Monday, Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception, 09 December 2019
Genesis 3:9-15, 20 ><}}}*> Ephesians 1:3-6, 11-12 ><}}}*> Luke 1:26-38
Every year, O Lord Jesus Christ, we celebrate on your birth month the Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception of your Most Blessed Mother Mary who was conceived without the stain of original sin.
Until now, many are still confused with this feast especially when our Gospel speaks about the annunciation of your birth, dear Jesus.
Nonetheless, it is the single most important part of your lives both that truly give us a valuable lesson about Mary’s blessedness – later to be expressed by Elizabeth at the visitation, “Blessed is she who believed that the words spoken to hear will be fulfilled”.
Her Immaculate Conception teaches us the importance of faith especially at this time when we face a great crisis in faith in the Church.
And so, we pray to you O Lord for the gift of faith like that of your Mother Mary, a faith that is deeply personal yet communal.
The first is subjective and the second is objective.
Mary said, “Behold, I am the handmaid of the Lord. May it be done to me according to your word.” Then the angel departed from her.
Luke 1:38
Malolos Cathedral, June 2019.
Unlike Eve in the first reading, Mary had always believed in God.
Her faith is a total entrusting of herself to God on a person-to-person relationship. It is subjective faith where emphasis is on believing itself than on what is believed.
However, Mary did not believe in a purely subjective manner as if God is a personal God detached from others and exclusively revealing only himself to her in secret.
Mary’s faith is also objective because when the angel explained everything to her, she believed the good news proclaimed to her is part of the bigger whole, of the coming new covenant, of the fulfillment of the promise of God made to Abraham and the fathers of Israel as she would later express in her Magnificat.
It is only in believing like Mary can we truly give ourselves to you, Jesus, to the Church so that what we believe may truly be fulfilled in us like Mary. Amen.
The Lord Is My Chef Sunday Music, 08 December 2019
Advent wreathe at the Malolos Cathedral, 04 December 2019.
Advent is the season of hope when we are encouraged to work on to fulfill God’s grand design for lasting peace here on earth. It is a time for us to dream with eyes wide open!
I had this dream In which I swam with dolphins In open sea a transparent blue (Maybe you dreamt it too) And on the earth The trees grew heavy with blossoms The rainforests had not died And the Amazon shined like an emerald
Somewhere, somehow, some way We must hold back the dawn While there’s still time to try Keep the faith, keep the dream alive
That is why we have chosen for this Second Sunday of Advent jazz master Michael Franks’ The Dream from his 1993 album “Dragonfly Summer”. It is a song very similar with Isaiah’s prophecy in the first reading of a “peaceable kingdom” where
“the wolf shall be a guest of the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid; the calf and the young lion shall browse together, with a little child to guide them.”
Isaiah 11:6
Considered as a leader of the “quiet storm” or “smooth jazz” movement, a genre of jazz music mixed with pop and rock tempo, Franks has collaborated with some of the great musicians of the world in the last 40 years with his compositions covered by many artists from the wide spectrum of the music world proving his genius and versatility.
For me, Franks is the Walter Becker/Donald Fagen of jazz, always precise and almost perfect in every piece of music that is intelligent and exquisite but never snobbish and definitely without pretensions. Like Steely Dan, his music is picturesquely evocative that one can feel and even see the timbre of every voice and instrument.
Gifted with a cool and sophisticated voice, Franks can sound playful like with “Eggplant” and “Popsicle Toes”, philosophical and dead serious with “Tiger in the Rain” and lovingly romantic with “Rainy Night in Tokyo” and “Lady Wants to Know”.
His music and lyrics are simple yet profound, always fresh and relaxing not only to ears but also to one’s soul that’s very inspiring.
Going back to our featured music on this second Sunday of Advent, Franks’ The Dream challenges us to test and keep our faith in order to work for a lasting peace here on earth.
I had this dream That we were all one family Which war and famine could not undo (Maybe you dreamt it too) Our family name Was either Kindness or Compassion We recognized each other And we recognized the light inside us
Isaiah 11:1-10 ><}}}*> Romans 15:4-9 ><}}}*> Matthew 3:1-12
Cathedral Basilica Minore of the Immaculate Conception, Malolos City, Advent 2019.
Advent is a season we are invited to look forward, to dream of the ideal, of the best things we wish we all have in this destructive world we live in.
