Blessed hunger & thirst for God

Lord My Chef Sunday Recipe for Soul by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II
Solemnity of All Saints, 01 November 2026
Revelation7:2-4, 9-14  ><}}}}*>  1 John 3:1-3  ><}}}}*>  Matthew 5:1-12

Thousands of people arrive to pray at the graves of their relatives at a cemetery during the annual observance of All Saint’s Day in Manila on November 1, 2019. Photo by *Ted Aljibe, AFP.*

The way we Filipinos say goodbyes illustrates vividly – with a dash of some humor – the theology of our celebrations of All Saints Day and All Souls Day we collectively call as Undas.

When we are in a party or any gathering, we never say we are leaving like alis na ako that sounds rude, or layas na ako that is tinged with anger while diyan na kayo could mean burning of one’s bridges, a sort of total separation.

Normally, we say goodbyes either by saying tutuloy na po ako or mauna na po ako. The po is optional but both are the most kind and accepted way of telling everuyone we are leaving. our hosts we are leaving. Tutuloy na ako literally in English is “I’m coming in”when you are actually going out to leave while mauna na po ako means I’m going first or will go ahead of everybody whereas no one is following you especially the host.

But here are the twists in these Filipino goodbyes: both indicate our being Christians, of our deeply ingrained religiosity no matter how hard some would deny. Whenever we say tutuloy na ako, mauna na ako, we unconsciously or subconsciously express our hunger and thirst for heaven, for eternal life.

To say tutuloy na ako is to express that basic truth we all die with one final destination which is heaven in eternal life.

To say mauuna na ako is an affirmation of our other famous maxim about death, una-una lang yan, that nobody knows who’s going to die among us next.

Every time we bid goodbye to anyone, we express this holy desires to be in heaven, to be with God, to be like all the Saints we celebrate on this first day of November.

When Jesus saw the crowds, he went up the mountain, and after he had sat down, his disciples came to him. He began to teach them, saying: “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness for they will be satisfied” (Matthew 5:1-2, 6).

*Photo by author, Baguio City, July 2018.*

In this time of faith in a mass-mediated culture that thrives in promoting pleasures and merry-making alongside with overflowing food and drinks while more others are starving and dying in hunger and still more are without potable water to drink, we find the fourth beatitude a rarity.

Notice how bacchanalian our generation has become with all the food apps and restaurants offering a plethora of food and drinks so glorified in social media called “food porn”, a prostitution of food and drinks. How sad so many people has become so insensitive in posting all their food in social media without any deference for the poor who could barely make ends meet for a decent meal thrice daily. See how so few among us Catholics really fast or go on abstinence every Ash Wednesday and Good Friday with all of our excuses and alibis.

*Photo by author, side entrance to Church of Beatitudes, the Holy Land, May 2019.*

Very sad.

Hence, Jesus called “blessed” those who hunger and thirst for righteousness because it is an affirmation of our faith in him who told the devil in the wilderness that “man does not live by bread alone but by every that comes forth from the mouth of God” (Mt.2:4). To hunger and thirst for righteousness is to value more the soul than the body. It is an appetite for the sacred and for things of deeper value and importance than those that are fleeting and superficial like food and drinks and other pleasures including those that bloat our egos.

Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness because it is a desire to be holy first of all, a desire for God himself, a desire for heaven. Righteousness for the Jews is holiness which is the observance of God’s Laws and Commandments. But, problem with this frame of mind as we have seen since the other Sunday is the tendency to be legalistic, to see more the Laws than the person that ultimately, fails to see God in one another.

Holiness is being filled with God like the souls already in heaven called Saints. They are holy because they have been purified of their sins and therefore filled with God as John tells us in his vision of heaven of great multitudes wearing white robes washed in the Blood of the Lamb.

But for us still on earth, still battling with sin and evil, holiness is being filled with God but not sinless. And because we are filled with God, we strive always to work alongside with Christ, bearing all the pains and sufferings he bore first for us for the sake of righteousness, of justice and peace. In this world when conformity to whatever “everyone is doing” is the rule of the game like corruption, dishonesty, and infidelity, being hungry and thirsty with the poor and suffering is our strongest signs of protest and resistance against the prevailing evils of our time. Being hungry and thirsty for righteousness is also being hungry and thirsty for the Kingdom of God because that is a sharing in Christ’s Passion and Death leading to his glorious Resurrection.

*Photo from bloomberg.com of a homeless man in New York City during a fashion week in summer 2019.*

The most difficult daily struggle we all contend with is our hunger and thirst, our most basic instincts for the most basic needs of food and water in order to live; without food and water, we grow weak and die. However, hunger and thirst tend us to overindulge with food and drinks because these readily give us pleasures, making us forget the more essential things in life.

That is why the need for some forms of sacrifices like abstinence and fasting not only with food and drinks but anything that gives us pleasure and comfort so that we learn to desire for higher things like God, holiness and virtues.

