All Saints Day, Tuesday, 01-11-11

Rev 7:2-4, 9-14 / 1 Jn 3:1-3 / Mt 5:1-12

This feast of All Saints had its earliest certain observance in the early fourth-century.

It was originally a commemoration of "all the martyrs." In the first 300 years of the Church's history, many Christians witnessed to Jesus with their lives and they were martyred, meaning to say that they suffered horrendous torture and finally lost their lives.

The Church highly honoured these martyrs and believed that they are now with God in heaven.

And it was the Church's early tradition and practice to have recourse to these martyrs for their intercession.

This is an expression of the fundamental belief that there is a deep spiritual communion between those who are in heaven and with the Church here on earth, i.e., the Church triumphant and the Church militant respectively.

As time went by, the Church also acknowledged that there are other paths to holiness, and that is why this feast is called All Saints, and not just the martyrs.

All Saints is generally understood as canonized saints. Canonization is a long process that the Church uses to officially declare that a person had lived a life of holiness on earth and is now with God in heaven.

This is a very profound declaration. The Church, under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, confers the title of Saint to a person, and in doing so declares that he/she is in heaven.

Hence, devotions to Saints, is not only a Church approved practice, but we can say that it is a God approved practice.

So we can be confident that when we pray to St. Jude in our desperate moments, or to St. Anthony when we lose something precious, or to St. Pio for safety, we can be assured that that saint in heaven is praying for us and with us.

But more importantly, this feast is a celebration of all the saints in heaven, whether canonized or not. It is a celebration of God's everlasting love for mankind and that He wants us to be with Him in heaven.

The path that the martyrs and the saints took is the none other than the way of the beatitudes which Jesus taught in the gospel.

It is the way of humility, gentleness, mercy and compassion, purity that the saints took that lead them to be with God eternally.

It is a long and narrow way, it is a difficult and painful way. But it is the way of love. It is the way to life. It is the way to be with God eternally.

31st Week in Ordinary Time, Monday, 31-10-11

Romans 11:29-36 / Luke 14:12-14

At times when we are feeling lousy and in a bad mood, we tend to see the world as a rotten place.

There is so much suffering, so much tragedies, so much sadness.

And of course there is the wickedness and sinfulness that seems to be all over the place.

Hence we might start asking: Why does God allow so much sin and evil to exist and happen in the world and also in our lives?

Well, we can ask and we can search, but we may not find an answer that will satisfy our queries.

Maybe that was why St. Paul, in the 1st reading, after talking about sin and mercy, has this to say.

How rich are the depths of God - how deep His wisdom and knowledge - and how impossible to penetrate his motives or understand His methods!

Well, to put it simply, God didn't create us just to know more about Him and have our questions answered.

God created us to love Him, because He is loving and merciful towards us.

Yes we have sinned against God, and yet He is still loving and merciful towards us.

God's love and mercy is something that we can never repay or return back to Him.

God's love and mercy is His gift to us. And God never takes back His gifts.

We only need to humbly accept it and love Him in return.

30th Week in Ordinary Time, Saturday, 29-10-11

Romans 11:1-2, 11-12, 25-29 / Luke 14:1, 7-11

We may remember who Pope John XXIII was. He was affectionately known as "Good Pope John" and he even had a nickname "Johnny Walker" because he would sneak out of the Vatican in the evenings to walk around the city of Rome.

But Pope John XXIII was better known for initiating the 2nd Vatican Council in 1962 but he did not live to see its conclusion.

Pope John XXIII was a really down-to-earth person and not one for ceremonies or status-conscious.

Shortly after he became Pope, he visited the Regina Coeli Prison in Rome.

The newly elected pope, animated and clearly comfortable in this unusual setting, shared with the inmates the somewhat surprising tale of his own cousin, who had been imprisoned in the same jail after his conviction for poaching.

The official Vatican reports of the papal visit would omit this part of his talk for fear that it would cause scandal with pious and sensitive Catholics, and also that the Pope would be subjected to ridicule.

Yet it was his simple, frank and humble personality that the Church and the world began to call him the most beloved Pope of the century.

Indeed as Jesus said in the gospel, the man who humbles himself will be exalted. Yet the man who exalts himself will be humbled.

We may not be asking to be exalted, the very fear of embarrassment and failure or "lose face" can lead us to do strange and even sinful things.

But as the 1st reading puts it - Is it possible that God has rejected His people? Even the Jews are still loved by God, loved for the sake of their ancestors. God never takes back His gifts or revokes His choice.

Yes God loves us, He chose us as His own, and He will never reject or abandon us.

