Epiphany: recognizing Christ revealed

Lord My Chef Sunday Recipe for the Soul by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II
Solemnity of the Epiphany of the Lord, 04 January 2026
Isaiah 60:1-6 ><}}}}*> Ephesians 3:2-3, 5-6 ><}}}}*> Matthew 2:1-12

*From https://www.godwhospeaks.uk/what-is-epiphany/*

After the Nativity of the Lord and the Solemnity of Mary, Mother of God, comes now the third major celebration of Christmas Season, the Epiphany of the Lord we celebrate this Sunday. It is still the Christmas Season, so, continue greeting one another with Merry Christmas!

Had the rare opportunity of spending the past week after Christmas with my two nieces and only nephew in a staycation in Makati. I requested them to bring me to the Mind Museum inasmuch as I wanted to stroll at the BGC too after 20 years since I last hanged out there!

And that was when I realized the irony of our Christmas celebrations when we unconsciously leave Christ behind because the harder we try to be “in” Jesus from our Simbang Gabi to our shopping and noche buena, the more we actually push Jesus “out” as we think more of ourselves than of Him and others. This is most sadly true at how so many benighted Catholics imitate the westerners led by these giant malls in removing Jesus from Christmas in their more “inclusive” greeting of “Happy Holidays” instead of the Merry Christmas.

*Photo by author, Ayala Triangle, 28 December 2025.*

The more we celebrate Christmas, the more we think of our selves as we are so concerned with everything new and beautiful like our clothes and gifts, forgetting the poor and marginalized as well as the sinful and outcasts for whom Jesus actually came for. Of course, Jesus comes and dwells in our hearts but let us not forget that Christmas is not being “in” but being “out” in Him by thinking less of ourselves, more of Him and of His love and mercy.

Christmas is getting out of our comfort zones inside our old, usual self to meet Jesus outside the box so to speak.

And that is also the meaning of our celebration today, the Epiphany or Manifestation of the Lord to the Nations of the world represented by the magi. For us to find Jesus who manifests Himself in so many ways daily, we need to get out of ourselves like the magi and avoid being locked inside and held captive by our fears like King Herod and the people of Jerusalem.

When Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea, in the days of King Herod, behold, magi from the east arrived in Jerusalem, saying, “Where is the newborn king of the Jews? We saw his star at its rising and have come to do him homage.” When King Herod heard this, he was greatly troubled, and all Jerusalem with him (Matthew 2:1-3).

It was totally odd that when the magi inquired about “the newborn king of the Jews”, Herod and the people in Jerusalem were troubled instead of at least checking on their statements like looking up to see if there was indeed that star leading them, or ask for clarification about what kind or who was the king they were talking about. Instead of being troubled, the strongest feeling one could have would be perplexed or baffled, with the familiar reactions of “what?” or “duh…” or “huh” or as we would always say, “ha, ano daw iyon?”

This is what we mean of Christmas more as being “out” than “in”: instead of going out to check on the inquiry by the magi, to look up the sky to see for themselves about the star, Herod and the people of Jerusalem went inside themselves and got locked in their positions!

They were troubled because they felt the status quo would be altered that could throw them off their comfort zones. And the biggest irony is that they who have the answers in the scriptures remained locked inside their own selfish worlds, refusing to get out and meet the newborn king!

How often does it happen with us especially in our parish, in our Church, in our families that we are so stuck into our old beliefs even traditions that we refuse to go out and meet Jesus Christ Who have come into the world more than 2000 years ago to set us free from all forms of slavery caused by sins? Herod and the rest of Jerusalem were troubled simply because they were not interested with Jesus Christ which tragically continues to happen these days on many occasions in our lives when we do not really search for the Lord as we are more intent in pursuing our own stars of fame and glory.

Epiphany in Greek means manifestation, appearance and revelation. On Christmas day, we celebrated the birth of Jesus Christ while Epiphany today is telling us the identity and mission of the Lord, that is, He is the Son of God, the Messiah or “Anointed One” (Christos in Greek) who had come to set all people free from sins.

Jesus fulfilled the longings of the people since the Old Testament time as heralded by Isaiah’s prophecy in the first reading which St. Paul beautifully explains in the second reading in his concept of “the mystery made known by God to him.” Mystery in this sense is not something hidden but revealed so that in Christ Jesus, the mystery of God, His plan for us is revealed or made known for everyone not only the Jews but for all peoples of the world represented by the magi.

Yesterday, GMANews reporter Joseph Morong posted an experience at a burger stand when he told the server to “keep the change” of ₱50.00. According to Mr. Morong, the server refused to accept his gift because the amount was so big. That’s when the reporter commented “may mali sa ating mga Filipino”: yung nasa burger stand hiyang-hiyang tanggapin yung tip na ₱50 habang yung mga corrupt sa gobyerno at congress, di masiyahan sa ₱50-M at ₱50-B!”

So true! Many of us keep on looking inward, of what is for us that we forget Jesus found among the poor and marginalized. Today’s celebration of the Epiphany is reminding us how Jesus Christ continues to reveal and manifest Himself to us today outside in our daily lives to lead us back to the Father.

Are we willing to be like the magi who dared to leave everything behind, unmindful of the long and perilous journey to make in order to meet Jesus Christ?

In meeting the Lord like the magi, are we willing to give up everything we have especially the most precious ones and offer these to Him?

Most of all, upon finding God, are we willing to go back home by “another way” like the magi as instructed in a dream never to return to Herod?

The Lord continues to manifest Himself to us in so many ways every day, often in the simplest occasions and things. May we have the courage to meet Jesus Christ so that we may see the light and beauty of this New Year He has for us. Amen. May your new year be filled with Jesus Christ’s peace and grace!

Who are you?

Lord My Chef Daily Recipe for the Soul by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II
Friday, Memorial of Sts. Basil the Great & Gregory Nazianzen,
Bishops and Doctors of the Church, 02 January 2026
1 John 2:22-28     ><))))*> + ><))))*> + ><))))*>     John 1:19-28

*Photo by author, Hagia Sophia, Istanbul, Turkiye, 01 November 2025.*

Lord Jesus,
today I feel like John
being asked by priests
and Levites sent by Jews
from Jerusalem:
"Who are you?"

What a great question 
we all have to confront
at the start of the new year
because unless we truly know
and accept who we are,
we can never give the right
answer in making you known,
Jesus; many times,
we fail to make you known
not because you are difficult to
know but simply because we do not
know who we are unlike John;
we cannot give a definitive answer
"I am not the Christ"
because even if we do not 
claim it verbally, unconsciously
we pretend as the Christ;
many times, Lord
you are not known 
not because you are so far
but because our lives are so far
from you that people could not 
believe what we say about you;
most often, you are not known
Jesus not because your teachings
are hard and difficult but because
we ourselves are lost and could not
find the way into our true selves
to be the voice of one in the desert 
like John crying out,
"Make straight the path 
of the Lord."

