23rd Sunday in Ordinary Time Year B

Mark Twain says: “It's better to keep quiet and have people think you stupid, than to talk and confirm it”. A lot of times this remains the wisest option—to keep quiet because when Shakespeare says: “The lady doth protest too much, methinks”, he is telling us that when we try to deny something, we may actually be confirming what we are trying to deny.

However, the duties of the ordained ministers are stipulated by the three munera. [1] The first of the Munus triplex (three-fold ministry) is munus docendi which is the duty to teach through preaching based on Christ’s role as Prophet. The second is munus sanctificandi which is the duty to sanctify through worship, based on Christ’s role as Priest and finally, the third is munus regendi which is the duty to shepherd through the pastoral office based on Christ’s role as King.

If you accept the quotations of Mark Twain and Shakespeare, you would know that one of the most difficult and loneliest roles for an ordained minister to fulfil is the ministry of the Word, the munus docendi. This is because everyone is an expert. In our internet-connected postmodern world, this might well be true. [2] We have canonised an experience that different people have different perspectives into a gospel truth. Whilst this may be true, it is subjectivism at its worst. A characteristic of postmodernism is this breakdown in a shared world, a breakdown of stories that can bind us together. Thus, truth is not something which we search together through reason—it is no longer “objective”. Instead, truth is defined by what is meaningful to me. And in an unjust relationship, my truth has a greater claim than yours. [3]

When truth is about what I think and how I feel, then, often enough we encounter chasms over which we cannot cross. Is it any wonder why we have condemned ourselves to live in ghettoes? A good example of this chasm, under the guise of seeming respect that must be accorded to the other, is the attempt to ban beer in a particular precinct in a nearby city.

Today, I would like to bridge this chasm or propose a bridge beyond an entrapped self. The chasm is created in the context of what this parish has been doing—it is contextualised firstly, by the question asked by Judas. “Can’t the money be used for the poor?”. It is the same concern that is found in the 1st and 2nd Readings. Secondly, the chasm gives rise to the question “why this particular form of exercise that we have embarked on”?

Firstly, the Judas question is valid and important. How come so much money was spent on this roof and why assistance to the poor cannot be matched by the same amount we had spent? The fact is that we have been giving through many channels to the poor. Saying this is defensive and it misses the point. The point is, what we are doing here is related to the poor (to justice in particular) and I know the audacity of this statement will surprise many of you. How is what we have done or are doing related to the poor? Well, the option for the poor is not just an economic option. Furthermore, liberation (which we desire so much) should not be understood only in the social, political or economic sense. In a liberated world, despite all that we can achieve, we will still encounter alienation. We all suffer from loneliness. We conceive of liberation as freedom from loneliness—that is social liberation. We all suffer from oppression. We conceive of liberation as freedom from oppression—that is political liberation. We suffer privation. We conceive of liberation as freedom from hunger—that is economic liberation. We want freedom from loneliness, oppression and hunger. But, the truth remains that when we have everything we want, when we are no longer lonely, when we are free from oppression and when hunger is banished, it does not mean that we will be happy or saved. The answer to alienation is not liberation even though it is so important. The answer to alienation is redemption. All desire for liberation must lead to the desire for redemption from sin!

This desire for redemption from sin brings us immediately into the horizon of God. Note that the centrality of God is the only sure way to salvation. The centrality of Man, that is, his social, political and economic needs, no matter how pressing they are, is not the solution. Instead, a focus on Man solely often leads to dehumanisation—as we are witnessing in North Korea [4] now and as we have witnessed in so many failed socialist projects. Poverty—the Judas question—is a pressing issue that we must not overlook. But, in looking at poverty, in trying to give an answer to Judas, that is, in trying to solve the world’s hunger problem, many of us forget that poverty arises because we have forgotten to put God first. [5]

Thus, a way out for us, the way to bridge the chasm, is to put God first. [6] That is why we have embarked on this whole exercise because it is related to a phrase we are all familiar with—anamnesis. “Do this in remembrance of me”. Sin can be conceived of as the act of forgetting. Israel forgot God’s goodness in the desert. She forgot and she murmured. Anamnesis is thus to remember—for the memory, our memory, is also God’s reaching out to us. In the sacraments we celebrate, God does so through the rituals that we have—the solemn music, the incense, the ringing of the bell, the consecrated bread held high. And in our Gospel, Jesus poked his finger into the man’s ears and used spittle. Both are sacramental signs of God reaching out to us. Thus, our exercise—what we do and what we have—is an attempt to remember God.

In trying to remember God, we acknowledge that we have actually forgotten God’s beauty. Thus, the choice for whatever we have here is not as important as understanding why Beauty is necessary. The choice we make is not nostalgic. It is not harking back to days gone by though it seems like it. We are not here to wallow in nostalgia. So, let me tell you why we chose what we chose.

