Two sons of the Father

In order for our faith to be alive and authentic, our deeds must match our words and our words must be of God.
In the Parable of the Two Sons (Matthew 21:28-32), Jesus teaches us that simply saying the right words in an attempt to gain favor without backing them up with good works is both hypocritical and prideful disobedience. These two sons represents us.
The disobedient younger son spoke the right words, but his deeds did not match them. He represents Israel, particularly those scribes and Pharisees who gave a good show of pious observance of their religion, but who were interiorly prideful, self-centered and disobedient. When faced with the truth proclaimed by John the Baptist, they clung to self instead of humbly submitting themselves to their God.
The other son repented of his sinful words and obeyed his father, thus humbly doing the father’s will in the end. He represents all who repent and walk humbly with the Lord to do the right thing.
The first of the sons in the parable did not want to go and work in the vineyard: he did not want to suffer... This son also had two loves: the love of self, and the love of his father. First it is the love of self that has the upper hand, then it is the love of his father that dominates. Here he begins by loving himself, and replies to his father, "I will not." But, as this son has a upright conscience, it reproaches him for his attitude toward his father and, finally, it is his love for his father that wins out: he goes to work in the vineyard, he does the will of his father!
The two sons in the gospel stand for the two directions of the spiritual life: one moving closer to God’s will, the other moving away from it. The first son starts poorly. He refuses to do what the father asks. But in time he comes around and does the father’s will. The other son begins well. He says that he will do what is asked. But he does not follow through and ends in failure. There is a principle in the spiritual life which states, “Unless you are moving forward, you are falling backward.” What you do not use, you lose.
This excerpt from the Universal Prayer of Pope Clement XI seems very appropriate to this endeavor.
[Lord God] I adore You as my first beginning, I long for You as my final end. I praise You as my constant helper, and call on You as my loving protector. Guide me by Your Wisdom, correct me with Your Justice, comfort me with Your Mercy, protect me by Your Power… Lord, enlighten my understanding, enflame my will, purify my heart, sanctify my soul. Help me to repent of my past sins and to rise above my human weaknesses and to grow stronger as a Christian…

Monday

What Authority You have
Public questioning and debate between religious teachers was a popular sport in Judaism. Yet, it is likely that these representatives of the Sanhedrin were more into entrapment than debate. In seeking to identify the authority by which Jesus exercised his ministry, they were hoping to gather further evidence for a charge of blasphemy.We get hit with a question and we waffle rather than answer the question honestly because we fear the consequences of being truthful.
“Honey, what do you think of my new hairdo?” “Wow, that certainly is different.”
“Do you think we can win the big game?” “I’m sure you’re going to give it your best
shot.”
“Did you like my sermon?” “It gave me a lot to think about.”
We waffle to be kind. We waffle so we don’t look stupid. We waffle to protect ourselves.
We waffle because we don’t want other people to know what we really think and believe.
At first glance you might think Jesus is waffling in today’s Gospel lesson. Jesus isn’t waffling. He agrees to answer their question, but first, they must answer a question. And it is a simple question with two possible answers, “from heaven” or “from man.
Jesus’ question is no simple debating tactic. He’s not buying time so he can think of an answer to their question. Jesus’ question gets to the heart of the proclamation of Jesus as the Messiah.
John’s whole ministry was about preparing the way and pointing to the one who would come after him; Jesus of Nazareth. After all, John had proclaimed that Jesus was the Lamb of God. So if John’s Baptism was from heaven, well then his words must have been from heaven too. If John’s words had heavenly authority, then Jesus must be the Christ.
They couldn’t admit that John’s baptism was from heaven; otherwise Jesus will ask them why they didn’t believe him. They couldn’t say from man, because John had been immensely popular with the people, and they were afraid of the crowd.
The interrogation of Jesus by the leaders of the Jews demonstrates their prideful hearts. It is a lesson to us to be careful so that our own pride doesn’t let our authority outweigh that of Christ. Martin Luther wrote that ‘ambition is the mother of all heresies and sects.’ We also learn from this text that what we need is humility before Christ, not our own self-esteem.

Rejoice always
My dear brothers and sisters in Jesus Christ,
The 3rd Sunday of Advent is called “Gaudete Sunday.” Gaudete is Latin for “rejoice.” It is a command taken directly from Paul’s First Letter to the Thessalonians, as in today’s second reading: “Rejoice always” (1 Thessalonians 5:16). It is a positive command, one that we are supposed to keep at all times and in all circumstances.
As we sing in the Lord of the Dance, “It’s hard to dance with the devil on your back.” As followers of Christ, we know that life on earth is not always rosy, but life after death is bliss. Our hope is not in this life only. That is why we are able to rejoice in good times and in bad, as Jesus himself did.
Author Leo Buscaglia tells a story about his mother which shows that it takes a lot of faith to rejoice. His father came back from work one day and announced that he had lost all his money because his business partner had duped him and ran away with their firm's funds. That same evening, his mother went out, sold some of her expensive jewelry, and bought food for a sumptuous feast. People criticized her for reckless spending at a time when poverty was staring her in the face. But she told them that "the time for joy is now, when we need it most, not next week." Her courageous act rallied the family and gave them the hope they needed to face the future with confidence and trust that God was in control.
The call to be joyful does not mean a call to overexcitement. Christian joy is profound, deep, unshakeable, and permanent. And being a joyful Christian doesn’t mean that we cannot feel sorrow, grief, or sadness. The truly joyful person feels these emotions very deeply – and expresses them without embarrassment.

We may all wonder: Is it possible to be happy all the time? On the other hand, what do we need to do to have the disposition to rejoice always? First of all, the realistic Catholic knows well that honest striving for holiness involves suffering. And suffering threatens to take away our happiness.
Christmas time is a time of great joy for Christians. Paul says it quite clearly, in our second reading today: “Brothers and sisters: Rejoice in the Lord always!” It seems an odd thing for a man to write who is in prison and on the way to execution to see so much cause for joy. What is the secret for Paul? What is it that causes him, in the face of prison and possible death to see joy when others in the face of the holidays are depressed? I think the key to understanding the difference between the two outlooks lies two sentences further on. Paul says The Lord is near. For St. Paul, his nearness to Christ is what brings him his joy. He tells other Christians it should be their joy as well. The nearness of Christ to our hearts is the deciding factor upon whether we look on our life with joy or with gloom.
A fully human life is one that is turned outward toward others and toward God. It is oriented toward community and others rather than self. St. Therese of Lisieux compared herself to a little flower and I think that analogy for the soul is a good one here. A flower turned in upon itself is wilted and dead. A flower turned outwards toward others and the Sun is living, vibrant and in bloom. In the same way a soul turned in upon itself is dying, dead or in a state of decay. A living, vibrant and healthy soul is turned outwards toward God and others. That is why St. Paul can so easily tell us: Brothers and sisters: Rejoice in the Lord always. For St. Paul his joy is Jesus Christ. He carries that joy within him wherever he goes. His situation or the things he have cannot shake the foundations of his joy, which is Jesus Christ. If we too want the same, unshakeable joy that he has, then we must build upon the same foundation which is Jesus Christ. The key to happiness or unhappiness lies in our relationship with the Lord. The only thing that will make us truly happy is God. If our relationship is good then we are joyful. If it is bad then the joy we experience in life is fleeting at best and in most cases not true joy. The things we seek in the world other than God are not the keys to our happiness. Things or people cannot bring us lasting happiness because they are breakable, they can be lost, and they can change. Only the unbreakable, the unshakeable and the unchangeable God can bring us the joy we seek. Only in God can we find the firm foundation that brings us the joy we all hope for. Even in the midst of difficult situations, we can be joyful, if we have Jesus.
Another tool for happiness is to ‘Be humble’. if we listen to today’s Gospel we see the importance of humility in our lives and as a way to make sure that we don’t lose our joy and peace when difficult times come our way.
St. John the Baptist gives us a great example of humility. People were coming to him to be baptized and the “Jews from Jerusalem sent priests and Levites to him to ask him, ‘Who are you’ he admitted and did not deny it, but admitted, ‘I am not the Christ’
He could have given importance to himself and talk about the importance of his life and mission. He defers and talks about Jesus, ‘there is one among you whom you do not recognize, the one who is coming after me, whose sandal strap I am not worthy to untie’
He shows us the value of humility. The humility of knowing who he was, accepting the Will of God for him and being happy to forget about himself, to the point of asking his own disciples to go and follow Jesus.
Finally, to remain in joy, St. Paul encourages us to ‘pray without ceasing’. Let us not forget that Advent and then Christmas are a time to intensify our prayer. As St. Paul says in today’s second reading: ‘May the God of peace make you perfectly holy and may you entirely, spirit, soul and body, be preserved blameless for the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ’

Yes, dear brothers and sisters, it is hard for us to live a life of rejoicing always, but the One who calls us to this life is one who always provides us what we really need to follow His commands. He is faithful, and He will do it in our lives. Rejoice always. Whether we are joyful or sad, One day we are going to die. Be happy and help others to be happy.

