To know that He is Lord

Solemnity of Christ the King 2021

As we come to the end of a second year of this pandemic, two years marked by lockdowns, social-economic upheaval, rising unemployment, businesses closed, disruption of our sacramental lives and all our plans, deaths of friends and loved ones, we look back and come to realise how fragile our lives have really been. These disruptions have cascaded in ways that seem novel and imaginatively overwhelming. All of a sudden, we see before us something we have perhaps talked about before, but never really faced personally. Suddenly we must “stay home,” keep a safe distance from others, turn to ourselves. And we are, surprisingly, afraid!

One reason why this has been a major crisis in so many lives is because we have been living in a bubble, believing that everything is under our control. Both medical and technological advancements have given us a false sense of security - we are enveloped by a delusional sense of impregnability and immortality. We are so cut off from our past that we have forgotten that our experience is not unique. Many in previous generations took for granted—in ways that are unthinkable to us—that life was not predictable, diseases, the inability to travel, death at an early age or in infancy—were a part of life. We have largely forgotten this until this pandemic hit us with a harsh reality check.

Many believe that this crisis has shaken our faith in God because it has disturbed our assumptions about God’s benign supervision and His ability to control suffering. But I choose to see it differently. I believe that it is this false faith we have in ourselves and in the infallibility of science which has been shaken. If this crisis has done anything, it has drawn us back to acknowledge once again, the utmost sovereignty of God over the universe. He alone is God, not man.

COVID-19 calls us to learn again from our forbearers, who looked to Scripture’s descriptions of God’s agency in times of disaster as a compass for their own times. Modern man only attempts to demythologise these stories and provide them with a plausible rational explanation devoid of God’s agency. One obvious place to turn, is to the story of the plagues visited upon Pharaoh and Egypt, at the time of the Hebrews’ deliverance from slavery. One can note a key difference between Moses and Pharaoh. Moses recognises God in extraordinary events. Pharaoh does not. Despite experiencing one remarkable plague after another, Pharaoh refuses to believe. His failure to do so because he thought of himself as the true ruler, the true king of his empire. God describes the purpose of the ten plagues clearly: they are not punishment. They are an invitation to know God: “The Egyptians shall know that I am the Lord, when I stretch out my hand against Egypt and bring the Israelites out from among them” (Exodus 9:15-16).

Likewise, this pandemic has also provided us with an opportunity to know and acknowledge the sovereignty of God. Though, it often doesn’t feel this way, this pandemic has been a reminder that we are first and foremost recipients—and not the creators—of all that is good in our lives. We are not in control and there is some sense of relief in knowing that. Could you imagine the total mess we are capable of making if we were really in-charge of the universe and all that happens therein? Many dictators have attempted to assert this, only to leave millions of people dead and a trail of destruction in their path, in seeking to create a utopia of their own design. As we work for the Kingdom, we are not building a utopia here on earth. Our duty is not to bring the Kingdom into existence, nor is the Kingdom something we build ourselves. The Kingdom is brought and built by the King – our duty is to serve the King.

Who is that King that we serve? I believe you know the answer. Our Lord Jesus Christ is our King and yet, He tells Pontius Pilate in today’s gospel: “Mine is not a kingdom of this world.” Why is our Lord’s Kingdom different?  Our Lord is not just highlighting the difference between His kingship and that of worldly models, but also suggesting that His kingship will appear differently in this world and in the age to come.

We must distinguish between the Kingdom of Christ on this earth and that which He exercises in eternity. In Heaven, His reign is one of glory and sovereignty. Here, in time, it is mysterious, humble and hidden. Although appearances may seem misleading, Jesus, is in fact, the Supreme Lord of every single thing in the universe, including the sub microscopic virus. This is what the Second Vatican Council declared, “here on earth the kingdom is mysteriously present; when the Lord comes, it will enter into its perfection” (Gaudium et Spes 39). This is what He meant when He said that His Kingdom is not of this world.

Times like this remind us that we are still fragile mortals living in a fallen world, under the ancient curse upon creation and that the Kingdom of God in its fullness is still the future. When the city of Rome burned from foreign invasion in 410 AD, St Augustine penned the City of God from his diocese in North Africa to assure that, while earthly hopes are being shaken and shattered, the eternal promises of God's Kingdom for the future, remain certain.

Times like this are also opportunities for the Church on earth to show what she truly believes, by exhibiting an unshakable faith and hope in her Sovereign King, while continuing to do good in love toward one another. In dark times, especially, be on the lookout and watch for extraordinary rays of light, faith, hope, and love. We might not all be called to the frontlines of caring for the sick, but there are other ways we can show loving concern and compassion toward others during this time of crisis, and certainly, our response through this disruption will reflect where we place our hopes, and the strength of our faith, before a watching world. The Church will come through this, as it has in times past, though not without scars, but then that too was how our Lord appeared to His disciples after His resurrection – scars, wounds and all. Likewise, the scars of the Church are not proof of her defeat, but evidence of her Divine Spouse’s victory over sin and death.

Provision for the Journey

Nineteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time Year B

The first reading gives us this poignant story of an angel of the Lord providing strength and encouragement in the form of a meal to the prophet Elijah, who is languishing in despair and on the verge of suicide. Think of it as a spiritual “Happy Meal.” This physical sustenance, which is also spiritual in nature, prefigures the Eucharist. The story of Elijah’s bread is also reminiscent of one of the wondrous items found in the fantabulous stories of J.R. Tolkien. Fans of Tolkien may know that he was a devout Catholic and that his writings made no secret of his Catholic faith. Of all the Catholic parallels in his writings, lembas, the Elven way bread, is perhaps the strongest as it bears a striking resemblance to the Eucharist.

The attributes of this Elvish bread and instructions on how to eat it are described in Tolkien’s book, “Eat a little at a time, and only at need. For these things are given to serve you when all else fails… One will keep a traveler on his feet for a day of long labour.” Yes, this bread is strength for the weary and food for the journey!

This is how we describe Holy Communion for someone near to, or in danger of dying - Viaticum, a Latin word which literally means “provision (or food) for the journey”. Just as the characters of Tolkien’s universe received renewed strength and purpose to complete their mission, the Eucharist received as Viaticum, gives renewed strength in body and spirit to those who are sick and dying, and in fact to all of us who trod through the “shadow of the valley of death.” Tolkien was most certainly aware of this connexion when he wrote to his son with these words, “"The only cure for sagging or fainting faith is Communion.”

The allusion to food for the journey is similarly found in today’s gospel - the second instalment to the Bread of Life Discourse. The gospel begins with a controversy: the crowds found it disturbing that our Lord should describe Himself as the Bread that comes down from heaven. They were scandalised not because of His use of this metaphor nor because they thought that He was speaking literally instead of figuratively. He had yet to associate that bread with His flesh. The real reason is that they found it arrogant on His part to even claim that He was on par with both Moses and the manna, which Moses made to fall from heaven.

Last Sunday’s passage gives us the context for today. The crowds had asked the Lord for a sign as proof that He had come from God, and they cited the manna as an example of the kind of sign they’re looking for. In response, our Lord tells them that the manna foreshadowed the “true bread from heaven” that God would give His people, and then He unabashedly announces that He Himself (and ultimately his body and blood in the Eucharist) is the “bread which came down from heaven”. If you understand that the Exodus is the defining event of their identity and covenantal relationship with God, you would understand His audience’s outrage. No one would dare to claim that there is something greater than the event of the Exodus and its hero, Moses. But here comes our Lord Jesus claiming exactly that.