It is the time for healing our wounds and brokenness as we look forward to the fulfillment of God’s promise of lasting peace brought by Jesus Christ’s coming more than 2000 years ago.
On that day, a shoot shall sprout from the stump of Jesse, and from his roots a bud shall blossom. The spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him… Not by appearance shall he judge, nor by hearsay shall he decide, but he shall judge the poor with justice, and decide aright for the land’s afflicted… Justice shall be the band around his waist, and faithfulness a belt upon his hips. Then the wolf shall be a guest of the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid; the calf and young lion shall browse together, with a little child to guide them. The cow and the bear shall be neighbors, together their young shall rest; the lion shall eat hay like ox. The baby shall play by the cobra’s den, and the child lay his hand on the adder’s lair. There shall be no harm or ruin on my holy mountain; for the earth shall be filled with knowledge of the Lord, as water covers the sea.
Isaiah 11:1-2, 3, 4, 5-9
“Peaceable Kingdom”, a painting based on Is.11:1-10 by American Edward Hicks, a Quaker pastor (1780-1849).
Jesus is coming again to heal our destructive world
Last November 28 we celebrated Red Wednesday to remember the more than 300 million Christians worldwide persecuted in various forms because of their faith in Jesus Christ. Many of them were tortured and/or murdered while others were denied of work, housing and liberty for carrying the cross and confessing their faith and love for Jesus Christ.
According to some reports, about 80% of wars and conflicts in the world today are due to religion. How tragic – and scandalous – that religion is tearing us apart than bringing us together as peoples believing in a God who is loving and merciful!
But despite all these destructions going on, Isaiah’s prophecy challenges us to keep our hopes alive for a better future, to look forward for the coming again of Jesus Christ, “the shoot that shall sprout from the stump of Jesse” to heal our destructive world.
Advent assures us that it is never too late for the Lord to make peace and justice spring forth in our dying world like a stump of tree.
Isaiah’s vision is an imagery of God’s test of faith to us all to make it Jesus Christ’s peace a reality in this fragmented world, calling us into conversion so that we shall be “filled with knowledge of the Lord, as water covers the sea.”
It is a call made louder and clearer by St. John the Baptist at the wilderness that still echoes to our own time today.
Healing our destructive world starts within me
Photo by Mr. Jim Marpa, September 2019.
When he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming to his baptism, he said to them, “You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the coming wrath? Produce good fruit as evidence of your repentance… Even now the ax lies at the root of the trees. Therefore every tree that does not bear good fruit will be cut down and thrown into the fire.
Matthew 3:7-8,10
The season of Advent is not only inviting us to look forward for a new world order where there would be lasting peace and justice, when all our tears would be wiped out, with perfect joy replacing our pains and sufferings. Advent is calling on us to look forward in renewing our relationships with God and with one another by beginning within our own hearts.
And make no mistake that St. John’s preaching and call were not only meant for the Pharisees and Sadducees of his time but also to us all Christians of today to “produce good fruit of our repentance” because being sorry for our sins is just the first step to conversion.
Whenever there is true repentance in our hearts, there must also be a change in our very selves, in our living. And only then can we expect of a better and more beautiful world coming like Isaiah’s vision because from true repentance comes justice and mercy.
St. John was very clear: it is Jesus Christ who is coming whom we shall await and prepare to meet right in our hearts. He is coming not to destroy the world – and us – but to restore everything into life anew.
Skies over the desert of Sinai in Egypt, May 2019.
Meeting Christ in the desert
Sometimes we get discouraged by some people and many situations that throw us off-balanced, tempting us to abandon all our efforts to be healed of our wounds and brokenness, in striving to become better persons.
Like St. John the Baptist, we have our own desert of desolation and bareness that purifies us further in preparing the way of the Lord, in meeting the Lord to be healed.
It is in our own desert of desolation and bareness where we are healed as we learn to be empty of ourselves like St. John in order to conquer first our selfish desires with silence and prayer, not with activities as we are all bent in doing these days.
In our world saturated in media with cacophony of voices telling us to do everything to be rich and popular and famous, the more we become empty and lost, broken and wounded.
“St. John the Baptist Preaching in the Wilderness” by German painter Anton Raphael Mengs (1728-1779). From Google.
Like St. John the Baptist, we have to break free from the trappings of the world by retreating into our own desert right inside our hearts in order to listen more to the voice of the coming Christ we must proclaim fearlessly in words and in deeds.
