Seeing and Hearing Jesus

40 Shades of Lent, Sunday Week-2, Year C, 17 March 2019
Genesis 15:5-12, 17-18//Philippians 3:17-4:1//Luke 9:28-36

From the mountain of temptation, we now join Jesus in His mountain of Transfiguration this Second Sunday of Lent. It does not matter on which mountain Jesus transfigured because Lent as a journey is not about destination but direction that begins right in our hearts when we examine and purify, renew and vivify our faith in the resurrection of Christ. At the very core of this Lenten journey is the glory of Jesus seen in the light of His Cross.

Jesus took Peter, John, and James and went up the mountain to pray. While he was praying his face changed in appearance and his clothing became dazzling white. And behold, two men were conversing with him, Moses and Elijah, who appeared in glory and spoke of his exodus that he was going to accomplish in Jerusalem… Then from the cloud came a voice that said, “This is my chosen Son; listen to him.” After the voice had spoken, Jesus was found alone. They fell silent and did not at that time tell anyone what they had seen.
Luke 9:28-31,35-36

Of the three evangelists who reported the Transfiguration, only Luke tells us its context, prayer: “Jesus took Peter, John, and James and went up the mountain to pray” (Lk. 9:28). It is very clear with Luke that the Transfiguration is a “prayer event” to show us what happens when Jesus talks with His Father. It is reminiscent of the experience of Moses when his face became radiant after talking with God at Sinai but far more deeper in meaning and reality. According to Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI, the Transfiguration is the “interpenetration” of Christ with His Father, becoming “light from light” for He Himself is the light. The face of Moses shone by receiving light from God after meeting Him on Mt. Sinai while the Transfiguration affirmed the divinity of Jesus as the Son of God whose light came from within Him.

What a wondrous sight to behold seeing Jesus in all His glory that prompted Peter to ask Jesus that they remain there as he offered to build them with a tent each! Luke tells us a similar story on the evening of Easter when two disciples going home to Emmaus met Jesus along the way, asking Him to stay with them for the night. In both stories, the sight of Jesus in His glory vanished immediately after He was recognized by the disciples. The same thing happens with us when we go through the same experiences of seeing the glory of Jesus in our lives, of how we wanted to preserve it, wishing Christ would remain to stay with us so we can keep those feelings of joy and peace within. Like Peter, the experience is too deep for words that we find ourselves not knowing what to say; and, like the two disciples at Emmaus we feel our hearts burning within because we have seen and heard the Lord!

Seeing and hearing are God’s greatest gifts. We find in the gospels how people were amazed whenever Jesus would restore sight of the blind and enable the mute to speak by opening their ears. Jesus Himself tells the disciples that include us today of how “Blessed are your eyes because they see, your ears because they hear! Amen, I say to you, many prophets and righteous people longed to see what you see but did not see it, and to hear what you hear but did not hear it”(Mt. 13:16-17).

Seeing and hearing Jesus happen whenever we pray, the starting point of every Transfiguration. This is the reason why we have to pray always, not only during Lent. Prayer is communion with God, being one with God. The beloved disciple tells us that “No one has ever seen God. Yet, if we love one another, God remains in us, and his love is brought to perfection in us” (1Jn.4:12). God’s love is perfected in us whenever we join Jesus in His exodus or pasch, His passing over Passion, Death, and Resurrection. This is why the voice heard during His Transfiguration said “This is my chosen Son; listen to him.” After His Transfiguration, Jesus would always speak about His coming Passion, Death and Resurrection, calling us all to follow Him always.

And that is Transfiguration: the light of Christ’s Passion and Death burn us within to be transformed into His glorious Resurrection. Any experience of God is always a transfiguration and transformation into His image and likeness which sin had destroyed and disfigured in us. The surest sign that we have seen and heard God is when we die in our sins, being transformed into new persons in Christ when we forget one’s self, carry our cross daily and follow Jesus. See again the centrality of the Cross in the Lord’s teachings and events. We can never have a complete and correct picture of Jesus Christ without the Cross. And there can be no real change in us without sufferings and pains with Christ leading the way.