The fourth beatitude is most timely in a world that has become so consumerist where only matter matters with everything reduced to pera pera lang with God slowly being deleted from daily life scenes. See how our world has become like showbiz with all the glitz and glamor with everything for show or palabas that despite the abundance we now enjoy not only in food and drinks but almost everything, the more we have become empty and alienated within.

Blessed are you if you hunger and thirst for righteousness because it is a grace reminding you of that fact many forget that the world and everything here passes. Being hungry and thirsty for righteousness is having God in your heart, of experiencing his love, of working to love others so that they too may experience God because they have been so hungry and thirsty for love and kindness, care and concern from others.

What do you hunger and thirst for these days?

How sad that with all these technologies we now have meant to bring us closer with one another have actually brought us apart. Worst of all, the very technologies meant to work for us now enslave us, becoming not only the gods of many but masters too. Blessed are you in your hunger and thirst for God because he alone in Christ Jesus can truly satisfy us here and hereafter. Dwell in the love of God in Jesus Christ John tells us in the second reading like the saints who have gone ahead of us, resisting all evils and temptations to sin for only the Lord satisfies us. Amen. A blessed All Saints’ Day to you!

*A panel of Fra Angelico’s painting (1423-24) “The Forerunners of Christ with Saints and Martyrs” from wikipedia.*

August month, not ghost month

Quiet Storm by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II, 19 August 2026

*Photo by Boris Pavlikovsky on Pexels.com*

Of all the months in the year, August has the most beautiful name of all but sadly most maligned as a “ghost month”: from the Latin augustus that signifies reverence or to hold someone in high regard, august as an adjective means “respected and impressive” like when we say “in this august hall of men and women” of science or faith.

Yes, it was also taken from the name of the Roman emperor Augustus Caesar but like the rest of the months and days of each year, it is always a blessed one.

No day nor date nor time is malas because these each day is a gift from God who is all good. Nothing bad can come from God.

Moreover, when God became human like us in the coming of Jesus Christ, life has become holy, filled with God, debunking those ancient beliefs of the Divine being seen in various cosmic forces. Pope Benedict explained this so well in his second encyclical:

*Photo by a friend in Washington, 28 July 2026.*

In this regard a text by Saint Gregory Nazianzen is enlightening. He says that at the very moment when the Magi, guided by the star, adored Christ the new king, astrology came to an end, because the stars were now moving in the orbit determined by Christ[2]. This scene, in fact, overturns the world-view of that time, which in a different way has become fashionable once again today. It is not the elemental spirits of the universe, the laws of matter, which ultimately govern the world and mankind, but a personal God governs the stars, that is, the universe; it is not the laws of matter and of evolution that have the final say, but reason, will, love—a Person. And if we know this Person and he knows us, then truly the inexorable power of material elements no longer has the last word; we are not slaves of the universe and of its laws, we are free. In ancient times, honest enquiring minds were aware of this. Heaven is not empty. Life is not a simple product of laws and the randomness of matter, but within everything and at the same time above everything, there is a personal will, there is a Spirit who in Jesus has revealed himself as Love[3]. (#5, Spe Salvi by Pope Benedict XVI, 30 November 2007)

That’s quite a volume but so lucid, so true, so beautiful. Especially this part: “It is not the elemental spirits of the universe, the laws of matter, which ultimately govern the world and mankind, but a personal God governs the stars, that is, the universe; it is not the laws of matter and of evolution that have the final say, but reason, will, love—a Person.”

This is the whole meaning of the recent Sunday gospel of Jesus walking on water: God in total control of this world.

*“Christ Walking On Water” painting by Julius Servus von Klever (1880) from commons.wikipedia.org*.

It is this Person of Jesus Christ why so many great men and women then and now have abandoned their previous ways of life to lead holy lives even in the face of death.

Very interesting in this modern time are two great saints we celebrate on this month of August, St. Teresa Benedicta of the Cross (August 09) and St. Maximilian Kolbe (August 14) who died at the gas chambers of Auschwitz during the Second World War.

St. Teresa Benedicta is the German philosopher Edith Stein. She came from a prosperous Jewish family gifted with a great mind becoming one of the first female university student and later professor in Germany.

An associate of the famed Edmund Husserl of the philosophical method of phenomenology, St. Teresa Benedicta became an atheist during her teenage years; but, upon further studies and prayer, converted into Catholicism, becoming a Carmelite nun where she adopted her new name. She wrote that “Those who seek truth seek God, whether they realize it or not“.

She actually had all the chances to leave for South America and then to Switzerland to escape the Nazis but opted to stay in their monastery in the Netherlands with her younger sister Rosa who had also converted as Catholic and joined the Third Order Carmelite. When they were arrested on August 2, 1942, she told her, “Come, Rosa… we go for our people.”

*Photo from FB page of Scott Hahn, 09 August 2024.*

St. Teresa Benedicta honored her Jewish roots by dying among them as a martyr of Christ, one who had “learned to live in God’s hands” according to Sr. Josephine Koeppel, OCD, a translator of much of her works.

