Easter Vigil/Easter Year A 2023

Lent is over and Easter is here. Alleluia, Jesus Christ is Risen. He has passed over from death to life. Last night and today we celebrate, marvel at and savour the great Passover of the Resurrection. St John Chrysostom’s description truly captures the jubilant mood of this solemnity. Hades or Pluto, otherwise the Greek or Roman god of the dead, in our case Satan is frustrated because it seized a body only to encounter heaven and in capturing the visible it is overcome by the invisible. So, Death where is your sting?

Jesus Christ is risen; the angels rejoice and life is freed from the clutches of eternal death.

The different Gospel accounts after Good Friday provide two clear indications that the Resurrection has taken place. Firstly, the tomb is empty. Secondly, Jesus appeared to certain people. Logically, one can argue that an empty tomb merely proved that something did happen like stealing a body and hiding it but what we believe to be the Resurrection has been corroborated by the records of Jesus appearing to some people.

What can the empty tomb and the appearances teach us?

The tomb is a symbol of our human limitations. When we die, we are entombed and there in the enclosure, we suffer the ravages of decay (cremation is just sped-up decomposition) and the oblivion of time. Whereas the empty tomb is a token of our human possibilities. When Selena Gomez sang in 2014 that “the heart wants what it wants”, she may have echoed Blaise Pascal’s “the heart has its reason which reason knows nothing of”. All these expressions about the heart’s own reason reveal that the human heart has been created for the infinite. As such, we always long to go beyond the limits that are imposed by this earthly life.

In other words, an empty tomb signals the fulfilment of the potential that cannot be accomplished in this life. The possibilities that are opened up by the Resurrection are answers to the narrow ideologies of materialism and scientism which seemed to have gripped our consciousness.

The Resurrection is a vision of life that reconciles so many of the imperfections imposed by earthly limitations. The existential angst of our generation is perhaps fuelled by a fear that death would mark the end of all possibilities. Think of an important relationship that needs to be repaired. If there were no Resurrection, one would be hard-pressed to repair what was broken for fear that once dead, there would be no chance of reconciliation. But through the Resurrection, when freed from the yoke of our human constraints, we will have the opportunity to make up for what could not be attained here on earth.

Imagine the sense of freedom and surrender knowing that failure is not the final chapter because the Lord of Life-after-this-life can bring about the needed closure that we have always desired. Reflect on the mistakes we have made in life. For those who have married the wrong person or did not have the courage to propose and missed the boat. Maybe, recall the injustice you suffered and it is accompanied by a restlessness that flows from a despondency that you have been victimised by your superior or employer or even country. So many of us struggle with the disillusionment of being betrayed by a country because we happen to have the wrong skin colour. People do not just migrate for money’s sake. Instead, it is not easy to live with this persistent hurt that you are disadvantaged simply because of your race.

Thus, the Resurrection provides a viable alternative to those otherwise weighed down and crushed by life. For example, a person with a congenital condition that renders life meaningless. Autism is a good illustration. What value does an autistic child have judging by the ability to produce? This corrective mechanism is not a pie in the sky, a kind of consuelo de bobo, or a pacifier. The Resurrection gives hope because it is not hemmed in by what we have no control over—life. In the earlier mentioned case of the unresolved hostility in relationship, the Resurrection provides the possibility that resolution can take place even after death. It is true that death puts an end to the time the individual has been granted for embracing God’s grace or rejecting it. However, with the Resurrection, there is a chance that our prayers can assist the soul along the path of reconciliation and therefore salvation.

The Resurrection guarantees that those who are spiritually weak are not entirely lost. It offers us the great prospect of rising with the Lord even if our lives here are incomplete and unfulfilled. Those denied justice in this life will reap the justice that is rightfully theirs in the next life. The Resurrection allows us to trust that God will give us what we have missed here on earth. Perhaps this is the kind of “democracy”, the type of fairness that we are unaccustomed to because our vision is heavily infused with a materialism or laden with a scientism that is incapable of peering beyond the veil of death.

The Lord appearing to certain people is an invitation to become a people of the Resurrection. This brings us to the heart of the Easter Solemnity, baptism. We have fewer than 10 baptisms for both Mandarin and English speakers. This raises the question if we truly are a Resurrection people. If we were, then we may not be as convincing as we should be. While quality is important but the pathetic number may just reveal our poverty of faith in the Resurrection. The entire premise of our belief is based on the Resurrection. If Christ did not rise from the dead, then everything we do would be a sham. Since we proclaim that He rose from the dead, then our lives must exude this Resurrection faith.

