Thank you so much,
dear God for you reassuring
words today:
"Just as from the heavens
the rain and snow come down
and do not return there
till they have watered the earth,
making it fertile and fruitful,
giving seed to the one who sows
and bread to the one who eats,
so shall my word be that goes forth
from my mouth; it shall not return
to me void, but shall do my will,
achieving the end for which I sent it"
(Isaiah 55:10-11).
Forgive us for being impatient,
for rushing everything and everyone
especially YOU with our many plans
in life that too often we refuse
to trust so that we may control
everything and everyone.
Thank you for being so patient
with us, truly a lover who waits
when we are ready to surrender
everything so that YOU may
take charge with our lives.
I know, dear God, the question
with you is not how true are your
words and promises but when
will you fulfill them because you are
truly "Our Father" who wishes only the
best things for us your children.
Through your Son Jesus Christ,
teach us that when we call you
"Our Father", we may submit
ourselves to your will as we lay aside
our own plans and agenda so that
we may fully experience the reality
of your power and grace. Amen.
The Lord Is My Chef Sunday Recipe for the Soul by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II
Feast of the Sto. Niño, Sunday II in Ordinary Time, 16 January 2022
Isaiah 9:1-6 ><}}}*> Ephesians 1:3-6, 15-18 ><}}}*> Luke 2:41-52
Photo by author, Sto. Niño exhibit at the Malolos Cathedral, 13 January 2022.
We Filipinos celebrate the longest Christmas season in the world which starts – unofficially -every September first when radio stations begin playing Christmas songs, ending officially today, the third Sunday of January with the Feast of the Sto. Niño (Holy Child Jesus).
Today’s feast is considered a part of the Christmas season which is in recognition of the crucial role of the image of Sto. Niño given by Magellan 500 years ago to Queen Juana of Cebu in the evangelization process of the Philippines. As the late Nick Joaquin would rightly claim in his essays, the Philippines was colonized by the Sto. Niño which is clearly seen in its widespread devotion coming in close second with Nuestro Padre Hesus Nazareno of Quiapo we celebrate every January 09.
What a wonderful “coincidence” or Divine intervention that the two most popular Christ devotions in the country happen on the same month of January, immediately after Christmas, reminding us despite our many shortcomings as the only Christian nation in this part of the world, Jesus reigns supreme in our hearts and homes.
And churches.
Despite the many accusations hurled against our brand of Christianity, of being sacramentalized but not evangelized, we can find hope and consolation in our being as very “church people” – our coming to the church even outside during this pandemic period in itself is a child-like trait, a grace we can deepen for a more matured faith that can lead to our transformation as a people.
This we see in our gospel today which we have heard proclaimed last month at the Feast of the Holy Family, a day after Christmas that was also a Sunday.
Each year his parents went to Jerusalem for the feast of Passover, and when he was twelve years old, they went up according to festival custom. After they had completed its days, as they were returning, the boy Jesus remained behind in Jerusalem, but his parents did not know it. After three days they found him in the temple, sitting in the midst of teachers, listening to them and asking them questions. When his parents saw him, they were astonished, and his mother said to him, “Son, why have you done this to us? Your father and I have been looking for you with great anxiety.” And he said to them, “Why were you looking for me? Did you not know that I must be in my Father’s house?”
Luke 2:41-43, 46, 48-49
“The Finding of the Savior at the Temple” painting by William Holman Hunt (1860) from en.wikipedia.org.
We are all children of the Father in Christ
When we examine Christ’s life and teachings, we find how everything is anchored in being a child of God the Father as he would always remind everyone that unless one becomes like a child, one cannot enter the kingdom of heaven.
This Jesus clearly showed when he was 12 years old after staying behind at the Temple in Jerusalem that left Mary and Joseph so “anxiously looking for him”.
We see in this gospel scene how Jesus must have been so rooted in his own childhood experience that he could speak with familiarity about the child’s being and dignity. Most of all, of being the Son of God, a child of God when he told his Mother Mary, “Why were you looking for me? Did you not know that I must be in my Father’s house?” (Lk.2:49).
