him that those who are the sons and daughters of the kings of the earth, namely the lords and royalties of the worldly kingdoms do not pay taxes, but instead, the strangers and aliens that live in those kingdoms.

But at the same time, He also told St. Peter to obey the laws of the earth, the laws of the worldly kings and rulers, by asking him to obtain a gold coin miraculously from a fish he caught at the lake. Then He asked St. Peter to pay that gold coin as the due for Him and His disciples to the temple tax collectors. This resonates with what the Lord also said in another occasion in the Gospels, namely when He said, "Give to Caesar what belongs to Caesar, and give to God what belongs to God."

What does this mean, brothers and sisters in Christ? It means that as good Christians, all of us must first of all of course be obedient to God and follow all His laws and precepts without exceptions. But at the same time, we must also be good citizens and members of the community. While the Lord did mention that the ways of this world are often contrary to His ways, it does not mean that we should oppose each and every works of the states and countries we belong to in this world.

Rather, as long as the actions and the works of the states and countries we belong to are just and righteous, and working for the good of the common people and everyone, then by all means all of us Christians must be obedient and active in our participation in the world community and amongst our neighbours in our societies as well. However, having said that, we must also be vigilant lest what the world demands from us has become something that departed from righteousness and justice, as in this world, states and countries can indeed become corrupted by the power and the wickedness found in this world.

This is why, all the more that each and every one of us as Christians must not be lukewarm or passive in our faith life, but instead we must be truly devoted and be active in our faith, or else that is when we will end up being swayed away from the path of the Lord's righteousness and justice, into the path of selfishness, wickedness and injustice.

That also means that as Christians, all of us must stand up for the sake of justice. We must defend the rights of the poor and the weak, be loving and compassionate in our dealings to each other, showing care and concern for those who are sorrowful and suffering. And we must be true followers of Christ in all things we say and do, in the footsteps of the saints and martyrs who have predeceased us and gone before us.

Particularly, on this day, what we have heard in the Scripture passage is very apt, as today we mark the feast of St. Maximilian Kolbe, the famous saint and martyr of the Holocaust during the Second World War. St. Maximilian Kolbe was a devout and committed Polish missionary and priest, who worked hard among the people to spread the faith and strong devotion to the Lord and His blessed mother Mary.

He went to many places as a missionary, spreading the faith to the people in faraway places. His commitment and devotion won him many converts who followed the faith because of his preachings among them. But, his most renowned act came about at the time of the Second World War, when the NAZI German government invaded most of Europe, conquering most of Europe and bringing many people, especially the Jews into the terrible concentration camps.

Surely we have heard the great sufferings that those people have endured in those concentration camps, especially in Auschwitz concentration camp, where the worst atrocities happened. It was one of the worst displays of worldly wickedness, evil and entirely selfish desire of mankind, their pride and ambition, arrogance and hatred, in the genocide that had happened in those places.

Yet, the actions of St. Maximilian Kolbe became a great light that become an inspiration to many others in the midst of the great darkness. He was arrested and eventually ended up in the Auschwitz concentration camp as his monastery was closed down due to its publications standing up faithfully for the Lord, speaking out against the great atrocities of the NAZI Germany.

At a place where death awaited people living there daily, St. Maximilian Kolbe helped to encourage many of the prisoners through his preachings and exemplary actions among them. However, his greatest act lies in the moment when he offered himself in exchange of another prisoner who was condemned to death due to the escape of some prisoners. He offered his own life willingly to save his fellow inmate, who was crying out for his family.

And thus it was how St. Maximilian Kolbe showed the love of Christ, in its perfect and ultimate form, in obeying with complete faith, the law and the will of God, over that of his obligations to any worldly rulers and powers. He gave up his own life as the sign of the love of God, which as the Lord Jesus Himself said, that there is no greater love than for someone to give up his life for a friend.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, the examples of St. Maximilian Kolbe and his commitment to the Lord should become our inspiration to live our faith ever more devoutly, in true commitment and with sincerity, to seek out righteousness and justice through our actions and deeds, and by standing up for our faith, for the goodness that God had taught us to do in our lives, and by the selfless giving of ourselves.

Let us thus live righteously from now on, remembering always the examples of the holy saints, men and women who have walked before us in faith. Let us emulate their actions and examples in our own living and actions, and may God bless us all in our endeavours, so that through us, His Name will ever be glorified, and we will always be able to live according to His will. Amen.