St. Lucy
St. Lucy (Santa Lucia) was a young Sicilian girl who took a secret vow to consecrate her virginity to Christ. Thus, her mother was quite dismayed when Lucy, as a teen, refused marriage to a young pagan. When Lucy's mother developed a hemorrhage, Lucy persuaded her to visit the tomb of St. Agatha to pray for healing. When her mother was healed, Lucy revealed her vow of virginity and asked permission to bestow her fortune on the poor. Joyful at her cure, Lucy's mother agreed, but Lucy's pagan suitor was incensed. With the persecution of the emperor Diocletian at its height, the jilted young man accused Lucy, before a judge, of being a Christian. When Lucy refused to relinquish her faith, the judge ordered her to a brothel. However, guards who attempted to drag her to the house of sin were unable to budge her. Similarly an attempt to burn Lucy to death failed so she was dispatched by thrusting a sword into her throat. The date of Lucy's martyrdom was December 13, 304.Lucy's suitor, however, had other plans, and revealed Lucy as a Christian. Authorities went to collect her, planning on forcing her into prostitution -- but they were unable to budge her, even after tying her to a team of oxen. She was then tortured by having her eyes torn out. They'd planned on torturing her by fire, too, but the fires kept going out. She was then killed by being stabbed in the throat with a dagger.
Because of the above, St. Lucy is the patron of those with eye problems, and is often depicted carrying her eyes (often on a plate), being tied to a team of oxen, with St. Agatha, or before her judges. Her relics lay in Syracuse for hundreds of years, were translated to Constantinople, and then to Venice where they may be venerated at the Church of San Geremia. Her head was sent to Louis XII of France, and reposes in the cathedral of Bourges.
Her name, "Lucia," means "Light," and light plays a role in the customs of her Feast Day. According to the Julian calendar, December 13 was the shortest day of the year. wearing a crown of candles, and carrying a torch to light her way, moves from house to house in each village or neighborhood and brings baked goods to each home before the sun rises.The change to the Gregorian calendar altered the date to December 21st, but did not change Lucy's feast day celebration, and she is forever associated with lengthening days and more sunlight. Whatever the fact to the legends surrounding Lucy, the truth is that her courage to stand up and be counted a Christian in spite of torture and death is the light that should lead us on our own journeys through life.

Our Lady Of Guadalupe
We are here this morning to celebrate the feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe. Most of us know the gist of the story. Some 477 years ago, in 1531 an elderly Indian man named "Juan Diego" had a vision of Mary, the mother of Jesus, at Tepeyac, a squalid Indian village outside of Mexico City. Mary directed Juan Diego to tell the bishop to build the church in Tepeyac. The Spanish Bishop, however, dismissed the Indian’s tale as mere superstition — he was, after all, an Indian — but then, to humor Juan Diego, he insisted that he bring some sort of proof, if he wanted to be taken seriously. So, three days later, the Virgin Mary appeared again and told Juan Diego to pick the exquisitely beautiful roses that had miraculously bloomed amidst December snows, and take them as a sign to the Bishop. When the Indian opened his poncho to present the roses to the Bishop, the flowers poured out from his poncho to reveal an image of the Virgin Mary painted on the inside of the poncho. That image hangs today in the Basilica of Guadalupe in Mexico City and is venerated by thousands of pilgrims from all over the world.
The vision also tells us something about ourselves: that we generally listen to people who look and act important. That the people to sweep the hallways or fry the burgers or paint the numbers on our curbs do not really have anything to say to us. The vision challenges us to listen to the people who do not look or act like us.
Juan Diego’s vision of where God wants to be or whom we should listen to should come as no surprise to us. Throughout history, God has consistently chosen to be with poor people. We know that our God "hears the cries of the poor." While it is true that God loves each and every one of us, there is a special place in God’s heart for the poor and the powerless. In that respect, Juan Diego’s message is a restatement of Jesus’ vision of God.
The Mother of God, through her messenger Blessed Juan Diego and her permanent apparition on his mantle, invites the people of America to place all their trust in God and in His commandments. In other words, she invites us to submit ourselves completely to the reign of Christ the King, the Holy One of Israel who helps us and guides along the way of life to eternal life.
The very vivid vision described in our first reading (Rev 12) has particular meaning for everyone in the Americas since the appearance of Our Lady to St. Juan Diego took the same form as what is described in that reading from Rev 12.
…a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars. She was with child…(Rev 12:1-2)
This is the image Our Lady left on St. Juan Diego’s tilma. She is clothed with the sun, standing on the moon, and has a crown of twelve stars. She is pregnant and so Our Lady of Guadalupe is revered as Patroness of the Unborn and also revered as Patroness of the Americas since she appeared in the center of North and South America.

St Mary’s Residence
95th Anniversary
Today’s Mass is a great act of thanksgiving. We thank God for all that has been achieved here in St Mary’s Residence over the last ninety-five years. We thank God for the staff, and for the leadership that they have exercised. We thank God for the members who have lived in this Residence and for the good that they have done. On this anniversary, first and foremost, we acknowledge the great contribution made by the Sisters, Daughters of the Divine Charity. We thank Sister Mary Clair, the current Superior, and Sr Almaisa Brito, the Administrator of the Residence and all the sisters past and present who have given their lifeblood for the work of this Residence.
An Anniversary celebration such as this is a time not only for thanksgiving but also for reflection, for re-examination of orientations, for clarification of the road map and for resolutions for the future… I would like to bring in a great figure of Catholic tradition: St Augustine of Hippo who was engaged in a great quest for truth and for freedom.
Augustine tells us the story of his quest in his great book, The Confessions. There he speaks to us of the human being – you and I – being a great enigma. We know that people are capable of great goodness and of creating great beauty. Yet we also know, with equal certainty, that human beings are capable of destructiveness and great obscenity. So we can well ask: What lies at the heart of this great enigma that we are? Augustine pointed out that we have to come to understand ourselves either as an absurdity, being of no sense with a huge contradiction at its core, or as participants in a great mystery. That’s our choice, absurdity or mystery.
This realization, the fruit of so much reflection and education in St Augustine, led him to express his two great classic affirmations: “I believe in order to understand”. In other words, I believe in God in order to understand myself and the world around me. And secondly “I understand the better to believe”. In other words, I study and struggle so that my faith becomes deeper and clearer.
Today you remind me in a very natural way of the second letter of St Paul to the Corinthians in which St Paul conveys an idea that seems to apply especially to you. He describes the faithful of that Church as “Letters from Christ” “You are a letter from Christ…written not with ink but with the Spirit of the living God; not on stone tablets but on the tablets of human hearts”. (2 Cor.3:3)
You, like all Christians are letters from Christ. In that capacity, you have not only the right but also the obligation to be God's message to the whole of humanity. This is certainly not a letter written with ink, but something much deeper, more beautiful and mysterious. It is the presence of God in your hearts, a text written by the Holy Spirit, a letter made into flesh and blood at the service of each person that you encounter.
In today’s Gospel, Jesus says to us “Love one another” and “Remain in my love.” Then Jesus goes on to explain. “I have told you this that my joy may be in you, and your joy may be complete.” The mark of one who is truly living in His love is joy, the joy that we see in one another. Joy even in the midst of suffering is a sign of knowing Jesus – “Yes, I am loved by God. Yes, I know that I give myself as Mary and Jesus gave themselves totally.” It is not simply to love one another but to love one another as Christ has loved us. That makes the difference. The greatest love a person can have for his friends is to give his life for them. "And you are my friends if you do what I command you. He loved those who hated him. He loved those who beat him. He loved those who crucified him.
This evening we thank the Lord for guiding this Residence through these Ninety-five years of its history. We ask his blessing on these next years under the gracious patronage of our Mother Mary. May God continue to bless the work of St Mary’s Residence and all those who have been a part of its journey in the past, at this moment, and in all the events and challenges that lie before us in the years to come.
God bless you all.
In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

My Yoke is Easy
Refusal to forgive others, ready criticism of others, and all the many shapes that selfishness assumes in our minds and in our dealings with others, are indications of the failure to take up the yoke of love. The person who is prompt to criticize others, who finds fault with all manner of behavior is not only a heavy burden to oneself; they also weighs heavily on those one lives with.
The remedy that Jesus brings us for such a burdensome life is love.
"Come to me, all you that are weary and carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest," Jesus tells the crowd. (Matthew 11:28) The invitation is extended to all.
Jesus' yoke – his rules – are simple: Love God and love each other. And here's the bonus: he offers to teach his disciples how to live fully into these two rules. "Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me," he says. (Matthew 11:29)
This invitation to "learn from me" suggests relationship, which opens up a new way of thinking about this image of "yoke." A yoke usually joins two working animals together as a team. One of those animals is the experienced one, the leader. Jesus invites his followers to harness up with him. He assures them that he will help them plow through all the challenges of their lives. He invites them to work along side him has he prepares the field – God's glorious Kingdom – for planting and harvesting.
What do you do to rest? Listening to the radio all day long or watching TV all evening will not bring you rest. It will fill your mind with thoughts and you will not have room in your mind for God or spiritual matters. When you want rest, go to the Lord in prayer.
Jesus certainly knew all about yokes. As a carpenter he would have been asked from time to time to make a wooden yoke for farmers so that they could get two oxen to pull a plough or other farm implement together. The yoke was the wooden crossbeam that joined the two animals at the neck and that crossbeam dragged the farm implement. Since animals are different sizes it was common to have a yoke cut to measure for the animals pulling it. Otherwise it would not fit the animal correctly and cause considerable discomfort. As a carpenter Jesus must have cut many such yokes. The yoke that Jesus cuts for us does not cause discomfort but brings us comfort because the yoke of Jesus is easy and light. The invitation of Jesus to us is not a yoke that weighs us down but is easy and light,
Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am meek and humble of heart; and you will find rest for your selves. For my yoke is easy, and my burden light. (Matt 11:29-30)

