Reflection from Friar Nicholas

WEDNESDAY OF HOLY WEEK     Isa 50:4-9; Ps 69:8-10,21-22,31,33-34; Mt 26:14-25 The Fate of the Son of Man Are persons destined to particular ends without any input or choice? Many people believe this to be the case. But to believe such is to hold or believe something different from what the word of God reveals about the human person. The book of Genesis started with the creation of man and woman. As we have noted previously, the story of the fall is intended to demonstrate the free will of man and woman, as the fall validates the claim that God created them in His own image. The whole revelation, as contained in the Scriptures, is based on this truth: that we are free to do or not to do; to obey and worship God or not. The salvation story we are celebrating is a vocation to each of us to accept the redemption from the effects of the Fall that God has worked for us through His Son. So, we are free to accept or reject the free gift of salvation in Jesus Christ. As...

TUESDAY OF HOLY WEEK     Isa 49:1-6; Ps 70:1-6,15,17; Jn 13:21-33,36-38 Sorrows of The Servant of God It is overwhelming for any human person to step in and play the role of God. Mere human nature cannot carry the weight of God’s providential care over his creatures unaided. It is made even more difficult in our present condition when we have to deal with people of unclean hearts and lips. The sinful condition of the people makes the vocation and mission of the Servant of Yahweh a very difficult one; it gives the sacrifice of the Servant an unsavoury taste and flavour. In these bitter tastes and flavours lies the sacrifice by which the Servant brings about redemption for the people. Acting through the humble and obedient submission of the Servant to his divine will, God uses his sufferings to lift the people who are submerged in the darkness of sin and evil to salvation and freedom. The Servant vicariously suffers darkness and evil for the redemption of those overwh...

MONDAY OF HOLY WEEK     Isa 42:1-7; Ps 27:1-3,13-14; Jn 12:1-11 The Covenant for the People We have begun the Holy Week with the celebration of Passion Sunday. Within the week, Saint John will gradually lead us through the drama of the last days of the Son of Man in Jerusalem, culminating in his crucifixion on the day before the Sabbath, that is, on Good Friday. The prophecy of Isaiah the prophet supplies the scriptural background to the drama and story of the Messiah. As we noted previously, what we heard on Passion Sunday is detailed and drawn out for us throughout the week, so that we may deeply appreciate God's plan of our salvation and its exact execution. The psalmist offers us the mindset of the Son of Man as he approaches the time of his glorification in the completion of his total sacrifice of self to God. “The Lord is my light and my help; whom shall I fear? The Lord is the stronghold of my life; before whom shall I shrink?” This confession of total confid...

PALM SUNDAY    Mt 21:1-11; Isa 50: 4-7; Ps 22:8-9,17-20,23-24; Phil 2:6-11; Mt 26:14-27:66 The Lesson of Our Teacher and Master Today is Palm or Passion Sunday. The celebration ushers us into Holy Week for the celebration of the Paschal mysteries of our Lord. The readings prepare our minds with a summary of the events of the coming days. The naming of the Sunday is from the major event of the day, which is the triumphant entry of Jesus Christ into Jerusalem. The first part of the celebration depicts this. The blessing of the palms at a suitable place outside the church and subsequent procession into the church are to recall these events from the Gospels. The major lesson from this initial celebration is the emphasis placed on the Lordship of the Son of Man. What we see clearly through the Gospel reading proclaimed outside the church in preparation for the procession is Jesus’ foreknowledge of all things and his command or control of every event. He knew the hour had...

SATURDAY, FIFTH WEEK OF LENT    Ezek 37:21-28; Jer 31:10-13; Jn 11:45-56 Gathered Together by The Son of Man God called Abraham and promised him many blessings if he would obey and follow God. As we noted previously, the physical blessings of descendants, nations, and the land of Canaan were sacramental signs of the spiritual blessings God prepared for Abraham and his spiritual descendants. When God fulfilled the promised physical blessings, he made use of these blessings to direct our attention to the real spiritual blessings that would be realised last. By the scattering of the children of Israel among the nations of the world, God achieved two things: First, he showed the children of Abraham by physical descent that they were mistaken in putting too much emphasis on the physical in place of the spiritual. Second, he sent them to their rightful places among the unbelievers, in preparation for the gathering of the spiritual children or descendants of Abraham from a...

