Peace! Kalilintad! Shalom!

Category: LiturgIcal Year B

  • PRUNING

    PRUNING

    March 17, 2024 – 5th Sunday of Lent

    Click here for the readings (https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/031724-YearB.cfm)

    Fruit-bearing process of Jackfruit tree is indeed amazing. Summertime during my childhood days, my parents used to ask me to strike with a bolo the trunk of the jackfruit tree, (we call langka), so that its tree would bear much fruits. It had always been a mystery to me why, if you scratch or peel off its trunk’s skin, thus, releasing white juices (in a way inflicting pain or wounds around its trunk), would a langka, jackfruit tree bears much fruit.

    Simply put, why would a jackfruit tree bear much fruit, if one cut and injure the jackfruit tree? Bakit ba namumunga ang puno nga langka pagsinugatan mo ito?“Nganong mamunga man ang punu-an sa langka kon imong samad-samaran ang lawas sa iyang punu-an?”

    For us Filipino, this has been a common practice – for jackfruit to bear much fruit, we cut or scratch the skin of its trunk.   And most of the time, our parents or elders could not explain why it happens. Usually, they would just rationalize that it has been done before and it worked, and it will be like that always. Well, it does work & we definitely enjoy its fruits.

    But if we try to observe closely the fruit-bearing process of a nangka tree, we realize that in order for it to bear much fruits, it is necessary for the nangka tree to undergo such painful process of scratching & peeling off some of its trunk’s skin. Because if you notice, a langka tree normally grows with a lot of leaves, leaves that usually blocks the sunlight to get in.

    We know then that less sunlight, there would be less chance of growing flowers, thus less chance of bearing fruits. For the sunlight to get in, thus letting flowers to grow and bear fruits, one need to lessen or trim down the volumes of leaves around the nangka tree without damaging its branches, by scratching off the trunk’s skin or inflicting wounds around the tree. Thus, when its leaves fall and sun then comes in, time will come new flowers will bloom and then will produce new fruits.

    Simply put, sometimes we do need to go through process of pruning thru legitimate sacrifices & sufferings for the promise of new life to flourish in our life again & anew.

    In the same manner, our readings today have the same message. The Lords says in our first reading, “the days are coming when I will make a new covenant with them where I will place my law within them and write it upon their hearts, I will be their God, and they shall be my people.”

    Meaning, the time is near for a personal covenant with God.  Jesus in our gospel today is proclaiming us that God’s glory is about to be revealed, “the hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified.” – the good news of God’s glory is near and our salvation is at hand.

    However, for God’s glory to be revealed and our salvation to realized, we must experience legitimate sacrifices and dying. Jesus said: Amen, amen, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains just a grain of wheat; but if it dies, it produces much fruit. Whoever loves his life loses it, and whoever hates his life in this world, will preserve it for eternal life.

    St Paul said, Jesus himself experience sacrifices for he offered prayers and supplications with loud cries and tears. He learned obedience from what he suffered. Like jackfruit tree, we must shed off our sins and be naked & properly exposed before the Lord, so that His glory and life will be revealed to us, & will be received by us. 

    The psychologist Karl Jung says that most mental sickness comes from the avoidance of legitimate suffering. The neurotic maneuvers we make to avoid the legitimate suffering that is part of our reality become much more painful than the original suffering would have been. Avoiding suffering & pains thus hinders us to grow fruitfully in life.

    For a woman to fully enjoy motherhood, she must go through and endure the sacrifice of childbearing, and suffering of childbirth. Just like the fruit-bearing process of the langka tree, our life must also undergo pain and shedding of sinful ways so that God’s light will ignite and prepare our faith for a new life. In all spheres of life, the secret of deeper joy is in delayed satisfaction and legitimate suffering.

    Season of Lent is usually the moment for our legitimate sufferings and necessary sacrifices to prepare ourselves once again to recognize and receive God’s glory into our live, that we may bloom and be fruitful anew in our Christian life.

    In review, Ash Wednesday calls us to repentance & faith, “Repent & Believe the Gospel”. 2nd Sunday of Lent, God challenges us to Listen to His Beloved Son. 3rd Sunday of Lent Jesus insists that we cleanse & consecrate our lives as God’s temple as we “stop to make His father’s house a marketplace”. 4th Sunday reminds us that we raise above ourselves to these Lenten challenges so that we may have Life eternal with God. A

    nd now on the 5th Sunday of Lent, through legitimate process life-sufferings & pains, we are to prepare & expose ourselves to openly receive & accept God’s gift of salvation for us here & now at this very juncture of our life.