This faith proclaims that nothing, not even our sins, can ever separate us from God’s love. In fact, the price of that love was paid with the life of Christ, His Son. He died so that we may have the chance to rise to eternity. A Resurrection people returns His love by breaking forth from the prison of sins.

Secondly, daring to live and love despite the unfairness of this world is to trust that God will have the final word, and not death. No matter how we dress this earth up as heaven, it is not and it is never going to be. We trust and will not be cowed by death because the Resurrection is hope and encouragement in the valley of tears, sorrows and pains. God will always be victorious no matter what.

Finally, faith in the Risen Lord guarantees our own Resurrection. We will rise with Him. Those who believe will not be lost because He will not allow it. The caveat is that we must continue to eat the Bread of Life in preparation for the Resurrection. Jesus, the first fruits of those who have fallen asleep, continues to nourish us with His Sacraments, most especially in the Eucharist which makes Holy Communion not just a Viaticum. It is unquestionably the food of and strength for the Resurrection. In conclusion, ever since that Sunday, the Risen Christ has been present to us and through a vigorous sacramental life, He invites us to join Him in the Resurrection. Alleluia.

Easter Year B 2021

As the Paschal Candle processes in, we intone three times “Lumen Christi” as the lights are switched on progressively. If there is a symbolism to be appreciated, then it is this Easter Beacon burning brightly and illuminating the world, banishing the darkness of eternal death. Indeed, it is a jubilation.

What are we celebrating?

The simple answer is the Resurrection of Jesus Christ the Lord. But we may need to take a step back to appreciate a much bigger picture. We begin with an ancient homily that paints Holy Saturday as the great silence. But it is not an empty silence.

“Today a great silence reigns on earth, a great silence and a great stillness. A great silence because the King is asleep. The earth trembled and is still because God has fallen asleep in the flesh and He has raised up all who have slept ever since the world began. . . He has gone to search for Adam, our first father, as for a lost sheep. Greatly desiring to visit those who live in darkness and in the shadow of death, He has gone to free from sorrow Adam in his bonds and Eve, captive with him - He who is both their God and the son of Eve. . . "I am your God, who for your sake have become your son. . . I order you, O sleeper, to awake. I did not create you to be a prisoner in hell. Rise from the dead, for I am the life of the dead”. (quoted in CCC#635).

Christ entered the tomb of death in order that the whole of creation since the beginning of time can follow Him out. St Paul likens the Sacrament of Initiation in the same manner that through Baptism, we follow Him into the tomb in order that we may rise with Him. In other words, in Christ’s Resurrection or in His rising from the dead, we are celebrating, more than anything else, our discipleship. In this way, the Resurrection is therefore not only a joyful observance, but it is a powerful call to discipleship.

To be a disciple, we have to re-examine the Resurrection of Jesus in the light of His death. Otherwise, we may risk an empty or vacuous and meaningless celebration. In order that we have a deeper grasp of this Easter grace of the Resurrection, we borrow an idea found in Dietrich Bonhoeffer book on the Cost of Discipleship. He makes a distinction between what he calls “cheap” and “costly” grace. For him,

“Cheap grace is the preaching of forgiveness without requiring repentance, baptism without church discipline. Communion without confession. Cheap grace is grace without discipleship, grace without the Cross, grace without Jesus Christ, living and incarnate”.

What experience can we draw from life to grasp the difference. The notion of “cheap” grace can be gleaned from our familiarity with a fact of modern marketing—freebies. Our idea of “free gift” is closer to “a thing” we do not need. Like the free plate from the two tubes of toothpaste we buy. In general we have no attachment to this type of a free gift. If it breaks, it breaks. Usually, when we receive a gift we do not need, we will not know how to value it.

To appreciate the Resurrection, we need to acknowledge the reality of sin. But not in the way that we like to commit them even though that may be true for many of us. In fact, some of us have a love relationship with our favourite sin. What it means is that our admission should take the form of accepting that our sins, individual rather than collective, weigh heavily from the Crown of Thorns to the Cross on Calvary. Christ our Scapegoat and Saviour bore the burden of “MY” offences through the winding streets of Jerusalem and every whip across His enervated Body was a stripe for “MY” sins.

The more we desire to celebrate the Resurrection, the more we ought to recognise the price that was paid for it. Without acknowledgement that our sins put Jesus there, what are we celebrating but cheap grace? Here, admission is not unhealthy guilt. It is not meant to be a dark cloud that continually oppresses us. Perhaps to highlight what it means to have a healthy sense of sin, listen to a common rendition of the Act of Contrition.

