Lord My Chef Daily Recipe for the Soul, 16 July 2025 Wednesday, Memorial of Our Lady of Mount Carmel Exodus 3:13-20 ><}}}*> + ><}}}*> + ><}}}*> Matthew 11:25-27
Photo by author, Sonnenberg Mountain View, Davao del Sur, August 2018.
Today, O Lord your words bring us to the mountain as we celebrate too the Memorial of Our Lady of Mount Carmel; in the first reading you brought Moses to your mountain in Horeb to see you in the burning bush while the Memorial of our Blessed Mother today reminds us of the early monks who banded together to pray at Mount Carmel.
When the Lord saw him coming over to look at it more closely, God called out to him from the bush, “Moses! Moses!” He answered, “Here I am.” “Come, now! I will send you you to Pharaoh to lead my people, the children of Israel, out of Egypt.” But Moses said to God, “Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh and lead the children of Israel out of Egypt?” He answered, “I will be with you; and this shall be your proof that it is I who have sent you: when you bring my people out of ??Egypt, you will worship God on this very mountain” (Exodus 3:4-5, 10-12).
How lovely was your conversation, Lord with Moses, so similar with our conversations when we would readily answer your call with the declaration "Here I am" that suddenly when you hand us our mission, we balk and question you, "Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh?"
Many times we are like Moses - while showing humility with some fears in our quick response to your call, we suddenly doubt ourselves upon learning the mission you entrust us with whereas you simply assure us of your presence, of being our companion with your simple statement "I will be with you." Such is your simplicity, Lord.
Teach us to be like Mary your Mother, dear Jesus Christ, simple and childlike filled with humility, always open to God and his plans; after all, you call us first of all for a relationship with you not with a task to be achieved.
May the Brown Scapular given by Mary to St. Simon Stock be a reminder of our relationship with God in Christ with Mary; always open to his will but most of all faithful and obedient to his call of communion and oneness. Amen.
Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II Our Lady of Fatima University Valenzuela City
The Lord Is My Chef Daily Recipe for the Soul by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II Monday, Week I in Ordinary Time, Year I, 13 January 2025 Hebrews 1:1-6 <*((((>< + ><))))*> Mark 1:14-20
Photo by author, Mt. St. Paul Spirutality Center, Pico, La Trinidad, Benguet, 04 January 2025.
Brothers and sisters: In times past, God spoke in partial and various ways to our ancestors through the prophets; in these last days, he spoke to us through the Son, whom he made heir of all things and through whom he created the universe, who is the refulgence of his glory, the very imprint of his being, and who sustains all things by his mighty word (Hebrews 1:1-3).
O how lovely and so deep, dear God are your words on this first day of Ordinary Time; they are so touching and personal yet very ordinary, common, and typical.
That is how we take the word "ordinary" so often - lacking in special or distinctive features that we take for granted anything ordinary because it is... ordinary.
Maybe this is the reason why we find it so hard to really believe in you, Father; when you sent us your Son, Jesus Christ, the "refulgence" or reflection of your glory and "imprint" of your being, we find him so ordinary because we wanted someone more, someone bombastic, someone so different from us, not so like us because we feel so ordinary.
It is so funny and silly of us, God, that we cannot accept you in Jesus who became human like us, who chose to be ordinary, preferring to be poor than rich, simple than complicated yet so kind, so very much akin to us in everything except sin; instead of being honored and grateful in your choosing to be ordinary like us, we rejected him and us in the process.
Open our minds and our hearts to your coming to us in Jesus like the brothers Simon and Andrew, James and John who left everything behind to follow Jesus whom they have found to be extraordinarily ordinary; may we find meaning in life in Jesus your Son in whom the ordinary is actually the orderly order of things in life with you Father always above all. Amen.
Photo by author, sunrise at Mt. St. Paul Spirituality Center, Pico, La Trinidad, Benguet, 06 January 2025.
The Lord Is My Chef Daily Recipe for the Soul by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II Simbang Gabi-4 Homily, 19 December 2024 Judges 13:2-7, 24-25 <*((((>< + ><))))*> Luke 1:5-25
Photo by author, wailing wall of Jerusalem where Jews pray until now being the section closest to the Holy Holies destroyed in year 70AD.
