Reflection from Friar Nicholas

SAINT VINCENT DE PAUL, PRIEST Zech 2:5-9,14-15; Jer 31:10-12,13; Lk 9:43-45 The Cost of Rebuilding the Temple God created us to be his temple. It is a statement of a deep mystery that we can never really comprehend until we behold God in beatific vision. The realisation of this project requires the awesome and infinite greatness of God, because, unlike the physical temples we build with material things, the construction of human temples requires the cooperation of human wills. Unlike material things, which we can hammer and chisel into shape with little physical difficulty, the human wills are not shaped by force alone or anything without, but with so much and varied inputs of divine grace within. Even grace is not enough without human obedience and willing cooperation, for we cannot be saved without us. The free will God gave to us is real, and that means he requires our cooperation to save us. Our free will underscores the dignity and mystery we share in God. It is the deeper m...

FRIDAY, TWENTY FIFTH WEEK IN ORDINARY TIME Hag 1:15-2:9; Ps 43:1-4; Lk 9:18-22 God’s Ability and Man’s Disability Our ignorance of God is usually the cause of our sin, which is always disobedience to the will of God. We often attempt to understand God using our own limited measures and standards, thereby falling into the trap of doubt that the evil one sets for us. We are raised in the community of unclean people with unclean lips, as the prophet Isaiah avowed when he encountered the holiness of God. With the psalmist, we pray: “Defend me, O God, and plead my cause against a godless nation. From deceitful and cunning men rescue me, O God.” Hence, we are used to people not matching their words with actions or deeds. The experience of men as flawed makes it difficult for us to exercise faith in the word of God, for we think of God and his word as we think of men and their w ords. We often attribute the weaknesses of men to God because he presents or communicates to us in our forms ...

THURSDAY, TWENTY FIFTH WEEK IN ORDINARY TIME Hag 1:1-8; Ps 149:1-6,9; Lk 9:7-9 The Need to Rebuild the House of God The whole universe is designed and made for the purpose of the Creator. Every intricate part of creation works together to achieve the purpose of the Creator who sustains all in being. Our ability to sin against God, that is, to disobey his will, shows the dignity God bestowed on the rational nature. He made them with free will; he made them in his image, like gods, in the sense that they determine themselves. Some people are uncomfortable with the fact that God gave them the freedom to choose to do or not do. They blame God for allowing us to commit sin. They fail to see the nobility in what God has endowed men and the angels with, giving them free will. The true nobility of man can only be understood in God, who made us for himself. The mystery of our nature makes it impossible for anyone to know and determine his nature without God. We are bound to wreck the beau...

WEDNESDAY, TWENTY FIFTH WEEK IN ORDINARY TIME Ezra 9:5-9; Tob 13:2,4,6-8; Lk 9:1-6 Preaching the Will of God It is difficult to understand or comprehend God's plan and his work within and without. God is the mystery of holiness, for only he understands what holiness entails. Thus, the divine will defines what is holy. Everything he created proclaims his holiness knowingly or unknowingly. Our wretched selves, in our sinfulness, would still proclaim the holiness of God. Since sin is our disobedience to the will of God, the punishment that follows our sins proclaims the holiness of God to us. Thus, in our pain and isolation from the holy communion of God and creation, doing his will, we realise how sinful we have acted by going against his will and are thereby compelled to confess his justice and holiness of his will. The situations and conditions that bring us into harmony with the whole of creation in proclamation of God’s holiness outline the path of our redemption and adopti...

SAINT PIUS OF PIETRELCINA (PADRE PIO) Ezra 6:7-8,12,14-20; Ps 122:1-5; Lk 8:19-21 The Reign of the Spirit of God Through David’s desire to build a temple for God in Jerusalem, God revealed his intention to have a temple in Jerusalem, where he would dwell with his people in a covenantal peace. We attribute the inspiration to David because he was the first to receive, own, and reveal it to the prophet Nathan. But in an actual sense, the inspiration is from God’s Spirit residing in him, to whom David listens and obeys in everything. Whoever receives the word of God and keeps it equally receives the same Spirit. Thus, to live with the Spirit and receive inspiration from him is to have the fire of God within us. Without the Spirit within us to enlighten and guide us in all things, we can hardly find our path to God or fulfill the divine will. The Spirit of God rouses anyone to understand the will of God and to work in harmony with it. As Cyrus, the king of Persia, was moved by the Spi...

