Reflection from Friar Nicholas

MONDAY, SIXTH WEEK OF EASTERTIDE    Acts 16:11-15; Ps 149:1-6,9; Jn 15:26-16:4 You will be My Witnesses The Son of Man does not encounter us only when we hear the Gospel preached to us, but he calls us every day of our lives. We encounter the Son of Man within us, in the testimony of our rational nature. We have often explained how he is the perfection of our nature and therefore, everything good in us answers to him or draws us to him. We encounter him every day as we come to apprehend the created reality which contains his impression and speaks to us about God. We encounter him each time we understand and know a truth; for every truth echoes his voice, beckoning us to communion with him, and to a life in him. Every truth we know, embrace, and live out prepares us for his indwelling within us in spiritual life. Hence, the sheep of the Lord know him and recognise his voice even before they encounter him in the Gospel. The Son of Man made this declaration himself in ...

SUNDAY, SIXTH WEEK OF EASTERTIDE    Acts 8:5-8,14-17; Ps 66:1-7,16,20; 1 Pet 3:15-18; Jn 14:15-21 Necessity of Love for the Risen Lord The major gain we receive from the resurrection of the Lord from the dead and glorification is that he is now the Lord of all. Glorified, he is present through the glory of God to every soul who desires him. This was why he declared to the apostles and disciples that they would benefit more from him when he was gone from them and back to the Father. Another major gain is that he would take care of our sins, which prevent us from participating in the life of God. Because his going is through the passion he was set to undergo in Jerusalem, his suffering and death would bring to perfection his offering or sacrifice of his life to accomplish the Father’s will and make our human nature acceptable to God once more. With his resurrection from death, the Son of Man reconnected human nature to God as it was created to be. Henceforth, any huma...

SATURDAY, FIFTH WEEK OF EASTER    Acts 15:22-31; Ps 57:8-12; Jn 15:12-17 Structure of Evil and Hatred We have acknowledged and described the presence of divine love in the created universe and in the human family that God instituted for the well-being of his children. The orderly structures in creation and in the family are a result of obedience to God’s word, which brings things into existence. Thus, the orderly structures propagate the presence of God through his word, upholding the structures and forming noble souls within and through them, both in creation and in the human family. Disobedience, on the other hand, which entered the universe through the disobedience of Adam and Eve, and became the seed of darkness and evil in them and their progenies, also produced its evil structures. The structures of sin, disobedience to divine will, emanating from man, work to obstruct the working of the divine structures or to obscure them by darkness and destroy man in the d...

FRIDAY, FIFTH WEEK OF EASTER    Acts 15:22-31; Ps 57:8-12; Jn 15:12-17 The Structures of Divine Love We have often explained the infinite goodness of God, as displayed in the entire creation, which God intends to be our first school of divine goodness, teaching us the right attitude and willingness of creatures to obey the divine order and will. We do not learn the initial lesson from the created reality due to our inattentiveness to God, creatures, the created order, people around us, and even to our true selves. In his infinite wisdom, God did not stop at surrounding us with the orderly creation; he ordained that each of us come to life through a family. The family is not just an orderly structure for supporting life, but also a cradle of love and providence for a new life. Coming from a family, each of us is received into a loving environment, cared for, as we grow and mature into loving and responsible individual persons. The love and care we receive in our fami...

THURSDAY, FIFTH WEEK OF EASTER    Acts 15:7-21; Ps 96:1-3,10; Jn 15:9-11 The Divine Will and our Holiness The holiness of our God is such that no creature can add to it or remove from it in any sense. God is so perfect that every one of his perfections is infinite and beyond our comprehension. This is why his divine will is so holy and immutable. His holy will, which stands for the greatness of God, is carried by his word. In the eternity of God’s existence, the Eternal Word is the Begotten of the Father. We worship the Word, the Son, as we worship the Father, for he shares in the Godhead of the Father. Based on this lofty and exalted holiness of God, none of us can be holy or compare in holiness to God by our own works or efforts, but we receive our holiness from God. The scripture bears witness to this by stating that all our works or righteous acts are like filthy rags before God. Cf. Isa 64:4. Our goodness or holiness of life comes from our conformity with the holy w...

WEDNESDAY, FIFTH WEEK OF EASTER    Acts 13:1-6; Ps 122:1-5; Jn 15:1-8 The Vine and Its Branches The Son of Man uses the beautiful analogy of the vine and its branches to awaken our minds and hearts to ruminate on the kind of communion we share with him in God. Just as the vine and its branches form a single tree, the Son of Man forms a mystical union with all his members. We gain the membership of his body through profession of faith in the divinity of the Son of Man. As our head, the Son of Man, is hypostatically united to the Eternal Word. His resurrection from the dead proves his divinity beyond doubt. So, our faith in his divinity is also our faith in his resurrection. Our profession of faith enables us to share in the blessedness the Son of Man received for us as the head of our human nature. What he received without merit, he received for us, his brethren; and what he merited by his faithful obedience, he shares with us, so that we may also receive the fullness of ...