Jesus, the “love language” of God

The Lord Is My Chef Sunday Recipe for the Soul by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II
Twenty-seventh Sunday in Ordinary Time, Cycle B, 06 October 2024
Genesis 2:18-24 ><}}}}*> Hebrews 2:9-11 ><}}}}*> Mark 10:2-16

*With our student sacristans in our San Fernando Campus in Pampanga during the Mass of the Holy Spirit last year.*

One of the joys of my ministry as chaplain in a university and a hospital is the daily interaction I have with young people who keep me young like them, always updated with the many trends happening among them especially in the languages they speak. In them I continue to find the many faces of Jesus Christ who continues to pass by even in this modern world so swiftly changing due to social media.

Two terms I have recently learned from them are “love language” and “situationship”. Let’s just talk about “love language” this Sunday that is more appropriate with our gospel and reserve that other word “situationship” when the setting is more apt. Lately I have noticed the term “love language” mentioned quite often in social media posts and reels. I never bothered to know it until somebody asked me what is my “love language” that threw me off balance with many wild things rushing into my mind, thinking what is it!

It turned out that “love language” is a term coined in 1992 by Baptist pastor Gary Chapman in his book of the same title where he identified five love languages we give and (prefer) to receive: words of affirmation, acts of service, receiving gifts, quality time, and physical touch. It was an amazing moment of learning from me when I realized that everyone – including us priests – has a favorite love language in expressing our love to everyone. And in our gospel today, we find that even God who is love Himself has a love language in the very person of His Son Jesus Christ!

The Pharisees approached Jesus and asked, “Is it lawful for a husband to divorce his wife?” They were testing him. He said to them in reply, “What did Moses command you?” They replied, “Moses permitted a husband to write a bill of divorce and dismiss her.” But Jesus told them, “Because of the hardness of your hearts he wrote you this commandment. But from the beginning of creation, God made them male and female. 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” (Mark 10:2-9).

*Photo by author, 2024; I have loved mosses that thrive even with little sunlight, reminding us of God’s grace especially when we are in darkness and tribulations.*

Jesus and the Twelve continued their journey to Jerusalem with His teachings not only getting more exciting but actually more difficult and hard as He addressed the thorny issue of divorce which continues to divide us in this modern age.

Interestingly enough, this scene happened while Jesus and the Twelve were in Judea, the province governed by King Herod who had John the Baptist arrested and later beheaded upon the instigation of his wife Herodias. John spoke against Herod’s taking of Herodias as wife because she used to be the wife of his own brother Philip then governing another province. One can just imagine the grave danger the Pharisees have exposed Jesus in discussing divorce right in the turf of an evil ruler living with an adulteress!

As usual, Jesus did not fall into the test by the Pharisees because He had no intentions of joining our endless debates about divorce as He knew very well that it is something so complicated that has continued to ruin human relationships as a result of the “hardness of our hearts”. Recall too similar instances when Jesus was asked for an opinion in politics like the paying of taxes to Caesar and the settlement of disputes among brothers regarding their inheritance. See how Jesus would always make it clear that His mission is not to settle our disputes in economics and politics nor personal relationships but to always reveal to us the will of God.

Instead of giving a simple answer of “yes” or “no” on the lawfulness of a divorce or the paying of taxes to the Romans, Jesus would always bring us to God our Father, the very core of our being and relationships. It is only in being rooted again in God when we realize personally, existentially why we have to strive in choosing what is true, good and beautiful no matter how difficult it may be.

This Sunday, Jesus is not offering compromises to us weak human beings about divorce but rather proposes the ideal of marriage by going back to its very source and beginning, God Himself who is love.

That is why our first reading was taken from Genesis to remind us and make us realize that everything, most especially man and woman – is created by God. Everything in this world was from God, especially our desire for union and communion which we also find expressed even by trees and plants as well as animals.

However, what makes us distinct from the rest of creation as we see in other parts of Genesis is God breathing on us His breath of life that gives us the consciousness of our oneness, of that transcendent otherness called humanity that makes us realize our deeper reality in the “I-Thou” relationship. Plants and animals do not have that consciousness.

*Photo by author, St. Scholastica Retreat Center, Tagaytay City, August 2024.*

The creation of a woman as suitable partner of man is not a result of an after-thought of God as if He never knew man would never be fulfilled without a woman. The creation of woman being taken from one of the ribs of man cast into a deep sleep by God reminds us of each person being a gift to everyone. No pet nor plant can bring that kind of ecstasy and joy of finding somebody like us, of bringing unity in every one who is incomplete in one’s self.

See how Jesus repeated the Genesis account “that is why” or “for this reason” a man leaves his father and mother and be joined with his wife to become one.

This tendency of ours towards one another, a consciousness of then other person, is a gift and a grace indicating our origin who is God who always relates with us. Every time we destroy this unity, whenever we upset this complementarity among us in God, that is when disorder happens, generating competitions among us that lead to our endless conflicts that only leave us with more pains and sorrows. Hence, back in the house again towards the end of our gospel scene this Sunday, Jesus reiterated the example of the child after His disciples drove them away.

*Photo by author, statue of the Child Jesus hugging St. Joseph, Sacred Heart Novitiate, Novaliches, QC, March 2024.*

How lovely and ironic that despite the weaknesses and incompleteness of children, we find in them all five love languages too. What a joy to play and converse with children, especially carry babies despite their lack of language skills we find each one a love language in himself/herself – exactly like Jesus Christ, the love language of God who gave us everything to experience oneness in love.

God knows everything that He created us in His own image and likeness. Nothing, not even sin could ever destroy His grand design for us since creation so that right after the Fall, God right away promised salvation fulfilled in Jesus Christ whom He had sent to remind us anew of His wonderful plan for us.