How many of you use credit cards? Do you know what the ordinary entry level is for your credit cards today? It is the gold card. But, sometimes your gold card is not enough. You need platinum or beyond platinum to titanium. What has happened to the “simple” original silver-looking plastic credit cards that nobody wants anymore? Banks market it as the “classic” card. It is grossly a wrong use of the word classic. You see, nothing fades like fashion. Our teenagers will be the first to tell you that. Look at architectural structures of the 60s or 70s or even 80s... they betray their age. Nobody wants to be caught dead with bell-bottoms! But, when we look at something classical we see “timelessness” or the quality that speaks of “enduring”.

Thus, the choice we made reflects timelessness. And yet, it is not just simply anything “classical” because we could have chosen the Taj Mahal or turned this place to look like the Great Wall. After all, these are classical too and they better reflect our Asian background. [7] We could not because our choice of the “classical” was guided by the scandal of particularity. The Church which is truly Asia (not only Malaysia is) because Christ was Asian and the Church’s birthplace was Asia, when she spread she was immediately coloured by the particularity of what is known as the Graeco-Roman philosophy and culture. This is significant because Graeco-Roman philosophy enabled the Church to give a rational explanation of the experiences of the early Church and thus ensured the spread of Christianity. Thus, we had to look back at our particular Christian classics or tradition for direction because the quality of “timelessness” embodied in our tradition reminds us that the exercise of beautification is an attempt to remember who the Church is.

She is timelessly beautiful, that is, she is forever the Ecclesia Formosa, because she is the beautiful Bride of Christ—the meeting place of salvation. [8] She is where we remember that God saves us. We want to be saved and thus we are concerned with God’s truth. We want to be saved and thus we are concerned with God’s good. But according to Fyodor Dostoyevsky’s Idiot: Prince Myshkin, the not-so-clever prince who gave the title of the book Idiot, says: Beauty will save the world. Thus, the choice, for want of a better choice, is an exercise to reflect the timelessness of God’s beauty.

So, my dear brothers and sisters, I am not so hung up on the fact that the altar should look like this or the altar-piece should look like that. In fact, when the original sketches were presented, they had to be scaled down because people would not be there to make the connexion yet. So, I am not offended that people do not like what has been done. I recognise that in this exercise, I find greater affinity with Don Quixote of La Mancha—embarking on this foolish quest. I further recognise that my vision may not fit into some kind of preconceived big picture of how the parish should be run. But I look at Benedict XVI, my Pope and yours, I hope, and I try to see what he sees. With him, I am deeply convinced of the necessity to return beauty to the liturgy and to the church—this sacred space—so that we may, in giving God His due, then together with Him, look at the world and make it reflect the Beauty of Christ the Son.

Thus, in this exercise, I am humbly guided by Albert Einstein...who had this to say about his achievements, “You imagine that I look back on my work with calm and satisfaction. But there is not a single concept of which I am convinced that it will stand firm, and I feel uncertain whether I am in general on the right track. I don’t want to be right—I only want to know whether I am right”.

I am nowhere near the shadow of Einstein but I live with this vision that what I am doing, though far from what many other Jesuits are conventionally doing, is actually trying to remind you, through the beauty of our liturgy and our sacred space, of the central reality which is none other than this: Christ is the only Saviour of the world. We are only instruments. No programme, not even Liberation Theology, not even the best BEC, can ever take His place. He alone is the Saviour. If we want to save the world, the beauty of the liturgy and sacred space bid us turn to Him. From Him we draw our vision, courage and transfusion of love to help re-shape the world to reflect His beauty so that we might be saved.

FOOTNOTES:
[1] The root of the English word remuneration (salary) comes from this word which means “mission, ministry and office”.
[2] We do not need libraries. All we need are Google and Wikipedia.
[3] The result is usually an unjustified use of force. Government against people. Parents against children. And in reversal, career children against aged parents.
[4] They are concerned with Man and have banished God.
[5] By extension, the same can be said of social and political problems. They arise because we forgot to put God first.
[6] Recently I met with all the choirs of the parish. I told them that there is too much "WE" or “US” in the liturgy and too little of God.
[7] Our choice does not mean that Asian architecture has no merit. There are places which have used indigenous artefact effectively. We had to work with limitations of time, expertise available and finances. An important thing to note about this exercise is the act of choosing. Many of us understand the act of choosing as a function of “likes”. A major criterion of choosing is “one’s likes or dislikes”. However, if truth is one’s concern, something which commands my attention, then choosing is a function of the good, the true and the beautiful. What a person likes or dislikes may come into play in the act of choosing but the main reason for choosing is because the choice reflects what is good, true or beautiful. When “likes” or “dislikes” are canonised, then morality will tend to take on an arbitrary characteristic—more to do with emotion than with volition. Imagine a person being good because he or she feels like it.
[8] Beauty is sometimes impractical. In being impractical, it breaches the limiting dome of practical reason. This means that beauty does not always have to be “functional”. Functionality is part of practical reason but when coupled with a culture of convenience has a dehumanising effect. Imagine our friendships based on functionality. Friendship is reduced to utility. Thus, without beauty, the very people we want to protect will be the first to “enjoy” the practical consequence of “functionalism”. Take the example of our elderly. What good are they when they cannot contribute to society? In adopting a practical attitude towards beauty in the guise of helping the poor, we have actually harmed those whom we are sworn to protect: the poor, the orphans and the widows.

