way of the Lord

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Friday, 1 May 2015 : 4th Week of Easter, Memorial of St. Joseph the Worker (Psalm)

Liturgical Colour : White

Psalm 2 : 6-7, 8-9, 10-11

YHVH said, “Behold the King I have installed, in Zion, upon My holy hill!” I will proclaim the decree of the Lord. He said to Me : “You are My Son. This day I have begotten You.”

“Ask of Me and I will give You the nations for Your inheritance, the ends of the earth for Your possession. You shall rule them with iron sceptre and shatter them as a potter’s vase.”

Now therefore, learn wisdom, o kings; be warned, o rulers of the earth. Serve the Lord with fear and fall at His feet; lest He be angry and you perish when His anger suddenly flares. Blessed are all who take refuge in Him!


Alternative reading (Mass of St. Joseph)
Psalm 89 : 2, 3-4, 12-13, 14 and 16

Before the mountains were formed, before You made the earth and the world, from eternity to eternity – You are God.

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

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

Fill us at daybreak with Your goodness, that we may be glad all our days. Let Your work be seen by Your servants and Your glorious power by their children.

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Thursday, 30 April 2015 : 4th Week of Easter, Memorial of Pope St. Pius V, Pope (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : White

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, today we hear a brief summary of the history of salvation and of the people of God, Israel, in the first reading, from the Acts of the Apostles, where St. Paul preached and testified for the faith in front of his fellow Jews in a synagogue. He told them about how God led His people out of Egypt, and gave them leaders to guide them, from the Judges to the kings, and on David, the faithful servant and king which God had chosen to rule over His people.

And it was told of the fulfillment of God’s promise of salvation of His people, through the promise which God had made to David, that His descendant would rule forever on his throne. And indeed, everything was fulfilled in Jesus Christ, including God’s promise to mankind, that salvation would come to them. Jesus broke free mankind from the chains of their slavery to sin and liberated them, just as the people of Israel once had been freed from their slavery to the Pharaoh and the Egyptians.

This freedom however, is not easy to maintain, as history had once proven. The people of Israel during their sojourn in the desert, were sorely tempted and many of them repeatedly gave in to their desires. As a result, they complained against God, rebelled against Him by saying how good their lives were back in Egypt as compared to what they had then in the desert, even though God fed them with manna and birds, and made them drink sweet and clear water in the middle of the desert.

Is this not the same with our own experience? We also have often done the same in our own respective lives. If we reflect on it, we should realise that there are some or many moments in our lives where we also disobeyed the Lord to pursue our own desires. We have this tendency to be tempted by the many things that Satan and the world offers us, and if we accept them as such, then we are no different than the people of Israel of old.

In the Gospel today, Jesus spoke about how a servant is not greater than his or her master, and therefore, as this is the case, all of us as the servants of God should not presume things and do things that betray our Lord and show that disobedience to the Lord, for if we truly belong to the Lord, then we ought to do things as the Master had taught us. If we do not, then we are liars and hypocrites, and we do not belong to Him, and thus we have no part in His inheritance.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, we have for an example, a saint, whose holy life had been an inspiration for many throughout the ages. This holy man, who happened to be the successor of St. Peter the Apostle as the Pope and Bishop of Rome, and therefore as the Vicar of Christ and leader of the entire Universal Church of God had a very important role to play in the development of the faith of many whom he had touched and inspired.

Pope St. Pius V lived at a time of great uncertainty, of many dangers and threats to the people of God and to the Church. He led the Church through a very turbulent time of dangers both outside and inside the Church. At that time, the threat of the mighty Ottoman Empire was at its zenith, and many feared the eventual conquest of Christendom by the forces of the heathens. In addition, the effects of the Protestant ‘reformation’ still caused great divisions in the body of the faithful, wars and conflicts.

Pope St. Pius V played a pivotal role in all of this, by truly committing himself to the role which he had devoted himself to, as the Leader of all God’s faithful, by assembling the combined forces of Christendom and the forces of the faithful that eventually led to a major and crushing victory against the Ottoman Empire at the Battle of Lepanto. As such, the external threat against the faithful and the Church gradually diminished afterwards.

And with regards to combatting dissent and opposition in the Church and beyond, Pope St. Pius V successfully completed the long delayed Council of Trent, which resolved many of the outstanding issues in the Church and emphasized on the maintenance of the true faith and all of its teachings, as preserved by the Church since the time of the Apostles, to counter all the harmful effects of the so-called ‘reformation’.

