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Right at the start of our Lenten reflection, we run smack into the phenomenon of temptations. Immediately after His baptism in the Jordan, Jesus is led or driven into the desert where the Devil tempts Him. However, the 1st Reading seems to speak of something else by reminding Israel to offer the best to God as a way to remember and to be grateful for their deliverance. How is offering to God the best connected to the temptations of Jesus?
Firstly, conversion. Secondly, relationships.
The flip-side of the temptations that Jesus underwent which we too will be subjected to, is conversion. When we think of or speak of temptations, we often assume their objective or goal lead to bad or evil actions. In other words, we are tempted to behave badly or commit acts which are bad. Overeating for example or stealing is another. But people can be tempted towards the “good” too. What does this mean? Jesus is a model of this kind of temptation.
Coming up out of the River Jordan, Jesus was filled with the Holy Spirit. Would it make sense for Satan to tempt Him to evil? No, it does not. Satan would not have suggested that Jesus go on a murderous rampage. Instead, he proposed to Jesus, “Now, I know that you are about to begin your journey of doing good—heal the sick, let the blind see, make the lame walk, allow me assist you. I will give you all these kingdoms. Imagine with such a great scope and capacity, how much more can you accomplish?”.
It does not help that the entertainment industry has portrayed evil as sinister, dark and malevolent. The images we have of the Devil are ugly and hideous but what Satan proposed to Jesus was not grotesque domination but rather the alluring potential to do good.
If you can, imagine the tête-à-tête or the exchange between Jesus and Satan. It was not a vicious conflict between good and evil but rather a civil conversation, an almost intimate chat on choosing between good and better. For those who are bent on self-destruction, the Devil does not have to do anything because their hearts are already hell-bent. If one were heading to Hades, no assistance is needed. But for those who are ascending to heaven, Satan will be subtle. He proposes to unsuspecting souls, ideas which on their own, look good enough. To those who are serious about serving God, Satan will appear as an angel of light. We joke about this but maybe you can appreciate why meat seems to taste better on Friday.
In the desert, Jesus returned to the source of all that is good, beautiful and true. He turned to God. The temptation to power is appealing because of its capabilities. Hiding behind the ability to master and dominate is the temptation of self—worship. Jesus reminded Satan that all power must bow before the Lord for He alone is to be adored.
Thus, at the heart of Christ’s temptations is the conversion in our relationships. Christ was not resisting temptations in themselves but pointing us in the right direction of our relationships. On Ash Wednesday, we were alerted to the three virtuous practices of the Jews: fasting, alms-giving and prayer. They symbolise our relationships with ourselves, others and God.
Temptations subvert the proper order of these relationships. When Jesus was tempted to turn stones to bread, He reminded the Tempter where in the hierarchy of priorities should one place material things. Pleasure itself is not our ultimate desire. God is the only one who can fully satisfy our needs. Our needs are not just material but also spiritual.
The temptation to power reminds us that while it is good to serve the poor, feed and clothed them, the greater temptation is to believe that we are gods who can solve the world’s economic crises. A globalist agenda believes that through sheer dominance, we can control diseases and disasters. The opposite is not that humanity deserves to suffer or that the poor should be neglected. The Son of God Himself made this remark that we will always have the poor with us. It is not a condemnation that the poor should accept their status quo but rather a challenge that we must never forget the poor in our midst.
The powerful are always tempted towards achieving the greater good but ultimately it is the temptation to control. We should help those who are in need but always remembering that we must depend all the more on God for the conversion of selfishness; the same selfishness that traps and prevents us from reaching out to one another and especially to the marginalised.
The last temptation by Satan to test God gives us a glimpse into how we are supposed to depend on God alone. Sadly, our idea of dependence is rather independent. Meaning? We only turn to God when we are unable to do things. How often have we turned to Him immediately in a crisis? Practically never. Remember during the Pandemic, the first thing we did was to shut the Churches. We only depend on Him when we are incapable.
We will be tempted to forget God and at the heart of every temptation is basically a forgetfulness of our relationship with God. The nature of temptation can be obscured by our conflating it with hideous and repulsive manifestations. When we reduce evil to ugliness we can lose sight of its true nature. The true nature of temptation is to lead us away from God and on most occasions, it does not lead us away with ugliness but with beauty. If you are well-intentioned, you are generally immune to choosing ugliness. Instead, you will be lured to choose the good rather than the better.
What makes temptation a difficult reality to appreciate is when we lose the sense of sin. The result of our sin-blindness is also a rise in justification or rationalisation. We explain away sin by reducing everything to just psychology. In the past, when a person sins, he or she falls sick. Today we are merely sick and because we cannot help ourselves, we sin. Pathologies excuse our sinful behaviour. Najib’s governance was labelled as a “kleptocracy”, remember? As a kleptomaniac, he could not help but enrich himself. Najib was not alone. He has a good companion in one Ismail Sabri Yaakob.
Finally, I was in a country noted for its order. Everything appeared perfectly placed, right down to the minute details of life. Buses and trains run like clockwork. There was nothing to complain about. Yet when everything is planned and runs smoothly, what is unseen is a great force exerted even though outwardly there appears to be a great measure of personal autonomy. Beneath all the planned activities and even though individual freedom is exercised, there is coercion. I am not criticising organisational skills etc but merely pointing out that beyond this ability to manage or direct our destiny, there lies a greater power. The Temptation is the desert reminds us of the great power over Whom we are powerless. It is to recognise Who the real power is and He is God our Lord.
Many had left their unwanted sacramentals for us to burn. Thankfully, we managed to finish burning the last discarded Bible about two weeks ago. On Monday morning, after the Eucharist, we gathered to burn last year’s palms. The ashes have be finely “cinderised” and cooled for safe administration.
For some Catholics, today is really a big day. Similar to Good Friday. Perhaps our fascination with ashes is a good place to start thinking about Lent. “Rend your hearts and not your clothes”. Our translation says, “Let your hearts be broken, not your garments torn, turn to the Lord your God again”.