In the first reading, Abraham saw and heard God at night in the desert like in the Transfiguration. God sealed His promise to him to be the father of all nations by taking the initiative to burn by “passing over” the animals he had sacrificed. Abraham held on to that promise through many tests and trials from God, thus becoming the father of all nations recognized by Jews, Christians and Moslems alike.

Yes, our life and times could even get worse with all the killings and problems going on in many parts of the world, even in our own lives, family and friends. Things may even get worst than better but the story of the Transfiguration this Sunday assures us of our future glory in Christ amidst all the crosses in our lives. Let us “stand firm in the Lord” as Paul tells us in the second reading by reviewing the many decisions and choices we have made in the past to go back to Christ’s direction to His Cross. Like Abraham and the apostles, let us be faithful to Jesus our Savior “who will change our lowly body to conform with his glorified body by the power that enables him also to bring all things into subjection to himself” (Phil. 3:21-4:1). A blessed week to you in Christ Jesus!

Painting of the glorious crucified Christ called “Luwalhati” by Bulakenyo artist Aris Bagtas, acrylic on old wood 18×24, 2019. Used with permission.

God’s Word, God’s Sign

40 Shades of Lent, Wednesday of Week 1, 13 March 2019
Jonah 3:1-10///Luke 11:29-32

Open “the ears of our hearts”, O Lord, to always heed your words especially in this holy season of Lent when your readings are so rich and meaningful. So many times we are like your contemporaries, “an evil generation always seeking signs.” (Lk. 11:29)

Or, like your reluctant prophet Jonah: we cannot believe your words, always trying to escape responsibilities and mission from you to proclaim your word.

The word of the Lord came to Jonah a second time: “Set out for the great city of Nineveh, and announce to it the message that I will tell you.” So Jonah made ready and went to Nineveh, according to the Lord’s bidding.
Jonah 3:1-3

How funny and even insane, Lord, for us to run away from you, hide from you like Jonah because we find your words so simple, doubting its powers to move and change people.

But when like Jonah we proclaim your words, we are amazed and surprised at its efficacy not only with the people they are directed to but most of all with us. Your words indeed are alive and so powerful especially if our whole heart is humbled and contrite from our sins.

Help us to always recognize your presence in your words for you are the Word who became flesh. Take away our stony hearts and give us a natural heart that beats with firm faith, fervent hope and unceasing charity and love. Amen.

Becoming a presence of God

40 Shades of Lent 
Friday after Ash Wednesday, 08 March 2019
Isaiah 58:1-9///Matthew 9:14-15

God our loving Father, in this 40-day journey of Lent in and with your Son Jesus Christ, help us to imbibe anew the value of “fasting”. How unfortunate that in this age when we have made everything so fast and quick, we have forgotten or totally disregarded the other meaning of that word “fasting” that seemed to have been stuck with the past.

We have ceased to fast not only during Ash Wednesday and Good Friday but even before receiving the Holy Communion in the Sunday Mass, making all kinds of excuses with bold claims of having sacrificed so much in doing good deeds that we need not fast from food anymore.

And if ever we fast these days, we repeat the very same mistakes of the people in the Old Testament of having themselves as the focus of their fasting rather than you, O God, through others.

“Why do we fast, and you do not see it? Afflict ourselves, and you take no note of it?” Lo, on your fast day you carry out your own pursuits, and drive all your laborers. Yes, your fast ends in quarreling and fighting, striking with wicked claw. Would that today you might fast so as to make your voice heard on high!”
Isaiah 58:3-4

In this age of superabundance of almost everything in the world like food, clothes, money, gadgets and other things except YOU, teach us to let go of some comforts and pleasures to be one with those in suffering.

Most of all, let us fast to be empty of our very selves so we can create a space for you and for others. Fill us with your Self to become your very presence here on earth:

“Then your light shall break forth like the dawn, and your wound shall quickly be healed; your vindication shall go before you, and the glory of the Lord shall be your rear guard. Then you shall call, and the Lord will answer, you shall cry for help, and he will say, Here I am!”
Isaiah 58:9

What a joy it would be if more people experience you, O Father, through us. Amen.

Blessed Are the Children

MarpaKids — *Photo by Jim Marpa. Used with permission.*

The Lord Is My Chef Breakfast Recipe for the Sou

Thursday, 28 February 2019, Week VII, Year I

Sirach 5:1-10///Mark 9:41-50

Dearest Lord Jesus:

Your Mass readings today complement the disturbing and shocking news headlines of sex abuse in the Church festering for the last 30 years or so.

