13th Sunday in Ordinary Time Year C 2022

We are back into the green[1] of Ordinary Time. This Sunday reveals a turning point in the itinerary of Jesus. In the 2nd half of His public ministry, He resolutely makes His way for Jerusalem. There is a thread running through both the 1st Reading and the Gospel. However, there is more to their similarities because Jesus’ resolution seemed to be cast in concrete. In His unflinching determination, He makes no room for human frailty. In other words, if you follow Him, it will have to be a hundred percent or not at all.

It seems really forbidding but this resoluteness in Christ can be our starting point for reflection. Two inter-related concepts are at play when it comes to one’s resolution. Firstly, it is commitment and secondly, the pledge one is able to make is determined by one’s sense of freedom. For our present ears, one hundred percent sounds rather daunting because it feels rather slavishly restrictive. But it is not as oppressive as one perceives because, in the recent past, it was like that.

Take two examples. The first instance took place recently. In conjunction with the Cathedral’s Ruby Jubilee, we celebrated the anniversaries of couples, 25th, 40th, 50th and above. Couples these days rarely reach 50 years and above. Main reason could be death of a spouse because people are getting hitched at an older age.[2] However, by and large, married couples find it hard to go the entire length. No judgement on those who failed. A more relevant reason could be the primacy of personal autonomy. “What about me?”.[3]

The second case in point comes from a past when inter-continental travels were few and far between. Missionaries used to leave their countries of birth and many never returned home. The cemeteries of older parishes are graced with graves of priests and religious who, following the Lord, in manner of speaking, “took on the flesh” of those whom they serve and became as one of them. These hands who took the plough never looked back.

When there is determination, then lines will have to be drawn and boundaries will have to be marked. Coincidentally the 2nd Reading speaks about freedom. To follow Jesus whole heartedly, we need freedom and His Gospel’s demand challenges our notion of what freedom should be like.

We think that freedom is tied to personal autonomy or individual liberty but it is not. Just to be able to do what I want, when I want and how I want, is not freedom. A serial murderer can definitely exercise that kind of liberty but no one here would even dare to define that as freedom. True freedom is bound to one’s identity and this identity is not self-manufactured—like I feel womanly and therefore I am a woman. In Jesus, His resoluteness was directed to the fulfilment of His true destiny. He needed to go to Jerusalem, not to face what awaited Him, but rather to fulfil His role as the Saviour of the world. The urgency of establishing the Kingdom of God took priority over all the other freedoms that He might have enjoyed.

Likewise it has to be for us if we were to follow Him. Our entire existence should be directed to the inauguration of the Kingdom of God as we heard in the Gospel.

Today marks the closing of the World Meeting of Families. In a way, both the examples of the permanency of marriage and the magnanimity of missionaries are expressions of the two Sacraments of Service, namely Matrimony and Holy Order. Both these sacraments express the commitment and identity of our discipleship. We serve and follow Christ through the Sacrament of Matrimony which establishes the family and through the Sacrament of Holy Order which institutes the sacerdotal ministry of shepherding His people.

Now, in the service of the Church, either through the family or through priesthood, “I, me and myself” is not selfish. It may be misguided because it comes from a space of self-preservation. We balk or hesitate at the idea of giving our all and everything. Our sense of self or our definition of autonomy is close to absolute which explains why our generation is allergic to commitment. We are afraid that it might chip away at our hard-won freedom.

What is more? We are promised a vision that self-actualisation is the only way to personal fulfilment. The other day a radio DJ was commenting on the winner of this huge jackpot and one comment was striking. She said, “I would rather be rich and miserable than be poor and miserable”. Hidden within this sentiment is an idea that money is our ticket to freedom and with it, one can buy happiness. Our materialistic generation has come so far to deify the spontaneity of freedom so much so that commitment feels very much like a millstone around our neck. But commitment is a constituent necessity for being who we are. To wit, once again, think of a relationship that is moving towards marriage. The very idea that a partnership should be open in the sense that both are seeing other people is anathema to the core of our being. No marriage can withstand this kind of fluidity. A good example would be Will Smith and Jada Pinkett Smith both famously touting a kind of open relationship that in the end recognises that it is impossible to maintain it.