From Matthew, we now shift to Luke to listen to his account of Christmas which is the most complete and detailed. In fact, most artistic renditions of Christmas were inspired by Luke’s gospel.
Very surprising in his Christmas story, Luke started it with the annunciation of the birth of John the Baptist to his father Zechariah who was then serving at the temple of the Lord in Jerusalem. It is a reminder to us all these days that Advent and Christmas begin in the church, in our holy celebrations.
In the days of Herod, King of Judea, there was a priest named Zechariah of the priestly division of Abijah; his wife was from the daughters of Aaron, and her name was Elizabeth. Once when he was serving as priest in his division’s turn before God, according to the practice of the priestly service, he was chosen by lot to enter the sanctuary of the Lord to burn incense. Then, when the whole assembly of the people was praying outside at the hour of the incense offering, the angel of the Lord appeared to him, standing at the right of the altar of incense (Luke 1:5, 8-11).
Luke’s detailed account of the event is the Jewish Day of Atonement (Yom Kippur) when their priests incense yearly between September 18-24 the Holy of Holies where they used to keep the Ark of the Covenant. From this detail by Luke we got the reliable timetable in the celebration of Christmas on December 25 by considering this event as the time of Elizabeth’s conception of John who was born June 24 or nine months after. Tomorrow we shall hear in the gospel how “on the sixth month” of Elizabeth’s pregnancy which fell on March 25, the angel Gabriel announced to Mary the birth of Jesus, the Solemnity of the Annunciation we celebrate on that date. Nine months from March 25, we have December 25! Who said our Christmas date is not in the Bible? We got it here in our gospel today courtesy of Luke!
Photo by author, Parish Church of St. Joseph in Morong, Rizal, January 2021.
It may sound simple yet, it is so profound. In narrating this to us, Luke reminds us today that the Christmas story began in a holy celebration in the temple of Jerusalem now happening in our Eucharistic celebrations in every church around the world.
Many take our Sunday Masses for granted these days with so many excuses and alibis but, let us set aside all these to reflect on this simple detail from Luke’s first story on Christmas.
Photo by Mr. Jim Marpa, 2018.
First, this is a call for us all to go back to the church by finally putting a stop NOW of online Masses. Online Mass as a term is an oxymoron because it presupposes actual presence of people. There can be no virtual Mass because there is no such thing as virtual sacrament nor virtual grace. That is why God introduced Himself to Moses as “I AM WHO AM”, the One who is perfectly present, always actual never virtual.
Since the waning of the COVID virus last year, both the Pope and the CBCP have called for the ending of online Masses but unfortunately, so many priests have remained stubborn with some making “shameful profit” out of it which is strongly prohibited by Canon Law and other Church and papal documents. Unless online Masses are stopped, people will always find reasons and alibis not to go to church on Sundays.
As we reflect on Luke’s account of the celebration at that time of the annunciation of the angel to Zechariah while he was incensing the Holy of Holies, we get the feel of solemnity and sacredness that are sorely missing these days in many of our celebrations of the Mass.
Like Zechariah and the priests of the Jerusalem temple at that time who were all steeped in traditions and presumably spirituality, we have every reason to expect the same, even more, from our bishops and priests today. They are the ones who set the tone of every celebration and of life in the parish; their spirituality or lack of it is manifested in the parish life, from its building structure to its witnessing.
Photo by author, pious Jews and Rabbis in another enclosed section of the wall of the temple of Jerusalem, May 2017.
How sad when priests have lost the sense of the sacred of the Holy Mass when they disregard the solemnity of the celebration with all their antics and gimmicks; worst of all, of coming to Mass unprepared without a homily and good vestments, sometimes without having showered or shaved! What is tragic is when the priest attends all socials in proper attire, but never in the Mass.
The other day, I saw a sticker at the back of a delivery van that asks, “How’s my driving? And my grooming?” Too bad I was not able to get the name of the company of that delivery van but how great are its people must be in giving a premium on how their drivers behave and look!
Some priests shamelessly argue that what is essential is what is inside but they forget that the outward appearance is an indication of what’s inside them too. How can the people feel and experience God if their pastor comes shabbily dressed without any good vestments, so untidy as in dugyot, unprepared for the Mass, without a good homily?