I have a similar image like this in my room, my most favorite statue of St. Joseph as protector of the Child Jesus and Mary. But most of all, we find Jesus being the love language of God even in his childhood with His all-encompassing love that reached its highest point at the Crucifixion.

God knows everything, especially our weaknesses in keeping our relationships. Jesus is not judging us and knows very well the pains many are enduring as a result of separation and divorce. The Letter to the Hebrews we heard in the second reading tells us how Jesus in suffering death has become like us in order to share with us the grace we need to keep our human relationships strong.

Every Sunday, I visit our patients in the hospital to give them Holy Communion, hear their confessions and often, anoint most of them with Oil for the sick.

Whenever I meet couples especially those already old and with debilitating sickness, I praise God for the tremendous grace he gives them. In them I always find God so truly present among us, especially in every husband and wife lovingly serving each other in sickness and in health. Let us pray for all couples that they may cooperate with God’s grace in keeping their marriage alive. Amen. Have a blessed week ahead!

Marriage, a choice & a gift of Christ

Quiet Storm by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II, 15 July 2024

It is very disappointing that the recent statement of the CBCP on divorce was so unusually soft, trying to balance everything like walking on a thin line, very cautious of not stepping on whoever’s feet or hurting their feelings.

What is most sad is how this statement so watered down unlike the bishops’ previous pronouncements in the last elections supporting a candidate. It is so frustrating for us Catholics when our bishops have repeatedly crossed boundaries getting into partisan politics supporting many election candidates when on this part of our nation’s history they are tepid in standing by the Lord’s flock under attack by fierce and intense pro-divorce lawmakers and supporters. This is the crucial moment when our bishops should rally us more in defending our stand against divorce being the last country where it is still illegal.

We shall have another piece on that later as we continue today our sharing of our past wedding homilies we hope can help you be clarified why we must oppose the divorce bill. Of course, we cannot impose our stand against divorce but we make it clear to everyone why we are against it. After all, it is an informed choice we make guided by the grace of God and the Holy Spirit.

Here is our homily at the wedding at the Manila Cathedral on January 16, 2006 of our very good friend from UST’s the Varsitarian, Dra. Chona T. Capulong and Mr. Stephen Kemp of Kansas.

Twenty three years ago and less than 50 pounds today, our friend and former managing editor Chona had a column at the Varsitarian called “Choice Cuts.”

I will never forget her column with its very catchy title, so well written and most of all, more than 20 years later today, the gospel she had chosen for her wedding speaks about choosing, about choices, Jesus told his disciples, “It was not you who chose me, but I who chose and appointed you to go and bear fruit that will remain…” (John 15:16).

Today we are so blessed to have been called and chosen by Chona and Stephen to be present in this most joyous day of their lives when they pledge their love for each other before God and His people. Let me stress on those words of Jesus saying how we are all “called and chosen to bear fruit.”

So beautiful.

God calling and choosing us to bear fruit. The all-knowing God making a choice for us and should we be glad and grateful for that!?

When God calls and chooses us, He does not remove our freedom which is the ability to choose what is good, not simply whatever you want. What happens is that when God calls and chooses us, this gift of freedom is actually enhanced because the Ultimate Good shows us what’s best for us.

That God choosing us rather than us choosing Him is evidently true in friendships and marriage. Chona is from this city of Manila, thousands of kilometers from Wichita, Kansas where Stephen comes from.

How they have met and be in love is a long story; what matters is the choice made by God for them and how they cooperated in that choice.

Most often, whenever we make a choice, it is oriented towards success and triumph. We always make it a point that it would be advantageous for us and most of all, easy and convenient because as much as possible, we want lesser problems and lesser risks.

Being successful, whether in life or in marriage or in business is characterized and based on strength and powers, of how we are able to control situations and bend them to our own advantage. It is about power.

On the other hand, when God makes a choice for us, it is different.

When God makes a choice for us, it is always difficult and never convenient, slow and time-consuming. Most of all, God’s choice always entails sacrifices from our part because, it is so good that we have to be emptied first in order to receive such a beautiful gift like marriage.

When God makes a choice for us, it is always based on our weakness and vulnerabilities. God is not concerned with our being “successful” but more with being fruitful because in this life, especially in marriage, it does not really matter what or how much we have achieved but what have we become.

We may have all the wealth and power in the world, all the success but, what have we become?

Have we been more loving, more forgiving, more understanding, more generous, more honest, more faithful?

Bearing fruit is different from being successful in the sense that when God makes the choices for us, He makes us into better persons, becoming the best husband or best wife or the best person in the world. This He does by letting us come to terms with our own weaknesses and vulnerabilities, emptying ourselves of these impurities and being filled by God’s goodness and holiness.

Being fruitful in marriage means being able to understand and accept, even own because of love the shortcomings of a spouse or of those around us. Being fruitful in life or in marriage is being able to bear all the pains and hardships of life because like in gardening, it is the constant pruning of trees and plants that lead to more blossoms and fruits. It is being like Jesus Christ who willingly accepted His Cross because of His great love for us. He did not remove the Cross but made it holy instead.

*Photo by Joseph Kettaneh on Pexels.com*

Chona and Stephen, this wedding is already a fruit of that call and choosing by Jesus on you. After so many pains and hurts as well as sacrifices from both of you, this day had finally come for both of you to stand before the altar of God and offer yourselves to His plans and choices. This is not the end but the beginning of more pains and hurts and sacrifices.

I am not scaring you, Chona and Stephen; however, may this wedding be an assurance for for both of you that, although there would be more problems and difficulties and trials waiting for you along the way of your married life, be assured of the great glory and fruitful life ahead for both of you.