Lost sheep
We believe firmly that God is good, He is love. But that his love is personal, directed to me, insignificant as I am of myself is quite another matter. Our Lord reveals here the personal, loving care that the heavenly Father has for each of his children.
"Sheep" had a long history as a common metaphor for God's people in the Old Testament before Jesus gave this parable. "The Lord is my shepherd . . ." (Ps 23:1). "We are his people, and the sheep of his pasture" (Ps 100:3).
Since God takes so much trouble to recover a lost one, they must carefully guard against causing one to stray (Mt 18:5-10). "The sheep that so foolishly and willfully strayed is not only recovered and restored to the flock; but rejoiced over, as if the recovery were a great gain”. This example of unconditional forgiveness must also characterize the disciples (Mt 18:21-35.
None is too lost or too insignificant to be sought. Jesus says that God, the shepherd, is concerned about each of his sheep. And if one of them strays, he will not just wait to see whether the lost sheep will return on its own. He goes after the lost one; he seeks it and seeks it until he finds it. He does not wait for the lost sheep to return on its own. He picks it up and carries it home. It is not the sheep’s choice whether to come home or stay lost. The sheep is not consulted about that.
In the parable, Jesus tells us that it is the shepherd, and not the sheep who knows what is good for the sheep. He has a purpose in searching for the lost sheep, and his purpose is to bring the sheep home. But there is never a question of leaving the sheep out there, even if that is where the sheep thinks it wants to be. Chapter Eighteen of the Gospel according to St. Matthew begins with disciples asking Jesus the question, "Who is the greatest in the Kingdom of Heaven?" Jesus instructs the disciples that if they are to enter the Kingdom of Heaven they must become like little children (Mt. 18:1-5). In verses ten through fourteen Jesus begins by referring to these "little ones" again. Here he refers to these little ones as sheep who have strayed from the fold and that it is his mission to bring these lost sheep back so that none of them will be lost.

Immaculate Conception of Mary
One of the titles given to Mary is “Ark of the Covenant.” The Ark of the Covenant in the Old Testament was a chest made of wood to carry the two stone tablets containing the commandments God gave to Moses (Ex 25:16). Therefore, we could say the ark contained the word of God and Mary contained Jesus the Word of God in her womb, so for that reason Mary is sometimes called Ark of the Covenant. In the Old Testament those who were called on to move the Ark of the Covenant could not be sinners because the ark was considered so holy since it carried God’s word (1 Chron 15:14). In like manner, Mary, who is the new Ark of the Covenant, could not be touched by sin. It makes perfect sense that God would specially prepare Mary in holiness to carry Jesus in her womb. God and sin are opposites, and God prepared the sinless Virgin Mary to be a fitting mother to Jesus his Son.
It was not until December 8, 1854, after Pope Pius IX had consulted all the Bishops of the world, that he pronounced and defined in the Ineffabilis Deus the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary. This dogma states that the Blessed Virgin Mary, "in the first instance of her conception, by a singular privilege and grace granted by God, in view of the merits of Jesus Christ, the Savior of the human race, was preserved free from all stain of original sin, is a doctrine revealed by God and therefore to be believed firmly and constantly by all the faithful."

In summary, this dogma proclaims that the soul of the Blessed Virgin Mary who was the tabernacle created by God Himself for the purpose of the incarnation, was never subject to original sin, but completely preserved from the original taint. In other words, the Blessed Virgin Mary was created immaculate by God as the new Eve, equal to the first Eve that was created immaculate by God.
When Our Lady appeared in Lourdes four years later in 1858 she said to St. Bernadette, “I am the Immaculate Conception” confirming the Pope’s decision to declare the dogma of the Immaculate Conception four years earlier. Our Lady herself confirmed the Pope’s declaration that she was immaculate.
The angel said to Mary, “Hail, full of grace!” (Luke 1:28) The particular word Luke used to describe Mary as “full of grace” (κεχαριτωμέη) means that Mary was full of grace all her life. It means that Mary is full of grace not just at the moment the angel comes to her but that she is full of grace since the beginning of her life.
In Adam and Eve's case, they were created immaculate in soul, spirit and body for the Divine purpose of being eternal children of God. In that original state of sinlessness, they could not die. They had eternal life.

But because they refused to trust and obey God, tempted by Satan who was an angelic being who had rebelled against God, they decided to do what they wanted. They disobeyed God by sinning. Consequently, sin was transmitted to the entire human race, depriving Adam and Eve's descendants of the original state of holiness and justice that they enjoyed. [CCC. 404]

Following the disobedience of our first parents in the Garden of Eden, God said, "I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers; he will strike your head, and you will strike his heel." [Gen. 3:15] The seed of the woman who will crush the head of the serpent is Christ, the woman at enmity with the serpent being the Blessed Virgin Mary.

As soon as the Kingdom of God was corrupted by Satan, the holy and eternal soul, spirit and body of God's children became subject to death. Therefore, God instituted a redemptive plan to reinstate His eternal Kingdom. Through the new Adam, Christ, and the new Eve, the Blessed Virgin Mary, God planned to reclaim His kingdom and save His people from eternal death.
Every day we have to overcome temptation and sin. We ask Mary immaculate to help us overcome all temptation and sin in our lives. O Mary conceived without sin, pray for us who have recourse to thee.
Amen.

Prepare the way of the Lord! Make straight… a highway for our God!
My dear brothers and sisters in Jesus Christ,
It is said that some people cause a lot of joy when they appear while others cause a lot of joy when they disappear! John the Baptist is among those who bring a lot of joy when they appear. And today’s readings explain why this strange looking man brought so much joy wherever he went.
John’s mission is to prepare the people of Israel for the day of salvation which is to dawn in the coming of Christ. John knows that he has an important mission, to prepare a way for his master.
John the Baptist is one who, by his whole life, points to the Lord. John the Baptist's life was fueled by one burning passion -- to point others to Jesus Christ and to the coming of his kingdom.
St. John the Baptist is the last prophet of the OT. You know the difference between a Prophet, a Poet and a Pragmatist.
The prophet is someone who is not afraid to speak out. He is not afraid of calling a spade, a spade. He will speak the truth even if it will cost him his head. He speaks out in order to call people to change and by changing their ways change the prevailing situation. The job of the prophet is a thankless job. Who wants to create enemies? The poet is someone who sets possibilities before us. He sees the ugliness of the present but tells people that things don’t have to remain that way. He points to a beautiful future that all of us can create together. Martin Luther King, Jr. was a poet. He witnessed, nay he experienced firsthand the oppression of black Americans at the hands of white Americans. It was ugly. But he knew in his heart that things don’t have to be that way. He created a dream in his heart and then shared that dream with America. He said: “I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character. “ The pragmatist is someone who gets things done. He delivers. Things don’t remain in the drawing board. He turns plans into reality. Lee Kwan Yu is a pragmatist. He turned Singapore into a prosperous city-state. They say that the former Clark Airbase is even bigger than Singapore.
Prepare the way of the Lord! Make straight… a highway for our God!
Every year, as we draw closer to Christmas, we hear this same invitation. God, who in every age has shown his burning desire to be with his children, now comes to ‘live among us’. (John 1: 14) Today too he stands at the door and knocks because he wants to come in and ‘eat’ with us. (Rev 3: 20)We ourselves often long to meet him, to have him as our companion on life’s journey, and to be filled with his light. For him to enter our lives, we first need to remove the obstacles in his path. It is no longer a matter of clearing the roads, but of opening our hearts to him.Jesus himself identified some of the barriers that close our hearts: ‘theft, murder, adultery, avarice, wickedness, deceit, licentiousness, envy, slander, pride…’ (Mark 7: 21-22) At times these barriers may be put up by grudges against our relatives or friends, prejudice against people of other races, indifference to the needs of our neighbors, or a lack of attentiveness and love in our families.
There were only two people on this earth who had no sin, Jesus and Our Lady. If you say you have no sin are we expected to think that you are Jesus or Our Lady? If we say we have no sin do we not mean that we have allowed our consciences to go dead so that now we sin but are not even aware of it?
To prepare the way of the Lord has great meaning when we apply it to our own hearts. It is in our own hearts that we need to prepare a way for the Lord. It is in our hearts that we need to make a straight highway for God. It is the valleys of sin in our own hearts that are to be filled with God’s mercy and healing, and the mountains and hills of pride in our own hearts that are to become low. God is searching for us and wants to hold us against his breast.
To prepare the way of the Lord is to repent, to change our lives, to change our attitudes, to change our behavior, to turn our back on the way we used to be and to begin making the Kingdom of God a reality in our own personal life through acts of kindness.
How can we do something practical to prepare the way of the Lord? By asking his forgiveness each time, we realize we have put up a barrier that obstructs our communion with him. We may want to undertake some changes in our lives. However, there is a real danger that our good intentions remain only good intentions. Good intentions are important. They are the first step. Unless you take the first step, you will always remain where you are. Are there things there, things we are doing, saying that might not please Jesus when he comes or that might make it a little harder for Jesus to come into our hearts? Then we are to pick them up, get them out of the way, and toss them aside. We do that by asking Jesus to forgive us and by changing the things, we do and say.