When our Lord says that His flesh is given “for the life of the world”, He means that His flesh is the new manna, the “true bread from heaven” that is intended to sustain all of us on our journey to our heavenly homeland, just as the manna in the Old Testament fed the Israelites on their journey to the Promised Land. But this is no mere equivalence. Our Lord makes this stark distinction: “Your fathers ate the manna in the desert and they are dead; but this is the bread that comes down from heaven, so that a man may eat it and not die.” Although the manna sustained the Israelites on their journey to the Promised Land just as lembas did for the hobbits, neither form of sustenance could guarantee them immortality. Where these foods failed, the Eucharist succeeds in providing us with the antidote to death and the elixir immortality.

The Eucharist quite literally sustains our spiritual lives. Without it, as the Lord says, we “have no life” in us. In other words, it helps to sustain the life of grace within us, the grace that we receive at baptism and that we believe will flower into the life of heaven once we die, just as earthly food sustains our physical lives. As the Catechism of the Catholic Church explains, the Eucharist “preserves, increases, and renews the life of grace,” “separates us from sin,” and “preserves us from future mortal sins” (CCC 1392-1393, 1395). The Eucharist is food for our journey home, food that helps us to survive the hostile desert of this world and to arrive safely at our heavenly homeland.

As we witness how this pandemic continues to claim new victims despite severe lockdown measures and without any hint of an end to this suffering, I can assure you of this, just when you feel like giving up and resigning yourself to despair, our Lord will send help from heaven, as Elijah discovered in the first reading.  Like Elijah’s bread, which took him from black despair to strength of purpose and clarity of mission, the Eucharist can take us from the darkness of the moment and empower us for the voyage ahead. For now, you cannot receive our Lord in Holy Communion in a physical way, but only do so spiritually. But do not lose sight of your purpose and God’s sovereignty over our situation. He will not let us be tested beyond our endurance but will continue to feed us with the spiritual food of His invisible grace until He can feed us with the true bread from heaven, the Eucharist, when you return to church.

In a letter to his son, Michael, Tolkien gives the following advice, an advice which is most certainly meant for us all, especially today,

“Out of the darkness of my life, so much frustrated, I put before you the one great thing to love on earth: the Blessed Sacrament… There you will find romance, glory, honour, fidelity, and the true way of all your loves on earth, and more than that: Death: by the divine paradox, that which ends life, and demands the surrender of all, and yet by the taste—or foretaste—of which alone can what you seek in your earthly relationships (love, faithfulness, joy) be maintained, or take on that complexion of reality, of eternal endurance, which every man’s heart desires.”

Sir, give us this bread always

Eighteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time Year B

Last week, we took a break from our marathon reading of Saint Mark’s gospel as we read St John’s version of the miracle of the multiplication of loaves and the feeding of the multitude. This week we continue with the first instalment of the discourse on the Bread of Life which is unique to the Fourth Gospel. Like the other discourses in Saint John’s gospel, we see our Lord expounding a theological truth in the course of a dialogue - a back and forth exchange with His audience. And like other exchanges, we can’t help but smile at how the message of our Lord flies over the heads of His audience.

After having heard our Lord say that it was not Moses who gave their ancestors bread from heaven but it was His Father who is the real source of that live-giving bread, the crowd immediately demands a share in this wondrous food: “Sir give us that bread always.” In response to their request, our Lord gives this enigmatic answer, “I am the bread of life. He who comes to me will never be hungry; he who believes in me will never thirst.” The irony of this story is that this crowd who had pursued our Lord with such eagerness to get more of Him, would turn their backs on Him after He had done explaining the true meaning of these words.

In both the first reading as well as in the gospel, we see people acting out of a sense of entitlement rather than gratitude. The Israelites complained to Moses about their lack of food. They had forgotten that it was God who had liberated them from the misery of slavery. Strangely, God in His mercy rewarded them by raining down manna from heaven. Similarly, the crowds in the gospel demand that our Lord gives them this “bread of God … which comes down from heaven and gives life to the world,” despite having feasted on a sumptuous meal of miraculously multiplied bread and fish. Instead of reprimanding them for their greed and sense of entitlement, our Lord provides them with this life-saving truth of the Bread of Life - our Lord Himself is that very Bread of Life. Yes, our Lord is truly, really and substantially present in the Eucharist today, the true bread of heaven that gives life to the world.

In these past few months where many of you have been forced to observe intermittent fasting from the Eucharist due to the lockdowns, I hope that you have had the opportunity to reflect deeply on the mystery of the Eucharist and the privilege of receiving Holy Communion. In the past, when Masses and Holy Communion were readily available, and many took it for granted because of its unobstructed accessibility, many may have unknowingly suffered a loss of the sense of the sacredness for this sacrament. As the adage goes, “familiarity breeds contempt.”

We often forget that receiving our Lord in the Blessed Sacrament is a privilege rather than a right. If it is a right, then God and the Church owes us a duty to dispense it to us without questioning our motives or disposition. But if it is a privilege, then the Eucharist is a pouring forth of God’s beneficent grace to the undeserving, a privilege which we should never take lightly. And this is why we pray this at every Mass before receiving Holy Communion: “Lord, I am not worthy to receive you under my roof, but only say the word and I shall be healed.” This sense of unworthiness is also reflected in one of the two prayers said by the priest quietly before he receives the body and blood of Christ: “May the receiving of your Body and Blood, Lord Jesus Christ, not bring me to judgment and condemnation, but through your loving mercy be for me protection in mind and body and a healing remedy.”

The teaching and practice of the Church is rather clear. We receive Holy Communion only when we are in communion with God and His Church. In order to receive Holy Communion, a Catholic must be in a state of grace, meaning that no mortal sins have been committed. If one is in a state of mortal sin, then it is necessary to have those sins forgiven in the Sacrament of Penance before receiving Holy Communion. That discipline is based on the clear teaching of Saint Paul, who says that to receive the Eucharist unworthily is to invite condemnation (1 Corinthians 11:29). Saint Paul was encouraging the church to live the faith authentically, entirely and with integrity.

We who profess the faith of the Church, must live as the church commands us because through His Church, Jesus Christ calls us to repentance, forgiveness and holiness. To approach the Eucharist otherwise is to condemn ourselves at the altar of the Lord. That is why we say that the Holy Eucharist, both offers us “a healing remedy” for those who are properly disposed, but can be poisonous for those who are not. This risk comes with our freedom to live lives that are coherent or incoherent; lives that are consistent with God’s truth or not. To approach the Eucharist casually and without the fear of possible condemnation is to risk one’s eternal salvation. That is why when the Church trivialises the danger of an unworthy reception of the Eucharist, she fails to properly love those who continue to jeopardise their souls.

To modern ears, the above may sound unmerciful and unloving. Yes, love is indeed merciful, but authentic love is also truthful. Our Lord in His ministry gives us many examples: Saint Peter and the apostles, the woman caught in adultery, Zacchaeus, and the Samaritan woman. Love acknowledges that condemnation is within reach. It recognises that how we approach the altar and the reception of the Eucharist requires a sense of the sacred which is preceded by a healthy fear of the Lord.