As he grew up and matured during his ministry, Jesus frequented the synagogues and later the Temple as a devout and faithful Jew.
What a beautiful expression of his being a child of the Father, always coming to the “Father’s house” to worship and praise, to be one with God and with the people.
What a beautiful expression of his – and our being children of God the Father!
Every time we come to the church to celebrate the Sacraments especially the Holy Eucharist, every time we come to pray inside the church, we express our being children of the Father. It is the most beautiful expression of our being child-like before God when we come to him in his house of worship in total surrender, on bended knees to plea for his grace and mercy.
Photo by Ms. Mira Mandal Sibal, September 2021.
To believe in the Church and come inside the church is part of our faith in the mystery of the Church as the Mystical Body of Christ we profess in the Apostles’ Creed, “I believe in the Holy Spirit, the Holy Catholic Church”.
Recall that after cleansing the Temple, Jesus declared to those asking him for signs to “Destroy this temple and in three days I will raise it up” (Jn.2:19) with the Evangelist’s added note, “But he was speaking about the temple of his body” (Jn.2:21). Eventually on Good Friday as he died on the cross, we are told in another gospel account how “the veil of the sanctuary was torn in two from top to bottom” (Mt.27:50), indicating a new phase in worshipping God in his Son Jesus Christ who has become the Body of the new people he had called that includes us today, the Church.
Therefore, every time we come to the church as a community of people, it is an act of being child-like as taught by our Lord Jesus Christ in the same manner he told his parents that “I must be in my Father’s house”.
Our being able to come to the church for the Mass and the other sacraments is a pure grace from God, an act of being child-like before him when we submit ourselves to him, when we try to listen to his words proclaimed, when we believe in the power of prayers and Sacraments.
At the height of this pandemic when religious gatherings were banned, so many faithful expressed their child-likeness to God by turning to on-line Masses and prayers.
However, as we slowly open up churches for live celebrations, there now arises the call for us to return into the Father’s house. The very nature of the Church as the Body of Christ and the Sacraments presuppose presence.
Here, we find the great relevance of today’s Feast of the Sto. Niño to return to the Father’s house and reconnect anew with our fellow disciples without disregarding health protocols of course.
When the Spaniards returned to the Philippines in 1565 (40 years after Magellan), they saw the Sto. Niño venerated on an altar above other anitos inside a hut presumed to be a house of worship of the natives. Most likely, the natives felt the Sto. Niño as the superior deity always answering their prayers for abundant harvests, healing from sickness or avoidance of pestilence, and fertility for more children to work in the fields. Again, the imagery of that child-like attitude of coming into the “Father’s house” to commune in prayer by those natives.
Photo by author, National Shrine of Our Lady of Fatima, Valenzuela City, 14 January 2022.
It is perhaps the new challenge we will be facing as the COVID-19 virus wears off as experts claim, how to bring back people into the Father’s house. Confounding the problem is the lure of the convenience of online Masses that have commodified the Sacrament, a clear indication of lack of any child-like attitude but more of manipulation.
Added to this is the relativistic attitude of modern time when some people claim to believe in God without necessarily having the need to believe in the Church that is deeply embroiled in cases of sexual abuses by its clergy.
All of these are calls for everyone in the Mystical Body of Christ, the Church which is a mystery in itself for its members, clergy and lay alike, to recapture that child-like attitude of Jesus himself to always affirm his being in the Father’s house. Amen.
The Lord Is My Chef Breakfast Recipe for the Soul by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II
Friday, Week XIX, Year I in Ordinary Time, 13 August 2021
Joshua 24:1-13 ><]]]]*> + ><]]]]'> + ><]]]]*> Matthew 19:3-12
Photo by author, modern chapel at the Milk Grotto in Bethlehem, the Holy Land, 2019.
I know, dear God our Father,
you have no need of our words
nor works in exchange for your
abounding love and grace given us
in Christ Jesus; and there lies
your goodness and holiness when
all you ask of us is our fidelity
to your covenant, that we remain true
to you by dealing with love and justice
to one another which is all for our own good too.
“I gave you a land that you had not tilled and cities which you had not built, to dwell in; you have eaten of vineyards and olive groves which you did not plant.”