Continue to cooperate with God’s choices for you by leading a life of faith, hope and love rooted in prayers. Jesus had called and chosen you, Chona and Stephen; Jesus would always be with you because He knows what’s best for you. Amen.

Stephen died a few years ago before the COVID pandemic but our friend Chona had remained firm in her faith in God, raising their daughter into a lovely young lady she is now. Last week, Chona told me how proud and happy she is her daughter is going to take her college abroad, away from her!

So glad that despite her fears as a mother, she had allowed her daughter to study abroad, believing, of course, it is God’s choice for her to eventually become a better woman someday. May we be faithful not only in our duties and responsibilities but especially with the people entrusted to us by God whom He had chosen to become parts of our lives.

How to fail in marriage

Quiet Storm by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II, 01 July 2024

Many people today see marriage in the human level, downplaying or outrightly refusing its supernatural dimension being a gift and a grace from God. What is most funny with them is how they also insist on giving weddings some semblance of “spiritual” meanings with all the crazy symbolisms and dramatics conjured by some wedding planners that have prompted – rightly so – many parishes to impose strict rules and guidelines to stop all these follies that have robbed Matrimony of its holiness and sanctity.

We in the Church have never failed to remind couples getting married that more important than their weddings becoming Instagrammable is their spiritual preparation because marriage is a vocation, a call from God to a life of holiness for husband and wife to become Christ’s saving presence in the world.

Divorce has always been the easiest way out of many failed marriages even among God’s chosen people in the Old Testament, an attempt to free couples of moral responsibility and culpability in their failures they could not humbly admit. Jesus had explained and clarified it 2000 years ago and still, here we are insisting for divorce which is a symptom of pride, the first sin of Adam and Eve when they broke away from God. That is why, divorce is a breaking away from God too.

There are many ways to succeed in marriage but there is only one sure way to fail which is to turn away from God, to disregard God, to stop believing in God. Here now is a homily I shared two years ago at the wedding of a very good friend in my former parish in Bagbaguin, Sta. Maria, Bulacan.

*Photo by author, Don Bosco Chapel on the Hill, Bgy. Cahil, Calaca, Batangas, 03 January 2023.*

My dearest Gracie and Chino:

Congratulations on this most joyous day of your lives. Finally, after much prayers and waiting, following so many detours in your lives, you are now before the altar of the Lord to exchange vows in the Sacrament of Holy Matrimony.

I am sure you must have heard so many things on being successful and fruitful in marriage. In fact while praying over this homily since last year (yes, believe me), a lot of things have also come to my mind that I felt very important so you may grow and mature in your married life. But, as I prayed more, I realized lately that while there are many ways to be successful and fruitful in marriage, there is only one sure way in order to fail as husband and wife.

Disregard God.

Stop believing in God.

Live as if there is no God.

Do not pray. Do not celebrate the Sunday Mass.

Forget God. And you will surely fail in marriage.

Without God, Gracie and Chino, you cannot truly love each other because the only true love we must all imitate despite our weaknesses and imperfections is the love of Jesus Christ poured out on us there on the Cross. He said it so clearly today in our gospel, “This is my commandment: love one another as I have loved you. There is no greater love than to offer one’s life for a friend.”

Remember, Gracie and Chino, human love is always imperfect; only God can love us perfectly.

Here lies the great mystery and joy of human love, of marriage: God willed from the very start that man and woman be united in marriage. When His Son Jesus Christ came to the world, He not only reminded us of this wonderful plan of the Father for us but also elevated marriage into a sacrament, a sign of the saving presence of God.

In sharing His life with us, we are able to love like Jesus that is why He tells us too that it was Him who chose and called you, Gracie and Chino, not you who chose Him. God willed that on this day, Gracie and Chino that you get married. It was also part of His plan that you met during the COVID pandemic when we were locked down and when many weddings were either postponed or cancelled.

Very clear, Gracie and Chino, it was God who designed your marriage! Do not disregard Him. Invite Him daily into your lives in the same manner you invited Him on this day of your wedding.

*Photo by author, Don Bosco Chapel On The Hill, Bgy. Cahil, Calaca, Batangas, 08 February 2023.*

Let me warn and remind you, Gracie and Chino, that a wedding nor a sacrament is not everything. Love is difficult because love is not just a feeling but a decision we renew daily. You must have heard how some couples ran out of love that eventually, they split up, separated and failed. When we have that deep faith, fervent hope and unceasing charity and love of God, you will never run out of love, Gracie and Chino, because God is love.

Keep that in mind. If you want to remain in love, love God. That is what marriage is all about: in loving your wife, your husband, you are actually expressing your love to God who is after all our very first love. That’s what Tobias realized when he married Sarah in our first reading. Tobias went to a far away land not only to look for a wife and a cure for his father Tobit’s blindness but also for God! When he found Sarah, he also found God.

Is it not the same thing happened with you, Chino, upon meeting Gracie? It was not love at first sight but more like the experience of Tobias when God revealed by silently speaking into your heart Gracie is the woman whom you shall marry. In a flash, you felt so certain about it, Chino, and despite your distance from each other, you felt this love growing deeper every day.

There is no perfect marriage, Gracie and Chino, but every couple is surely blessed by God. Cooperate with Him, do whatever He tells you as the Blessed Mother told the waiters in the wedding at Cana where Jesus transformed water into wine. Imagine, the first miracle by Jesus Christ was in a wedding just like this!

You know why? Because love is most truest when there is forgiveness and mercy. As I have told you, human love is imperfect, only God can love us perfectly. Without God, it is impossible for us to forgive and move on with life. Without God, it is impossible for us to say sorry and ask forgiveness too. It is God who gives us the grace to be sorry and to be merciful and forgiving like Him.