22nd Sunday in Ordinary Time Year B

All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing—a quote from Edmund Burke, a Irish statesman and philosopher. We can connect this quotation to our theme today: The commandments of life. How is it so?

Christ in the Gospel tells the Pharisees that they honour Him with their lips but their hearts are far from Him. The context for Him saying that is the controversy over ritual cleanliness. The Pharisees are more concerned with the observance of Jewish ritual practices than with the purity of intentions or motives. In the first reading, Moses urges the people to be faithful to God’s law without addition or subtraction. The Israelites tend to add their particular traditions to the Law and over time these traditions will come to be regarded as equally authoritative and binding as God’s Law. Finally, the Letter of St James states that “Pure unspoilt religion, in the eyes of God our Father is this: coming to the help of orphans and widows when they need it, and keeping oneself uncontaminated by the world”.

All the three readings have a general theme running through them: We ought to live in such a way that God’s commandments are not empty but instead are life-giving. This is where Edmund Burke’s quote may apply to us. All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. Let us break down the quote to analyse what it really means and how it may be applied to us.

First of all, to do nothing, that is, inertia could be a symptom of an age gone wrong. What it means is that we may have lost a sense of sin, characterised by a lack of reflexion or examination of conscience. Or we may just have a dead conscience. But, if we have not lost a sense of sin or our conscience, perhaps sin is perceived in a generalised sense that something is wrong and no more. It is out there and I am somehow unaffected. However, the fact is we have not totally lost our conscience because, in this age gone wrong, the yearly Petronas adverts actually reveal a collective yearning for a time when race and religion do not really matter. Sadly though, beyond our lamentation or our nostalgic yearning, we stop short.

Are there no more wrongdoings or is our sense of what is wrong no longer acute that we simply do not think that there are “rights” worth our standing up for or principles worth our embracing? We all know something is not right but what is truer is that we have collectively and individually become moral pygmies. A good example is corruption. We reason that everyone is doing it or why bother since nobody seems to be able to change the status quo.

Secondly, proof that we have become morally stunted may be corroborated by the increasing preoccupation with the “self”. Check out the number of weight-loss programmes available. You might think that the Pharisees were shallow and superficially concerned with ritual cleanliness but really, we too are preoccupied with the “cleanliness” of the body as evidenced by the focus on our “image”. We may not be too concerned with ritual or religious purity. Nevertheless, we are obsessed by how we look or smell to others. We are about projecting the perfect “image”. In this concern for the “perfect” image, we are also quite worried about the water we drink or the food we eat. In short, we are anxious about pollution.

But, evil is the worst kind of pollution. When St James says “Keep yourself uncontaminated from the world”, he is not referring to environmental pollution. Instead, he asks us to keep ourselves uncontaminated from the evil of the world. This task is not about barricading ourselves. We cannot run away or escape the world by building Christian ghettoes. Instead, the quote clearly indicates a way to go forward because good men or “good people” is clearly not a reference to “perfection” and neither is it about purity. Instead, it is about us... ordinary folks who have come to believe that we are so small that we are insignificant. On Wednesday, at the celebration of the thanksgiving Eucharist for Fr OC, at least 8 cars were broken into. Many of the car owners felt that nothing will change or that it was not worth the inconvenience of making a police report and felt that the best option was to get on with life. Many helpless parents look hopefully at Australia, New Zealand or Canada as our solution to this malaise called Malaysia.

I don’t blame you, but, in the meantime, evil is proliferating. I am not referring to the exorcism type of evil. Evil is as simple as when the heart is far from the lips—when our actions are different from our intentions or beliefs. Evil will proliferate not because “good men” keep quiet but because everyone keeps quiet. First, it is about receiving Holy Communion only to be spat out and photographed. Now it is about a cow’s head in front of a building. What will be next as most of us remain silent?

The readings speak about the commandments of life. What is life if we maintain silence in the face of evil men or women? I am not condemning any religion or criticising any government. Economic, social or political progress cannot be bought with silence for our silence could only mean we condone the actions of evil men or women. The commandments of life mean that we must not only be those who hear the word of God but we must also be doers of God’s word.

I am not pouring cold water onto those who choose to go to Singapore or Australia etc. I spent 5 years in Ireland and I had thoughts of settling there because they were also in need of priests plus I had relatives living there. But I chose to come back. The choice to come back does not make me more virtuous than those who choose to migrate. I made it with hope and trust. It is a choice that shows how important the sacraments are and the Church is. About 15 years ago when I was with Campus Ministry, I told the Catholic students that they should build networks. They cannot stand up to evil men and women alone. They will be overwhelmed or discouraged or worse, succumb to the forces of evil. Since these students will belong to the upper strata of the movers and shakers of society, they will be placed in positions of power to effect changes. Now, you will understand why the sacraments and Lifeline, BECs or prayer groups are important. In order to defeat evil men or women, the sacraments provide us with strength and the BEC or our prayer groups provide us with support. God gives us strength and our brothers and sisters give us courage. We will never be alone in standing up to evil men and women when we have God on one side and our brothers and sisters on the other side.

