HAVE A MEANINGFUL LENT

We have completed one week of the Lenten season - a season of fasting, prayer, penance and almsgiving. When we started, we began with a strong desire to make this Lent different from every other Lent before. However, this past week, there’s been an atmosphere of festivity, with Valentine’s Day and Chinese New Year.

Now that the celebrations are over, lets be a little serious in observing Lent from this week onwards. There are many graces and blessings waiting to be offered this Easter. Everyday should be a realisation that a life-changing moment is being offered for us. During this favourable season, we have entered once again into the process of preparing our lives for greater heights and to go deeper into our spiritual lives. Often these questions come to mind: What should I give up this Lenten season? What can I do this Lent to deepen my trust in God? God is slowly and steadily transforming our lives towards greater joy, love and service for His people.

Some may find it difficult to fast and abstain, but relatively – today’s Lenten observance is much easier compared to decades and centuries ago. The Church doesn’t require us to fast and abstain every day throughout the 40 days of Lent, unlike our Muslim brethren do, during the month of Ramadhan.

We may think that by abstaining from meat or skipping a meal or two a day, that we keep this season holy. However, the Church invites us to pause and examine our interior disposition more thoroughly. We have to stop and listen to our bodies, which often directly influences our attitude and behaviour. We need to see our true weaknesses, limitations and tendencies toward what is comfortable and pleasurable, and then make sacrifices accordingly. Our sacrifice needs to be a gift to God and to our neighbour. When we make a sacrifice a gift, then it will turn into a powerful form of prayer and fasting. These prayers and fasting reminds us of our hunger for God and our preparation for our eternal life.

We have become so negligent in some areas of our lives. The season of Lent invites us to be more self-denying and self-disciplined by tuning our minds and bodies in a more spiritual manner. We need to leave our selfish attitudes and not to grow cold towards global ecology and conservation. For this reason, we need Lent and this is what Lent is seen today.

As we encounter trials and struggles with sin, we should also anticipate something wonderful and exciting in our daily lives. “God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that in all things at all times, having all you need, you will abound in every good work,” (2 Cor 9:8). God’s greatest desire is to bless us always and to place us close to His heart. He desires to make all grace flow in every aspect of our lives so that we may carry our good work for His greater glory and for His Kingdom.

Let us make this Lent different, by offering the grace and blessings which we have received from Him to the less fortunate. Make necessary changes in our lives by reflecting on what repentance is all about. May this holy season of Lent teach us to create a space for God and for one another rather than in ourselves.

MOUNTAINTOP EXPERIENCES

Jesus takes Peter, James and John up a high mountain (MK 9: 2-10). He shares with His disciples a glimpse of His future glory in the Transfiguration. This is an event that is mainly for Him but that needs to be witnessed by these three disciples so that they can tell people about it after His resurrection.

Jesus and His disciples didn’t stay on top of that mountain of glory because Jesus knew he had his ministry to be continued and He had to go down in the valley in order to reach the next mountaintop.

The mountaintop is where we look back and see that Christ is with us every step of our way. The mountaintop is where we see the glory of Christ face to face and that gives us the strength and hope to continue our daily task. The valleys of life are what makes us who we are and allows us to have those great mountaintop experiences.


During this Lent, take some time in prayer to consider the most serious struggles that we face at this present time in our lives. Be grateful for the gift of faith in God and seek His face to know Him more intimately so that our face be transfigured and transformed.

LENT: CREATE A SPACE FOR JESUS

“He was with the wild beasts, and the angels looked after him,” (MK 1:12-15).
Every year as we start the Lenten season we question ourselves: what to do and what should I give up? This Lent we shall put Jesus into the center of our lives and deepen our trust in Him. Without Him we can do nothing.

We allow Jesus to be God in our lives. When He takes more space in our lives He can work in us the way that He wants to work. Jesus will be with us and will bring power into the darkest sides of our lives. He will not leave us alone in the wilderness and with the demons. If we create enough space for Jesus in our hearts He will reveal to us what we need to put to death in our own lives.