Christ in the Gospel mentioned the three religious practices amongst devout Jews. Firstly, it is to give alms. Secondly, it is to pray. Thirdly, it is to fast. Of course, these were spoken of in terms secrecy meaning that one should do these things minus public display. Such a counsel is rather alien to a culture bent on self-promotion. To be fair, self-promotion has always been man’s temptation. It was already there during the time of Jesus as He had preached against it too. Perhaps, it is a matter of degree in the sense that they were simply ostentatious, being a kind of show-off whereas we are just “transparent”; meaning that we are open books for all to see. Since branding is everything and we are hyper-focused on marketing, everything is optics nowadays.
Making a great show of what is being done misses the point of why it is being done. A good example is alms-giving. Politicians, philanthropic clubs, prominent people, etc. engage heavily in charitable causes. Commonly they conduct mock-cheque handing-over photo-sessions to create fanfare for all to see. The question is, what happens post photo-ops? The aftermath is not as important as consciences salved. People can go back to their homes secure that they had done their wee bit and the poor have something to eat or wear.
But alms-giving is more than the usual charity directed to the poor. If we operate from a space of self-sufficiency, the default engagement with the world will be from a position of surplus. I give because I can afford but I do not really need the poor. They are simply objects of my compassion or largesse. Hence,alms-giving has to be broader than giving alms because it symbolises my social relationships. How?
Charity is linked to mercy but mercy is associated with justice. Justice is necessary because we do not live alone. As social beings, justice demands that we owe it to others and not because we have more. Instead, justice is as simple and personal as not stabbing someone behind the back. Or stealing from my employer by not fulfilling my end of the contract. Even words or notions such as personal or private are relational in nature because personal suggests that there is a reality which is inter or extra personal and a private space can only be carved out from a public sphere.
While we are highly social beings, what is personal is marked by our fasting. Thus, the act of fasting denotes the manner in which I take care of my body and soul. What sort of content do I consume from the internet? Does it include the unsavoury stuff? Porn is a sin that afflicts many but because it is so pervasivethat it is accepted as a fact of life. In a culture built upon the principle of consumption, do I over-eat or over-drink? Do I take care of my health or am I overly fearful that I have become anti-social?
Beyond our personal and social realms, we are also spiritual beings. Prayer connects us with God. Sadly, that relationship can be quite utilitarian because we tend to pray only when in need. The central question for us is not who God is. We know who He is. The question is where He is placed in our life. Do I give Him my best or do I leave Him my rest, my left-over?
Before we rush into a shopping list of what to let go of, or what we should give up on, perhaps, Lent is an invitation to be more. Jesus asking us not to look miserable is really an invitation to exude joy. Giving up can be painful, a chore that is tiring because we tend to hoard which raises the question why obesity is a challenge. When we focus not on the giving up but on the being more, then our outlook may change. Our relationships with others can be enriched by an attitude which is not just about giving but also of receiving meaning that we relate to others on a deeper plane rather than superficially. We embrace a healthier outlook in life not because we fear dying but because we honour our Creator by not giving in to crass consumption. Finally we enter into a more intentional presence before the Lord rather than sporadically turning to Him only when we are in need.
In conclusion, Lent is as much a season of seriousness as well as light-hearted joy. The ashes on our heads just tell us that it is time to be serious not just with giving up but also with growing in joyful relationships with others, with ourselves and with God. It is not about doing. Rather it is about becoming who we can be with God, with ourselves and with others.
This is the last Sunday before we enter Lent. This coming Monday, the sacred branches from last year’s Palm Sunday will be burnt for use on Ash Wednesday. The readings themselves, though not “Lenten” are tending towards the renewal represented by the season. Hence, the Gospel is centred on self-awareness and correction. The 1st Reading points out that a person’s mettle is tested out by fire. One’s true character is revealed when he or she undergoes trials. Maybe it explains the largescale pervasiveness of mediocrity. Our children have not been tested because we, the adults, have been trying to protect them from life.
The Gospel is challenging because everyone is a flawed individual. How do we judge others and how do we judge ourselves? There is a story about the Patron Saint of parish priests, St John Mary Vianney. He was sent to an obscure village called Ars and he got lost whilst travelling there. Apparently, he asked a young shepherd for directions and supposedly he said, “Young man, can you point me out to where Ars is and I will point you in the direction heaven”. The young boy, Antoine Givre did point the way to Ars and today his statue stands at the entrance to the village. However, according to another retelling, the young man’s response was rather cynical, “You cannot even find your way to Ars and you want to point me the way to heaven”?
The point being that how can we expect a blind to lead another blind. If we are to get away from our blindness, perhaps there may be two areas which we ought to look into. They are firstly, self-awareness and secondly, authenticity.
By and large we have forgotten sin or the reality that there is sin. A “sinless world” or rather, a “sin-insensitive” or “sin-indifferent” world is not a better one. It is a ruthless and a dangerous one. We aim to be colour-blind or race-blind or religion-blind but the result is that we have simply become “sin-blind”. But it is a weird kind of blindness. The explosive prevalence of electronic devices is indeed a blessing for so many of us. Parents find them such a great help to raising children. Let them watch You-Tube whilst eating. It is painless. We do not need to carry heavy books because everything can be downloaded. All our pictures are safely stored and readily available at the touch of a finger. When it is dark, we rely on the torch on our phone. Best of all, we can attend Mass online or read the Gospel on our devices. At the same time, tell me that you have never received unsavoury contents on you social media and even if you are not into them, you may have inadvertently watched them through the same device without thinking twice. So, one minute soft-porn and the next minute the same device is used for praying the Divine Office. The frightening truth is that nobody seems to feel that there is anything wrong with that. Perhaps you appreciate why I do not allow the Readings or the Gospel to be read or proclaimed from an electronic device because we do not know where the screen has been to.
Of course, we are sin-blind when it comes to ourselves but we are not blind to sin in others. In fact, our eyes easily spot and note weaknesses in others. If you were part of an organisation, you might be familiar with this illustration. The boss points out the short-comings of some employees and in your head, you would be searching for a name to pin the sin on.
There is a joke about the Jesuits, the Dominicans and the Franciscans. According to the legend, St Ignatius said “Let the Dominicans be famous for their intellectual learning. Let the Franciscans be known for their poverty. But let the Jesuits be known for their humility”. So, when one of the Regional Superiors spoke of disobedient Jesuits, I was young once upon a time and immediately in my head, I would have worked out the names and faces of Jesuits whom I deemed to be examples of disobedience. Now in my waning years, I look at myself and feel the awkward shame that I had failed to see myself as an example of disobedience.