If marriage as a human institution instinctively calls for an all or nothing commitment, why can we not think this of the relationship between God and us? There is a radicality of discipleship in which God demands no less than our hearts. It is true that one cannot serve both God and mammon because the human heart is made for this singular divine commitment and true freedom comes from our covenant with God. We should get it into our heads as early as we can that freedom, as in unfettered personal liberty, cannot guarantee our happiness. Sadly, we can be blindly committed to ourselves, thus failing to recognise that the freest self is discovered in focusing on the Lord. Look at all our saints. They only have eyes for God and if we give Him our hearts, we will find ourselves. The odyssey to discover our deepest and truest self, as so many are led to believe, is supposed to be the crown of human quest. It is a futile enterprise because it does not gain us happiness. Only the resolute searching for God does.


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[1] We “turned” green on the Tuesday after Pentecost. But Sunday after Pentecost was Trinity Sunday (white) and the Sunday after that was Corpus Christi (white). Now the Sunday properly turns green.

[2] One marries at the age of 38 and a silver jubilee (at age 63) would be a bonus. A golden anniversary would have been an achievement.

[3] There is a growing phenomenon in more affluent societies that when the children fly the coop, couples get on with their individual lives. It is like the duties of child bearing and rearing are over and now the couples should be free to pursue their individual interests.

Solemnity of Corpus Christi, Year C, 2022

The Solemnity of Corpus Christi, that is, the Body and Blood of Christ, reminds us that even though the Incarnate Word, has ascended to heaven and is seated at the right hand of the Father, He is actively present in His Church now and until the end of time. As part of this event, there is usually a procession which supposedly leads the faithful through the streets of the city. In our case, it is a short route around the housing estate.

Why the parade? It makes no sense to speak of the Eucharist as the source and summit of Christian life if we were reduce it to merely an expression of our personal faith. To grasp why everything flows from the Eucharist and how every action is directed to it, we should take a closer look at the concept of “Transubstantiation”.

Part of our challenge is Catholics have scant understanding of what it means.[1] Inadequate knowledge can have negative consequences and the worst would be the reduction of the Blessed Sacrament to merely a symbol. As a practitioner of this “liturgical craft” or a person plying the “religious trade”, and without judging, I can say that many Catholics treat the Eucharist like an exalted symbol. The problem is, no matter how esteemed or dignified, it remains a symbol, nonetheless.

So, if it is not a symbol, what is it then?

Catholic theology affirms that Christ is truly, really and substantially present in the Blessed Sacrament. What this means is that the Real Presence of Jesus is distinct from the other ways in which He is said to be present. It is true that He is present everywhere but the Real Presence is where we can say with conviction that what we receive on the tongue or what is placed on our palm is “God Himself” and not a symbol of Him.

Yes, the Consecrated Host may be a tiny piece but it contains not a part of Christ. Each fragment is entirely His Body and His Blood, His Soul and His Divinity. No less. At the Incarnation, He became present to us in time and space, for 33 years or thereabout. But after His Resurrection, His Presence could no longer be constrained by time and space.

How is that possible? Through the process of “Transubstantiation” and supported by “Apostolic Succession”. Without Apostolic Succession, there cannot be transubstantiation.

According to the Council of Trent, as quoted in the CCC, “by the consecration of the bread and wine there takes place a change of the whole substance of the bread into the substance of the body of Christ our Lord and of the whole substance of the wine into the substance of his blood. This change, the holy Catholic Church has fittingly and properly called transubstantiation.” (CCC 1376)

It is still a loaded concept. What is it?

To understand it we need two categories which are related to each other and they are substance and accident. These two philosophical categories are seldom used except that accident for us means something else. One cannot separate substance from accident because they are metaphysical (beyond the senses) categories rather than physical. There is no such thing as “pure substance” which one can identify. Substance answers the question “What” because it addresses the “whatness” of an entity. Examples are man, woman, cat, table.

We only know what a substance is by virtue of its accidents. This means accidents answers the question “How” because it addresses the “howness” of an entity. How do the descriptions make a thing what it is? In English grammar, accidents are analogous to “adjectives” because an adjective qualifies or demarcates a “noun” just like accidents define a substance.

Whenever change takes place, it is the “substance” that remains. This means that substance acts as the principle of unity for the various accidental[2] changes that it undergoes. For example, the fluid that you drink to quench your thirst. In terms of mechanics, the cup of thirst-quenching fluid undergoes changes by freezing, by liquifying, by boiling. The content of the cup can be frozen into ice or liquified into a solvent, and finally through boiling vapourised into steam. It is the same content in the cup that undergoes all these accidental changes.