When couples become hardened in their hearts as they keep tabs of each other’s sins and mistakes and misgivings, they get tired and fed up with each other and then separate.

With God, we are able to clean our slate, delete our memories and restart/refresh our programs like the computer to begin anew each day.

Without God, the festering anger within us gets worst and soon, everything crashes. That is when we fail because we do not have God as our foundation and root.

Try seeing it this way: human relationships are like two hands together.

Without God, they are like interlocking fingers where the partners are both so good, so bilib in themselves, filling each other’s needs that soon, they get filled with themselves. Like interlocking fingers that get painful, they eventually breakaway or separate from each other because love has become a demand than a gift, sex an obligation than an offering, with each one becoming more an object to be possessed than a person to be loved.

With God, human relationships are like two praying hands. Very flexible. You keep your identities and personalities intact, growing together, maturing together in love as you both create an empty space for each one’s shortcomings and most especially for God to have a place in your lives.

Like Tobit and Sarah in our first reading, pray always. Handle your lives with prayer, Gracie and Chino. The more you pray and believe in God, the more you will love Him, and the more you will believe each other too and hence, love more each other too! Keep God in your life as husband and wife. Whatever you do to each other, that you do first to Jesus who is always between you.

You see, Gracie and Chino, there are so many ways to be fruitful in marriage for as long as you are rooted in God. Take away God and you will surely fail as an individual and as a couple.

My prayer for you, Gracie and Chino is that today may be the least joyful day of your lives. Live in God through Jesus Christ with Mary our Mother. Amen.

How to fail in marriage

High school life, married life

Quiet Storm by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II, 19 June 2024

*With our Grade 7 Students in our San Fernando, Pampanga campus last March.*

In my 26 years in the priesthood, the primary reason I have always objected to divorce aside from its being against the teaching of the Lord are the children. When couples separate, their children suffer the most.

Whenever I would speak to couples getting married, I always insist on this important aspect of marriage, of having children, of how this life calls for much maturity and responsibilities from husband and wife to ensure a bright future not only for them but for humanity. From them will come children and future generations. The kind of life they surely affects their children for better or for worst. And there is our future.

Marriage is not a question or a thing based on luck – the Sacrament and grace of God are not everything. Couples need to work harder and pray hardest to keep their union strong in faith, hope and love so that they would have good children who shall be matured and responsible Christians and citizens.

*Praying with our students in our main campus in Valenzuela City.*

Allowing divorce is opening the floodgates of so many abuses and excuses that will surely destroy the basic unit of the society, the family. Very often in my interaction with students from separated parents, they always have two wishes: that their parents would not separate or if still possible be reunited; and the second, how they wished they were not born to experience all pains and difficulties of having parents on the verge or already separated.

Very sad. Even tragic.

That is why the more I find meaning in my priesthood assigned in the school. Actually, it is more difficult than being in a parish but most fulfilling as I get to see my students mature and bloom, though there were times some of them got lost or went wayward in their lives.

My first assignment after ordination was as administrator-teacher of our diocesan school in Malolos for 11 years, the Immaculate Conception School for Boys (ICSB) and Immaculate Conception School of Malolos (ICSM). In 2011, I literally begged our bishop to assign me to a parish as I have never experienced being a pastor. During our grand reshuffle in 2021, our new bishop assigned me anew as chaplain here at my present assignment at the Our Lady of Fatima University (OLFU) in Valenzuela and its five other campuses.

Every day in my encounters and engagements with students in the sacraments and casual talks, the more I feel my “fatherhood” – here are thousands of kids longing for a dad, a father. Many times I tease God, asking Him if this is the reason why we priests do not get married so that we could take care of somebody else’s children?!

What a joy that even for a brief moment I become a dad for many of them in my stories and teachings. And presence.

*Speaking to our elementary students after their weekly Mass in our Valenzuela campus.*

That is why I feel so glad and proud of many of my students especially from ICSB who have turned out so well as responsible dads and faithful husbands to their wives. One of them was Micah who asked me to officiate his wedding to Lery shortly before the pandemic in 2020.

The homily I prepared for their wedding was actually a review of the five important things I used to tell Lery and all my students in ICSB to have in their pocket as a man: handkerchief, money, pen, comb, and Rosary.

Here’s my homily (just click the link).

Five reminders from high school for married life

*Lery at my back in another wedding of his classmate in January 2020.*

Micah and Lery are happily married with two kids and a third coming in eight months. They all live abroad where Micah is working.

Most of his barkada are also happily married, many abroad too like him.

I send them my prayers and reflections once in a while as I remember them all in prayers, hoping their marriage will remain strong, that they – and their kids – would truly be icons of the love of God in Jesus Christ. Amen.

Marriage is a prayer

Quiet Storm by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II, 11 June 2024

*From stillromancatholicafteralltheseyears.com*, *January 2022.*

What is very sad in this ongoing debate against divorce in our country is how some people claiming to be graduates and professors of Catholic institutions insist on their many “intellectual reasonings” why divorce should be allowed while at the same time declaring it is wrong to profess we are against divorce simply because we are Catholics.

What a tragedy when those educated or teaching in Catholic schools and universities who are supposed to know more and better about Jesus Christ and His teachings are the ones favoring divorce. They cite so many studies and authors even theologians to support their stand in favor of divorce without ever mentioning Christ’s teachings found in the Sacred Scriptures that were explained by the Church in our Catechism as well as in so many other documents by the Popes and bishops.

We understand how journalists could err regarding names and other details that essentially do not effect the veracity of their news like the recent sakalan blues in Gagalangin, Tondo when the interview of a priest was ascribed to another; but, to be one sided in the presentation of a story is something else like Rappler’s “The Problem with I am Catholic, I say no to divorce”. There’s a reliable maxim in journalism that says “Opinions are free but facts are sacred.”