MONDAY, TWENTY FIFTH WEEK IN ORDINARY TIME Ezra 1:1-6; Ps 126; Lk 8:16-18 Moving with Inspiration from God Among various things that can motivate us to action, love ranks the highest. The beloved lives in the lover and moves him by the strong chains of love. Based on this, God commanded us to love him with all our minds, hearts, and wills. We easily accomplish onerous tasks for the sake of love. But we cannot love what or whom we do not know, and to the extent we know someone, to that extent we love him or her. Similarly, our love for God is measured by our knowledge of him. God sends his word to us that we may know him and subsequently love him. Without encountering the word of God, we cannot love him or accomplish his will. So, the appearance of the Eternal Word of God among us as a man demonstrates God’s desire to call us back to himself from our straying path. By coming into our human nature, God has lit a fire of love among us. The fire is to enlighten us and to inflame our ...

SUNDAY, TWENTY FIFTH SUNDAY IN ORDINARY TIME Amos 8:4-7; Ps 113:1-2,4-8; 1 Tim 2:1-8; Lk 16:1-13 Our Commonwealth in God The closeness of God to us is beyond our human comprehension. Most of us live mindlessly of God and his keen interest in us and our welfare. The cause of this ignorance is our preoccupation with self, which prevents us from attending to our surrounding reality in its totality. Putting self first prevents us from objectively receiving the gifts of God within our surrounding reality. People, things, and events of each day are part of what God gives us daily; they are all part of his blessings for the day. We run into a deficit because we ignore or overlook these gifts in their totality. Because we overlook the gifts, we also overlook the giver of the gifts. We do not understand the gifts because we are ignorant of the giver of the gifts. Gifts help us appreciate the giver, especially when we appreciate the gifts. We are used to thanksgiving only when things come ...

SAINTS ANDREW KIM TAEGON, PRIEST, AND COMPANIONS 1 Tim 6:13-16; Ps 100; Lk 8:4-15 Acquiring the Sense of Duty Our Christian life is the greatest thing we possess, for its value is not just within the confines of this world, but beyond. It affords us communion with God and eternal life. As we live our lives here on earth, engaging in various activities and professions, we are also expected to deepen our spiritual roots in the mysteries of Jesus Christ and grow in spiritual life. God created us to know, to love, and to serve him. So, every one of our engagements and involvements should be directed towards achieving these. The otherworldly aspect of our lives is what the Christian faith enriches. Our profession of the Christian faith makes us reorient our minds, hearts, and wills toward the eternal goal, Jesus Christ. Our growth in spiritual life implies growing in our understanding of the meaning of life as Jesus Christ and nothing else. We can make progress in a journey only when ...

THURSDAY, TWENTY FOURTH WEEK IN ORDINARY TIME  1 Tim 4:12-16; Ps 111:7-10; Lk 7:36-50 Remaining Guided and focussed on the Lord God created all things by his word, and his word remains in them as their essence, guiding them to achieve the divine purpose of their creation. For the rational creatures, made in the image of God, his word remains in them on two levels. First, it is on the level of their nature, which they received from God at creation; second, it is on the level of operations, which requires their deliberations and choices. Unlike the irrational natures which attain the purpose of their creation without deliberation, the perfection of the rational creature lies in their ability to deliberate and choose the end of their actions. The free will of man consists in these deliberations and choices. The word of God is in our constitution as rational beings, but it will only be in our deliberation and choices through our cooperation. For this reason, the word of God is sp...

WEDNESDAY, TWENTY FOURTH WEEK IN ORDINARY TIME  1 Tim 3:14-16; Ps 111:1-6; Lk 7:31-35 The Presence of Wisdom in her Children Wisdom of God is present in all creation, as we have explained in previous reflections. Since man is part of God’s creation, we are supposed to exhibit the presence of wisdom as the whole creation does. The absence of wisdom in man’s life and conduct is the reason for redemption. Our witness of sin, which is the offspring of evil and disorder, is the proof of man’s sickness. If sin is empirically verifiable in our lives, and its consequences visible to everyone throughout the world, the path to the mystery of redemption is not hidden then. The mystery of sin leads us to the source of redemption and to the doorstep of Wisdom. We celebrated this fact in our exaltation of the Holy Cross of our Lord. Attempting to understand sin and death leads to the Eternal Wisdom. Just as the essence of darkness is the absence of light, sin is the absence of wisdom in ou...

