Novena of Grace (Day 3) Year A

The geography of Malacca has changed much. Near the ruins of the old fort, the A Formosa, there is a stone relic which according to stories told, the high tide water would never wash over because Francis had dusted his shoes there as he left Malacca in disgust over the sinfulness he had encountered there. The rock is now surrounded by reclaimed land. It’s no longer miraculous that no tide washes over it.

The fact is that it didn’t happen that way. What took place at his last visit to Malacca was that the city was racked by a family feud between the Captain of the Fort and his brother. The conflict saddened Francis so much that coupled with the subsequent rejection of the people, he removed his shoes, struck them against a rock as if removing the dust that clung to it.

In fact, the way Francis dealt with sin is reminiscence of the way Moses dealt with his people’s sin. Moses pleaded with God on behalf of his people, always to mitigate or to stay God’s anger against the people. Francis didn’t really plead with an angry God even though he did encounter a headstrong people when he came to Malacca, a bustling cosmopolitan city of that time, a meeting place for cultures and religions. Here, we find cross-crowned steeples of Catholic churches appealing to heaven together with mosques and temples dedicated to Indochinese deities.

The apostolic landscape was far from charming because the city was where greed and lust cohabitated. It was not easy but Francis plunged into this corrupt milieu with his customary zeal and enthusiasm. He found great difficulty in bringing about reform. So, more than any other place of his sojourning, his prudence and charity became evident. Seeing that there was nothing to be hoped from mere exhortation or denunciation, he set himself to win the hearts of the sinners. He was always a jovial self, mixed easily with everybody, men and women. He would even go to the place where they were gambling, showing that he enjoyed their company and if they, out of deference for him, tried to stop the game, he encouraged them cheerfully to carry on, for—he said—soldiers were not expected to live like friars. To be merry without offending God is better any day than grumbling and quarrelling.

Not only the Portuguese but also their concubines and servants loved him dearly and liked to have him for lunch at home, for he showed great love for everyone…telling them that their girls were very beautiful and they deserved to be wives of honest men.

Witnesses testified over and over again that it was mainly his radiant cheerfulness that attracted people to him. Here in Malacca, an incidence of relevance to our blessing today is a strange story related by a Fr Paul Gomez who tells us that, "There were some mothers with their babies. He called the babies by their names, inquiring from them about their fathers. I and many others believed this a miracle. How could he know the names of children he had never seen?" He served the sick and taught the children daily. On Sundays, he preached at the church on the hill and he was so overwhelmed by the great number of people seeking ministrations that he himself bore testimony to the fact saying, "It is impossible to satisfy all who come".

How is this related to us?

Yesterday, we spoke of friendship and affection as means to apostolic efficacy. It might give us good grounds to ponder on how we approach those who do not share our sentiments. I think by and large, our normal response is to shut people out—people who are difficult often end up as lumps swept under the carpet. Everyone knows that there’s a problem but no one wants to deal with it and people simply just sidestep the lump. Or if we do deal with it, we might be a bit more judgemental when we express our disagreement. When it became more difficult for Francis, his prudence and charity became more evident. Virtues such as these are not easy to exercise. But, it is worth our while to ask for this grace. Conversion is a response to love—not matter how cliché it sounds; conversion is never the fruit of anger.

But, beyond the conversion, we need to look into the area of catechesis, the process of handing on our faith. Both the Israelites in the desert and the unbelieving Jews reveal the stark reality of the complexity of catechesis and conversion. On this topic, we run into some kind of an invisible wall. Most Catholics understand catechesis to be the work of the Church, namely, our Sunday Schools. It may explain why the topic of catechism does not make sense to most people. It’s a task to be engaged by others. Perhaps an analogy may help us understand our role in catechesis. A child spends barely an hour each Sunday in formal catechism. If you consider the minimum 70%-attendance obligation, that does not count for much. Thus, the formal catechesis that our children receive at our Sunday school is like a skeleton. The home is where the “enfleshment” or incarnation takes place. Family must take a greater role in the formal catechetical development of a person. A difficulty we might encounter is where to begin... how do we begin?

A very good starting point is through the liturgy and the celebration of the liturgy. Lex orandi lex credendi. How the Church prays is what the Church believes in. Here, we’ve endeavoured to make sure that our preaching and our liturgy help each other. It is as simple as paying attention to the way a prayer is structured to find the theology of our belief. Every now and then, you will find little catechesis taking place as we celebrate our liturgy. Our grasp of the faith is enriched so much through the prayers of the Church.