Another way to conceive the relationship between substance and accident is to look at your school yearbooks from Std 1 to Form 6. Through the series of class photos, you are able to trace how a “subject” underwent changes through the years. Whatever the changes are, it is always the same person who undergoes the changes. From a short, tiny boy, he has sprung into a well-built man, from a scrawny little girl, she has grown into a tall and slim model.

Almost every case of change conceivable is accidental. In the case of the Eucharist, what we have is a substantial change. How? If a substance is the unifying factor for accidental changes to take place, then in transubstantiation, the unifying factors for change are the accidents of bread and wine. These accidents must remain unchanged, in order that, when a priest consecrates both the bread and the wine in the chalice, the substances of the bread and wine are completely changed, or rather transubstantiated into the very Body and Blood, the Soul and Divinity of Christ. As the accidents remained unchanged, it feels like bread and it tastes exactly like wine before consecration. In other words, the “breadness” of the bread or the “wineness” of the wine are changed completely into the same substance that 2000 years ago walked upon the earth.

This explains our carrying the Consecrated Host in procession. We are not interested in carrying a “symbol” through the streets. Symbols may be powerful but they cannot save us. Only God can. If anything, Satan would like and is working very hard to lead us in thinking that the “host” we receive is no more than just a “symbol”. The point is, no matter how meaningful, no matter how magnificent, it cannot be a symbol as Flanner O’Connor, the eminent Catholic novelist, wrote in 1955, “Well, if it is a symbol, to hell with it”. We are not worshipping a symbol.

Transubstantiation explains the Church strict teachings with regard to the reception of the Eucharist. St Thomas Aquinas in the “Lauda, Sion” or “Sing forth, O Zion”, which was the sequence we sang or recited, “Behold the bread of angels (Panis angelicus) sent. For pilgrims in their banishment. The Bread for God’s true children meant that may not unto dogs be given”. The dogs are symbolic of those who do not know and therefore cannot gain from receiving Holy Communion.

If it were only a symbol, then there should be no drama involved when every Tom, Dick and Harry receives Holy Communion. But it is not. If we were to feed a dog Holy Communion, what is the dog eating? The Body of Christ, for objectively that is “Who”, not “what”, it is. The difference between a dog and a baptised Catholic consuming Holy Communion is that the dog will NEVER gain anything good from eating the consecrated Host but we will benefit or not, depending on whether or not we place obstacles (our sins) to its effects.

This knowledge that we are eating and drinking no less than the Body and Blood, Soul and Divinity of Christ is the reason for St Paul’s teaching in 1 Cor 11, “And so anyone who eats the bread and drinks the cup of the Lord unworthily, will be behaving unworthily towards the Body and Blood of the Lord”. It may sound offensive but it highlights “Whom” we are truly and objectively receiving, Jesus Himself. Now you understand why we cover the spot where you drop your Host so that we can purify it. If you find it abhorrent to even think about subjecting the corpse or remains of your beloved to people stomping on it, how much more must we be reverential when dealing with the Body of Christ.

If we think negatively, St Paul’s teaching sounds condemnatory but if we regard it positively, he is inviting us to an inner transformation. Transubstantiation changes the substances of the bread and wine into the Body and Blood, Soul and Divinity of Christ whereas transformation does not turn us into God but rather that those who meet us will encounter Jesus Christ—through our words and actions. This is what we must bear in mind and heart as we process with the Blessed Sacrament or when we consume it. Whether or not there is a procession, transubstantiation goes hand in hand with our transformation. The more we eat of the Body of Christ, the more we can resemble Christ in every thing that we say and do. We are not God but we can be like Him and for that, we need the only “vehicle” capable for this divinisation: the Bread of Life—the Eucharist.

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[1] It is a concept alien to the modern mindset. Our world view is organised according to “I, me or myself” as the centre of the universe. A suggested alternative to transubstantiation is “transignification”. The Holy Communion signifies a reality for me. The question then becomes what happens to that “reality” when it no longer means anything to me. Does it cease to be “real”?

[2] An accident is defined as the unfortunate incident that happens unexpectedly and unintentionally, resulting in damage or injury. Translated, it is “kemalangan” and the closest it resembles “unintentionality” is when we describe birth as an accident. This kind of accident is not a failure in contraceptive practice but rather it details how one is born either as poor or rich, man or a woman. A rich person could have been born poor and therefore the being rich is really an accident of birth.