FRIDAY, FIFTH WEEK OF LENT    Jer 20:10-13; Ps 18:2-7; Jn 10:31-42 The Son of Man Eluded Their Grasp The omnipotence of God is such that he is always near to us and carries us, supporting us with his powerful providence. Sometimes the real presence of God is difficult to grasp, perceive, or comprehend. He seems so removed from our troubles and anxieties that we feel like giving up in our faith. None is a total foreigner to these moments of radical isolation from others and from God, our source of existence and being. In such moments when we search for meaning in life, we must hang on with faith in God, bearing in mind that God’s presence and love will be renewed at dawn. By dawn, we mean whenever God chooses to bring back his light to our darkness and re-establish his communion with us. The psalmist describes his own dark moment in the psalm. “The waves of death rose about me; the torrents of destruction assailed me; the snare of the grave entangled me; the traps of deat...

THURSDAY, FIFTH WEEK OF LENT    Gen 17:3-9; Ps 105:4-9; Jn 8:51-59 The Covenant in Perpetuity Following the readings the Church gives us to reflect on, we consider God's faithfulness to his word again. As we have come to understand, we can say without doubt that God keeps his covenant ever in mind; for through his word and dealings with men, we come to know the meaning of covenant. God lives by himself and does not need anyone or anything for support. Rather, He is the support of all that exists and will come to exist. God is life and truth, and his word is life and truth. Our Lord taught us this when he informed the Jews that the Father gives life and has also given the Son the same power to give life to whomever he wills. He created man and woman to be with him and enjoy the communion of his goodness. The initiation of the communion as desired and designed by God is revealed in the Son of Man. By the perfection of the planned communion, the Son of Man gives life to who...

THE ANNUNCIATION OF THE LORD     Isa 7:10-14,8:10; Ps 40:7-11; Heb 10:4-10; Lk 1:26-38 The Reward of The Sacrifice of The Lamb We have reflected on the sacrifice that our human nature was created to be to God. For a sacrifice to be truly worth the name, it must be a voluntary offering and never forced in any way. Any form of coercion removes the beauty and worth of the sacrifice. Therefore, after God’s creation of man and woman in His image, he let them exercise their free will as a path leading to making them in the likeness of God. The path outlined by their free will, if illuminated by the word of God, leads to divine likeness. Thus, the true path of our free will is a path of sacrifice of ourselves to God. It is indeed so, because God, who leads us in the path, is the meaning of sacrifice. God is holy unto Himself; He is consecrated to Himself as He cannot be any other, in any respect. So, listening and doing the word of God makes us a sacrifice to God. Sin...

TUESDAY, FIFTH WEEK OF LENT    Numb 21:4-9; Ps 102:2-3,16-21; Jn 8:21-30 The Lifting of the Son of Man We can understand the revelation of man as the temple of God in a slightly different way, which enriches our appreciation of our vocation to God. The fact that God created us for himself, to be his dwelling place, implies that our nature is supposed to be a sacrifice to God. Since human nature is ours, the sacrifice ought to be made by man, and not by God or any angel. However, the fact that corruption lies at the root of our nature makes this sacrifice impossible. By their original disobedience, our first parents admitted the seed of corruption into our common nature. Because of this corruption at our origin, God promised a new beginning for the human person when He promised to create enmity between the serpent and the woman, between the seed of the serpent and the seed of the woman. The new beginning of human nature was necessary for its sacrifice to God, as divi...