The Eucharist is a gift, not an entitlement, and the sanctity of that gift is only diminished by unworthy reception. While it is likely that too many receive the Eucharist in a state that is objectively separated from God without having made a good confession, this is no reason to lower the bar. Low expectations lead to mediocrity not spiritual excellence, and the path to hell is pathed by spiritual sloth. This is not an issue of equity or equality but of sanctity. We are all called and challenged to imitate the Saints, which is to say to imitate Christ. None of us are perfect, as no saint is perfect from birth save for the Blessed Virgin Mary, which means that we are constantly called to repent, amend our ways and deepen our communion with God before we receive Holy Communion in a worthy fashion. Only then can we utter with true conviction, humility and gratitude, these words: “Lord, give us that bread (the Eucharist) always.”

The Feast of Plenty

Seventeenth Sunday in Ordinary Time Year B

Malaysia, the Land of Plenty, a food paradise renowned for a variety of cuisines and culinary delights, had never known hunger on a large scale (except during WWII perhaps). Rather than wondering when the next meal will arrive, Malaysians often struggle with the myriad of choices that can drive one mad. Malaysians generally eat not because they are hungry, but as painful as it is true, we eat because we are greedy.

But these months of lockdown, with so many losing their jobs and their only source of income, hunger has become a reality. White flags can be seen flying outside homes and poverty relief organisations across Malaysia have been overwhelmed these past few weeks as citizens cry out for food and other assistance, amid the country’s latest seemingly never-ending lockdown. As some commentators have noted, the white flag is not a sign of surrender but has become a powerful sign of human solidarity, as people from all walks of life rush to give assistance to alleviate the suffering of their neighbours and fellow Malaysians. This uncommon sign of solidarity has strangely caused alarm to the authorities, with some even viewing it as a subversive symbol of defiance against the administration. “How dare common Malaysians do the job of the government?” The answer is simple. The government machinery, for all its boasts, has miserably failed.

As our political leaders endlessly theorise as to how to deal with this crisis, ordinary Malaysians and entrepreneurs have rushed into action. This seems reminiscent of the conversation which takes place between our Lord and His apostles in today’s gospel. While the apostles continue to debate on the next course of action, our Lord moves into action. The readings turn our attention to the problem of hunger and how God provides for His people. This is especially moving when we read it in the background of the ravages of COVID. After having contended with the Coronavirus for over a year, we now have to face the more lethal “virus” of starvation.

It is interesting how the apostles sound so much like our inept political leaders. Let’s be honest. Despite our complaints and arm-chair pontification, none of us have found a fail-safe solution to our present predicament. Like the apostles, we may be constantly arguing over the scarcity of resources and practicality of our responses. But the gospel draws our attention to the Lord and begs us to imitate Him - He sees the crowds, He recognises their need, He looks at what is available, and then trustingly surrenders it to God before He shares it with the people. And the amazing thing is that when we are no longer cracking our heads and worrying about our limited resources, we would be able to share it willingly with others and God will bless our gift and multiply it with abundance. The truth is that everyone can do something, even though it may seem as insignificant as five loaves and two fish. But this is way better, than doing nothing.

But the readings point to a deeper truth. As much as starvation and hunger are realities which must be combatted at every level, the world’s hunger for food will only be satisfied when man learns to live not simply for himself, but for others, as Christ did. It will be satisfied only when the inner law of love, and not merely self-interest and greed, governs our individual and collective existence, inspires our policies and regulates our social structures and institutions. The world’s hunger for food will only be satisfied when man learns to hunger for God.

And this is why we partake in the Feast of Plenty, the Eucharist, a taste of the heavenly wedding banquet. We partake in the Eucharist because we are hungry. Ours is an elemental hungering. We want sustenance. We crave nourishment beyond food and drink that sustain our physical lives. We hunger for life to be spiritually meaningful and for it to be redeemed from the evil and viciousness that all too often mar it. Our hunger is the human appetite to be in communion with one another. Like the thirst of which the psalmist spoke so long ago, it is also our inescapable longing for God.

The Eucharist is not a symbolic meal of intellectual concepts. It is real food and real drink, ordinary food made from wheat and grapes that we lift up to God, returns to us as the extraordinary sacrament of Christ. This is why the online Mass, though providing us with help for our prayer and spiritual lives, will never be an adequate substitute for the real thing. You cannot satisfy your hunger by reading a cook book or by watching Jamie Oliver on television. The Eucharist is not just to be admired from a distance, but to be consumed before it can release its greater power in us. In Holy Communion, our Lord unites Himself with us and we unite ourselves with others through our union with Him. It is made possible by Jesus’ act of complete surrender to the will of the Father, whereby He offers up His life, His love, and finally His body and blood on the Cross. With five loaves and two fish, our Lord feeds the crowd and satisfies their physical hunger. But with His body and blood, He feeds and saves the world!

The popular spiritual author Henri Nouwen wrote about this: “The great mystery of the Eucharist is that God’s love is offered to us not in the abstract, but in a very concrete way; not as a theory, but as food for our daily life. The Eucharist opens the way for us to make God’s love our own... Whenever you receive the body and blood of Jesus in the Eucharist, His love is given to you, the same love that He showed on the cross.” Just as food is consumed not just once but daily, we must continually go to Mass and receive the Eucharist.  It is something that gives daily nourishment and fulfilment.

Someone once suggested that in the post-COVID age of social distancing and online services, the Eucharist and Holy Communion have ceased to be relevant. But the truth is that the Eucharist will always remain relevant, it will always remain necessary as food for the journey, antidote to death, and sustenance for the soul. To paraphrase the reply of the martyrs of Abitene to the magistrate as they faced the sentence of death for attending Mass, a prohibited activity under Roman rule: “We cannot omit the celebration of the Divine Mysteries. The Christian cannot live without the Eucharist and the Eucharist without the Christian. Don’t you know that the Christian exists for the Eucharist and the Eucharist for the Christian? … The Eucharist is the hope and the salvation of Christians.”

Likewise, Christ’s miracle of the multiplication of loaves continues to have contemporary relevance. This world needs SHARING. But more importantly, this world needs SAVING. Let us not forget that it is only when, in faith and love, we give away the little that we have—a few loaves and fishes—that God blesses our poor efforts and, in His omnipotence, multiplies them to meet the hunger of the world. It is also through our little efforts of sharing our faith, that we can offer Christ’s gift of salvation to the world.

God is still in charge

Eleventh Sunday in Ordinary Time Year B

This entire year has plunged many into an existential crisis. Plans have been disrupted, some even cancelled, anxiety levels have escalated as we struggle to comprehend and navigate a future that remains uncertain. One thing that many have learnt during this year is that, we are not in charge. Before this, we had bought into the myth that through hard work and a can-do (Malaysia Boleh) attitude, we can control our own lives. We can master our own destiny, captain our own ship, and set a course for the future. But we’ve realised that control is an illusion. The good news is that God is still in charge. You just need to get out of the way.

Today’s gospel treats us to two parables instead of one: the parable of the growing seed and the parable of the mustard seed. You may have heard it explained to you that parables are short stories which our Lord likes to tell His audience and how we wished that all our priests would confine their homiletic material to similar anecdotal wonders, instead of meandering off into some inexplicable theological maze where everyone gets lost. This is the popularly held view. But though their content seems simple and the message simpler still, they actually do contain something far more profound. That is why the learned of Jesus’ time often found difficulty in comprehending His message and why our Lord had to explain the meaning of these stories to His own disciples, who should have known better.