Trinity Sunday Year C 2022

With the Easter and Pentecost hubbub all settled, the Church brings out a few topical but important matters for our consideration. They may sound marginal or peripheral but they are not. Instead they are central to Christian life. The first of the topics focuses on the Blessed Trinity. This is followed by Corpus Christi. After that, the Solemnity of the Sacred Heart of Jesus.

With regard to the Trinity, it is a homily priests struggle to preach. Reasons include the lack of understanding and a loss of interest in the mental sophistry of trying to reconcile three in one. Or people simply do not care about it. For all intents and purposes, the Trinity makes no difference in their lives.

Slowly we veer towards a vocabulary centred on the Trinity relevant to us. The false divide between the immanent Trinity, that is, God in Himself apart from the work of salvation, and the economic Trinity, that is, God in relation to the history of salvation, may have contributed to a Trinitarian illiteracy.

After all, we make the sign of the Cross without second thoughts. Sometimes we do not even voice the formula “In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit”. Unthinkingly, we just trace the cross over our head and chest. This gesture is also used for comedic effect in entertainment especially when actors find themselves in a “Hail Mary” desperation.

Catholics are vaguely familiar with the Trinity in the sense that it is there. While the liturgy is steeped in Trinitarian references, yet it remains a conceptual challenge. We accept a Trinitarian God but many cannot give satisfactory explanation for this belief. One major monotheistic religion still cannot wrap its head around the idea of a God who is 3 Persons in 1. For us, at best, we take refuge in the usual reply that it is a mystery which we just accept and move on.

Christianity took a few centuries to clarify how the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit are not three Gods. We may not face the same problem today because the Church has arrived at a better knowledge of the Trinity. However, if we are not careful, meaning, if we do not have a working grasp of who God is, we might end up worshipping three gods. In other words we confess a Trinitarian God but in actual fact, we have deviated towards a form of tritheism.

The Trinity may be a mystery but God chose through Jesus Christ to reveal His inner life to us. For example, “the Father and I are one. And I will ask the Father, and He will send you another advocate who will be with you till the end of time”. This profound self-revelation of God is central to how we ought to live.

According to the Catechism: “The mystery of the Most Holy Trinity is the central mystery of Christian faith and life. It is the mystery of God in himself. It is therefore the source of all the other mysteries of faith, the light that enlightens them. It is the most fundamental and essential teaching in the ‘hierarchy of the truths of faith’”. (CCC 234).

If it is that essential, we should know who God is in Himself. The fact that the Trinity is a mystery should actually make us want to know more about it. It is natural for the more a reality is shrouded in mystery, the more we want to know it. Just like we are interested into know the private lives of celebrities.

The confession that we believe in one God is true simply because He is one divine nature. Pay attention to the Creed later. “God from God, light from light, true God from true God. Begotten, not made, consubstantial with the Father”. It describes the one divine nature of God. Yet He is distinctly three in persons, meaning that the Father is God, the Son is God and the Holy Spirit is God is also true. These two questions “Who are you?” and “What are you?” allow us to grapple with the mystery of why God is One but Three in Persons. To God, the question “Who are you?” will draw three distinct replies. The Father will response “I am the Father”. Likewise the Son and the Spirit. These are not one person with three answers but three Persons, each giving a distinct response. Then the question “What are you?” will draw the same answer from each Person of the Trinity. The Father will reply “I am God”. Likewise the Son and the Spirit. The distinction that the Father is neither the Son nor the Spirit provides insight that these three persons are relational in nature. The best description for the Three Persons in One is love.

St John equates God with love. He is love and love’s power is shown through relationship. In a manner of speaking, love is Trinitarian in nature because the one who loves is the Father. The one who is loved is the Son and the love between them is the Holy Spirit. Love is verbally an act meaning that it does not exist in an abstract. No one just loves “directionless” or aimlessly. Instead, when a person loves, he or she loves someone and there is someone who is loved and between them there exists a love that binds them together.

The more we know that God is love, the more we would want to invest in relationships. True relationship cannot be reduced to monetary value but instead, it is marked by love and if the nature of God is love in relation, then the knowledge of Him should also inspire us to follow Him.