What is so shameful and disgusting with this news is the fact you have never failed in warning us against hurting the little children including women and the poor who have nothing in life except you.

Those sins are so grave that moved you to harshly declare that “Whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin, it would be better for him if a great millstone were put around his neck and he were thrown into the sea” (Mk.9:42).

We make no excuses O Lord for these grave sins against children. No words, no programs and no compensation could ever bring back their lost innocence and dignity from the hands of your priests and servants. It is a betrayal of the highest degree like what Judas Iscariot did to you.

We are angered by their sins, Lord; but, worst of all, we are deeply angered by our inaction that allowed them to continue with their evil deeds in the guise of mercy and compassion.

But, Lord, there is also something sickening than this news when our brother priests are falsely accused of sexual misconduct. We pray you keep and protect them. We pray for faithful priests to be spared of these false accusations.

You know very well O Lord you have more faithful and celibate priests working in silence and hiddenness than the unfaithful ones. Yet, we still pray that you continue to help us heed your words of wisdom through Ben Sirach (Sir. 5:1-10):

“Let us stop relying on our wealth, power, and strength in following the desires of our hearts.

Let us stop being so sure that no one could prevail against us or subdue us for God will surely exact punishment against us.

Most of all, let us not delay our conversion and stop being overconfident with your forgiveness, adding sin upon sin, for your wrath alights with the wicked.”

Have mercy on us all your priests, dear Jesus, keep us faithful to you our Lord and our God. Amen.

Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II, Parokya ng San Juan Apostol at Ebanghelista, Gov. F. Halili Ave., Bagbaguin, Sta. Maria, Bulacan.

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Thinking Like Jesus

The Lord Is My Chef Breakfast Recipe for the Soul

Thursday, 21 February 2019, Week VI, Year I

Genesis 9:1-13///Mark 8:27-33

My dearest God and Father, today you remind me of the beautiful story of Noah, of how you had promised through him never again to destroy earth.

What a joy always to my eyes to see your rainbow, its beautiful colors without any definitive origin nor end, reminding me of how you have given us more than a promise but a covenant.

When I was a child, I always heard that at the end of every rainbow is a pot of gold that would make anyone who would find it very wealthy. As I matured, I realized O God that the pot of gold of your rainbow is your Son Jesus Christ our Lord: whoever finds Him becomes wealthy indeed!

Like the song of the psalmist today, “From heaven the Lord looks down on the earth”, Jesus became your rainbow, your new covenant who stretched His arms on the Cross to save us.

Give me the grace O God to think like Jesus as the Christ who willed to suffer and die for us in accordance with your Holy Will.

Give me the grace O God to think like Jesus as the Christ so that my life and those around me are enriched in your love and mercy. Amen. Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II, Parokya ng San Juan Apostol at Ebanghelista, Gov. F. Halili Ave., Bagbaguin, Sta. Maria, Bulacan.

When Listening Is Most Important

The Lord Is My Chef Breakfast Recipe for the Soul

Friday, 08 February 2019, Week IV, Year I

Hebrews 13:1-8///Mark 6:14-29

Today O Lord we thank you for one of the most unique saints of modern time, St. Josephine Bakhita who had taught us the importance of when and how to listen. Her life proved that indeed, “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever” (Heb.13:8) for you never abandoned her, always speaking to her on many occasions through the many people and events of her life.

Teach us to emulate St. Josephine Bakhita who chose to listen to your voice within her, in her conscience to do what is good, to desire only your will. Despite the many sufferings she had endured as a child sold to slavery from Africa that she had forgotten her name, she chose to listen to her conscience that had remained pure and clean.

So unlike Herod who loved listening to the preaching of John the Baptist though he would always be perplexed because he refused to accept them. Most of all, Herod preferred to listen to the words of the people around him, especially the daughter of Herodias than listen to his conscience that led to John’s beheading.

O Lord Jesus, so many times I confuse your words with the words of the world. Grant me a clear conscience that I may always pursue your holiness. Amen. Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II, Parokya ng San Juan Apostol at Ebanghelista, Gov. F. Halili Ave., Bagbaguin, Sta. Maria, Bulacan.