According to various accounts, St. Teresa Benedicta showed great inner strength by encouraging her fellow prisoners to have faith in God while helping in looking after the small children when their mothers were so distressed to do so. One woman who survived the war wrote: “Every time I think of her sitting in the barracks, the same picture comes to mind: a Pieta without the Christ.”

Dying ahead of her in Auschwitz on August 14, 1941 was St. Maximilian Kolbe, a Franciscan priest who was arrested for his writings against the evil Nazis. It was actually his second time to be arrested.

When a prisoner had escaped from the camp, authorities rounded up ten men to die in exchange of the lone escapee. Fr. Kolbe volunteered to take the place of a married man with children. They were all tortured and starved in order to die slowly in pain.

A devotee of the Blessed Virgin Mary, St. Maximilian was injected with carbolic acid on the eve of the Assumption after guards found him along with three other prisoners still alive, without any signs of fear like screaming but silently praying.

We no longer have gas chambers but atrocities against human life continue in our time, hiding in the pretext of science and laws with some like the wokes exaggerating the truth they believe or follow in the name of inclusivity and various rights.

And yet, there are men and women, young and old alike including those not yet born in their mother’s womb are hunted and killed both for profits and for convenience to correct what many perceived as excesses and wrongs in the society like the grim drug war of the past administration.

Or those corrupt government officials and despicable politicians, from the highest offices down to the barangay behind the flood control scam that are all ghost projects that have submerged vast areas and communities into floods.

The Nazi officers and soldiers of Auschwitz of the past and those involved in the flood control scam as well as the tokhang drug war remind us the true “ghosts” and evil spirits of our time sowing hatred and deaths are people who may be well-dressed, even educated in the best schools, and come from devout or “normal” families. They sow evil every day without choosing any particular month, blindly following orders without much thinking and reflections or introspection. These people entrusted with positions and power are mostly the ones who bring ghosts into our lives causing so much miseries among our people especially the poor ones. Many times, they insist on following or speaking the truth – a truth so empty of the person of Jesus Christ who is “the way and the truth and the life” (Jn.14:6).

I have always believed that the opposite of love is not hatred but hopelessness – without hope, people will just destroy everything for the sake of wealth and power.

Saints have shown us that with much love in our hearts in Jesus Christ, we are also filled with his hopes for better, holier days and months.

By the lives of the many great saints of August, or of any other month for that matter, we are reminded that holiness is not being sinless but being filled with God, being converted daily to the truth of Jesus Christ by allowing that holiness to spill over and flow onto others with our lives of authenticity expressed in charity and mercy, kindness and justice, humility and openness with one another. As St. Paul had written, “Do not conform yourself to this age but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and pleasing and perfect” (Rom.12:2).

And so, discard those thoughts of a ghost month and let us keep every month an august time and space for our good deeds to make Christ’s loving presence felt among us. A blessed week to everyone!

“Please stay here… I will not leave you.”

Lord My Chef Daily Recipe for the Soul by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II
Wednesday in the Eleventh Week of Ordinary Time, Year II, 17 June 2026
2 Kings 2:1, 16-14 ><))))*> + ><))))*> + ><))))*> Matthew 6:1-6, 16-18

*Photo by author, St. Michael Retreat House, Antipolo City, 16 June 2026.*

Your words today,
O Lord, 
are lovely paradoxes
expressed in the two readings:
from the second book of Kings,
you invite us to walk with
Elijah and Elisha to experience
both being a mentor and a student,
a companion in life's journey,
comfortable in conversation
and silence, most especially 
in doing your will.

Elijah said to Elisha, “Please stay here; the Lord has sent me on to the Jordan.” As the Lord lives, and as you yourself live, I will not leave you,” Elisha replied (2Kings 2:6).

And that is how life is,
people come like family and friends
but eventually we part ways
and in every separation,
there remains God who keeps
our bonds together,
even getting stronger after death,
the ultimate separation.
Here you call us, Lord, 
to witness to others your loving presence
as part of our mission,
not for our own glory.
May we have the same courage
of Elisha to show to everyone
your power not for personal gain
but for mission to continue the
works of Elijah.

But before we can go out
witnessing your loving presence
and power, 
dear Jesus,
teach us first to remain hidden
in doing what is right,
what is just,
and what is good as expressed
in your gospel today;
let us realize that despite 
life is now lived in social media,
the more essential things in life
are still and will remain best kept hidden;
it is in that hiddenness where we
must remain and stay like Elisha
to truly witness your great power
not for our own sake and vanity
but for your mission and glory
so that at the end of our daily journey,
we may find you always,
Lord Jesus,
in every "Jordan" we cross
like Elijah
and Elisha. 
Amen.

*Photo by author, sunset at the RISE Tower, Our Lady of Fatima University, Valenzuela City, 10 June 2026.*

What good is it?

Lord My Chef Daily Recipe for the Soul by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II
Tuesday in the Eleventh Week of Ordinary Time, Year II, 16 June 2026
1 Kings 21:17-29 <*[[[[>< + ><]]]]*> Matthew 5:43-48

God our loving Father,
grant me the grace to love you more,
to follow you more closely,
to be like you,
"perfect" and "holy";
I feel so sad especially
these days as I continue to grapple
with your mystery,
of your immense love for us all,
even ton our enemies and oppressors.