Pope St. Pius V therefore led the Church in the vigorous effort of Counter-‘reformation’ to combat the rampant heresies among the people, and as a result, countless thousands and millions of souls returned to the true faith. Such was indeed the example of how all Christians should live their lives, that is to be truly devoted and faithful to all the ways of the Lord.

Therefore, brothers and sisters in Christ, are we all able to be true disciples of the Lord, and devote ourselves completely to Him? Are we able to commit ourselves to the way of truth and be true disciples of our Lord? It is the opportunity which we have today that we should not waste. May Almighty God therefore guide us on our path and help us so that in all of our actions, we may always be faithful to the Lord, and as a result, be found worthy to receive the inheritance which He had promised to all of us. God bless us all. Amen.

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Thursday, 30 April 2015 : 4th Week of Easter, Memorial of Pope St. Pius V, Pope (Gospel Reading)

Liturgical Colour : White

John 13 : 16-20

At that time, Jesus said to His disciples, “Truly, I say to you, the servant is not greater than his master, nor is the messenger greater than he who sent him. Understand this, and blessed are you, if you put it into practice.”

“I am not speaking of you all, because I know the ones I have chosen, and the Scripture has to be fulfilled that says : ‘The one who shared My table has risen against Me.’ I tell you this now before it happens, so that when it does happen, you may know that I am He.”

“Truly, I say to you, whoever welcomes the one I send, welcomes Me; and whoever welcomes Me, welcomes the One who sent Me.”

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Wednesday, 29 April 2015 : 4th Week of Easter, Memorial of St. Catherine of Siena, Virgin and Doctor of the Church (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : White

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, today we heard how in the first reading, God chose St. Paul and St. Barnabas to be the servants of His will in delivering the message of the Good News to many peoples of different origins, which  brought about a solid foundation of the Church of God. The disciples prayed over them and laid their hands over them, which is the beginning of the rites of what we know now as the ordination of priests. They then served the people of God and preaching to them the words of truth, and to obey the Lord their God and follow Him in all their ways of life.

With this, we see how the theme of obedience to the Lord and His will as the requirement for our salvation. If we, the people of God, obey His will and walk in His ways, then we shall be secure, and our inheritance will be great. Our reward is great in the Lord who sees all those who obey Him and He will bless them. He blesses those who obey Him and to those who do not obey Him, He still gave them the opportunity to turn from their mistakes and repent.

As it has been shown in the Gospel today, that God came into this world in order to save it and not to condemn it. And those who listen to the Lord and follow Him, have the new life in them, life that is blessed by God. Those who refuse to listen and walk against the will of God, will be condemned not by God, but by the very action which they had taken against God.

This is to remind all of us that our faith cannot be one that is passive or artificial. Our faith must be based on real action and must show that we are truly devoted to the Lord and his teachings, or otherwise, we would be considered as liars and no one would believe in us. If we want to inspire others and make them to believe in the Lord as we do, then we better show it through our own actions.

There is no meaning to our faith, if we do not practice it in our own lives and if we do not mean what we believe in or say. Our salvation comes not just because we believe in God, but also because we act in the same way as our belief, and we make full use of that faith for the good benefit of ourselves, and also for all the others around us. Remember, the parable of the fig tree? The tree that bears fruit shall be kept and maintained well, but the ones that do not bear fruit are cut off and destroyed in fire.

Thus, it is the same with all of us. If we do not do anything to show our faith is truly genuine, then we too would have no part in the inheritance promised to us by the Lord. Today, we celebrate the feast day of a great saint of the Church, whose examples hopefully could inspire all of us to follow her in deeds and actions. She is St. Catherine of Siena, the well known saint, whose devotion remain widespread even unto this day. Who was she and what has she done to merit such great respect?

St. Catherine of Siena was born in the high Middle Ages Italy, where she was born of a parent with many children, who had wanted her to pursue the life normally expected of her at that time, that was to marry a husband and then start a family on her own. But since her youth, she had known that God had a greater and nobler plan for her, that is for her to devote her entire life to the cause of the Lord.

She did not give up despite all the oppositions, and through her fervent faith and devotion, and ceaseless prayers to God as well as real works of faith in charity and love, she managed to overcome the opposition and persuaded her parents to let her go to the hands of the Lord. And by her complete dedication to the Lord, she had brought much blessings and goodness to the people of God.