At the start of this new year,
dear Jesus,
help me to be like John
or St. Basil or St. Gregory
who knew themselves very well,
embracing everything about me
especially my sins and weaknesses
so that like John, 
I can declare "I am not the Christ"
and therefore, stop from pretending
or acting or speaking as the Messiah;
let me embrace the limitations I have,
the darkness and emptiness
within me so that
I may remain in you
and your grace only.
Amen.

*Photo by author, detail of John the Baptist from the Deesis Mosaic in the hagia Sophia in Istanbul, Turkiye, 01 November 2025.*

Welcoming 2026 with Mary

Lord My Chef Daily Recipe for the Soul by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II
Thursday, Solemnity of Mary, Mother of God, 01 January 2026
Numbers 6:22-27 ><}}}}*> Galatians 4:4-7 ><}}}}*> Luke 2:16-21

*“The Adoration of the Shepherds”, a painting of the Nativity scene by Italian artist Giorgione before his death at a very young age of 30 in 1510.*

Still a blessed Merry Christmas to everyone! Please continue greeting one another with a Merry Christmas until January 11, 2026, the Feast of the Lord’s Baptism that closes the Christmas Season.

Keep greeting Merry Christmas even on this new year’s day because what we celebrate today is the Solemnity of Mary, Mother of God – not the New Year! Remember we had our new year last first Sunday of Advent, evening of November 29 and the 30th.

Stop announcing our New Year’s Mass. Our Mass today is Solemnity of Mary, Mother of God which is the Eighth Day within the Octave of Christmas.

It is the oldest feast of the Blessed Virgin Mary that celebrates the mystery of her being the Mother of Jesus Christ who is true God and true Man following the Council of Ephesus in 431 AD. Since Jesus remained fully God and fully human in his conception by the Blessed Virgin Mary, it is right and proper too as the Council affirmed to call Mary the “Mother of God” (Theotokos). Since the birth of Christ is also our point reference in reckoning time that we have the terms “BC” (Before Christ) and “AD” (Anno Domini or Year of the Lord), this celebration teaches a lot on how to welcome this 2026 like Mary.

*Photo by author, mosaic of Mary with Jesus, Hagia Sophia, Istanbul, Turkiye, 01 November 2025.*

First lesson the Blessed Virgin Mary teaches us this new year in Christ is what we have mentioned last Christmas – if there is anything that merits haste, it is those of things of God. How sad that these days we are so preoccupied with what is trending and viral or we race for what is “in” in fashion and everything. In an age of instants, we rush everything that we miss out life itself, God and one another, especially our very selves.

The shepherds went in haste to Bethlehem and found Mary and Joseph, and the infant lying in the manger. When they saw this, they made known the message that had been told them about this child (Luke 2:16-17).

Mary went in haste too for the Lord. Recall her response to the Angel at the Annunciation, “Be it done unto me according to your word.” Her response was immediate. She did not dare the Angel like Zechariah. After the Annunciation, Mary went in haste to visit her cousin Elizabeth pregnant with John the Baptist.

It is true that “haste makes waste” because doing things too quickly leads to mistakes that result in greater losses in time, effort, and materials. The great St. Francis Sales cautioned us that haste is the biggest enemy of growth in spirituality.

However, during the Christmas season, we find that haste is not that totally bad at all.

As shown to us both by Mary and the shepherds, there is something so good with making haste to find Christ, to share Christ, to be with Christ.

We have a prayer formula now rarely used in public prayers wherein the leader says “O God come to my assistance” with the people responding, “O Lord make haste to help me” while making the sign of the Cross like in the praying of the Rosary. It is a beautiful prayer that tells us how God would always hasten to come to us even before we have called Him!

How sad that we rush to everything and everyone except to Jesus our Lord and God! More sad is the fact so many people have been in making haste to these days for the more mundane things without even spending some quality time in the church to pray.

This 2026, let us go in haste in the Lord for He has so many things in store for us as the shepherds and Elizabeth realized.

*From forwarded cartoon at Facebook, December 2020.*

Second important lesson the Blessed Mother is teaching us in welcoming Jesus Christ this new year is the value of silence which is a prerequisite in cultivating a prayer life, in making haste to God.

Though I grew up from the very barrio that manufactures most of the pyrotechnics sold in my hometown of Bocaue in Bulacan dubbed as the fireworks capital of the Philippines, I never liked these popular products every new year. Aside from being so dirty, these are so dangerous as I have seen many of our neighbors who have lost their arms, hands or fingers in manufacturing and playing with fireworks. Worst of all are the many lives of people lost following explosions of some factories in our barrio.

When I became a priest, I kept telling people including my barrio folks that welcoming the new year with fireworks is pagan practice, not Christian. And the most Christian way of welcoming new year like Mother Mary is always in silence, silent prayer like before the Blessed Sacrament.

*Photo by Ar. Philip Santiago, Chapel at the Angels’ Field in Bethlehem, October 2025.*

All who heard it were amazed by what had been told them by the shepherds. And Mary kept all these things, reflecting on them in her heart (Luke 2:18-19).

It is very interesting that Luke had told us how people were amazed at what the shepherds spoke about that night on the birth of Jesus Christ they have found on a manger with his Mother Mary and her husband Joseph. Keep in mind that the shepherds were among the least trusted people of that time but their story went “viral” and “trending” so to speak. Amid all these talks was Mary, the Mother of Jesus, silently meditating everything in her heart!

Tonight or today, try to spend some silent moments of prayer before the Blessed Sacrament to thank God for all the blessings of 2025 as well as to listen to Christ’s instructions and plans for us this 2026. Jesus has always something to tell us but we always go in haste somewhere else or to somebody else. Jesus is right there in our hearts, the faintest voice you always dismiss and take for granted.

Let us cultivate a prayer life like Mary who always kept in her heart the words and experiences she had with Jesus. Let us not be like the shepherds who were there only at Christmas, never came back to Jesus specially when he was preaching in Galilee and when crucified on Good Friday wherein his constant companion in silence was Mary his Mother.

*Photo by Ar. Philip Santiago, Basilica of the Annunciation, Nazareth, October 2025.*

Third important lesson the Blessed Mother Mary is teaching us this first day of 2026 is to have faith in God in Jesus Christ His Son our Savior. Therefore, please stop all those superstitious beliefs of pampasuwerte like feng shui and fortune telling that are pagan practices.

When eight days were completed for his circumcision, he was named Jesus, the name given him by the angel before he was conceived in the womb (Luke 2:21).

Mary was very much like us when Mary gave birth to Jesus on that first Christmas: she too was totally unaware of what was in store for her, of what would happen to her Son. She was totally unaware of what would happen in the future. The only thing she was certain was the name to be given to her child, “Jesus” which means “God is my Savior”.

All blessings come only from God, not from any other spirits. We drive all the malas and bad spirits and negative vibes of the past year not with noises and blasts of trumpets or fireworks but with silence that is rooted in deep faith in Christ Jesus.

Such was the attitude of Mary on that first Christmas until her glorious Assumption into heaven: she never knew Jesus would be betrayed by one of his trusted friends and apostles; she was never told by the angel how after Jesus would feed and heal so many people He would later be arrested and crucified like a criminal except that she believed in Him until the end, remaining with Christ at the foot of the Cross.