We have been taught not to be judgemental, right? The truth is, when we are sin-blind, meaning that we no longer see sin, then, the result can only be that there is really no standard at all. There is nothing to “measure up to” but the very fact that we dare to “judge” others, which if you reflect on it, actually points us to the reality that there are standards that we should live up to. Objectively, we can judge if a person has fallen short in his or her behaviour. But subjectively, this is where authenticity and credibility come in.
Authenticity does not mean we never judge. Authenticity just means that we must become what we proclaim. The truth remains that there will always be a gap between our belief and our behaviour. That gap is called sin. We will and we frequently fall short in our behaviour. To be credible, each one of us must take responsibility for his or her actions or failures to act according to our beliefs.
St Paul in the 2nd Reading reminds us of sin and its reality. As we are about to enter into Lent with its penitential focus, we might want to take time to reflect and examine our conscience. This is why the Sacrament of Confession is so important in the lives of Catholics. The more we desire to receive Holy Communion, the more we should want to go for Confession too.
These two Sacraments go hand in hand. The fact that few frequent the Sacrament of Confession, is not only revealing but possibly, it is proof of our sin-blindness. Lent has not begun but it is never too early to start our penitential pilgrimage with a resolution to go for Confession.
We are not done with the Sermon on the Plain yet. It feels as if what Jesus said last week continues to this Sunday. “Blessed are you when people persecute you and speak all kinds of calumny against you”. Here Jesus is asking us to forgive and also to bless those who hurt us.
This is by far one of the most radical teaching put forth by Jesus. And it is a daunting challenge to our human nature. The Christ who emptied His divinity to assume our humanity is inviting us to be divine like Him.
When we consider the topic of forgiveness, we may conceive of it as a feat which we struggle with, at best, to accomplish or at worst, we are plainly unable to do so. As such, how often have we come up with justifications like “I can forgive but I cannot forget” or “I can forget but I cannot forgive”. The ability to forgive is a gargantuan task. Often enough we are a tangled mess of emotions that simply overwhelms whatever will or “voluntas” we may have.
A proof of this mess is how we slip with ease into a victim mentality. Firstly, there are genuine victims and there are people who are persecuted because of their orientation or preference, their race or skin colour, their class or social status, their political beliefs or their religious persuasion. Persecution is real. Or one is simply an unfortunate victim of crime, robbed or scammed. But how often have we looked at an instance or an event which is unfavourable and immediately conclude that it was a racist incident? Our interpretative lens is heavily tinted by our preconceived labels.
When we have preconceived ideas such as being a victim, it is easy to blame everyone instead of taking responsibility for our own actions. When one is a victim, forgiveness will always feel like a losing proposition. A person, who believes himself or herself to a victim, is already disadvantaged, and for this person, hatred, dislike, gossip can be a security that one holds onto. In such a situation, to forgive would be to lose that one advantage a person has. Furthermore, this victim culture also has an ugly step-sister and it is the outrage industry. When we accept our victimhood, we can be easily triggered.
However, instead of approaching forgiveness as an achievement we might want to consider it from the perspective of result and a fruit. How? In general we have lost the long-term perspective that allows us to hold contradictory emotions together. Our quick-solution tendency is to try to get rid of pain because we are unable to deal with a less than perfect situation. Pill-popping and numbing narcotics are easy solutions to this inability to cope with the contradictions arising from natural imperfections.
After all this is a valley of tears and no matter how perfect a world that we hope for and desire, it often falls short of perfection. Such an imperfection becomes a burden when we lose sight of the Resurrection. If we are unable to see beyond death to the Resurrection, then we will always be driven to exorcise our discomfort, which is a kind of imperfection that belongs to this temporal reality.
After each day of creation, God saw that it was good. Yet it whatever He had created was not the perfection of heaven. Imperfection is not a sign of God’s lack. Rather, it belongs to the natural order of creation. Thus, we need to consider forgiveness from the perspective of heaven or our desire for heaven. What Jesus taught becomes relevant to our effort to forgive. “Blessed are you when people persecute you and speak all kinds of calumny against you” becomes an invitation to bless even those who persecute you. From the perspective of heaven, the fruit of blessing is forgiveness.
Try blessing someone whom you really dislike and watch how the hatred that grips your heart gets loosened. Blessings and curses cannot belong together. You cannot in all in sincerity ask God to bless and at the same time curse a person. It just does not work that way. How often have I wished I were a mutant like Magneto. I would have the power to crush terrible drivers in their cars andfeel the glee of disposing of them like ragged dolls. But to what avail? Whereas, when we bless others, even bad drivers, we free ourselves and we allow ourselves to look for ways to reconcile. It may not be that we forget but we will definitely not look for ways to harm another person.
When Jesus taught us to forgive, He did it to both the Disciples and the crowd in Matthew’s Gospel. Whereas, in Luke, He addresses only His Disciples. This is such a fundamental call that it raises Christianity to a noble calling. Luke holds such a high standard for the Disciples to imitate God.
Indeed Christian life is not for the faint-hearted. It is not the weak who forgive because they have no choice. Rather it is the strong who forgive because they choose to. Ultimately, the blessing we invoke on others will make us walk through this valley of tears not unharmed but with confidence and hope in the Lord.
Forgiveness is like the air we let go of in a balloon. Unforgiveness is like the millstone around our neck which does nothing but drags us down. It weighs upon and drowns us. It is energy-sapping because it takes a lot of energy to be angry and to hate. On the other hand, it takes less energy to be joyful.
In the 1st Reading, David was badly wronged by Saul and yet David spared Saul’s life. Our victim-society is an existential reality from which we cannot escape. Therefore, we must deal with the reality that there are a lot of victims but the question is not “How do we deal with being wronged by others?”.Rather, the question is “How not to live as victims and despite our victimhood, how can we be freed from the oppression of unforgiveness?”.
Sometimes, it feels good that we can get even especially when misfortune befalls our enemies. Like being Magneto but the thrill of schadenfreude is always short-lived. Ultimately, it leaves us empty even if we should get even. As they say here, “padan muka” or “serves you right”. It feels good but after that, what? Are you happy or satisfied? What frees us is when we are able to bless our enemy and at the same time, to leave it to God to exact justice the way He sees fit. This is trust and such is the grace that we are invited to this Sunday.
