When darkness becomes light

The Lord Is My Chef Easter Sunday Recipe, 21 April 2019

During our morning prayer (lauds) at the parish today, I invited my parishioners to “internalize” the meaning of Jesus being buried, being “dead” this Saturday. I love the word “internalize” that evokes the imagery of Jesus “descending into the dead” while we his disciples go inside our very selves, probing deeper our heart and soul to examine our faith in the Risen Jesus Christ.

Internalize. I think this is the keyword this Easter Sunday. To internalize means to go into the dark, to befriend darkness. Unless we have gone through the darkness of Good Friday, we shall never fully appreciate the brightness of Easter Sunday. How sad that so many of us went through all liturgical celebrations and other devotional practices of Palm Sunday into Holy Thursday and Good Friday only to be absent this Easter Sunday which is the most important celebration of our faith, the very foundation of our being Christians. All those five weeks of Lent plus the Holy Week are preparations for Easter which covers more than 50 days beginning today until Pentecost. And those 50 days are counted as one big day because Easter is the Mother of all feasts in the Church!

And if Christ has not been raised, then empty too is our preaching; empty, too, your faith.
1 Corinthians 15:14

Recent events demand that we as a Church, the Body of the Risen Lord, internalize our being Christians. You must have seen that viral photo of Antipolo pilgrims who have turned the Cathedral into a huge trash bin during Holy Thursday’s visita iglesia. It was the same sight in many churches and pilgrimage sites last week that make us wonder if Jesus is really alive in us? Or, Jesus has risen but we have remained dead in our sins and indifference, in our own “do-it-yourself” kind of religion or cafeteria Catholicism when we choose to believe only in certain teachings and beliefs that suit our tastes and well-being.

Problem is not only with the faithful but also with us priests when we have forgotten or even disregarded Jesus our Lord and Master, giving more emphasis on our own beliefs and concepts of what is true, good and beautiful that our celebrations and practices have become more of a show than expressions of faith. See how repositories on Holy Thursday have become more like a stage for “Asia’s Got Talent” or any variety show that have robbed Christ of the dignity and honor because people have become more focused with the glitz and glamour of the stage design and production. Sorry to say, it has become more of a show than a devotion as people leave talking about the spectacle than Jesus being present. And the sad part is how we priests have misled the people away from Christ but consciously or unconsciously, closer to us.

Now see my dear readers how in our gospel accounts this Easter Sunday that the prevailing mood and scenery are of darkness.

At daybreak on the first day of the week… On the first day of the week, Mary of Magdala came to the tomb early in the morning, while it was still dark… That very day, the first day of the week, two of Jesus’ disciples were going to a village seven miles from Jerusalem called Emmaus…As they approached the village to which they were going, they urged Jesus, “Stay with, for it is nearly evening and the day is almost over.”
Luke 24:1… John 20:1…Luke 24:13, 28-29

Jesus rose in the dead of the night to bring light and life. Recall how the evangelists unanimously tell us that when Jesus died, there was widespread darkness to remind us that our darkest moments in life are our finest ones when we are with him. His first appearances were all in the darkness of dawn, dusk, and evening. There is something in darkness that Jesus invites us to come to him and meet him. It is only in the dark when we truly enter into a new and deeper level of friendship and relationship, of intimacy with him or with anyone else like married couples because it is in darkness when we truly trust and believe the other person. In the darkness of the night we muster all our faith and trust, strength and courage to await the breaking of a new day filled with hope and joy.

In this age of social media when everybody has the whole world as a stage, we always live in the brightness of so many artificial lights, stage lights for performances or palabas as we call them. We no longer have what Paul Simon sings “Hello darkness my old friend, I’ve come to talk with you again…” Jesus conquered darkness so we can befriend it to find our selves and others better. Darkness is the light that leads us to Easter! Life need not be always bright because the sun does not shine on all days.

