Reflections

The word “patient” is repeated several times in the very short reading from St. James’ letter (5:7-10), which is the second reading for the Third Sunday of Advent. True patience is required while waiting for the coming of the Lord.In our age of instant gratification, genuine patience has become a foreign, practically obsolete concept that we, as believers, ought to recover. It is patience that is lived out with firmness of heart. It is patience that is continuously tested by our imperfections…

We shall try to pick up the relevance of the message given us for this 2nd Sunday of Advent. In poetic form, the reading from Isaiah (11:1-10) describes for us God’s dream about creating a new world free of devastation, grief, divisions, strife, tears and death. This dream is about a world better than the original one which he had created at the beginning of time, with the Garden of Eden in it, before sin ruined everything. It is a…

What must interest us directly is to see why, in the Eucharistic gathering for the 23rd Sunday in Ordinary Time,, the Lord Jesus brings up once again the harsh conditions for being his disciples of the 21st century. (Luke 14:25-33) We ought to keep in mind that our Lord is still on “his way to Jerusalem.” Thankfully, the real number of those who come after Jesus carrying their cross is large, even though their climb of mount Calvary goes mostly unnoticed to the eyes…

We must keep in mind that the original setting (Luke 14:1, 7-14) depicts an itinerant rabbi by the name of Jesus, who is invited to a formal dinner into the house of a prominent and influential Pharisee to honor him as equal and as equal to the other invited guests. What ensues, instead, is something so appalling that it goes a long way in explaining why Jesus had to be eliminated from the religious and political scene of that time.…

Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am meek and humble of heart. (Matthew 11:29) Contrast it with the opening statement of our gospel passage for this 20th Sunday in Ordinary Time: “I have come to set the earth on fire, and how I wish it were already blazing! (Luke 12:49) Or take “Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give it to you. Do not let your…

One morning, the disciples must have gotten up earlier than usual and observed Jesus from a distance while he had been in intimate conversation with the Father. That sight must have been more magnificent and more awe-striking than any sight they had ever seen. Unable to contain their wonderment, they eagerly asked him: “Lord, teach us to pray just as John taught his disciples.” (Luke 11:1) Incredible as it sounds, due to our inability to pray, we have a lot to…

In Luke 10:42, the Lord tells us all: “There is need of only one thing…” Hence, let us attempt to find that ONE THING which we all need. For as long as we do not find that ONE THING, or we get sidetracked looking for many other things, inexorably, we can expect anxiety, restlessness, tension, agitation, in a word: a substandard type of life. By substandard I mean a way of life that is far from what Jesus died and rose from death to give us. We can…

I don’t know about you, but whenever I hear the word, love, I am immediately drawn to words that convey an action; for you English majors, verbs! In his poem, These I Can Promise, Mark Twain relates that love, if we allow it, provides us with an anchor to weather the ups-and-downs of our earthly lives. I cannot promise you a life of sunshine;I cannot promise riches, wealth, or gold;I cannot promise you an easy pathwayThat leads away from change or growing old.But I…

At least once a year, we need to venture into the infinitude of God and to explore it rather than shy away from such impossibility. We wonder about this lure of the infinite that makes us feel so very small, so embarrassingly inept and yet so loved by the ultimate, most perfect Being, our Triune God from whom our very existence directly depends. As our faith grows over time, we were taught, correctly so, that we cannot probe God’s mystery. However,…

Even if it is incorrect because the earth is spherical, instinctively we look up in the sky whenever we think of heaven, and we look down into the bowels of the earth whenever we think of hell.  As always, the starting point should be the fundamental fact that we are living in Christ and with Christ as one, inseparable entity: Jesus the Head and we the members of the Body of Christ, i.e., the Church. So, the Ascension into heaven…

Growing up, I remember having a keen interest in real estate shows. These many years later, I think they interested me because as the hosts moved from town-to-town, neighborhood-to-neighborhood, and house-to-house, they always left me with a question: “When it is my turn to purchase a house and sign a mortgage, just what sort of house will I choose to live in?” This past week, as I’ve reflected upon the readings for this Sixth Sunday of Easter, the topic of…

On the Fifth Sunday of Easter, here is a very important question: what is our reaction to what Paul and Barnabas tell us today? They tell us that it is necessary for us to undergo many hardships to enter the Kingdom of God.(Acts 14:22) Before we answer that question, and point out our reaction to those inspired words, let me remind all of us that our God is the God of the living. Being the God of the living, today, he uses…