What had become of our churches that have been the shining glory of architecture through the centuries but now look like malls? Some churches look like videoke bars with a lot of giant TV screens while priests serenade the people with their wonderful voices instead of delivering a homily.
How sad that many churches are untidy and ugly. Yes, ugly is the word. And kitschy, bereft of any sense of the holy that people cannot experience God except be played on their emotions with dramas and not to forget, second and third collections. Choirs are on their own with a concert, totally deaf to the fact their music is supposed to lead the congregation into prayerful reflections not to applaud them for a performance. It is about time we restore the dictum of the Roman liturgy of noble simplicity not only of the church and also of celebrations.
Photo by author, Archdiocesan Shrine of Nuestra Señora De Guia, Ermita, Manila, 28 November 2024.
Our gospel invites us today, especially us priests and bishops along with those involved in preparing our parish celebrations to be silent like Elizabeth – lest we be silenced and be made mute by the Lord like Zechariah to finally open ourselves to listen to God’s instructions about His Son’s coming.
Let’s face that sad reality of so many of us clergy and laity in the church who are like Zechariah trying to control everything including God, even playing God who give the people enough reasons to turn away from the Church completely.
Photo by author of the beautiful sacristy of the Archdiocesan Shrine of Nuestra Señora De Guia in Ermita, Manila where even a guest priest could feel at “home” with everything in order.
Like Elizabeth, let us choose to be silent in order to pray truly, awaiting God in the Holy Spirit to stir us into His Divine Plans like Samson in the first reading, “The boy grew up and the Lord blessed him; the Spirit of the Lord first stirred” (Jgs.13:24-25). We find the same thing in the gospel when Gabriel told Zechariah how John while still in Elizabeth’s womb would be filled with the Holy Spirit (Lk.1:15) in accomplishing his mission as precursor of Jesus.
If we could allow ourselves to be stirred by God first – not by fad or ulterior motives in our church celebrations – then every Mass becomes a Christmas, a coming of Christ.
Let us do away with unnecessary things in the church and in our celebrations that call attention to us, to our abilities and talents, even power like Zechariah by being more daring in silence and noble simplicity to experience God’s coming every Mass.
As we shall see in the coming days from the gospel of Luke, Christmas is both a journey into Bethlehem, Jerusalem and other places as well as into the very hearts of Joseph and Mary and of those who would recognize and accept Jesus Christ. May our churches reflect what is in our hearts as disciples of Christ, always with a space for Jesus to come and dwell inside and among us. Amen.
Photo by author, Simbang Gabi in our previous parish, 2018.
Quiet Storm by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II, 23 July 2024
Photo from sunstar.com.ph of that viral incident between a Cebu personality addressed as a “Sir” by a waiter in a mall last Sunday.
It is a classic case of “brouhaha” in the real sense, especially if we consider our Tagalog word buruha or bruha: a waiter was told to stand for more than an hour to be “lectured” on gender sensitivity by a Cebu personality belonging to the LGBTQ community after being addressed as a “Sir”.
Well, at least, the issue had been settled amicably with an apology by the celebrity after a deluge of negative reactions from netizens. Likewise, we can now sigh with some relief that there are no plans among the LGBTQ community to imitate their sistah from the Queen City of Cebu, proof that there are more sane and kind LGBTQ who have better things to do than make a big fuss about themselves or the rainbow. Imagine if every LGBTQ will lecture everyone of us just on how to address them in Metro Manila alone, life would be disrupted and paralyzed, worst than what we went through during the lockdowns during COVID-19!
But kidding aside, what makes that incident disturbingly sad is how it had shown again the sad plight of the poor in our country. Bawal maging mahirap, maging dukha sa Pilipinas. So sad. Even in the church it is very true. We do not have to look far to see how this is so true among us. Kawawa palagi ang mga maliliit.
How do we treat our house helpers and drivers, delivery personnel, janitors and janitresses, even professionals doing not so glamorous tasks like nurses. And security guards, of course. (Kudos to our alma mater, the Faculty of Arts and Letters of UST who had their security personnel joined the march of their recent graduates!)
Photo by Mr. Jim Marpa, 2018.