All Mary had was a deep faith in Jesus as told her by the angel as the name to be given to her child is also the child of the Most High. Like Mary, let us keep our faith in Christ alone, not to round fruits nor stones nor other stuffs peddled to us to bring luck this new year.

Let us imitate Mary, the Mother of God, so human like us except in sin who was always in haste with things of God, silently meditating his words and workings, and most of all, trusting wholly in her Son Jesus. Amen. May your new year be filled with Christ’s peace and grace!

A kingdom or a home?

Lord My Chef Sunday Recipe for the Soul by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II
Feast of the Holy Family of Jesus, Mary & Joseph, Cycle A, 28 December 2025
Sirach 3:2-6, 12-14 ><}}}}*> Colossians 3:12-21 ><}}}}*> Matthew 2:13-15, 19-23

Last November we were blessed to have visited Romania’s three famed castles at Transylvania region: the Bran Castle considered as the home of Count Dracula in Bram Stoker’s stories; the Cantacuzino Castle owned by one of Romania’s wealthiest family which is the setting of Netflix’s Wednesday series; and the Pelisor Castle which is the smallest but loveliest for me due to its romantic story behind.

I remembered these Romanian castles because of our gospel today about two kings: one is a ruthless, old king named Herod so “greatly troubled” upon hearing the news of the “newborn king of the Jews”, our Lord Jesus Christ (Mt.2:2, 3).

Very often when we hear of kings and royalties living in castles, so many images of affluence and power come into our minds. And indeed they are so true when we went inside those castles with its wonderful interiors and amazing artworks; however, as we learned more of its history especially of the lives of its occupants, our wonder and excitement dissipated. It was really more like a fairy-tale, or a horror story in the case of Bran Castle.

*Photo by author, Cantacuzino Castle, Romania, 06 November 2025.*

It must have been so lonely and sad living in those palaces; however, let us admit how often the presence and reality of Jesus whom we take for granted like when he was born in Bethlehem more than 2000 years ago invite us into those parts of our lives where we like to rule like kings or queens.

I find this important and even essential before reflecting about the Feast of the Holy Family because it is right in our homes – ironically or tragically – where we are first exposed to evil and sins. It is inside our homes when the father or mother or siblings take on their “power trips”, insisting on their rules, even flexing their powers over each other that in the process we hurt each other. Sometimes, the trauma that comes after may last a lifetime.

Would we rather choose a kingdom or a home? Be a Herod or a Baby Jesus?

Of course, our answers are so obvious as we would generally choose a home than a kingdom and be a Baby Jesus than a Herod. This we can do by imitating St. Joseph.

When the magi had departed, behold, the angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream and said, “Rise, take the child and his mother, flee to Egypt, and stay there until I tell yo. Herod is going to search for the child and destory him.” Joseph rose and took the child and his mother by night and departed to Egypt… When Herod had died, behold, the angel of the Lord appeared in a dream to Joseph in Egypt and said, “Rise, take the child and his mother and go to the land of Israel, for those who sought the child’s life are dead.” He rose, took the child and his mother, and went to the land of Israel. But when he heard that Archelaus was ruling over Judea in place of his father Herod, he was afraid to go back there… He went and dwelt in a town called Nazareth, so that what had been spoken through the prophets might be fulfilled, He shall be called a Nazorean (Matthew 2:1314, 19-22, 23).

*Photo by author, site of the Nazareth home of the Holy Family underneath the Church of St. Joseph in Nazareth, Israel, 2017.*

Remember how Matthew described St. Joseph as a righteous man? Here after the birth of Jesus Christ, we find Joseph’s holiness most shining. See how before this scene, Matthew described to us the attitudes of Herod and the experts in Jerusalem vis-a-vis the Magis from the East: Herod and company were all disturbed while the Magis were all sincere and so open in their search for the Christ.

That’s what we were saying earlier: of how we play so much on our turf and power, on how we want to make our “rule” as sovereignty felt always right in our home, in Jerusalem that was then the seat of power and of worship. Very clear at that time, the temple was already so untidy that needed Christ’s cleansing thirty years later.

When sin especially pride fills us, it is difficult to recognize Jesus. Moreover, even the smallest and harmless or weakest person like a child or a woman would always disturb anyone filled with one’s self, feel threatened like Herod that one’s rule is being taken away. How sad when a father or a husband, a mother or a wife including the eldest children would dare challenge everyone at home, asking who is the father or who is the one supposed to be in command? Sino ba and tatay (o nanay) dito na dapat masunod? It is the most scariest tactic of all not because of what the power trippers can do but actually it was a proof enough they are immatured and lacking of proper understanding about power and authority.

Joseph was clearly not of the same kind. He readily left his home and moved the Infant Jesus and Mary to Egypt. Remember that Bethlehem as the town of David is Joseph’s turf so to speak being from royal Davidic lineage himself. It must have been so difficult for him to leave Bethlehem and be a refugee in Egypt!

But Joseph had none of those airs of rule and superiority. For him, the only rule was God and that meant always the good of Jesus and Mary. That is why Joseph twice “rose” to obey the angel’s instructions to him to take the Infant Jesus and Mother Mary to Egypt and then back to Israel after some time.

Joseph’s rising was actually an act of bowing low to the power and authority of God, most of all to the Son of God he had named as “Jesus”.

Can we imitate Joseph’s “rising” from our selfishness and ordinariness of petty quarrels and assertions of power or “rule” especially in our homes? To imitate the Holy Family, we need to be like Joseph who rose not just literally from his sleep and comfort but rose above his very self. Jesus is inviting us this Sunday to rise too above our pride and self-centeredness to give way to his love and mercy, kindness and understanding for each other so that everyone remains safe and unharmed like the Infant Jesus and Mary following Joseph’s selflessness.

*Photo by author, St. Joseph Parish Church, Pacdal, Baguio City, 28 December 2024.*

Home is where the heart is. This is most true when we get into the origin of the Filipino equivalent of home which is tahanan which is from the root word tahan that means to stop crying. When children cry, we tell them to tahan na, tahan na… or stop crying.

Home is where we stop crying because that is where we are most safe, that is where we find the people who love us, believe in us, the one who would still accept us and forgive us when we have sinned. Home is our safest place because that is where there are people willing rise above their selfishness, to rise above their painful memories, and rise to let go of their comforts for others in distress and more difficult plight and situation in life.

Jesus, Mary and Joseph all rose from their very selves for each other to be safe. Most of all, they rose above themselves because they love so much for each other, a reflection of their great love for God the Father. Amen. May your family be blessed!

Christmas Stable, stability of mankind

Lord My Chef Christmas Eve Recipe, 24 December 2025

*Photo by Ar. Philip Santiago, a mural of angels announcing the birth of Jesus Christ to shepherds in the field, Angels’ Field Chapel in Bethlehem, October 2025.*

A blessed Merry Christmas, friends ad relatives, especially our followers. In our Monday’s Simbang Gabi when Mary sang her Magnificat during her Visitation of Elizabeth, we reflected how songs not only express our innermost thoughts and feelings but reveal our very person, too.