The tragedy of forgetting darkness, of always living in artificial lights is that the more we fail to see ourselves, others, God, and the world around us. The more we fail, the more we are sad, the more we are unfulfilled. Worst, the more we do not see despite all the lights! Don’t you find that ironic, even absurd? And that explains why we have so many undeserving elected leaders today. This Easter, let the darkness of the dawn, of the empty tomb be our light in following Jesus. Be not afraid to walk in the dark like the two disciples going to Emmaus because Jesus always walks with us, listens to us, shares with us in the darkness of our lives. Jesus is alive and he loves you very much! Amen.

*“Road to Emmaus” painting from Google.*

A prayer on “spy Wednesday”

The Lord Is My Chef Breakfast Recipe, Holy Wednesday, 17 April 2019

Isaiah 50:4-9///Matthew 26:14-25

Today O Lord Jesus Christ is “spy Wednesday” for tonight Judas will strike a deal with your enemies to betray you. Tonight is said to be the night of traitors, of betrayers.

O Lord, we hate being called traitors and betrayers, a Judas Iscariot. And yet, too often, it is true whenever we sin, whenever we turn away from you, when we exchange you for things and people we find more valuable than you.

One of the Twelve, who was called Judas Iscariot, went to the chief priests and said, “What are you willing to give me if I hand him over to you?” They paid him thirty pieces of silver, and from that time on he looked for an opportunity to hand him over.
Matthew 26:14-16

Please forgive us Jesus whenever we betray you. Most of all, we pray and seek your forgiveness and healing O Lord from this grave sin of betrayal for we do not only do it to you but to those most dearest to us, our family and friends whom we hurt whenever we hand them over to troubles and miseries, to grief and tears.

Help us Lord Jesus to enter into full communion with you, to be filled with your Holy Spirit so that we think and act like you in total obedience to the Father, giving no space in us for satan to trade you off for anything. Amen.

Knowing is Intimacy

The Lord Is My Chef Sunday Recipe, Palm Sunday of the Lord’s Passion, Year C, 14 April 2019

Isaiah 50:4-7///Philippians 2:6-11///Luke 22:1-49

Today we begin the Holy Week with two celebrations merged into one, Palm Sunday of the Lord’s Passion. The Palm Sunday is a tradition started by the early Christians in Jerusalem in the fourth century while in Rome during the 12th century, the Pope proclaimed the long gospel account of the Lord’s Passion on this Sunday to signal the start of Holy Week. Almost 2000 years later in reforming the liturgy, Vatican II merged these two traditions into one to usher in our holiest days of the year.

Like in the four Sundays of Lent except last week, St. Luke guides us today in reflecting the Lord’s Passion with emphasis on the Cross with its call to conversion. For St. Luke, the cross is the object of discipleship in Christ. Join me in reflecting on the last three words our evangelist had recorded when Jesus was crucified.

First word:

When they came to the place called the Skull, they crucified him and the criminals there, one on his right, the other to his left. Then Jesus said, “Father, forgive them, they know not what they do.”
Luke 23:33-34

*Mosaic of the Crucifixion at the crypt of the Manila Cathedral. Photo by Arch. Philip Santiago, October of the Jubilee of Mercy 2016.*

This is very striking. Immediately upon his crucifixion, Jesus prayed for the forgiveness of his enemies! It is a total adherence to his preaching during his sermon on the plain, “love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you” (Lk. 6:27-28, Seventh Week Ordinary Time, 24 February 2019). Here we find the immense love and mercy of Jesus — no hatred, no calls for revenge or threats like “karma” against those who crucified him. He simply begged for their forgiveness because “they know not what they do.”

In Jewish thought, to know means more than an intellectual knowledge for it implies relationship. Knowing somebody for them is more than knowing one’s name but having ties with the person. And to know something is always to see things in this perspective, always in relation with a person. Had they known Jesus is the Christ, they would have not crucified him! Exactly the preaching of St. Peter at the healing of a lame man after Pentecost at the temple when he told them they have “acted in ignorance” in “killing the Author of life whom God raised from the dead” (Acts 3:15). St. Luke also notes in his Acts of the Apostles how the crowd upon hearing St. Peter’s preaching were moved or “cut to the heart” (2:37) that many were baptized on that day. Recall also how at the arrival of the wise men from the East searching for the child Jesus: the scholars of Jerusalem “knew” from the books how the Christ would be born in Behtlehem yet he was found by the pagan magis! Even the most learned man in the New Testament, St. Paul admits how ignorant he had been in persecuting and blaspheming Jesus before (1Tim.1:13) experiencing God’s loving mercy.