The very sight of a waiter standing in front of a customer immediately caught my attention while scrolling my Facebook, asking myself, “what happened?” Gut feelings told me something was very wrong and surely, the guy must have been so disadvantaged.
For addressing that celebrity customer as “sir”, the waiter had to endure the humiliation of standing before him like in a trial. Even if it was just between the two of them. Even if he did not scream or yell at the waiter. What’s the big deal? Iyon lang?
His ego, his femininity more valuable than the very person of the waiter? It is the new pandemic among us spreading these last 20 years. The malady of entitlement, of never making the mortal sin to address some people as Doctor or Attorney or even Father. We have lost touched with our humanity, our being a human being, a person, a tao first of all.
Good thing there was a good soul around that mall who came to the waiter’s rescue.
What we have here is a classic case of “exaggeration of truth, exaggeration of self” – a phrase I have found years ago in one of the many writings of Pope Benedict XVI. It was my parting shot to our graduates of Senior High School last July 05, 2024 during our Baccalaureate Mass.
Many times in this age of so many platforms of communications, we tend to exaggerate the truths, of clamoring for so many things like inclusiveness everywhere when in the process, they have actually become so exclusive! Many times, people exaggerate the truth presenting themselves as disadvantaged and victimized when in fact it is far from reality. Many people are advancing so many things these days when in fact they are actually promoting themselves. Many are exaggerating the truths when they are actually exaggerating themselves (https://lordmychef.com/2024/07/10/exaggerating-truth-exaggerating-self/)
The tragedy of our time characterized by affluence and upward mobility so splattered across social media daily, is how so many among us who have lost touch with our humanity. Everything has become a show – a palabas we say in Filipino. We forget that inside – the loob – as more essential.
And what is inside each one of us?
Our dignity as image and likeness of God or pagkatao that is best seen and expressed in our being small, being little like the children, the very core of Jesus Christ’s teaching.
Look outside even in the countryside now invaded by those giant tarpaulins – why have we become like those tarpaulins, thinking and feeling we are larger than others?
Truth in Greek is aletheia that literally means an opening, of not being concealed like the blooming of a flower.
Simply be yourself. And don’t forget everyone as they are.
God bless everyone!
Photo by Dra. Mai B. Dela Pena, MD at Deir Al-Mukhraqa Carmelite Monastery in Isarel, 2014.
The Lord Is My Chef Daily Recipe for the Soul by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II Wednesday in the Fifteenth Week of Ordinary Time, Year II, 17 July 2024 Isaiah 10:5-7, 13-16 ><))))*> + ><))))*> + ><))))*> Matthew11:25-27
Photo by Dra. Mylene A. Santos, MD in Infanta, Quezon 2020.
Praise and glory to You, God our loving Father who has the whole world in your hands; nothing happens by chance, all good things come from You and if ever something bad happens, You know it for sure; You never punish us for our sins and whatever bad happens to us is a result of our transgressions, of turning away from You; therefore, let us always hope and trust in You for You never abandon us your children especially in our times of trials and tribulations; in the same manner, let us not be so proud when we are in the height of our success believing we are the best because You have the final say in history; let us not be proud like Assyria of old:
“My hand has seized like a nest the riches of nations; as one takes eggs left alone, so I took in all the earth; no one fluttered a wing, or opened a mouth, or chirped!”
Will the axe boast against him who hews with it? Will the saw exalt itself above him who wields it? As if a rod could sway him who lifts it, or a staff him who is not wool! Therefore the Lord, the Lord of hosts, will send among his fat leanness, and instead of his glory there will be kindling like the kindling of fire (Isaiah 10:14-16).
Teach me, dear Jesus, to be small like a child, simple and trusting in You; feeling more than thinking more, kind and loving than analyzing and sizing up others, most of all, lowly and humble because You alone has the whole world in your hands. Amen.
The Lord Is My Chef Daily Recipe for the Soul by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II Friday in the Fourteenth Week of Ordinary Time, Year II, 12 July 2024 Hosea 14:2-10 <*[[[[><< + >><]]]]*> Matthew 10:16-23
Thus says the Lord: Return, O Israel, to the Lord, your God; you have collapsed through your guilt. Take with you words, and return to then Lord; Say to him, “Forgive all iniquity, and receive what is good, that we may render as offerings the bullocks from our stalls” (Hosea 24:2-3).