Allow me this Christmas to share with you a song I have recently heard to reflect on the meaning of Jesus Christ’s birth. The song is called “My Lord Has Come” written in 2010 by Will Todd, a renowned contemporary British composer and pianist who blends melodic classical compositions with jazz elements. Check YouTube to feel its moving music but for now, experience the sense of wonder in its inspiring lyrics.

Shepherds, called by angels,
called by love and angels:
No place for them but a stable.
My Lord has come.

Sages, searching for stars,
searching for love in heaven;
No place for them but a stable.
My Lord has come.

His love will hold me,
his love will cherish me,
love will cradle me.
Lead me, lead me to see him,
sages and shepherds and angels;
No place for me but a stable.
My Lord has come.

*Photo by Ar. Philip Santiago, a mural of shepherds as first visitors to the newborn King of kings, Angels’ Field Chapel in Bethlehem, October 2025.*

I learned and heard this song last week while researching for materials this Christmas. And the word “stable” struck me.

See its varied meanings. First, “stable” means firm and sturdy, unshakeable like a stable table, stable ground, and stable truth or opinion. But during this period, we know a “stable” also refers to the Nativity scene or creche which we Filipinos call as a Belen that is actually a translation of the Lord’s birthplace of Bethlehem.

In those days a decree went out from Caesar Augustus that the whole world should be enrolled. This was the first enrollment, when Quirinius was governor of Syria. So all went to be enrolled, each to his own town. And Joseph too went up from Galilee from the town of Nazareth to Judea, to the city of David that is called Bethlehem, because he was of the house and family of David, to be enrolled with Mary, his betrothed, who was with child. While they were there, the time came for her to have her child, and she gave birth to her firstborn son. She wrapped him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the inn (Luke 2:1-7).

How lovely that God manifested to us in the most humble way, being born on a manger, at a stable for animals!

And see now why Christmas is the greatest exchange gift of all time when God became human like us born in a stable so that we too may become divine like Him.

But, it is no easy exchange gift we often do in our Christmas parties when we just have to buy gifts that fall within the range of prices we have agreed upon. Jesus Christ the Son of God came not for any price that can be bought and paid by humans for He came with His whole life and being.

Picture the Christmas stable, of how the eternal entered the temporal, the infinite and perfect became flesh and bones and blood among us, so intimate with life and all the mess and chaos of living including death itself. He was born because He loves each one of us immensely.

And listen now to Will Todd telling us, “The Lord has come in a stable… anyone searching for Him – whether angels or shepherds or sages like the Magis, there’s no place except the stable.

Even for me and for us searching for stability in life, meaning in life, direction in life that can be found only in the stable where the Lord has come. How lovely!

In the silence of the darkest night of the year, amid the loud claims of everyone being the greatest and most powerful, the best and brightest, unknown to them the only true great and mighty one is in the stable.

In the gospel we heard too how the shepherds went in haste to visit the newborn Messiah in the stable, rejoicing afterwards at the great sight and good news they have found.

But, how about us today? How sad nobody cares at all to go to the Holy Mass which is actually the modern Christmas stable of Bethlehem which means “house of bread”. Jesus is the Bread of life as He preached later in life in the Gospel of John. On the eve of His death at the Last Supper, Jesus gave Himself as the Bread broken and shared for all lifetime to lead us to eternity.

How sad that we search for life’s meaning and sense in the most unstable of all instances like science and technology, new thoughts and ideas that overextend our rights without any regard for responsibilities and true freedom. If there is anything that merits haste these days, it is the things of God like the Mass and prayers and Sacred Scriptures. Not social media and all those viral and trending reels of our follies and stupidities we love to follow.

*Photo by author, Christmas 2021 at Basic Education Department Chapel, OLFU-Valenzuela City.*

See also the animals in the Christmas stable especially the ox and donkey who all symbolize our blindness to God who humbly came to us in the stable. Isaiah and the other prophets in the Old Testament lamented how animals particularly the ox and donkey “know” so well where to go when hungry and thirsty which is the stable while we humans wander far because we are so blinded by many things.

Christmas tells us humans to stop looking so far as Will Todd insists in his great composition My Lord Has Come inspired by our readings last night and today: it is only in Bethlehem that we find the true stable reality of life where the Son of God was born so that we now reckon time according to His birth with BC and AD because humans and civilizations do not last. “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever” (Hebews 13:8).

Our only stability in life is found in the Christmas stable especially when the nights are dark and long. Amen. A blessed and stable Merry Christmas to you!

Advent is the light of Christ coming

Lord My Chef Simbang Gabi Recipe for the Soul by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II
Wednesday, Simbang Gabi-XIX, 24 December 2025
2 Samuel 7:1-5, 8-12, 14, 16 <*((((>< + ><))))*> Luke 1:67-79

*Photo by author, sunrise at Lake of Galilee, the Holy Land, May 2019.*

Being an early riser or “madrugeño” in Spanish, I have always loved and preferred early morning Masses because churchgoers at that time are mostly silent, either still sleepy or simply truly reverent.

Though sunsets are more colorful and dramatic like a spectacular show – a palabas in Filipino -sunrise is different because it is more of paloob, of inside movement that is subtle yet intense when light steals into shadows as the sun isgradually breaking open the darkness to reveal what is unseen. Our local term for sunrise or breaking of dawn says it all, pagbubukang liwayway.

There lies the beauty of our Simbang Gabi especially on this final day of our novena when we are slowly seeing the light of Christ’s coming. It is hoped that in these nine days of prayers and reflections on the Sacred Scriptures, we have been enlightened about the the true meaning of Christmas, of how it continues to come and happen in our modern time so darkened by sin and evil.

On this final day of our Simbang Gabi, we reflect on the wonderful aftermath of the assertions by Elizabeth and later by her husband Zechariah on the name “John” meaning “God is gracious” being given to their child as instructed by God. Suddenly, Zechariah who was rendered deaf and mute following his unbelief in having a child, sang praises to God!

Zechariah his father, filled with the Holy Spirit, prophesied, saying: “Blessed be the Lord, the God of Israel; for he has come to his people and set them free. He has raised for us a mighty Savior, born of the house of his servant David… In the tender compassion of our God the dawn from on high shall break upon us, to shine on those who dwell in darkness and the shadow of death, and to guide our feet into the way of peace” (Luke 1:67-68, 78-79).

*Painting by Italian Riccardo Cessi in 1892 of Zechariah giving name to his son John;from commons.wikimedia.org.*

In singing the Benedictus, Zechariah affirmed and confirmed in himself the reality and truth of God being present in our lives.

Many times we are like Zechariah that even if we pray, celebrate the Masses, do all the devotions but still deep inside, doubt God’s reality that we simply do all this sacred rites and traditions just for the sake of doing them. Last week at the start of our Misa de Gallo, we have invited you to reassess and examine the reason why we are keeping this sacred tradition. Is it because of special favors we are asking from God or is it because we want to see God?

The late American Trappist monk Thomas Merton said in one of his writings that seeking God is not like searching for a “thing” or a lost object because God is more than an intellectual pursuit or a contemplative illumination of the mind. Merton explained that God reveals Himself to us in our hearts through our communion and fellowships in the Church.