21st Sunday in Ordinary Time Year B

We come to the final instalment of a series of passages from John’s Gospel. It is climactic. We have seen Jesus feeding the five thousand. Then, when He calmed the sea He was crossing, He reveals His divine identity as the “I AM”. After that, as He preached in the synagogue, He presented Himself as the Bread sent by the Father. Now, just like Joshua in the First Reading who asked the people to make the choice of either serving the one true God or other gods, Jesus in today’s Gospel stood His ground—and so like Joshua or Peter, we have to make a choice.

Jesus presented Himself without quibble, without hesitation as the Bread of Life. To have life was to eat His flesh and to drink His blood, no less. Such language did not sit well with those who heard Him. They left Him but as proof Jesus meant what He had said, He did not chase after them. He simply let them go.

Jesus was the choice they had to make. It was either to choose Him or to leave Him. Today, we are challenged too. Jesus is the choice we must make for in the Eucharist, the Church presents Him to us not as symbols but as Real Presence.

In some way, the way we choose Jesus is a reflexion of what is known as the phenomenon of cafeteria Catholicism; we pick and choose what we want to believe. But, this image is perhaps too simple and dismissive because it paints a rather dismal picture that is black and white. The challenge is not what we pick and choose but rather how we pick and choose.

We all choose as a matter of fact. Choosing is part of the experience that makes us human. In some matters, we have no choice. We cannot choose the natural colour of our hair [even though you may choose to colour it] or which family to be born into [even though you may wish that you had been born into a more peaceful family than your present quarrelsome one]. In some other cases, the choosing had already been done by others. For example, the faith we profess. Many of us were baptised without our consent [we may have been screaming and kicking as the priest poured water over our heads] and as such, our decision to come here is perhaps the consequence of someone’s choosing. Our faith is derived from the authority of someone else. Or, if not, we may come here as a matter of habit or preference. In conclusion, some of our defining characteristics are conferred upon us by nature, whereas others by the choices of our parents etc. Those choices beyond our control, we are not interested in. But those we can control, we are interested in, because when we choose, we define ourselves.

Choosing is an exercise in self-identity—or self-definition. We can choose to be British, that is, if the United Kingdom wants us. We can choose to be of the opposite sex, that is, if we decide to go for a sex change. We can choose not to be a Catholic because the Protestant vision of Christianity is more vibrant, or being of another religion makes better economic sense.

However, to define who we are is more than the exercise of choosing as if we were in a supermarket. In order to properly exercise this ability to choose we need to get away from the supermarket type of choosing. It requires that we clarify why and what we want. It demands clarity of the purpose of life. It requires discipline and discipline equates to self-denial, self sacrifice and purification of motives and intentions. Choosing requires discipline because choosing has to be in conjunction with what it means to be human. [1] The key word is “human”—we choose in order to be fully human and today, Jesus presents the picture of humanity not just in itself. His picture of humanity is set within the context of eternal life. It is the spirit that gives life, the flesh has nothing to offer.

Thus, we must choose eternal life and in Jesus, eternal life is assured through eating His body and drinking His blood. That was why Jesus was unequivocal. He did not mince His words. Choosing Jesus is big decision. He cannot be just someone at the side—like your side-dish of mushrooms or asparagus as you eat your main meal. He has to be someone at the centre of our lives. We choose His life or no life. We eat His flesh or no flesh at all.

It is true that the Gospel presents us with this climactic and dramatic choice that we are to make. However, the plain truth for so many of us is simply less climactic, less exciting and certainly less dramatic. It is closer to mundane. In this, we share a lot in common with the martyrs for in their case, their choosing had already been done a long time ago. They exercise their faculty of choosing—decision by decision, choice by choice. They did not just choose to be martyrs; they certainly did not wake up in the morning and suddenly decide to be martyrs. The choice to be martyrs came from a life-long practice of choosing Jesus every day and which they only and ultimately paid with their lives. Martyrdom is more the fruit of perseverance than an act of bravado.

We can take heart for the examples of the martyrs give us hope as they illustrate the life-long process of conversion necessary if we were to choose Jesus. So, if we have not counted Jesus as the cost of our lives, now is the time to choose Him so that we may begin on the slow road of conversion that one day, we may, if called, have no second thoughts paying the cost of our choosing with our very lives.

FOOTNOTE:
[1] The current ennui we encounter, with regard to life, may be due to the fear of choosing.

19th Sunday in Ordinary Time Year B

This week we continue with the 3rd instalment in the series of 5 passages from Chapter 6 of John’s Gospel. The theme is the Father draws us to Himself. To understand how the Father can draw us, let us take a look at an important Gospel moment found notably in Mk 8:27, Luke 9:18 and Mt 16: 13. When Jesus asked whom people thought He was, His apostles answered: Some say John the Baptist, others Elijah. Elijah was mentioned simply because he was a great champion of Yahweh, and was expected to come back to usher in the Messianic age. Today, in the first reading, we witness the greatest of the prophets brought low; a man of broken spirit. He had taken on the establishment but in retaliation, Queen Jezebel had him running for his life. Elijah was dispirited and wanted to opt out of being God’s prophet.