In the bible we always see this combination of knowing and ignorance at the same time to indicate that more than factual and cerebral knowledge, there is that deeper knowing of relating and of loving. If we really know somebody, the more we love, the lesser we sin. St. Thomas Aquinas used to say that the more we know and become intelligent, the more we realize the truth, the more we must become good and holy. That is why saints are the most intelligent people that they were able to do what is good and what is right.

In this age of Google and Wikipedia , Jesus is challenging us that if we truly know so much that we have become smart and more intelligent, then, how much do we really love and care for others?

Second word:

Then he said, “Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom.” He replied to him, “Amen, I say to you, today you shall be with me in Paradise.”
Luke 23:42-43

The Venerable Archbishop Fulton Sheen used to claim that Dimas was indeed a great thief who was able to steal or snatch Paradise from Jesus just before dying on the Cross. It may be funny but very true. But more than “stealing” his salvation from the Lord, Dimas had displayed on the cross what we have discussed earlier about the combination of knowing and ignorance. I would say Dimas is perhaps the “most learned thief” of all time who truly knew what is most essential in life which is to know Jesus. The moment he called out to him “Jesus”, Dimas expressed his knowing Jesus, of belonging to Jesus. As we have reflected earlier, to know is to relate. Anyone who truly relates must first believe in order to love dearly. Dimas believed in Jesus that he called out to him while hanging on the Cross.

Today, Jesus is reminding us that the door to Paradise is him alone. And we begin to enter Paradise the moment we entrust our total self to Jesus like Dimas who came to know Christ at the Cross, and then believed him and loved him. If we really know, do we believe?

Altar of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre over the exact site where Jesus was crucified outside Jerusalem. Photo by Arch. Philip Santiago, October 2017.

Third word:

Jesus cried out in a loud voice, “Father, into your hands I commend my spirit,” and when he had said this he breathed his last.
Luke 23:46

One of St. Luke’s unique feature is always presenting to us Jesus at prayer. Especially here at his crucifixion. See how his first words were prayer of forgiveness for his persecutors. Now at his death, St. Luke presents Jesus again at prayer, reciting Psalm 31:5, “Father, into your hands I commend my spirit.”

Here we find the whole picture of Jesus Christ’s life which is a prayer and his prayer is his very life. From the very start, Jesus has always been one with the Father which is the essence of every prayer called communion. And that is the important aspect of his being our Savior: everything he said and did was everything the Father had told and asked him. There is that perfect communion of the Father and the Son in the Holy Spirit so that in his death, Jesus offered his total self with us to God. Everyone and everything is thus sanctified anew in Christ. This became possible only with his kenosis, his self-emptying eloquently expressed to the Philippians by St. Paul in our second reading.

On the Cross, everything in the life of Jesus Christ came to a full circle, God’s whole picture emerged. Now more than ever, we have become closest to God in love. In his dying on the Cross, Jesus made known to us God, brought him closest to us so we can relate and be intimate with him more than ever. In his becoming human like us by bearing all the pains and sufferings expressed in the first reading from Isaiah, God proved to us his love in Jesus. Most of all, he enabled us too to be capable of knowing and loving like Jesus Christ by being intimate with him always. This is why these days are called Holy Week when we are filled with God so we experience him anew and have him more than ever in our hearts, in our very selves. Amen.

Paanyaya ng Semana Santa

Lawiswis ng Salita ni P. Nicanor F. Lalog II, Ika-9 ng Abril 2019

Ano kaya ikaw ay maanyayahan
Pakinggan ngayong mga mahal na araw
Na iyong paunlakan itong panawagan
Ng bagong utos na magmahalan?

Magturingang magkakaibigan
Walang paglalamangan bagkus pagbibigayan
Respeto at dangal ng bawat isa
Lalo na ng mga nakalimutan ng lipunan.

