Ikatlong Linggo ng Kwaresma (B)

Marso 11, 2012

Mga Pagbasa: Exodo 20:1-17 / 1 Cor 1:22-25 / Jn 2:13-25

Puro utos, panay utos! … iyan ang panlalait na malimit marinig sa ayaw sumunod, antemano. Para sa maraming tao ngayon, panahon ng postmodernismo, (whew! Nakakain ba yan?), marami ang allergic ika nga, sa mga kautusan. Kasama rito sa kanilang isinusuka ang mg utos (daw) ng Diyos, at mg utos din ng Simbahan. Todos utos …walang paltos (may tugma ba?)

Aminin natin … mahirap ang sumunod sa utos. Di ba nuong mga bata kayo, ganyan rin kayo? Nagbibingi-bingihan kapag tinatawag ng magulang, o kaya’y nagtutulug-tulugan? Mabilis ang pulas kapag labas at “gud tym,” sabi nga nila sa jejemon. Mabagal ang kilos kapag trabaho at katungkulan ang pinag-uusapan. Maging nuong nasa seminaryo pa kami, mayroong tuwing umaga ay may sipon o may sinat. Pero pagdating ng merienda sa hapon ay magaling na at malakas pa sa kalabaw … kasi, may laro pagkatapos nito!

Mahirap ang mag-aral; mahirap ang magbunot ng sahig (may gumagawa pa ba nito?) … at lalung mahirap ang may listahan ng bawal (lalu na sa pagkain!).

Pero aminin rin natin. Kailangan natin ng daan; kailangan natin ng pamamaraan … kailangan natin ng patakaran at panuntunan … kung gusto nating makarating sa landas ng dunong at wastong kaalaman, na naghahatid sa higit pang mahalagang kahihinatnan!

Tanda! Ito ang salitang dapat tandaan natin kung sampung utos ang pag-uusapan. Mga tanda itong nagtuturo sa dapat. Mayroong bang dapat? Tumpak! Kahit naman saan ka pumunta, mayroong dapat at mayroong hindi nararapat. Mayroong tama at mayroong mali. Bagama’t itinapon na ito sa labas ng bintana ng postmodernismo, hindi maipagkakailang kailangan pa rin natin ng panuntunan, alintuntunin, at tamang pamamalakad. Kung walang batas ay walang kaayusan. At kung walang kaayusan ay walang patutunguhan.

Tanda? Oo … ang sampung utos ay hindi natatapos s utos. Ang lahat ay tumutuon at patungkol sa mga hanay ng pagpapahalagang Diyos mismo ang nagpapahalaga, una sa lahat: buhay, dangal ng tao, magandang pangalan ng kapwa, katarungan, pangangalaga sa pag-aari ng sarili at ng iba … at marami pa.

Tanda? Oo … ang utos ay hindi lamang utos. Ang lahat ng ito ay nakatuon sa pinakamahalagang katotohanan na ang pinakamalaking DAPAT ng ating buhay ay ang pagkakaroon ng isang KAUGNAYAN sa Diyos na maylikha sa atin. Siya ang puno at dulo ng ating pagiging tao. Siya ang dahilan … Siya ang Daan, Katotohanan, at Buhay. Ayon kay San Pablo, “si Kristo ang kapangyarihan at karunungan ng Diyos.”

Huwag na tayong magmaktol ay may batas. Masiyahan tayo at ang batas ng Diyos ay walang butas … walang palusot, walang kasinungalingan, walang takas, kahit na puede nating gawin ang gusto natin … kaya nga lang ay mayroon laging kahihinatnan, may hantungan, may kabayaran.

Huwag na tayong magtaka at kumuha si Jesus ng lapnis ( o lubid, sa aming salita sa Mendez, Cavite) at ginamit niya bilang pang hagupit sa mga tampalasan sa templo. Hindi nila iginalang ang bahay ng Diyos. Hindi sila tumalima sa daan ng pagpapahalaga sa banal na lugar. Hindi nila ginawa ang dapat. Kung kaya’t nararapat lang na ipagtanggol ng Anak ng Diyos ang bahay ng kanyang Ama.

Magulo ang buhay natin ngayon. Sala-salabat ang mga kalye. May mga kuliglig na “keep right” at mga traysikel na “keep left.” Naglipana ang mga sinungaling sa gobyerno. Nagkalat ang mga mapagsamantala sa kamangmangan ng balana, lalu na ng mga dukha, na walang ibang pagkukunan ng kabatiran o kaalaman liban sa isinusulsol ng mass media (na kaakibat tuwina at kakampi ng mga may poder at may pera!). Magulo rin ang buhay pangsarili. Kay raming inosenteng buhay ang pinapatay … Mula pa sa sinapupunan, “patay kang bata ka,” ika nga! Walang kinikilalang daan … walang tinitingalang dapat, at wala ring pinanghahawakang dunong.