Even the greatest amongst us know defeat, despair and discouragement. When we lose our spirit, we are like birds without wings or trees without roots. Without our spirit we cannot soar. So, in today’s Gospel, Jesus offers Himself as the food that will feed our spirit. Some Catholics think that Viaticum is given just before a person dies. But, the truth is Jesus is Viaticum not just before a person dies but He is The Viaticum because He is food a person needs on the way to the Father. He is food that draws us to His Father.

In the context of the previous two Gospel passages, let us expand the understanding of Jesus as Viaticum. It is unfortunate that by and large we often think of Jesus as food in a restricted sense that He is food for our “private” journey. Not that this is not true but this idea of Jesus as "my" nourishment is in some way a reflexion of a “narrow” philosophical framework where the reference is basically the subject or commonly understood as “I, me and myself”. When “I alone” is the frame of reference, the result of this subjective reference is disastrous in the long run for things like moral absolutes, dogmas, and revealed truths. It is disastrous for society.

As you can see, this “I" or the subject alone in relation to Jesus has immense ramifications or consequences sociologically. A notion of “private” food for one’s journey and a concern with one’s “private” feeding may blind the person to a reality which is beyond the “I" or the subject. We often fail to realise or see that a broken spirit is not just restricted to a person (ie., the individual). It applies very much also to a people and this is what we are: we are a broken people. We are a broken nation.

However, our national rhetoric will paint a picture of a nation that has gloriously propelled herself into the 21st century and beyond. We never think of ours as a nation broken in spirit if we look at our architectural wonders. We no longer have the world’s tallest building but we console ourselves that we have retained the title of the world’s tallest twin towers. The tourism authority consistently showcases our cultural diversity and recently, we have ventured into the territory of medical tourism.

But, for a moment, consider this: a parishioner on the way to Church on Friday evening, at a traffic light had her side window smashed and handbag taken away. Yesterday, someone in broad daylight tried to remove the tyres of our very own Fr Albert’s car parked inside Church grounds. We routinely hear such horror stories. Don’t tell me what you hear or read has not driven you to despair or discouragement? What about after 50 years, we are expected to swallow yet another vision of integration that is riddled with the same racism and discrimination? Foreign investors have to factor in the entrenched and accepted norm of bribery as a necessary component of doing business here.

The point here is not to highlight what is wrong but to illustrate that every horror story we hear only confirms our intuition of how far down we have travelled on the road to a failed nation. Despite a determined denial, spiritually we are a broken people and a broken nation. And the telling signs are when our newspapers have more advertisements than news and we are reduced to eating, movies, shopping and travelling.

If I may borrow a phrase from John Paul II, a people or a nation with a broken spirit, despite her vaunted achievements, belongs to the civilisation of death. You may think that JPII’s “civilisation of death” is a reference to abortion or euthanasia but abortion and euthanasia are just symptoms telling us that we may be alive individually but we are surrounded by death. [1] In such a situation, many of us respond individually by not caring or by becoming apathetic.

In feeding the 5000, Jesus is telling each and every one of us that He is not just food for one’s journey to the Father. He is also food for our journey. The emphasis is OUR journey. The Father can draw us to Himself. He not only gave bread to Elijah. As the manna was bread for the Israelites on the way to the Promised Land, the Eucharist is the Father’s invitation to come not just as an individual but also as a people. The healing in our country begins with an individual and it is made more effective when we are a people. Perhaps we understand better why Mass cannot be a private affair on a Sunday but it must reflect the celebration of a community within which the individual is fed by the Lord Himself. [2]

You know the Mediæval Age is often depicted as an age of obscurancy where people were living in a darkness that is marked by superstition etc. This cannot be further from the truth because the mediæval cathedral is testimony to a period where the spirit of the individual and the people were fed and enlightened by a vision of a God who is beautiful. Even a scholar, not entirely sympathetic to the Church, could speak admiringly of the devotion and patience that attended the construction of the cathedrals, notably of Chartres in France. To be able to construct such a magnificent structure, men, women and children [the community] were encouraged by their priests to work and to build. When at night they stopped, worn out with the day’s toil, their spare time was given up to confession and prayer [the individual]. Thus, the mediæval cathedrals are impressive evidence of an age where there was a more coherent integration between the individual and the community. [3] The individual must always and can only stand in relation to the community. In other words, one can only be a Catholic because there is the Church [the Body of Christ].

The cathedrals remind us that the Eucharist should never be “privatised” but instead they are concrete proofs of the possibility of integration wherein the Lord feeds us individually and draws us together into a people. Jesus does not nourish just the individual. If you listen to Eucharistic Prayer III (EPIII), you will begin to realise how many references are made to the “we”, the “us”, the community or the Church. The Father through the Body of Christ draws us into a body that is bound together by the Holy Spirit. Thus, the community [by extension the concrete church building] and not just the individual, must also be an image of Christ. Come, brothers and sisters, let us make this Eucharist mine, yours and ours.