Jesus said to his disciples: “You have heard that it was said, You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy. But I say to you, love your enemies, and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be children of your heavenly Father… So be perfect, just as your heavenly Father is perfect” (Matthew 5:43-45, 48).

What is most difficult
for me, O Lord, is when your
"anger" subsides,
when your mercy prevails
on those who do evil against us
like King Ahab in the first reading;
oh yes, Father,
sorry but it is true,
we enjoy you "castigating"
evil doers like King Ahab;
but, why Oh why,
after he had realized his sins
and be sorry,
you suddenly change your mind?

Then the Lord said to Elijah the Tishbite,
"Have you seen that Ahab has humbled himself
before me?
Since he has humbled himself before me,
I will not bring the evil in his time.
I will bring the evil upon his house
during the reign of his son"
(1 Kings 21:28-29).

Forgive me,
Lord Jesus Christ
when sometimes I see
vengeance as a form of justice,
forgetting your lesson yesterday;
but, help me learn
and realize to embrace fully
your words that are so extravagant,
asking far more than anyone
might ever think possible
not only in loving our enemies,
or doing good to our persecutors
but mystery of all mysteries is
when perpetrators of evil seem
to get away with their sins
like King Ahab
by simply being sorry?

But, on deeper prayer
as peace and tranquility
take over my anger,
then I realize your call Jesus
to be perfect like the Father
is also a call for me to be vulnerable
like him in offering kindness
because he is a Father,
not because of any worthiness
of anyone among us
for we are all sinners;
indeed,
we do not deserve anything at all
but because of your love,
you have made us deserving.

May we find your love
and kindness
and mercy in us, Jesus,
instead of look for these
on those who hurt us
for indeed, 
what good is it really
if I can love only
 those who love me
or hate those who hate me?

With you dwelling in my heart,
Jesus,
it's no good at all,
no good at all
for what is truly good
is to love like you:
help me Jesus
to bear witness
to your loving presence
in the world.
Amen.

Holiness in Silence

Lord My Chef Recipe for Holy Saturday, 04 April 2026

*Photo by author, Sacred Heart Novitiate, Novaliches, QC, 20 March 2026.*

A blessed Holy Saturday to you.

One of the most unforgettable scenes of COVID-19 pandemic when it started in the summer of 2020 was like what we have every Holy Saturday – empty streets with everyone away.

And silent.

What a blessed Holy Saturday we have again today like six years ago as we are in the midst of another worldwide crisis in oil prices due to the US-Israeli war against Iran, inviting us to rediscover the beauty and value of silence.

Because holiness is found in silence, the very language of God.

In the Bible, silence always precedes God’s appearances and revelations:

From the Book of Genesis in the story of creation when there was nothing – therefore, silent – to John’s gospel that said, “In the beginning was the word” to indicate there was only silence until “the word became flesh” (Jn.1:1, 14) in Jesus Christ who was totally silent during his growing up years in Nazareth and later frequently went into deserted places to rest and pray in silence during his ministry.

Here we find in Jesus that holiness is first found in silence and in rest, when we listen more to God to do his will.

On that first Holy Saturday when Jesus was buried in a tomb, the whole creation came to full circle.

See how after completing creation, God rested on the seventh day and made it holy (Gen.2:3) while Jesus was laid to rest on the seventh day too after completing his mission of salvation.

Silence and rest always go together.

This we vividly find in our Filipino word for rest which is magpahinga that literally means “to be breathed on”, to be filled with God which is what holiness is all about.

Like in the creation of the first man who was breathed on by God to be alive, Jesus breathed on his disciples locked in the upper room after greeting them with peace twice on the evening of Easter.

Silence is not being quiet, not an emptiness when we shut off all sounds and noise.

Silence is actually a fullness, of trying to listen to all sounds and noise in order to distinguish which to listen to. It is in silence when we hear our true selves, when we understand and feel others and most especially become one in God.

That is why when we rest, we return to Eden, like the garden where Jesus was buried.

Now in the place where he had been crucified there was a garden, and in the garden a new tomb, in which no one had yet been buried. So they laid Jesus there because of the Jewish preparation day; for the tomb was close by (John 19:41-42).

What a lovely image of God’s rest and silence in Eden and of Jesus laid to rest at a tomb in a garden because to rest in silence is to stop playing God as we return to him as his image and likeness again.

Today let us cultivate anew the practice of silence, of listening to the various sounds around us and within us and most of all, trying to listen to the most faint, the softest sound that is often the voice of God within us, reassuring us that in the midst of his silence, he never leaves us, that with him we are rising again to new life like Jesus Christ.

Let us be like those women who rested on the sabbath when Jesus was laid to rest. That like them, we may trust God more by being true to ourselves even in the midst of this oil crisis.