The reality is that Christians are not as loving as they should be. We are poor lovers in the sense that we do not know how to love like how God loves. To grasp that love, we can start with defining what the opposite of love is. The opposite of love is not hatred. Rather, it is selfishness. Those in a selfish marriage knows what this feels like. However, in God, there is no selfishness. The Father loves the Son completely. The Son loves the Father selflessly. The love between the Father and the Son is infinite. Jesus showed His love for the Father to the extent that He poured out His life in order to save each one of us. This is the love that Christians are invited to. Without being Pelagian, meaning that all this is down to our effort, perhaps our failure to live and love like Jesus is because we have yet to fathom and feel the love within the Trinity between the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. The knowledge of the inner life of the Trinity is not vacuous but instead it gives us the inspiration to live our Christianity to the fullest. Love which is truly life-giving is sacrificial for it never stops at the self but like Christ, life is most magnificent when it is poured out in love. The Trinity is our template for the love which Christ has come to show us.

Pentecost Year C 2022

We are not unacquainted with the Holy Spirit. Through the charismatic prayer movement, many associate His presence with speaking in tongues. But the feast of the Holy Spirit is more than “glossolalia” for it marks the beginning of a new dispensation. Today is the Church’s birthday for the coming of the Holy Spirit signalled the change in the manner that Christ would relate to the Church. Prior to the Ascension, “bodily” presence was the norm. In fact, after the Resurrection, He spent forty days with the Apostles, appearing “corporeally” to them at different places and times.

Ever since the Fall, God has laboured for Man’s redemption and in Christ, the restoration of creation continues. In order for Jesus to keep His promise to be with us and to continue the mission to save mankind, there has to be a new dispensation, that is, a new way in which Jesus acts because He is no longer with us in a “physical” sense. The Holy Spirit coming upon the Apostles ushered in the age of the Church and signified the manner which Jesus will be present to us. Primarily, He is present through the Liturgy and the Sacraments until the day He comes again.

Concretely, it means that now the Church is the principal instrument which Christ through the Spirit will use for the purpose of salvation. This mission to save is universal because at the Ascension, Christ issued the Great Commission. The promised Holy Spirit will empower the Apostles and those who follow after with courage and conviction in this mission to make disciples of all the nations.

At present, the task seems almost insurmountable if we were to consider how diversified the world has become but more than that, how canonised the position is whether baptised or not, everyone is assured of salvation. Bear in mind the Apostles and the sort of qualifications they possessed. None whatsoever and the only one qualified to handle money betrayed Jesus for 30 pieces of silver. More than that, as one body huddled in the Upper Room, they were hesitant and uncertain. It probably explains their staying behind closed doors for they were clueless as to what they should do. Here is our intersection with them. If we are overwhelmed by the pluralism of religions, they would have been too.

In this age of the Church, the Holy Spirit has a gargantuan task of assisting us in making disciples of all the nations. No matter what our views are with regard to the possibility of “Christianising” the world, the fact remains that at the end of time, when Christ comes to gather us into the Father’s Kingdom, there will only be one head and one Body which is the Church. This vision is reflected in the Collect of the Vigil Mass for Pentecost where we beg God to “grant that from out of the scattered nations, the confusion of many tongues may be gathered by heavenly grace into one great confession of your name”. The “one confession” refers to the Church and this is echoed in the Preface for the Mystery of Pentecost. “This same Spirit, as the Church came to birth, opened to all peoples the knowledge of God and brought together the many languages of the earth in profession of the one faith”.

In order to realise this future, the Holy Spirit’s role is to teach and to remind us of the things that we know and are necessary for salvation. At the same time, He draws us more deeply into the mystery of Christ so that the baptised can witness to the truth of His Paschal mystery. The profession of faith in the life, death and resurrection of Jesus knits us together into one. Written into each Eucharistic Prayer, there is an epiclesis that prompts the Holy Spirit to gather us into “one Body, one spirit in Christ”.

The reality is that we are nowhere near a unified Body of Christ—a sad reminder that the Spirit can only be effective in advocating on our behalf when we cooperate with Him. The many gifts lavished upon the Church is to enable us to collaborate with Him as well to foster our unity. Why? Because the unity of Christians as brothers and sisters is a powerful beacon that shines in a world fractured and fragmented by disputes and wars. Think of the scandalous armed conflict between the Russian and Ukrainian. Both sides claim Christ to be their Saviour.

Unity is profoundly attractive. At the most basic level, the unity within a body is such that when every part is working as one, then the body is at its optimum. Health is wealth, we say. Likewise, when groups of people live in harmony, that peaceful coexistence will draw others to it. However, in an individual, when the integrity of the body breaks down, the person’s health deteriorates. Similarly, the failure of individuals in a group will soon result in the collapse of the entire body.