    As we are now nearing towards our observance of Holy Week & celebration of Easter Triduum, may these challenges of Lent properly dispose us for the coming flower-blooming & fruit-bearing of the coming life-promises of Easter.

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

  • Rationale : Life with Him

    Rationale : Life with Him

    Fourth Sunday of Lent – Laetare Sunday

    Click here for the readings (https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/031024-YearB.cfm)

    We are now on the 4th Sunday of Lent. Meaning, we are already half way through the Season of Lent, the preparation time for us to celebrate once again Holy Week – the Paschal Mystery of Christ.

    Today, we are invited to review – to have a good look again at our past weeks of Lenten journey. We began the season of Lent during Ash Wednesday when we hear the first Good News Jesus preached, “Repent and believe in the gospel”, as we received the ashes and bore the sign of the cross on our foreheads.

    Then on the first Sunday of Lent, we reflected on the temptations of Jesus as real as our experience of occasions of sins in our lives – that human like us, Jesus also have struggled with temptations, as occasions of sin in our life.

    Again, calling us in the midst of our life-trials & difficulties to “Repent and Believe the Gospel.” Then on the second Sunday of Lent, we heard of the Transfiguration of Jesus, calling us to deeper faith and hope in Him, as even as the Father Himself challenging us, “This is my beloved Son. Listen to Him”. And last Sunday the third Sunday of Lent, we came to know the confrontational Jesus who was angry, making trouble in the public and making enemies along the way in order to stand for what he believes, and to set things right before God & us, as God’s temple. 

    All of these words, the call to repentance and faith – to be steadfast in the midst of temptations and occasions of sin, to listen to God’s beloved Son and to set things right & sacred before God, are demanding challenges for us.

    Based from our experience and perspectives, we might say those are nice challenging words to hear but difficult to heed and practice. Nice to hear and say but Difficult to do, for these words of God really challenge us to do something to change our lives and our ways.

    However, our readings today are more on sober tune. It is a respite, a breathing space from demands and challenges of Lent. It invites us to see the demands and challenges of Lent from God’s perspective, and provides us the context for & the rationale – reason behind our need for conversion & upgrade of our faith in our life now.

    We hear Jesus proclaims to us, “God so love the world that he gave His only Son, so that everyone who believes in Him might not perish but might have eternal life.”

    This is to remind us of God’s deep love for us to the point of sacrificing His son, so that we might believe in Him. Meaning, God suffered a lot for our Faith at the price of His son. He wants us to heed and do those challenging words of believing again & anew in His Son, so that He could always love and forgive us again.

    And above all, Why? He challenges us now & always because God wants to share His eternal life with us, His beloved children. God wants us to have Life with Him. 

    As we begun Lent, we considered Judas & Peter, as to how and why the sin of Judas is more serious than Peter’s. We come to realize that Judas’ is more serious than Peter’s sin, because Judas did not give the Lord the chance to love and forgive him again & anew, instead he ended his life by killing himself.  Yes, Judas repented but he did not believe anymore. Peter on the other hand, yes, have hidden himself… but stayed on until the Lord’s resurrection and got the chance to be forgiven and loved again & anew by the Lord. Peter repented & still believes in God despite what happened.

    In other words, Judas’ sin is more serious compared to Peter’s because Judas, by committing suicide, did not give the Lord the opportunity, the chance to forgive and love him again. Both may have repented but unlike Judas, Peter believes and remains to have faith in Jesus’ resurrection, in effect, made him experience life – eternal life with God. So also if & when we still believe despite of what happened to us, we could share in God eternal life through the Lord’s resurrection.

    A story also once told that in God’s kingdom when everyone lives blissfully in the everlasting life, Peter finds Jesus standing near the heavenly gate. He goes near Jesus, and said, “Well, everyone is looking for you. How come you are here near the gate?” The Lord replied, “Actually, I’m waiting for someone. I hopefully waiting for my dear Judas to come back…. The Lord is thus still & always waiting for our coming home in repentance & faith.

    Remember then that God loves us not because and after we are forgiven, but rather God forgives us because we are loved beforehand and eternally.

    Lent is the time for us to come back home to Him and believe in Him anew. And like Father in the Prodigal Son, the Lord is always waiting for us so that He could always love and forgive us again. So, at this time, as we do our best to respond on the challenges of Lent, let us give God now through Jesus a chance to forgive and love as again and anew, so that we experience eternal life with Him.

    May the fruits of our honest repentance, righteous attitude & deeper faith in the Lord be upon us, & so prepare us to experience & celebrate Easter, as our foretaste of eternal life with God.

    So Help us God. So May it be. Amen.

  • 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.