“Oh my God, I am sorry for my sins. Because you are so good, with the help of your grace, I will try not to sin again”. The operative word here is “try”. What does it mean to try? At best, it imitates the traditional usage “resolve”. I “will” (not future tense but volitional) not to sin again or I “want” not to sin again. But, instead of a firm resolution, what we have here is a rather detached severance from sin, as if one were doing God a favour. In this case, we are not as sinful as God is pathetically "needy". A rephrase might better express this. “Oh my God, I am sorry for my sins. But let me see, because you are so good, I shall do you a favour. I will try not to sin again”. I can safely say that nobody does that at Confession but the unspoken assumption in the prayer does suggest that.

Why?

This formulation exposes a chink in our self-supposition. We are not that sinful after all. Jesus did die on the Cross but not really for my sins. For others, maybe? The truth is, His death paid the price for “MY” sins just like His Risen Body in the Eucharist pays for the price of “MY” eternal salvation. The Blessed Sacrament is truly the medicine of immortality but if we do not count Christ’s death as the cost for this remedy, then this medicine is of no use to us. Just like the unvalued freebie, it might as well just be a health supplement. Something extra but not intrinsically necessary for our wellbeing and definitely not needed for our salvation.

If that were so, our celebration is but an empty victory. We can have fun, lots of it. Or rather, a lot of “eats” (makan) exemplified by the chocolate bunnies and to be fair, the over- eating happens during Christmas rather than at Easter but the point remains.

Addicted to cheap grace, we all want to be comforted by whatever—food is best, sometimes sins too. Nobody wants to be confronted by the reality who he or she truly is—a sinner. However, costly grace which calls us to follow and submit to Christ whole-heartedly requires an honest admission that we are sinners and are sinful. Thankfully, in light of Christ’s costly grace, the fact of our sinfulness is not the final statement of who we are. What liberates is to know that, like the adulterous woman forgiven by Christ, radical repentance is what makes for a better disciple, a faithful follower and an effective evangelist. Only then can our Easter explode with joy. The greater our celebration, the more profound should our appreciation be for the price of salvation. Thus, be wary for cheap grace is always waiting at the corner as a poor substitution for costly grace. It always makes us feel good, but it does no good in the end. Be more aware though that Christ did not die for nothing. "I" (not so much "we") have been saved to copy and imitate Him. He died so that "I" (not so much "we") may follow Him from tomb to triumph, from sin to salvation and from death to life.

7th Sunday of Easter Year A 2020

This would be Day 3 of what could be considered the original novena. The Pentecost or Holy Spirit Novena took place when Jesus instructed the Apostles to remain in Jerusalem. If the Ascension were celebrated today, then we might just miss out on what a Novena is all about. The Eleven had returned to Jerusalem and there, gathered in the Upper Room together with Mary, the Mother of Jesus and some others, they waited in prayer for the coming of the Holy Spirit. 

Waiting-in-prayer has taken an unplanned but central role in our lives these days. What do I mean by this? 

At the start of the lockdown, stopped in our tracks, the widespread prediction was that people would soon get fat from depression bingeing. When this is over, we will be seeing lot of bursting or bulging waistlines. Instead, the contrary is true. Quite a number of people have slimmed down. Hanging in the air is a fog of anxiety created by our powerlessness. As the race continues with the search for a vaccine to Covid-19, we seem to have our back against the wall. In many places, the stranglehold on the economy is not viable or sustainable in the long run. There are two aspects of human life that we should take note of. One is that power abhors a vacuum. When a king is weak, there will be plotting behind his back. Our backdoor government is a prime example. The “Old Man” is not as powerful as he was before. Two is that the economy cannot stop. Right now, the CMCO is merely lip service to the contagion containment exercise because people without work will soon starve. 

This Sunday of waiting gives us a chance to see us for who we truly are. We are dependent creatures and for the longest time, we believe that we are in control of our destiny. Much like the Apostles. Prior to the Passion, Jesus predicted their loss of faith but Peter, brash and not a little arrogant said, “Though all lose faith in you, I will not lose faith… Even if I have to die with you, I will never disown you” (Mt 26:35). Elsewhere, in John’s Gospel, Peter said, “I will lay down my life for you” (13:37). We witnessed how scattered they were when the Shepherd was stuck. Strong, generous and brave they were not because pride blinded them to their weakness. So, in the Upper Room, the Apostles teach us what it means not to be in control. The Good Shepherd truly knows His sheep, and He tells them to remain in Jerusalem. For the task He has entrusted to them, they will need His strength. There in the Cenacle, they experienced first-hand that waiting is praying. 