The main fact we have been holding on the sanctity and indissolubility of marriage for over 2000 years is our Lord Jesus Christ’s teaching against divorce that the pro-divorce everywhere have refused to accept.

Yes, we need to listen to different views about divorce but not to those views condemned by the Church because they are wrong.

Divorce cannot be isolated as merely a political issue to be resolved because marriage as a natural sacrament is spiritual in nature, a path to holiness.

Marriage is a gift and a call from God for men and women to live and work together in order to attain eternal life. This we achieve firstly by having a prayer life, a relationship with God expressed in our love for one another especially between husband and wife.

In arguing against divorce, we need to look for those couples who have made it through thick and thin in their marriage in order to inspire others in following the path of Holy Matrimony.

*Joyce and Tony in 2019 with son Atty. JA and wife Kathleen with their two sons, and daughter Rosella.*

As a contribution in our fight against divorce, I share with you my homily at the 40th wedding anniversary of my cousin Joyce Pollard to Tony Lopez in October 2019 which I titled as “Married life is a prayer”.

Oh what a joy to officiate weddings especially of relatives and friends!

Hope you find some lessons and inspirations on the beauty of marriage we have to keep.

As I prepared my homily for your anniversary, Joyce and Tony… “the moment I woke up and before your Mommy Fely put on her make-up, I said a little prayer for you.”

Of course that is not the theme song of Joyce and Tony. They haven’t met yet in 1967 when Dione Warwick recorded I Say a Little Prayer. But they were already married when it became one of the tracks in the movie “My Best Friend’s Wedding” starring Julia Roberts.

And since this is my “best cousin’s wedding anniversary” in this part of the city, I have thought of reflecting on married life as a prayer.

In our gospel we have heard Jesus Christ narrating the parable of the unjust judge and persistent widow to underscore “the necessity to pray always without becoming weary” (Lk. 18:1).

Prayer is an expression of faith.

When there is faith, there is also love.

And when there is prayer, faith, and love, what we have is a relationship, a community of believers who love each other.

People who love and believe with each other always talk and communicate. They make time to be with one another. And most often, that is what really matters with people who love and believe – simply to be together.

Even in silence.

Like prayer.

Prayer is more than asking things from God but most of all, prayer is a relationship with God expressed with others. That is the beauty of the Sacrament of Holy Matrimony: husband and wife are bound together in marriage to become signs of the saving presence of Jesus Christ.

Marriage as a sacrament means it is a prayer as well, a relationship of a man and woman with God as its source and foundation.

I am sure, Joyce and Tony along with all the other married couples here today will agree that married life requires a lot of prayers. In fact, married life is a prayer, a very difficult one that is much needed.

Like in that movie My Best Friend’s Wedding, there are real forces of evil that are trying to destroy couples. So many couples have already fallen, going their separate lives after several years of being together while on the other hand, more and more couples are refusing to get married at all due to this reality of breakups and separations.

And that is why we are celebrating today Joyce and Tony’s 40th wedding anniversary! We are praying with them in expressing our faith and love for them in Christ Jesus. Prayers have kept them together, transforming them into better persons.

At the end of the parable of the persistent widow and unjust judge, Jesus posed a very crucial question for us, especially to every married couple here today: When the Son of Man comes again at the end of time, will he find faith on earth? (Lk.18:8)

And what shall be our response?

“Yes, Lord, you shall find faith when you come again in Joyce and Tony!”

Like Moses in the first reading, they both prayed hard with arms outstretched on many occasions as they battled life’s many challenges and struggles.

“Yes, Lord, you shall find faith when you come again in Joyce and Tony” because they have both proclaimed your word with persistence, whether it is convenient or inconvenient like St. Paul in his second letter to Timothy. They have weathered so many storms in the past 40 years and your words, O Lord, have kept them together, sharing these with their children and with everyone in their life of fidelity and love.

“Yes, Lord, you shall find faith when you come again in Joyce and Tony” now before your altar to renew their vows to love and cherish each other for the rest of their lives!

“Yes, Lord, you shall find faith when you come again” among the many couples gathered here who have remained faithful to each other despite their many sins and failures, weaknesses and shortcomings.

Joyce and Tony, you are not only a prayer of faith but also a homily of the Holy Matrimony, showing us the light and power of Jesus Christ to transform people in prayer and bring them to fulfillment.

Prayer does not change things like typhoons and earthquakes. We cannot ask God in prayer to spare us from getting sick or be exempted from life’s many trials and sufferings. Prayer cannot stop those from happening.

What prayer does is change us, change our attitude so we may hurdle life’s many blows and obstacles. Especially with couples who always find God in their lives, in good times and in bad.

Prayers transform us into better persons as children of God, especially couples who eventually look like brothers and sisters after living together in faith, hope and love.

Tony and Joyce, I am sure everyone in our family and among your friends here can attest to the many good things that have transformed you in the past 40 years.

You have changed to become the best for each other.

In the bible, the number 40 means perfect.

May God continue to perfect you, Tony and Joyce.

Keep us too in your prayers as we pray for you. Amen.
https://lordmychef.com/2019/10/23/married-life-is-a-prayer/

*Joyce and Tony in 1979…may forever basta may prayer!*

Marriage as path to heaven, sign of the living God

The Lord Is My Chef Daily Recipe for the Soul by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II
Wednesday, Memorial of St. Boniface, Bishop & Martyr, 05 June 2024
2 Timothy 1:1-3, 6-12 <*((((>< + ><))))*> Mark 12:18-27

*Photo by author, Sacred Heart Novitiate, Novaliches, QC, 20 March 2024.*

Thank you so much,
dear Jesus for your words
today that shed light again
to this issue about divorce:
of how resurrection is real because
God is very much alive,
very much present with us
and in us!