Saint Nicholas
The Greek histories of his life agree that he suffered imprisonment of the faith and made a glorious confession in the latter part of the persecution raised by Dioletian, and that he was present at the Council of Nicaea and there condemned Arianism. The silence of other authors makes many justly suspect these circumstances. He died at Myra, and was buried in his cathedral.
How different it is what we celebrate as a Church and what our popular culture has made of this holy man. The man we celebrate is rooted in history. He lived in the 4th century. He was Bishop of Myra in Lysia. People made pilgrimage to his burial site to pray and ask God’s blessings, so that he would continue to pray and work wonders in God’s name for them as he did in his lifetime. His relics were taken to Bari, Italy and a Basilica was built there for worship of God and to pray. His Body continues to give a scented oil that has been used to anoint people who are sick to received blessing.
Our popular culture has turned St. Nicholas into a jolly and mindless senile old man. He has become the product of shear imagination and fantasy. He is no longer even Santa Claus, a shortened version of Santa Nicholaus. He is Mr. Claus. He has a Mrs. Claus. Or he is just Chris. We have now a jolly ho, ho, ho -- instead of a holy man of God! How empty and meaningless we have become. St. Patrick, the Missionary Saint and Apostle of Ireland, who brought Christian Faith and true worship of God to a whole nation has become reduced as a feast for everyone and reduced to wearing green, corned beef and cabbage and green beer.
What have we done to Christmas? We have made it the greatest shopping feast and continuous party time. Christ is no longer the center of the feast and like Joseph and Mary there is no room for him in the inn.
Christian Faith and History.
The true story of Santa Claus begins with Nicholas, who was born during the third century in the village of Patara. At the time the area was Greek and is now on the southern coast of Turkey. His wealthy parents, who raised him to be a devout Christian, died in an epidemic while Nicholas was still young. Obeying Jesus' words to "sell what you own and give the money to the poor," Nicholas used his whole inheritance to assist the needy, the sick, and the suffering. He dedicated his life to serving God and was made bishop of Myra while still a young man. Bishop Nicholas became known throughout the land for his generosity to the those in need, his love for children, and his concern for sailors and ships.
Under the Roman Emperor Diocletian who ruthlessly persecuted Christians, Bishop Nicholas suffered for his faith, was exiled and imprisoned. The prisons were so full of bishops, priests, and deacons, there was no room for the real criminals—murderers, thieves and robbers. After his release, Nicholas attended the Council of Nicea AD 325. He died December 6, AD 343 in Myra and was buried in his cathedral church.
Through the centuries many stories and legends have been told of St. Nicholas' life and deeds. These accounts help us understand his extraordinary character and why he is so beloved and revered as protector and helper of those in need.
One story tells of a poor man with three daughters. In those days a young woman's father had to offer prospective husbands something of value—a dowry The larger the dowry, the better the chance that a young woman would find a good husband. Without a dowry, a woman was unlikely to marry. This poor man's daughters, without dowries, were therefore destined to be sold into slavery. Mysteriously, on three different occasions, a bag of gold appeared in their home-providing the needed dowries. The bags of gold, tossed through an open window, are said to have landed in stockings or shoes left before the fire to dry. This led to the custom of children hanging stockings or putting out shoes, eagerly awaiting gifts from Saint Nicholas. Sometimes the story is told with gold balls instead of bags of gold. That is why three gold balls, sometimes represented as oranges, are one of the symbols for St. Nicholas. And so St. Nicholas is a gift-giver.
One of the oldest stories showing St. Nicholas as a protector of children takes place long after his death. The townspeople of Myra were celebrating the good saint on the eve of his feast day when a band of Arab pirates from Crete came into the district. They stole treasures from the Church of Saint Nicholas to take away as booty. As they were leaving town, they snatched a young boy, Basilios, to make into a slave. The emir, or ruler, selected Basilios to be his personal cupbearer, as not knowing the language, Basilios would not understand what the king said to those around him. So, for the next year Basilios waited on the king, bringing his wine in a beautiful golden cup. For Basilios' parents, devastated at the loss of their only child, the year passed slowly, filled with grief. As the next St. Nicholas' feast day approached, Basilios' mother would not join in the festivity, as it was now a day of tragedy. However, she was persuaded to have a simple observance at home—with quiet prayers for Basilios' safekeeping. Meanwhile, as Basilios was fulfilling his tasks serving the emir, he was suddenly whisked up and away. St. Nicholas appeared to the terrified boy, blessed him, and set him down at his home back in Myra. Imagine the joy and wonderment when Basilios amazingly appeared before his parents, still holding the king's golden cup. This is the first story told of St. Nicholas protecting children—which became his primary role in the West.
Another story tells of three theological students, traveling on their way to study in Athens. A wicked innkeeper robbed and murdered them, hiding their remains in a large pickling tub. It so happened that Bishop Nicholas, traveling along the same route, stopped at this very inn. In the night he dreamed of the crime, got up, and summoned the innkeeper. As Nicholas prayed earnestly to God the three boys were restored to life and wholeness. In France the story is told of three small children, wandering in their play until lost, lured, and captured by an evil butcher. St. Nicholas appears and appeals to God to return them to life and to their families. And so St. Nicholas is the patron and protector of children.

First Friday : advent First week

Today, once again, he calls us to participate with Him in bringing His light to the world. We have plenty of examples of darkness in our world: violence, war, the culture of death, injustice, etc. That is why we are called to be messengers of light in our world.
If we can express in one word the reason for the decision to follow Jesus, we have to say that it is Faith. Faith is the first principle upon which every supernatural work is based upon. St. Augustine says: “Ground all of your works in faith, for the just man lives by faith and faith acts through love. May your works be based on faith; believing in God will make you faithful”
I Believe is the First article of the Creed and the New Catechism of the Catholic Church has a complete analysis of the virtue of faith. Faith is called: Man’s Response to God. The Catechism tells us “by faith, man completely submits his intellect and his will to God. It is a free assent to the whole truth that God has revealed…” faith is full of practical consequences. It is reflected in our conduct. It informs our whole life down to the last detail. We see things in the light of faith and act accordingly.
It is very appropriate today when we read of Jesus giving sight back to two blind men who expressed their confidence in him. “The Lord is my light,” goes the re­sponsorial psalm, “and my salvation” (Ps 27:1). The more we get to know ourselves (and that is a lifetime study), the more we recognize how blind we can be. We are blind often to our own irritating traits. We are blind to the generous and inspiring qualities of those closest to us. We are blind to the signs of God’s love and care for us in the world around us. We are blind to sources of beauty and joy around us.
As we share the Body and Blood of Christ today, a good prayer would be that this light shine in every corner of our soul and our life: “You are my light, my salvation, Lord” (Ps 27:1).

St Francis of Xavier
The Catholic Church commemorates the feast day of St. Francis Xavier today, the Spanish priest regarded as the "Patron of Foreign Missions."
Born in Pamplona, Spain in 1506, he was one of the first seven followers of St. Ignatius of Loyola.
In 1541, four years after his ordination, he was sent as a missionary to India where he preached in the Portuguese colony of Goa. Crossing the sea of Arabia and India, they landed at Goa on the 6th of May, in 1542,
To do what he did and to go where he did in the circumstances in which he did it, are really quite remarkable. But all he did was take the Lord seriously and become a missionary as a disciple of the Lord.
On the Arrival in Goa on May6th 1541 he immediately began to preach and was successful in making converts. To call down the blessing of heaven on his labors, St. Francis consecrated most of the night to prayer. Having spent the morning in assisting and comforting the distressed in the hospitals and prisons, he walked through all the streets of Goa, with a bell in his hand, summoning all masters, for the love of God, to send their children and slaves to catechism. The little children gathered in crowds about him, and he led them to the church and taught them the creed and practices of devotion, and impressed on their tender minds strong sentiments of piety and religion. By the modesty and devotion of the youth, the whole town began to change its face and the most abandoned sinners began to blush at vice.
The Feast of St. Francis Xavier commemorates the death of St. Francis Xavier, patron saint of Goa. Fondly called the Goincho Saib or the Lord of Goa, St. Xavier was a Spanish Jesuit missionary who preached Christianity in many parts of Asia. After achieving great success in Goa, St Xavier set sail for China but breathed his last at the Sancian Island, about 10-km from the mainland of China, on December 3, 1552 while he was waiting for a boat that would agree to take him to mainland China..He was first buried on a beach of Shangchuan Island. His incorrupt body was taken from the island in February 1553 and was temporarily buried in St. Paul's church in Malacca on 22 March, 1553. Pereira came back from Goa, removed the corpse shortly after April 15, 1553, and moved it to his house. The body was received in Goa on March 16th 1554 from Malacca which would be his final resting place. The body is now in the Basilica of Bom Jesus in Goa, where it was placed in a glass container encased in a silver casket on December 2, 1637.