However, the suggestion of praying might seem insufficient for us as we are unaccustomed to helplessness. We are uncomfortable with powerlessness because our scientific skills and technological triumphs have lulled us into thinking that we are in control. At this moment, our saviour is the elusive vaccine that medical science is chasing after. Whereas, God has been reduced to the option of last recourse. How often have we turned to prayer the moment we encountered difficulties? Or, more naturally, do we not automatically think of a solution on our own first because we believe in our own capabilities and that we only turn to God when all else failed? The truth is, the more powerful we are, the more we need God. Science on the other hand generates a false disproportionality, that is, only the weak needs God. Hence, the original novena restores the right relationship we have with God by teaching us prayer and showing us that dependence is not a disability nor weakness.

Today is also Communication Sunday. We associate communication with preaching. However, praying also communicates. It is easier to spring into action because we are result-oriented. When success is predicated on output, it makes praying a losing proposition because it is not profitable—for most people, a waste of valuable time. But, praying communicates or expresses the correct relationship we have as creatures with God. 

We have received the pastoral directive that churches will remain shut for as long as the MCO is in place. If we consider this Easter as a prolonged Lent, we can also think of this pandemic as an extended novena—a sustained or protracted period of waiting and praying. If the prophets can cry out, “How long, Lord, do we have to cry for help”? We should pray like them. Interestingly, the word “patience” is related to both waiting and suffering. We are waiting for God and at the same time, many are suffering. 

While these nine days are a time of waiting for the Holy Spirit to come, we can also look at it as the Lord, through our suffering of Him seemingly not answering our prayers, is teaching us to look at the world differently. When a person breathes in an odour for a long time, after a while, he gets used to the scent that it no longer registers for him. Take your pick, fragrance, or flatulence, when you smell it all the time, it does not register any more. Same with us. Two phenomena might help us understand this lingering pandemic. The way we have treated the environment—not as stewards but as exploiters. Or the economic migrants. We are used to a certain way of doing things that we no longer think about them and their consequences.[1] 

Perhaps, we are now called to be more conscious of our responsibilities towards the environment as well as to those who never get a fair share of the economic pie. Our guards for example. The two of them work 7 days a week. Would you ever want to see your husband or son to slave like that? So, rather than viewing this unproductive period as God’s punishment, we can look at it as God’s gift to us, to wean us from the unquestioned status quo—destruction of the environment or exploitation of labour. When the pandemic is over, it is conceivable that we cannot go back to model of “business as usual” in the way we treat the environment and the manner in which we “consume” labour. When people are hungry, competition which is the norm of our economic engagement may need to embrace cooperation as an improved paradigm for progress. This type of conversion does not happen overnight. 

It is not surprising that this original novena is not popular. Instead, we have novenae to the Divine Mercy, St Jude and Our Lady of Perpetual Succour. Many novenae centre on asking whereas the Holy Spirit is given so that we may conform ourselves more fully to Christ. We do not always get what we want. Hence, these days we give ourselves to God for Him through the Spirit to shape us for the mission of the Son—Go baptise in the name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Thus, this is a time of patient waiting. In this pandemic, we have come to recognise that even though we are at the top of the food chain, we are not invincible. In fact, nothing is more vulnerable than to be on top. Only God is truly invincible. We are shown during this contagion what it means to be waiting for God. The waiting has not been easy, and it is definitely not pleasant. There could be more purification for us to undergo before we see the light at the end of the tunnel. In the meantime, we have a lot of praying to do. Like the Apostles gathered around our Lady, we can do no better than to pray.


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[1] A good example is the description we have of social or physical distancing as the “new” normal. New normal in itself is an amoral description. It chronicles the way things are now. Almost like, take it for what it is and move on. Whereas, abnormal is a term which is morally loaded. We have taken it for granted that the environment is basically raw resources for our exploitation as much as cheap labour is material capital. The “new” in “new normal” provides space for changes to be accepted without questioning the cost of the change. In terms of ecological sustainability, we have been advocating the reduction of single-use plastic because of its environmental impact. But, with new normal since it is amoral, single-use packaging has become the accepted standard. It is possibly better to characterise what have now as abnormal. However, one needs to be careful here because the “old” normal was not “sin-free” as it also required critique for its profiteering and consumeristic attitude.