Secondly, the home must become a place where the faith can take root. Parents are the first catechists for every child. Catholic sensibilities are caught at home. The whole sacramental system of the Church is built upon the senses experiencing the sacramentals. Rosaries, holy water, blessed candles, medals, the bible etc. Of course, the caveat is that the presence of the rosaries, holy water and bible resting on your altar do not mean anything if you do not faithfully use them. In general, if there is something lacking in the parents’ practice of the faith, it will be reflected in the child’s subsequent behaviour. For example, our crisis with the lack of social concern is reflected in the phenomenon that our current catechesis is basically damage control. So much of what we are doing in terms of catechesis is just damage control. I give an example: the altar servers’ formation has to begin when they first enter the society. If the substance of what we are doing is not inculcated or instilled, then subsequently we will have to deal with damage control—we basically try to limit whatever bad habits they have accumulated. We are constantly battling with bad habits... and how can we have a socially conscious young people when prayer, when Catholic social teachings do not even form part of their sensibilities?

Let us pray our Saint today that he ask the grace for us to be joyful in facing any difficult apostolic challenge and that our homes be graced much more as a place where faith is first taught and caught.

Novena of Grace (Day 2) Year A

In the Gospel today we hear Jesus speak of a unity between Him and His Father—a unity founded on affection that becomes the basis for the apostolic action of Jesus in the world. Jesus is united with His Father. That allows Him the freedom to engage in the ministry of drawing the world from the brink of annihilation/self-destruction back to the Father. Likewise, the members of the Society of Jesus are spread throughout the world engaged in the same apostolic ministry of reconciling the world with one another and with God—a ministry of consolation. Given the geographical spread, St Ignatius writes of the difficulty of maintaining unity in dispersion but insists on the importance of this unity for the efficacy of this apostolic endeavour. In the Constitution of the Society of Jesus it says: The Society (of Jesus) cannot be preserved or governed or, consequently, attain the aim it seeks for the greater glory of God unless its members are united among themselves and with their head. (655).

Today we enter the 2nd day of the novena. Let me focus on the subject of friendship expressed as affection and esteem for one another. The unity which St Ignatius envisioned is actually described by him as friendship in the Lord. The early companions were known as “friends in the Lord". It is perhaps an understated aspect of what a Jesuit is today. A critic of the Jesuits once said that the “Jesuits meet without affection and they part without regret”. It may be harsh but this truth can be explained by the fact that we have focused so much on carrying out our apostolic task that we forget that our apostolic endeavour is borne upon the shoulders of friendship and affection and not a burden shackled by duty. If you think about it, even the phrase “Jesus sent” lends itself to the idea that he is sent to carry out a duty. But, in reality, there’s an affection (or love) between the Father and Son which gave rise to the mission of the Son. I rephrase what I said earlier, there is a friendship founded on affection that becomes the basis for the apostolic action of Jesus in the world.

I would like to survey what little we know of the friendship between Francis and Ignatius and how it can help us reflect upon our daily Christian life.

The seed for our reflexion began in Paris. It was here, in the college as a student, that Francis met two other students who would have a huge influence on his life, Pierre Favre and Ignatius of Loyola. In 1526 Francis Xavier met Pierre and they became college roommates and friends. In 1529 they were joined by Ignatius of Loyola, who was then just new to the college. Pierre Favre was easily impressed by Ignatius whereas Francis was described by Ignatius to be the toughest nut ever that he had to crack. Francis Xavier did not take too kindly to Ignatius, even though Ignatius often came to the financial assistance of Francis, who, as a student, liked to live as a noble, much beyond his means. Ignatius may have seen the potential that lay hidden beneath Francis’ big ambitions but if anything else, it is more likely that Ignatius’ persistent friendship and affection that won Francis over to his cause. The two would become life-long friends. In fact, mutual affection was characteristic of the early Jesuits which allowed them to overcome the tensions that came from their differing personalities and nationalities. There were perhaps as many nationalities as there were the members of the original Society.