The Sword of St. Paul

The Lord Is My Chef Breakfast Recipe for the Soul

Friday, 25 January 2019, Feast of the Conversion of St. Paul

Acts 22:3-16///Mark 16:15-18

Today we thank you O Lord for your gift of St. Paul whom you converted from being a persecutor of the early Christians to becoming your “Thirteenth Apostle” who stands at equal footing with St. Peter in the growth of your Church.

What made him truly great and effective as an apostle, O Jesus, is not his brilliant rhetoric and sophisticated strategies but his willingness to suffer so much for you and your gospel. He had shown us the essence of discipleship which is to live one’s life completely in you alone – “I have been crucified with Christ; yet I live, no longer I, but Christ lives in me; insofar as I now live in the flesh, I live by faith in the Son of God who has loved me and given himself up for me” (Gal. 2:20).

St. Paul was able to accomplish this by showing us true conversion that we always misunderstand as something like changing into another person completely like turning around a shirt, from being proud and violent to becoming meek, or from being so shy to becoming daring or being impulsive to almost timid. While his letters teem with so many gems in teaching us how he was converted into loving you until the end, his imposing images with his sword remain his most beautiful symbol of conversion.

All his life as his images rightly portray him everywhere, he had kept that sword: when still called Saul, he had that sword to express his zeal and fire for the Law that he persecuted Christians; but on the way to Damascus, you called him and after a period of prayers and studies, he picked up again his sword to preach your gospel with the same fire and zeal that eventually in the end, he willingly accepted death by the sword in your name. From the sword that inflicted pain on others, it became a sword that slew his defects until later at the end of his life in Rome, it caused his martyrdom.

Help me Lord to keep my sword – my weaknesses and shortcomings – not for their own sake but because that’s me, that’s my personality. Help me to change my ways not my heart by using this same sword to slay the defects within me without extinguishing that fire for you and your gospel. Let these defects I have remind me always like St. Paul that “whatever gains I had, these I have come to consider a loss because of Christ… everything as a loss because of the supreme good of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord” (Phil 3:7-8). Let me fight, O Lord, for your gospel, for your Spirit as I fight pride and other sins within me. Amen. Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II, Parokya ng San Juan Apostol at Ebanghelista, Gov. F. Halili Ave., Bagbaguin, Sta. Maria, Bulacan.

*Photo from Google, statue of St. Paul in front of the Major Basilica of St. Paul Outside-the- Walls, Rome.

Refresh Us, O God

The Lord Is My Chef Breakfast Recipe for the Soul

Monday, 21 January 2019, Week II, Year I

Hebrews 5:1-9///Mark 2:18-22

Loving Father, lately I was again hurting deep inside, feeling alone and forgotten, even taken for granted but, after praying and remembering the immense love of your Son Jesus for me, for us all, I felt so consoled because I am no longer alone. I felt relieved and lighter at how your Son Jesus who is sinless bore all our sins by suffering and dying on the Cross to renew forever our relationship with you, opening for us a fount of constant joy and comfort within us.

“In the days when he was in the Flesh, he offered prayers and supplications with loud cries and tears to the one who was able to save him from death, and he was heard because of his reverence. Son though he was, he learned obedience from what he suffered; and when he was made perfect, he became the source of eternal salvation for all who obey him” (Heb.5:7-8).

Remind us always to remember this great truth, of how you have made Christ your Son as our sole mediator, designating Him our eternal High Priest who offered for us the most perfect sacrifice for our salvation. Make us your new piece of cloth, your new wineskin so others may experience your refreshing presence in the world today where many of us have become technical rather than personal, hiding in traditions and rituals long renewed in Jesus Christ, always asking “Why do the disciples of John and the disciples of the Pharisees fast, but your disciples do not fast?” (Mk.2:18).

Give us the courage O Lord like St. Agnes to be firm in our faith, vibrant in our hope in your presence among us in Christ. Refresh us in your abiding love so we may be renewed as a people, as disciples. Amen. Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II, Parokya ng San Juan Apostol at Ebanghelista, Gov. F. Halili Ave., Bagbaguin, Sta. Maria, Bulacan.