Ang lahat ng ito: dapat, daan at dunong ay galing walang iba kundi sa kanyang Panginoon ng Buhay, Panginoon ng katotohanan, at Panginoong naghahatid sa atin sa buhay na walang hanggan. Ito ang tunay na DUNONG mula sa itaas. Sundan natin ito!

Dear young friends,

Thank you for your warm welcome! “Heart speaks unto heart” – cor ad cor loquitur – as you know, I chose these words so dear to Cardinal Newman as the theme of my visit. In these few moments that we are together, I wish to speak to you from my own heart, and I ask you to open your hearts to what I have to say.

I ask each of you, first and foremost, to look into your own heart. Think of all the love that your heart was made to receive, and all the love it is meant to give. After all, we were made for love. This is what the Bible means when it says that we are made in the image and likeness of God: we were made to know the God of love, the God who is Father, Son and Holy Spirit, and to find our supreme fulfilment in that divine love that knows no beginning or end.

We were made to receive love, and we have. Every day we should thank God for the love we have already known, for the love that has made us who we are, the love that has shown us what is truly important in life. We need to thank the Lord for the love we have received from our families, our friends, our teachers, and all those people in our lives who have helped us to realize how precious we are, in their eyes and in the eyes of God.

We were also made to give love, to make love it the inspiration for all we do and the most enduring thing in our lives. At times this seems so natural, especially when we feel the exhilaration of love, when our hearts brim over with generosity, idealism, the desire to help others, to build a better world. But at other times we realize that it is difficult to love; our hearts can easily be hardened by selfishness, envy and pride. Blessed Mother Teresa of Calcutta, the great Missionary of Charity, reminded us that giving love, pure and generous love, is the fruit of a daily decision. Every day we have to choose to love, and this requires help, the help that comes from Christ, from prayer and from the wisdom found in his word, and from the grace which he bestows on us in the sacraments of his Church.

This is the message I want to share with you today. I ask you to look into your hearts each day to find the source of all true love. Jesus is always there, quietly waiting for us to be still with him and to hear his voice. Deep within your heart, he is calling you to spend time with him in prayer. But this kind of prayer, real prayer, requires discipline; it requires making time for moments of silence every day. Often it means waiting for the Lord to speak. Even amid the “busy-ness” and the stress of our daily lives, we need to make space for silence, because it is in silence that we find God, and in silence that we discover our true self. And in discovering our true self, we discover the particular vocation which God has given us for the building up of his Church and the redemption of our world.

Heart speaks unto heart. With these words from my heart, dear young friends, I assure you of my prayers for you, that your lives will bear abundant fruit for the growth of the civilization of love. I ask you also to pray for me, for my ministry as the Successor of Peter, and for the needs of the Church throughout the world. Upon you, your families and your friends, I cordially invoke God’s blessings of wisdom, joy and peace.

“Planted and built up in Jesus Christ,
firm in the faith” (cf. Col 2:7)

Dear Friends,

I often think back on the World Youth Day held in Sydney in 2008. There we had an experience of a great festival of faith in which the Spirit of God was actively at work, building deep communion among the participants who had come from all over the world. That gathering, like those on previous occasions, bore rich fruit in the lives of many young people and in the life of the whole Church. Now we are looking forward to the next World Youth Day, to be held in Madrid in August 2011. Back in 1989, several months before the historic fall of the Berlin Wall, this pilgrimage of young people halted in Spain, in Santiago de Compostela. Now, at a time when Europe greatly needs to rediscover its Christian roots, our meeting will take place in Madrid with the theme:“Planted and built up in Jesus Christ, firm in the faith” (cf. Col 2:7). I encourage you to take part in this event, which is so important for the Church in Europe and for the universal Church. I would like all young people – those who share our faith in Jesus Christ, but also those who are wavering or uncertain, or who do not believe in him – to share this experience, which can prove decisive for their lives. It is an experience of the Lord Jesus, risen and alive, and of his love for each of us.