Advent Tuesday first week : Be child Like relations to God
What he communicates to his followers here is the surprising truth that it is their very simplicity, their trusting childlike acceptance of his person that has qualified them to be recipients of the Father's revelation. They are more blessed than prophets and kings because it has pleased the Father to choose those who, like Jesus himself, are actuated by concern for pleasing the Father. They possess a high dignity, incomparably greater than the privileged of this world, not through ambition, nor because of their learning, power or influence, but, paradoxically, because God prefers the simple-hearted, those who approach him with the confident trust and love of children.
How do children differ from the learned and clever? The little ones are, in this contrast, individuals open to instruction, to learning something new, to being helped. If we bring a child-like willingness to be taught, to be led, and to be helped to the Savior, we open ourselves to the grace and power of this season. The childlikeness commended by the Lord consists in a willingness to believe that there is more to see and more to hear than we see and hear so far.
It is an absolute necessity that one must become like a child in order to enter the kingdom of Heaven. Now in order to be as a child, that means, on one level, to have complete confidence in one’s parents and to not worry about where things are going to come from. Little children do not worry about whether they are going to have a meal; they just assume that they will. They do not worry about whether they are going to have a roof over their head, but nonetheless they have confidence that all of these things are going to be taken care of. They just go. They just move on from one thing to the next and they do not worry about all the little things. That is the same kind of confidence we have to have.Become like a little child in the presence of God, to have that simplicity of a child which many of us find to be repulsive because we think that becoming more complex is the more impressive thing to do. In becoming more simple, we will become more childlike. That is exactly what Our Lord tells us we must do.
That is the kind of relationship Our Lord wants. to have those childlike traits, those virtues that we see only in little children: the complete confidence, the total love, the dedication, all of the things that a child is about. Those are the things God wants to see in us, to have that trust – total and complete trust in God – not worrying about everything, not upset about all kinds of things, not trying to control everything, just letting go and giving it all over to God; and when we have a difficulty, to come to Him; when we are having a great day, to come to Him. Any of you who are parents know how children are. They do not go very far from Mom and they make sure they pay a visit quite often. They are off playing all by themselves, they come racing over, grab her by the legs, go back, and play. A few minutes later, they come racing back, just want to sit on her lap for thirty seconds, and off they go to play again. They are constantly coming back. How many times a day do we check in with Our Lord? How far do we go away from the Lord? Little children always want to be right in the sight of their mother. They do not even like to be in the next room. We need to keep God always in our presence. No matter where we are, He is in our hearts if we are in the state of grace, but we need to keep our minds focused on Him. Be like a little child in the arms of God.

Advent Monday First week
A centurion was a military leader in the Roman army. His title means "commander of a hundred"; but a centurion may not have been a commander of a literal hundred soldiers. He may have been responsible for more than a hundred! At any rate, he was clearly a Roman commander of great significance.
This centurion was a humble man, a sensitive man deeply concerned for his servant, a man devoted to the needs of others rather to his own, a man who believed in the power of prayer. Ordinarily, a hardened Roman leader wouldn't be so personally affected when a servant became sick. But this centurion clearly loved and cared deeply for this "boy" who was his "servant". He was willing to go out of his way to save his beloved servant's life.
It is a mark of Christ-like character when we, who are in positions of leadership, show loving concern and care for those who are under us. That's how our Master Jesus treats us. Do those who are under you, or who work for you, know that they are loved by you? Do you love them so much that you bring them to Jesus?
In his request of Jesus, the Centurion teaches us much about prayer. First, when we go to Jesus for help, we ought to go confidently, knowing that he hears us. Secondly, our prayer ought to be selfless, on behalf of others and not in our own self-interest. Thirdly, our prayer should be rooted in the conviction that it will be answered.
His faith stands out because it is one that was placed confidently and completely in Jesus' authority as the Son of God. Matthew, under the leading of the Holy Spirit, encourages us to have the same sort of faith as the centurion.

Advent: First Sunday

Happy Advent to all of you who visit my pages. May God Bless you with His peace

First Sunday of Advent: A journey with Hope

My dear brothers and sisters in Jesus Christ,

Today is a special day, the beginning of a special season, Advent and the new liturgical Year B.
The Gospel of Mark, which begins in this First Sunday of Advent, was the first written Gospel. It was around 60AD…Christians were being persecuted in Rome by the anti-Christ, Nero. Peter and Paul had been recently executed in Rome, and it was to the Roman Christians that Mark wrote this Gospel. He wrote to bring hope … he wrote to remind them of the teaching of the Apostles (who were dying off) … and he wrote to remind them that “You do not know when the lord of the house is coming, whether in the evening, or at midnight, or at cockcrow, or in the morning.” So, therefore, be ready and alert. St. Paul (20 years earlier) reminded Jesus’ followers in his letter to the Corinthians (our second reading) that Jesus, Himself, would keep them firm to the end, irreproachable on the day of the Lord.
You may remember what I said about the wreath and the candles last year; but some of you asked me again I think it is a good time to repeat the meaning of it once more; the circle of the green wreath reminds us of God Himself, His eternity and endless mercy and Love, which has no beginning and end. The green of the wreath speaks of the hope that we have in God, the hope of newness, of renewal, of eternal life. Candles symbolize the light of God coming into the world through the birth of His Son. The four outer candles represent the period of waiting during the four Sundays of advent, which themselves symbolizes the four centuries of waiting between the prophet Malachi and the birth of Christ. The Advent color purple is the color of penitence fasting and solemn prayer as well as the color of royalty the Advent of the King, Our Lord Jesus Christ.
Three Candles are purple, symbolizing penance, preparation and sacrifice; the Pink candle symbolizes the same but highlights the Third Sunday of Advent, Gaudete Sunday, when we rejoice because our preparation is now half way finished. The Light reminds us that Jesus is the Light of the world that comes into the darkness of our lives to bring newness, life and hope. It also reminds us that we are called to be a light to the world as we reflect the light of God’s grace to others (Isa. 42:6).The Purple Candle is traditionally the candle of Expectation or Hope or Prophecy. The second purple Candle is the Peace Candle or Bethlehem or John the Baptist or Annunciation. Third Sunday Pink Candle is Joy Candle or Angels or Magi or proclamation. Fourth Sunday Purple Candle is the Candle of Love or Shepherds or Mary or Fulfillment.The Center Candle is the White and is called the Christ Candle. It is traditionally lighted on Christmas Eve or Day. The Center location of the Christ Candle reminds us that the incarnation is the heart of the season giving light to the world.
During Advent we focus on waiting, waiting for the Second Coming of Jesus, and during the week before Christmas our waiting changes to waiting for our celebration of the birth of Jesus. Anytime we wait we do so because we expect something to happen; we wait for a bus or train because we expect it to arrive. When we are waiting for a bus or train we cannot see it coming but hope it will come. During Advent we are waiting for the Second Coming of Jesus because the Second Coming of Jesus will bring all God’s plans for the world to completion. As we wait in hope for the Second Coming of Jesus we know he is with us in so many ways especially in the sacraments.
For those who are finding these times difficult for one reason or another the message of Advent is “Wait for God in patient hope.” God has not abandoned us, God is with us though sometimes our lack of faith prevents us from seeing him. Remember Jesus in the womb of Mary for nine months; Mary could not see Jesus but she knew that the Word had been made flesh and she was waiting in hope for his birth. Wait in patient hope for God to fulfill his plans in his own way in his own time.
Advent is not only about preparing for the celebration of Jesus’ birth at Christmas. We live between the first coming of Jesus when he was born at Bethlehem and his Second Coming at the end of time when he will come as Judge of all. Advent is also a time for us to reflect on the Second Coming of Jesus. So Advent is concerned with the two comings of Jesus; our preparation for the celebration of Jesus’ birth and our preparation for his Second Coming.
Stay Awake. Be prepared. If we go through life sleepwalking we might be caught unaware, like the people outside the ark at the time of the great flood. Noah was certainly not a sleepwalker. Noah was wide-awake. He was prepared. His neighbors thought him a fool, but Noah was prepared to meet the Lord. Like Noah we have faith. With Noah, we are in the ark, waiting in faith. Like Noah, we want to be prepared, and we want to stay awake, to be ready for Christ's arrival, for the coming of the light into the dark corners of our lives.
Today we light our first Advent candle. four weeks of traveling through the darkness toward the dawning light of Christmas day. Perhaps the darkness we travel through this year is the grief we still feel over the death of a loved one, or the ending of a friendship, lingering illness, or a conflict at work, a division with the family, or a scandal within our church. If Christmas is all about being "home for the holidays," then Advent is about traveling home. It's about staying awake and alert during the journey home so that we don't miss the exit off the highway.
Isaiah repeats himself at the close of the first reading, "Yet O Lord, you are our father," and add another image, "we are the clay and you the potter; we are all the work of your hands." God created us out of the clay of the earth. Now, as we begin this Advent season we ask our Heavenly father to remold us into a faithful people .
In the First Letter of Peter, St. Peter writes, “Be watchful and alert…your opponent, the Devil, is prowling like a lion, ready to devour you.”