This Sunday, the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew makes a descent down the slope to become the Sermon on the Plain for Luke. The Gospel writer, in particular, noted that Christ stopped at a piece of level ground. Matthew’s focus was on Christ the teacher for He had gone up the hill where He sat down and He began to teach them. Luke’s emphasis on the level ground revealed a Messiah who had come to fulfil the prophecies of old—mountains would be laid low and valleys would be filled in.
Jesus has come to make things right and the Lucan Beatitudes reveal that in God, there will be a reversal of fortune. Now, for the change we desire, we need to take note of whom we should trust. In the 1st Reading, the writer spoke of the foolishness of trusting in man or his machinations but praised the wisdom of trusting in God. This runs against the grain of accepted convention.
Our usual response is to manoeuvre. We tend to scheme our ways around because God cannot be trusted. In that regard, He has not failed somehow to “prove” or to “manifest” His untrustworthiness. How many of us have prayed and placed our trust in the Lord only to be disappointed? Think about Job and the misfortunes that landed on him. God appeared unmoved by our predicaments especially for so many who have lost their loved ones. They have prayed, fasted, made novenas and gone on pilgrimages to pray for miracles to no avail.
The key to trusting in God is found in the 2nd Reading and it is the hope of the Resurrection. St Paul was right to point out that if the Resurrection had not happened, then we would be the saddest people in the world. But the Resurrection did take place and it should ground our trust in the Lord. The truth of Christianity is premised on the truth that we will rise from the dead. Our hope is not confined to this life alone and there is a bigger picture which allows us to survive or hold on for the long run.
The promise of the Resurrection gives meaning to the Gospel’s blessings and woes. The English translation we are accustomed to, speaks of “happiness” but a better rendering would be to speak of “blessedness”. Happiness is suggestive of contentment and it could also be emotional or simply passing. Whereas to be blessed evokes a peace of mind and an interior joy and it does not exclude the possibility of suffering.
The blessedness of the poor described by Luke is balanced by the woes of the rich who have placed their hope in material well-being or even their own political prowess. They will receive their comeuppance. For those who are poor, who really have nowhere to turn but who have humbly placed their trust in the Lord, they will be justly compensated even if what they deserve may not be found in this world.
Our reward may only come only when our earthly existence is over. Therefore, to be a Christian today is really to walk a straight and narrow path. Frequently it is a long and lonely journey. Our natural inclination is to desire a form of discipleship that is easy-going and if we encounter challenges, we want the Cross to be light enough for us to carry or the trial easy enough for us to overcome. But life rarely bestows such an easy path to greatness. The path to saintly excellence is always heroic. “Blessed are you when people persecute you and speak all kinds of calumny against you”.
The reality is that we do not need to “engage” the world for it to reject us. The very fact that we follow Christ is enough. But rest assured that in Him there will be a reversal of fortune as presented by these Lucan Beatitudes. The four blessings and four woes invite us to consider where we are placed. Where do we fit in the grand scheme of things? The poor, the hungry, the weepers and the hated will find their fortune reversed and that is a promise as much as for the rich, the full, the contented and those praised by the world. They may find themselves “unblessed” in the end.
It becomes frightening if we only focus on the warnings expressed through the “woes”. While it should terrify us to a certain extent what they do is to remind us that we do not exist on a purely physical plane. There is a reality beyond our corporeal existence and because we are also spiritual beings, it explains why we can never be fully satisfied materially. Just observe a person who is greedy or avaricious. They acquire wealth and somehow whatever they have gained, there never seems to be enough to make them happy.
Maybe wealth accumulation is not a good example. Online shopping may be a better illustration. Have you gone on a buying spree? What felt at that time like the ultimate purchase when received will soon leave us feeling empty. Our addiction to shopping is symptom that we may have mistaken material acquisition to be the solution to the soul’s deepest longings. What is more? The modern phenomenon of hoarding is a tell-tale sign that we may be losing the fight of believing in the Resurrection. We “save” or rather we “hoard” because nobody can be trusted, not even God.
The woes in the Beatitudes open us to the truth that we are spiritual beings and they remind us not to be fooled and trapped by the material and physical experiences of this world. What makes living Christianity impossible is when we lose the sense of the Resurrection.
We all need a reversal of fortune but not in the material sense of getting richer. What we most need is to know that our faith has not been in vain. Suffering, loss, setbacks are not the final chapters in our lives. Jesus Christ, by His Death and Resurrection, has stamped life with a promise. Life has an eternity but not in this world. Blessed is he who has placed his trust in the Lord.
Recently, an artist was asked to perform at the Liberty Inaugural Ball to welcome the 47th President of the USA and he was criticised severely by his fans. There were calls to boycott him. His response is relevant to our Gospel today.
Jesus is at the house of Simon. He had been curing the sick and it included Simon’s mother-in-law. Later, He taught from Simon’s boat and even instructed him where to pay out his net. The catch was phenomenal, further confirming that with Christ present, there is always abundance.
The catch proved pivotal in the transforming and deepening relationship between Christ and Simon. Simon who recognised his unworthiness in the presence of His Lord, was given a new mission. From then on, Peter was to be the fisher of men. This episode of their deepening relationship was witnessed by two brothers, James and John. Significantly, the mission to be the fisher of men was addressed to Peter alone.
Now let us return to Nelly, the artist performing for Trump, who was chastised by his fans for daring to dignify or “normalise” the 47th, to which he replied, “I respect the Office. This isn’t politics. The politics, for me, is over. Trump won. He is the President. He is the Commander-in-Chief… It is an honour for me to perform for the President of the United States, regardless of who is in office”.
Today’s Gospel might be the genesis of one of the greatest offices of the world: the Papacy. History has not been kind to the office of the Pope. At best, it has been lukewarm and mostly for the anglophone, the English language is enmeshed in rather strong anti-papist sentiments. After all, English is the mother-tongue of a kingdom that had turned it back on the Pope.