1. At the source of your deepest aspirations

In every period of history, including our own, many young people experience a deep desire for personal relationships marked by truth and solidarity. Many of them yearn to build authentic friendships, to know true love, to start a family that will remain united, to achieve personal fulfilment and real security, all of which are the guarantee of a serene and happy future. In thinking of my own youth, I realize that stability and security are not the questions that most occupy the minds of young people. True enough, it is important to have a job and thus to have firm ground beneath our feet, yet the years of our youth are also a time when we are seeking to get the most out of life. When I think back on that time, I remember above all that we were not willing to settle for a conventional middle-class life. We wanted something great, something new. We wanted to discover life itself, in all its grandeur and beauty. Naturally, part of that was due to the times we lived in. During the Nazi dictatorship and the war, we were, so to speak, “hemmed in” by the dominant power structure. So we wanted to break out into the open, to experience the whole range of human possibilities. I think that, to some extent, this urge to break out of the ordinary is present in every generation. Part of being young is desiring something beyond everyday life and a secure job, a yearning for something really truly greater. Is this simply an empty dream that fades away as we become older? No! Men and women were created for something great, for infinity. Nothing else will ever be enough. Saint Augustine was right when he said “our hearts are restless till they find their rest in you”. The desire for a more meaningful life is a sign that God created us and that we bear his “imprint”. God is life, and that is why every creature reaches out towards life. Because human beings are made in the image of God, we do this in a unique and special way. We reach out for love, joy and peace. So we can see how absurd it is to think that we can truly live by removing God from the picture! God is the source of life. To set God aside is to separate ourselves from that source and, inevitably, to deprive ourselves of fulfilment and joy: “without the Creator, the creature fades into nothingness” (Second Vatican Council, Gaudium et Spes, 36). In some parts of the world, particularly in the West, today’s culture tends to exclude God, and to consider faith a purely private issue with no relevance for the life of society. Even though the set of values underpinning society comes from the Gospel – values like the sense of the dignity of the person, of solidarity, of work and of the family –, we see a certain “eclipse of God” taking place, a kind of amnesia which, albeit not an outright rejection of Christianity, is nonetheless a denial of the treasure of our faith, a denial that could lead to the loss of our deepest identity.

For this reason, dear friends, I encourage you to strengthen your faith in God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. You are the future of society and of the Church! As the Apostle Paul wrote to the Christians of Colossae, it is vital to have roots, a solid foundation! This is particularly true today. Many people have no stable points of reference on which to build their lives, and so they end up deeply insecure. There is a growing mentality of relativism, which holds that everything is equally valid, that truth and absolute points of reference do not exist. But this way of thinking does not lead to true freedom, but rather to instability, confusion and blind conformity to the fads of the moment. As young people, you are entitled to receive from previous generations solid points of reference to help you to make choices and on which to build your lives: like a young plant which needs solid support until it can sink deep roots and become a sturdy tree capable of bearing fruit.

2. Planted and built up in Jesus Christ

In order to highlight the importance of faith in the lives of believers, I would like to reflect with you on each of the three terms used by Saint Paul in the expression: “Planted and built up in Jesus Christ, firm in the faith” (cf. Col 2:7). We can distinguish three images: “planted” calls to mind a tree and the roots that feed it; “built up” refers to the construction of a house; “firm” indicates growth in physical or moral strength. These images are very eloquent. Before commenting on them, I would like to point out that grammatically all three terms in the original text are in the passive voice. This means that it is Christ himself who takes the initiative to plant, build up and confirm the faithful.

Continue reading here.

Gambling is corruption. It is ridiculous to equate it with integrity, honesty, nobility. Gambling is a vice. It is mockery to identify it with virtue, probity, honor. Gambling is indolence. It is a shame to claim that it is industrious, hardworking and productive people who indulge therein. This is precisely why gamblers are individuals who do not look straight at people, who hate well-lighted lobbies on their way to gambling and wherefore simply love dark and shadowy casino entrances.

Furthermore, gambling makes addicts to the point of making gamblers bet not only the money in their pockets but also that which is not yet theirs at all. This is precisely why gamblers are suspect characters in terms of their must-have money to gamble, irrespective of the ways and means to lay their hands on it. The truth is that they are driven to bet even the means to lay their hands on it. The truth is that they are driven to bet even the future of their families – to the point of even destroying them in favor of gambling. Addiction to drugs or to alcohol, to carnal drives towards men, women and/or children – gambling has addictive features even much worst than said accursed vices. Continue reading here.

ARTICLE
National Review Online
Publication Date: June 4, 2010

It’s not easy to understand the decision of Time’s editors to run the magazine’s current (June 7) cover story, with its cheesy title, “Why Being Pope Means Never Having to Say You’re Sorry.” The lengthy essay inside breaks no news; it recycles several lame charges against Benedict XVI that have been flatly denied or effectively rebutted; and it indulges an adolescent literary style (e.g., “mealymouthed declarations buttressed by arcane religious philosophy”) that makes one yearn and pine for the days of Henry Luce.