The women who had come from Galilee with him followed behind, and when they had seen the tomb and the way in which his body was laid in it, they returned and prepared spices and perfumed oils. Then they rested on the sabbath according to the commandment (Luke 23:55-56).

Imagine the more difficult situation those women were into during that time. But they dared to rest in silence in the Lord. Unlike us today worried only with prices of oil and other goods, without threats at all to our lives.

Silence is the domain of trust; people afraid of silence are afraid to trust.

Perhaps that explains why almost everyone is glued with their cellphones or stuck with earphones and EarPods to have each one’s own world, unmindful of others.

On the other hand, the most trusting people are the silent ones. And always, the most loving ones too.

Let us pray:

Help us to be silent today, 
O God our Father 
as we remember your Son Jesus Christ’s 
Great Silence – Magnum Silentium – 
when he was “crucified, died and was buried; 
he descended to the dead and on the third day he rose again.”
Breathe on us your Spirit of life and joy,
O God as we rest in you,
listening to your voice within us
so that we may follow always Jesus Christ's
path to Easter in the Cross.
Amen.

Lent is going beyond normal

40 Shades of Lent by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II
Friday in the First Week of Lent, 27 February 2026
Ezekiel 18:21-28     + + +     Matthew 5:20-26

*Photo by Dra. Mylene A. Abad Santos, MD, February 2021.*

Thank you,
dear Father for the
first week of Lent about
to end; much is still to be 
desired to be closer to you,
to be faithful to you,
to be one in you;
teach me in your Son Jesus
to go beyond the letters of
your laws,
to go beyond the minimum
requirements,
to go beyond of what is asked
of us in order to be more
loving to others in you:

Jesus said to his disciples: “I tell you, unless your righteousness surpasses that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will not enter into the Kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 5:20).

Teach us to be holy
or righteous
like you;
make us whole,
to be different
and be radical by
going back to you
our very roots of being
and existence;
instead taking the path
of supremacy especially
when we are angry
that we are unafraid of
breaking away from others,
insisting on what is right
than on what is good,
let us be reconciled
with you in others
and in our very selves
where peace remains
the best to have.

To go beyond
than what is required
is to be humble and gentle
like you, dear Jesus,
caring more for people
and relationships
than on being right
which often is not the case;
holiness
or righteousness
is confronting and accepting
our limitations
so that your infinite power
of love and mercy
may work in us
and through us,
Lord Jesus.

Lent is going beyond
the ordinary
because it is about
choosing you, Lord
above all else always:
you never condemn us
letting go and forgetting
of our past sins when we
choose to finally live in
your presence doing your will;
however, 
let us not be complacent
in your presence, Lord
for our good record
can be undone completely
when we refuse to love
you in others.

O Lord Jesus,
you have given me
with so much chances
to become better;
help me to remain in you
so I can also give more
chances
more mercy
and more love
to others lost and trying 
to find you.
Amen.

Integrity is living faith in Christ

Lord My Chef Sunday Recipe for the Soul by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II
Sixth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Cycle A, 15 February 2026
Sirach 15:15-20 ><}}}}*> 1 Corinthians 2:6-10 ><}}}}*> Matthew 5:17-37

It is a day after Valentine’s, also the final Sunday before we take a long break from Ordinary Time to start the 40 days of Lent this Ash Wednesday leading us to Easter that lasts until the month of May. It is so lovely and timely that we hear Jesus teaching us this Sunday to examine our hearts always so that we can live our faith in him daily, of remaining blessed in his beatitudes.

We are still at the sermon on the mount with Jesus giving us a series of general teachings illustrated in some concrete examples. However, keep in mind these are not new teachings as Jesus himself clarified he had come not to abolish but to fulfill the laws. In the light of the Beatitudes he taught us the other Sunday, Jesus is now directing us to look deeper into our hearts, to make it whole again in him and stay blessed unlike the scribes and the Pharisees.

Jesus said to his disciples: “I tell you, unless your righteousness surpasses that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will not enter into the kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 5:20).

This is not the first time we have heard the word “righteousness” in Matthew who used it to describe Joseph in his Christmas story as “a righteous man” (Mt.1:19).

Being righteous for the Jews is being holy which is obeying and living by the laws and commandments of God. Unfortunately, they got centered with the letters of the laws as insisted by their scribes and Pharisees. When Jesus came, they have forgotten God himself as well as the value of the human person and life itself for which the laws were meant to be. Matthew rectified this at the start of his gospel with the story of the annunciation of Christ’s birth to Joseph who obeyed God’s command expressed in his love for Mary whom he took as his wife then pregnant with the Savior he named as “Jesus”.

Righteousness or holiness is not being sinless but being filled with God, living our faith in Christ by witnessing his gospel. From the Greek word holos that means “whole” not broken, holiness in a sense is what we call as integrity.

Holiness, righteousness, and integrity all begin in the heart that we find expressed in the sixth Beatitude taught by Jesus two Sundays ago, “Blessed are the clean of heart, for they will see God” (Mt.5:8).