6th Sunday of Easter Year A 2020

As the weeks stretched into months, the extended movement control order seems to have prolonged our Lent even as Easter is drawing to its close. Though the exuberance or the energy of Easter is muted by the anxiety and fear surrounding the never-ending pandemic, we are never in total darkness. Yes, we can sense the end of Easter coming because four days from now we will mark the Ascension. However, as if we were watching a trailer of a movie, we catch a glimpse of the Pentecost of the Holy Spirit in the 1st Reading and are introduced to Him as the Advocate (Paraclete) in the Gospel. The passage taken from the Last Supper when read in the light of Easter gives us hope because we are now promised the Holy Spirit.

The coming of the Holy Spirit inaugurates a new dispensation or arrangement in the economy or plan of salvation. Christ who fulfilled the Father’s mission of redemption whilst He walked the earth will now continue to save the world through His Church. The same mission is carried out with the powerful assistance of the Holy Spirit. 

With the Holy Spirit, the Gospel is carried away from Jerusalem to Judaea, to Samaria and through Paul, to the ends of the world. In the 1st Reading, we note Philip the deacon, whose election is recorded in the Acts, had successfully evangelised the Samaritans (sworn enemies of the Jews) and they were baptised in the name of the Lord Jesus. When the Apostles—Peter and John laid hands on them, they received the Holy Spirit. While the separation between baptism and reception of the Holy Spirit in a way prefigures the practice of reserving the Sacrament of Confirmation to the Bishop, the point was possibly to highlight the Pentecostal experience that they had of the Holy Spirit. 

Without a doubt, the success achieved by Philip should be attributed to the Holy Spirit. And yet, equally crucial to the ministration or preaching of the Gospel is the agency of the man. In other words, God works through His human instruments as St Teresa of Avila reminds us “Christ has no body now but yours”. Hence, Philip became the voice of the Holy Spirit. Philip did, as what St Peter exhorted “(A)lways have your answer ready for people who ask you the reason for the hope that you all have”. The agency of man is central to the spread of the Gospel. 

How do we evangelise? As a quotation goes, “You might be the only Gospel that others read”. Two points to take note of most especially in this time of pandemic. 

Firstly, we evangelise by becoming docile instruments of the Holy Spirit. By docile, it implies that we be active in knowing and living our faith. There is a correlation between theory and practice, orthodoxy and orthopraxis, or thinking and doing. As social distancing dictates, anything that is considered non-essential has ground to a stop. In terms of formation, our knowing may stagnate since we are not fed intellectually. Thankfully, the internet grants easy access to trusted knowledge banks which we can tap in. Instead of bingeing on Netflix, we could invest time in reading or updating. To be able to give reason for our hope requires that we nourish ourselves intellectually; grounding the knowledge of our faith on solid foundation so that we can testify to why we believe in what we believe in. 

Secondly, as we live in an age of constant surveillance and instant information, we have to deal with the reality of what is called the credibility gap. All one needs nowadays is to whip out a phone and voila, someone is virally famous or infamous as many cases are. Rightly or wrongly, the truth no longer resides in being true in itself meaning that it is not enough that truth is objective. Instead, truth is narrowly defined as credibility in the sense that no matter how objective it is, it does not matter if the person who states it does not adhere to it. In other words, veracity is gauged by hypocrisy. A good example is the statement that smoking bad is invalidated by a smoker who makes the assertion. Our challenge is that when truth is defined by “credibility”, the standard of morality will drop as the integrity-deficit of our decision makers can become an excuse for our lack of virtue or moral depravity. 

It is not supposed to be that way, but we live in an age of “seeing is believing”. Whether we like it or not, the articulation of one’s actions speaks louder than the eloquence of one’s elocution. It is primarily through the manner of life that we evangelise the world. In short, holiness does not consist only of coming to Church. It requires that our Gospel be preached through our actions. 

When this pandemic is over, we will have to deal with the aftermath. We do not fully know what the effects of a sustained isolation are going to be like as we are dealing with the anxiety as to when this pandemic will tide over. For some people, the world might as well have ended because the lifting of the lockdown will see them out of employment. All the more, Christians need to give the reason for their hope. Hope does not take away the pain of suffering thought it can ground us in the certainty that even though we live in difficult times, God is still in charge. He who had bought us at the price of His Son’s life will not abandon us. It is not time to let go of our praying. That is why the rosary chain started at the beginning of the lockdown must continue. And all kinds of spiritual exercises that one is engaged in, continue with them. Though we are separated, we are not alone. Jesus is always there with and for us. Often, He uses His human instruments to reach those who are in need. 