Pope Emeritus Benedict explains that through parables, our Lord “shows how the divine light shines through in the things of this world and in the realities of our everyday life.” The whole of creation is a revelation of God’s mysteries, for those who have eyes to see and ears to hear. I’m reminded of the words of Elizabeth Barret Browning who wrote:

“Earth's crammed with heaven,

And every common bush afire with God,

But only he who sees takes off his shoes;

The rest sit round and pluck blackberries.”

The Greek word “parabole” means juxtaposing, placing side by side, making a comparison. And that is basically how we learn. We compare things that we already know with new things that we are getting to know. On the surface, the parables are simple enough for a child to understand. They make spiritual realities accessible by conveying them in concrete images, instead of theoretical abstractions. But paradoxically, these parables have a mysterious dimension, a hidden depth of meaning that is not always easy to grasp and that comes to light only upon thoughtful, open-minded and faith-filled reflexions. Therefore, the parables both conceal and reveal the mystery of the kingdom, depending on the disposition of the hearer. More importantly, parables elicit a response. We cannot remain neutral in the face of a parable, they are not just nice stories to be enjoyed, but they provoke thought and challenges the listener to a decisive response to our Lord and His message. You will either love Him or hate Him.

Let us consider the first parable in today’s passage. This is a parable which is only found here in Saint Mark’s gospel. Unlike the more familiar parable of the Sower and the Seeds which focuses on the different kinds of soil, this parable highlights the intrinsic power of the seed. The sower in this parable literally scatters his seeds and then goes about his daily routine with little care for “how his garden grows.” He has such confidence in the power of his seed that he doesn’t seem to fret over the outcome of his planting. Slowly, imperceptibly, the seed begins to sprout. For the man in the story, life is a mystery as our Lord explains, “Night and day, while he sleeps, when he is awake, the seed is sprouting and growing; how, he does not know.” The man does not know how it is happening, neither is he in control of the process. He understands that God is ultimately in control and he just needs to get out of the way.

With this parable, our Lord explains that the Kingdom of God is a divine work, not a human achievement. God brings about its growth, which at times is imperceptible. Sometimes we grow impatient and we attempt to hurry things along, but our efforts can never determine the time and condition of the final outcome which is in the hands of God. We can only cooperate, but we cannot control or hasten the arrival of the Kingdom by our efforts, any more than the farmer can harvest his grains at a time of his own choosing. The lesson is that we should place less confidence in our own ingenuity, efforts or machinations, but more in the Lord. Saint Paul wrote, “I planted, Apollos watered, but God caused the growth. Therefore, neither the one who plants nor the one who waters is anything, but only God, who causes the growth” (1 Cor 3:6-7). The parable serves as an encouragement for those who think their efforts are fruitless, and a warning for those who think they can bring about the kingdom by their own programmes.

The next parable is more familiar - it is the parable of the mustard seed. Because the Kingdom is a divine reality and not a humanly engineered utopia, it cannot be defined or contained in human categories. It can only be understood by using analogies that force the listener to think and ponder at a deeper level.  In this second parable, the emphasis is on the smallness of the mustard seed. A mustard seed is insignificant in comparison to the glorious kingdom. The contrast is meant to be a hyperbole, a literary exaggeration, e.g. “I’m so hungry I could eat an entire horse.”  And so, “the smallest of all the seeds on earth,” when “sown it grows into the biggest shrub of them all and puts out big branches so that the birds of the air can shelter in its shade.” The outcome is also another hyperbole because a mustard plant can never grow into a huge tree. This tree sounds like the cosmic tree spoken of by the prophets (Daniel 4:10-12 and Ezekiel 31:6). This tree signifies the new heavens and new earth, it points to the resurrected life of the age to come. And it all starts with a mustard seed. The growth of the kingdom will not be due to human efforts but entirely driven by God’s hidden power.

So, back to the question: “who’s in charge?” If there is one thing this pandemic has taught us, is that we are not in charge. As long as we hold onto our illusion, we are setting ourselves up for a major disappointment – we will continue to be fearful and anxious. When we choose to trust God, though, He transforms us into people who find our strength and our confidence in Him rather than in ourselves.

The parables are also important reminders that the growth of the kingdom can be hard to trace, detect, or measure. So many grow impatient and despondent when they are unable to detect any significant or visible change. But God often works quietly and in a hidden manner, but His hand remains firmly on the wheel. This is the paradox of Christ’s kingdom—a mysterious mix of visibility and hiddenness, glory and humility, power and weakness. But why is this the paradox of the kingdom?  Because this paradox matches Christ’s cross. He had to appear defeated in order to be victorious. He accepted humiliation at the moment of His glorification. He had to die in order to win for us eternal life. And though it may seem, that His enemies were in control, He was, is now and will always be in control. So, don’t be deceived into thinking that God is doing nothing about the mess that we are in. He is doing something and He is always in charge. Let us just stop whining, stay out of the way and let Him do His job.

The Fools' Feast

 Maundy Thursday

I believe that none of you would need to be reminded that today is the 1st of April, April Fool’s Day. It’s a day when we traditionally pull pranks on each other, not maliciously but in jest. But sometimes pranks can test the limits of friendship. Well, I hope that what I’m going to say next would not be taken as excessive and cause you to walk out. But if you are going to take offence, blame me, don’t blame God or the Church. Okay, here goes nothing. Being in church today, in a closed, confined and congested area flies against all the public safety advisories during a pandemic. Are you crazy?!!! You must be a fool to be here. What more, on the day the Church celebrates the institution of the Holy Mass.

How the world judges our actions as foolish is exactly how the world judges Christians from the early centuries of the Church until present day. Our liturgical celebrations, though it may not seem to be so, always had a certain edge to them, like those who engage in extreme sports who court death as they experience a rush of adrenaline. You may find this unbelievable. How could the Mass, which so many find boring, be a dance with death? Perhaps, the only danger we could perceive is to die of boredom.

We often forget the context of today’s celebration. Today we commemorate the Lord’s Last Supper, a Passover Feast and tomorrow, we commemorate His death. They are not two different events but a single one, for what our Lord celebrated today at His Last Supper, He will complete on the cross. The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, the Mass of the ages is a bloodless re-enactment, re-presentation of the gruesome bloody sacrifice of our Lord at Calvary. Risk, death and danger have always been part of the DNA of the Holy Mass from the moment of its institution.

The juxtaposition of celebration and death is a constant reminder that the Church of Christ, our Church, is indeed a Church of Eucharistic fools because Christians were willing to do the craziest things in order to receive the most precious thing that could sustain them, not just in this life but for eternity. For example, there is the amazing story of the courageous martyrs of Abitene (in modern-day Tunisia).  In 303, forty-nine Christians suffered torture and martyrdom because they defied the Roman Emperor’s order not to celebrate the Eucharist on Sunday. Despite this cruel law and the real prospect of death, this group of Christians risked everything to gather for Mass. When asked by the magistrate why they had disobeyed the emperor and put themselves at risk, one of them defiantly said, “Sine dominico non possumus” — “Without Sunday, we cannot live.” “Without the Eucharist, we cannot live.”

In fact, for nearly 2,000 years, Christians have risked their lives to participate at Holy Mass.  During the Reformation in England, priests were martyred when caught offering Holy Mass clandestinely for English Catholics. Courageous lay people who gave their homes over as places of Catholic worship, and who harboured priests, suffered torture and death. This trend continued over the centuries. In the Twentieth century, Catholics in former Communist countries like the Soviet Union or Vietnam were persecuted for practicing their faith. Today, in places such as Egypt, China, North Korea, Iraq, Sudan, Saudi Arabia and countless other areas, Catholics risk their lives and travel for hours to attend Mass.