Christ the King
My dear brothers and sisters in Jesus Christ,
Today on the last Sunday of the liturgical year we celebrate the Feast of Christ the King. CROWN identifies a King. Jesus is a King and he had a crown but one that is made of thorns. Moreover, he is not seated on a throne but is hanging on the cross. Christ as King is different from the kings we knew in this world in two ways he exercises his Kingship: FIRST, Jesus exercises his kingship by dying on the cross. By dying on the cross, Jesus is saying that his kingship is not about prestige and power but of SERVICE and SACRIFICE.
It seems to me that sometimes it is difficult for us to imagine Christ’ Kingdom or even just Jesus as a King. We usually think of a king as someone with a lot of authority and maybe with some personal privileges. We think a King should be able to protect himself from just about anything. Jesus Christ, the King, tells us that a true King does not fill himself up with possessions or surround himself with protection, but empties himself with love.
There is a beautiful passage from St. Augustine, "In Christ we are forever young." That is the way it will be for those incorporated into his being.
Prophet Ezekiel depicts the Lord God as a conscientious shepherd, concerned for the well-being of his flock. He not only sees to it they are well fed but protects them from danger and assists those who are weak or wounded. Still more remarkably, he searches out those who go astray and are in danger from wild beasts, being separated from the shepherd and the flock. In short, God watches with loving care over all his people, and none, weak or strong, wounded or healthy is devoid of his efficacious attentions. This concern for all is a characteristic of a true King. He has a personal and permanent relation to all those over whom he rules.
SECOND, Jesus will exercise his kingship not in this world but in the Kingdom he promised for all of us. In John 18:36, Jesus says that: “My kingdom is not of this world. If my kingdom where from this world, my followers would be fighting to keep me from being handed over to the Jews. But as it is, my kingdom is not from here.” This means that Christ is not a king like the rulers of the earth. His kingship does not depend upon the powers of this world and is not inspired by them. The first enemy to the Kingdom of Jesus is sin because “The kingdom of God cannot exist alongside the reign of sin” (Origen, priest):
We cannot forget that sin is, first of all, as our catechism teaches us “an offense against God”. It is a rejection of God and his kingdom.
Then we can see the consequences of sin in our lives and our society. There is war and terrorism; lack of justice and violence. The culture of death is still present in many ways. The dignity of the human person is not the basis for the common good. There is also our own personal weaknesses and sins. We are here today to reject sin and to tell Jesus that we want Him to reign in our own lives:
Then Jesus talks about the most important characteristic of his kingdom. It is charity. Love of God and love of others. We are not even asked to do things perfectly or in a heroic way, but to try to do simple things in a charitable way: Things that we all can do in our ordinary life.
Who among us cannot do some of these things, “you welcomed me, you visited me, and you gave me some food and drink”
The specific actions mentioned in the gospel today are (i) feeding the hungry, (ii) giving drink to the thirsty, (iii) clothing the naked, (iv) sheltering the homeless, (v) visiting those in prison, and (vi) taking care of the sick. Add (vii) burying the dead, and you got it; you have the traditional Seven Corporal Works of Mercy. The Final Judgment on whether we are true Christians or not, whether we belong to the kingdom of Christ or not, will be based on whether or not we have done the corporal works of mercy. This is our number one Christian obligation both as individual men and women and as a family of believers.
Whatever we do to the least of these needy children of God, these brothers and sisters of Jesus, we do to Jesus Himself.
What is our greatest need? The greatest need of all of us is ‘Our need for love.’ Each one of us, whoever we may be, married, single, priest, lay person, religious, we all need above all LOVE, to feel that we are loved, to believe that we are loved for ourselves, and to have someone for us to love. This is what our Divine Lord was talking about when he said, "Feed the hungry" and so on together with the physical needs.
A beautiful Christian ideal to have before us is that Jesus is present in my neighbor. Jesus is in the person next to me, the person behind me, in front of me, in the person with whom I live and work. One person in recent history who lived this is Mother Teresa of Calcutta.
Where will we get the power to love Jesus in others in this way as he asks in the Gospel today? (Matt 25:31-46) In a letter to the people of Albania on April 28th 1997 Mother Teresa gives the key to being able to see Jesus in others. The key to loving others is prayer. She wrote,
“To be able to love one another, we must pray much, for prayer gives a clean heart and a clean heart can see God in our neighbor. If now we have no peace, it is because we have forgotten how to see God in one another. If each person saw God in his neighbor, do you think we would need guns and bombs?”
Jesus’ idea of king and power is totally opposite to the world’s idea of a king and power. That is why the preface in today’s Mass describes Jesus’ kingdom as
a kingdom of truth and lifea kingdom of holiness and gracea kingdom of justice, love and peace.
In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

33rd Sunday:Parable of Talents: the third servant
My dear brothers and sisters in Jesus Christ,
Our attention in today's Gospel is immediately drawn to the third servant - the one who was given only one talent.
In the parable we hear about “a man going on a journey who summoned his slaves and entrusted his property to them; to one he gave five talents, to another two, to another one, to each according to his ability” (Matt 25:15). From the beginning of the story we are told that the servant who received just one talent is a man of little ability. Yet it is interesting to note that the master has a talent even for his relatively disabled servant. All God’s children have got their talents, even those who appear to have very minimal abilities in comparison with the more gifted ones. See here God gives to us according to our ability.
A "talent" is a biblical term for a large sum of money. The best estimate I was able to find is that it's roughly equivalent to 75 pounds of pure silver. I checked on the Internet this week, and silver was going for about $17.50 an ounce, or $280 a pound. That makes a talent worth about $21,000.
The other place I found said it was much higher. It said that a talent was worth about 6,000 drachmas. A drachma was a silver coin, and it was the standard day's wages for a worker. If you figure $7 an hour, times 8 hours a day, that's $56 a day – I know they worked longer hours back then, but stick with me – times 6,000 coins, that's $336,000.
Any way you look at it, a talent is a lot of money!
So, the master or the employer gives one person five of these talents – that's 375 pounds of silver. Another person gets two talents – 150 pounds. The third person gets one measly talent – just 75 pounds.
This third servant seems to be a rather unfortunate man and he makes us uncomfortable too because, in some ways, he reminds us of ourselves.
'... I was afraid ...' He digs a hole in the ground and buries his one talent. Why does he do that? Because he is afraid he is going to lose it if he trades with it. He must have reasoned like this: “Well, those with more talents can afford to take a risk. If they lost a talent, they could make it up later. But me, I have only one talent. If I lose it, end of story! So I better play it safe and just take care of it.” Many of us in the church are like this third servant. Because we do not see ourselves as possessing outstanding gifts and talents, we conclude that there is nothing that we do. The third guy's basic problem was fear. He didn't want to make a mistake. He'd been watching the market go down and down and down the way it has recently. And he didn't want to lose the money he'd been entrusted with. I think he was just like us. We talk a lot about using our talents, but a whole lot of the things God gives us are never used. We're afraid. God gives us everything. If we happen to think that we have so little that there is nothing to share and give to others, then we are like the ‘one’ with the one talent who buried it. We're afraid. So we bury them. We bury them just like the third guy in today's story.
Some of us surely feel like the third one – untrustworthy and poorly equipped to bring about any real change in the world. Others may have the confidence of the first slave, but the same results as the third. We simply hang on to what we have – be it money or skill – rather than risk it to accomplish more.
Our medieval ancestors in the faith were so moved the implications of this story that they coined the word “talent” as a term to describe any ability that God might have given us. It was a reminder to them – and to us – that our skills and our insights, our minds and our bodies, our interests and our specialties are all resources that can be used to change the world. It is also a reminder that these things, alongside any material wealth we might have, are not ours. They are not a birthright. They are a trust, given us by the One who has created us.
And that One expects … demands … a return on that investment.

I know this won’t be a good example but just take the current issue. Our elected President Barak Obama when he decide to stand for the presidential election, he could have thought of like this “who am I! I am just a black American, no Back American in the history of America stayed in the White house as a president, I am just young man who has no much experience in politics, my party opponent is senator Hilary Clinton. So I won’t win. Why should I waist my money.” He didn’t stop. He didn’t bury his talents he tried and he won the election. “If you wanna win, you got to play.”
A man got mad with God. “God,” he said, I have been praying daily for three years that I should win the state lottery. You told us to ask and we shall receive. How come I never received all these three years I have been asking?” Then he heard the voice of God, loud and clear. “My dear son,” says God. “Please do me a favor and buy a lottery ticket.”
The problem we face is that our hearts and souls are too often filled with an emotional fear, a negative fear that causes us not to act, that leads us into a selfish gathering of things that we keep only for ourselves. It is a paralyzing fear that leads us to be like turtles hiding inside a thick outer shell that prevents us from loving others, that keeps others at a distance, and that isolates in a self-imposed hell of loneliness.
Booker T. Washington was right on target when he said that “Success is to be measured not so much by the position that one has reached in life as by the obstacles that one has overcome while trying to succeed.”
Yes dear brothers and sisters learn how to count our blessings and count them. St. Paul reminds us [Romans 8:15], we are not heirs of a spirit of slavery and fear; we are children, adopted and claimed by the spirit of God.