The way to apostolic efficacy/effectiveness winds through the avenue of friendship. The very idea of St Ignatius that the Jesuits should be friends in the Lord is based on our creedal belief. The Communion of Saints we profess is not a loose congregation of saints whose commonality is that they have been canonised. They are there because of the sharing of what is good. “Since all the faithful form one body, the good of each is communicated to the others. There exists a communion of goods in the Church”. Of course, goods is not measured materially. Perhaps it’s not too far-fetched to say that within the Communion of Saints we find a sharing of affection. Is that not implied when we pray the Eucharistic Prayer III, “May he make us an everlasting gift to you and enable us to share in the inheritance of your saints, with Mary, the virgin Mother of God, with the apostles, the martyrs, St Francis Xavier and all your saints, on whose constant intercession we rely for help”? How else to explain the constant intercession if not because we believe in the mutual affection that exists between the Church Militant and the Church Triumphant?

If we ever envisage our parish to be efficacious, then perhaps, the idea of friendship should be explored even more because the pathway to Christ cuts through friendship and affection. The ancient philosophers recognised how important and essential friendship is for human development. They called friendship a necessity. With the exception of wisdom, Cicero views friendship as the "sun of life, . . . the best gift which the immortal gods have given humanity". Friendship can refer to many kinds of human relationships which are hardly worthy of the name. But, according to Aristotle, the true and perfect friendship has the good for its object, i.e., the friends each seek what is good for the other. They love each other not for what they can get out of the relationship but for what they are. St Thomas Aquinas would echo such sentiments.

Friendships are formed when we love others for their own sakes. For a true and genuine friendship to exist, something good has to be communicated. The higher and more noble this good is, the more noble the friendship will be. The best kind of friendship is the one in which "mutual and reciprocal communications relate to charity, devotion, and Christian perfection”. Perhaps now we see how friendship and affection really enriches our apostolic efficacy. The lack of friendship impoverishes us. Like Descartes’s “cogito ego sum”, we can say, “we are friendship”... for it is the essence of who we are.

It is through friendship and affection that a person becomes what he/she is. But, in order to enter into a friendship, people have to accept themselves as they are. We have to first be a friend to ourselves before we can become a friend to another. In this, we need courage to face our vulnerability. Jesus, hanging on the Cross was actually suspended in the vulnerability of the mutual affection between Him and His Father.

Thus, true friendship, which is modelled after that of the Trinity, accepts vulnerability and yet demands that we challenge our friends to be who and what they really are without ever implying in the challenge a withdrawal of our affection for them. Friends help Christians to be good Christians. And because friendship is who we are, a quality intrinsic to our human nature, think of how many people have been burnt in the furnace of friendship and the hurts they have suffered. If we are friendship, then broken friendship can only make the world a painful one. If the parish is not where it is supposed to be, it perhaps challenges us to a further reflexion on our various ministries. Are we friends? Dare we be affectionate? Do we hide our vulnerability behind the walls of duty?

I realise how far we are from our ideals. There is infighting in our ministries. We are by no means unique because it’s a sad phenomenon that affects every parish I know. This distance from our ideal is proof of sin active in our lives. It may be the occasion for criticism of hypocrisy that our actions do not match our ideals. But more and more, we need to come before the God who calls us to grant us that friendship, affection and esteem which we seek in order that our coming together may be apostolically fruitful and our parting always affectionate.

St Francis cut out the names of his companions and kept the parchment close to his heart and often wrote movingly of his love and affection for them. Tonight, let us pray for those who have been hurt by broken relationships and pray that we may never be afraid of the vulnerability of friendship but be granted affection in Christ to befriend and to love.

Novena of Grace (Day 1) Year A

Some people attend novenas as a matter of practice. Yearly, they find their way to St Jude or St Anne swearing by the efficacy of these novenas. But, some come as a matter of curiosity. I think in this intellectual parish, there is perhaps an enquiry about what it is and what it can do for us. So what is a novena and why are we doing this novena?

The word novena is derived from the Latin novem meaning nine. Thus, we enter a nine-day period of private or public prayer to obtain special graces, to implore special favours or make special petitions. There is a sense of urgency and neediness in novenas which explains St Jude for hopeless cases and St Anne for fecundity.

The origin of the novena is not easy to pinpoint. Nothing is indicated in the OT of a nine-day celebration. The closest we get to is perhaps at the Ascension. The Lord gives the apostles the Great Commission, and then tells them to return to Jerusalem and to await the coming of the Holy Spirit. The Acts tells us that they devoted themselves to constant prayer (Acts 1:12, 14). Nine days after the Ascension, the Holy Spirit descended upon the Apostles at Pentecost. Perhaps, this "nine day period of prayer" of the apostles is a basis for the novena.