SAINTS CORNELIUS, POPE, AND CYPRIAN, BISHOP, MARTYRS   1 Tim 3:1-13; Ps 101:1-3,5,6; Lk 7:11-17 The Cross of Leadership From the consideration and celebration of the exaltation of the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, to the Blessed Virgin Mary’s unique participation in the cross of her Son. We come down to the various ways we participate in the same cross of our Lord Jesus Christ. By his passion and death, our Lord purchased or redeemed us from the enslavement of sin and evil. Hence, the course of discipleship is a gradual transformation of our minds, hearts, and wills into those of Jesus Christ. In this sense, we understand conversion as an ongoing process in our Christian life. The Lord brings about the transformation in us through our spiritual attention on his person. We gradually grow in the Spirit of Christ by filling our minds with the message of the Gospel, contemplating it when our minds are not actively engaged in our daily activities. We do these activities to ...

OUR LADY OF SORROWS 1 Tim 2:1-8; Ps 28:2,7-9; Jn 19:25-27 The Disciple harboured Her in his Home The celebration of the exaltation of the Holy Cross of our Lord would not be complete without a glance or consideration for the woman who was crucified with him in her mind, heart, and will. The Church, in her wisdom, celebrates the memorial of Our Lady of Sorrows as a way of reminding us that the Blessed Virgin Mary participated uniquely and deeply in the mystery of our redemption. We keep returning to the origin, after the fall of Adam and Eve, to understand God's will and the intricacies of the salvation he worked out for us. We recall again that God established the woman and her offspring as enemies of the serpent and its seed. If, through our disobedience, always instigated by the serpent and its diabolical hoods, cross and death became our lot on earth, we must also understand that our sins were forgiven through the obedience of the woman and her Son. Through the obedience o...

FEAST OF EXALTATION OF THE CROSS Numb 21:4-9; Ps 78:1-2,34-38; Phil 2:6-11; Jn 3:13-17 The Narrow Path to Heaven We celebrate the feast of the exaltation of the Holy Cross of our Lord. The cross encompasses the whole length of our human life, such that it characterises our lives here on earth. The cross was not part of the divine plan for humanity, but entered the picture after the original fall of Adam and Eve as a consequence and a remedy for disobedience and sin. The cross symbolises the experience of death that Adam and Eve opted for when they chose to disobey the word of God. They were well informed of the consequences of the choice to disobey, for God told them, “You may freely eat of every tree of the garden; but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall die.” Subsequently, their choice to eat the forbidden fruit was a choice to walk the way of the cross and death. Therefore, the cross symbolises everything...

SAINT JOHN CHRYSOSTOM, BISHOP, DOCTOR  1 Tim 1:15-17; Ps 113:1-7; Lk 6:43-49 Our House on the Rock The Son of Man is the mystery of our human nature rooted in God. As we have reiterated throughout the week, God created us for himself. So, when our nature was taken from the purpose for which he made it in the beginning by the evil one, God decided to plant the head of our nature in his Eternal Word. By doing this, he bypassed the corruption introduced by the evil one and reclaimed humanity for himself. God accomplished the enmity he created between the woman and the serpent by this mystery. Saint Paul sings of this mystery hidden in God before the creation of the world, unknown to the principalities and powers, but now revealed to the Church of God. By planting the human head firmly in the Son, the Father opened a fountain for the cleansing of our sins and corruption of the evil one. The same Jesus Christ is our brother and our God. As our brother, he is our High Priest and pr...

FRIDAY, TWENTY THIRD WEEK IN ORDINARY TIME  1 Tim 1:1-2,12-14; Ps 16:1-2,5,7-8,11; Lk 6:39-42 Our Ignorance without God’s Light God is the light of our intellect and the true love of our hearts. The physical light is material and meant to illuminate the material world, so that the sense of sight can properly grasp the objects of its operations. The other senses are also different windows or doors through which our minds and hearts attend to creatures. The material creation is a ladder to the Creator, but not directly, for the way to God is not a material or sensible path. Our way to God is spiritual. Thus, material creation leads to God indirectly, through the path of wisdom, which orders their operations. The ordering of the material creation by wisdom produces a pattern in our minds, which moves our hearts through understanding to the love of things invisible. The ability to see and understand the path of wisdom in creation, and pattern our lives on it, is what the virtue o...