*Photo by Ar. Philip Santiago, Benedictus on the wall of the patio of Church of St. John the Baptist in Ein-Karem where he was born.*

In singing the Benedictus, Zechariah realized God’s presence and His coming communion throughout Israel’s history, from the Patriarchs down to the birth of his son John who would prepare the way of Jesus Christ. The Benedictus describes to us the coming of the Christ as expected by the people of Israel in the Old Testament and that is why, unlike Mary’s Magnificat, it is in the future tense. While Zechariah mentions the mission of his son John, the main focus of the Benedictus is Jesus Christ who was about to be born six months later at that time.

Therefore, when we who believe in Jesus as the Christ or Messiah expected by the people of Israel in the Old Testament, the Benedictus becomes an affirmation of God’s presence in us and among us today and forever.

It is in this most sublime expression by Luke we find Christ’s coming like the breaking of dawn like shafts of light bursting forth, “In the tender compassion of our God the dawn from on high shall break upon us, to shine on those who dwell in darkness and the shadow of death, and to guide our feet into the way of peace.” It is in this breaking of dawn we find and experience the poetry of sunrise that is more of the heart than of the eyes we mentioned earlier.

After seeing the coming of the Christ in the birth of his son John, Zechariah now summarizes to us the very essence of Jesus our Savior, of God Himself: tender compassion or in the original Greek, splaghna or “tender mercy” of God.

It is not just compassion which is to suffer with us but at the same time be filled with tenderness that one is so moved to reach out, to do something by going down with the one suffering.

Like courage, mercy is a movement in the heart called misericordia in Spanish from the Latin mittere, meaning to be moved, to be stirred. It is something dynamic, not static. It is a deep feeling that moves toward someone in pain and suffering. An identification of Jesus with every person going through so much hardships and sufferings in life.

*Ar. Philip Santiago reverently kissing the very site of John’s birthplace in Ein-Karem, October 2025.*

See now the culmination of movements we have mentioned in Luke’s Christmas story: last Saturday at the Annunciation to Mary, the Angel mentioned the “overshadowing of Holy Spirit” on her in bearing our Savior; today in the Benedictus, there is the moving or stirring of the heart in Zechariah. Whenever we allow God to overshadow with His powers, our hearts are moved to love more, to be tender like God.

Zechariah’s heart is no longer hardened with negativity and cynicism – it was so stirred by God that he mentioned His tender mercy or compassion because he had personally felt it as he recovered his voice and speech. With the birth of John, he now believes that God’s love for his suffering people is deep and personal.

And that is perhaps one of the things we sorely lack in our history as a nation especially during the decadent years of the last Administration – the utter lack of tenderness by our officials and their kawatan in corruption. Wala silang awa at habag sa taong-bayan.

Recall the tender compassion, tender mercy of Jesus, how during His ministry all four evangelists would narrate Jesus was moved with pity and compassion to the people who were lost, tired and sick “like sheep without a shepherd” that no matter how tired He may be, He would always find time to teach them, heal their sick, and even feed them. That is the mercy of God that Jesus had brought forth to us in His coming, experienced by Zechariah himself that he could foresee its coming at the birth of John.

*Photo by Ar. Philip Santiago, Filipino translation of the Benedictus on the wall of the patio of Church of St. John the Baptist in Ein-Karem where he was born.*

That is the Benedictus, the song of every faithful disciple of Jesus introducing His coming, His birth. So many people have forgotten God, do not know God, refused to believe in God because many among us He had lavishly loved have refused to share His love with others, choosing to remain in the darkness of the night, thinking more of themselves and of their hurts and pains that they revenge with by stealing billions of money.

How lovely to think that God’s tenderness moves in us like the breaking of dawn, of shafts or streaks of lights slowly penetrating, bursting forth through cracks in the skies, in our homes and even right in our very selves. Bask in that light saw by Zechariah, shared by John the Baptist his son. Amen. Have a blessed and meaningful Christmas! Thank you for following our reflections. Share it and let it be shafts of light to somehow illumine the darkness in others.

Noche buena at Pasko

Lawiswis ng Salita ni P. Nicanor F. Lalog II, Ika-02 ng Disyembre 2025

*Larawan kuha ng may-akda sa San Fernando, Pampanga, Nobyembre 2021.*

Napansin ko lang
kakaiba itong kapaskuhang
darating: tahimik si Jose Mari Chan
at inagawan ng eksena ng mga
mandarambong sa pamahalaan
at kongreso na hanggang ngayon
nagtuturuan,
nagtatakipan
habang pinagpipilitan
ng isang ginang
kakasya raw ang limang-daang piso
upang makapag-diwang
ng noche buena sa
bisperas ng Pasko
ang pamilyang Pilipino.

Kaya sumagi sa aking alaala 
pamaskong awiting aking kinalakhan:

Kay sigla ng gabi, ang lahat ay kay saya
Nagluto ang ate ng manok na tinola
Sa bahay ng kuya ay mayroong litsonan pa
Ang bawat tahanan, may handang iba't-iba

Tayo na, giliw, magsalo na tayo
Mayroon na tayong tinapay at keso
'Di ba Noche Buena sa gabing ito?
At bukas ay araw ng Pasko

Mga ginigiliw, 
atin nang mapagtatanto
sa awiting ito diwa ng Pasko:
ating pagsasalu-salo ng mga kaloob
na biyaya at pagpapala
na sinasagisag ng noche buena
ng pagkakatawang-tao ni 
Jesu-Kristo noong Pasko;
ngunit, paano nga
kung sa halip na 
tulungan lalo mga maliliit
tugon ng pamahalaan
ay bigyan ng presyo
natatanging pagsasalo-salo
ng Pilipino tuwing Pasko?

Narito naman makabagong awiting pamasko
naghahayag na walang tatalo sa Pasko sa Pilipinas:

May tatalo pa ba sa Pasko ng 'Pinas?
Ang kaligayahan nati'y walang kupas
'Di alintana kung walang pera
Basta't tayo'y magkakasama
Ibang-iba talaga ang Pasko sa 'Pinas

May simpleng regalo na si Ninong at si Ninang
Para sa inaanak na nag-aabang
Ang buong pamilya ay magkakasama sa paggawa ng Christmas tree
Ayan na ang barkada, ikaw ay niyayaya para magsimbang gabi

Muli mga ginigiliw
sa saliw ng awiting ito
madarama natin diwa at 
tuwa ng Pasko:
wala naman sa handang
noche buena ito kungdi sa
samahan at pagbubuklod
ng pamilya at magkakaibigan
katulad ng pagkakatawang-tao
ni Jesu-Kristo na pumarito 
upang tubusin tayo
sa ating mga kasalanan
at mapunan ating kakulangan
ng kanyang kaganapan
sa pagmamahalan.