*Tulay ng mga “magka-ibigan” at magkasintahan sa Taiwan.*

Hilumin mga pusong sugatan
Aliwin mga damdaming nasaktan
Pakinggan mga karaingan
Tulungan mga nabibigatan.

Samahan mga iniwanan
Katandaan ay alalayan
Mga sanggol ipagtanggol
Ngiti sa labi isukli sa hikbi ng mga sawi.

*Larawan ay kuha ng aking kaibigan sa Varsitarian ng UST, G. Jim Marpa, 2017.*

Marami pang paraan upang sundin
Mga tinuran nitong Panginoon natin
Noong gabi matapos nilang kumain
Aniya maghugasan din ng mga paa natin.

Halina't buksan puso't kalooban 
Upang masundan bagong paraan
Ng pamumuhay sa pagmamahalan
Ilahad banal na kalooban sa kapwa bilang kaibigan.

Maging laan na laging pakinggan
Hinanakit sa kalooban, masakit at di malabanan
Upang kanila ring maramdaman
Ika'y karamay sa kanilang kapighatian.

Doon magsisimula komunyon at kaisahan
Sa kapangyarihan ng Espiritung Banal
Isang panibagong pag-iral
Bukal ng tuwa at kagalakan.

*Larawan ay kuha ng aking kaibigan, Dra. Mai Dela Pena sa halaman ng Monasterio ng mga Carmelita sa Israel noong Oktubre 2011.*

Lent is judgment day

40 Shades of Lent, Monday, Week-V, 08 April 2019

Daniel 13:14-62///John 8:12-20

It is the final week of our 40-day preparation for Easter, Lord, yet your readings today remind us of your coming judgment day. And you know how we feel whenever we hear those words, “judgment day”.

Fear always grips us because we always feel we are not ready.

But when do we really get ready to meet you and face your judgment, Lord?

He spoke these words while teaching in the treasury in the temple area. but no one arrested him, because his hour had not yet come.
John 8:20

Unlike you, Lord Jesus, we are not God. We really do not know when that hour would come. But we are sure, O Lord, you will always give us the grace and the courage to face that hour that can be happening now. Right now.

Keep us rooted in you always, doing your holy will so that our works are verified in God.

Keep us faithful to your laws, let us practice justice especially among women and the disadvataged. Like the prophet Daniel in the first reading, let us never allow ourselves to be silent where there is injustice going on. Disturb us where people are maligned, rights are disregarded, lives are taken for granted.

O God, let us never allow evil to triumph by doing nothing, saying nothing because today is your judgment day. Amen.

*Batanes sunset after a storm. Photo by Mr. Raffy Tima of GMA7 News, October 2018.*

When goodness is repaid with evil

40 Shades of Lent, Wednesday, Week II, 20 March 2019
Jeremiah 18:18-20///Matthew 20:17-28

Our loving Father, today we share with Jeremiah in crying out to you, “Heed me, O Lord, and listen to what my adversaries say. Must good be repaid with evil that they should dig a pit to take my life? Remember that I stood before you to speak in their behalf, to turn away your wrath from them” (Jer. 18:19-20).

It is so difficult, O Lord, to understand and accept such a reality that after all the love and kindness, the compassion and concern we did for some people, we are repaid with evil.

Help us remain in you in this journey to Jerusalem with our crosses, serving one another without counting the costs or expecting to be paid in return with good favors even recognition.

May we be contented in simply walking with you, trusting in you, sharing with you.

Clear our minds and our hearts of the belief or inclination that every good deed must be rewarded by anybody. May we not be like the mother of James and John in the gospel today who asked that her sons “sit at your right and the other at your left, in your kingdom” (Mt.20:20).

The greatest reward in doing good is becoming like YOU. Amen.

Lent is docility to the Holy Spirit

40 Shades of Lent
Week I, Year C, 10 March 2019
Deuteronomy 26:4-10//Romans 10:8-13//Luke 4:1-11

Our gospel story on this first Sunday of Lent about the tempting of Jesus at the desert sets the prevailing mood and disposition we must have on this holy season: docility to the Holy Spirit.