Dedication of Lateran Basilica :We are the Temple of God

My dear brothers and sisters in Jesus Christ,
Today we celebrate this feast in honor of the Dedication of the Lateran Basilica. The Church of Saint John Lateran is the cathedral church of the Archdiocese of Rome–Saint Peter’s Basilica is not the cathedral church of Rome–so this is the Pope’s cathedral. Today, perhaps with good reason, all the major basilicas of Rome are considered more or less cathedrals of the Pope. It is an ancient building. There is not a saint by the name of Saint John Lateran, but rather it is a church named after Saint John the Evangelist and The Lateran, the land which once belonged to the noble Roman family, the Laterani, was given to the bishop of Rome by the Roman emperor, Constantine. That is how it has its name.
We have the physical church building, we have the new and eternal Jerusalem (in other words, the eternal temple of God in heaven), and then we have the temple which is our own body. In order to be able to truly understand what the dignity of this feast is, we have to be able to understand each of these elements. I think all of us would understand reasonably well the dignity of the eternal temple in heaven, but also I think we all see the importance and the dignity of the church building. But the problem is that we are the living members, the living stones, that make up that eternal Jerusalem and it is the dignity of our own self that most of us tend to miss.

Once, a woman in a coma was dying. She suddenly had a feeling she was taken up to heaven and stood before the judgment Seat.
Who are you?” a voice said to her.
“I am the wife of the mayor,” she replied.
“I did not ask you whose wife you are but who you are”
“I am the mother of four children.”
“I did not ask whose mother you are, but who you are”
“I am a school teacher.”
“I did not ask you what your profession is but who you are.”
And so it went. NO matter what she replied, she did not seem to give a satisfactory answer to the question, “Who are You?”
“I am a Christian.”
“I did not ask what your religion is but who you are.”
“I am the one who went to church every day and always helped the poor and the needy.”
“I did not ask you what you did but who you are.”
She evidently failed the examination for she sent back to earth. When she recovered from her illness she determined to find out who she was. And that made all the difference.
Your duty is to be. Not to be somebody, not to be nobody- for therein lies greed and ambition-not to be this or that- and thus become conditioned-but just to be.
Yes dear brothers and sisters, do you know who you are? In today’s readings, St Paul is giving an idea that you are the temple of God. And the Spirit of God dwells in you (1Cor. 3:11-17) .This Holy Spirit dwells in us personally and individually, but also dwells in us as the chosen people, the community saved by the death and resurrection of Christ Jesus. If we do not recognize the dignity of our own temple, which is a microcosm of the new and eternal Jerusalem, and which in fact is a living member of that new and eternal Jerusalem, then we will have no part of it. The body, as Saint Paul says, is not made for immorality. It is made for holiness, so we are to use our bodies to express in the physical world what it means to be an image of God, to show in a physical way what it means to live as members of Jesus Christ and as children of God.
Prophet Ezekiel presents us with the image of water flowing from the temple. This water is the blood of Christ poured out for us, it is the Holy Spirit poured on us, and it is the love of the Father embracing us. Whatever this water touches brims with life. My dear brothers and sisters, it is the right time to think whether the living water of God is flowing from us, the temples of God.
At first glance, this reading seems to be about the Temple building and the need to keep that space holy. In order to pay the required Temple tax, people had to convert their Roman and Greek pagan coins into religiously correct, imageless currency. For the sacrifices, most people purchased unblemished animals from the Temple markets - doves, sheep and cattle, a range of animals for a range of budgets. Most could only afford the cheapest option. A dove that cost 15 cents on the streets of Jerusalem cost $15 in the Temple market. These were expensive burdens for the mostly impoverished faithful, who sacrificed mightily to travel from all corners of the empire to Jerusalem. Jesus was enraged because the merchants were mistreating the people, overcharging and cheating the poor who came to worship. Jesus knew that the great Temple itself would be destroyed. Jesus also knew that God had made his dwelling place not in a building, but in “his Father’s house”, the House of Israel, the people themselves.
When the temple priests tried to stop Jesus, Jesus told the people that if the temple was destroyed He could rebuild it in three days. They thought Jesus was talking about the actual temple (the building) which had taken forty-six years to build. But Jesus meant the temple of his own body, which would be destroyed by death (He would die on the cross) but His body would be raised to life again after three days.
This is a radical shift in perspective. In that day, religions taught that God had to be found in certain designated places, such as the Temple building or at Jacob’s mountain in Samaria. Now Jesus is saying something entirely new. He is saying that God can be found in each person’s own heart and soul. As Paul says in the Second Reading, we ourselves are “God’s building.… The temple of God, and the Spirit of God dwells” in each one of us.
We are the living stones, and we carry the church around with us wherever we go. Each of us has a small part of the whole, and it is our job to put those pieces together, day by day and year by year. This is how the church of Jesus lives on. And make no mistake; it would be easier just to build a big stone temple. Anybody can build a building. It’s much more of a challenge and exciting and rewarding to build a community. And we all together form that community; the Church.
In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.
Amen.

30th :Love God And Neighbor
My dear brothers and sisters in Jesus Christ,
Jesus is asked about the greatest commandment in the law. The book answer, of course is love of God. But Jesus does not stop there. He goes on to give a more practical answer. True love of God and true love of neighbor is practically one and the same thing.
For Jesus, true love must express itself in three dimensions. These three dimensions are (a) love of God, (b) love of neighbor, and (c) love of oneself. The first two are positively commanded; the last one is not commanded but presumed to be the basis of all loving. The commandment to love your neighbor as yourself presumes that you love yourself.
Our love of God is manifested in how we love the neighbor. (And by neighbor, the gospel writer is not talking about the guy next door. It is any person, and most especially any person that we would rather not love, indeed, perhaps, an enemy). “If anyone says, ‘I love God,’ but hates his brother, he is a liar; for whoever does not love a brother whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen. This is the commandment we have from him: whoever loves God must also love his brother” (1 John 4:20-21).
Perhaps, the image of the cross is the best that captures this creative tension between love of God and love of neighbor. The cross would not be the cross without the two beams. The vertical beam corresponds to our love of God; it is the foundation for the entire enterprise, but it is not a cross. The horizontal beam corresponds to our love of neighbor. It is built upon the vertical, and without the vertical it would fall, and it itself, is not a cross. It is the arms outstretched in a sign of total and radical self-giving to and for others. Only the two together make the cross, the love of God and the love of neighbor. And yet, our love of God is primarily displayed in how we love our neighbor, how our arms are outstretched.To direct us all our lives to love God with our heart soul and mind, God has given us guidelines, the Ten Commandments.
The first three of the Ten Commandments show us how to love God. The next seven commandments show us how to love our neighbor.
How do we love?
A little girl had a brother who was in need of a bone marrow transplant in order to survive. Now this brother was not always particularly nice to her…in fact, as big brothers sometimes do, he picked on her quite a bit. As she was the perfect match for her brother, her parents came to the little girl and asked if she would agree to donate her marrow to allow her brother to live. She thought about it quietly, then, said simply, “Yes.” On the morning of the procedure, as the little girl was being prepped for the transplant, she looked up at her mother and asked, “Mommy, will it hurt when I die?” She mistakenly thought that she would have to lose her life so that her brother might keep his. She truly loved God. And this is the kind of love to which we are called. A total self-gift. Holding nothing back. No, we don’t always have to die physically…but we do need to die to self – to put others first.
If you are going to love someone with all your heart, soul and mind, you are going to be completely focused on that person. Jesus wants us to live our day to day lives in a loving, intimate relationship with God.
Then Jesus goes on to say our relationship with God is connected to our relationship with others. By adding the second commandment – loving your neighbor as yourself – Jesus was telling them how to love God. He was calling them to action. Not simply the feeling of emotional love, but an active love of total self-gift to our fellow human kind.
What would it mean to love our neighbors as ourselves? First of all, we have to love ourselves, which means we have to be nice to ourselves, to be merciful and nonviolent to ourselves, to forgive ourselves, and to treat ourselves with kindness. Every one of us needs to work on this, to be kind to ourselves. Loving ourselves in a proper way is necessary for us to love others. Why? The answer lies in an old Latin phrase, Nemo quod dat non habet - you can't give what you yourself don't possess. In other words, you can't love others correctly and in a proper way unless you have loved yourself enough first. Here, Jesus presumes that loving others is preceded by loving ourselves in a proper way.
You cannot be a loving person who shows compassion and mercy to others if you first do not show compassion and mercy to yourself.
My dear brothers and sisters, we almost never violate our beliefs. We hardly ever act against what we really believe. We live in line with our beliefs - not always with what we say we believe, but with what we actually believe. So if you want to change someone's lifestyle or behavior, what are you going to have to do? You're going to have to change the way they see things, how they believe about things, their understanding of things. If I want to change my mind and my beliefs about that thing, I've got to study and reflect and think about it until I get to the point where I find myself believing it.
To The World You Might Be One Person; But To One Person You Might Be the World. Love your God and Love your neighbor as yourself.
In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.
Amen.

