Peace! Kalilintad! Shalom!

Category: Homilies

  • General House Cleaning

    March 3, 2024 – Third Sunday of Lent

    Click here for the readings (https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/030324-YearB.cfm)

    When was the last time you have a general house or room cleaning? When was the last time you yourself have cleaned your own house? Or how many times have you yourself have cleaned your own room?

    Do you believe that a simple activity of cleaning your room or house yourself can be a learning and life-changing experience? Yes. Try to do a general cleaning of your house or just your room, and you get to know a lot of things about yourself as well as be in touch with your present priorities, needs, resources, response, expectations, difficulties, frustrations, adjustments, and challenges in life.

    Tedious and tiring chores it may be, if we really reflect on it, house cleaning can be a necessary exercise and opportunity to improve your life.

    First, by house-cleaning, you will not only get a good physical exercise, you can also have a review of your life. You see, clean and treasure again what you have at present – like, your gifts, resources, plans, resolutions, and dreams. You can be in touch again with your present state of being – your difficulties, adjustments, & struggles, and make reality check of your identity, commitments, and decisions.

    Second, cleaning your place could be your chance to re-arrange and re-adjust your needs, wants, priorities and expectations in a more realistic manner. Along the way, you may have collected a lot of clutters, stuffs or abobots in life that are not valuable, important, and useful anymore in your journey. House-cleaning is the time to let go and say goodbye to non-essentials and to take care of what are really essentials and truly important in life. 

    Lastly, house-cleaning can be the chance to renew and re-commit to life you choose to live. As you clean your room, you begin take hold and control, direct and make sense of your life again, and in effect, making your life more livable, tolerable, and meaningful.

    You might wonder why we are talking about house or room-cleaning today.

    Our liturgy and its readings today are telling us a simple and profound message: We are today’s God’s home, and we do need cleaning at times.

    Beyond the story about Jesus making a scene and being angry and wild inside the temple, Jesus in our gospel today is doing and calling all people then and now for a General House Cleaning. For Jews then and us today, the temple is considered to God’s home – the sacred place where God resides, lives, and dwells. We need then to revere, consecrate, respect, and behave well and righteously in God’s temple for it is where God incarnates and reveals Himself. God’s temple then is moment in space and time where and when we meet God and be with God. And at the very core of Jesus message is that God’s presence is not anymore confine into a place but now accessible and presented to all through and in Jesus. Jesus is the New Jerusalem. Jesus is God’s new temple. And whoever believes in Him, God and Jesus will reside in him.  This means that we who believes in Christ today are now the extensions and representations of God’s temple. We are then today’s God’s sacred home where God resides, lives and dwells.  This is how fortunate, privilege and sacred we are and we should be.

    However sacred, fortunate, privilege Home to God we may be, we do need at times house or room cleaning. As today’s God’s home, we may be undeserving, unworthy, and unruly to such honor and dignity. Sometimes we may not recognize, appreciate, and commit with such dignity, and worse, may neglect and reject the privilege of being and becoming God’s home. And during these times, we need spiritual house-cleaning. We need to review our life, re-arrange and re-adjust, and recommit our life according to our identity as God’s home.

    Lent is the time for our general spiritual house or room cleaning – the time to review life, the time to re-adjust and re-arrange one’s life, time to recommit to life in order to be and become today’s God’s home anew.

    Again, when was the last time you yourself clean your own house or room? Try to do it again these days and it may improve your life for the better, as a person as well as a Christian.

    Jesus during the first Sunday of Lent challenges us “Repent & Believe the Gospel”. God in the Lord’s Transfiguration last Sunday during the second Sunday of Lent proclaims to us: “This is my beloved Son. Listen to Him”. Now on the third Sunday of Lent Jesus confronts us: “Stop making my Father’s house a marketplace” – meaning, make God’s home Sacred, righteous & holy in us. In other words, let us do a good general spiritual house-cleaning & consecrate anew our lives to our Lord Jesus Christ.

    So Help us God & Bless Us always. So May it Be. Amen.

  • LISTEN TO BECOME A BLESSING 

    LISTEN TO BECOME A BLESSING 

    February 25, 2024 – Second Sunday of Lent

    Click here for the readings (https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/022524.cfm)

    There was once that I attended a meeting of a group of lay leaders in a parish. I was asked to sit down and listen. The meeting was called to resolve a conflict within them. As everyone sat down, it was very evident that the group was divided based on where they sat. Clearly, there was a division among the group. When the conversation began in order to hear both sides of the story, I also began to notice how many would speak at the same time. A certain group at the back would have their own conversation while a particular lay leader was telling the story.

    Others began to point their fingers and blame each other. Others showed on their facial expressions disdain and disrespect. The meeting hall sounded like a market place. Everyone was speaking and expressing their side. This attitude of the group only contributed to more tensions and conflicts.