Behind the Office, God stands. This is a powerful statement that finds little currency for some of us. God is the guarantor of the office. Not the politics. We may disagree with the politics of the papacy but we may want to get behind the fact that this office is the only one guaranteed by the Holy Spirit.
There is an element in the Gospel passage today which may provide a way to appreciate the Papacy. Whether it be a President, a Prince or a Pope, we seem to believe that transparency is only way to be. But then, in facing the demons, Jesus disallowed them from acknowledging Him. Why? Scholars believe that to be a part of the Messianic secret where Jesus does not want the demons to proclaim Him. If they had opened their mouths, and the people come to know about Him, He would be severely curtailed in His ministry.
However, the human heart is a landscape which only God knows too well. Yet we believe that transparency is enough and also we are free enough to be the best judge of the human character. Maybe Pope Francis was right. We do not judge because only God knows and it brings us to a topic which is central to the smooth running of the information superhighway. It is the matter of transparency in relationships.
There is a world of a difference between government secrecy and the Messianic secret. Governments view secrecy as a means to govern in the name of a greater good. Yet know that it is often motivated by self-interests. Somehow, Christ also willed secrecy as a means of doing greater good which raises the question of which “secrecy” is the better good. Where does transparency fit in all this? Good journalistic investigations have uncovered or revealed private interests shrouded in shadowy secret or even hiding in plain sight. Whereas the Messianic secret can beunderstood from the perspective of creation. God put Adam to sleep so that He could create Eve. We are not meant to know all secrets and transparency does not always guarantee accountability. This is not advocating apathy. Part of our challenge today is that everyone is a pope. We believe we know everything. We also want to know everything, like Eve greedy for knowledge.
Right now, there is a new sherif in town. More than half the American population is crowing or gloating. Less than half is foaming and perhaps flagellating themselves. The same jubilation and despondency was felt during the transition from Benedict to Francis. Those who love Benedict love him for his erudition and dislike Francis for his easy-going ways. Those who love Francis love him for his iconoclasm and dislike Benedict for his pedantry. These are simply caricatures but the point is there will be some “winners” and some “losers”. Now we have a popular Pope like now we have a popular President. Everything about Pope Francis is amazing. Francis this, Francis that. Everything is Pope Francis. When Benedict was in power, the conservatives were in ascendancy and they were elated. Now that we have a seemingly leftist pope, the liberal are just ecstatic. For conservatives who do not like him, whatever Francis does is raked over with a fine-tooth comb.
The point is popes come and go. A few are scoundrels and some are saints. Most importantly, it is to behold the office and recognise that it is not bestowed by us. Rather it is bequeathed by the Lord to His Church. If we like the Pope, well and good. But if we dislike him, the best we can do is to turn to the Lord and pray for the Pope and by extension the Bishops or the priests. Once I was out for dinner with a group of friends and the conversation drifted towards the character of a priest. A woman in the group casually remarked, “He is a mother’s son”. It was a sobering slander-stopper which drew our attention to how much prayer is necessary for the clergy and the religious. Every vocation is really a history of grace, for it is a calling from being ordinary to becoming extraordinary. All the more prayers and sacrifices are needed for that. Thus, the Church, most especially the Vicar of Christ, needs our prayers and our reparation. The more we pray, the more we will repent and return to God. The more we pray and repent, the better Christ can accomplish His salvation, despite the less than stellar quality of our Popes, our Bishops and our priests. God is great.
Today marks the 40th day after Christmas. Traditionally, it signals the end of the Christmas season. Of course, for most, if not all, we have already taken down our decoration since the Baptism of the Lord.
During Ordinary Time, the solemnities and feasts of Our Lord take precedence over the Sunday celebration. Since the Presentation falls on a weekend, it supersedes the 4th Sunday in Ordinary Time. The other two feasts sharing the same privilege are the Transfiguration and the Exaltation of the Cross. Coincidentally, this year, the Exaltation of the Cross falls on a Sunday too.
A feast on a Sunday might feel like an interruption but it actually presents a good segue into how we can scrutinise more profoundly the person of Jesus Christ.
Apart from the Presentation, Feb 2nd is also called the Purification of Mary. How can we understand the Mosaic tradition which considers a mother unclean for forty days after the birth of a son? The most humble Mother of God, despite her immaculate conception, submitted to the law and at the end of that period, she went to the Temple to offer a sacrifice for her purification and also to present the Boy to God.
Our challenge is that we have associated purification with the notion of moral impurity. This is partly due to our knowledge of biology having advanced to the point that this taboo does not sit too well with our current understanding. To understand Mary’s act purification, consider it from the perspective of cleansing the Sacred Vessels after Holy Communion.
The purification towards the end of Mass is not an indication that something impure has previously touched the vessels. How can it be when both the paten and chalice carried the Sacred Body and Blood of Christ during Mass? The act of purifying the vessel is a rite undertaken to prepare the vessel for future use. A woman’s greatest power is to conceive and bear life and her purification after birth is to prepare her for the possibility of a future conception.
The other name which makes more sense to us is Candlemas. There in the Temple, as the elderly Simeon encounters the Child and His mother, the prophecy gives meaning to the Rite of Blessing of Candles. Jesus is the “Light that enlightens the pagans”. To be more polite, “Gentiles”. The encounter with Simeon was yet another theophany, a manifestation of God in human history. God cannot be a Saviour if He were only the Saviour of the Jews and not the Gentiles. It does not make sense.
However, we seemed to have fractured history, meaning that, we isolate or dismiss historical realities in such a way as to accommodate present sensibilities. For example, the calculation of time periods is now divided into BCE and CE, and they stand for, “Before Common Era” and “Common Era”. Such a division allows us to take our focus off how time came to be calculated. In the past, we used BC and AD to represent time before Christ and after. BC is easy enough to understand: Before Christ’s birth. However, A.D. stands for “Anno Domini”, that is, in the year of the Lord. Historically when was Christ born is not the point here. Rather, time is reckoned or sanctified by the birth of the pivotal person of Jesus Christ. BCE and CE, despite trying to get away from referring to Christ as the measure is a form of cutting Him down to size. The new time reference is trying to ignore the impact of Christ’s birth even if it is still using Him as the marker.