Loving Father, let us "take words" with us this Friday, words of contrition for our sins, words of true repentance, words begging your mercy, words that are sincere not empty words; many times in this world of social media, we multiply words, we shout words, we alter words to give new meanings that suit us; many times our words are mere words, never bearing fruit, could not even stand because they are not true; like Jesus your Son, teach us to "enflesh" our words, let our words to You be translated into realities of conversion and loving service for one another.
When they hand you over, do not worry about how you are to speak or what to say. You will be given at that moment what you are to say. For it will not be you who speak but the Spirit of your Father speaking through you” (Matthew 10:20).
Let us heed your words, Lord Jesus Christ, for us to be "shrewd as serpents and simple as doves" by learning to be silent to let the Holy Spirit speak through us; in this noisy world with so many competing words and sounds, it has become indeed a persecution to be silent; it is more difficult to be silent to await your words, Lord; it is always easier to speak and add to the cacophony of deafening and hurtful words against each other than to just listen to our hearts, to listen to your words of love and mercy; like the psalmist, let my mouth declare your praise by awaiting your words first, not mine. Amen.
It’s been more than four years since the breakout of the COVID-19 pandemic that threw many of us out of sync in life, especially those planning to get married during those critical years of 2020-2022.
I had four weddings affected by the COVID-19 lockdowns in that period; three were postponed but I was able to officiate at the two weddings when reset to another dates except the first one that did not fit my schedule. The fourth wedding I was not able to officiate because I got the virus and had to be isolated.
This is the homily I delivered at one of those three weddings postponed I officiated, between Cris my former student at the Immaculate Conception School for Boys (ICSB) in Malolos City and Tim whom I met when they were going steady while we were all taking MA courses at UST.
More funny than that was the fact Cris and Tim have planned of getting married in 2020 but have to move it to 2021 due to the pandemic; but, when COVID still persisted that year, they finally fixed their altar date to early 2022. Alas! Just as they were all set in January 2022, the church was closed on the week of their wedding after its priests got the virus!
Cris and Tim were at a loss when their wedding would finally take place until they were offered by the parish the date February 22, 2022 after the weddings of those others postponed like them. I told them to go for it than wait further for other dates lest they in turn get the virus too!
Looking back to their wedding day, I have realized how God always finds ways in helping married couples in all their problems for as long as they are willing to cooperate. This is why we cannot allow divorce to be legalized in the country for God never fails in His grace and blessings. We just have to work on them.
From stillromancatholicafteralltheseyears.com, January 2022.
You must have heard the saying that “God writes straight crooked lines”. And today that proves so true not only with how God wrote so crooked His straight lines in your life, Cris and Tim, but even wrote in circles to make this date your wedding day – 22 February 2022!
Cris and Tim, God has always been so sure in calling you before His altar on this date, which will similarly happen again in 200 years – 22 February 2222! God writes straight crooked lines because everything in him is perfect, like numbers. Precise and exact. Like this date you never chose, 02-22-2022.
When you consulted me last month when priests here offered you this date due to their recent lockdown, right away I told you it is the most wonderful date for your wedding being the Feast of St. Peter’s Chair… St. Peter as in San Pedro like Cristopher Tabafunda San Pedro and later, Mrs. Fatima Macam San Pedro!
It was God who willed in all eternity that you, Cris and Tim, be married today — not last year, not the other week nor next week because today is the day that the Lord has made!
Cris and Tim are both very prayerful and good, practicing Catholics.
You are both good with numbers like God, a mathematician who is very precise and exact like an economist and stock trader (Cris) and a marketing and sales executive (Tim) who used to do a lot of chemical research before.
But God has better and deeper plans for you that numbers cannot count nor quantify.
God wants you to always go back to basic numbers, not to those found in equations only you two can understand or multiple digits only you can count.
Jesus said it so well in the gospel today: two is equal to one. So mathematical ba?
Photo by author, 2021.
“For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh? So they are no longer two, but one flesh. Therefore, what God has joined together, no human being must separate.”Matthew 19:5-6
Life is not about having the most but the least. That is where faith grows and deepens.