The ancient Romans on the other hand offered 9 days of prayer to avert evil or the wrath of the gods. They also do that when wonders have been predicted. Their burial customs too admit of a 9-day mourning period to be followed by a feast on the 9th day. It is possible that Christianity "baptised" this pagan practice. In fact, we witnessed this 9-day thing at the death of JPII.

During the Mediaeval period, 9 days signified the 9 months the Lord spent in the womb of our blessed Mother. At first, the novenas helped the faithful prepare for the festive yet solemn celebration of Christmas. Eventually, various novenas were composed to help the faithful prepare for a special feast or to invoke the aid of a saint for a particular reason: Miraculous Medal, Sacred Heart of Jesus, St. Joseph and St. Jude to name a few.

There was a time when people who normally skip masses would go for a novena religiously. But, with Vatican II, the primary focus of our spirituality and public worship has been shifted to the Holy Eucharist. The advent of the liturgical renewal and the increased participation of the congregation and the use of English at Mass may explain why novenas fell by the wayside for most Catholics except the diehards. Mass was in Latin whereas novenas were in the vernacular—that provided the laity with an outlet for the expression of popular devotion.

But, one of the practices which may have hurt the cause of novenas is superstition. Sometimes, one finds copies of a St. Jude novena which basically states that if a person goes to Church for nine days and leaves a copy of the novena to St. Jude, then the prayer will be granted — sort of like a spiritual chain letter. It is to treat God like a vending machine with very little to do with God’s will. Even though asking and petitioning form a part of the novena, the main thing about a novena is that it expresses our total dependence on God. Our consistent and faithful praying of a novena will enable us to be formed and shaped by it into the image of Jesus. Thus, novenas still hold a legitimate place in our Catholic spirituality.

Ours is called a novena of grace of St Francis Xavier for it originated in Naples, Italy after 1633, when a Jesuit, Matteo Mastrilli, was cured through the intercession of St Francis Xavier, who promised that those who made the nine days of prayer in preparation for the anniversary of his canonisation would receive many graces and favours. Thus, we have the name, Novena of Grace. It is not automatically that you’ve attended a novena and you receive what you ask for. Rather, a novena appeals to our desires and expectations.

Novenas are about desires and expectations. This is one area which we have in common with St Francis Xavier, under whose patronage we make this novena. He was a man of deep desires. He was tonsured when he was young, meaning that he became a cleric in a diocese, in his case, the diocese of Pamplona, capital of present day Navarre. Tonsure committed him to nothing but exempted him from any military service. Note his ambition as he took charge of the direction of his life. He knew that in order for him to climb the ladder of success in the clerical world he needed to increase his knowledge. That ambition brought him to the famous University of Paris.

So, suffice it to say that if you have come without desires or expectations, then be prepared to go away empty. If you came with the attitude that “If it works, then I have profited but if it doesn’t, then I have lost nothing”, then you would gain nothing. Come with great expectation and deep desires. Thus, as we enter this novena, let us trust that God is interested in what we desire. Ask for what you want for yourself or for your loved ones: a return to the practice of the faith, a relief from the allure of addiction, a cure for illness or a deliverance from a ghost past. Everything within the spectrum of human needs, expectations and desires can be the prayer of our petition. But, be prepared to have your expectations changed by God’s desire. The novena prayer gives us this hint that even as we ask of God what He can do for us we pray that our expectations always find their foundation in His will. “If what I ask for is not for the greater glory of God and the good of my soul, then give me what is conducive to both. Amen”. This marks us as different from the other popular novenas we are familiar with: St Anne’s or St Jude’s. Different not because we are better but different because we try to reflect what any novena or triduum is supposed to be. The greater are our expectations or desires, the greater will the opportunity be for us to be open to do the will of God. Novenas are not just about our desires or expectations. Novenas are really about the purification of our desires and expectations.

The first reading and the Gospel provide us with the wonderful imagery of water. We are invited to drink of the river of grace. Let us come with deep expectation. Let us be open to God’s will. Let us be surprised by His grace.

4th Sunday of Lent Year A

We all live with too much light. Even our occasional darkness caused by blackouts is not really an experience of real darkness because we have the power of halogen torches. Once I was in the south of the Philippines in a hamlet where the only source of electricity came from a generator used to mill rice and the electric grid/network connects three places: the rice mill, the owner’s house and the uncompleted priest's house. [A rectory would be too grand a word for that place--one side of the room had no wall]. The generator is turned off at 8pm and the entire hamlet is plunged into total darkness. The only illumination they had came from the flickering kerosene lamps. That was an experience of near total darkness [1]. An experience of total darkness helps us to appreciate the light of faith the Gospel is pointing to.