Thus, the Presentation is actually a kind of healing of time in the sense that in Christ we find the meeting of the Two Testaments. Here again, there is an attempt to separate both the Testaments in such a manner to accord them their autonomy, under the guise of respect for their uniqueness. Currently vogue is to use the terms, the Hebrew Testament and the Christian Testament to denote both the Old and the New Testaments. When Christ was brought to the Temple, a reconciliation took place. Such a healing may not be for the Jews but it is definitely for us. For the Jews it is OK for them to refer to the Hebrew Testament. For us, it is like calling the Real Presence a piece of wafer so that we may not offend those who do not believe in the Blessed Sacrament.
Going to Jerusalem, Jesus the New Temple of God enters the Old Temple to reconcile and fulfil the expectation of the old for the new. The Greeks called this encounter the “hypapante tou Kyriou” because both Simeon and Anna represented the Old Testament who have been waiting for the coming of salvation.
Indeed, creation has been groaning ever since the foundation of the world, longing for salvation. If we follow the 1st Reading, Christ now comes to Jerusalem to purify the city of its laxity and indifference. Thus, Simeon pointed out that He is destined to be the downfall and the rise of many in Israel. If we turn to the 2nd Reading, Christ is now the High Priest who offers the perfect sacrifice, that is, He offers Himself, and not merely any sacrificial offering. He is the only sacrifice that is acceptable to the Father. In that way, He ushers in the fullness of salvation in these last days.
If we reckon the Presentation as the last day of Christmas, the reconciliation between the Old and New Covenant cannot be more spectacular than the visit of the little Child to the Temple. He is the true Light that humanity has been waiting for, the Light that darkness cannot overcome. Christian is the mission that continues to shine the Light, who is Christ. The affairs of humanity and the state of the environment feel like Christianity is a losing proposition. Present situations actually highlight the reality of overwhelming darkness and this makes the list of our failures feel longer than our successes. Precisely the strength of darkness does not invalidate the mission to be Christ’s light.
At the start of the Mass, we all lit our candles, right? It was a reminder that the Presentation is a call of duty and devotion for each one of us to light up the world for Christ. We begin with our desire to be light even if we feel that we are nothing but little embers. As the hymn suggests. It only takes a spark to get a fire going.
A couple of weeks ago, I raised an issue which might relevant to the readings, notably, the subject of compulsion. The 1st Reading has Prophet Ezra speaking of God’s laws and reading to the people from morning till afternoon. The word “law” itself is already compelling because embedded in the notion of legality is an inherent threat of force. In order for it to be effective, laws must “carry a stick”. Just like fines imposed on us. If we were not punished for non-compliance, then what is the point of stating a fine? It makes a mockery of the law and our country is full of warnings but because they are never enforced. Almost everyone flouts the law and if enforced, it is done selectively.
So, right at the start of the year, how can we move away from this notion of the law as an imposition? If we were tangled by the annoyance that laws compel, then it will be hard to see beyond imposition. We will also feel burdened but beyond penalty, that is, away the long arms of the law, rules and regulations also serve another purpose. They define us. They are not merely matters of do’s and don’ts. In drawing lines, they define who we are. For example, if rapists were caught and released with simply a stern warning, the message to the rapists is that our society tolerates rapes.
In the Gospel, Jesus went to the Temple and there He took out the scroll of Isaiah and started reading. For him that was a moment of self-definition. He drew His lines like He did on the sand, and His behaviour after reading from Isaiah sent a clear signal of His identity. As He sat down, all eyes in the synagogue were fixed on Him and He proceeded to announce that the words of Isaiah were applied to Himself. He is the Messiah they had been waiting for. As the Anointed One, He has come to proclaim the Gospel, to set prisoners free, to give sight to the blind, to set the downtrodden free and to proclaim a year of favour.
For the Church, the boundaries that defines the Messiah’s engagement with the world has deep social and ecological implications. They define who we are too. In fact, the Church’s self-understanding harmonises with mission she has received from Christ Himself. Doing good has been the DNA of the Church and currently that good is done through a comprehensive care for the environment and a search for a form of equality that respects with our dignity as “imago Dei”.
As the image of God, we reflect the Trinitarian character of our God. We are not monads, or single-cell organisms. We are not amoebas. We are defined by our complex relationships. The 2nd Reading speaks of the body as an organic whole and yet we are not merely any body but a spirit-filled body with the heart of Christ beating within. Echoing the 3rd Eucharist Prayer which we are familiar with, “One body, one spirit in Christ”, we are animated by Christ’s Spirit to be His Body, the Church. As such, each one has a role to play in making this Body come alive.
Sadly, we are highly motivated as individuals and we think in terms of self-reliance, independence and assertiveness. We fiercely guard our personalfreedom so much so that beyond our close-knit circle of family and friends, there seems to be a chasm or a void out there which we seldom feel responsible for. This is exemplified when people speak of “victimless” crime as if there were truly such a thing. The criterion that no one got hurt cannot be translated to a victimless crime.
The organic analogy of the Church given by St Paul is an antidote against such a notion of victimless crime. For even if no one were hurt or injured, the person who sins, deforms his or her soul. If being good makes us more like Christ, then sin mars His image in us and moves us further away from His body. In other words, everyone has an influence on everyone no matter how small. If a member of the Christian community is hurt, then all the other members also share in the suffering. This makes us responsible for each other.
What has become an important value for modernity is authenticity. But if we think about it, Christ’s proclamation of Isaiah’s scroll would not sound so revolutionary if everyone regarded himself or herself as part of an organic whole. For example, we are inspired by acts of generosity and goodness. In heaven, everyone is generous and good that it would not even cause a ripple or register as a stand-out.
Christ’s definition of Himself is an invitation and challenge to each one of us to cultivate the habits of generosity and goodness because these acts create the Body of Christ, making the Church even more Christ-like for the world which hungers for and also seeks the face of God.
Finally, the very idea of laws is not alien to us. It is not an imposition but rather as found in Jeremiah 31:34: “For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, declares the Lord: I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts. And I will be their God, and they shall be my people”. In love there is no compulsion. When there is love, there will always be an overflowing of compassion and charity. When we love, there God is.
We have arrived at the final theophany in a trilogy of Divine manifestations. First, came the Magi from the East. Second, Christ was baptised in the desert by His cousin, John. Third is this weekend’s Gospel set in Cana and we have jumped from Luke to John’s Gospel. There was a wedding and the mother of Jesus was there. So too were Jesus and His disciples.