We give thanks to God that we do not have to put our lives in jeopardy to attend Mass at our local parish, except assume the risk of contracting COVID 19. Yes, we should be prudent and not recklessly put ourselves and others in harm’s way. But I suspect that sometimes we seem to have substituted the primacy of salvation for the lesser need for safety.

Perhaps this is the reason why so many have little appreciation for this Sacrament until they were deprived of it. We rejoice that, unlike those in poor areas, we do not have to walk for miles, over hills or on dirt roads to attend. The vast majority of us can make a short drive to arrive at our beloved parish. In fact, we are spoilt for choices. But the ease, convenience, and accessibility of the Mass should not cause us to ever lose sight that the Mass is so precious that many of our Catholic brothers and sisters around the world are braving great inconvenience and persecution to receive what we, by God’s love, have available near us.

In his first Holy Thursday letter to priests, Pope Saint John Paul II touchingly recalled situations of the faith triumphing over persecution from his own personal experience of living under religious oppression, at a time when the priests were rounded up and there were none left to celebrate the Eucharist: “Sometimes it happens that [the lay faithful] meet in an abandoned shrine, and place on the altar a stole which they keep, and recite all the prayers of the Eucharistic liturgy: and then, at the moment that corresponds to the transubstantiation a deep silence comes down upon them, a silence sometimes broken by a sob … so ardently do they desire to hear the words that only the lips of a priest can efficaciously utter.”

In the months of lockdown, when our churches and chapels were closed and Masses suspended, many waited for the day they could return to Church to celebrate the “source and summit” of their Christian lives. But still others lost hope in waiting and some may never return. Of course, many are still not able to return because they fall within a high risk group. But many have chosen not to return by choice. If you are watching this Mass at home, this message is for you. Please know that we miss you, we love you, and we hope you will rejoin our Catholic family for our Masses. Some of you have drifted away from the Church and have been waiting for a good time to return.  I pray that you will consider this the time to join us on our faith journey toward Heaven.  We miss you, the Church misses you, Christ misses you - come home!

I would like to close this evening with the words of Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI, at the 2005 World Youth Day in Cologne Germany:

“The Eucharist must become the centre of our lives. … This is because the Eucharist releases the joy that we need so much, and we must learn to grasp it ever more deeply, we must learn to love it. Let us pledge ourselves to do this – it is worth the effort! Let us discover the intimate riches of the Church’s liturgy and its true greatness: it is not we who are celebrating for ourselves, but it is the living God Himself who is preparing a banquet for us.”

He stretched and touched us

Sixth Sunday in Ordinary Time Year B

These are strange times. I would occasionally venture out of the church compound to do my grocery shopping and would notice this frequent phenomenon - people actively moving away from me as I passed. I see people wearing masks and wiping off surfaces that other people may have touched. Apart from certain stores, everything else is closed. No one wants to be closer than one metre from anyone else. I try to keep it at two metres just to be on the safe side. You can even be fined or arrested for getting too close to another.

COVID-19 has spread throughout the entire world, and everyone is viewing those around them as a potential carrier and therefore a potential threat. Even my close friends don’t want me in their house (though to be fair, I don’t really want them in mine either). We are living in a moment in history where we are all viewed as a great danger to one another. This is, of course, all necessary and understandable during this pandemic. However, it is still a strange time of being isolated and feeling, in a way, unwanted by those around me.

Sanitary practises and social distancing may seem to be part of the new normal but they are as old as the Bible. We see in the first reading, biblical prescriptions set out to prevent an infectious disease from spreading in the community. To avoid contact and contamination, the leper, the person infected with this virulent skin disease, is to observe a strict regime of social distancing. He is to be quarantined and kept apart from the community, and he is to be dressed in a manner easily identifiable and to shout out warnings to others to ensure that the social distancing measures are not violated.

But we see something entirely different in the gospel. Our Lord bridges the gap and closes the distance. He, in fact, breaks with the SOP on social distancing in His encounter with the leper. Our Lord did not just speak to the leper and draw close to him, but he did the most outrageous thing - our Lord “stretched out his hand and touched him.” Some of you may immediately declare - “how gross!” Upon reading this, my hands automatically reached out for the nearest hand sanitiser as if the touch of Jesus would also render my flesh contaminated too.

But this story is not just about infectious diseases and the public health precautious we must observe. It is a story about humanity, sin and salvation. An infectious disease is the most apt analogy for sin. Consider this - we are that leper, covered not with the sores of that horrible disease, but covered in the shame of our sins. Our sins have rendered us untouchable. Our sins have kept us separated from God, the community and others. Sin is equally infectious. It is interesting how sin begets sin. Unless one’s spiritual immunity is high, many of us could easily succumb to the pandemic of sin that is so prevalent in our culture and society.

But contemplating the story of how Christ approached, spoke to, touched and healed the leper, has made me all the more grateful for what He has done to me. Regardless of how gross our past or present is, the lesson from the leper tells us that our Lord still wants to reach out and touch us. Christ did not shy away from us in our guilt and shame. Instead, He willingly stepped into the pandemic of our sin and the havoc that it has brought on this world. And it was a dangerous thing to do. It led Him to the cross. But He loves us that much to risk the terminal effects of sin, for He knew that the only way He would find a cure to sin was to consume it and transform it within His body, like how venom is transformed into anti-venom and immunity is produced from the mutation of the original virus.

As much as this pandemic has wreaked havoc in our world in a way that has not been seen in more than a century, the coronavirus is a small problem in comparison to the problem of sin. Governments have taken such drastic measures to quell the spread of COVID-19, but seem unconcerned with the pandemic of sin. We’ve had this coronavirus pandemic for more than a year and sometimes, it feels like eternity. But we’ve had sin plague us since the beginning of human history. COVID-19 may take the lives of some and threaten the livelihood of others, but sin can deprive us of something far more important – eternal life. Yes, we’ve battled sin, many have succumbed to it, but we live in hope and not in defeat because we have already found the cure - it is Jesus Christ, our Lord and Saviour. Christ has entered into this sinful world, He has come near to us, and He offers redemption.

And though at times, we may feel too ashamed of our condition to approach the Lord or go and see a priest for confession for fear that we would be harshly judged, the example of the leper teaches us how when one approaches the Lord in humility and faith, not as someone entitled, but as someone recognising that grace is always a gift given to the undeserving, telling Him, “if you want to, you can cure me”, we can be certain that Our Lord would never turn us away or refuse that request. This is what He will say to us every time we turn to Him in sincere repentance, “Of course I want to! Be cured!”

Treasure and Ponder

Solemnity of Mary Mother of God

It’s that time when making a list of the most memorable highlights of the year seems all the rage. It’s a time-honoured tradition to look back and reminisce, to count down the best moments and experiences of a year gone by. In a normal year, it would have been quite easy to pick out some gems. But this year, most people would be scraping the bottom of the barrel to find a reason to be thankful. It seems that only one thing stands out and continues to hang over our heads like the proverbial Sword of Damocles. Covid 19! And it’s no cause for rejoicing.