Through her devotions and works, St. Catherine of Siena helped to rejuvenate the faith in many people throughout the land that had been sagging and weakening. St. Catherine of Siena wrote many testimonies and writings which are still influencing many of the faithful even unto this very day. She helped to establish a stronger Church that truly practiced the messages it preached, and because of that many souls were brought closer to redemption and salvation in God.

Therefore, the examples of St. Catherine of Siena showed us that all of us as the members of God’s Church have much to do in this world. We still have plenty of things which all of us should conscientiously do, in order to bring more and more people to God’s light and salvation. Just like St. Paul and St. Barnabas, who had been called and chosen to minister to the people of God at that time, we too have been called to bring God’s light to the nations through our own actions and deeds.

May Almighty God guide us and bless us in our works, so that in all the things that we so, we may bring greater glory to God, and bring more souls closer to salvation. God bless us all, now and forever. Amen.

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Tuesday, 28 April 2015 : 4th Week of Easter, Memorial of St. Peter Chanel, Priest and Martyr, and St. Louis Marie Grignion de Montfort, Priest (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : White or Red (Martyrs)

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, today we heard again, in continuation of the last Sunday, which was Good Shepherd and Vocation Sunday, that the Lord is our Shepherd, and His sheep, that is all of us, are coming back to Him in huge numbers, right then, and even right now. The works of the Church in evangelising the world since the time of the Apostles had not ceased, and still continues at a great pace.

In the first reading itself from the Acts of the Apostles, we heard how the Church was established in the region of Antioch and in many other areas of the Eastern Mediterranean, in places where people from various backgrounds lived. There were Greeks, Egyptians, Syrians, Persians, the Jews themselves, Samaritans, and also there were Romans.

People from different origins, different backgrounds, cultures and upbringing, all came together as one, having heard the Good News and believed, that they were since then known as Christians, or Christianos, in the original Greek language. This means that they have chosen to belong to Christ, which comes from the Greek word meaning the Messiah or the Saviour.

This has a great significance, in that a people who once lived in the darkness, in the world, had chosen to take the initiative to be saved from that darkness, and enter into the light through Christ, their Saviour and our Saviour too. We all have been taken out from the world, chosen and separated by God to be His sheep, and with Him as our Shepherd and Leader.

And because of that, we should no longer follow the ways of the world, but the way of our Lord, for we have been made one flock, under the guidance of one Shepherd. There is no more division and disunity, but now everyone who believes in Christ are made into one people, all walking the same path towards our salvation. And this is what we are doing now, under the guidance of the shepherds which God had appointed for us, our priests.

Today we honour the memory of two shepherds, each of whom led the people of God in their own unique way, but ultimately with the aim to lead them to salvation. St. Peter Chanel, a martyr of the faith, a French priest who went to the region of Oceania to preach the Faith and the Good News there. Despite the difficulties and challenges, he continued to persevere through the difficulties, continuing to preach the Faith to the people of God.

When the people, including even the son of the king desired baptism after having been taught the Faith by St. Peter Chanel, the king sent someone to kill him, and thus, St. Peter Chanel was martyred in the cause of the faith. But his hard works earned for the Lord a whole nation of believers. The whole nation who once persecuted St. Peter Chanel has been made whole by his martyrdom.

Meanwhile, St. Louis Marie de Montfort was a well known French priest, whose faith to the Lord and devotion to Him was very renowned throughout the land. St. Louis Marie de Montfort was also renowned for his pious Marian devotions, the dedications and prayers he led for the mother of our Lord Jesus Christ, Mary, the ever Blessed Virgin.

He preached in many places and converted many people to the cause of the faith. He led them from the darkness of this world into the light. Through his hard and painstaking work, he had brought so many into salvation in Christ. That is why, today we glorify him as one of the glorious saints, and together with St. Peter Chanel, in their different ministries, they had brought the people of God closer to their Lord and Master.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, inspired by the examples of these two faithful servants of God, then we too should also endeavour to bring many souls to salvation. How do we do so? It is by practicing our faith with real action and devotion that we may bring about the conversion of many. If we are true disciples of Christ through our actions, then people will flock to us and listen to our preaching and believe in them.

May Almighty God be with us all, and may He bring all of His scattered sheep from all over the world, from all nations back, that there may be one flock, one people, with one Shepherd, our Lord Jesus Christ, our Lord and Master. Amen.