Photo above by the author, Dominican Hill, Baguio City, 18 January 2019.

St. Agnes image from Google.

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Christmas is Reclaiming Our Being Children

Quiet Storm by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II, 28 December 2018

Christmas is always regarded as for children, of being like children. What a joy to always remember that God the Almighty chose to become human like us – who likes to always pretend being like Him and powerful – that the path to true greatness and power is in becoming small like an infant, being like a child. The late Cardinal Hans Urs von Balthasar claims in his last book shortly before he died in 1988 that the central mystery of Christianity is our “transformation from world-wise, self-sufficient ‘adults’ into abiding children of the Father of Jesus by the grace of the Holy Spirit. All else in the Gospel, from the Incarnation of the Lord to His hidden and public lives, His miracles and preaching, His Passion, Death and Resurrection has been for this, of becoming like a child” (Unless You Become Like This Child, Ignatius Press, 1991).

This probably explains why we adults as we mature and age, we mellow: we realize that we cannot simply control everything. That it is always best to act than to react in almost every situation in life. The gospel tells us today how King Herod reacted furiously after realizing the Magis have tricked him that he ordered the murder of every male child in Bethlehem below the age of two for fears of the “newborn king of Israel.” Herod lived in constant fears of being deposed in power that he also had three of his sons as well as some of his ten wives killed after suspecting them of trying to overthrow him. It is crazy but very true! We may not be like Herod with the way we react and deal with our many fears but have the same effects: death of friendships, death of love, death of everything, the end of life and adventure.

Fear is not totally negative; it has its good effects that have actually led mankind to every great progress in life like the discovery of new lands and territories, new medicines, new inventions and other things. Fear becomes a liability when it prevents us to trust more like little children. Kids and young people are often “positively” fearless because they trust so much that nobody would hurt them or that nobody would forsake them. As we age, our fears increase because our trust decreases: we fear so many things because we are afraid of losing the little we have, we are afraid of getting hurt, we are afraid of starting all over again. That’s the irony of life: we start fearing almost nothing that we grow so fast but as we age, we begin to fear everything that we stop growing and stop living. Christmas is a beautiful reminder to be children again like God the Son Jesus Christ who entrusted Himself to us, to care Him, to love Him, to protect Him, to keep Him. Let us reclaim that childhood again by casting away our fears so we can truly love faithfully and freely!

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Advent Is Time to Wake Up, to Rise and Walk in Christ

The Lord Is My Chef Breakfast Recipe-Prayer

Monday, 10 December 2018, Advent Week 2

Isaiah 35:1-10///Luke 5:17-26

As morning breaks on this first working day of the second week of Advent, I echo O Lord Jesus the joyful words of the people of your time,“We have seen incredible things today.” (Lk.5:26)

It is so incredible Lord that in this season of Advent as I try to befriend my inner self in the spirit of prayer and silence, as I try to accept all of me, my worth and unworthiness, the more you are amazingly loving and kind to me. I feel both like the paralyzed and those men in the gospel today who broke the roof of the house where you were staying so they could lower before you their sick friend. And the first words that came from you were not about healing but forgiveness! Most of all, you have forgiven the sick man after you have seen the faith of the friends who have taken apart the roof of your house. What a way of creating a room for you, Lord Jesus!

Teach me to be daring like them in creating a space for you by taking apart the many sins and pretensions I use to cover myself. Help me to take apart the various insecurities where I hide myself that prevent me from meeting you, from welcoming you into my life. So many times, Jesus, you know how I just sleepwalk in my being a Christian when I think I am radically living as your disciple when in fact I am just dreaming, just sleeping.

Teach me to abandon myself to you Lord, to relinquish all false securities that the world offers me. Most of all, let me abandon those thoughts I have about you that are not so you at all, those ideas I have about God like the scribes and Pharisees who have usurped upon themselves the standards of what is holy and not, of what is right or wrong. Let me start living in your pasch, unafraid of being vulnerable and weak so I can rise and walk again, freed from sins and infirmities. AMEN.Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II,Parokya ng San Juan Apostol at Ebanghelista, Gov. F. Halili Ave., Bagbaguin, Sta. Maria,Bulacan 3022.

*Photo by Jim Marpa, 2018. Used with permission.

LMC