When we recall the upheaval wrought by this pandemic in 2020, the tempting thing to do is to say “good riddance.” Let’s be honest, no matter how you wish to spin it, it hasn’t been a good year. Anyone who tells you otherwise is either delusional or lives on the planet Mars. 2020 brought with it plenty of suffering and perhaps for many of us, the most unbearable had been spiritual in nature - deprived of our Masses and sacraments, with cancelled Christmas Masses being the last straw. But the answer to suffering isn’t bitterness. It’s thankfulness. Sometimes, the hardest thing to do is to count your blessings when things are going poorly.

This is what our Lady teaches us. A week ago, someone sent me a caricature of the Holy Family at the first Christmas, with Mary complaining to Joseph, that it’s all his fault for not having made prior reservations for a hotel room. The caption below this make-belief scene: “The real reason why it was a Silent Night?” The meme suggested that Mary was upset with Joseph and was giving him the silent treatment. As humorous as this tongue-in-cheek remark may have been, it is the furthest thing from the truth.

Instead of a petulant, sulking and exhausted young mother adversely reacting to all the mishaps on that first Christmas night, a nightmarish disaster, we see the exact opposite - a woman who was composed, meditative and grateful. This is how St Luke describes Mary’s composure and demeanour: “she treasured all these things and pondered them in her heart.”

The word ‘treasure’ is used twice to speak of Mary’s reaction to the events of the Infancy of her child, Jesus. The first instance is here in today’s gospel passage after she had given birth and the shepherds had left. Then later at the end of Chapter 2, we see Mary reacting to another incident in the life of her child, now a young adolescent. Those of you with children transitioning into teenage years will know how this story resonates with you. She and Joseph had just lost their 12-year-old in the Temple, and upon finding Him, they must have been shocked by His nonchalance attitude. Yet, St Luke again tells us ‘His mother treasured all these things in her heart’.

The word ‘treasure’ has to do with what has most value to us. And sometimes we do not really appreciate the value of something until we’ve lost it. So many Catholics have shared with me how the absence of the Eucharist in their lives have led to this insatiable and painful hunger. Online Masses can only provide so much band-aid to a Catholic deprived of the sacraments, but it cannot fill the gaping hole in his starving soul. When something is common-place and readily available, we often treat it with contempt because we know that if we were to lose it, it would be so convenient to buy a replacement off the shelf. But when something is rare, we will appreciate its true value when we no longer have it. This entire year has been a painful experience for many Catholics deprived of the Eucharist. But it has also been a year to help them cultivate a deep longing for what they often take for granted and have little thought of, once received.

To treasure is not just at the heart of gratitude but the way of prayer. Christian prayer begins in treasuring and pondering these things. And through prayer, every experience, whether painful or sweet, can be transformed into gratitude. That’s where Mary shows us the way, with regard to our own life and experience. Now most people will tell you that it is easy to ‘treasure these things’ when the events and words are all positive. We treasure sweet memories, the highlights of successes and achievements, we immortalise what is favourable to us by filling our display cabinets, walls and photo albums with trophies, memorabilia, and photographs, reminders of the most positive and memorable experiences in our lives.

But Mary shows us that we can’t be selective when we wish to “treasure” things. The befuddlement she must have experienced upon hearing the angel’s announcement, the prospect of being rejected and stoned to death if it was known that she was with child without being married, the arduous journey to Bethlehem while she was heavily pregnant, the inhospitable and unsanitary conditions in which she had to deliver her child and the visit of a rag-tag group of undesirables in the form of shepherds, the inability to fully comprehend the nature and mission of her child and finally, the horror of having to witness her own Son’s execution, would have been some of the things which she had to endure, treasure and ponder upon.

The painful as much as the pleasant, what breaks the heart as much as what fills it with joy is to be contemplated, prayed and be grateful for. That’s what Mary teaches us. That’s the example she shows. Prayer in this contemplative sense is for all of us, because all our lives are a mixture of what pleases and what pains, and all the grey areas in between. All our experiences, be they welcomed or unwelcomed, are to be the subject matter of our prayer. Our Blessed Mother was able to hold the terrible tension and pain of these long moments without wilting or breaking down or sinking into despair. To ponder in this sense is no joke; prayer in this sense is no joy, to be grateful in this sense requires more than human effort. It is all endurance and grace.

Through the lenses of Mary, we have a new appreciation for what matters. For me, I’m grateful to God for helping me to trust Him more than my own devices, cutting back on the noisy clutter in my life and helping me realise that He’s given me far more than I’ve ever asked of Him. Faith. A Parish Community. Family. Friends. That’s what’s important. It was a difficult, trying year. But God has a way of moulding us in tough times, and 2020 was no different. Love is perfected through suffering, faith is strengthened when put to the test and hope is deepened in the midst of darkness. Yes, 2020 was a difficult year. But it would also be a memorable year!

Mary’s experiencing of treasuring and pondering helps us to see that God didn’t abandon us even when all is dark and uncertain. If suffering provides us opportunities to love others, trials will give us opportunities to grow in faith and the uncertainties of the future will give us more opportunities to place our hope in the Lord. So, on this day as we celebrate a new calendar year, we look ahead into the unknown future, knowing that our God will never desert us no matter what circumstances we find ourselves in. It is also a day to be thankful, to be grateful, for all the opportunities we have been given this past year. Mary teaches us that with Jesus by our side, that’s a blessing we should never ever take for granted.

This is the day the Lord has made. Let us rejoice and be glad in it.

What time is it?

Christmas Mass during the Night

Priests and parish staff are oft to repeat this rant about Christmas, especially in the run up to the big day. The office phone will be ringing off the hook inundated with calls enquiring about Mass timing. The icing which tops the cake has to be this seemingly innocuous question: “What time is Christmas Midnight Mass?” Let that sink in.... it’s like asking, “what time is your noon lunch break?” Sometimes, the obvious isn’t that obvious even when it is stated explicitly.

Well, there may be a reason why someone would ask for the timing of the Midnight Mass. It has been a long time since Midnight Masses were celebrated at midnight in most parishes, especially here in Malaysia, where multiple Masses are celebrated throughout the night to accommodate the massive crowds and the vernacular communities. The Holy Father’s decision to move the Christmas “midnight” Mass to 7.30 pm this year due to a curfew imposed by the civil authorities for public health reasons has enraged many traditional-minded Catholics and befuddled many others as the Mass during the night appears to move further and further away from its traditional midnight slot. To be fair to Pope Francis, it was St John Paul II who had moved the “midnight” Mass to 10 pm during his pontificate on the pretext that he needed to wake up early in the morning to celebrate the dawn Mass.

I can understand why Catholics would be upset with this change of timing as the traditional timing has deep significance. In the first place it corresponds with the traditional belief that Christ was born at midnight. Secondly, from the material darkness around us, we are reminded of the spiritual darkness in the world which only Christ the Light can dispel.

But what is more important than the timing of the Christmas Mass is the significance of this day in human history. To understand this, we need to know that there are two Greek words and concepts associated with “time.” There is “chronos” which refers to time measured by the clock, by seconds, minutes, hours, days. Here in this story of the birth of Christ, we are given such an indication with St Luke recording that the event took place during the reign of Caesar Augustus and his empire-wide census. As important as this historical date or event may be (some historians have questioned its historicity), it is a mere cursory note in Luke’s narrative.

The Greeks, however, have a second type of reckoning of time - “kairos” - the opportune moment, the right moment, the perfect time for acting and making decisions. And it is here that we see how the Divine Kairos moment converges with the chronological hour. The story shifts away from the chronological hour to the Kairos moment of God’s decisive intervention in human history - the Eternal Word takes on flesh, God becomes man, the Timeless One enters into our time and space.