Subalit kay hirap
maramdaman pagmamahal
ni malasakit nino man
tulad ng mga nasa kapangyarihan
animo mga maligno at impakto
ng mga ghost project
kaya Biyernes Santo hindi Pasko
pakiramdam ngayon
ng maraming Pilipino: 
wala ang mga ginigiliw
na ate at kuya may handang iba't-iba
dahil sila ay mga nagsipag-OFW na
habang ang mga buwitre at buwaya
sa Kongreso nagpapasasa 
sa kaban ng bayan mula sa dugo at 
pawis ng mga mamamayan na
pinagtitiis sa limang-daang pisong
noche buena na kahuluga'y
"mabuting gabi" nang pahalagahan
ng Diyos ang tao
sa pagsusugo niya ng Kristo
na patuloy sumisilang
sa puso ng bawat nilalang
tuwing nagmamahalan
at nagbabahaginan 
na pinapaging-ganap 
sa hapag ng pakikinabang 
ng Banal na Misa 
hanggang sa mesa
ng bawat pamilya.

Ngunit papaano na kung
pera hindi kakasya
sa noche buena?
Iyan ang masaklap at nakasusuklam 
ng limang-daang pisong noche buena: 
hindi ang halaga ng pera 
kungdi kawalan ng pagpapahalaga
nitong nasa pamahalaan 
sa dangal ng bawat isa
lalo ng mga maliliit at aba
na sa halip tulungan maka-ahon
o maibsan kanilang hirap at gutom 
sila pa nga ay ibinaon 
sa presyo na pang galunggong
hindi hamon!

Kaya nakakamiss
sa gitna ng nakakainis
na mga balita si Jose Mari Chan 
sa kanyang awiting pamasko 
na maalala nating palagi
Sanggol na sumilang sa Bethlehem
sa tuwing masilayan mukha 
ng bawat kapwa nang walang pasubali
hindi sa halaga ng salapi!

Whenever I see girls and boys
Selling lanterns on the streets
I remember the Child
In the manger, as he sleeps
Wherever there are people
Giving gifts, exchanging cards
I believe that Christmas
Is truly in their hearts

Let's light our Christmas trees
For a bright tomorrow
Where nations are at peace
And all are one in God

Let's sing Merry Christmas
And a happy holiday
This season may we never forget
The love we have for Jesus
Let Him be the one to guide us
As another new year starts
And may the spirit of Christmas
Be always in our hearts

Ngayong Pasko
marami ang wala maski
limang daang piso at marahil
itutulog na lang ang noche buena;
tayo nawa maging dahilan ng
"mabuting gabi" nila upang tunay nilang maranasan
pagsilang ng Kristo sa kumakalam
nilang tiyan at sikmura.

*Larawan kuha ng may-akda sa Dau, Mabalacat, Pampanga, Nobyembre 2022.*

End of Christmas, start of daily “theophany”

The Lord Is My Chef Sunday Recipe for the Soul by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II
Feast of the Baptism of the Lord, Cycle C, 12January 2025
Isaiah 40:1-5, 9-11 ><}}}*> Titus 2:11-14; 3:4-7 ><}}}*> Luke 3:15-16, 21-22

*Photo by author, San Fernando, Pampanga, November 2021.*

Today is your last chance to greet “Merry Christmas” the people you have forgotten as well as claim your gifts from Santa because this Sunday’s “Feast of the Lord’s Baptism” closes the Christmas Season.

The Lord’s Baptism shows us that Jesus did not remain an infant on the manger in Bethlehem nor a child in Nazareth. It is sad to note both the religious and secular emphasis on this child imagery of Christ have reinforced the notion among people that Christmas is for children and a time for adults to return to the innocence and joy of their childhood.

Jesus grew up and matured into an adult on a mission from the Father to save us that led to His Passion, Death and Resurrection at Easter. Through our baptism in becoming the children of God, Jesus invites us to continue His Christmas story by maturing in our faith, hope and love in Him by embracing His Cross that His Baptism anticipated.

This Sunday Feast of the Lord’s Baptism is a coming to full circle of last week’s Epiphany into a theophany. Yes, they sound Greek because both are from the Greek words “epiphanes” and “theophanes”.

Epiphany is Jesus manifesting Himself to all nations through the Magi as the King of kings last Sunday; today, it is God the Father who recognizes Jesus as His Christ, His Anointed One with the voice declaring as a theophany, “You are my beloved Son; with you I am well pleased” (Lk.3:22).

Every morning as we wake up is a theophany with God telling us “You are my beloved child; with you I am well pleased.” Three things I wish to share with you for us to hear God’s daily theophany and fulfill our mission as baptized children of the Father.

*Photo by author, sunrise in Atok, Benguet, 27 December 2024.*

First, let us recognize and affirm our being, identity, and existence. Many times, we are more of a “zombie” than a human person who can’t find life nor experience living at all, wasting precious time to be somebody else, living in the past or living in the future.

When Luke noted “The people were filled with expectation, and all were asking in their hearts whether John might be the Messiah” (Lk.3:15), he wished to inform us how the people at that time recognized and admitted they were sinners, that they were broken, that they were sick physically, emotionally and spiritually as they all affirmed their need for salvation. They accepted and owned the realities of their lives that they needed God, they needed the Christ whom they thought was John the Baptizer.

The Baptism of Christ by John the Baptist in the Jordan River. Detail of dome mosaic in the Battistero Neoniano (Orthodox Baptistery) in Ravenna, dating from 451-75. On lower right is a personification of the Jordan River as an old man rising from the water, holding a reed in one hand and offering a garment to Christ in the other. The right arm and dish of John the Baptist, the dove, and Christ’s head are 18th- and 19th-century restorations; the rest is original.

Even John the Baptizer is presented by Luke as also so sure of who he was as the precursor of the Messiah. Among the expectant people and John, we realize that indeed, growth happens the moment we accept who we are.

Examine the testimonies of many devotees of the Nazareno at Quiapo, of how they support each other in their woes and sufferings in life that we find a sort of theophanies by God, something like what we have heard from the first reading today, “Comfort, give comfort to my people, says your God” (Is.40:1). That comfort, that salvation, happened right there and then, in the now and not in a distant future.

Despite my “dislike” for their attitudes during the Traslacion, devotees of the Nazareno have always amazed me for daring to be truthful and honest with themselves, admitting their own sinfulness and weaknesses as they recognized too their need for help and most especially of their desire for God. This desire for God and admission of one’s sinfulness are very crucial to experience and hear God’s daily theophanies to us.

*Photo by Mr. Jay Javier, 09 January 2019.*

Second, for us to hear God’s theophany, we need to imitate Jesus Christ in taking the downward movement in life. His baptism at Jordan clearly illustrates this with His coming down to the Jordan valley through the mountains that evoked His own coming down from heaven to be born here on earth, in Bethlehem.

What is so beautiful with Jesus Christ’s downward movement is essentially a being with the sinful, the sick, the rejected, the marginalized, the poor, and those considered dirty. From being purely clean and sinless, Jesus took all our dirt to be cleansed like Him. Such is the kindness of God that Paul speaks today to Titus “so that we might become heirs in hope of eternal life” (Titus 3:7).