*Photo by Designecologist on Pexels.com*

A clean heart is a loving heart. We can only see God and the other persons with a loving heart. The human intellect cannot know most especially God as St. Paul tells us in the second reading.

In the same manner, we know the other person not with the intellect but always with the heart as the Little Prince said, “What is essential is invisible to the eye; it is only with the heart that one can truly see” while Marvin Gaye expressed it so beautifully in his 1971 hit “What’s Going On” with the lines “we have to put some lovin’ here today” so we can understand each other.

Indeed, the heart is the very center or core of every person because everything flows from the heart. And this is what Jesus himself underscores in his three admonitions against anger, lust, and falsehoods this Sunday. In all three teachings, we find how love is severely damaged when we quarrel against each other, when we take everyone as things and objects to be used, and when we lack the sincerity in our words.

“You have heard that it was said to your ancestors, You shall not kill; whoever kills will be liable to judgment. But I say to you, whoever is angry with his brother will be liable to judgment, and whoever says to his brother ‘Raqa,’ will be answerable to the Sanhedrin, and whoever says, ‘You fool,’ will be liable to fiery Gehenna”(Mt.5:21-22).

First thing we notice in these three teachings is its construction where Jesus first mentioned what was said by the ancestors in the phrase “You have heard” immediately followed by his own take, “But, I say to you.”

Again, Jesus is not contradicting the laws given by Moses and elaborated by their elders; Jesus was actually expressing its fullness in him found in love that begins in the heart which St. Paul reiterated in his letters that love is the perfection of the laws and commandments of God.

Whenever we quarrel in words or in deeds, we not only break our ties with each other as brothers and sisters but even with God we call “our Father”. Remember, love of God is love of one another. And the sad part of this reality is our being cut off from God even if we don’t admit it. And even if we know we have nothing against anyone, we surely feel the break-up in our selves due to the lack of love and charity, most of all, of peace. That is why Jesus added that when in our worship we realize a brother or sister has anything against us, we must first reconcile with him or her. That is why before the Holy Communion, we give the greeting of peace with one another who represents the person we are at odds with. The responsibility becomes more pronounced if the person is in the same assembly we are in if we really want to have a meaningful and holy communion.

“You have heard that it was said, You shall not commit adultery. But I say to you, everyone who looks at a woman with lust has already committed adultery with her in his heart” (Mt.5:27-28).

Here we go again with the issues of marital infidelity as well as of divorce: at the very core of this is the equality of every person, of every man and woman as being created in the image and likeness of God with same equal dignity. Jesus reminds us today that there is no difference between man and woman when it comes to marriage because the same duties of fidelity bind each partner. Most of all, Jesus has consistently taught how we must go beyond the Laws when it comes to marriage because every spouse is an image of himself, of his saving grace. Hence, we must reject every temptation and inappropriate words and actions that may destroy unity and love of couples and even in our other relationships as family and friends.

*Photo by author, Makati City, 09 February 2026.*

“Again you have heard that it was said to your ancestors, Do not take a false oath, but make good to the Lord all that you vow. But I say to you, do not swear at all. Let your ‘Yes’ mean ‘Yes,’ and your ‘No’ mean ‘No.” Anything more is from the evil one” (Mt.5:33-34).

This last admonition is perhaps most needed these days when we are bombarded with too much fake news as well as our own words are empty. Shakespeare said it so well in Hamlet, “words, words, words” wherein we think and believe that the more we increase our words, the more it becomes true and meaningful.

Of course, it it totally untrue as Jesus reminded us today to be truthful always. In Genesis, we are told in the story of creation how God shared only this power of words, of language with humans alone. Our ability to speak is a sharing in God’s power that demands responsibilities (Spiderman). Hence in the first reading, Ben Sirach reminds us to be responsible in choosing good than evil like in choosing between “fire and water”, “life and death”. Ben Sirach’s short reminders are very timely in this age of social media where “influencers” choose for us not only the candidates to elect but even the food to eat and clothes to wear. Being free is to decide, to choose knowingly what is good.

This Sunday, Jesus invites us to look into our hearts, to cleanse it of evil and sins so that he may dwell and reign completely in our hearts so we can have integrity and remain blessed and holy in him. Amen. Have a blessed week ahead, everyone!

Praying with Bono and U2

Lord My Chef Daily Recipe for the Soul by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II
Friday, Third Week in Ordinary Time, Year II, 30 January 2026
2 Samuel 11:1-4, 5-10, 13-17 <*((((>< + ><))))*> Mark 4:26-34

*Photo by author, Museo Valenzuela & the National Shrine of Our Lady of Fatima, Valenzuela City, 21 January 2026.*


Thank you Lord Jesus
for the Friday break,
the penultimate day of this month
of January 2026;
it was a heavy week 
and a very long month 
for most of us we thought
would never end.

