Daniel 5:1-6, 13-14, 16-17, 23-28 / Luke 21:12-19
Graffiti is writings or drawings scribbled, scratched, or sprayed illicitly on a wall or other surface in a public place.
In this country, graffiti is a crime as it is the damage to property caused by: spraying, writing, drawing,
marking or applying paint or another marking substance to a person's
property without their consent.
And there can be no question of doing graffiti in high security places like Parliament House, military headquarters and other dignified places.
In the 1st reading, there was graffiti in, of all places, the royal palace, where king Belshazzar was having a great banquet with his noblemen, their wives and singing women, and they were using the sacred vessels looted from the Temple of Jerusalem.
But that was no ordinary graffiti. It is what is understood as "the writing on the wall", done by the hand of God.
Those words " Mene, Mene, Tekel, Parsin" were meant for king Belshazzar and he would know what it was all about and what was going to happen.
In the gospel, Jesus tells of another hand, but not that of God. It is the hand of injustice and persecution. It is the hand of evil and hate that wants to stop the Good News from spreading.
It is a hand to be reckoned with, but Jesus will also be at hand to defend us and help us bear witness to Him.
We just have to hold on to the hand of Jesus, and He will write His name on the walls of our hearts.