Our world today teaches us the opposite direction Jesus Christ had taken by climbing up the pinnacle of success, of good life, of supremacy, of power, of everything! They call it “upward mobility” that has prompted everyone even those in the Church to join the rat race for being rich and famous, of being somebody, putting on masks and taking more of the goods the world offers until we get lost in misery finding no meaning at all with one’s self because we thought life is “up there.”

Jesus Christ is not up there but down here, in our very selves, in our very hearts filled and battered with our many agonies and failures, hurts and pains, weaknesses and sins. Look down more into our very selves to find Jesus in our dirt and miseries which is the message of Jesus Nazareno.

Observe all those interviewed in Quiapo have only one prayer – well-being of a loved one. They never asked to be rich or have money. Just heal a sick child or parent was the most requested prayer of devotees. Our favorite Pope Benedict XVI explained this downward movement so well:

To accept the invitation to be baptized now means to go to the place of Jesus’ Baptism. It is to go where he identifies himself with us and to receive there our identification with him. The point where he anticipates death has now become the point where we anticipate rising again with him (Jesus of Nazareth, page 18).

*Photo by author, sunset in Liputan Island, Meycauayan City, Bulacan 31 December 2022.*

Last but not least for our reflection is something very peculiar with Luke alone: the theophany of Jesus happened not right after His baptism but while He was praying, “After all the people had been baptized and Jesus also had been baptized and was praying, heaven was opened and the Holy Spirit descended upon him in bodily form like a dove” (Lk.3:21-22).

In the Acts of the Apostles, Luke recorded the Pentecost happened while the Apostles with the Blessed Mother Mary were all praying when the Holy Spirit descended upon them like tongues of fires which is similar with what took place at Jesus’ Baptism. In all books of the whole Bible, divine revelation is always preceded with prayer. As we shall see this year when Luke guides us every Sunday with his gospel account, he is the one who portrayed Jesus most in prayer than any of the other evangelists.

*Photo by author, Garden of Gethsemane, the Holy Land, May 2017.*

If we want to hear God’s theophanies to us, let us handle life with prayer which is more of listening and being one with God. Begin and end each day with prayer. There is no other way to hear God’s voice, to hear Him affirming us, to know His plans for us until we are one with with Jesus in prayer.

In His baptism at Jordan, Jesus Christ as the Second Person in the Holy Trinity prayed not because He needed something from the Father but because He is one with Him in the Holy Spirit. That was when the Father affirmed Him as the Christ being sent on a mission.

Through the Sacrament of Baptism we have received, we are reminded today of God’s anointing of each of us as His beloved child. May we heed His voice and be one with Him for a more blessed 2025 ahead of us as we begin Ordinary Time tomorrow. Have a blessed week. Amen.

Blessed new year with Mary

The Lord Is My Chef Daily Recipe by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II
Solemnity of Mary, Mother of God, 01 January 2025
Numbers 6:22-27 + Galatians 4:4-7 + Luke 2:16-21

Still a blessed Merry Christmas to everyone! Please, do not dilute the blessedness of this first day of 2025 with the very secular and empty greeting of Happy New Year. Our first reading says it all how God wants us to be blessed not just happy throughout 2025.

It is still the Christmas season until January 12 when we close it with the Baptism of the Lord. Continue greeting one another with a Merry Christmas because it is also a prayerful wish of blessedness to everyone. Forget that happy new year greeting as well as that inclusive greeting of happy holidays because we are celebrating the birth of the Son of God Jesus Christ who became human like us so that we can be divine like Him.

The Lord said to Moses: “Speak to Aaron and his sons and tell them: This is how you shall bless the Israelite. Say to them: ‘The Lord bless you and keep you! The Lord let his face shine upon you, and be gracious to you! The Lord look upon you kindly and give you peace!'” (Numbers 6:22-26)

*Photo from Tetra Images/Getty Images, mosaic of Virgin Mary and Jesus in the Haghia Sophia, Istanbul, Turkey.*

That is why on this eighth day since His birth (octave) that falls on January first, the Church celebrates the Solemnity of Mary, Mother of God not the start of a new year as most people wrongly believe.

We honor Mary on this eighth day of Christmas because she is the image of true blessedness. Recall how Elizabeth was the first to call her “blessed among all women” during the Visitation because “she believed the words spoken to her would be fulfilled.” Mary showed us that true blessedness is not found in money and material things or those of the world like fame and popularity. From the Annunciation to the Nativity until finally there on the Cross on Good Friday and later in the beginnings of the Church, Mary affirmed that true blessedness is having God in our hearts by believing in Him, trusting Him, loving Him, serving Him through one another by cooperating in His plans for us.

*Photo by author, Angel of Peace Chapel, RISE Tower, Our Lady of Fatima University, 25 December 2024.*

Mary was truly blessed of all women because she was chosen by God to be the Mother of the Christ not because of any special characteristics but because of His own goodness and immense love. This we find clearly in the first reading when God freely gave his blessings to all people to all time, instructing Moses and Aaron of how they should bless the people. St. Paul wrote it so well in the second reading, “When the fullness of time had come, God sent his Son, born of a woman” (Gal.4:4) to show that we need not do anything at all for we cannot earn – not even Mary the Mother of Jesus Christ – God’s blessings and favors.

As a gift freely given, God’s blessings of which Jesus is the greatest must always be received and appreciated by the recipients, us! In blessing us, we have become more like God as the “Lord let his face shine upon you, and be gracious to you!” (Nm.6:25).

What a beautiful prayer of blessing that God’s face may shine on us. Imagine Mary as the Mother of Jesus truly the first human on whom God’s face literally first shone as she was the first along with Joseph and then the shepherds to have seen the Son of God who became human. However, that blessing of God’s face shining on us can only happen if like Mary we also cooperate with His grace.

To let God’s face to shine on us means fulfillment, that is, eternal life which is to experience God and His presence even in our finite world. Right in our modern time, we can feel God’s blessings still being poured out especially as we remember Pope Benedict XVI’s death on December 31, 2022. Here is indeed a great human, like Mary who kept reflecting in her heart the word of God.

As he approached death, Pope Benedict still wrote and spoke so much about God and His importance and relevance to our modern times. In fact, he said “the face of God” is eternal life “where God is always new” because “with God there is perpetual, unending encounter, with new discoveries and new joy” as he explained to Peter Seewald in 2016.

Truly a holy and blessed man, Pope Benedict said this may sound very theological but on the human level, it is something we always experience as we approach old age when we look forward to meeting our own family and friends who have gone ahead of us.

That is when we truly experience peace within us when we look with gratitude to the past and with joyful expectation to the future, not seeking anymore anything for ourselves because we are contented. All we have in our hearts are joy and wonder because of Jesus so alive within us like Mary His Mother.

At the start of this new year, let us discard those pagan practice of lighting fireworks and firecrackers to drive away evil spirits long ago driven away by Christ. Let us imitate Mary by being silent in prayers, keeping everything in her heart, reflecting where God is leading us this 2025. Stay blessed this new year with Mary by having only Jesus, always Jesus in your heart. Amen. God bless you always!

*Photo by author, sunset in Atok, Benguet, 27 December 2024.*

Christmas is God at home with us; are we at home with God?