When we have so much in life, when we feel so sufficient, when we are so filled with things, we forget God. We stop believing in him, we believe more in ourselves.
And when we stop believing in God, we lose our faith and then, we stop loving, too. Sooner or later, we become empty and miserable.
So, be simple, Cris and Tim.
Reduce everything to the barest and simplest. Simplify, simplify, simplify as Henry David Thoreau said: “let your affairs be two or three, and not a hundred or a thousand.”
When we get complicated like our Facebook, life becomes difficult as we can’t find right away who and what matters most to us.
Kaya nga isa lang ang asawa, Cris at Tim, kasi hindi puwede marami.Hindi lang magulo. Magastos pa. Imagine kung dalawa o tatlo wedding rings? Pag isa lang, kita agad at alam na this – married na ang mamang ito na may cute na dimple o itong girl na ito na naka glasses at dalawa pa ang dimples! Hayaan ninyo sabihin ng mga makakita singsing ninyo na sayang at taken na pala siya!
You see, the lower the number, the simpler, the better. Madaling tumaya at manampalataya.
That’s faith! Parang PBA game kung saan kayo nagkakilala. And you have both experienced, walang tatalo sa faith in God ninyong dalawa!
God is greater and more than the numbers the wiz kids and supercomputers of the world can calculate and predict. His thoughts are not our thoughts, nor His ways. He first created just one man and one woman – just two – to be one with each other in Him, and to be faithful to Him and each other.
Because the more we become faithful, the more we become loving.
That is the message of this Feast of the Chair of St. Peter which is the “Primacy of Rome” or of the Pope: it is the primacy of faith and the primacy of love together which cannot be separated.
Chair of St. Peter in Rome, from Wikipedia.
Forget all those numbers Cris and Tim, focus only in the One – God in Jesus Christ. Just focus on Jesus, always Jesus.
Love is not about counting or keeping tabs and tallies, like how many “likes” and “followers” we get in our posts.
The true measure of love is when we love without measure, when we simply love, love, love. And love.
That is why we only have one heart so we can love with all our heart. Forget Sana Dalawa ang Puso Ko. It is just a song.
When you have LQ (lover’s quarrel), who should blink first, or smile? Who should take the first move to reconcile, the first to offer the hand of peace?
Whenever lovers and couples or even friends quarrel, I always say, whoever has more love to give must be the first one to initiate reconciliation, the first to blink, or smile, the first to offer the hand of peace.
To have the most love to give and share does not mean to be better or superior than the other; to have the most love to give and share is to have more faith, to have a deeper faith the he/she is ready and willing to lose everything for the sake of the loved one.
Like Jesus Christ who gave everything for us on that Cross because of love.
When we were growing up discovering the power of love, these nursery rhymes were so sublime we used to find every Valentine's without knowing why "Roses are red, Violets are blue, Sugar is sweet. So are you. And I love you!"
Red means love but what about blue that has become violet too? Late have I known as a chaplain to kids and grown ups too when I Googled that violets mean simplicity, humility and modesty that to give a violet close to blue is to say "I love you too!"
In this blessed season of Lent when everything is violet a shade akin to blue to keep things subdued as we try to imbue virtues and values of repentance and contrition for sins, of patience and perseverance, of sacrifice and alms-giving that lead to a sharing of self in love like Jesus Christ did a long time ago.
True, violets are blue, hue of God's mercy for me and you; as we go through this journey in Lent hear my plea to you, Jesus: "Roses are red, violets are blue; let your Lent come true because I love you too!" Amen.
40 Shades of Lent by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II Monday in the Third Week of Lent, 04 March 2024 2 Kings 5:1-15 ><]]]]'> + ><]]]]'> + ><]]]]'> Luke 4:24-30
How amazing it is, God our loving Father, that Lent is often portrayed in shades of violet that signify "modesty" and "humility" - or, simply put, s-i-m-p-l-i-c-i-t-y.
May we rediscover in this Season of Lent the beauty and fulness of simplicity, of just being by our true self, without the ifs and buts, lovingly embracing our weaknesses and shortcomings, contented with our finite humanity you created as good.