Post-pandemic will truly be a test of morality as we become the voices, the hands, the feet, the eyes of Jesus in the world. It will be a great time of Catholic courage especially when we help rebuild society—this time by looking out for those at the fringes of society. A neighbouring country famed for her progress now realises that the contagion goes unabated not amongst her cultured and sophisticated natives but rather in the hidden and segregated immigrants. This is not a moment for smug sanctimony or virtuous self-satisfaction. We could be worse because our immigrants are not segregated. Instead, they are unseen, unacknowledged, and untested. Our infection numbers could be higher. The greater number amongst the crowded indentured workers merely highlights that our consuming lifestyle is not restricted to the consumption of material resources but is premised on the massive exploitation of cheap labour. Consumerism devours humanity because this unseen resource is someone’s son, daughter, mother, father, husband or wife. As Jesus cared for His sheep, we will also have a lot to care for. There was never a time when the Church did not rise to the occasion when she was needed—she educated the poor and she cared for the sick. Today, we will have to tend to those who fall by the wayside because they cannot keep up with the race to material prosperity. 

Finally, St Paul VI in the apostolic exhortation Evangelii nuntiandi says “for the Church, the first means of evangelisation is the witness of an authentically Christian life, given over to God in a communion that nothing should destroy and at the same time given to one's neighbour with limitless zeal. Modern man listens more willingly to witnesses than to teachers, and if he does listen to teachers, it is because they are witnesses”.

5th Sunday of Easter 2020

The Gospel is rather repetitive in the sense that on Friday and yesterday, we read from almost the same passage. Reflecting on it feels very much like attempting a 3rd squeeze of santan (coconut milk) from grated or desiccated coconut.

What is significant in the Gospel is the imminent departure of Jesus. It was the Last Supper and to a certain extent, the Disciples were at a crossroad, each wondering if he should leave or stay. We know that Judas left. In this Farewell Discourse, Jesus spoke of His impending death and His return. It would make sense if He were referring to His appearance after the Passion, but the context of the conversation was otherwise. He was speaking of a future return. Two observations to be made of the coming future.

Firstly, it is certain in the sense that His absence would not be a sign of abandonment but rather a groundwork of preparation. He is going to prepare us a place so that where He is, we may be too. Hence, speaking to their disquiet, He exhorted them to trust in Him.

Secondly, between now and the future, we have an interim to live. As Thomas enquired on the direction to this heavenly destination, Jesus gave Himself as the Way, the Truth and the Life, the guide here that will lead us there.

Within this interim is where we work out our salvation. How?

In the first reading, we hear of how the early Church was expanding. Last week, the focus in general was on the priesthood of the ordained. This Sunday, we have a sort of continuation. As with all human organisations, progress is measured by the development of structures to accommodate increase and expansion. In other words, the Church, like all human groupings, went through the pains of growing up. As she grew in stature, she needed to differentiate through the separation of roles. St Peter himself noted, “It would not be right for us to neglect the word of God so as to give out food…”. The need had arisen for a separate service to free the Apostles so that they could concentrate on their spiritual duties. They elected deacons to serve the temporal challenges of an expanding community. However, this differentiation of or “ordination” of deacons in the community did not result in a kind of hierarchy of exclusion meaning that everyone shared in the one covenant of belonging to the chosen race, the royal priesthood, the consecrated nation and a people set apart for God. Later in the Letter to the Corinthians, St Paul would describe the diverse charisms given to the Church for her good. Therefore, our salvation is worked out in the many ways we serve God and people.

In the 2nd Reading, St Peter speaks of salvation as a life-long process whereby we grow closer to Jesus. As paths towards any centre converges, we too draw closer to each other and in the course of growing closer to Jesus, we also learn how to love one another. Quarrels may sound jarringly scandalous as we read in the 1st Reading—so early in the history of the Church we see how fractious the community was, divided as it were along linguistic lines. But quarrels could also illustrate the learning mechanism in community building. They were learning how to love. As with anything in the order of grace, when we keep close to Jesus, we will be able to love—even our enemies.

Therefore, loving each other in Christ becomes a powerful message of salvation as well as a mission in the world as we bring it to everyone. It is neither an easy message to embrace nor a painless pursuit. We recognise how fragile human relationships are because we effortlessly get entangled in the awkwardness of race, the complexities of languages and the convolutions of genders. In this gigantic cauldron of pity party, where everyone is a victim, it is easy to flag any one of these badges of “honour”. A current example is that it has not taken long to raise the racial nationality of Covid-19.