St. Paul assures us that all that scripture foretold in the past has been fulfilled in Jesus Christ who is coming again at the end of time. Despite the many destructions in this world, despite the many setbacks we have in life, may we imitate St. John the Baptist in awaiting Christ in our own desert for he is most faithful in his promise and presence. Amen.
Quiet Storm by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II, 06 December 2019
Advent 2019, Parokya ng San Juan Apostol at Ebanghelista, Bagbaguin, Santa Maria, Bulacan.
Advent and Lent are two beautiful seasons in our Church calendar that prepare us for the great feasts of Christmas and Easter, respectively. Both have violet as motif though Advent is supposed to have a more bluish hue to distinguish it from Lent’s penitential character.
They both invite us to “look forward” into that future glory of Jesus Christ when he comes again at the end of time to establish “new heaven and new earth” where peace would finally reign, removing all sufferings and pains, wiping away all our tears to fill us with perfect joy.
On that day the deaf shall hear the words of a book; and out of gloom and darkness, the eyes of the blind shall see. The lowly will ever find joy in the Lord, and the poor rejoice in the Holy One of Israel.
Isaiah 29:18-19
Advent is renewed relationships
More than the promise of a new order of things in the Second Coming of Christ, Advent invites us also to look forward into renewed relationships with God through others.
Our Advent Candle 2019.
Jesus Christ comes first in our hearts, his new manger. Unfortunately, we seem to have forgotten Jesus, remembering only his birthday and its trimmings. Fanned by social media, people are going crazy as early as August with their own Christmas countdown with those memes of Jose Mari Chan poised to sing his popular “Christmas in Our hearts”, forgetting its beautiful message of opening our hearts to Jesus through one another.
How sad that more than ever, people are so excited with Christmas for the wrong reasons like gifts and money, parties and vacations but not Jesus himself.
Advent invites us to “actively wait” Christ’s coming by renewing our relationships with our family and friends in every here and now of our daily living.
As Jesus passed by, two blind men followed him, crying out, “Son of David, have pity on us!” When he entered the house, the blind men approached him and Jesus said to them, “Do you believe that I can do this?” “Yes, Lord,” they said to him. Then he touched their eyes… and their eyes were opened.
Matthew 9:27-29, 30
Need to remove our “blindness”
Advent is a season to remove our blindness to Jesus present in us and in every person we meet. Our gospel today tells us a short story of Christ’s healing of two blind men with a twist of humor.
According to St. Matthew, the two blind men kept following Jesus after teaching a crowd, begging him to restore their sight.
How they were able to follow Jesus, your guess is as wild as mine… but, most funny is how they followed Jesus home to finally heal them!
Go figure it out. How did it happen if both men were blind, following Jesus every step of the way into his home?
But they both teach us a valuable lesson not only for this Advent but for everyday living: of the need to remove our blindness so we may see Christ coming to us day in, day out.
How sad when most of us have eyes but cannot see or even refuse to see Jesus Christ coming to us personally and among other people especially our family and friends, among the ordinary and usual people we meet everyday in our lives.
Last Tuesday amid heavy rains and winds of Supertyphoon “Tisoy”, two elderly couples in the parish requested for the Sacrament of Anointing of the Sick.
After hearing their confessions, anointing them with Oil, and giving them the Holy Communion, I decided to stay longer when I found out they live by themselves despite having six children living in the vicinity with their many apos!
Making things worst for the couple are the two children living abroad: one in the States have totally cut ties with them without any communication in 15 years while the other living Down Under refusing to help them in their medical needs.
May the light of Christ heal us of our many blindness so we may see him among our families and friends.
The way we live and what we hope
I have been told the elderly couple I have visited were not really that “good parents” and neighbors as well. But, I explained to everyone after my visitation that is not important, nor the issue at hand.
What matters most is who would take care or look after these two elderly people, an arthritic father and a mother stricken with stroke? Must we allow ourselves to be blinded by past sins and hurts and pains that we fail to see Christ coming in the present?
Yes, this is easier said than done but, in this life, we only have two choices to make, either we become better or bitter. Make the right and better choice always!
Last Sunday I told my congregation that the way we live dictates our hope.
Photo by Jo Villafuerte at Atok, Benguet, 01 September 2019
Those who strive in life to do what is good, to become better in whatever form are those who truly hope. And truly love because they believe in the future, they look forward to something better if not in this life, maybe after.