What is the enemy of unity?

The obvious answer is “disunity”. We might think of division arising from enmity, gossip, jealousy, insecurity or selfishness. However, what is not so evident is that disbelief destroys unity. Ours is a union based on faith. We are not banded together through gender, race or class for in Him, there is neither Jew nor Greek, neither rich nor poor, male nor female. In fact, believing together, we are rather unstoppable. Remember the animated movie “Prince of Egypt”? The theme song, “You will when you believe?" suggests that you will achieve great things when you believe.

If it is through the Holy Spirit that we proclaim Jesus is Lord, then everyone who believes will be united by the same Spirit. Disunity follows from unbelief as nothing is more destructive to unity than our lack of faith in Christ and His Church. At the Easter Vigil, the Exultet calls attention to the reality that darkness is overcome by the light of faith. When our faith is fragmented, then darkness will grow.

The Night Prayer before we sleep points out that the Devil like a prowling lion goes in search of souls to devour. Disunity isolates which makes it is easier for the Devil to succeed. Think of so many of our youths studying in “pagan Christian” countries with no involvement in the local Church communities. How many have succumbed?

Prayers of faith and for unity are antidotes to prevent us from disbelief. More than ever the Church needs to ground the faith of her sons and daughters and also to strengthen the unity that exists. What renders it difficult is the breakdown of common understanding or shared worldviews. Under the canon of diversity, almost every idea is to be respected and accepted. Otherwise there will be criticisms of bigotry or prejudice.

Division remains our Achilles’ Heels. How can we convince the world that the Lord wants to save us? How can those who are waiting for the grace of the Gospel come to the knowledge of Christ if we are disunited? Our disunity is a source of scandal and shame. Despite this, the Christian must labour. Not on his or her own. We labour with the assistance of the Holy Spirit. We beseech the Lord to send us His Spirit to mould and to shape us into His servants. Secondly, servitude or docility to the Holy Spirit requires humility on our part especially when everyone is supposedly a “guru” or an expert or better still these days, the “pope”.

Jesus established the Church through the Spirit. Thus, the Church especially in her magisterium is we where we can find authenticity and authority of Christ’s teaching because the Church reflects Christ. It is almost impossible to believe this statement if we know the politics involved. Think of the manoeuvring hidden in the struggle of ascendancy. Naturally, we may feel let down by the failures of Church moral leadership. There are some who believe that they know more than the Pope or the Bishops. The point is, human frailty does not invalidate the truth of the Holy Spirit’s role in the Church because the Father through His Son has sent the Holy Spirit to be the guarantor that the Church be truly a reflexion of Christ. As St Irenaeus proclaimed in the 2nd Century “for where the Church is, there also is God’s Spirit, and where the Spirit of God is, there are also the Church and all grace”.

7th Sunday of Easter Year C 2022

We seem to have arrived at a “useless” Sunday of the Easter season because many parts of the Catholic world are celebrating the Ascension today. This is still the waiting period for the early Church poised for expansion. We are introduced in the 1st Reading to the great persecutor, Saul who later became our beloved St Paul. This outward growth of the Church is not just an expansion in terms of acquisition of peoples and places. As the 2nd Reading suggests, the spread of the Gospel comes as a response of creation in its entirety waiting for its Creator, Saviour and Lord. It is in this context that John’s Gospel makes a lot of sense.

Taken from the Farewell Discourse, Jesus reaffirms His total union with the Father. Over and over, He prayed for unity amongst His followers because the unity of Christians reflects the union between the Father and the Son. In Jesus’ prayer to the Father, He expresses care and concern for the Disciples that He will leave behind. But even as Jesus commends all who follow Him to the Father, what is profoundly interesting are the admission and the appeal in the prayer expressed before today’s Gospel passage.

Firstly, Jesus acknowledged that His followers would be hated because they were not supposed to be of this world. Yes, they are “from” this world but they are not “of” this world. What differentiates Christians is their sanctification in the truth. Truth is rather tricky because it does not refer to “my” truth or to “your” truth as if truth were a possession that one can claim so as to have an upper hand. Truth points to Christ and His teaching through the Church because the Church is the only human institution guaranteed by the Spirit from inerrancy in matters of doctrine and morals. Submission to the orthodox Church teaching is to be sanctified by and to be a humble servant of Truth. This will definitely entail “suffering”.