Racially divisive or not, we will soon meet with the challenge of discipleship in a post-covid-19 world. The situation will call for our Christian response to the reality of economic disaster for individuals and families. If an incoming tide raises all boats, then the outgoing flow lowers will usually translate into financial hardship or ruin for all who are at the bottom rung of the economic ladder. Since we are socially distancing, the ripple effect of a near total shutdown on the economy is not fully felt yet. As things stand, we are helping to deliver cooked food to migrant workers who are left high and dry as their services are not required now.

What is relevant for us is a recognition that right at the very beginning, in building up the community, both salvation (the message of the Apostles or heaven) and service (election of the deacons or the interim) went hand in hand. In other words, each Christian serves according to his or her charism as he or she follow the way marked out by Christ Himself. There is a proportionality between heaven and service. The more we hunger for heaven, the more we take in the word of God, the more we want to serve Him here. That is the mark of the Saints. They never run away from hard work and sacrifice because of their love for God.

In the Gospel, Philip asked to see the Father whom Jesus loves so much. So, Jesus gave him this answer: “I am the image of the Father. To see me is to see the Father”. St Paul in his letter to the Colossians called Jesus the Image of the Unseen or Invisible God. In the language we are familiar with, Jesus is the Sacrament of God the Father. Analogically, this could also be said of the Church—to see Church is to see Christ. Somehow, we balk or flinch with this audacious comparison because we see how scarred the image of the Church is, even in the 1st Reading and recently with all the scandals we have. These are not signs of God’s failure or that His message is not valid but rather of Satan’s presence.

In our endeavour to faithfully serve to Him between now and heaven, we can be sure of one thing. Satan would do his utmost best to convince us otherwise. As our little prayer at the end of Mass asking St Michael’s assistance indicates—Satan prowls the world seeking the ruin of souls. All our efforts would come to naught if we do not guard ourselves against the agent of perdition—Satan.

For now, know that nothing, not even the most heinous crime, invalidates this truth that every act of Christian kindness and generosity is really a reflection of who Jesus is. Whether we live up to our calling or not, He is still The Way, The Truth and The Life. So, instead of focusing on that which is unchristian, perhaps we should look for evidence that following Christ is still a viable option—we see this in the men and women who continue to serve without counting the cost. The other day, I volunteered to be a driver to help my sacristan send food to the migrant workers. At one of the stops, we waited for quite a while for the recipient to come down from his rented flat to collect food. You would think that people on the receiving end would be grateful and therefore be hasty. I was grumbling in my head and finally, the person did not show up. Those delivering food must have endured this on a daily basis and NOT a complaint escaped their lips—indeed a humbling lesson to learn on Christian charity and service.

Finally, we are progressing towards the Ascension. The choice of the Gospel makes sense. Jesus has gone to prepare a welcome for us and He would return when the time is right. As we wait between now and eternity, we have His blueprint which marks the sure Way to heaven as we serve the Truth and embrace His life.

3rd Sunday of Easter Year A 2020

I know. It is already the 3^rd Sunday and it feels like our passage out of the tomb is similar to being trapped in a never-ending maze. There appears to be no light at the end of the tunnel except to forge ahead in this meandering labyrinth. The Gospel this Sunday can help us in this pilgrimage. Given the present paucity in the public celebration of the Mass, the road to Emmaus is just as well a good place to begin a reflexion on this unique situation where the Mass is absent in the lives of so many who hold the truth of the Real Presence.
 

It is an accepted interpretation that the trek from Jerusalem to Emmaus which ends with the Lord breaking bread is an ambulatory depiction of the Mass we celebrate. Just as in our regular Sunday Eucharist which is broadly composed of two liturgies—of the Word and of the Eucharist—He began by enlightening the minds of the two disciples with Scriptures: “Then starting with Moses, He explained to them the passages through the Scriptures about Himself”. Secondly, to crown the day, He celebrated the liturgy of His own Body and Blood: “While He was at table with them, He took the bread, said the blessing, broke it and gave it to them”. This narrative gives us the familiar phrase that “They recognised Him at the Breaking of Bread”.

Well and good but somehow at the start, the two Disciples also expressed something which may resonate with us today. Even though quite a few have expressed that the lifting of the lockdown would not be soon, those of us who are waiting for the curtain to lift are impatient at this extended intermission. We hear at the start of the conversation with Jesus that the two had harboured expectations: “We had hope”. Some of us too have hoped that we can somehow return to the life which we know so well.