Joshua 24:13
You have given us everything, O God:
the earth and everything on it that we have
wasted and destroyed; worst of all, you
have given us family and friends, every person
and people to love and cherish, respect and
be kind with but whom we have always
hurt with our words and actions when we
see only our very selves, failing to see
others as brothers and sisters in you
as Father from the the very beginning.
“Have you not read that from the beginning the Creator made them male and female, and 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, man must not separate.”
Matthew 19:4-6
Forgive us, merciful Father
for the "hardness of our hearts" (Mt.19:8),
in our building walls among us instead
of bridges to bring us close together
as your children reconciled in Jesus Christ;
help us to find the common grounds that
make us all the same, not different;
make us find and accept our vocation
in life so we may fulfill your calling
by serving you through one another
with love and respect, kindness and mercy
especially in this time of the pandemic.
Amen.
The Lord Is My Chef Breakfast Recipe for the Soul by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II
Thursday, Week XIX, Year I in Ordinary Time, 12 August 2021
Joshua 3:7-10, 11, 13-17 ><]]]]'> Matthew 18:21-19:1
Photo by author, sunrise at Lake of Tiberias (Galilee), the Holy Land, 2019.
Praise and glory to you,
O God our loving Father!
How great indeed are your
works that you do everything for
our own good even long before
we are born, preparing us
for every great moment of
trials long before we have seen
them coming or even happening!
You are always there, Father
ahead of us in every step of
the way in this life like in the
entrance of your chosen people
to your promised land preceded
by the ark of the covenant,
parting the Jordan River so that
your people may cross on dry land
reminiscent of the Exodus at Red Sea.
No sooner had these priestly bearers of the ark waded into the waters at the edge of the Jordan, which overflows all its banks during the entire season of the harvest, than the waters flowing from upstream halted, backing up in a solid mass for a very great distance indeed… While all Israel crossed over on dry ground, the priests carrying the ark of the covenant of the Lord remained motionless on dry ground in the bed of the Jordan until the whole nation had completed the passage.
Joshua 3:15-16, 17
Dear God, whenever I review my life
especially those low moments of
failures and disasters, sins and evil,
sickness or wrong decisions when I thought
everything had collapsed and totally gone,
you were always there, bringing me to safer
grounds; you were always there five steps
or more ahead of me, fixing all the problems
and troubles I have fallen into, even trapped inside.
Like in the history of Israel from Abraham to Joshua,
you never stopped surprising me
with your mighty presence and love.
But the greatest of all
marvelous things you have done
to me and us all, loving Father,
is sending us your Son Jesus Christ
to save us from all our sins with your mercy
and forgiveness that is without end.
Like in today's parable, teach us to be
merciful and forgiving to those who have
sinned against us for we are all
forgiven sinners you love so much.
You have done so much for us, Father,
but we have done so little for you through others.
Amen.
The Lord Is My Chef Breakfast Recipe for the Soul by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II
Monday, Memorial of St. Irenaeus, Bishop and Martyr, 28 June 2021
Genesis 18:16-33 ><)))*> + <*(((>< Matthew 8:18-22
Photo by Ms. Ria De Vera at Lalakhan, Santa Maria, Bulacan, 02 June 2021.
You are sometimes
so funny and amusing, dear God
when you act like our daddy
as if like dilly dallying
on whether to tell us something
he is planning
knowing so well
he is the father and the master
that we his children must obey
and abide by his will and order.
How nice of you, O Lord
to act so decent, so good
full of kindness and consideration
to make us feel important
with what you have in mind
of our role and part in your divine plan
because when you act like one of us
that is when you also want us
to act like you, to think like you
to be holy like you.
The Lord reflected,
"Shall I hide from Abraham
what I am about to do
(to Sodom and Gomorrah),
now that he is to become a great
and populous nation,
and all nations of the earth
are to find blessing in him?
Indeed, I have singled him out
that he may direct his children
and his household after him
to keep the way of the Lord
by doing what is right and just,
so that the Lord may carry into effect
for Abraham the promises he made about him."