We are thankful Lord
today because we are still
with you with many of us
struggling in our prayer lives,
persevering in being good
and everything like being king
and understanding and forgiving;
indeed, like your parable today,
everything good begins so small
like the seed scattered in the field
that sprout and grow while the farmer
sleeps and rises night and day
without really knowing how;
but that is how it is also with
sin and evil that always begins
so small, so subtle 
like in the experience of
David in the first reading: 
he had been complacent
in his life falling into temptations
of lust that led into murder.

Dear Jesus,
remind us always 
to never take little things
for granted -
whether small deeds that
lead to holiness or small
sins that may leave us stuck in 
a moment we can't get out of
according to Bono of U2:

You've got to get yourself together
You've got stuck in a moment
And now you can't get out of it
Don't say that later will be better
Now you're stuck in a moment
And you can't get out of it

We pray, Lord Jesus
for those feeling stuck in 
a moment or a sin or a vice
or a relationship that they can't
get out of;
give them the courage to quit
and return to you,
even little by little.
Amen.

*I know what you are thinking but this is a good piece from U2's 2000 album "All That You Can't Leave Behind"... it might help you pray better.

From Youtube.com

Bloodlines do not bring Christmas

Lord My Chef Simbang Gabi Recipe for the Soul by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II
Thursday, Simbang Gabi-III, 18 December 2025
Jeremiah 23:5-8 ><}}}}*> + ><}}}}*> + ><}}}}*> Matthew 1:18-25

*Photo of St. Joseph with Child Jesus from vaticannews.va.*

After presenting to us the genealogy of Jesus, Matthew now gives us the very essence of Christ’s origin who is God himself making him truly Divine but at the same time coming from the lineage of Abraham and David, truly human like us in everything except sin.

But, in the light of the corruption so rampant in our country, I find Matthew’s genealogy so timely as it also shows us so clearly the need to break away from the much vaunted and abused powers of bloodlines and kinship so common in most nations and societies where key positions and status are considered as hereditary.

Sociologists call it “familism” which is too much emphasis on one’s family line that leads to abuses like nepotism in offices, dynasty in politics and even caste systems that all degrade of the value of every human person. We reflected yesterday how in the genealogy of Jesus, we are all beloved children of God; when some people cling to power and positions as if they are the only ones capable of doing things even in bringing Christmas, they are totally wrong.

See how in our country politicians shamelessly abuse their power in a family dynasty occupying all elective positions aside from controlling major businesses in their town or city, region or province. A classic example of kawalan ng kahihiyan. And thank God Jesus was not born in the Philippines!

Sorry for the rant but let us recall Matthew’s shift yesterday in the flow of Christ’s genealogy at the end: “Eliud the father of Eleazar. Eleazar became the father of Matthan, Matthan the father of Jacob, Jacob the father of Joseph, the husband of Mary, of her was born Jesus who is called the Christ” (Mt.1:15-16). See the break from the rhythmic cadence of “is the father of, is the father of” to stress that Jesus is from God, not from any man like St. Joseph, biologically speaking. This, I think, is crucial for Matthew so that no one can ever claim an exclusive family tie or bloodline in Jesus nor brag being a “relative” or even the “son” of God like that pastor now in jail in Manila.

*Francisco Goya’s painting, “Dream of St. Joseph” (El Sueno de San Jose) done in 1772; from en.wikimedia.org.*

With the birth of Jesus by Mary, all mankind by faith in Christ can now trace our origin in God – thanks to both St. Joseph and Blessed Virgin Mary! They showed us that Christmas did not happen by mere bloodlines but through active cooperation in the work of God.

This is how the birth of Jesus Christ came about. When his mother Mary was betrothed to Joseph, but before they lived together, she was found with child through the Holy Spirit. Joseph her husband, since he was a righteous man, yet unwilling to expose her to shame, decided to divorce her quietly. Such was his intention when, behold, the angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, “Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary your wife into your home. For it is through the Holy Spirit that this child has been conceived in her (Matthew 1:18-20).

Men are seldom described by their relationship to a woman as it is more often the other way around like in the tradition of wives assuming their husband’s surnames.

Most notable exception anywhere in history is St. Joseph who is known more because of his connection to Mother Mary; however, it is in this unique aspect that we also find his greatness, his holiness.

Like in any patriarchal society, it is always the father who gives the identity to the child especially among the Jews. Every pilgrim who had gone to the Holy Land knows this so well when you look at the ID of tour guides and bus drivers that always include the lines that says “bar” followed by one’s father’s name as “son of so and so.” Unlike men, women easily claim motherhood for a child as part of her nature; a man would never give his name to any child not his.

But not Joseph who was really an exception for being “righteous” according to Matthew.

Righteousness among the Jews is also holiness which is to keep and abide by the laws of God.

Here we find Matthew as a Jew writing to his fellow Jewish converts to Christianity that holiness is more than obedience to the Ten Commandments and its over 600 precepts every pious Jew must first follow.

For Matthew, righteousness or holiness is always complementary to justice which is more than legal fairness but having the character of God who is fair and merciful, compassionate and kind especially with the weak. In the first reading, we hear Jeremiah speaking about the coming Messiah to be called “the Lord is justice” who shall restore what’s broken, primarily his people.