This is what the angels announced to the shepherds and what we proclaimed in the response to our psalm, “Today a Saviour has been born to us, He is Christ the Lord.” What we celebrate at Christmas is not so much the birth of a baby, as important as that is, but what’s so significant about the birth of this particular baby is that, in this birth, we have the incarnation of God Himself, we have the birth of our Saviour.

The fullness of time had come. For thousands upon thousands of years, God’s people waited for the coming of the Son of David, the Messiah-King of Israel, the promised Prince of Peace, Wonderful Counsellor, Mighty God. And now, their prophets’ wildest dreams finally materialised as angel choirs announced, The King is here! Born this very day. It doesn’t matter whether it was midnight or 10 pm or 7.30 pm in the evening. The point is that with Christ’s coming, that’s always the right time, the perfect time, the ultimate Kairos moment.

Many of us would find ourselves questioning God’s timing which sometimes seems at odds with our own timing, our plans. Many would have made plans this year to travel, to get married, to further their studies, to move jobs, to grow their business, to buy a house or a car. But here comes this global pandemic which seems to have ruined all our plans and thrown every timeline and dateline of ours into utter chaos. What lousy timing? Could God have delayed this until things were a little bit more secure, or couldn’t He just allow this to happen earlier without throwing our plans into disarray?

But the truth is this: God's timing is always good timing. It’s perfect timing. God is never too early, never too late, but always on time. Our timing isn't God's timing. For us, God's timing often feels like a long, desperate delay or it comes too soon when we are least prepared. God's perfect timing does two things: It grows our faith as we are forced to wait and trust in God and it makes certain that He, and He alone, gets the glory and praise for pulling us through.

So, it is “Today”, not “yesterday” nor “tomorrow,” but “today!” “Today a Saviour has been born to us, He is Christ the Lord.” It may not be the ideal slot at midnight; it may seem a little too early to celebrate the Christmas midnight Mass, but what we celebrate today at this Mass is always perfect timing: “Today a Saviour has been born to us, He is Christ the Lord.”

Many people may be complaining that this year, because of this destructive pandemic, has been the worst year of their lives - an “annus horribilis”, an awful year, as opposed to an “annus mirabilis”, a wonderful year. This year has turned people’s worlds upside-down in so many ways. Many would say that this pandemic and government restrictions have also rendered our Christmas, the worst Christmas of our lives. With smaller budgets for shopping, restrictions on festive celebrations, uncertain future and disrupted plans for next year, and public Christmas Masses suspended, it does seem that this Christmas does deserve that ignoble accolade.

But before you throw your own pity-party, it’s good to remember the experience of the Holy Family that first Christmas. A couple, with a heavily pregnant young mother finding themselves out in the cold on a winter night, separated from kin and away from their home, only finding refuge in an animal stable, giving birth to a child in an extremely hostile world of insecure tyrannical despots, a child who will be placed in a manger, a feeding trough for animals. All the elements needed for a disaster movie, making it one of the worst experiences for any family. But this is not the case.

Rather than being a start to an annus horribilis due to such harsh and horrid conditions, the birth of this child will inaugurate an aetas mirabilis, an age of such great marvel, simply because “Today a Saviour has been born to us, He is Christ the Lord.” That alone will cast a light that would immediately dispel the surrounding darkness in this world. That alone, would transform misfortune into a blessing, a bleak future into a hopeful one, a sense of loss into one of abundance. Whatever situation you find yourselves in tonight, no matter how you may question God’s timing, know this - the birth of this Child changes everything. So, if someone tells you that Christmas has been cancelled this year due to the pandemic, you should respond, “No, this pandemic has been cancelled by Christmas!”

Nothing cancels Christmas, absolutely nothing!

Because “Today a Saviour has been born to us, He is Christ the Lord.”

The Paradox of Happiness

Solemnity of All Saints 2020

When her name first emerged over the internet, everyone thought it was a sick joke, a satire meant to poke fun at Catholic sensibilities. This already obscure saint had almost entirely been forgotten only to have her fame restored during a time when the world had to contend with a virus that shared the same name – St Corona. That’s irony for you.

Today’s feast is all-embracing and all-encompassing. It’s a feast that celebrates the memory of great saints like Augustine, Francis and Teresa, and also the obscure and forgotten saints like Corona. It is hardly ironic but certainly logical to think that the saints are often remembered and invoked during times of crises, especially now.

The gospel which is read every year on the occasion of this feast seeks to underline the paradox of being a saint. One could paraphrase the Beatitudes in this way, “Blessed or Happy are those who are unfortunate.” One who mourns, for example, would never imagine himself as being happy. But our Lord declares this to him, “Happy are those who are not happy.”

But what strange kind of good fortune is it that is suggested by the words “blessed” or “happy”? The word has two temporal dimensions: it embraces both the present and the future, and each in a different way. The present aspect consists of the fact that those who seem to be in an unfortunate situation are told that they enjoy a special closeness to God and His Kingdom. God has favourites. He favours those mentioned in the Beatitudes. It is precisely in the sphere of suffering that God with His Kingdom is particularly present to them. When someone suffers and complains, God’s heart is moved to act and draw near to the person to offer deliverance.

But the present dimension of each of the Beatitudes also includes a future: God’s ultimate victory that is still hidden will one day manifest. Hence what each beatitude is saying is this: “Do not be afraid in your distress; God is close to you here and now, and He will be your great comfort and consolation in the time to come.” Because of this future dimension, the beatitudes provide us with the core of Christian hope. The paradox of the beatitudes are captured so beautifully and succinctly in the words of St Paul, “We are treated as impostors and yet are true; as unknown, and yet well known; as dying, and behold we live; as punished, and yet not killed; as sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; as poor, yet making many rich; as having nothing, and yet possessing everything” (2 Cor 6:8-10). This paradox has now become the model of Christian life and existence, the roadmap to sainthood.

Pope Francis reminds us, “The Beatitudes are like a Christian’s identity card. So, if anyone asks: “What must one do to be a good Christian?”, the answer is clear. We have to do, each in our own way, what Jesus told us in the Sermon on the Mount. In the Beatitudes, we find a portrait of the Master, which we are called to reflect in our daily lives”

In order to grasp the true profundity of the Beatitudes, and thereby the core of Christian hope, it is important to remember that they are essentially Christological. The real subject, of the beatitudes and in fact the entire Sermon on the Mount, is Jesus. It is only on this basis that we can discover the entire meaning of Christian faith life. Pope Benedict puts it this way, “The Beatitudes are the transposition of the Cross and Resurrection into discipleship. But they apply to the disciple because they were first paradigmatically lived by Christ himself … (they) present a “sort of veiled interior biography of Jesus.”

One needs to remember that in order to study the Beatitudes and the Sermon on the Mount, it is not enough that we study the text of the gospel. The Sermon on the Mount is not meant to be some exaggerated, abstract and unreal moral lecture that has no correlation to daily life. The best commentary of the sermon and the beatitudes is the life of Christ and by extension the lives of the Saints. Christ stands in the middle of the text and unites it with the lives of the saints who sought to imitate Him, in life and in death. The saints saw themselves in the text of the Beatitudes because they saw Christ in the middle of it. Christ is the one who is poor in spirit. He is the one who mourns, who is meek, who hungers and thirsts for righteousness, who is merciful, who is pure in heart, who is a peacemaker and who is persecuted for righteousness’ sake. Each of the Beatitudes is flesh and blood in Him. Can there ever be a better example?