Secondly, despite the world’s opposition, Jesus pleaded the Father not to remove His disciples from this world. The struggles and suffering that disciples undergo in the name of Christ are essential to making an impact in this world. However, this request of Jesus that the Father allows Christians to undergo trials and tribulations runs against the current grain of helicopter parenting. You may resonate with the phenomenon of parents who go out of their way to shield their children from harm and hurt. Parents may feel defensive hearing this but say, we acknowledge that it is natural for parents to be protective as they should be. However, over-protection has a psychological and social cost of disabling children. Good parenting means journeying with rather than attempting to remove the hurt. We need failures or even shame to learn and disallowing our children to feel disappointed is not good. Furthermore, parents have expressed how they have sacrificed much so that their offspring can have a more secure future. In the face of well-intention, how many children have responded with “What you want for me is not what I want for myself!”. The road to hell is indeed paved with good intentions.

Life is not meant to be a bed of roses. We do not live a charmed life but instead, like Jesus, we face existential challenges. In our suffering, God is not testing our faith but rather, He allows trials to purify it. Imagine this scenario of missionary priest or religious who is unable to endure a little heat or humidity. Why? His previous life was nothing short of pure comfort and convenience. Untested and unproven, he is not able to rise up to the challenge of personal inconvenience. How to be a missionary?

Jesus predicted that those who follow Him would be hated. Should we then be surprised by hostility? Or do we cave in the second we encounter resistance? Today, do you think that hatred or hostility come from non-Christians? Three days ago, we celebrated St Augustine of Canterbury—the Apostle to the English. Pope St Gregory the Great sent him to England to Christianise the pagans. Christianity did not take root amongst the Anglo-Saxons as much as it did with the Celts. Through St Augustine, pagan England embraced Christianity.

The example of St Augustine of Canterbury illustrates that the normal process in evangelisation is that pagans become Christians. At present, the process no longer holds true. Firstly, the England now is representative of Europe in general. The so-called West is supposedly “Christian” in character. But the empty cathedrals and churches are sad reminders of what Europe has become. Benedict XVI made an analysis to this effect that the West has become the birthplace of a new paganism. In fact, this paganism is becoming more and more the Church. We are not threatened by the “outside” but really by the “inside”.

The Church is no longer, as she once was, a Church composed of pagans who have become Christians. She is now a Church of pagans who call themselves Christians. The problem is not that these so-called neo-pagans do not practise the faith. Rather, they choose what they want to believe and from there try to impose their personal “creed” unto the Church. Give you two glaring examples. President Joe Biden and Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi. Both proudly proclaim themselves to be devout Catholics but each staunchly takes positions contrary to what the Catholic Church teaches.

Christ prayed the Father not to shield us from troubles because He knows that the mission to evangelise is not helped by our inability to withstand the complications and complexities of life. The need to numb ourselves from pains and rejections has made the missionary enterprise more formidable and daunting. 

Evangelisation is supposed to be “ad extra”. Today, our greatest test is evangelisation “ad intra”. There is no greater test than to preach to your family and friends. “Physician, heal thyself” as Jesus was quoted to say. Or “Can anything good come from Nazareth?”. The fear of contemptuous familiarity is a powerful deterrent when it comes to preaching to a relative or a close friend.

All baptised have the vocation of labouring to spread the Gospel. More and more it is the Church who needs to be re-evangelised. In a sense, it would have been better to live in the days of St Augustine. It is easier to convert pagans to Christians than to re-Christianise “Catholics” who have reverted to paganism. In the preparation for the coming of the Holy Spirit, Jesus knows that His disciples must face this challenge of re-evangelisation head on and not be shielded from the difficulties involved. Dialogue is fraught with difficulties when merely putting ideas across can be shouted down by cancel, mob or woke cultures. Hatred or hostility within families, between relatives and friends can be deeply intense, more than with strangers. This is the same in the family of believers, the Church. 

In praying for us, Jesus is assuring us that where trouble is, He will always be there in His Spirit to accompany and to strengthen us. What remains in our family and in the Church is that more and more we should become the open Bible that others can read which means that we ought to convert the pagans in us first before attempting to convince the pagans outside.

Ascension Year C 2022

The Ascension feels like one in a series of Post-Easter events but if one reads it from the perspective of an ending or a finale, then it can be a frightening or even a traumatic experience. Perhaps the many Covid measures could give us an insight into how people feel about closures because death is a closure of sorts. But by no means is death the only ending. Moving away to a new place, retirement from a life-long employment and divorce are endings that can be frightening.