Jesus said to them, “Are you not misled because you do not know the Scriptures or the power of God? When they rise from the dead, they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but they are like the angels in heaven. As for the dead being raised, have you not read in the Book of Moses, in the passage about the bush, how God told him, I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob? He is not God of the dead but of the living. You are greatly misled.
Mark 12:24-27

Most of all,
you have shown us too how 
marriage is a path towards heaven:
man and woman marry in this life
for a taste of heaven,
to work for heaven,
to try making this imperfect world
a heaven, your dwelling;
we pray for all couples
especially those going through
crises these days 
to heed St. Paul's words to
Timothy, "to stir into flame 
the gift of God" they have received
on their wedding day before
your altar:

For God did not give us a spirit of cowardice but rather of power and love and self-control. So do not be ashamed of your testimony to our Lord, not to me, a prisoner for his sake; but bear your share of hardship for the Gospel with the strength that comes from God.
2 Timothy 1:7-8

Remind us that life
is always difficult
because there is always
the cross we have to carry;
however, let it sink into us too
that the cross is meant to make
us better and stronger,
that every sacrifice and
mortification we make is not to lose
life but actually to gain it more,
to have it more fully!
Most of all, every perseverance
to love and to forgive,
to be kind and be caring
happen all in your grace, O God;
in this age of instants
when every difficulty has become
a door to escape and exit from problems,
let us not be ashamed of the
real stuff that truly makes
life meaningful
by suffering and dying
in You, dear Jesus;
in this time of serious attacks
against marriage,
may we remember the words
of your servant St. Boniface
"Let us be neither dogs
that do not bark
nor silent onlookers
nor paid servants
who run away before the wolf.
Instead,
let us be careful shepherds
watching over Christ's
flock."

May we stand for what
is true and good,
O Lord,
not only in words but
especially in deeds,
 witnessing your Gospel.
Amen.

*Photo by author, Ubihan Island, Meycauyan City, December 2021.*

Husband & Wife, an Icon of Christ

Quiet Storm by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II, 04 June 2024

Here is our second instalment of our contribution in reflecting why divorce should not be allowed because it is against the plan of God and therefore, a sin. Please, we are not judging anyone here.

It is the simple truth that for the longest time people have refused to accept in their hearts that they have continuously sought ways of justifying divorce because right in their hearts, they are the first ones bothered. They had their chance to confront Jesus Christ about it 2000 years ago but the Lord minced no words when He declared the painful truth any pro-divorce would not discuss, “Because of the hardness of your hearts Moses allowed you to divorce your wives, but from the beginning it was not so” (Mt.19:8).

How sad when articles come out trying so hard to dilute this truth by deliberately interpreting it in their own terms especially the many statements by Pope Francis which he had repeatedly clarified including that of the same sex union.

Most sad is when a news report supposed to present all sides chooses to cite only the questionable teachings of some experts in religion or theology without citing the Sacred Scriptures, the Catechism of the Catholic Church and Church documents for official teachings on marriage. Worst, the same report highlighted views of Catholic theologians silenced long ago (may they rest in peace) by the Church for their misleading views on morality!

Divorce is against God’s plan. Marriage is only between a man and a woman as created by God, not invented by any one that is subject to changes or whims. Jesus explained this clearly in the same gospel scene which we shall echo today and forever: “Have you not read that from the beginning the Creator ‘made them male and female’ and he said, ‘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” (Mt.19:4-6).

As a creation of God, marriage is a sacrament, a sign of His saving presence in this world in Jesus Christ who had come to reassert this truth. The problem remains the hardness of the hearts of people, especially of those getting married who are so preoccupied with the accidentals of marriage without realizing that they are an icon of Jesus.

My first assignment after ordination in 1998 was to teach at the Immaculate Conception School for Boys (ICSB) in Malolos City. We also run an all-girls high school and an elementary school for boys and girls.

Marian was my student from elementary to high school whom I have known so well including her parents. We call our students ICONS, from the initials of our school name. Here are parts of my homily to Marian’s wedding last June 29, 2019 at the Malolos Cathedral.

Congratulations to you, my dearest Marian and Matt!

God willed that you get married today on the Solemnity of St. Peter and St. Paul, the two pillars of the Church established by our Lord Jesus Christ.

Like you, Marian and Matt, St. Peter and St. Paul are two people of opposite personalities, of different social and cultural backgrounds but were able to overcome these to work together for Jesus Christ. We celebrate their feast together because despite their many differences, they were united in their love for Jesus Christ. It was Christ who brought them together and kept them together so his Church would grow and be what it is today.

The same is true with you, Marian and Matt: Jesus Christ brought you together in spite of your many differences to be united in his love. Most of all, Marian and Matt, Jesus wants you to be his ICONS or images in the world today that has become individualistic.

An icon or image of Jesus like St. Peter and St. Paul is to be one in the Lord. A man and woman get married to become disciples of Christ, to become one in Christ, to look like Christ. That is the meaning of the word sacrament, visible sign of the saving presence of Jesus in the world.

And that is why the gospel you have chosen for your wedding day is so perfect, the Sermon on the Mount where Jesus gave us his Beatitudes that are actually directions for discipleship… let us reflect on the sixth Beatitude of Jesus: “Blessed are the clean of heart, for they shall see God” (Mt.5:8).

Remember the Little Prince where the fox told him that “What is essential is invisible to the eye; it is only with the heart one can truly see”?

We can only see God with our hearts. The intellect alone is never enough.

And so it is with any person.

We can learn and know so many things about another person with our intellect but nothing will be enough for us to truly love him or her unless we let our hearts see the real him or her.