Actually we got this thought on the complementarity of justice and righteousness from one of our favorite bloggers at WordPress, Sr. Renee Yann who in her “Lavish Mercy” issue in March 19, 2019 cited a Protestant exegete about the matter:

“Justice in the Old Testament concerns distribution in order to make sure that all members of the community have access to resources and goods for the sake of a viable life of dignity…. Righteousness concerns active intervention in social affairs, taking an initiative to intervene effectively in order to rehabilitate society, to respond to social grievance, and to correct every humanity-diminishing activity” (Walter Brueggemann, Journey to the Common Good).

That complementarity of justice and righteousness in St. Joseph is best expressed by Matthew when he said that “When Joseph awoke, he did as the angel of the Lord had commanded him and took his wife into his home.”

When Mary was found pregnant with a child not his, St. Joseph already displayed his righteousness when he took the concrete and painful step of quietly leaving her to spare her of all the shame and even punishment their laws imposed on such cases. And after the angel had explained to him everything about the pregnancy of Mary, St. Joseph all the more showed the depth and reality of his holiness or righteousness that was willing to forget his total self for the greater good of Mary and everyone!

*Photo by author, “St. Joseph Protector of the Child Jesus”, 2024.*

As a sign of his righteousness in accordance with his deep sense of justice, St. Joseph showed in his very life that true relationship with God is expressed in our love for others which would become later a major teaching by Jesus Christ.

Moreover, it was in accepting Mary as his wife that Jesus finally came into the world as our Savior. Today, St. Joseph is teaching us that Christmas happens whenever we respect and accept each other because that is when Christ comes in our midst like in their eventual marriage.

It was not the first time that St. Joseph displayed his kind of righteousness complemented by the virtue of justice. After the Nativity, St. Joseph took the difficult and perilous task of fleeing to Egypt to protect and save Mother Mary and the Infant Jesus from the murderous wrath of King Herod.

Twice St. Joseph acted as a righteous man in the temple: first at the presentation of Jesus when he allowed Simeon and Anna to take the Holy Infant into their arms and praised him; and second in the finding of Jesus in the temple when St. Joseph chose to step into the background to let the Child Jesus assume his teaching vocation among the learned men there, an apparent anticipation of the ministry of Jesus later. (Recall in that scene that St. Joseph was totally silent while it was the Blessed Mother who did all the talking by speaking to Jesus how worried they have been looking for him.)

Based on these few instances found in the gospel wherein the Holy Family were presented together, St. Joseph remained righteous and just during their hidden years in Nazareth as he worked hard to provide for Mary and Jesus, actively doing good for his family and community while silently fostering, forming the personality and ministry of Jesus Christ.

Let us imitate St. Joseph working hard in silence amid the great temptations of glamor in this social media age, always rooted in Christ, our only Savior and Mediator. True holiness is purely grace and part of that is our hard work in actively bringing Jesus into this world so sick, so dark with evil and sin. Amen. Have a blessed Thursday!

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

Hollowed, then hallowed

Lord My Chef Daily Recipe for the Soul by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II
Friday, Memorial of the Presentation of the Blessed Virgin Mary, 21 November 2025
1 Maccabees 4:36-37, 52-59 <*{{{{>< + ><}}}}*> Luke 19:45-48

*Photo by author, Mary’s home in Ephesus, 03 November 2025.*

God our loving Father,
today I praise and thank you again
for the recent chance to travel
and experience your majesty
and beauty abroad
and among other peoples
of different culture;
most of all,
I am grateful to have been
to the home of the Blessed
Virgin Mary in Ephesus;
until now, 
I am savoring,
"masticating" the blessed
experience.

Jesus entered the temple area and proceeded to drive out those who were selling things, saying to them, “It is written, My house shall be a house of prayer, but you have made it a den of thieves” (Luke 19:45-46).

As I recall 
that brief moment of stay
inside the Ephesus home of Mary,
I felt my whole being emptied - hollowed -
and as I knelt and prayed
without any distractions,
no worries about pictures nor of time,
slowly I felt being filled within
by you, O God: from hollowedness
to holiness or hallowed;
that is why Jesus drove away
the merchants out of temple:
every temple,
every place of worship
including our very selves
is a home and dwelling place of God;
the chief priests, scribes
and leader of the people
felt under attack by Jesus
because they were empty of God,
filled of the world and its things;
the people were spellbound
on the other hand because
they have realized that
truly, we are the indwelling
of God; therefore, let us cleanse
ourselves always within
not only of sin but also of
so many things that distract
us away from God 
to dwell in us
like social media.

O Blessed Virgin Mary,
from the very start you have
been reserved by God from any stain
of sin to be the Mother of the Christ
but it was also fulfilled because 
of human cooperation: of your parents
dedicating you to God and most of all,
of your fiat to God.
Pray for us, Mama Mary
that we may cultivate a prayer life
that shall make us a home
to God; let us express our
fiat to him daily by presenting
ourselves to him like you.
Amen.