FOOTNOTES:
[1] Euthanasia is alive because we think we care for the person (put to death) but in reality, it reflects more the culture of convenience expressed through the disposability of the individual. It is ironical that in a society that prizes the individual, the individual is easily disposable.
[2] If Mass is boring, apart from not bringing yourself there (individually), it is because you have not made yourself a part of the community.
[3] They also tell us that not only are individuals oriented to God but that the community too must be oriented to God.

18th Sunday in Ordinary Time Year B

Last Sunday, the Lord fed the hungry and this week we see them coming back for more. He tells them not to work for food that cannot last but for food that endures to eternal life. Physical hunger is therefore set within the context of spiritual sustenance and satisfaction. The manna from heaven in the first reading is but a foreshadowing of the spiritual food which is being offered by Jesus to those who choose to follow Him. Manna provides temporal and physical sustenance whereas the Bread given by Jesus will give spiritual nourishment and is necessary to sustain eternal life.

So today, I want to speak of sin in the context of our search for spiritual sustenance. How are we to think of sin? For an understanding of sin, let us turn to a debate between the Dominicans and Franciscans. They debated on whether or not Christ would come if Adam had not sinned. In this debate, the Franciscans held the position that Christ would have come even if Adam had not sinned. My interest is not which position was right. Instead I am interested in how the Franciscan position can help us understand how we behave the way we do and better still, how we should behave.

First of all, our usual understanding is that Christ came to save us from our sins and bring us back to God. He became like Adam in order to undo Adam’s sin. Thus, through His obedience, He is able to lead us back to God. This, in a nutshell, explains what St Irenæus would call the doctrine of recapitulation. St Paul himself had given the idea in his Letters to the Ephesians (Eph 1:10) and also to the Romans (Rom 5:12ff).

The Franciscan position is helpful because it gives us an insight into the nature of created reality. If there had been no sin and yet Christ would still come, this position is telling us something about our orientation—our human constitution or make-up. Even if creation were perfect, that is, even if it had not been vitiated or weakened by sin, it would still be incomplete because creation would still exhibit its in-built dependence on the Creator.[1] We are made for God and Christ’s coming is to fulfil humanity’s search for God. In other words, there is in humanity an insatiable desire for God. Therefore, sin in this context can be seen as distortion of our orientation or compass for God. Sin blinds us to our need for God.

What does this mean?

It means that we are always searching for God and hunger is an expression of our existential need for God. Since creation is dependent, it means that there will never be a time when humanity will never hunger for God. This is where we run into trouble because our hunger sometimes leads us to deadly places.

Given this, Blessed Teresa of Calcutta provides us with a key to understanding how deadly unruly appetites can be and how the Bread of Life is the only adequate antidote to this existential hunger. She said that the biggest disease today is not leprosy or tuberculosis, but rather the feeling of being unwanted. What has happened is that we have turned what is for us existential human needs, that is, to be loved, to be wanted, to be recognised into obsessions. We have become obsessed with possessing things mostly and people sometimes. We are obsessed with status or image. We are obsessed with comfort and convenience. Our existential needs as expressed through our hunger have become the obsessions of our unruly appetites. Sin is when hunger turned into unruly appetites.

However, when we consider our unruly appetites, we are often weighed down or laden with guilt, and perhaps with a sense of hopelessness or despair; a feeling that one ought to be ashamed of oneself—thinking that one is beyond redemption. I know this through hearing confession. It does not matter what the sin is—we are not concerned to describe what the sin is—but it does matter that people despair because of the recurrence of the same sin.

Such feelings only obscure the truth that our hungers-turned-unruly-appetites merely mask the strength or degree of our need for God. The more unruly our appetites the more we are searching for God. Think of something you are most ashamed of. Behind that shame is your search for God. Thus, the greater the sinner does not mean the greater the condemnation. Instead it just means the greater the search for God.

So, if only we pause a while, if we take a look at our insatiable needs. Whenever we are afflicted by an addiction, realise that our search for God has just quickened. Our addictions only confrm that we need God even more. Now we may begin to appreciate and recognise how important it is to stop halfway, sit, think and allow God to interrupt our “usual” way of doing things. It helps us re-align our existential needs with our true orientation. In the context of sin, we never have bad appetites. We never have poor appetites. We only have unruly appetites.

But, in a sense, the Gospel tells us that we are, of all people, most truly blessed. Today, we have with us a group of people who are in the RCIA journey. They will look to us for the example we can give, that we are truly blessed. Why? We have been given the Bread of Life to remind us that nothing comes close to satisfying our deepest desires. Thus, the Bread of Life is a reminder to us that only Christ is the answer to our hunger. He is God. Only God alone can satisfy us fully. If this does not sound convincing, then that’s because we have been duped or misled into thinking—like the crowd--that hunger is just physical or material. It is not. St Augustine tells us that our hearts are made for God. Let us search for Him.