(Genesis 18:17-19)
But more than acting
and thinking like you, O God,
is for us to love like you
that is why sometimes
Jesus sounds too harsh and
difficult to follow, challenging us
to let go of our own desires
and usual ways of living
in order to love you completely
and selflessly.
Jesus answered him,
"Foxes have dens, birds have nests,
but the Son of Man has nowhere
to rest his head."
Another of his disciples said to him,
"Lord, let me go first and bury my father."
But Jesus answered him,
"Follow me,
and let the dead bury their dead."
(Matthew 8:20-22)
We pray, O Lord,
for our leaders in the Church
and in government
to be more committed
in serving your people
than in serving their own interests;
enlighten them of your ways, Lord,
of your kindness and mercy
dispensing justice swiftly
where there is outcry against sin. Amen.
The Lord Is My Chef Breakfast Recipe for the Soul by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II
Friday, Solemnity of the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus, 11 June 2021
Hosea 11:1, 3-4, 8-9 + Ephesians 3:8-12, 14-19 + John 19:31-37
Let me begin my prayer to you, dear God,
with a confession from my heart that despite my
many years of praying, I have not really known you;
when I pray the "Our Father"
words simply pass my lips
slipping, skipping depths of my being.
On this Solemnity of Your Son's
Most Sacred Heart, please grant me
intimacy you have long offered a reality
if only our eyes can see
by looking at him whom they have pierced
blood and water flowed, our source of peace.
In that natural heart of your Son
is found your revelation
that outside of him
we find no salvation;
open our hearts, clear our doubts
to experience your love!
How sad that we cannot love
because we feel not being loved
when our Father in heaven is truly a Dad
who has never been mad when we are bad
in his boundless love for us
gave us his Son, full of tenderness and compassion!
40 Shades of Lent by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II
Tuesday in the Second Week of Lent, 02 March 2021
Isaiah 1:10, 16-20 ><}}}*> + ><}}}*> + ><}}}*> Matthew 23:1-12
Photo by Dr. Mylene A. Santos, MD, at Infanta, Quezon, February 2021.
Thank you, dear God our Father for this wonderful Season of Lent when we are able dwell and contemplate your immense love for us. Despite our many and serious sins that we deserve to be called as “princes of Sodom” and “people of Gomorrah” (Is.1:10) reminiscent of those two cities you have annihilated with fire, you still call us to come to you, ready to forgive us and set things right in our lives.
Come now, let us set things right, says the Lord. Though your sins be like scarlet, they may become white as snow; though they be crimson red, they may become white as wool.
Isaiah 1:18
How lovely are those lines from you, Father, “Come now, let us set things right” — filled with love and tenderness, so sincere, so true!
Whose heart would not melt with such an invitation, when we should be the one begging you for mercy and forgiveness?
But, here you are, O Father, so concerned with us that you made the move, even willing to adjust so we may be able to start anew. You are so sweet and comforting that you did not mind going down to our level in your Son Jesus Christ to reach us, fix us, and set things right once and for all.
Give us the grace through your Son Jesus Christ to believe in your love, mercy and forgiveness.
Most of all, give us the courage to turn our hearts back to you, dearest God, to be true and humble as who we really are instead of pretending to be somebody clean and perfect (cf. Mt.23:8-12). Amen.
The Lord Is My Chef Breakfast Recipe for the Soul by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II
First Friday, Memorial of Guardian Angels, 02 October 2020
Exodus 23:20-23 | + | >><)))*> | + | Matthew 18:1-5, 10
Photo by author, dome of the Malolos Cathedral, December 2019.
Praise and thanksgiving to you, O God our loving Father! In your great love for us, you did not only give us your Son Jesus Christ to redeem us but also sent us guardian angels who guide and protect us in this journey in life.
What an honor in making each one of us truly your favorite child!
May we always heed the guidance and leading of our guardian angels so we may always follow and do your Holy Will, O God.
May we be respectful, devoted and grateful to our guardian angels who function as our protectors, keeping us safe from all harm and dangers.
Lastly, give us the courage and banish our fears, Lord, for we have our guardian angels always beside us, sometimes ahead of us to prepare our paths.
Let us “follow them, stay close to them so we may dwell under the protection of God’s heaven” (St. Bernard). Amen.