For us too, the Beatitudes are a summon to follow Jesus Christ in discipleship. He alone is “perfect as our Heavenly Father is perfect.” On our own, we can never hope to be “perfect, as our heavenly Father is perfect.” The saints understood this truth. They recognised the path to sainthood is simply this – to die to oneself so that more of Christ would come alive in them. The saints provide us with a kaleidoscope to view Christ. That is why when the saints are honoured, it is Christ who is honoured above all. In loving the saints, Christ is not loved any less. On the contrary, Christ is rightly loved and glorified and His commandments are observed in the veneration of the saints.

The journey from this life to the next can be long, with many twists and turns, ups and downs, and it is imperative to stay on the right road.  How can we be certain that we will not get lost? Our Lord provides us with the Beatitudes as a roadmap and the Church provides us with the saints as guides. What more can we ask for?

Back to our little forgotten saint. Over the centuries, St. Corona was often prayed to by people seeking her help in times of trouble, be it heavy storms or livestock diseases. In these difficult times, may St Corona and all the saints of heaven, continue to give us courage and hope as we seek their intercession, that though we may still suffer poverty, experience grieving, hardship, suffering, illness and persecution in this life, Christ continues to assure those who are faithful to Him: “yours is the kingdom of heaven.”

Come to the Wedding

Twenty-Eighth Sunday in Ordinary Time Year A

Deprive a camel of water for a week, and you would see the poor thirsty creature race to the nearest drinking hole to get its first sip of water. One would imagine that after three months of lockdown and being deprived of the Eucharist for the longest time imaginable, many Catholics would be rushing back for Mass and clamour to get a taste of the Eucharist. But this was not so. It began with a slow trickle and then the numbers plateaued. Ironically, those who really wanted to return were told to wait - the high-risk members of our community, the elderly. Many were willing to risk infection and even death in order to get a taste of the Eucharist but were told to be patient and to wait until it was safer to return. And here’s the other irony. Just as we have gradually made allowance for the elderly to return with extra precautions, we are seeing a second surge which has resulted in another suspension of Masses in the Klang Valley. Back to watching live-streamed Masses and spiritual communion. That is Murphy’s Law for you.

My fear is that with this second shut down of churches and suspension of public Masses, this may be the final nail hammered into the coffin of many Catholics who no longer feel any urge or see any need to return for Mass. There is a likelihood that when we finally decide to reopen, few would heed the call to return for Mass. Sounds very much like today’s parable.

The Lord compares the kingdom of Heaven to a king who gave a wedding banquet in honour of his son. Those who were invited refused the invitation. He sent out other servants a second time with special instructions to say: "I have my banquet all prepared, my oxen and fattened cattle have been slaughtered, everything is ready. Come to the wedding.” But they took the invitation lightly. Many just gave light reasons to excuse themselves from the banquet.

It is easy to make a connexion between the wedding feast and the Eucharist, given the similar scenario we are facing - many have been invited but few have heeded the call. But the parable points to something bigger - the Heavenly Banquet. Heaven is, of course, the ultimate prize. Yes, it is a great opportunity to get back to attend Mass but our ultimate hope is directed to our perfect, eternal fulfillment — to heaven, that is. And in a way, there is a connexion to the Eucharist because the Eucharist is a foretaste of the heavenly banquet, or as St John Chrysostom beautifully puts it, “heaven on earth.” So how we respond to this earthly invitation to participate in Mass, is ultimately connected to our response to God’s invitation to participate in His heavenly banquet. If you want to get to heaven, start by coming for Mass.

Many who have chosen to stay away have done so for valid reasons. After making a risk assessment as it should be, they have decided to avoid the crowds, at least for now. But others I guess have few, if no good reasons at all to stay away. We are reminded of the guests in today’s parable. They took the invitation lightly. Now, it's not that they had some other pressing matter. No, they simply had their priorities wrong. They gave little value to the king’s invitation. Other matters, even the most trivial, seem more important. Their sin was their indifference to God's call to live for Him, to make Him their chief end in life, not themselves.

I believe that one of the major reasons why people take lightly the invitation of the Lord is because they have little appreciation of the value of heaven and little understanding of the horrors of hell. When you lack appreciation or understanding of an object, it holds little appeal for you. That is why it is important to remember that today’s parable is a parable of judgment, a parable which addresses the importance of decisions, decisions with eternal consequences.  A decision whether to attend Mass or not, is not just a trivial matter which has little consequences. On the contrary, our decision has dire consequences – it points to our ultimate destiny and end. We are either setting out a path for heaven or for hell.  Hell is an eternal state of alienation from the vision of God and Heaven is an eternal banquet given in honour of Christ.

Our eternal salvation is not about being a nice guy. If being a nice guy was sufficient to get to heaven, we would be making a mockery of the lives and deaths of the great martyrs of the Church throughout the centuries who suffered much and sacrificed their lives for the sake of the salvation of souls of future generations. The standard by which all of us will be judged will be the love that appears to us from the cross. Heeding our Lord’s invitation means following Him on the path to the cross. Our Lord reminds us that the gate is wide and the road broad that leads to perdition and those who enter through it are many, but how narrow the gate and constricted the road that leads to eternal life, and those who find it are few (Mt 7, 13-14).

But it is not only a lack of appreciation for heaven and hell which may lead to our ruin. What condemns us is our utter ignorance of the true value of the Eucharist. The food that will be served at the wedding banquet, the fattened calf that was sacrificed, is none other than the Bread of Life, Christ Himself, which is the food that is given at every Mass. And that is why it is so important to spend the rest of our lives disposing ourselves towards the Bread of Life and to hunger for it continually. We cannot live without the Eucharist.

It is understandable that many have decided to stay away because the obligation to attend Mass on Sundays and holy days of obligation have been temporarily suspended during this time of pandemic. As Catholics, we all know that attendance at Mass every Sunday and on holy days of obligation is an obligation rooted in God’s commandments and Church law, but we have to get to the point where it is no longer an obligation. Please don’t misunderstand what I am trying to say here. I am not suggesting that this rule should be reformed. Rather, I am saying that we have to get to the point where we simply cannot miss Mass because our hunger for it is so great, it's no longer an external law outside of us, but has become an interior law, compelling us from within, just as hunger propels us to eat in order to live.

It is true that none of you are momentarily able to attend Mass until the risk of transmission is brought under control. But when public Masses resume, many of you may not be able to return right away. You might need to exercise caution for yourself or those you love. You might need to keep watching from a distance for a while. But when the time is right, it is my prayer that you can and must, gather again with the people of God. After all, every Mass is ultimately a taste of heaven. Scripture’s vision of heaven doesn’t look like a quarantine, a livestream, or a Zoom call. It’s a “face to face” encounter with the Risen Christ and a reunion with the saints and the angels. In the life to come, we won’t be socially distanced and segregated in mansions of glory, but living and working and loving and serving together in a new world where righteousness dwells. So, once we know it’s safe, wise, and no disservice to our communities, let’s gather together again in person and continue to do so until the Lord gathers us again on His mountain, where He will prepare for us a banquet of rich food and fine wines, where He will remove the mourning veil and destroy Death forever, where He will wipe away the tears from every cheek and take away our shame. Indeed, we will acknowledge Him as “our God, in whom we hoped for salvation; the Lord is the one whom we hoped.”