Many times, we are like Naaman: despite our feelings of inadequacy deep within in contrast with our stature following our many accomplishments, we still insist on what is complicated, extraordinary and difficult which we often take as more grand and therefore, better.
With this, he (Naaman) turned about in anger and left. But his servants came up and reasoned with him, “My father,” they said, “if the prophet had told you to do something extraordinary, would not have done it? All the more now, since he said to you, ‘Wash and be clean,’ should you do as he said.” So Naaman went down and plunged into the Jordan seven times at the word of the man of God. His flesh became again like the flesh of a little child, and he was clean.
2 Kings 5:12b-14
Keep us simple, Lord, so we may believe more, trust more, dare more, and achieve more!
The world has gone so complicated even with life and relationships we have made into something like our technologies that accomplish so much but still empty; the world has gone so complicated and competitive that unfortunately, we take pride in being so even though deep within us we know it isn't good at all, for you, O God, is perfect because you are first of all simple. Amen.
40 Shades of Lent by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II
Palm Sunday of the Lord's Passion, 02 April 2023
Isaiah 50:4-7 > + < Philippians 2:6-11 > + < Matthew 27:11-54
Photo by author, Palm Sunday of the Lord’s Passion 2019, Parokya ni San Juan Apostol at Ebanghelista, Bagbaguin, Sta. Maria, Bulacan.
We now enter the holiest week of the year, the height of our Lenten preparations for Easter. What we have today are two ancient celebrations merged by Vatican II in 1963: the blessing of palms practiced in Jerusalem as early as the fourth century and the papal tradition of proclaiming the very long gospel of the Lord’s Passion in Rome about year 500. Hence, the title “Palm Sunday of the Lord’s Passion”.
And it is a beautiful innovation in our liturgy showing us so many truths in our lives like we begin Holy Week with the triumphal entry of Jesus to Jerusalem, leading to the Holy Triduum of Passion and Death on Maundy Thursday and Good Friday into the bursting joy and glory on Easter.
That for me is life itself.
We come into this world in triumph like Jesus with everybody rejoicing with our birth until we grow up, going through a lot of pains and sufferings with little deaths right in the hands of those supposed to love us but always, there is the joy of maturity, of fulfillment in Christ with many Easter moments of triumphs and consolations. Today’s celebrations remind us that while there will always be the disappointing manifestations of sin and evil in life, overall, there is always the immense and immeasurable love of God expressed in Jesus Christ dying on the Cross.
“Ecce Homo” painting by Vicente Juan Masip (1507-1579) from masterapollon.com
Our gospel is very long even in its shorter version. Let us focus on the Lord’s silence from his arrest to His crucifixion.
The Lord God has given me a well-trained tongue, that I might know how to speak to the weary a word that will rouse them. I gave my back to those who beat me, my cheeks to those who plucked my beard; my face I did not shield from buffets and spitting. The Lord God is my help, therefore, I am not disgraced; I have set my face like flint, knowing that I shall not be put to shame.
Isaiah 50:4, 6-7
Jesus is the fulfillment of the so-called Suffering Servant of God in the Book of Isaiah. What is striking is how he claims to have been given with a well-trained tongue but He rarely spoke when tried and crucified, choosing to be silent in the midst of great sufferings. What a great display of love for us!
In a world drowning in a cacophony of sounds and noise with everyone and everything speaking like elevators and cellphones, the more God is silent, waiting for us to stop and listen to Him in Jesus Christ who speaks within us. From Pilate to the soldiers to the Pharisees and priests with their rabid packs of demagogues who ceaselessly mocked Jesus even while slowly dying on the Cross, Jesus remained silent.
Because He loves us.
Because He waits for us to stop and listen.
Because life is more true and fulfilling in silence, not in sounds and noise.
Last Monday we celebrated the Feast of St. Joseph where we heard in the gospel how an angel told him to take Mary as wife with the specific task of naming her child “JESUS” which means “God saves”. See how God gave that specific mission to the most silent man in the Bible, St. Joseph who must have taught Jesus the value of silence!
That is how God saved us in Jesus by remaining silent even on the Cross. If ever He spoke, it was mostly to pray the psalms. In Jesus, God saves us in silence while we are in the din of noises of sin. Oh how we speak a lot these days against God, still putting Him on trial, blaming Him for all the problems and woes we have in our lives and in the world.
