Peace! Kalilintad! Shalom!

Category: Season of Lent

  • Going deeper to dialogue with Jesus

    Going deeper to dialogue with Jesus

    March 15, 2020 – 3rd Sunday of Lent 

    Click here for the readings (http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/031520.cfm)

    Homily

    In the Book of Exodus, the people became thirsty while they were in the desert. They became desperate. They began to complain and become bitter of their situation. They also began to blame Moses and God for bringing them out of Egypt. Moses had become desperate too and afraid of what the people might do to him. Moses pleaded with God.

    However, despite the ingratitude of the people to God for saving them from slavery in Egypt, the Lord responded generously to them. Striking the rock implied trust in God. The rock is hard and empty of water but out of that emptiness, God brings forth abundance, life and assurance of God’s love. There was flowing water.

    In the Gospel, the Samaritan Woman, who experienced deep thirst in her soul, had a dialogue with Jesus. This was something that was forbidden at that time. But then, this was the initiative of Jesus to meet the woman “where she was at that moment.” This tells us that God meets us where we are too.

    She had been with different men, and with this, people around her must had been condemning and judging her.

    “Give me a drink,” was an invitation of Jesus to allow him to dialogue with her and to know her deepest longing in her heart. Jesus wanted her to allow God to feel her thirst for love and acceptance. The woman was indeed thirsty for such love and acceptance.

    This encounter with Jesus allowed her to look deeper into her life, into her many experiences of thirst for love, for acceptance, for true friendship, for true and lasting intimacy with people whom she loved and loved her.

    Her dialogue with Jesus turned her bitterness, desperation and sadness into hope and joy. At the end, the words of Jesus, “Give me a drink,” have become her words too, she said, “Give me this water, so that I may not be thirsty again or have to keep coming here to draw water.”

    Such statement is very deep. This does not only mean to water itself, but to the deepest thirst and longing of the woman. What she was asking was freedom from her sadness, desperation, and bitterness from those negative/traumatic experiences in her life that have made her to constantly seek from what was only temporary.

    Hence, she realized and found that “Living Water” in Jesus, in a person, in God who showed true compassion to her, lasting friendship with her and acceptance of her painful and sinful life.

    This is the invitation for us also on this 3rd Sunday of Lent. Jesus invites us to dialogue with him, because it is in dialoguing with God, is expressing our heart to God and listening to God’s that we begin to dig deeper into our own well, to recognize the dryness and thirst that we experience in life. However, this will also allow us to discover the abundance of God’s love and forgiveness for us. 

    When we begin to recognize and own fears and failures, sinfulness and weaknesses that we also ask God to fill us, to love us, to forgive us and to give us life. 

    We are not called to bury ourselves in fear and anxiety when difficulties come in our life, or to turn towards bitterness and complaints when our struggles become confusing and overwhelming. Like Moses and the Samaritan Woman, let us turn towards God who shall direct US to that Living Water, to life itself, to our life’s contentment and joy with God.

    As an exercise for this week, I invite you to find time at least 10 to 15 minutes every day, spend those moments in silence. You do not have to say your memorized prayers, but just stay in silence and be comfortable with that. Allow yourself to confront yourself and to dialogue, in expressing to God what is in your heart and in listening to what God would like to tell you. Ok lang? Sana all.

    Jom Baring, CSsR

  • Loving beyond the minimum

    Loving beyond the minimum

    March 7, 2020 – Saturday 1st Week of Lent

    Click here for the readings (http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/030720.cfm)

    Homily

    “If you love those who love you, what is special about that? And if you are friendly only to your friends, what is so exceptional about that?”

    These questions are not from me, but from Jesus for all of us.

    Loving those who love us or being friendly with those who are only our friends means that we are only doing what is minimum and easy which requires less effort from us. 

    Have you met persons who live their life to what is only minimum?

    There are people who tend to work to what is only expected from them. They won’t be late yet they will never come early. They will be the first person to “time out” and the first person out of the door. They won’t dare going an extra mile yet, we cannot accuse them of not doing their job. 

    There are also some of us who fulfill their Sunday obligation or other religious obligations and stop there. Yet, they would also stop from extending themselves to do some volunteer works or from joining solidarity causes of the Church.