Today’s Gospel is a straightforward lesson on the growth in faith symbolised by the movement from total darkness to light—a movement that marks a journey from unbelief to belief. Even though the Gospel is designed for the Rite of Scrutiny of the Elect bound for baptism this Easter, they are actually a challenge to us also who were baptised to reflect on our faith in an adult way.

The journey of the man is centred on the growth of knowledge. Hear him tell the religious leaders that he doesn’t even know where Jesus is. But he knows that he was blind and now he sees. At first he calls Jesus a man, then a prophet and finally addresses Jesus as “Lord”—a title reserved for God. On the contrary, the religious leaders never made the journey of knowledge because they were so certain in their opinion that they couldn’t see beyond appearances.

According to the first reading, things are not what they always seem. Plato has a story or allegory that parallels the Blind Man. In “The Myth of the Cave”, we find prisoners chained in a darkened cave. All that these prisoners could see are flickering images on the wall. Since that was the only thing they ever saw, they took these shadows to be reality. But, one prisoner though managed to escape and made his way to the world outside the cave. He saw the sun for the first time and he returned to tell his fellow prisoners of what he had seen but they all thought him crazy. Such an experience is akin to the rejection of the “prophet who is not accepted in his own country”.

In the case of the Blind Man, the religious authorities did not think him crazy. They only abused him and expelled him. What is relevant for us is that blind man’s experience of Jesus can be interpreted according to Plato’s Myth of the Cave as a journey of intellectual assent of the soul to truth; an acceptance of the truth that leads to freedom. St Paul in the 2nd Reading tells us once we were in darkness but through baptism have been brought into the light of the Lord. So, we are to live as children of the light. The freedom that comes from the intellectual assent to the truth is that we should live as children of the light. But, just because we are baptised Catholics brought into the light is no guarantee that we cannot walk back into the darkness of sin. In fact, there are really more Catholics living in darkness than there are Catholics living in light.

The other night, I was going to hear confession in the Church of Our Lady of Guadalupe. [One of the blessings of a priest is I don’t need to battle the morning or evening rush-hour traffic]. The traffic after the toll was heavy but the cars were moving. I was talking on the mobile (using hands-free, of course). The traffic was inching haltingly and a car came in from my left and tried to force its way in but I purposefully refused to allow him to cut into my lane and we ended up with both our cars rubbing and scraping against each other. Earlier in the week, I had just repaired a dent and some scratches on the left front side of my car and that night, the dent and scratches came back. The thing is I can’t explain what possessed me to behave in that manner.
That I had acted out of character didn’t surprise me. That I could sin didn’t surprise me either. But what saddened me was the fact that I chose to act in that manner. There I was going to hear confessions yet I ended up behaving in a manner which did not reflect my status as someone brought into the light. After some reflection, I came to the embarrassing conclusion that my action only revealed that the light of Christ may not have penetrated deep enough in me. Often we live in a manner that is characterised by “OK”, more or less, give or take we sin a bit. Here a white lie, there a white lie... That’s where the danger is for we think that we’re doing OK but the truth is, it could mean that Christ's light has not really penetrated the depth of our being. It explains why I behaved so uncharitably. Such an experience proves that baptism does not guarantee us that we will not sin. What baptism does promise is the availability of grace should we consciously choose to live its consequence.

The blind man’s progressive enlightening is also a deepening in the knowledge of Christ as he first thought of him as a man, later a prophet and finally acknowledged him as Lord. This acknowledgement has an implication—that we come to live as the children of the Light.

Christ is the light that draws us to walk out of the shadow of our sins. But, this walk is made possible when we grow in the knowledge of who He is for us. And the depth of our knowledge of Christ is measured in terms of our familiarity with Scripture [how much do we read, know and pray the Bible?], acceptance of his teaching [does his teaching make impact in our life?] and the devotion to the sacraments [what place do the sacraments have in the way I worship God?]. A few minutes spent before the Blessed Sacrament is always a good way to get to know Him who remains forever the only Light that leads to Salvation. Whether we are preparing for baptism or struggling to live up to the challenges of baptism, the important thing is to have faith in Jesus Christ and to believe in the light and life he brings.