The heart is the wholeness of the person. Yesterday we celebrated the Solemnity of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. Sometimes, when we use our minds, we see the world as so dark and so evil. But, if we have hearts that can see, we will be more surprised that there are more goodness, more beauty in this world than what we hear and see in the news and around us.

Marian and Matt, always have a clean heart to see each one’s goodness and beauty.

Always go back to those early days when you first saw each other with your hearts. Aside from the kilig factor, you felt and realized something deeper with each other. The beloved disciple, St. John, wrote in our first reading, “No one has ever seen God. Yet, if we love one another, God remains in us, and his love is brought to perfection in us” (1 Jn. 4:11-12).

And that is how we see God and others: always with our hearts when we love.

To have a clean heart, Marian and Matt, is to enter into the mind of Jesus Christ and that is to embrace his Cross. Having a clean heart is becoming one with Jesus Christ, especially in his love and fidelity.

A clean heart is a loving heart that always gives life, other-centered, veritable and enduring. Always in communion with Jesus Christ who gave us the new commandment to love like him by being rooted in the Father.

The love of Christ is the fire that purifies and cleanses our hearts, unifying our intellect, will and emotion that enables us to see oneness in ourselves before God. We see not only the good and the bad sides in ourselves but also among those around us, especially those we love.

Look back at your many experiences, Marian and Matt. Look at your past lives, your struggles, your mistakes and sins. Despite all these, you have also seen and experienced God’s loving presence in you in spite of your many darkness and divisions within.

That is why you are so “blessed”, Marian and Matt, because today on your wedding day, you enter God himself and you are able to “see” him with your loving hearts despite your pains and hurt, failures and shortcomings. Keep your hearts clean in Jesus Christ so you may always see God in each other. Amen.
https://lordmychef.com/2019/07/06/husband-and-wife-icons-of-christ/

*Photo by author, Malolos Cathedral 2019.*

My dearest married couples, please do not forget that fact, that reality: you are an image, an icon of Jesus Christ. And what a great honor!

That is why Jesus made His first miracle in a wedding at Cana to show your special place in God’s plan. You have chosen a most difficult kind of life but that is why you chose to get married in the Church – to be blessed by God.

God keeps His promise. Keep yours too! Praying for all couples especially those going through difficulties these days.

The Eucharist: our experience of divinity & unity in love

The Lord Is My Chef Sunday Recipe for the Soul by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II
Solemnity of the Body and Blood of Christ-B, 02 June 2024
Exodus 24:3-8 ><}}}}}*> Hebrews 9:11-15 ><}}}}}*> Mark 14:12-16, 22-26

When I was a teacher-administrator of the Immaculate Conception Schoo for Boys (ICSB) in Malolos during my early years in the priesthood, I used to tell my students that in every first date they would have, always bring their girlfriend to a restaurant because what matters most is not the food and drinks but the moments we share together to know each other.

That’s the spirit behind every gathering we host with family and friends. What we really offer our guests are not food and drinks and desserts but our very selves, expressing to them our desire to be closer and intimate in our relationships as family and friends. When we tell them to have more food and drinks including sending home with tons of “Sharon Cuneta”, we actually share to them our selves as food and drinks in the same manner they nourished us with their coming. That’s Filipino hospitality so known even abroad, so appreciated by foreigners as we see in many reels and TikTok in social media.

Universally speaking, every meal is more than eating and drinking but of togetherness, of deepening of our bonds as family and friends nourishing each other, becoming food and drinks for one another.

It is the same thing the happens in a more complete and perfect manner whenever we celebrate the Holy Eucharist.

By giving us His very self as Body and Blood, Jesus Christ our host in this sacred meal not only nourishes our spiritual and deepest longings but most of all offers us the most intimate communion possible with others and with God. Jesus is the one who makes everything possible for us to be together, calling us to “come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest…for I am humble and gentle of heart” (Mt.11:28-30).

On the first day of the Feast of Unleavened Bread, when they sacrifice the Passover lamb, Jesus’ disciples said to him, “Where do you want us to go and prepare for you to eat the Passover?” He sent two of his disciples and said to them, “Go into the city and a man will meet you, carrying a jar of water. Follow him. Wherever he enters, say to the master of the house, “The Teacher says, ‘Where is my guest room where I may eat the Passover with my disciples?’ Then he will show you a large upper room furnished and ready. Make the preparations for us there.” The disciples then went off, entered the city, and found it just as he had told them; and they prepared the Passover.
Mark 14:12-16

*Photo by MART PRODUCTION on Pexels.com*

See how Jesus personally prepared everything for their Passover meal when He arranged everything with coded messages like following “a man carrying a jar of water” because at that time, it was the woman who fetched water. You cannot find a man carrying a jar of water unless there is something extraordinary like in our gospel today. And that is how much God loves us, always taking the initiative to meet us, to encounter us, to be closest with us.

It is always Jesus Christ who takes the initiative to meet us and bless us like in the Holy Eucharist. Imagine at the start of the Mass, right away He welcomes us even if we are sinners, granting us pardon even before we have asked forgiveness. In the Eucharist, we receive Jesus Christ personally like the apostles at the Last Supper this time under the signs of bread and wine as His Body and Blood, drawing us closer to Him.

That is what really happens in the sacred meal of the Holy Eucharist, a divine communion!

I tell people that after receiving Jesus in the Holy Communion, speak to Him in the most personal manner, tell Him everything whatever you want, including your cries and complaints. But, like in every meal, listen too to Jesus who has always has something so personal to tell us.