FOOTNOTE:
[1] That you are seated here for Sunday Mass is ample proof of this dependence of creation on the Creator. You are here primarily not because you have sinned and are in need of salvation, even though that may be true. Your being here is an expression of created reality’s dependence on God. Created reality is always dependent reality. We have this from John’s Gospel: In the beginning was the Word...Through him all things came to be...

17th Sunday in Ordinary Time Year B

We are in for a treat. For the next four Sundays, the Gospel readings will come from chapter six of John’s Gospel. The Evangelist has no account of the Institution of the Eucharist but this chapter makes up for the seeming “deficiency” of the Gospel.

There is a connexion between physical hunger and spiritual satisfaction; between food and the Eucharist. Thus, an understanding of the Eucharist begins aptly with a basic human need: food. In the multiplication of the loaves, the scenario set up by John gives us a picture of 5000 hungry men. But in reality, when we include the women and children present there, a figure closer to 15000 might be more accurate. In feeding such a number, we are shown the abundance of God’s generosity.

The first reading confirms this generosity with Elisha becoming the sign or sacrament of God’s concern for His people. At first glance, Elisha seems to have dispensed with bureaucracy. He takes the bread, the first-fruits, meant for offering to God and distributes it to the people. That can be interpreted as a doing away with the “red-tape” surrounding the temple worship. But at a deeper level, the first-fruits, which are rightfully offered to God in thanksgiving, are but a reflexion of the generosity of God. The left-over shows that God is always generous in providence.

The Gospel reflects this providence. We have a boy with only 5 loaves and 2 fish. And yet, a miracle of stupendous proportion took place. How? Our scientific minds search for the plausibility of belief as we try to make sense of the possibility of it happening. But, the Gospel only records the instruction of Jesus to His disciples to make the crowd comfortable. Beyond that it remains silent. It only echoes what we hear each time we celebrate the Eucharist that “Jesus took the loaves, gave thanks and gave them out to all”... The emphasis was not on “how” He multiplied bread. The emphasis was on the Eucharistic tone of the miracle.

Thus, generosity is a foretaste of the greatest gift God gives us: The Eucharist. The multiplication of the loaves and fish shows us what God can do for us. But, when we are interested in the “how”, we tend to forget this side of God’s strength. When we think of the “how”, we come face to face with the impossible. That is where we will get such replies like: “My faith is not strong enough”. “I don’t have the strength”. “How can it be”, and etc.

The miracle is possible because it consists of bringing whoever we are and whatever we have to the Lord. He will make wonders out of what we dare to entrust Him with. The result is whatever God does will be enough for us and also enough for others.

But, sometimes God’s providence is presented as a Gospel of Prosperity. It simply tells us that the more you give, the more God will bless you. After all, this does tie in with the giving up of the boy’s 5 loaves and 2 fish. However, the miracle is not about our benefit as it is about who God is. It is not about the advantage of our giving nor is it about the receiving. Instead, the Gospel of Generosity is about our giving as God gives.

This is what it means that we are called to give so that others may have life. All we have, our talents, gifts, wealth, are considered blessings from God. But, the converse is not true that what we lack is to be considered a curse from or of God, if one follows the Gospel to its logical conclusion. The generosity of God’s blessing is an encouragement for us to give to those who are in need and in giving, nothing that we have is ever too small, too insignificant or too little.

The Miracle of the Multiplication is at once an affirmation of who God is and what we can be: generous like God is generous. The heart is the measure of the world and not the measuring tape. It is not the square miles of arable land, the square kilometres of potable water. But, instead, the bigger the heart is, the bigger the world—the smaller the heart is, the smaller the world.

The feeding of the 5000 or 15000 is indeed a miracle accomplished by no less than God. Yes, it is a miracle in which human effort is not missing because it is also a miracle of the heart. The boy who dared to share found that there was more than enough rather than not enough…. When one is worried and starts to grab, then there can never be enough.

In conclusion, the greatest of all miracles is the Eucharist. In order for us to grasp its possibility, Christ begins with what we can see: food. Food, a basic human need, can always be shared. Jesus worked his best miracle through food and now He will do it through the Eucharist.

16th Sunday in Ordinary Time Year B

In the noviciate we were presented with a classic case of “rationalisation” and how Jesuits were skilled at it. It goes like this. Would it be alright to pray whilst we were smoking? Yes was the answer. Would it be alright to smoke whilst we were praying? No was the answer. This subtle rationalisation about the connexion between prayer and work has led many a Jesuit down the road of activism. It does tie in with the theme, the Good Shepherd, for He is one who cares for the sheep; whose life is dedicated to the marginalised. Jesuits tend to rationalise that their active life must revolve around the apostolate, the ministry and the people. After all, everything can be prayer or contemplation. But, today, the Gospel actually shows us a side of the Lord’s way of proceeding and how important this side is for the apostolate, the ministry, the people and most of all, the Church.