What actually take up much space in our life and what are the stumbling blocks or barriers Jesus from being God for us? We may need to give up something so that He can have more space to work in our lives.

“Lord, make me know Your ways and teach me Your paths!

LOVE AND LENT 2018

We have started our Lent season on 14 February 2018, coinciding with Valentine’s Day. This year, Valentine’s Day shares the calendar with Ash Wednesday, the first day of Lent. It will occur once again in the year 2024 and 2029. It is an obligatory day of fasting from one or two meals, and abstinence from meat. I hope your Valentine’s Day celebration didn't interrupt much of your Ash Wednesday observation – pray, fast and penance.

The Holy Father, Pope Francis has chosen on a theme, “Because of the increase of iniquity, the love of many will grow cold” (Mt 24: 12) for Lent 2018. Jesus spoke these words to His disciples at the Mount of Olives before His passion as He was describing to them about the end times where “false prophets would lead people astray, and the love that is the core of the Gospel would grow cold in the hearts of many.”

These false prophets come in various forms to manipulate and confuse human hearts to enslave and lead them astray by offering “easy and immediate solutions to suffering that soon prove utterly useless.” Holy Father added that these false prophets lead our people to choose false sources of happiness for real ones, which is a strategy typical of the devil. The devil, who is a “liar and the father of lies” always confuses our human hearts by presenting “evil as good, falsehood as truth.”

Many children and young people are mesmerised “with pleasures mistaking them for true happiness” and engrossed with wealth “which only makes them slaves to profit and petty interests.” Some turn to drugs as solutions for their life problems, but all these are proven to be pointless. They only lead to violence against human beings and a global selfish attitude of indifference. Their hearts grow cold because of their problems, their sufferings and their lackadaisical attitudes.

We often think that as long as we are relatively healthy and comfortable, we do not have to care about those who are less fortunate. “When a person doesn’t have enough to eat, that’s a form of violence. Where there’s exclusion and inequality in a city, that’s a form of violence. When there’s no respect for the dignity of the person, that’s violence,” the Pope said. The real temptation for us Christians is growing in a selfish attitude of indifference to our neighbours. As Christians we need to confront these attitudes.

During this season of Lent the Holy Father invites us to reflect on three scriptural texts:

·      “If one member suffers, all suffer together” (1 Cor 12:26) which refers to  the church;

·      “Where is your brother?” (Gen 4:9) which refers to parishes; and

·      “Make your hearts firm!” (James 5:8) which refers to individual Christians.

Lent is a time of grace, and it is a favourable time. As Catholics, we should observe Lent by giving up our selfish attitudes of indifference and resist these “great tribulations” which are happening in our Church community and amongst individuals. The Holy Father hopes that we can overcome all these indifferences as “we give alms and share in God’s providential care with those who beg for our assistance.” Fasting “makes us more attentive to God and our neighbours” and “revives our desire to obey God, who alone is capable of satisfying our hunger.”

Lets evaluate ourselves in light of God’s words - merciful, graciousness and abounding in steadfast love. May these words remind us of who God is and what He does for us, inviting us not to be indifferent to violence. We shall be merciful, be gracious and steadfast in love like Him, and not to grow cold towards our parish community and individuals.

FOSTERING LIFE AND LOVE

World Day of Marriage

is a day to celebrate the Sacrament of Marriage once again. As we celebrate World Marriage Day, it is a great opportunity “to focus on building a culture of life and love that begins with supporting and promoting marriage and the family.”

The Church reminds husbands and wives to understand that their call to marriage is a call to make a total gift of self to their spouses and a deep union with each other. Vocation is a calling and it is not a job. When we fail to recognise marriage as a calling, we belittle it. All married couples, single, divorced, widowed need to pray every day for the grace to live out their vocation to perfection and holiness in an imperfect world.

Pope Francis says that newly married couples should be helped “to enrich and deepen their conscious and free decision to have, hold and love one another for life” (Amoris Laetitia, no. 217).

On this day let’s pray that all married couples renew their marriage covenant, strengthen their bond of peace with their children, grow closer together and grow more confident in their vocation to share God’s love with all those around them.