Here we find an essential element in every meal, in every conversation, in a covenant: our responsibility, our response to the offer of our host Jesus Christ. This is the meaning of Moses splashing the blood of the animal offerings to the people in sealing their covenant with God: the blood symbolized life or gift of self, our giving of ourselves to God our Lord. Jesus perfected this in the sacrament of the Holy Eucharist as the Letter of the Hebrews tells us:

Brothers and sisters: When Christ came as high priest of the good things that have come to be, passing through the greater and more perfect tabernacle not made by hands, that is, not belonging to this creation, he entered once for all into the sanctuary, not with the blood of goats and calves but with his own blood, thus obtaining eternal redemption. For this reason he is mediator of a new covenant: since a death has taken place for deliverance from transgressions under the first covenant, those who are called may receive the promised eternal inheritance.
Hebrews 9:11-12, 15

*Photo by author, Chapel of St. Francis Xavier, Sacred Heart Novitiate, Novaliches, QC, 20 March 2024.*

Here we find the element and essence of sacrifice of Jesus as sacrifice of the Mass. From the Latin words sacra facere that means to make holy or sacred, Jesus offered Himself as a sacrifice for us to make us holy like Him. In the Mass, we do not repeat His sacrifice but makes it present, actual in ourselves.

For us to receive Jesus Body and Blood in the Eucharist, we too give ourselves to Him to become His very presence in the world not only in the community gathered as His mystical Body or Church but most of all, in our union as family and friends like in Marriage. But, remember that the sacrament is not everything. We have responsibilities to nurture, deepen and protect the grace every Sacrament bestows us. What do we give? What do we sacrifice?

My dear friends, that aspect of mortification in sacrifice is accidental. We do not sacrifice or give up something merely to deny ourselves of something good. To sacrifice is not to deprive oneself of life but actually to offer oneself to a higher life. That is why we sacrifice for our loved ones and even for ourselves to achieve our dreams and aspirations. God asks us to sacrifice not because He needs us but in order to make us better, to make us holy, more equipped to keep our end in His covenant. Hence, divorce is contrary to the Eucharist, to the covenant of God.

*Photo by Ka Ruben, National Shrine of Our Lady of Fatima, Valenzuela City, 2022.*

There is no perfect marriage nor perfect couples but every marriage is made in heaven, blessed by God. Problems do happen indeed in many marriages or in life in general but these are of human origins – the hardness of our hearts as Jesus declared, not with the sacrament or with life itself.

Everybody has got to give, has to sacrifice. The best things in life are not free, especially a happy marriage. Or a fulfilling ministry or career or whatever. We have to give ourselves too in the same manner Jesus gave us Himself on the Cross. Problem is we no longer sacrifice in these days of instants that even that most wonderful union of man and woman called marriage is being destroyed by some in the pretext of a solution with divorce.

In celebrating the Solemnity of the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ today, we experience the love and unity of God expressed in last week’s celebration of the Blessed Trinity, of how the three Persons in their mutual giving of self to each other outpoured upon us life and abundant blessings.

Like the three Persons bonded in love, we too can achieve that unity with God and with others through the Holy Eucharist when we too learn to sacrifice, assuring us of God’s presence among us in the ordinary instances in life. Experience God in every movement, in every step as He always takes the initiative to meet us, to be with us so we become like Him.

Let us pray:

Lord Jesus Christ,
You have given me Your total self
in love, Body and Blood
on the Cross and daily in 
the sacrifice of the Mass;
You never asked me to give
myself literally: You merely ask me
to be more loving and kind,
to be more forgiving and merciful,
to be more charitable;
what's more, every good deed 
I am able to do actually comes from You!
I practically just have to be Your lips,
Your hands, Your limbs, Your Body and Blood
and yet, I could not give up myself to You!
Help me Jesus
to learn to sacrifice,
to offer my body,
my total self to You
through the loving service of others.
Amen.

Our prophetic mission in Christ

The Lord Is My Chef Breakfast Recipe for the Soul

First Friday, Week IV, Year II, 07 February 2020

***Sirach 47:2-11* ><)))> 0 <(((>< *Mark 6:14-29***

Photo from catholicworldreport.com, “The Beheading of St. John the Baptist” (1869) by Pierre Puvis de Chevannes.

Your gospel today, O Lord, is so appropriate and timely: while we were busy, albeit foolishly discussing the novel coronavirus in every fora, a technical committee in the House of Representatives has approved three measures seeking to legalize divorce in the country.

We do not know what have really happened but it is so sad that no one among the Catholic and Christian lawmakers there made a solid stand against these measures like St. John the Baptist who was imprisoned on account of his objection to Herod’s taking of his brother’s wife Herodias.

So many times, Lord, we are so afraid and worried of what others might say against us when we make a stand for what is right and just, for what is proper and decent, for what is right and good, for what is your will.

Worst, O Lord, many of us are like Herodias who have prostituted our very selves in the service of the worldly allures of sex, fame, and wealth, choosing to be silent with all the many immoralities going on in government, in the society, and even in the church!

Give us the same courage, Lord, you have given your precursor St. John the Baptist to be prophets in this modern age, to be a voice in the wilderness, making a stand for what is holy, true, and just.

Like David, may we always seek your ways, ask for your grace to do your will against the giants and monsters of this world who ram into us every modern thought and idea that disregard the sanctity of life, the value of every person, as well as the sanctity of marriage.

Let us not be silent anymore with the growing impunity of many in their arrogant display of authority, throwing their weight around us with their cuss words and fallacious arguments that dignify their truncated egos and pride for the sake of progress and modernity. Amen.

The Lord Is My Chef Breakfast Recipe for the Soul

First Friday, Week IV, Year II, 07 February 2020

Sirach 47:2-11 ><)))*> 0 <*(((>< Mark 6:14-29

***Sirach 47:2-11* ><)))> 0 <(((>< *Mark 6:14-29***