The Good Shepherd tells His disciples “You must come away to some lonely place all by yourselves and rest for a while”. Why does He do that? An analogy might help. Have you ever entered the expressway, going in the wrong direction? If you’re unlucky, you will need to travel many kilometres before you can find an interchange to make a U-turn. Many of us are not so much on wrong expressways as we are trapped in the information superhighway of immediate gratification. We want an instant connexion with the world faster than the speed of light. But, even if we were not, and were living a sedentary life, the rhythm of our life revolves around appointments, meetings, deadlines, and social engagements. But, beyond our immediate needs and this is critical, when we consider the immensity of needs around us, we are often driven by this incessant urge to fill the gap for a God who is seemingly helpless.

But, is God that helpless? Apparently not because, in the overwhelming face of hunger and sickness, there were many moments where Christ showed us how He escaped to some lonely places, to be by Himself. His going away was an act of creative absence. In fact, Christ’s absence after the Last Supper gave us the perpetual presence of His Eucharist; His absence through death gave rise to faith in His resurrection and His absence after the Ascension gave us the testimony of the Gospels.

The point here is that absence is not nothingness. Instead, absence is part of the rhythm of creation. In a sense, the Church follows this as she provides us with seasons, solemnities and feasts to remind us that our rhythm of life is not supported by our activism. Instead, the seasons, solemnities and feasts remind us that God is the foundation of our activities. Thus, doing nothing is not nothing doing. It actually allows God to enter into our space. It interrupts our “activism” to allow for “being” to stand out. As God enters our space, we come into His presence. One of the experiences I had in the Ateneo Manila University was the Angelus. The minute the Angelus bell chimes, everything stops. Conversations cease; those walking remain standing, those eating take a pause. Perhaps, an image by Jean-Francois Millet speaks a thousand words for us. He depicts a farmer and his wife both caught up in the mystery of the Annunciation. In the distant horizon, you can discern a Church spire—the reason for the silence of reverence.

Here, we are speaking ordinarily for it does not mean that the surgeon stops operating; the fireman stops putting out fire etc. In the ordinary an interruption is good. According to a historian, he says that the whole rationale of symbolic gestures requires that they disrupt and disturb the secular order. Their power to witness—not only to others but to ourselves—comes precisely from their awkwardness. It is awkward to put ashes on your forehead on Ash Wednesday. It is awkward to say to your colleagues, “I don’t eat meat on Friday”. It is awkward to process in the streets.

Unfortunately, we have removed the “awkwardness” of the Epiphany on 6th January and of Corpus Christi on Thursday after Trinity Sunday and have conveniently moved them to a Sunday. When we do away with the awkwardness of our symbolic actions, we have not just accommodated ourselves to the spirit of the world. Instead, we have failed to understand that tradition is the distinctive language of belief. When we do away with the awkwardness of our symbolic gestures, we cannot be far from devaluing our Catholic beliefs. When holy days of obligation become a matter of convenience [and Sunday Mass is celebrated on a Saturday] to make time for the practicality of our life, we have entered a slow ritual of suicide for what we believe in. Faithfulness is not restricted to doctrines to be believed or teachings simply to be obeyed but it is also the disciplines which are expressed through our symbolic gestures—ashes, abstention, pilgrimages, processions and fasting.

The Year for Priest, inaugurated at the Solemnity of the Sacred Heart this year, is offering us the opportunity to come away to some lonely place. In fact, some of us have actually been “going away” even though there is so much to do. The bombing in Jakarta, again? A young man about to be married allegedly committing suicide at the place where he had been interrogated. Finally and not the least, we are worried about the case of Herald’s restriction and our freedom to worship God. Thus, “coming away” before the Blessed Sacrament is a powerful symbolic gesture. And the parish is providing time for us to come away to be with Christ who can do for us what we cannot do.

Furthermore, in conjunction with the Year for Priest and as part of the Golden Jubilee celebration, the parish will launch an initiative where there will be semi-perpetual exposition of the Blessed Sacrament. People will be asked to come and offer an hour to accompany the Lord and to pray for the Jesuit priest serving in this part of the world. Like Jesuits, we can be so caught up with our “ability” to organise forgetting that it is God whose grace we need most to be more effective.

Someone asked me about how we are to put the initiative into practice. I told the person the “how” was not so much my concern but the “why” would be more important. Let me make a distinction between the Priesthood of Christ and the priesthood of a priest. This distinction helps explains why sacrifice is necessary. If the mystery of the priesthood is to be appreciated as God’s gift to the Church, then your prayer before the Lord is to ask that the His priesthood will become more and more the priesthood of the ordained person. Beyond what L’Oreal crudely put as “Because I am worth it”, your prayer is needed simply because of the nature of the ministry, the apostolate and the Church. So, you can see the “how” is not as important as the “why” is.

Finally, the coming away to some lonely place is our simple exercise in the Year for Priest to reclaim the awkwardness, the rhythm of practice that allows the Church to be Church and in so doing, allows Christ to be more visible in the priests that He has called to serve Him and His Church. We always talk of renewing the Church. We seem to think that renewal is for the Laity. But the 1st Reading reminds us otherwise. Vatican II started the renewal of the Church through the liturgy. Many took that seriously but forgot that the process of renewal must also involve the renewal of the priesthood and the conversion of the priest because the priest is the sacrament of Christ and the custodian of the other sacraments of the Church.