Footnote:
[1] I suspect that explains the reason why there were so many children in the hamlet.

2nd Sunday of Lent Year A

What is the significance of the Transfiguration? First of all it was an event of captivating beauty. It took place on a mountain. The mountains are places of God’s particular closeness. And Jesus often finds himself on different mountains. For example, earlier in Matthew’s Gospel, one of the defining moments is the Sermon on the Mount. There, on the mountain, Jesus the new Moses dispenses the law of the New Covenant. Last Sunday, in the Temptation, Jesus is also brought to a mountain by the Devil. It helps us appreciate that God is not far from Christ (and also therefore from us who are) struggling with temptation. In the background of the various mountain experiences of Jesus, we hear the echoes of the OT revelations at Sinai, Horeb and Moriah.

Today, Mount Tabor, another mountain, is also the place where our profession of faith comes alive. In the gospel, his face shone like the sun and his clothes became white as light. Can you hear the echo of or at least appreciate the profession of our faith: Jesus in his communion with the Father reveals to us that He is God from God, light from light, true God from true God. Unlike Moses whose face shone with light received from his encounter with God, the light of Jesus shines out from within him.

Secondly, from the Temptation to Tabor, we can also discern an intensification of the process of initiation for those who are searching for the Way, the Truth and the Life and for those who are baptised, there is a deepening of discipleship. The white garment of Jesus’ transfiguration should be seen through the Book of Revelation. John the Evangelist speaks of the garments of the Elect that have become white because they have been washed in the blood of the Lamb (Rev 7:14). Through baptism, the Elect are united with Jesus’ Passion. His Passion is the purification that restores to the baptised the original garment lost through sin. The transfiguration shows us what will happen or what happens to those who seek baptism and those who are baptised—we are clothed with Jesus in light and we ourselves become light.

In that sense, the Transfiguration cannot be a once-off event. The little drop of water at the preparation of the gift reminds us of that. “By the mystery of this water and wine, may we come to share in the divinity of Christ who humbled himself to share in our humanity”.

It has life-changing significance. It prods us to ask where God is leading us like He led Abram. In that, the symbol of the mountain is appropriate. The ascent, the going up the mountain symbolises the breaking free from the ordinariness of life. If we follow Jesus up the mountain then we will certainly encounter a God who speaks life-changing or life-liberating words to us. Even as we stand in awe at the revelation of the beauty and magnificence of the Divine Son of God, we are stopped in our track by a God whose Word challenges to make life-changing decisions. There is a lot at stake for so many of us. We can choose to merely exist. We go to the supermarket, watch movies, drink at pubs, marvel at the places of interest of our sight-seeing. In short, we busy ourselves with life. But, unfortunately, the busyness of life often has the unintended consequence of shielding us from hearing God.

If we do not merely exist, Lent can become the mountain where we live by choosing to hear the voice of the God who called Abram; even if it seems incomprehensible; even if it involves suffering according to St Paul in the 2nd Reading. And because it is life-changing, the Transfiguration is not a “wham and bang” event but is experienced as a gradual change of our loves and desires into the holiness of God. It means that slowly, my time, my energy, my work, my rest, my meetings—every single action of mine begins to radiate the brightness of the Light of Christ. That is why we make special attempts at fasting, praying and almsgiving because these practices of self-denial help in the process of changing so that little by little the splendour of the Father becomes more visible to the world. But, it must begin like Abram who chose to follow the will of God. Slowly and steadily we say yes. We may fall but we get up. Never losing hope but allowing God the greater freedom to change our lives. Let us ask for the grace as we progress further into the heart of Lent.

1st Sunday of Lent Year A

Some people tend to overeat when they are stressed. That is why we have such a term called “comfort food” that people turn to for familiarity and emotional security. We sometimes use food to shield ourselves from ourselves. Not only food, but we use perfumes, undergo cosmetic surgery, buy branded goods, go to cinemas, make noise, engage busyness and chase adrenaline—what we called creaturely comforts and activities—all these are not bad in themselves but they sometimes appeal to our fear of facing ourselves. The first Sunday of Lent challenges to enter the desert in order to face ourselves.

The desert today beckons us, like it beckoned Jesus to abandon his fears, his security blanket and go in search of the real him before God. In order to understand what the desert means for us, take a look at the first reading. Adam and Eve were created perfect. They may be the best of God’s creation but nevertheless, creatures.