But those who do nothing in this life, those who feel resigned, “enjoying” their miseries in life are the ones who do not hope. And surely do not love at all for they see only death and destruction, nothing to look forward to. They do not mind hurting even killing others because they believe there is no future at all.
Indeed, as TIME Magazine’s Lance Morrow wrote in 1991, the opposite of love is not really evil but hopelessness. Very true.
As we end this first week of Advent moving closer to Christmas, let us pray for the grace of Jesus Christ to heal us of our many blindness in life so we may see him anew in us and in others too. A blessed weekend to you!
Isaiah 29:17-24 ><)))*> ><)))*> ><)))*> Matthew 9:27-31
Advent in our parish, 2019.
Time flies so fast, O Lord, and we are almost over with the first week of Advent! How reassuring are your words today especially in the first reading of the wonderful things coming soon, in fact happening now in Jesus Christ’s coming.
Thus says the Lord God: but a very little while, and Lebanon shall be changed into an orchard, and the orchard be regarded as a forest! On that day the deaf shall hear the words of a book; and out of gloom and darkness, the eyes of the blind shall see. The lowly will ever find joy in the Lord, and the poor rejoice in the Holy One of Israel…
Isaiah 29:17-19
I know, Lord, and yes, I can see clearly now that great things are coming for us who faithfully await your coming. There shall be joy and justice, healing and consolation for those who suffer and cry.
Keep our eyes opened, remove our blindness to see the more essential things in life especially you so we may always experience your presence, your coming. Amen.
Isaiah 26:1-6 ><)))*> ><)))*> ><)))*> Matthew 7:21, 24-27
Chandelier of the Malolos Cathedral, 04 December 2019.
Let me stay in your “house”, O Lord, and help me keep your house rules, too. I am sorry when most of the time I simply want to rest and drop by your “house” with no plans of really living there, of listening to your words and doing your will.
Jesus said to his disciples: “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the Kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father in heaven.”
Matthew 7:21
Forgive me Lord when I have become so complacent as your disciple, as a Christian, relying solely on my name and affiliation with you without working so hard to be like you.
Help me to be holy like God our Father, listening to your words intently and faithfully acting on it at all time so that I may be wise and most of all, be filled with your peace:
A nation of firm purpose you keep in peace; in peace, for its trust in you. Trust in the Lord forever! For the Lord is an eternal Rock!
Isaiah 26:3-4
So many times, Lord Jesus, we take you for granted… just like the people in our own homes. But when things go wrong, they are the only people we can count on to receive us, to love us, and to forgive us. Very much like you, Jesus.
May this Season of Advent make us more open to you not only to receive you but also to keep you. Amen.
Isaiah 25:6-10 ><)))*> ><)))*> ><)))*> Matthew 15:29-37
The Manor House, Camp John Hay, Baguio City, 2017.
Praise and glory to you, O Lord Jesus Christ for coming to us, in fulfilling our lives, in making our joy complete. Unfortunately, no one seem to be waiting for you or worst, we live as if you have not come at all.
How sad, O Lord, that often even if we are so excited with Christmas, it does not necessarily mean we are excited of you as a person coming to us. Even if we love to sing and hear that carol “Joy to the World”, we are not really joyful because our hearts are far from you.
Forgive us, Jesus, in being focused with time and dates, than with your person and with your coming.
The more we get focused with dates and gifts and carols and other trimmings of Christmas, the less we think of you and of others too.
Open our hearts to receive you in us.
On that day it will be said: “Behold our God, to whom we looked to save us! This is the Lord for whom we looked; let us rejoice and be glad that he has saved us!” For the hand of the Lord will rest on this mountain.
Isaiah 25:9-10
Open our hearts to you, Jesus, that you are more than enough than anything we could wish for.
Make us desire more of you than of things so we may always have an abundance of you as our “bread” or everything in this life. Amen.
Tuesday, Advent Week I, Memorial of St. Francis Xavier, 03 December 2019
Isaiah 11:1-10 ><)))*> ><)))*> ><)))*> Luke 10:21-24
What a blessed Tuesday we have today, O Lord, despite the threat of a super typhoon approaching us!
Your words console us, assure us of your protection and grace.
You give us today two beautiful images of greatness in being small which is the true spirit of Christmas, of you our God coming to us a child born in Bethlehem more than 2000 years ago.
First image is the “shoot shall sprout from the stump of Jesse, and from its roots a bud shall blossom” (Is.11:1).