    There might be some of us also who would tend to relate with others in a casual and in a minimum encounter with others. This minimum encounter does not require us of building deeper relationship but only superficial. It does not require more energy and effort of extending oneself for the other. It only stays to what is safe, not risky and self-beneficial.

    Hence, doing what is only minimum can become an attitude of complacency and would developed into indifference. This is what Jesus was criticizing about. And this is also the very attitude that Jesus wants us to get out and to go beyond. When we become complacent, we become stagnant and won’t grow. When we become indifferent, we become detached and isolate ourselves from God and from others.

    Remember, when we truly love somebody, this love does not do the minimum, but always the maximum. And surely, to many of us, this kind of loving beyond the minimum is being experienced at home where parents sacrifice or go an extra mile to provide better opportunities for their children. This is also experienced among couples who take the risk of loving each other despite their differences. This is also showed by people who work tirelessly to serve others such as teachers, nurses, doctors, etc. 

    What Jesus is calling us now is that in our relationships too and in the expression of our faith, go beyond what is minimum. And this is done by loving our enemies and by making them our friends, at least in our own perspective. Not just to settle down to what is only beneficial for us but to extend ourselves to others by becoming more generous of ourselves and presence to those who need company, friendship and assurance of love and affection. 

    Though there is beauty in minimalism and goodness in it but not in loving. Do not be a minimalist in loving because it won’t be love anymore. Love as much as we can as God has done it for us. Express such love in concrete ways and let your relationships be founded on it, your profession and work be its inspiration, and our faith be its power. Hinuat pa.

    Jom Baring, CSsR

  • stoop down low enough… to listen to Him

    stoop down low enough… to listen to Him

    March 8, 2020 – Second Sunday of Lent

    Click here for the readings (http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/030820.cfm)

    Homily

    Once a man approached a priest and asked, “Father, how come God seems so absent and silent? Why do we not feel and hear him anymore listening to us 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. But rather, nowadays no one can stoop down low enough to listen to Him. No one… can stoop down low enough… to listen to Him.”

    Once in a while (if not most often) we experience the absence and silence of God in our lives. Though we trust and believe that God is with us since the Lord is with us, we live through moments in life where God and Jesus seems 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? 

    During this Lenten Season, if you happen to have some time, consider to watch the movie: “Silence” – a movie about Jesuits missionaries during the time of Japanese persecution of Christians. The movie is surely not a silent movie, but full of messages to hear and listen. Though it is called “Silence”, rest assured you will hear a lot from it and perhaps in many ways be moved and disturbed by it. 

    Because among its many messages, the movie is really an invitation for us Christians, those who follow and believe in Jesus Christ to listen to Jesus in silence. A call for us Christian to Listen to Jesus in Silence. A call to Silence for us in order to hear and listen intently God’s will for us in life. Only in silence, only in experiencing God’s seeming silence and absence, and not in the noise of our hearts and others that we can discern and recognize God’s will for us through Christ. Only in God’s Silence that we can experience God’s glory and our salvation. 

    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 message 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 silence and absence. Only then 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. In other words, “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 isulti nato. Di pag-gahud, Ari siya. May inug-hambal sa aton. 

    Pope Francis 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 indeed, 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.  

    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 to you and for you.

    As you hear it, So may it be. Sya nawa. Hinaut pa unta. Kabay pa. Amen.

    Shared by Fr. Mar Masangcay, CSsR – a Filipino Redemptorist Missionary based in South Korea

  • To be righteous beyond what is minimal

    To be righteous beyond what is minimal

    March 6, 2020 – Friday of the First Week of Lent

    Click here for the readings (http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/030620.cfm)

    Homily

    There was a wealthy man who told a young priest that he was not so religious, in the sense that he would not go to Church. However, as a form of religious piety that he could do, since he was rich, he would only donate big amount of money to several parish churches in the city.

    The wealthy man proudly enumerated how he helped through his charity to finish the construction of a particular church, helped another church to build its own adoration chapel and assisted another church for its air-conditioning and so on. The man was indeed wealthy, yet, as the wealthy man enumerated his charitable acts, there was no mention if he ever gave just compensation to his many workers and laborers, if he ever been a good and faithful husband and father, or an honest and just businessman. 

    The young priest did not judge the wealthy man for this but this gave the priest questions in his heart. The young priest asked himself,

    “Is it enough to only do what is comfortable for me? Is it enough to show to others that I am charitable and to be proud of my good works? Is it enough for God that I will just do some good works but remain indifferent with others?”