    I did not wonder at all, why conflicts would easily arose in such group. People never really listen and so people cannot understand. For this Second Sunday of Lent, it is in this way that I would like to offer my reflections based on our readings and God’s invitations for us, to listen well.

    In any conversations or whenever a person speaks, teaches, tells a story or explains, we who are the listeners may actually show “bad listening practices[1].” This is done intently by us or  unaware that we are doing it already. Hence, I would like first to identify these bad listening practices so that we may become aware of them and challenge ourselves to become an effective listener.

    Types of Bad Listening Practices

    First is INTERRUPTING especially when it is done to dominate and overpower the one who is speaking. Though not all interruptions are bad, however, when our interruption causes confusion, distorted information and competition, then we lose real conversation and not able to listen well.

    Second is DISTORTED LISTENING. This happens in many ways like having a wrong story, or lacking information to a story that we communicate. Sometimes  also the real story has been added with other misleading information. This is the cause of more tensions and conflicts because when we begin to communicate we pass a distorted story and distorted information. This is actually common in many communities and even organizations. This breeds gossips, malicious attacks against another and defamation. People who listen to distorted stories tend to believe it and at times even add more distortions to it.

    Third is EAVESDROPPING that involves intentional and a planned attempt to secretly listen to a conversation. Like for example, we saw some people talking in a corner then we pretend to do something until we come near them in order to listen to what they are talking about. This is indeed a bad practice because this is a violation of a person’s privacy. Moreover, people who eavesdrop tend to get wrongful information as well. This also creates, when caught, damage to inter-personal relationships and causes hurtful feelings.

    Fourth is AGGRESSIVE LISTENING. A person really listen well, however, it has the intention to ambush and attack the one who is speaking. It criticizes another person’s ideas, personalities or the characteristics of the person. This usually happens to people who are already very familiar with like couples, friends and those who have been together in a group or organization for a very long time.

    Fifth is NARCISSISTIC LISTENING. It is a self-absorbed and self-centered form of listening. We pretend to listen to a person sharing a story, however, we interrupt and bring the conversation back to ourselves. It never respects and acknowledges the feelings of the one speaking, but rather, it tries to divert the attention towards ourselves. Like for example, “Your story is nothing compared to mine,” or “if I were you, I would do like this,” or “That remind me of the time when I was (at your age/the one in charge/there in your place…)

    Sixth is PSEUDO-LISTENING. You must be familiar with a family member or a friend or someone you know who repeats a story hundreds of times and you have already memorized it. In order not to offend the person, we pretend to listen well but not. We may nod our head or even complete the sentence. This “act” is pseudo-listening. Yet, when it becomes our habit this bad listening creates negative and even painful consequences in our relationships because we do not listen well at all.

    So, what kind of bad listening behavior do we have? We may have one or more bad listening practices actually. But be aware that having such bad listening practices in our relationships do not help us and do not help the community. What God wants of us is to listen well so that we may respond well.

    Biblical Significance

    Take for example the story of Abraham. Despite the risk that he had to take by sacrificing his own son, Isaac, Abraham listened to the Lord God and responded to him. As a father, Abraham must have a heavy heart. Yet, he listened well. That was done, as the Book of Genesis told us, to test Abraham’s capacity to trust in God. Indeed, God saw the faithful heart of Abraham and spared Isaac.

    By this capacity to listen well to God’s command, Abraham became a blessing to many. By listening well to God, Abraham became the father of faith to us.

    This is the very invitation that we find in the Gospel of Mark today. The voice of the Father in Heaven tells us, “This is my beloved son. Listen to him!”

    However, notice also how Peter responded to this mystery. He interrupted and suggested to Jesus to stay there, to build three tents.

    The Gospel told us that, “Peter hardly knew what to say because they were so terrified.” Yet, at that very moment what matters most was not to say anything, but TO LISTEN.

    To speak and to interrupt was actually an temptation. Not to fully listen to what was happening would deprive Peter to understand fully the mystery that was being unfolded before them.

    Hence, the invitation was “LISTEN TO HIM!” – to listen to Jesus, to his way of life, his challenges for us, to his heart and mind. This way of life of Jesus entails struggles, pain, sacrifices, suffering, and even death. Yet, it does not end there. There is also the glorious resurrection. This is the meaning why the cloths and face of Jesus was transfigured.

    Jesus’ capacity to listen well to the Father and to respond well to the Father brings transformation. Again, this was how Abraham was transformed into a blessing to all.

    For all of us today, listen well, listen to Jesus! Listen to Jesus’ heart and mind! Do not be tempted to listen to Satan’s deception and lies. Do not listen to distorted stories! Do not listen to gossips and malicious attacks against your neighbor that intend to bring division and pain! Because when we do that, we become children of the father of lies and evil.