Every great thing always starts small. Most of all, they always happen where we least expect them like shoots sprouting from the stump of a tree! Help us to keep this in mind especially when we are losing hope.
How sad that in today’s world, people insist that “size always matter” that we always want to be the biggest in everything.
Second image, O Lord, that you have given us today of greatness in smallness is being childlike, your favorite:
Jesus rejoiced in the Holy Spirit and said, “I give you praise, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, for although you have hidden these things from the wise and the learned you have revealed them to the childlike. Yes, Father, such has been your gracious will.
Luke 10:21
Photo by Mr. Jim Marpa, 2018.
Being like a child is the very essence of your life and teachings, O Lord Jesus which we seem to fail to grasp and accept. All our lives we have always insisted on being so wise and learned that have often led us to more problems and disunity among us.
Teach us to be childlike, full of trust and confidence in you and most especially, with that sense of awe.
Like our Saint for today, that great child in faith of St. Ignatius of Loyola, St. Francis Xavier who kept that spirit of being childlike in his going to mission as far as China and Japan working tirelessly for the faith.
O blessed St. Francis Xavier, pray for us to remain small and simple before God our Master like you so that his greatness and majesty be seen more in us. Amen.
Isaiah 4:2-6 ><)))*> ><)))*> ><)))*> Matthew 8:5-11
Sunrise at the Lake of Galilee, the Holy Land, 2017.
O God our loving Father, who among is truly worthy to receive you under our roofs?
Who among us is truly worthy of receiving you in our sinful selves?
No one, O dear God!
Yet, you still sent us your only Son Jesus Christ to live among us, to dwell among us sinners so that unworthy as we are, we may be worthy to receive him.
Just say the word, Lord, like with the centurion’s request to you in today’s gospel.
Cleanse us, our minds, our lips, and our hearts so that we may be worthy to receive you into our lives in your daily coming. Most especially in your Second Coming, Lord Jesus.
Unworthy as we are, let us come to you with clean hearts and receive you Jesus in your sacred banquet of the Holy Eucharist, the foretaste of that banquet in the Kingdom of heaven.
For over all, the Lord’s glory will be shelter and protection; shade from the parching heat of day, refuge and cover from storm and rain.
Isaiah 4:6
Come, Lord Jesus! Amen.
Trees at the Sacred Heart Novitiate in Novaliches, Quezon City, 2017.
The Lord Is My Chef Sunday Music, 01 December 2019
Photo by Mr. Jim Marpa, 2018.
A blessed Sunday to you my dear follower and reader!
It’s the first day of December, the final month of the year but at the same time the start of a new year in our Church calendar with the Season of Advent, the four Sundays before Christmas.
From the Latin adventus that means coming, Advent has a two-fold character on the two comings of Jesus Christ: beginning today until December 16, all readings and prayers are focused on his Second Coming; from December 17 to the 24th, we shift our sights to the first Christmas when Christ was born in Bethlehem 2000 years ago.
Jesus said to his disciples: “As it was in the days of Noah, so it will be at the coming of the Son of Man. In those days before the flood, they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, up to the day that Noah entered the ark. They did not know until the flood came and carried them all away. So will it be also at the coming of the Son of Man.”
Matthew 24:37-39
Nobody knows when Jesus Christ is coming again but he assures us that it will be sudden and unexpected like in the days of Noah. It is useless to know exactly when it would be because it may be any time. According to St. Bernard of Clairvaux, between the two comings of Christ is his third coming – that is, in every moment of our lives.
Contrary to common beliefs, the Second Coming of Christ at the end of time known as parousia will not necessarily be catastrophic. It all depends to our attitude: if we are negligent of our Christian duties to love and serve those in need, then we end in disaster like what Jesus tells us in the gospel today.
Jesus is coming again not to destroy the world but to bring it to perfection, into new heaven and new earth. What he is asking us is to be like him, Christ-like, to be his presence by allowing us to let his light shine through our words and deeds.
Here to inspire us to glimpse Christ’s coming to our daily lives is Johnny Nash in his 1972 hit “I Can See Clearly Now”.
Composed and produced by Nash himself, I Can See Clearly Now evokes a very Advent spirit of active waiting and vigilance. Its musical arrangement laced with reggae influences from Nash’s earlier collaborations with Bob Marley gives the song with some touch of solemnity that makes it so perfect for this First Sunday of Advent.
Happy listening and may the song open your eyes too to Jesus Christ’s love for you!