Photo by author, August 2020.
Like Pilate and the crowd with their religious leaders, we say a lot about God that are often not true but He never argued nor debated with us just like then because Jesus loves us, because His name means “God saves” and that was exactly the meaning of His silence.
How could be God so demanding as many would claim with His many words of instructions and commandments of things to do and not to do plus warnings against sin just to obey Him when He has always been silent?
Today we are reminded how we talk too much and accomplish so little, even nothing, while Jesus is silent because His name means “God saves”, witnessing it in fact in silent sufferings that was a scandal for many at that time.
Moreover, Jesus showed us today in His sufferings how silence is ultimately the expression of trust in God. When we are able to slow down and be silent in the face of many trials, that is a clear indication of our deep faith and trust in God. People who trust are the most silent because simply wait for their deliverance or salvation. Like Jesus Christ.
Christ Jesus, though he was in the form of God, did not regard equality with God something to be grasped. Rather, he emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, coming in human likeness; and found human in appearance, he humbled himself, becoming obedient to death, even death on a cross.
Philippians 2:6-8
Photo by author, Betania-Tagaytay City, 2018.
More scandalous than the silence of Jesus Christ during His trial was His crucifixion, the supreme expression of His name’s meaning, “God saves”. See how since the fall of Adam and Eve, sin has always been an attempt by humans in becoming like God. There has always been that conscious or unconscious feeling of competition with God whom many see as controlling, manipulative and even power-hungry.
But right there on the Cross, Jesus showed us that indeed, in His very Person how God saves by utterly being weak and powerless.
God saves us in Jesus through the path of powerlessness and weakness, docility and humility, of simplicity before men and before His Father.
That is why even at His triumphal entrance to Jerusalem, He rode a lowly donkey never been used by anyone, a fulfillment of many Old Testament allusions and prophecies that “your king comes to you, meek and riding on an ass, and on a colt, the foal of a beast of burden (donkey)” (Mt. 21:5; Zech. 9:9). His triumphal entry into Jerusalem was the fulfillment of the words of God to his prophets, showing us that indeed, everything Jesus did and said were in accordance with the Father’s will, never on His own.
Photo by author, 2018.
Because His name Jesus means, “God saves”.
What is most beautiful in the reading earlier at the blessing of palms was how Matthew described the Lord’s triumphal entry into Jerusalem – exactly just like the coming of the wise men from the East!
And when he entered Jerusalem the whole city was shaken…
Matthew 21:10
Imagine how a very large crowd welcomed Jesus, spreading their cloaks on the road where He passed, chanting “Hosanna to the Son of David” (Mt.21:9).
Like when Jesus was born and Magis from the East came to Jerusalem inquiring about the newborn king of Israel, they were also shaken! And the irony then at His birth and at His triumphal entry, the learned have refused to recognize Him despite their having all the knowledge and writings available to them.
Is it not the same thing continues to happen to us in our lives, when despite all the kindness and mercy of God, we refuse to recognize His Son’s coming Jesu Christ including the salvation He had gained for us? Where have all the people gone on Sundays? Does God still matter to us? Do we not care at all whenever Jesus comes to us most especially in the Eucharist during the Sunday Mass?
Both the rites of the blessing of palms with the procession and the Mass on this Palm Sunday of the Lord’s Passion are not merely a recalling of a past event, but a making present, a re-membering of Jesus our King triumphantly coming daily – still in silence – to us in the simplicity of bread and wine to become His Body and Blood for us to offer and share in order to experience Him, our Resurrection and Life because His name means “God saves”.
In the Eucharist, Jesus comes to us as “God saves us”, fulfilling us, blessing us.
This Holy Week, especially at the Holy Triduum of Holy Thursday, Good Friday and Easter Vigil, we are reminded of our task to witness to everyone the meaning of the name of Jesus, “God saves” by being present to Him in the Eucharist. Inside the church. With our family. Not in the beach nor a resort unmindful of history’s greatest moment when God saved us from sins by dying on the Cross. Amen. Please, have a meaningful Holy Week to experience the joy of Easter!
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