MONDAY, FIFTH WEEK OF LENT    Dan 13:41-62; Ps 23; Jn 8:1-11 Our Choice to live a Spiritual Life The Gospels we have heard for three consecutive Sundays of Lent have been thematic; the Church uses these different themes to prepare us for the coming Paschal celebrations. The theme of water of life, or the living water, was presented on the third Sunday at the encounter of our Lord with the Samaritan woman. The theme of the light of the world was presented on the fourth Sunday with the healing of the man born blind. The theme of life was presented yesterday, the fifth Sunday, with the raising of Lazarus from the dead. In each of these encounters, the Son of Man offers himself as the living water, the spiritual light, and the life of the world respectively. The offers remain open for each of us to accept or not. At each point of these encounters, our Lord makes it clear that it was not the making of the needy person that he or she is found in that position of need. But...

SUNDAY, FIFTH WEEK OF LENT    Ezek 37:12-14; Ps 130; Rom 8:8-11; Jn 11:1-45 I am the Resurrection and Life As we draw nearer to the Paschal celebrations of the Church, we witness more of the tension between light and darkness, between life and death. The readings the Church places before us make the identity of Jesus Christ clear. As the identity of the Son of Man is unveiled on one hand, the stance of those who oppose him also becomes known. The revelation of light brings to light various works of darkness and also illuminates darkness for us to know it for what it really is, namely, the absence of light or dislike for God. God is the only source of true light; every light derives its source from God alone. As God put forth the light of his word and presence, each of us chooses the role we want to play. It is a choice we make within and by ourselves. Those who choose to be with God and work with him receive light and life. On the other hand, those who refuse to be with ...

SATURDAY, FOURTH WEEK OF LENT    Jer 11:18-20; Ps 7:2-3,9-12; Jn 7:40-52 The Sacrifice of the Son of Man As Saint Paul stated in 1 Corinthians 2:15, the spiritual man or a righteous soul can judge all things through the light of God’s word that he has in him. The word of God, which is the light of wisdom illuminating us and all creation, directs the mind and heart of the spiritual person to discern the truthfulness of all things and their purpose in his life. The knowledge of creatures and their usefulness is only a secondary good that the word of God confers on us when we receive it with faith; the first and most important being the knowledge of God and His holy will for us. Our knowledge of God through His Word helps us to order our lives to Him first as our Creator and ultimate good or end. Subsequently, we are able to use all things as they come our way as a means to reach our end in God. Because faith enables us to receive the word of God and build our lives on God,...

FRIDAY, FOURTH WEEK OF LENT    Wis 2:1,12-22; Ps 34:16,18-21,23; Jn 7:1-2,10,25-30 The Origin of the Son of Man The Son of Man is the Eternal Word of God dwelling in our human nature. He is the embodiment of God the Father’s holy will and teaches us the same will. But the identity of the Son of Man is only revealed to faith and not to our human senses. Hence, the Son of Man comes as the revelation of the Father’s immutable will only to the faithful. Those who lack faith in the word of God are deprived of the knowledge of the divine origin of the word of God in the scriptures and as given to us in the Son of Man. As we noted earlier in the previous reflections, the Incarnation of the Eternal Word has renewed the entire creation as a sacrament of God’s presence. So, those who believe in his coming in human nature receive the gift of faith, which enables them to attain certainty on what remains unseen but made present through the visible realities. The chief among the ...

SAINT JOSEPH, HUSBAND OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY    2 Sam 7:4-5,12-14,16; Ps 89:2-5,27,29; Rom 4:13,16-18,22; Mt 1:16,18-21,24 Do not fear to take Mary Home The Church celebrates a great saint today. Saint Joseph is celebrated by the universal Church today as the husband of Mary. Not much is known about this noble and quiet man. The scriptures tell us only of his silent devotion to God. His dignity is first revealed in the Gospel when it is said that the Blessed Virgin Mary was betrothed to him. That he was to be the husband of Mary was ordained by God. The dignity of Saint Joseph comes to the fore when we consider the fact that God chose him for the all-important role of taking charge of His new creation: the Woman and her Offspring. If we learn from Scripture that the Woman and her Offspring are archenemies of the ancient serpent and sin, then the man Joseph must be a holy man to live in the company of the woman and her offspring and take charge of them. In fact, ...