Firstly, it is not fear alone that makes us avoid conclusion because when the going is good, nobody in a bull run likes a slide into a bearish recession. Ask the restaurants around here if they would mind another lockdown to stem out Covid infection? Secondly, even in a divorce where a spouse is getting out of an abusive relationship, there is fear because the devil one knows is “securely” better the devil one is uncertain of. Even if a divorcee gains freedom, it still can be intimidating to chart a new path in life.

In the case of the Apostles, imagine the dry and dusty roads, the bad food or even the lack of it and the uncomfortable sleeping arrangements—foxes have holes and birds of the air have nests. The Apostles did not just leave their homes, spouses, children, but they followed this itinerant preacher unreservedly for three years as He made His ways through the cities and villages of Palestine. The foregoing of familial ties and the lack of creaturely comforts aside, they were now at the end of an intense and intimate journey with Jesus who is preparing to leave them. They were naturally sad and possibly frightened by the prospect of having to stand on their own. Visualise the occasion that they were not able to drive out spirits which in the end, embarrassingly they had to refer to Jesus to supply for their inability. Now they had to face a life without the security blanket of having a Jesus on call.

It can be daunting. However, what is not always noticeable is that a tearful finale can be the start of a new journey. The Ascension is not a stand-alone event. It is the beginning of a new chapter which is connected closely to Pentecost and after. Physically, Jesus may have departed from the Apostles but His going away was not an abandonment. He left so that the Holy Spirit could come to be with them.

The Ascension is therefore a preparation for the next phase in the development of discipleship. They are to return to Jerusalem to wait for the promised descent of the Holy Spirit so that clothed with the Spirit’s strength, they will be able to preach the Gospel, no matter what. If fact, Jesus had to leave because when you think about it, not many Masses could be celebrated if Jesus were still here in person. Why? Because in order to celebrate the Eucharist, He would have to be physically present at each one. It is because He is no longer here that the bread and wine through the Holy Spirit can be transubstantiated into His Body and Blood.

Precisely that the Eucharist is a continued presence of Jesus that the Liturgy also reminds us that this preparation is not restricted merely to the mission of evangelisation in this world. It is also a preparation for the next world. Both the Collect for the Mass of the Day and the Preface I of the Ascension point out the purpose of our preparation. From the Collect, we have this: “(f)or the Ascension of Christ your Son is our exaltation, and where the Head has gone before in glory, the Body is called to follow in hope”. From the Preface of the Ascension, we hear that Jesus, the “Mediator between God and man, judge of the world and Lord of hosts, He ascended, not to distance Himself from our lowly state, but that we, His members, might be confident of following where He, our Head and Founder, has gone before”.

The more profound preparation is captured in this sense: “Where He has gone, we hope to follow”. This description is not topographical but aspirational. It is not a reference to heaven as a physical place. Instead, where He is that we aim to arrive at, must come through a life that proclaims Jesus as Lord both in our word and through our action. It is not as if we were trusting in something vague in the future. The history of salvation is succinctly expressed by the desire to be there where He is and not here where He is not. This longing gives meaning to life here on earth. 

As everyone can testify, life can take so many turns for the worse that it seems that we are always one stumble away from hopelessness. Just think of the multiple untimely deaths from the pandemic. That we die is a given but dying before one’s time feels like a tragedy. Thus, the Ascension of Christ presents us with this vision that goes beyond the failures and the disappointment of our temporal existence. What is more, we have Satan and his powers who are arrayed against us in every sense of the word. If we were disappointed, Satan would do his best to make us despair and lose hope. To arrive where Christ is, is indeed a more arduous preparation because it requires taking personal responsibility to live in a manner which is both gracious and good.

St Paul in the Letter to the Ephesians reminds us that this is the hope that God has called us to, which ends in a glorious inheritance amongst the saints. However, we are called to be saints not only when we reach heaven but to be one here on earth. If Pentecost inaugurates the mission to evangelise and sanctify the world, then the Ascension tells us that the mission must begin with us, with the sanctification of our lives. As the Preface for Christ the King sums it up, our sanctity or holiness is in line with the mysteries of human redemption that in the end, He the Lord, can present to the immensity of the Father’s majesty, a Kingdom of truth and life, a Kingdom of holiness and grace, a Kingdom of justice, love and peace.