The Lord Is My Chef Breakfast Recipe for the Soul by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II
Tuesday, Week XXII, Year II in Ordinary Time, 01 September 2020
1 Corinthians 2:10-16 >><)))*> || >><)))*> || >><)))*> Luke 4:31-37
Photo by author, Chapel of Holy Family, Sacred Heart Novitiate, Novaliches, May 2017.
Lord Jesus, let me be focused on you alone, on your suffering and death for my sins, on your love for me, on your dying on the Cross for me. Breathe in me your Holy Spirit so I rely on you alone to have your “mind”.
Brothers and sisters: The Spirit scrutinizes everything, even the depths of God. Among men, who knows what pertains to the man except his spirit that is within? similarly, no one knows what pertains to God except the Spirit of God… The one who is spiritual, however, can judge everything but is not subject to judgment by anyone. For “who has known the mind of the Lord, so as to counsel him?” But we have the mind of Christ.
1 Corinthians 2:10-11, 15-16
What is this “mind of Christ”, O dear Jesus, that astonished the people of Capernaum at your preaching because you spoke with authority that even the unclean spirit of the possessed man rightly recognized you?
So many times, we fail to experience and manifest your mind because we have been so preoccupied with our very selves, so confident in our wild thoughts about you despite our claims that you are beyond human comprehension.
Photo by author, inside our parish at sunrise, 2019.
Yes, many of us are so conceited in knowing you so well, Lord, preaching all about health and wealth, the good life minus your Cross and sufferings that have sadly continued to mislead so many people today like during the time of Paul at Corinth.
Refresh your mind of Christ in us, Jesus by instilling in our hearts and minds that everything is grace from the Father, that whatever gift we have received from him is perfected when we are one with you in your suffering and death on the Cross.
That is the mind of Christ, dear Jesus: a beautiful mind so faithful and trusting in the Father who makes everything possibly good and wonderful, even the most painful experiences or darkest moments we ever had.
Keep us attuned with your Spirit so we may always follow the depths of God and be one in him through you, Lord Jesus. Amen.
The Lord Is My Chef Breakfast Recipe for the Soul by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II
Thursday, Week XIV, Year II in Ordinary Time, 09 July 2020
Hosea 11:1-4, 8-9 >><}}}*> >><}}}*> >><}}}*> Matthew 10:7-15
Photo by Mr. Jim Marpa, 2019 in Carigara, Leyte.
This is the fourth straight day, O God when you have come to me in the most touching and personal manner through your prophet Hosea. It is so comforting to dwell on the tenderness of your love for me but at the same time so embarrassing too at what I have given back to you.
Thus says the Lord: When Israel was a child I loved him, out of Egypt I called my son. The more I called them, the farther they were from me, sacrificing to the Baals and burning incense to idols. Yet it was I who thought Ephraim to walk, who took them in my arms. I drew them with human cords, with bands of love; I fostered them like one who raises an infant to his cheeks. Yet, though I stooped to feed my child, they did not know I was their healer.
Hosea 11:1-7
These expressions are so true and so lovely, O God! I could feel your personal closeness to me as my Father, feeling all your love and concern for me, teaching me how to walk, taking me into your arms. And most especially that part of being fostered and raised like an infant to a father’s cheeks.
That’s how close you have been to me in many instances but sadly, it is true that the more you called me to stay closer to you, the more I drifted apart from you in sin and evil.
Forgive me, dearest God our Father, in taking you for granted in the same manner we I disregard the love and affection of those closest to me.
And that is where I feel most your personal love for me — when despite my sinfulness and turning away from you, you prefer not to give vent to your “blazing anger” to me because you are God, not human.
In fact, when your Son Jesus Christ came, his first order to his disciples was to cure the sick among us, raise the dead, cleanse lepers and exorcise those possessed by evil spirits. You only have our good always in your mind that we always fail to see or even refuse to accept and believe.
Today, Lord, we ask you for the grace to bask in your goodness and grace! Amen.
Photo by author, Church of the Our Father outside Jerusalem where Jesus taught his disciples the Lord’s Prayer.
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