The lengthy story is also poorly sourced, relying (as many such exercises do) on alleged “Vatican insiders” and giving analytic pride of place to the Italian Church historian Alberto Melloni.

As real Vatican insiders know, real Vatican insiders don’t give back-stabbing and score-settling sound bites to the American media. That practice is more typically indulged in by clerics far down the Vatican food chain, monsignori who have no real idea of what’s happening within the small circle where real decisions get made inside the Leonine Wall, but who are happy to chat up journalists over a cappuccino or a Campari and soda while pretending to a knowledge they don’t possess. Such sources can be occasionally amusing; they are almost never authoritative. Please continue reading here.

At 4:30 am, I was on the road for the last leg of my journey – 46 km to Iligan. I had to use my head lamp so that I can see clearly what’s in front of me. I felt dizzy, weak and tired. I had to walk slowly, keeping my balance, I felt like I was being tossed in a stormy sea. I took a lot of breaks. Then I saw a roadside eatery which was open and ordered breakfast – the first time I had breakfast during this journey. So no more fasting. The heavy breakfast did not improve my condition. I still felt weak. I began to suspect that my heart could not cope anymore with the stress of long-distance trek (I was diagnosed with having atheroscerosis and myocardial ischemia 3 years ago). I was all alone and no one could help me. I was worried that I might not be able to finish the journey and will have to take the bus.

I continued walking very slowly and praying for divine help. The line of the song crossed my mind: “You’ll never walk alone.” Yes, for 9 days, I have ran/hiked alone across Mindanao…  continue reading here

MANILA, March 3, 2010— The Catholic hierarchy refused to soften its stand on artificial contraception and called for a complete ban on condom ads.

In a statement, the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) said advertisements on condoms should be removed because it was likely to cause serious or widespread offence.

The church reiterated its policy on condom use Wednesday after a meeting of the CBCP officials led by its president, Tandag Bishop Nereo Odchimar.

“The multi-million dollar condom business… heavily targets the adolescent market, at the expense of morality and family life,” Odchimar said.

“Condom advertisements should be banned from television, radio, movies, newspapers, magazines, and public places, as they desensitize the youth’s delicate conscience and weaken their moral fiber as future parents,” he added.

The CBCP issued the statement as the government revitalized promotion of condoms to avert the spread of HIV/AIDS in the country. Continue reading here.

When a man experiences God, he recognizes his own sinfulness, and it is only when he really knows and acknowledges this sinfulness that he really kows himself.  And in that way he becomes truly himself.  Only when a man knows that he is sinful and has comprehended the evil of sin does he also comprehend the summons: “Repent, and believe in the good news” (Mk 1:15).

For without conversion, it is impossible to discover Jesus, to discover the Gospel.  I am reminded here of Chesterton’s paradoxical sentence that states this thought with great accuracy: We know a saint by the fact that he knows he is a seinner.  The failure of modern man to experience God is reflected today in his failure to experience sin, and vice versa, his failure to acquire this knowledge draws him away from God.

Without regressing to a false pedagogy of anxiety, we should learn once more the truth of the words: Initium sapentiae timor Domini.  Wisdom, genuine understanding, begin with the proper fear of the Lord.  We must relearn this if we are to learn true love and to undertand what it means when we say that it is permitted us to love God and that he loves us.

Peter’s experience is likewise a fundamental prerequisite for the apostolate and thus for the priesthood.  Conversion- the first word of Christianity- can be preached only by one who has himself had personal experience of its necessity and has, in consequence, comprehended the greatness of grace.

From:Diener eurer Freude, pp. 92-93

How long could supposedly high public officials in this government go? How juvenile could such seemingly responsible adults be? To what extent would they entice young people to be promiscuous unlimited? How far are they willing to go precisely to promote sexually transmitted diseases?

Distributing free condoms in public. Telling a man and woman to sexually desire one another without being spouses. Instigating Filipinos to carnally covet someone not their spouse. Helping multinational pharmaceuticals to sell their products contrary to the dictate of elementary ethics. Making HIV AIDS and other sex related plague, the order of the day. These are in fact, the unsaid but well advertised message of such pretentiously caring individuals during the otherwise lovely day!  Continue reading here.

My purpose in writing this essay is not to rehash all the arguments for or against contraception. What I want to do is to go beyond all the common arguments and to reduce them to the basic moral attitudes upon which lie the positions of the Church and her anti-life opponents. I will not attempt to describe all the principles that are at the heart of these respective positions; I will simply point out the attitudes that summarize these principles.

Continue reading here.