The wedding at Cana is listed by the Evangelist as the first sign performed by Jesus. What makes it the first miracle bears a closer scrutiny. The context for this miracle is interesting. Firstly, John speaks of the event from the perspective of the third day. Secondly, the answer Jesus gave to Mary is also related to it. He tells His mother that His hour has not come yet. Hence, right at the start of His public ministry, we catch a glimpse of both the Cross and the Resurrection. The “hour” points to His Passion and the “third day” is echoed each Sunday when we recite the Creed that “On the third day, He rose again”.
The symbolism is there to see. What is about to take place at a wedding highlights a future to come. The past was caught up in the history of Adam and Eve whereas the future is charted by the New Eve who simply indicates to her Son that His hour is about to begin and through this new Adam, creation is getting a fresh start.
Therein is something for us to think about.
Christ is the new beginning. According to today’s Gospel narrative, it started with the water jars meant for ablution. As the couple ran out of wine, the miracle initiated by Our Lady is quite frankly out of this world. Associated with new beginning in Christ is abundance. The six stone jars represent incompleteness and in a manner of speaking, chaos and raw disorder at the start of creation. Christ calms the chaos and completes creation with the blessing of plenty.
The Evangelist’s first sign is an invitation to appreciate life and to savour the bounty of God’s goodness towards us. Christ Himself promised that “I have come so that you may have life to the fullest”. However, this begs the question of what the “fullest of life” could mean.
At the level of human experiences, He multiplied bread and fish to feed the multitude. After their meal, they were left with baskets full. This is what the Lord does when it comes to scarcity. The boy who offered Him the five loaves and two fish learnt that in Christ abundance is the miracle but we have to trust in Him. The more generous we are with God, the greater His benevolence.
An expression of our trust in God’s generosity is to share this abundance with others. Again it is not about material plenty. The great thing about material sharing is that our second collection for the poor is doing rather well. Kudos to the people who have responded really so generously especially towards our food bank. Working in the office, one gets to see how the regulars drive in and start loading up the poor box with basic necessities that POHD needs to fulfiltheir charity run.
More than feeding the poor, abundance calls for a sharing of life. This might be a bit messier because it involves people and feelings. How do we let the abundance of our love flow out to others. Of course, as always, it starts at home, beginning with relationships in the family and it flows out into our relationships with others. How can we interact or socialise, wherever we are, so that people sense that life is worth living? How do we support each other psychologically and even spiritually? Do people who encounter us leave more hopeful? Or they come to us and they feel that life is sucked out of them?
There is more to life than merely earthly abundance, be it material or psychological. What about spiritual abundance in the fullest sense of the word? Through our experiences with others, be it family or friends, Christ actually purifies our earthly delights and He also elevates our sorrows. In Him, there has to be a reconciliation between a life in abundance and the sorrow that we will experience on earth. God’s blessing and sorrow are not mutually exclusive.
Both Laetare and Gaudete Sundays are examples of why we dare to celebrate even though Lent and Advent are both penitential seasons in their nature. Catholics know how to have a good time but Catholics also know how to endure difficulties gracefully. Tribulations are merely reminders that total plenitude can never be found in this world.
We necessarily live within a world where there is going to be sorrow but it is not a sign that God is miserly. In fact, the abundance of God is manifested in the Son. Right at the beginning of the Cana experience, there was already an indication of the Passion to come. Christ who died on the Cross is God’s mightiest benevolence. Just like it is for the couple at Cana, their wedding celebration is truly a sign of trust that come hell or high water, Jesus will never fail us. With Him, the couple enjoyed His abundance. There were about 700 litres of alcohol to imbibe, judging by the 6 times 30-gallon jars. The lesson at the start of the Ordinary Time, is that with Jesus and Mary, there will always be enough. Let us rejoice.
Last week we marked an epiphany. Again, this Sunday is another theophany. It is the baptism of the Lord. How can we better appreciate this event and the Sacrament?
Perhaps we can approach it from the perspective of birthdays. Celebrating birthdays is such a central feature in modern living. Life is precious and we ought to celebrate the day we were born. But there are other birthdays too. For example, do you remember the day of your baptism? For the majority amongst us, it is truly a non-event. We can be sure that babies, in general, have no memory of the rite. So much so that the Anabaptists and some of their offshoots have a tradition that only adult baptisms are valid. For them, the criterion for the sacrament’s validity is being able to make a conscious decision to accept and ask for baptism.
In a way, the belief of the Anabaptists mirrors the experience of some of our RCIA candidates who are to be envied for if they had undergone a genuinely life-altering baptism, they will generally make better Catholics than some of us cradle-baptised.
A little anecdote of how insignificant baptism is for some of us. I was ordained a deacon in AD1999 and then a priest at the turn of the millennium. Went back to complete my licentiate after the sacerdotal ordination and then returned to full service in AD2001. After conducting many prenuptial enquiries, I thought it might be a good idea to obtain a fresh copy of my baptism certificate since we were always demanding for their latest copy. One day, I was passing through Malacca and so decided to step into St Theresa’s Church, the family’s parish, to request an extract. A couple of months later, I was in Malacca again and went to parish office to enquire but still, there could not locate my baptismal record. Long story short, this terrible “harassment” of the parish office staff took 3 years. Finally, they managed to obtain an extract for me. They traced through the Confirmation record they had kept to the Church of the Seven Sorrows, Macalister Road in Penang. It was embarrassing but more importantly, it simply highlighted how insignificant “baptism” can be for some of us.
Jesus today was baptised as an adult. Firstly, He had no need of it because John’s baptism was a rite of repentance which was a symbolic and outward expression of an interior desire for change. Precisely Jesus was sinless and yet He submitted Himself to the rite to show His solidarity with humanity. Yet, John pointed to Him as the Lamb of God who takes the sins of the world—Jesus.
Secondly, as Luke detailed, coming out of the water, He prayed and heaven was opened. That was an important milestone in His life. It was the confirmation of His Father’s love and also signalled the start of His public ministry.