29th :Give to Caesar what belongs to Caesar
My dear brothers and sisters in Jesus Christ,
Jesus' enemies, having heard the good news about God's compassionate and reconciling love that Jesus had preached. They weren't interested in it. All they thought about was their own power. So they wanted to trick Jesus.
The Pharisees and the Herodians, religious and political parties respectively, teamed up to entrap Jesus. The Pharisees were opposed to taxation by the Romans. On the other hand the Herodians, as supporters of King Herod, felt there was an obligation to pay the tax. And so the Pharisees, in the presence of the Herodians, asked Jesus, “is it lawful to pay the census tax to Caesar or not?” If Jesus had answered “yes, it is lawful,” the Pharisees would have had justification to persecute him. If he answered “no, it is not lawful,” the Herodians would have arrested him for opposing the tax. It’s a real trap more than we can expect. But Jesus, as he so often did, provided the perfect answer, saving himself from punishment by either party while teaching us something at the same time. He answered, “repay to Caesar what belongs to Caesar and to God what belongs to God.” In saying this, Jesus acknowledged that both Caesar and God have certain rights. Neither party could arrest him.
The question was whether one should give (Greek didômi) tribute to Caesar. But Jesus' answer spoke of giving back, paying back (paradidômi), as if one already owed something. Jesus’ answer could be paraphrased as: "Give back to Caesar what is Caesar's due, and to God what is God's due." Instead of answering the direct question of whether one should pay the forced tribute to Caesar or not, Jesus raises the question to another level, that of the principle of justice. Greek philosophers before Jesus defined justice as "giving back to everyone what is their due." Jesus seems to be saying that the only binding obligation is that of justice, that of giving back to every person what is due to them. Serving God is basically a matter of justice? If God has given us all that we are and have, then we are bound in justice to give back to God some gratitude, loyalty, and service. The central act of Christian worship is called Eucharist, which means "thanksgiving." It is basically a question of paying back the debt of gratitude we owe to God.
The answer our Lord gives has very serious implications for you and for me. First, it means that you and I have dual citizenship: in the kingdom of heaven and in the kingdom of earth. Second, it means that our citizenship in heaven and all that it demands must serve as the litmus test for how we conduct ourselves as citizens on earth. This makes sense: how we behave here will help decide whether or not we reach our heavenly citizenship. Third, it causes us to consider the role of the Catholic in public life. We have a civic duty. Tell me brothers and sisters, if it is not a law or mandatory to come to the Sunday Mass; will you all be here today? And if there is no Law in this free world what will be our future? Bishop Robert J. Herman, the administrator of the Archdiocese of St. Louis, asked the faithful to consider what kind of witness they give to God when they enter the voting booth on Election Day.
Jesus asked to bring a coin and The inscription on this coin reads “Caesar Augustus Tiberius, son of the Divine Augustus.” To Jesus, this was blasphemous: the coin claims that Augustus was a god.
One interpretation of Jesus’s words was that he was making an analogy — the coin is made on the orders of the emperor and is stamped with the image of the emperor, and the emperor may call on you to give it to him in tribute; by analogy, you were made by God and in God’s image, and you must therefore devote your life in tribute to God, rather than Caesar.
Tertullian, (in De Idololatria,) interprets Jesus’ saying to render “the image of Caesar, which is on the coin, to Caesar, and the image of God, which is on man, to God; so as to render to Caesar indeed money, to God yourself. Otherwise, what will be God’s, if all things are Caesar’s?”
So we give to Caesar what is Caesar’s and to God what is God’s. Give God what is God’s? What is God’s? If God is the Creator, then it’s not enough to say that everything belongs to God. It’s even more than that. We are all in God. The world and the cosmos and time and space and everything else. It’s mind boggling that God takes interest in anything in this world. Anything that we can give. God doesn’t just want anything. It’s not like he needs money. Or food. Or anything. Actually, in the Bible, God says a couple of times that it’s not sacrifice that he desires. He even said that he is repulsed by stuff that people bring him. All the festivals and ceremonies. What does God want from us? Is it not us that he wants? He wants me and you, the real me and you. He wants me to seek him, like he’s real, and like he’s what matters most. I used to bring God my religious self, not my plain self. I still do sometimes. But he wants to have a frank relationship with me. He doesn’t want to be my religion. He wants to be my God. God wants to see me be like him. In the same passage where he says he doesn’t want sacrifices, he says he wants mercy. He wanted to see his heart and compassion in people. But people were selfish and ruthless and mean to each other.
This week, as you go about whatever God has called you to do, see in the works that you do, the hand of God building His Kingdom, one act, one brick ,one small act of love at a time. And know that in the end, you can look back and see that the house of love that you've helped build is the Kingdom that God has prepared for all of us, from the beginning of time. And that is what the missionaries are doing; doing their duty as citizen of Heaven and citizen of earth. Helping others to become the citizens of heaven. No matter how little, if that is the best you could, that is good enough for God. In the final analysis, it is not your ability that counts, but your availability and your mentality.
In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.
Amen.

28th :Parable of the Vineyard and wicked tenants
My dear brothers and sisters in Jesus Christ,
Parables are narrative time bombs. The parables were meant to blast people into new awareness, new understandings, and new ideas.
This parable is one of only three that appears in all of the synoptic gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke. Curiously, some of Jesus' best-known parables (like the Good Samaritan) occur in one gospel alone but nowhere else. Only the parables of The Sower, The Mustard Seed, and The Tenants get repeated in the synoptic gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke.
Today's gospel calls for responsibility and accountability in our dealings with God, which include our dealings with our fellow human beings.
Let us also identify all the players of the parable. The vineyard is the nation of Israel -- the chosen people of God. The owner of the vineyard is God. The tenants are the religious leaders of Israel who were responsible for the cultivation of fruitful holiness and the wellbeing of the people of Israel. The servants sent by the landowner are the prophets who God sent to warn, to encourage, to challenge and to reassure; yet they were often greeted with threats of violence and even death. The son in the story is Jesus who is sent by His heavenly Father.
The parable teaches us a lot about God and how God relates to us. First we see the PROVIDENCE of God. "There was a landowner who planted a vineyard, put a fence around it, dug a wine press in it, and built a watchtower"(Matthew 21:33a). Before God entrusts a responsibility to you, He makes provision for all that you will need in carrying out the responsibility.
"Then he leased it to tenants and went to another country" (verse 33b). This shows God's TRUST in us. We all have at least received life from God. Life is given to us in trust. We are expected to cultivate and manage this life in such a way that it bears good fruit - fruit that we can present to God the owner of our lives on the day of reckoning. God does not stand looking over our shoulders, policing us to make sure we do the right thing. God leaves the job to us and goes on vacation to a far country, so to say. God trusts that we will do the right thing. Unfortunately many of us don't. The story also highlights God's PATIENCE with us. God sends messenger after messenger to the rebellious managers who would not render to God what is His due. Our God is a patient God. Just as the landowner sent several servants in multiple waves to collect his payment of produce, God also seemingly gives us chance after chance to respond to his unique call to us. Do we recognize and appreciate the patience of God? With each messenger, God provides another chance for us to put an end to rebellion and do the right thing. Finally there comes a last chance. God plays His last card and sends His only son. If we miss this last chance, then we've missed it. In the end we see God's JUDGMENT in which rebellious humanity lose their very lives, and their privileges are transferred to others who are more promising. The picture is that of a provident, trusting, patient, but also just God.
There is lot more to understand. First we see human PRIVILEGE. Like the managers of the vineyard, everything we have is a privilege and not a merit. This is what we mean when we say that everything is God's grace. Grace is unmerited favor. Another word for this is privilege. Life itself is a privilege which can be taken away from any of us at any moment. Privilege comes, however, with RESPONSIBILITY. We are ultimately responsible and accountable to God for the way we use or abuse our God-given privileges. God has given us all that we need to make a judicious use of all our privileges, yet we retain the ability to abuse them. This is called FREEDOM.
St John Vianney used to try to move his people to love one another, to love God, to be faithful to their Mass, to their marriage partner but he couldn’t and he wept. They asked him ‘Why do you cry?’ and he said ‘because you won’t’.
In the final verses of this parable, Jesus asked, “Didn’t you ever read in the Scriptures? Psalm 118:22 ‘The stone rejected by the builders has now become the Cornerstone. This is the Lord’s doing, and it is marvelous to see.’” Ephesians 2:20 tells us that Jesus is the chief corner stone in the structure of God’s house (see Psalm 118:22, Isaiah 28:16).
What is the vineyard now? The vineyard for us is everything God has given to us. We are the tenants looking after the vineyard that God has given to us. What is our attitude to the vineyard? You and I are tenants of many vineyards.
The vineyard of your marriage: are you looking after it? Is it bearing proper fruit?
The vineyard of your family: mother – father; son – daughter?
The vineyard of this parish: Are we listening to the Word of God, living it, proclaiming it? Are we drawing others to Christ?
And finally, each one of us is the tenant of a special vineyard called our soul. It is the most important vineyard of all. What condition is it in? Is it bearing fruit?
Are we grateful for everything God has given to us? Are we like the tenants acting as if we own everything God has given to us and forgetting that we are to produce fruit for God? Are we forgetting about the Giver who has given us all these beautiful gifts?
Yes dear brothers and sisters in John 15:16 Jesus says, “I chose you from the world to go out and bear fruit, fruit that will last.”
In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.
Amen.