The Lord Is My Chef Sunday Recipe for the Soul by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II
Feast of the Holy Family, Cycle C, 29 December 2024
1 Samuel 1:20-22, 24-28 ><)))*> 1 John 3:1-2, 21-24 ><)))*> Luke 2:41-52

*Photo by author of a depiction of the Holy Family near the main door of St. Joseph the Worker Parish in Pacdal, Baguio City, 28 December 2024.*

You must have heard of the classic song “A House Is Not A Home” composed by the great tandem of Burt Bacharach and Hal David recorded by Dionne Warwick in 1964 for a movie of the same title. It went back to charts in 1981 when the late Luther Vandross covered it in his first album.

It is a very lovely ballad of a love lost, teaching us that indeed, “a house is made of walls and beams while a home is made of love and dreams”.

A chair is still a chair
Even when there's no one sitting there
But a chair is not a house
And a house is not a home
When there's no one there to hold you tight
And no one there you can kiss good night

A room is still a room
Even when there's nothing there but gloom
But a room is not a house
And a house is not a home
When the two of us are far apart
And one of us has a broken heart

But, in the Hebrew language and Jewish thought, the word “house” in itself connotes relationships. There are no distinctions between a house and a home for them that is why we find Jesus claiming the temple as His Father’s house.

*Pope Francis opening the Jubiliee Door at St. Peter’s in Rome to launch the start of the Jubilee Year of 2025. Photo by Maurix/Gamma-Rapho via Getty Images*.

In fact, the first letter of the Hebrew word for God (Yahweh) is actually shaped as a door or a house. That is why there is the blessing of church doors in dioceses today worldwide following the blessing and opening of the Jubilee Door at St. Peter’s in the Vatican by Pope Francis last Christmas Eve to launch the Jubilee Year. The Jubilee Door signifies our passing through, an entering into a relationship with God.

In John’s gospel we find Jesus as an adult using the word “house” twice when He cleansed the temple, telling everyone to “stop making my Father’s house a marketplace” (Jn.2:16) and at their last supper when He assured the disciples, “In my Father’s house there are many dwelling places or rooms” (Jn.14:2).

The only other occasion Jesus used the word “house” to mean the same thing as John was when He was found by His parents in the temple as we heard today on this Feast of the Holy Family.

Each year Jesus’ parents went to Jerusalem for the feast of Passover, and when he was twelve years old, they went up according to festival custom. After they had completed its days, as they were returning, the boy Jesus remained behind in Jerusalem, but his parents did not know it. After three days they found him in the temple… When his parents saw him, they were astonished, and his mother said to him, “Son, why have you done this to us? Your father and I have been looking for you with great anxiety?” And he said to them, “Why were you looking for me? Did you not know that I must be in my Father’s house?” But they did not understand what he said to them (Luke 2:41-43, 46, 48-50).

*“The Finding of the Savior at the Temple” painting by William Holman Hunt (1860) from en.wikipedia.org.*

We find in the story of the finding of Child Jesus in the temple that even at a very young age, Jesus had always been clear with His oneness in God by always referring to the temple as His “Father’s house”.

As we have reflected in December 19 in Luke’s first Christmas story, the annunciation of John’s birth to his father Zechariah while incensing at the temple in Jerusalem during a major Jewish feast that Christmas begins in the church where we gather to praise and worship God as a community. See how this Sunday after Christmas our many empty pews in the church. How sad that many Catholics after Christmas have totally disregarded the Sunday Mass, going to all the vacation spots here and abroad with many of them having no qualms at all that this is the “day of the Lord”, a Sunday obligation.

Again, here is Luke in his artistic narration of Christmas into Christ’s adolescence insisting on us the importance of communal worship and prayer. Not surprising that of the four evangelists, Luke is the one who presented Jesus always at prayer as an expression of His oneness or communion in the Father and he wants us hearers of his gospel account to cultivate that same communion with God in Jesus, with Jesus, and through Jesus.

Christmas is essentially Jesus Christ becoming human so that God may be “at home” with us humans as John beautifully wrote in his prologue we heard last Christmas Day, “And the Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us” (Jn.1:14).

But, are we at home with God in Jesus?

*Photo by author, the small entrance door leading to the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem where one needs to bow low literally and figuratively to enter Christ’s birthplace.*

On this Feast of the Holy Family, our gospel reminds us this Sunday of how even Mary and Joseph had trouble with their adolescent son Jesus like most parents these days, a kind of family conflict so familiar with many people everywhere.

What a lovely scene today this Christmas season amid widespread reports of child kidnappings and so many children caught in the middle of many conflicts among adults like wars in many parts of the world and worst, right inside every family, right in their house, or homes where there are no relationships at all.

Luke was a physician who understood very well the anguish and sufferings of many people, especially parents during his time that continue to these days. In narrating to us this sad episode of his Christmas stories when Jesus was lost but eventually found in the temple, Luke is assuring us that despite all the darkness and troubles that engulf many families today, we have a very loving, personal God in Christ always with us.

*Photo by author, picture taken from the inside of the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem of its small entrance door.*

Mary and Joseph did not understand what Jesus meant that He must be at His Father’s house but it did not deter them from exploring its meaning so that only Mary with John and two other women remained with Christ at the foot of the Cross on that Good Friday.

How lovely that Mary and those others at the foot of the Cross were the ones truly “at home” with the Lord, in the Lord! The same thing speaks so true with Joseph who in his silence was so “at home” with God in Jesus, whether awake or asleep. He kept that relationship with God alive through Mary and those others around him especially Jesus.

As an adult approaching His pasch, Jesus assured His disciples including us today of having a dwelling place or room in His Father’s house in heaven – that, despite our many sins, God would never cut off His ties with us in Jesus, with Jesus! That is how God loved us so much as the author of the Letter to the Hebrews reminds us “God is greater than our hearts and knows everything” (1Jn.3:20).

Like Hanna the mother of the child Samuel, let us start cultivating this relationship with God even while still very young. It does not really matter if we destroy and cut it so often; what matters is we keep on trying to let it grow anew for it is and would never ever get lost again. Thanks to Christmas!

That is why I personally insist in my homilies and writings that we keep greeting everyone with a Merry Christmas until January 12, the Feast of the Baptism of the Lord that closes the Christmas season. It is still Christmas after all!

*Photo by author, Chapel of the Angel of Peace, RISE Tower, Our Lady of Fatma University, Valenzuela City, Christmas 2024.*

Like Mary and Joseph, let us keep coming back to God symbolized by Jerusalem and its temple now replaced with our churches. Let us go back to prayer and to Sunday Masses to find Jesus again present in the signs and symbols of the liturgy and most of all, in everyone present celebrating His coming.

Let us continue the story of Christmas with our relationships with God through others, of our being at home with the Father in Jesus Christ who “advanced in wisdom and age and favor before God and man” (Lk.2:52) after this episode which closed Luke’s Christmas account.

Let us be at home with God and with one another in Jesus, with Jesus, and through Jesus. May you continue to have blessed Christmas Season. Amen.