As such, the temptation of Adam and Eve is set within the context of creatureliness, meaning within the context of our reliance or dependence on God. Adam and Eve struggled with swhat it meant to be perfect and yet dependent. They may be perfect and but yet they were constrained by the boundary between good and evil. Imagine the serpent’s temptation. “You sure there are certain things you can’t do? You are sure you are not God yourselves?” The Devil’s temptation must be seen in the context of luring the creature to deny this dependence on God.

According to St Paul in the 2nd Reading, sin entered the world through one man. Sin entered the world through this single lie of self-sufficiency. That is why the desert is a challenge metaphor because its starkness provides no space for hiding from ourselves, nowhere to run from the truth that we are not self-sufficient. The first Adam failed the test of dependency because creatureliness was deemed a curse rather than a blessing. Instead of dependence as a relationship of love between the Creator and the creature, a relationship marked or characterised by “limitation” which we otherwise know as “moral standards” or as mentioned earlier, the boundary between good and evil. In this relationship of dependence, we obey God’s laws because of love. The Devil, on the other hand, introduced the notion of dependence as slavery. Limitation is slavery. Why must you listen to God? Why can’t you decide to do what you want to do? Our notion of freedom is self-decision independent of God. Is that not our notion of freedom, especially the freedom of the self-made man?

But the answer of the 2nd Adam, Jesus, to the Devil includes the very notion that the created being is of necessity dependent on the Creator alone. In the desert, shorn of all that can hide us, be they creaturely comforts or excessive activities symbolised in Jesus’ temptation as food, prestige and power, we have no choice but to face with ourselves. The truth is that we prefer to hide, like Adam and Eve hid from God and lived in denial. The fig leaf in the Garden of Eden is a metaphor for what we use—alcohol, crass material wealth, noise or busy-ness—to hide away from the loving gaze of God who sees us for who we are, not who we pretend to be.

We have also become adept or good at running away from ourselves. For example, busyness could be a symptom of running away. And many of us have this personal phantom “trainer” who drives us and tell us that we have to be elsewhere and not here. We can be a better husband elsewhere, not here with my present wife. I can have a better career elsewhere, not here in my current job. I can live in a better country elsewhere where my gifts are appreciated, not here where there’s always discrimination. I should be elsewhere except here to make a stand to be a better person. It seems that I cannot encounter God here but elsewhere. Busyness is a form of running away from facing ourselves.

That is why the desert is not a physical place but an interior space for God to see us, to commune with us and to love us. It is only possible when we do not run away from facing ourselves. But, we are a generation that feels really bad about itself. If we weren’t so then there must be an explanation why the constant need to market ourselves? We are a generation of emotional pygmies because we look for our validation, justification or affirmation not from God but from what we can do or achieve. Many of us are afraid that God dares to love us and we are deceived by the Devil to think that God’s love can never be greater than our sins. Our notion of God is a God who hates not just the sin but ALSO the sinner.

The point is: so what if you were a sinner and so what if you were unworthy? That’s the reality of who we are. Therefore, it should come as no surprise that God can and even dares to encounter us. The devil’s job is to convince us that we are so utterly useless that God cannot love us. That’s his lie. So, the person who stays away from Church for years out of the fear that God cannot love him or her is not staying away from God but is rather running away from himself or herself. He or she is afraid to be encountered by God. That is why alcohol often comes in. After a few beer or shots of whiskey, I feel good about myself. I don’t need God to make me feel good.

Jesus in standing up to the Devil shows us that Lent is the here to stand utterly naked before God, without the fig leaf of false security that we find in our comfort food and in our running away, etc. By standing still, Jesus acknowledges his total dependence on God for who he should be. For us, however hideous our sins may be, it is time to allow them to come to surface and realise that God’s gaze is a healing gaze and not a condemning glare. We too can be who we should be but only if we dare to stand naked before God.

4th Sunday in Ordinary Time Year A

I don’t quite like to preach on the beatitudes because the experience is like going to buy shampoo only to find that there are 20 different types of shampoos to choose from and everyone of them good. I am afraid that having chosen of the beatitudes and halfway through expounding it, I get stuck because I have nothing else to say. So, let’s see how the CCC can help us in this matter. The Catechism says, “The beatitude we are promised confronts us with decisive moral choices. It invites us to purify our hearts of bad instincts and to seek the love of God above all else. It teaches us that true happiness is not found in riches or well-being, in human fame or power, or in any human achievement—however beneficial it may be—such as science, technology and art, or indeed in any creature, but in God alone, the source of every good and of all love" (CCC#1723).