    With this, this reminds me of today’s challenge of Jesus in the Gospel. The Lord calls his disciples and also all of us today, “unless you surpass the righteousness of the Lawyers and the Pharisees, then, you will not enter the kingdom of Heaven.”

    Without condemning these people, who were the Jewish Lawyers and Pharisees, Jesus wants us to realize something beyond the usual actions of these people and to become righteous beyond what is minimal. 

    Indeed, they were more inclined in focusing on the letters of the law, meaning, these people were more concerned of following trivial things in the Jewish Law. However, this kind of attitude prevented them to be compassionate to others and more expressive of mercy to the sinners, the sick and the poor.

    Thus, Jesus gave a very practical challenge to his disciples, an action that expresses mercy and compassion. Jesus calls for “Reconciliation” and “Reparation” of the damage we have caused to others. To be reconciled with the person whom we have hurt and those who have hurt us expresses the essence of this Season of Lent.

    Hence, Lent invites us to look closely at our failures and sins and to recognize them. Yet, we do not stop at the recognition of sin but we step forward by making peace, by reconciling ourselves with others, by doing the right thing and doing what God desires us to do.

    This tells us that God also challenges us to go beyond from what is only easy and comfortable for us. It is a big temptation to settle to what is only minimal and become complacent and indifferent towards others. And true enough, it is very easy  for us to continue what we are doing like going to mass, praying our rosary and novena, and going to confession regularly, but then, remaining unmoved by the many social issues that surround us, or remaining indifferent to the needs of people around or in doing the same sins over and over again.

    Today, Jesus invites us to be more expressive of our devotion to him by being honest and true in our words and actions and by seeking reconciliation and peace with our brothers and sisters. In these ways, then, we make a room for Jesus to renew our heart and to experience God’s mercy. Hinaut pa.

    Jom Baring, CSsR

  • God is for everyone and His mercy is for all

    God is for everyone and His mercy is for all

    March 4, 2020 – Wednesday 1st Week of Lent

    Click here for the readings (http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/030420.cfm)

    Homily

    Jonah was quite rebellious to God because he was sent by God to do something, which he did not want to do. For that reason, Jonah tried to escape from God and to escape from the responsibility that God gave him. 

    Jonah was sent to Nineveh, a city of which Jonah hated so much because they were Assyrians, the very people who oppressed them. Indeed, Jonah’s people suffered so much from the Assyrians.

    We can understand why Jonah hated the Assyrians and why he tried to escape from God. God sent him to Nineveh in order to preach repentance so that God may show mercy to them and will save them from death. Jonah feared that these people will repent and believe in God and then, God will show mercy to them. Jonah wanted these people to suffer, to die and to rot in hell. He did not want his enemies to be saved and to be shown mercy.

    Yet, this is what really happened. When Jonah called the people to repent, they indeed repented and believed in God and that was why God showed mercy to them and saved them from death.

    This tells us something of our attitude like Jonah. We might also find ourselves wishing suffering and death to those whom we hate, especially those who have caused us so much pain. We might have wished and cursed those people who did something terrible to others too. When a violence and or a crime is done to an innocent, we might have demanded too, the same violence and crime to perpetrators. Like Jonah, we too might have believed that justice is attained through a gruesome death to our enemies. Like Jonah, we also could tend to believe that God should not show mercy to those who have hurt us, to our enemies and people who did terrible things to the innocent.

    However, Jonah’s story tells us differently. God is a God of everyone, of good and bad people, of righteous and sinners, of criminals and law-abiding citizens alike. God is for everyone as His mercy is for all.

    And because God’s mercy is for all, God also desires that all will be saved and will be reconciled to Him.

    God indeed shows mercy. Jesus who became human like us and lived among us is the Father’s ultimate sign of mercy and love. In Jesus, the Father tells us that we are never abandoned, that there is always hope and goodness in each of us no matter how broken we are, and sinful we have turned to be. God always sees goodness in us.

    Thus, in this Season of Lent, may each of us also become God’s sign of repentance, of mercy, and of hope to our brothers and sisters. May our words and actions express and give hope, and encourage renewal to those whom others may believe to be hopeless and less human – may they be alcoholics, drug addicts, inmates and other law offenders, and street dwellers. Hinaut pa.

    Jom Baring, CSsR