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Tuesday, 28 April 2015 : 4th Week of Easter, Memorial of St. Peter Chanel, Priest and Martyr, and St. Louis Marie Grignion de Montfort, Priest (Gospel Reading)

Liturgical Colour : White or Red (Martyrs)

John 10 : 22-30

At that time, the time came for the feast of the Dedication. It was winter, and Jesus walked back and forth in the portico of Solomon. The Jews then gathered around Him and said to Him, “How long will You keep us in doubt? If You are the Messiah, tell us plainly.”

Jesus answered, “I have already told you, but you do not believe. The works I do in My Father’s Name proclaim who I am, but you do not believe because, as I said, you are not My sheep. My sheep hear My voice and I know them; they follow Me and I give them eternal life. They shall never perish, and no one will ever steal them from Me.”

“What the Father has given Me is above everything else, and no one can snatch it out of the Father’s hand. I and the Father are One.”

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Monday, 27 April 2015 : 4th Week of Easter (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : White

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, today we continue on the theme of our Lord as our Good Shepherd, the One who truly knows us in and out, and He is truly the only One who really cares about us and loves us all with all of His heart. And it is only through Him that salvation and life can be attained, and nowhere else. And that is why, He said that He is the gate, and all of His sheep pass through that gate.

And He does not discriminate between peoples, or have favourites on certain races and groups. All are equally loved by Him and all stands equal in His presence. What matters to God is not our background, our birth and our status in this world, but rather, how much we love Him and devote our attention and love for Him. This is what God wants from us, and thus it is indeed what truly matters.

As the first reading from the Acts of the Apostles showed us, some of the disciples of Jesus criticised Peter, and later on also the other Apostles like St. Paul, for having worked among the non-Jews or the Gentiles, and dwelled with them, ate with them and doing things with them. For the Jews, brought up in their rigid faith system since the days of Moses, this was anathema and forbidden.

The Jews took great pride in their ‘privileged’ status as the chosen people and the chosen race of God, being the direct descendants of Jacob, and the children of Abraham. They often looked down on the pagans and other races, those considered as not belonging to the Jewish race and faith, and they prized their status more than anything else. This is the background for understanding why some of the Jewish disciples acted the way they did.

But God, who is our Shepherd, does not care about that. He gave His salvation and the life He had brought us to everyone. He did not die for a particular group of people, but for everyone. What matters is for us to walk in His path and follow Him. If we do not do as He had instructed us to do, and if chose to follow our own whim and desires, then we can have no part with Him.

It is just like sheep following the shepherd, and if the sheep does not follow the shepherd, that sheep will be lost and will likely meet a cruel and painful end, at the hands of the wolves and other calamities may befall it. The sheep cannot be far from its shepherd, and neither can it survive without the shepherd. The shepherd gives the sheep his love, care and attention, and the sheep cherish them all.

Thus, let us all reflect on this fact, that our Lord is our Shepherd, the Way, the Truth and the Life, as He Himself had said. If we follow Him with all of our heart, then we have life in us, and if we do not do so, then we also do not take part in the salvation which He had given us and offered us freely. Thus, this is indeed the time for us to see into our own lives, if we had indeed been faithful to our Lord and Shepherd, who tirelessly put His effort to bring us all back into perfect unity with Him.

May Almighty God bless all of us, forgive us all our sins, and guide us in this life, as our Lord and Shepherd, that in the end, all of us may find our way to Him and be saved. God bless us all. Amen.

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Sunday, 26 April 2015 : Fourth Sunday of Easter, Good Shepherd Sunday, Vocation Sunday (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : White

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, today we celebrate the Fourth Sunday of Easter, but also known more commonly as the Good Shepherd Sunday and as the Vocation Sunday. On this day, as we have heard from the readings of the Sacred Scriptures, the readings all highlight the nature of our Lord as the One True Shepherd, who is the Good Shepherd, the only One who truly loves us and cares for us unconditionally.

And from this the entire history of our salvation came about. God is our Shepherd and we are all His sheep, who roam in this world, that is the pasture of the Lord, the world as the range which He had created for us all His sheep. And we are like wayward sheep, who did not listen to the voice of the shepherd, and therefore we were lost, and we could not find our way back to safety.