    Listen to Jesus! Listen to the Gospel! – that we may be transformed and become a blessing to our families, friends and communities and not become a curse to many.

    As an assignment, make it your habit to read the Bible, reflect on it and pray over it that we may able to listen to Jesus. Hinaut pa!

    [1] According to https://open.lib.umn.edu/communication/chapter/5-2-barriers-to-effective-listening/

  • PAMINAW

    PAMINAW

    February 25, 2024 – Second Sunday of Lent

    Click here for the readings (https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/022524.cfm)

    Once a man approached a priest and asked, “Father, how come God seems so absent and silent? Why we don’t feel and hear him listening to us anymore as He used to be? Why does God no longer speak to us His people?” The priest sadly replied, “It is not that God no longer speaks to His people. It is that no one these days can stoop down low & silent enough to listen. No one… can stoop down low & silent enough… to listen.”

    Occasionally (if not most often) we experience the absence and silence of God in Jesus. Though we trust and believe that God is with us – the Lord is with us, we live through moments in our life where God and Jesus seem distant and silent. But is God really no longer listening and talking to us? Has he really abandoned us? Or is it we become too noisy, self-preoccupied, or high and far enough to listen to Him?

    In our gospel today, we hear that the apostles heard God saying to them: “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased; LISTEN to Him.” Their experience of the Lord’s transfiguration has the same very simple message: Jesus is His beloved Son – God’s gift and word to us, so we must acknowledge and listen to Him intently.

    And we can only do this – acknowledge and listen to Jesus – like the apostle, not in noise, pre-occupation, and ambitions of our hearts, but in the shadow of God’s seeming silence and absence. Only by experiencing God’s silence that we recognize God’s glory in Lord’s transfiguration, transformation in our lives and hear intently God’s will for us now.

    Sound simple, but we do know how difficult for ourselves to be deprived of and abstained from words nowadays. With a lot of things happening & going on, both our world outside & our world inside ourselves are getting noisier & noisier to the point that we cannot anymore hear ourselves & don’t know anymore how to listen to others, much more to God. If we really come to think of it, sometimes we do truly need to fast from our words so that we may become silent in order to listen to God, others & ourselves.

    We do know the destructive ill-effects of miscommunication, misinformation, & fake news to our lives today, simply because of our irresponsible use of our words & our unwillingness to listen. At this time, we should be wise-enough to be careful to use our words, for it can make life Better OR Bitter. Learn to listen first before using our words.

    It is also interesting that if we happen to play with the letters in the word: LISTEN, we may realize different levels of meaning. Try to rearrange all the letters in the word: LISTEN, and form other words using all & same letters… Well, from the word, “Listen”, we can form the words “silent” & “enlist” & nothing else. From these words: listen, silent, enlist, we may form the challenge: “Enlist oneself to be silent in order to listen”, or “Be silent, enlist oneself to listen”, or “Listen, silently enlist oneself”. All of these reflects the need to for us to willingly be quiet ourselves in order to hear what is being said. In other words, to opt for silent listening amidst our noisy words & our noisy world.

    Simply put, “Be Quiet (Don’t be noisy) for the Lord is with us and He has something to say for us. Huwag kang maingay, Narito sya at may sasabihin sa atin. Ayaw’g saba. Ania siya ug naay ika-sulti nato. Di pag-gahud, Ari siya. May inug-hambal sa aton. Jesus is God’s word for us. So, LISTEN to Him. Makinig Sa kanya. Minaw Niya ba.

    Pope Francis also once said: “People listen to radio, to TV and to gossips throughout the day, but do we take a bit a time each day to listen to Jesus?” True, we spend a lot of time listening to and knowing about others. We also may spend some time listening to and knowing about ourselves. But do we spend some time to listen to and know Jesus?

    Listening to Jesus entails praying low enough in and with God’s silence. Only in silent prayer, we can recognize Him and listen to Him. Thus, we do need to fast from our words in order to be silent enough to listen to Him.

    So next time you find yourself restless and sleepless at night, stop counting sheep. Talk to the shepherd. Pray then silently and listen to Him, for the Lord has something to say and then you will hear what He got to say, especially during this Lenten Season these days.

    So Help us God, So May it Be. Amen.

  • Ash Wednesday Reflection MERCY.

    Ash Wednesday Reflection MERCY.

    February 14, 2024 – Ash Wednesday

    Click here for the readings (https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/021424.cfm)

    Lent is all about God’s Mercy. As we begin the season of Lent today, better for us to have a good understanding of God’s mercy & forgiveness being continuously offered us.

    Often, we think of Lent with dread because we often associate it with giving up something. “I have to give something up” we habitually reflect during these times. But giving up something during Lent is more than just about self-denial, self-discipline, and imposition of burden.