For that, we can only humbly give thanks and praise the Lord and know that He will always raise up the humble and lowly.

Sts. Simon and Jude, Apostles, 28-10-11

Ephesians 2:19-22 / Luke 6:12-19    (2016 / 2025)

The feast of St. Simon and St. Jude is celebrated on the same day probably because they both preached the Gospel in Mesopotamia and Persia where it is said they had both been sent.

But nothing certain is known about them besides the fact that they were called as Apostles by Jesus.

The letter of Jude which forms part of the New Testament is accredited to St. Jude, and he was also related to Jesus as cousins.

Like most of the other apostles, St. Simon and St. Jude were literally unknowns and could be said to be very ordinary and simple people.

Yet God chose them to be instruments of the proclamation of His Good News and to be the foundations of His Church.

Both also suffered martyrdom. St. Simon is often represented in art with a saw, the instrument of his martyrdom.

As for St. Jude, nearly every image depicts him wearing either a medallion or a portrait with a image of Jesus.

St. Jude is also the patron saint for those in a desperate and urgent need. We have heard of enough testimonies to say that St. Jude is a powerful intercessor for us.

As we celebrate the feast of St. Simon and St. Jude, let us also ask for their prayers that we live out the Good News of salvation in our simple and ordinary lives.

More importantly, may we always carry the image of Jesus in our hearts and be a witness to His love in our lives.

30th Week in Ordinary Time, Thursday, 27-10-11

Romans 8:31-39 / Luke 13:31-35             (2019)

It is a historical fact that King Herod was a man who wanted, at all costs, to have no trouble in his territory.

He saw Jesus as a trouble-maker and he wanted Him out of his place.

Hence he could have sent the Pharisees to warn Jesus and to frighten Him.

But Jesus was not going to turn back, and He was adamant in completing His mission, even though He could see where it was leading Him.

Jerusalem had a long history of killing the prophets and Jesus could see that He was the next in line.

But He also knew that God was with Him and hence He had to complete His mission.

And that is also what the 1st reading is telling us.

In the face of persecutions, who can be against us when God is on our side? What can ever come between us and the love that God has for us?

St. Paul was certain that neither death nor life, no angel, no prince, nothing that exists, nothing still to come, not any power, or height or depth, not any created thing, can ever come between us and the love of God.

St. Paul's certainty lies in Jesus Christ who is the visible love of God.

May we also be certain about the love of God, and put our faith in Jesus Christ who promised to be with us until the end of time.

30th Week in Ordinary Time, Wednesday, 26-10-11

Romans 8:26-30 / Luke 13:22-30

One of the easiest topics to start a conversation is to talk about how difficult life is and how tough the times are.

Almost everyone will have a story about financial difficulties and struggles to keep the job and stressful competition.

Under such adverse circumstances and situations, would we still be able to have faith in God and trust that He will provide.

In the gospel, Jesus said that we should enter by the narrow door. In other words, life is about pushing and persisting in our faith.

But of course it is also so easy to give up and start to compromise and to find an easy and quick way out of difficulties and struggles.

Yet from our own experience of our faith and trust in God, we know that difficulties and struggles are actually opportunities for growth and we will see the marvels that God will do for us.

As the 1st reading puts it, we know that by turning to their good, God co-operates with all those who love Him.

So essentially it is about our love for God and believing in how much He loves us.

It is easy to talk about how difficult life is. Yet we must also remember to talk about how loving and caring God is. That will enable us to persist in our faith.

30th Week in Ordinary Time, Tuesday, 25-10-11

Romans 8:18-25 / Luke 13:18-21

We know what a watermelon is. We have eaten it before and there are those seeds that we dig out.

Each of those seeds is a wonder in itself. Each has the capacity to grow to 200,000 times or more of its size and become yet another watermelon.

We may not be that familiar with mustard seeds or with yeast and dough, but certainly the watermelon seed and the watermelon will give us an adequate picture of what Jesus was talking about in gospel.

In the two parables which is about the kingdom of God, Jesus talked about a growth that is beyond imagining.

Yet the 1st reading tells us that growth is not without struggle or suffering.

We and the whole of creation is "groaning" and we strive to grow and to be set free from the slavery of sin and decadence.

Yes, we yearn to live in the freedom and the glory as children of God, and as such, we have to accept struggle and suffering as part of the process in our growth to freedom.

At the same time we must also remember that the suffering in this life can never be compared to the glory that is awaiting us.

So in faith and in hope, let us persevere and persist, because God will reward us for our faithfulness. And that reward is for eternity.