God can just ignore us and pretend not to care about us. After all, He is the Lord of all things who is all perfect by Himself, and He has no need for others. But He loves all of us as His own, and He is our Father, who cares for all of His children greatly. He created us not so that He can dispose of us. Instead, His love for us is so great, that St. John in our second reading mentioned that for that great love, He had sent us such a great redemption, that He sent Himself, in the form of Jesus, His Son, as the Saviour to redeem all mankind from their fate of certain destruction.

The Good Shepherd cares about all of His sheep, and our Lord therefore cares for all of us greatly. He does not want us to fall prey to the wolves, that is Satan and his allies. That was why He did what He had done, that is to give Himself to us, as the Guide and Leader to lead us back to the right path to salvation. The shepherd guides the sheep so that they will find their way to the green pasture and not lost.

Therefore, today we reflect on our Lord as our Shepherd, the One whom we should heed always and follow. We have to aim our gaze always at Him and not be distracted by other things in the world. Why is this very important? That is because we are really very easily distracted by the many dark things in this world, and we are very easily persuaded to abandon our Shepherd and follow the whim of our own desires.

Ever since our first ancestors first succumbed to their desire, the want for knowledge and their greed for earthly desires, we have been made vulnerable to the same desires, and if we allow ourselves to be overcome and controlled by our desired, then that is where we shall fall, and we shall fall into damnation together with Satan and his angels if we are not careful.

Ever since Satan had been cast out of heaven and brought down low for his failed attempt to take over the throne of heaven out of his pride and vanity, he had resented all that God had created and crafted. And the greatest of all God’s creations is us mankind, whom therefore he tried to destroy as well, and the best way to do so, is by causing us to rebel against God as well, just as he had once done before and which he had done ever since.

Thus, it is like the wolves who desire to take the sheep away from the shepherd. They would surround the flock of sheep and wait for the opportune moment for some of the sheep to linger and stray beyond the flock, and then snatch them and destroy them. This is Satan’s aim, trying to snatch us away from the salvation which God had promised us, and which He had purchased with His own Body and Blood.

Remember that Jesus said that the Good Shepherd lays down His life and thus dies for His sheep? That was exactly what Jesus had done. He barred the wolves, that is Satan and his allies from coming through to get us. He protected us and shielded us, all because of His infinite love for all of us, and His everlasting desire to see us saved from the pain and suffering caused by our sins.

And thus we were indeed saved by our Lord, and we have been made whole again. But this does not mean that we are completely out of danger and harm’s path. Even though the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross have given mankind the salvation and the path to liberation from death and into life, but we require an active effort and participation in the work of salvation for us to be saved.

The shepherd knows his sheep and he knew them all by name. And thus, our Good Shepherd, our Lord Jesus Christ also knew us all, each and every single one of us. And He calls on us to join Him and walk with Him. Now, the issue is, are we willing to put in the effort to walk with Him and walk in His path? It may seem to be easy, but I can assure you that it will not be the case.

The world is the domain of the evil one and his allies, and therefore, the ways of this world are inherently not compatible with the ways of Christ our Lord. Thus, if we follow Him and walk in His footsteps, it is likely that we will encounter difficulties, opposition and ridicule. Remember, brethren, that Christ Himself had shown us an example, by enduring all the ridicule, all the persecution and rejection of the world, on His way to Calvary bearing the cross that is our sins.

Therefore, Christ had left us all a great gift, that is His Church, the union of all the faithful together as one people, united with Him in a spiritual Body of the faithful by the sharing of the Eucharist, which He left behind as the centre of the efforts which He had started to call back all the wayward souls and sheep of His flock, to return to His loving and caring embrace.

And He had also placed for us, shepherds to take care of us, to be His representatives, under the leadership of the chief shepherd of all, from St. Peter to his successors as the Vicars of Christ, the chief representative of our Lord, the One and True Shepherd of all in this world. The priests, all the members of the ordained ministry, the holy orders, including all the bishops and all whom have given themselves to fulfill God’s calling and to become His servants, we celebrate today on this occasion as well.

Thus, today is also Vocation Sunday, a day when we remember all those who have been called to vocation in the Lord, to take up a life of dedication to the Lord and His people, to be the shepherds to guide the flock of God on their way to God. Let us pray for them, that they will remain always strong amidst the difficulties and challenges that certainly will come their way.

But let us also not forget that on this day, we too should also heed the Lord’s call, especially those of us who are young and have not known what we are to do with our own lives. Let us pray that all the young men whom God had chosen and called to His service, may discern and find their path and purpose in life, and when the time comes, to become the shepherds of God’s people, accepting the heavy but fulfilling responsibility which God had entrusted them with.