The first misconception we might want to disabuse ourselves of is that the beatitudes glorify starvation, misery or persecution as if they were “blessed” states of being. For example, abject starvation is evil. The great and grave number of children going to bed with an empty stomach is unconscionable; most especially if we live in the context of wastage of food. In today’s world of agricultural advancement, no one should ever have to starve. Hence, the blessedness of the beatitudes refers to our reliance or dependence on God alone as we heard in the quote from the CCC and so, it is right that the beatitudes challenge us to choose how we live our Christianity—by authentic Christianity through reliance on God or by a Christianity that conforms to the standards of the world.

It boils down to asking if we want to live true and authentic Christianity or do we want a Christianity of compromise. If we choose to live authentic Christianity, our life will change as our choices will affect how we live, move and have our being, just to paraphrase a quote from Act 17:28.

At one time, I remember, it was really fashionable to speak of “being counter-cultural”. But, I think, the term “counter-cultural”, even though true, sounds ideological. The beatitudes are not a set of “rules” but rather a description of a way of life. St Paul describes in the 2nd Letter to the Corinthians his beatific experience of suffering. “We are taken for impostors while we are genuine; obscure yet famous; said to be dying and here we are alive; rumoured to be executed before we are sentenced; thought most miserable and yet we are always rejoicing; taken for paupers though we make others rich; for people having nothing though we have everything (2nd Cor. 6: 8-10).

St Paul’s description of discipleship is not ideological but rather, comes from a lived experience. He describes the Christian’s life as a paradox indeed. The blessedness we possess is not because we are persecuted. To be happy because we are persecuted may be indicative of mental illness. Instead, blessedness means that in spite of persecution, we are able to laugh or despite our hunger we are able to rejoice. The paradox is that our peace comes not from outside but rather wells up from inside. This is why the beatitudes cannot be ideological because ideology is subscription to a set of ideals or values or better still, to political manifestoes. On the contrary, the beatitudes are a subscription to a person: Christ. It is the person of Christ who gives us the reason for the laughter despite all that is crushing around us. St Paul says that much in 2nd Cor. 4: 8-9, “We are in difficulties on all sides, but never cornered; we see no answer to our problems but never despair; we have been persecuted, but never deserted; knocked down but never killed”.

The person of Christ is the reason why Paul says that “always, wherever we may be, we carry with us in our body, the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus, too, may always be seen in our body” (2 Cor. 4:10-11).

According to Benedict XVI, the beatitudes express the meaning of discipleship. They cannot be expressed in purely theoretical terms; it is proclaimed in the life and suffering, and in the mysterious joy, of the disciple who gives himself over to completely follow the Lord. As such the beatitudes are not a social programme even though the choices we make in completely following the Lord will have social implications. It is when we have anchored ourselves upon Jesus, upon the person of Christ that we begin to mould a culture of inner freedom in order to stand up to the prevailing culture of affluence, a culture which glorifies self-sufficiency.

It is not difficult to trace the culture of “self-sufficiency” in our lives. As I have said before, every time we fail at an enterprise, our first thought is often, “I have not done enough”. It is a thought which betrays that the success of our undertaking is premised on our ability to carry out or execute all our plans. But, the beatitudes invite us to the inner freedom that is not afraid to embrace even failure because we are totally dependent on God’s promise to be with us.

In conclusion, the beatitudes invite us to a new way of living which is both difficult and challenging. First and foremost, this life is made possible by the person of Christ. He alone can offer to us all the spiritual means that we need in order to live his beatitudes or live Him with conviction in our daily lives. You may be wondering why I am hammering the point of “the person of Christ”. In the context of liberation theology, the beatitudes seem to be a programme of social initiatives aimed at the liberation of the human person. But, more and more, I am convinced that the failure to love mercy, to act justly or to walk tenderly with the Lord is a failure of recognition. We fail to love our neighbour because we do not know Christ enough. Christianity is not serving a programme but serving the person of Christ.

So, it is right that we turn to Him, as St Paul so says, “God has made us members of Christ Jesus and by God’s doing he has become our wisdom, and our virtue and our holiness and our freedom. If anyone wants to boast, let him boast about the Lord”. Only in Him, will what we do make sense. Through Him we live the beatitudes and through Him we become the beatitudes.