Perhaps we could also rethink the ways we could celebrate our baptismal anniversary. So far, our focus is on birthdays. They are tangible milestones but do you know that there is a tradition in some countries, where the predominant Church is either Catholic or Orthodox, to celebrate a person’s name day.
Every day of the calendar has a name associated with it and it is usually that of a Saint. Thus people should celebrate the day that they took on a new name which happened to be the day of their baptism. But with a heavy emphasis on originality and individuality, we tend to accentuate the uniqueness of a person as reflected in the most “fantabulous” names parents can conjure.
A name day is coming from another angle and it is based on imitation and it is also exemplary. Moreover, assuming a new name represents a change in one’s life direction. Like Simon becoming Peter and Saul transforming into Paul, their names changed signalled their newfound purpose to be missionaries of Christ. Likewise, it is for us. When we take on a patron saint’s name at baptism, we indicate that we are part of that mission to be apostles of Christ and that our patron saint is a concrete model to emulate.
This is borne out by our liturgy too. When a drop of water is added to the wine, the priest says sotto voce, “May we come to share the divinity of Christ who humbled Himself to share our humanity”. He came to be one of us and through the grace of our baptism, we should strive to be like Him. The pantheon of saints are shining beacons that beckon us to follow their examples.
In other words, baptism is such an important event in our life, that not even our birthdays rank as high. There is a rule for celebrating a saint’s feast day. The day we commemorate a saint is usually associated with the day he or she died. The day they died is called “dies natalis”, the day that they are born into heaven.
Our baptism is both a death and a birth. The waters of baptism mortify as well as vivify. We die because of our sins but at baptism we also die to our sins. But what feels like death is actually a rebirth, like for example, a child in the womb who needs to “die” in order to be born. Thus the death to sins is a birth in the Spirit. Baptism, our second birth initiates our journey on earth that must end with our birth into the fullness of life in heaven. Let us live for that final birthday, the “dies natalis”, when we will be counted amongst the saints and friends of the Lord in eternity.
Epiphany is a feast of manifestation. So far the shepherds were the only ones who had seen the Christ. With the Magi, He is now shown to the world and that is just the beginning. If the world were in doubt, they will no longer be for the King of the kings is here now. The event that has brought the Magi is by no means a flash in the pan because liturgically, there are two more epiphanies to come and they are the Baptism in the Jordan and the Wedding at Cana.
As a public presentation to the world, we respond. Both shepherds and Magi responded by seeking out the Child to marvel and to worship. However, Herod responded with a somewhat malignant motive. Jesus was right when He told the Apostles, “Those who are with us are for us and those who are not with us are against us”. Either you are on His side or you are not. Herod was on the opposite side of Jesus.
If we fancy ourselves on the side of Jesus, then we have things to think about.
The three Magi brought gifts befitting the King. More than the status of a King is true worship. If anything, the gifts, even with gold, were just side shows. Significantly, these men had come from the far ends of the known world to behold the Child. That is devotion and dedication. Perhaps we should ask what attitude we bear when we come before the Lord.
Our present attitude is pretty much exposed via the system of obligation. The present religious practice is that we are required to attend Mass on a Sunday or any of the designated days of obligation. If the basic attitude were simply to fulfil it, then we may have just missed out on what the Magi did. They were under no obligation to come from afar. Yet they willingly embraced the hardship of travel in order to come and behold the child. Can you imagine yourself moving heaven and earth in order to come worship the Lord? Or do you feel compelled to be here? Last Sunday, when we launched the Jubilee, as part of the rite, there was a procession into the Cathedral. We announced that those with mobility issues should remain while those who can walk should join in the procession. There were mutterings about having to “vacate” the Cathedral and to go out into the hot sun. When we chafe under such a minor inconvenience, can we endure a more rigorous demand like persecution for our beliefs? We have become worshippers of convenience.
Compulsion does not grow well in the soil of freedom. St Augustine in his famous Confessions remarked that the God who created us without our permission cannot save us without our cooperation. That is how profoundly free we are—to accept or to reject. But God is also a “mysterium tremendum et fascinans”. It means that He is both a fearful and a fascinating mystery. Whether we recognise it or not, man fears that God will punish him if he does not toe the line. Even the Psalms highlight the fear of the Lord as a virtue. Whilst its meaning is “reverence”, what we hear it as “terror” or being terrified by the Lord. In fact, dictators are powerful because they know how to exploit our weakness which is the fear of the consequence of our inability to love.
But if like the Magi, nothing is going to stop us from coming to worship the Lord, then, gifts should be unfolded. If we come here because our hearts are searching for the Lord, then our gifts will represent that. We bring our best before the Lord. Perhaps the system of tithing might be brought up. Tithe is a method of ensuring that if all else fails, at least 10% is reserved for the Lord. But that can brings us back to the compulsion of giving. True giving is not calculative. To clarify, I am not suggesting donation. Just trying to see how we can move away from having to be dutiful out of compulsion to being dedicated out of love.
The Cathedral that is rebuilt in the centre of Paris should be our model. The French decided to return to the ancient Gothic structure that represented the best of what the mediaeval artisans erected for the Lord. Those Gothic monuments soaring into the sky sprang from a foundation of love. Since that should be the case, then we should spare no effort to give God our best. It is represented by our offering to Him the best of who we are. It is quality and not just quantity.
The same qualitative principle at work is to love God with all our hearts and to love our neighbour as ourselves. Again the love for the Lord is the engine that powers our love for others and not the other around. Loving others in order to “prove” that we love God is to fall into the trap of giving grudgingly at best or merely fulfilling the obligation at worst. A good example is when the collection bag comes. Everyone seems to be putting in. You will look bad if you alone do not put anything in. The giving will be grudgingly or just fulfilling the obligation. Again the point is where our heart is, there is our treasure.
Finally, after the Magi had offered their best, they also made the decision to follow the star on their way home. Having the desire to worship God, we render Him the finest gift of ourselves and we should earnestly strive to follow the north Star. This so-called “true Star” is not the same as that which is promoted by popular culture. Our “celebrity star” puts a stress on my self-fulfilment and whatever I want to do. Everyone is his or her my own star. No. The Star is Christ Himself. He is the light that shines upon our path. Once we have found Him, we must not let go, no matter what. He is the treasure which we would want to hold onto forever, even if it should cost our life.