We are, after all, Homo Consumptor (or in mock or dog Latin, Homo Consumericus). Our entire economic life is premised on this cycle of exploitation, production, and consumption. The closure of malls has only witnessed the explosion of online shopping—our courier services are not only overwhelmed by delivery deadlines but are also laughing their merry ways to the banks. Furthermore, we are expecting oil price to rebound once the supply chain that feeds our consuming habits cranks up again.

To match this consuming philosophy, the coronavirus pandemic is considered merely a glitch of nature, as it were. And if Louis Vuitton can conscript or re-purpose its production line to manufacture face masks, you can imagine how every endeavour is directed to the discovery of the elusive vaccine to help us, not so much as to live healthily but to return to a life we have come to expect as typically ours as a Homo Consumptor. Imagine what the so-called “new normal” of social distancing would do to an economy that rests solely on the consumption of leisure?

What is relevant to us is if we would dare to run against conventional wisdom that this nature’s glitch could also be God appearing and speaking to us. Just like what He did to the two oblivious Disciples in their despairing departure from Jerusalem. Of course, our current theology does not permit a God who dares to punish us let alone chastise us. We have imprisoned God in a gilded cage of mercy without justice. A capricious God is not reasonable, it would appear, for it would harken back to the days of the Olympian deities easily insulted and wounded by our insolence.

However, canon law possibly provides us with what is more in tune with our understanding of God. Whatever penalty we find therein, its aim is never punitive but rather rehabilitative, restorative, and finally redemptive. The Mass was once commonly called the Holy Sacrifice. The notion of redemption gels with the language of sacrifice. He offered His life as a sacrifice in order to redeem us and to restore us to grace. Hence, if God were to punish us, He is not out to even the score or to get even with us—a kind of tit for tat. No. If at all, God punishes, it is in order to reconcile us to Himself as St Alphonsus de Ligouri characterised in the prayer of a sinner: “O God I have so much offended you, chastise me in this life, that you may spare me in the next”.

Perhaps, Covid-19 is the pause we all so needed for the purification (or to use the argot du jour, sanitisation) of our expectations. Whatever the cause of this viral affliction, be it nature’s caprice or God’s punishment, we are being purified. God’s wrath and His mercy are not polar opposites or mutually exclusive but rather they are two sides of a coin. Even if we choose the think Covid-19 in terms of eco-catastrophe as the result of our misuse of freedom, it belongs to the permissive will of God that we are being afflicted by this pandemic to turn us back to God.

We are in the darkness of a long and lengthy Lent. But there have been lights shining if only we are attuned to them. It is not the light of commercial success—like the “ka ching” of online shopping. Rather, the pollution over parts of China, the mass and cheap production centre of the world, has improved and here in our country, even our rivers are cleaner now. Once we return to normalcy, we may have to rethink our cycle of consumption to replace it possibly with an economy that better expresses what it means to be graced human rather than how much we can regain commercially. It may be true that the market is about life, but life is not entirely about the market. Scarcity, competition, and consumption are not the only invisible hand that runs the economy. When the lockdown is lifted, there will be wounded to be cared for. Even now, they are already showing up on our radar. How do we mobilise the other invisible hand of Christian charity, so that the human landscape can better mirror the image of Christ? St Peter puts it through the language of grace in the 2^nd Reading to live worthily the new state of life which we have gained through Christ’s Resurrection. Thus, caring for those injured by the pandemic is witnessing to Christ who has risen and is also alive in us.

This economy of sharing, giving and self-sacrifice is established on His memory, not on a virtual memory of Him. The two disciples’ experience walking to Emmaus establishes the paradigm for who the Church is and how central the Eucharist is to her identity. The Eucharist should belong to the essential services because Christ the Lord Himself wants to feed us with His Body and Blood. We should never be content with this virtual feeding but creatively must look for ways, within the law, to allow this essential service to be available in spite of everything.

Finally, Dietrich Bonhoeffer commenting on the Church as the Body of Christ said something to this effect that “Christ’s body (the Church) takes up physical space here on earth. The body of Jesus Christ can only be a visible body or else it is not a body at all”. For now, we seem to be trapped in this isolating tomb of “Eucharistic fast” and worshipping in exile, almost in a disembodied Church. Yet, we are resolutely hopeful because the Lord is still sacramentally present in both word and sacrament to the small the community we have, as in 3 religious sisters and a sacristan. In hope we pray for the end to this prohibition of providing this essential service, a cure for Covid-19 and most of all, we pray that this deprivation of the Mass will only deepen our love for His Sacramental Presence.