Docility is obedience. A docile person is an obedient one who is also attentive which is the literal translation of the Latin root docilitas. On the other hand, “obedience” is also from two Latin words “ob audire” that literally mean to listen intently. Here we find that Lent is a season that invites us to be attentive God and with others. Most of all, Lent is the season that calls us to recover this beautiful trait of docility and obedience by submitting and surrendering our selves to God and those above us like our parents.

How ironic and unfortunate that in our highly advanced world, we have become inattentive with persons and more attentive with things and gadgets. We have not only become less obedient but even less caring and kind with others because we no longer care at all with persons next to us. We cannot listen intently to parents and teachers, friends and almost everybody because our ears are always plugged with earphones while our eyes are fixed on screens! And maybe that explains why we always find ourselves into so many disastrous situations in our lives that could have been prevented had we been more attentive with our selves, with others and with God. According to a study in 2015, the average attention span of audience is 8.25 seconds while a goldfish has 9 seconds. This maybe the reason why looking at fish in an aquarium can be therapeutic… at least a goldfish can spare you with more attention than anyone!

Going back to our gospel this Sunday, we sense this spirit of docility of Jesus in the introduction and conclusion of Luke’s version of the temptation in the desert that follows right after His baptism at Jordan.

Filled with the Holy Spirit, Jesus returned from the Jordan and was led by the Spirit into the desert for forty days, to be tempted by the devil. He ate nothing during those days, and when they were over he was hungry.
Luke 4:1-2

“Filled with the Holy Spirit.” What a beautiful expression to describe Jesus after His baptism at Jordan and in going to the wilderness to pray and fast, later to be tempted by the devil!

Docility in the Spirit is being filled with the Holy Spirit we first received in our Baptism, in Confirmation, in the Holy Communion and the sacraments. Every day like Jesus during His baptism at Jordan, we are filled with the Holy Spirit upon waking up because we are all beloved children of the Father. We have to claim the Holy Spirit who fills us, comes to us day in and day out. Docility in the Spirit is being attuned with God like a radio or any communication device that must be “connected” to a power or signal source. This is the reason we have to fast and do some sacrifices as well as pray during Lent so that we may be empty of our selves to be filled with the Holy Spirit and be docile to God. Without the Holy Spirit, there can be no docility.

Docility in the Spirit is entrance into the very person of Jesus Christ who is the beloved Son of God. The five Sundays of Lent are like doors that lead us closer into the innermost room of God. It is a journey that begins in our hearts. It is a journey we said last Ash Wednesday that is more about direction than destination. We enter the person of Jesus Christ, just like when He entered the synagogue at Nazareth to proclaim the reading from Isaiah that said “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me…” (Lk.4:14-21). The people were amazed at Jesus because He was so filled with the Holy Spirit that they really felt the part of the scripture fulfilled in His proclamation. Recall also the gospel last Sunday when Jesus said “from the fullness of the heart the mouth speaks” (Lk.6:45) to remind us that whatever good or evil comes from us comes from what is in our hearts, from the kind of spirit that fills us.

Jesus was consistently filled with the Holy Spirit up to the end, was consistently docile to the Father that reached its summit at the Cross because he was also continuously tempted on many occasions by the devil up to His crucifixion. That final temptation at His crucifixion was first heard in the wilderness when the devil said “if you are the Son of God” very similar with the words of the bystanders at the foot of the Cross. Most of all, that final temptation at the crucifixion was foreshadowed in the desert when the devil led Jesus to parapet of the temple in Jerusalem, teasing Him to throw Himself down for the angels would surely support Him.

Every time the devil tempts us to sin, his intention is not only for us to sin but for our lives to be destroyed by making us turn away from God signified by jumping from the top of the temple in Jerusalem. Jesus knew this so well that is why from the desert to the Cross, Jesus remained docile to the Father, remained filled with the Holy Spirit by relying on the powers of God than of Himself or of anyone else. And that is always the temptation we also encounter daily: to abandon God, to rely on ourselves and various forms of human powers. Every temptation faced by Jesus was always a temptation to abandon God’s plans, to be ordinary, to remain stuck in the level of the of the world.