    Giving up something, (that is, by praying, fasting, doing works of mercy) is an invitation towards God’s mercy. It is about entering & experiencing God’s mercy & forgiveness once again & anew
    on a much deeper & intimate level.


    We observe Lenten discipline of prayer, fasting & works of mercy by giving up something so that we may be predisposed to experience once anew God’s love and mercy into our lives.

    Lent, we remember is all about receiving, benefitting from & sharing with others God’s mercy rather than just giving up something through self-denial, self-discipline, or imposing burden to oneself & others.

    In other words, Lent is our chance & our way to be silently, secretly, personally & closely intimate with our loving & merciful God once again & anew for we do believe that “our Father who sees in secret will repay us” with His love & mercy.

    As we receive the ashes today, we are challenged to “Repent & Believe the Gospel”. This is a constant invitation for us to renew
    our faith-relationship with God, by changing & updating our normal ways, and be open once again to receive God’s ways & will for us now so that we may experience God’s mercy & forgiveness anew.

    Lenten season then is all about experiencing God’s mercy anew along with our Lenten discipline & renewal of faith. Rather than our giving-up of something ourselves, Lent is all about our giving-in to His graces & blessings.

    “Lord, Have Mercy”. Perhaps this should be our prayer these times as we do need now His mercy especially during these times of imminent-threat of war & division, natural & human disasters, poverty, sickness & others.

    Let this be our prayer during this Lenten season:

    Ginoo, Maluoy ka sa Amon.

    Ginoo, Kaloy-I kami.

    Panginoon, Maawa ka sa Amin.

    Chunim, chabirol bepososo.

    Kyrie, Eleison.
    Lord, Have Mercy on us.

  • PRAY. FAST. GIVE.      

    PRAY. FAST. GIVE.      

    February 14, 2024 – Ash Wednesday

    Click here for the readings (https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/021424.cfm)

    The Church begins today the first day of the Season of Lent. Changes in our liturgical celebrations are also applied. We now use the color purple that symbolizes sorrow for our sins and repentance. Our music becomes mellow and subdued. We don’t sing now the Gloria or the Alleluia as Gospel Acclamation. Even colorful flowers are removed from the sanctuary.

    These changes in our liturgy direct all of us to look deeper into our lives, the kind of heart we have so that we may discover our own sinfulness and begin to repent. Hence, on this Ash Wednesday, the ashes that will be imparted on our forehead reminds of these two important messages. First, “to repent and believe in the Gospel.” The Lord in his mercy and compassion calls us now to come to him. God invites us not to be afraid anymore because the Lord desires to embrace us and heal us.

    Second, “we are from dust and to dust we shall return.” As the Lord God made out of clay and formed the man, he also breathe the spirit into his nostrils. The was how life was given. This reminds us of the frailty of human life and the certainty of our death, yet of the beauty as well because we are one with the earth and God is our creator.

    These reminders bring us now to enter fully into the Season of Lent. And welcoming this season calls us also to observe this 40-day journey faithfully and with open heart. The Church invites us now, as the Gospel of Matthew told us of the three ancient spiritual practices to guide us towards a renewed self and a transformed heart.

    The first of this, is PRAYER. Lent calls us to pray more and to pray better. To give more importance to prayer and to pray daily. Now, to pray is not limited with our memorized prayers or those that we have become so familiar with like the recitation of the Rosary or our Novenas. To pray, rather, is to be more aware of God’s presence among us. To pray is to be constantly conscious of God’s spirit working in our lives. That is why, it is an invitation for us to find ourselves praying even while at work, while traveling, while eating, while encountering and meeting people.

    Second, FASTING AND ABSTINENCE. To deprive ourselves from eating a full meal is an ancient spiritual practices that is also common in other religions. Fasting allows us to not just make us aware of our physical hunger but also our other different forms of hungers. Our hunger for love, for concern, for justice, for peace and to work for it. This makes us to have a focus on what lies within our heart. Abstinence, is to refrain ourselves from enjoying those things that we like and we love. By law, the Church only requires 18 years old up to 60 years old to fast on this Ash Wednesday and on Good Friday except for the sick. And starting at 14 years old and above, we are required by law to abstain from eating meat on this day and in all Fridays of lent and on Good Friday. This leads us to make ourselves free from anything that may prevent us being close to God and others.

    Third is to GIVE ALMS. To be charitable or to express our generosity is an important component of this Season. Our good works or our kindness is not limited to few coins that we give to the poor, but by making actions life-giving for others. Through our generosity others may find hope and blessing.

    As we begin the Season of Lent, may this 40-day spiritual journey may truly become a time of grace, of renewal and transformation of our hearts. Hinaut pa.