Reflection from Friar Nicholas

SUNDAY, FOURTH WEEK OF EASTERTIDE    Acts 2:14,36-41; Ps 23; 1 Pet 2:20-25; Jn 10:1-10 I Am the Gate of the Sheepfold We celebrate the fourth Sunday of Easter as the Good Shepherd Sunday. By this celebration, the Church leads us deeper into the Messianic role of the Son of Man. The Eternal Word assumed our human nature in order to save us from sin, death, and evil, and to restore us to the eternal dwelling that God prepared for us. This is the core content of the celebration. The celebration presents this content using the analogy of the Shepherd and the sheep. The illumination of this analogy is important for our understanding of the celebration. The fact that we are rational creatures of God makes us his own in every ramification. Though he made us rational, we are conceived and born in ignorance of God and the divine truths necessary for our eternal well-being. The disobedience of our first parents placed additional stumbling blocks or difficulties on our path to acqu...

FEAST OF SAINT MARK, EVANGELIST    Pet 5:5-14; Ps 89:2-3,6-7,16-17; Mk 16:15-20 Vocation to feed the People with Jesus Christ Remaining spiritually young and agile depends on what we feed our spirits. Since the maintenance of a thing of nature usually comes from the same principle that gave it existence, the word of God that gave us spiritual life also sustains it. We obtained spiritual life through believing in the resurrection of the Son of Man, which we confessed at our baptism. The same confession of faith in the Risen Lord makes us grow in our spiritual life. This confession of faith in the resurrection of the Lord is ritually expressed when we receive the Lord in the Eucharist. Our reception of the Sacrament of his body and blood, includes his soul and divinity. We can receive the Sacrament, the bread and wine, without faith, but the reality of his body and blood, his soul and divinity we definitely cannot receive without faith. If, therefore, we believe in hi...

FRIDAY, THIRD WEEK OF EASTERTIDE    Acts 9:1-20; Ps 117; Jn 6:52-59 Eating the Flesh and Drinking the Blood of Jesus Christ What causes us not to eat the flesh and drink the blood of the Son of Man? Understanding the sacramental nature of creatures and creation as a whole, we see that the problem is not that we are not eating the body and drinking the blood of the Son of Man; we are eating and drinking without recognising the reality we are feeding on. Because we eat these creatures, structured into a rational path leading to divine truth and revelation, without walking the path of reason they present to us, and the spiritual path hidden behind their sacramentality, we fall short of eating his flesh and drinking his blood. When we interact with creatures without hearing the voice of God through them or seeing God through them, we misuse them and fail to follow the path they point out to us for God. It was to bring the consciousness of his disciples to his abiding pr...

THURSDAY, THIRD WEEK OF EASTERTIDE    Acts 8:26-40; Ps 66:8-9,16-17,20; Jn 6:44-51 Freedom from Darkness of Error The nature of each creature of God is a certain law which represents the will of God that brings and sustains it in existence. So, the operation of the nature of a thing expresses the will of God for its existence and divine purpose for it. In all creation, we see that each nature has intrinsic and extrinsic bearings. In the former, it maintains the inherent structure of the thing, and in the latter, it relates and corroborates with other natures in the maintenance of a certain stable equilibrium in the universe. This web of relations and correlations of natures reaches its highest complexity in humans. The entire material universe works together to support the human person, made in the image of God. The Scriptures teach us that God created the entire world for the benefit of humanity. But both the human persons and the material universe that God created...

WEDNESDAY, THIRD WEEK OF EASTERTIDE    Acts 8:1-8; Ps 66:1-7; Jn 6:35-40 I Have Come to Do the Father’s Will As we reflected on, the will of the heavenly Father is the daily bread we are invited to eat. Jesus is our real food and drink, for He represents the will of God for us. This is what the kingdom of heaven is essentially: doing the will of God. There are myriads of angels in heaven, but there is only one will in the whole of heaven; that is, the will of the Father. The holy and immutable will of God the Father is what makes heaven a complete joy and happiness. God is infinitely good and pours all his goodness into his divine will. Since the will of God expresses the infinite goodness of God, there is no other thing more exquisite and attractive than the holy and immutable will of God. Hence, the Son is totally dedicated to doing the will of the Father and completely represents the will of God the Father. Everything in creation shows forth a little aspect of th...

TUESDAY, THIRD WEEK OF EASTERTIDE    Acts 7:51-8:1; Ps 31:3-4,6,8,17,21; Jn 6:30-35 The Father Gives the Heavenly Bread All who are born of water and the Holy Spirit have the life of heaven or spiritual life. This life was not possible before the passion and death of Jesus Christ, because all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. Hence, no one could discern the things of heaven or possess heavenly life, for no one came from heaven to reveal God or make his will known here on earth. The Only Begotten Son of God assumed human flesh and lived among us that he might teach us about the Father and reveal the holy will of God to us. The revelation would have no effect if all the children were in bondage to sin and enslaved to the evil one. A slave does not own himself and therefore cannot give himself to another master when he is the slave of another. The only way open to a slave to escape the bondage of his evil master is rebellion, which leads to the death of...