The good news is not only that Jesus had overcome every temptation from the devil but most of all, enables us to do so by filling us with the Holy Spirit. Like Moses in the first reading, remember how God saved us in the past. He will never forsake us for as St. Paul reminds us today, “everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved” (Rom.10:13). May we be attentive to the Holy Spirit always. Amen.

The imagery of the wilderness every Lent invites us to be docile, i.e., literally attentive in Latin, to the Holy Spirit, to the things of God and of the more sublime than merely human and material. Photo by author, Holy Land, April 2017.

The Joy of Lent

40 Shades of Lent
Saturday after Ash Wednesday, 08 March 2019
Isaiah 58:9-14///Luke 5:27-32

Our loving Father, we are now about to enter the first Sunday of Lent. We have been trying to be serious with this season with our prayers and fasting. But, let us not lose sight of the fact that Lent is a joyous season too as we wait for Easter!

There are times O Lord some of us feel like Levi, sitting alone at the customs post, surrounded with all the wealth and trappings of the world, longing for some meaning in life. Maybe like Levi in that little customs post, some of us feel trapped in our sinfulness with no help in sight.

But, then you came, O Lord Jesus, like a shaft of light amid the darkness, just passing by, saying “follow me” (Lk. 5:27) without even asking our sins or work or world. You asked us nothing but you know everything about us. And that is the mystery that caught us!

What a joy being called to follow you, despite our sinfulness. Remind us always of that joy of Lent that in the midst of our sinfulness and darkness, you still come to call us to follow you.

Help us, O Lord to “remove oppression from our midst, false accusation, and malicious speech… bestow bread to the hungry and satisfy the afflicted” (Is.58:9-10). Help us to sustain our efforts in following you in every direction by being good and just with one another. Amen.

The Calling of St. Matthew (Levi), a painting by Caravaggio which is one of the favorite masterpieces frequently visited by Pope Francis in Rome while still a student and Archbishop of Buenos Aires. Let us keep in mind that Lent, despite it penitential character, is a joyful season of Christ’s coming. Images from Google.

Life is Lent.

40 Shades Of Lent 
Thursday after Ash Wednesday, 07 March 2019
Deuteronomy 30:15-20///Luke 9:22-25

Dearest God:

Life is a mystery, life is Lent. Of course, we always choose life over death but in reality, you know it is not so: though our lips, our minds agree in the words of Moses, our hearts are so far from you.

“Today I have set before you life and prosperity, death and doom. If you obey the commandments of the Lord, your God, which I enjoin on you today, loving him, and walking in his ways, and keeping his commandments, statutes and decrees, you will live and grow numerous, and the Lord, your God, will bless you in the land you are entering to occupy.”
(Deut.30:15-16)

Teach us, O God, through your Son Jesus Christ our Lord to rightly choose life by being responsible with this gift of life, of taking care of others by forgetting our very self; of bearing with all the pains of life by carrying our cross daily; and most of all, by following his direction, being present and one in him and with him in every persecution.

Life is a daily Lent when we lose ourselves in you to be renewed into a better person more like you, our true image and likeness. Amen.

We always have something to give

The Lord Is My Chef Breakfast Recipe for the Soul
Tuesday, 05 March 2019, Week VIII, Year I
Sirach 35:1-12///Mark 10:28-31

*Sunrise at Lake of Galilee, the Holy Land. Photo by the author, April 2017.*

Lord Jesus Christ, you know very well our favorite expression in Filipino “walang wala ako” whenever we do not feel like helping somebody in need especially if it is money.

We always say it to show how poor we are, that we literally have nothing at all. And you know as we also know very well that it is not true at all.

Forgive us in professing that absolute lie for if ever we possess no wealth at all when our hands are totally empty of anything, we still have those hands to share and reach out to anyone in need.

Help us heed Ben Sirach’s admonition,

“Appear not before the Lord empty handed, for all that you offer is a fulfillment the precepts… Give to the Most High as he has given you, generously, according to your means. For the Lord is one who always repays and he will give back to you sevenfold.”
(Sir. 35:4, 9-10)

Let us not be like Simon Peter who sometimes feel bragging about our sacrifices and offerings for everything we have is not ours but all yours.

Amen.