O Lord, our Good Shepherd, our Master and our God, be with us always and love us always. And allow the love and devotion for You to grow ever stronger in our hearts. Help us to guide one another on our way to You, so that none of the sheep of Your flock may be lost. Be with our priests and all those who have dedicated themselves to Your service, and be with those whom You have called. Be with us always too, now and forever. Amen.

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Saturday, 25 April 2015 : Feast of St. Mark, Evangelist (Homily and Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : Red (Apostles and Evangelists)

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, today we celebrate the feast day of one of the Four Great Evangelists, the four writers of the Holy Gospels. Today is the feast of St. Mark, one of the important Apostles of Jesus, who went with St. Paul in his travels of preaching the faith, and eventually founded the See of Alexandria in Egypt, now known as the Patriarchate of Alexandria, which can trace their founding from St. Mark himself.
The significance of this day cannot be separated from what we heard from the Gospel, which highlighted the very important mission which Christ had placed on our shoulders, which He entrusted to all those who have placed their trust in Him. This mission is for us to preach the Good News to all the peoples all around the world, all the way to the ends of the earth.

This mission calls us to evangelise the Gospels to those who have yet to hear the Word of God and the Good News, so that all of them may hear them and be saved as well. We cannot deny this mission nor can we ignore it, for it is this mission has been entrusted to all of us who have been baptised in the Name of our Lord. And this mission continues even to this day, as all of us still have the need to proclaim the word of God’s salvation to all the peoples.

Had the Apostles kept to themselves and did not proclaim the salvation in Jesus Christ because they were afraid of all those who were out to persecute them, then there would have been no Church, and at least not the Church that we know of and are accustomed to. All of the greatness of the Church, in terms of its reach and works, are all possible because of the courageous acts and deeds of the Holy Apostles and disciples who braved even death and destruction to bring about salvation to all peoples.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, today we are all called to walk in the footsteps of the Apostles and all the holy saints, that we may also be able to carry the cross of Christ, by becoming His mouthpiece and witnesses to all the nations. Now the question is if we are ready to bear that cross and do what we are expected to do as the members of God’s Church and as the partakers of the Lord’s work of mercy and salvation of all mankind.

St. Mark had written all these testimonies, so that all of us may be aware of what our faith truly is, and how we ought to live it out faithfully and not just with empty proclamations. Therefore, similarly, we too should also heed it through real and concrete actions, to show that we truly belong to the Lord our God. As in our first reading today, St. Peter exhorted the faithful to don the vest of humility as part of their lives, and be sober and alert against the temptations and corruptions of the devil. This shows us that we must indeed be devoted to the Lord via real and genuine love, and not just with empty faith.

There are many temptations in this world, brothers and sisters, and very often, these have taken their toll on us, by turning us in rebellion against God and by turning our hearts and eyes away from His truth and His ways, and we rather follow our own way. This is the great trouble that is facing our world today, and there is something indeed which we can do in order to make it better.

Can we make use of this great opportunity, which God offers us daily, so that we may wholeheartedly change our ways and abandon our ways of sin and disobedience, and become better disciples of our Lord. Remember, brethren, that people will likely only believe in us and in whatever we preach to them, if we have practiced what we preached in our own actions and deeds.

May Almighty God give us courage and strength, the wisdom and the eloquence of speech, as well as a faithful heart and devoted mind, so that we may, by our examples, lead many more people and save more souls through the same salvation which our Lord Jesus Christ offered us freely for our forgiveness. God bless us all and may He help to keep us safe. Amen.

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Saturday, 25 April 2015 : Feast of St. Mark, Evangelist (Gospel Reading)

Liturgical Colour : Red (Apostles and Evangelists)

Mark 16 : 15-20
At that time, Jesus told His disciples, “Go out to the whole world and proclaim the Good News to all creation. The one who believes and is baptised will be saved; the one who refuses to believe will be condemned.”

“Signs like these will accompany those who have believed : in My Name they will cast out demons and speak new languages; they will pick up snakes, and if they drink anything poisonous, they will be unharmed; they will lay their hands on the sick, and they will be healed.”
So then, after speaking to them, the Lord Jesus was taken up into heaven and took His place at the right hand of God. The Eleven went forth and preached everywhere, while the Lord worked with them and confirmed the message by the signs that accompanied it.