Dear Family!

We have been reading about the various aspects of the ministry of Jesus the Good Shepherd. We see him teaching, healing, and this week, feeding. This shepherding role is extended to all the Apostles. This aspect of ‘Feeding’ is the theme of the readings this Sunday. The Church guides us to John Chapter 6 for the next five Sundays (17th to 21st Sunday).

Dear Family!

We are both followers and leaders at the same time. A wise man once stated that the ‘Leadership is the ability to articulate a vision and get others to carry it out.’ As leadership continues to be in a constant threat under priesthood these days, I am almost at the verge of finding a grip in the efficacy and relevancy of priest-leadership in the modern world.

Dear Family!

There is so much pressure on young people to develop an image of faith in themselves. Most of their friends do not go to church anymore; their parents are either divorced or not practicing Catholics; there is always a Sunday Sports in the morning (as Taxpayer, you cannot question the system). The young are forced to create their own excuses such as ‘headache, body pain, homework’ and the like.

Dear Family!

July 4th brings in a lot of memories of ages past. The Declaration changed the meaning of American freedom forever. Eric Foner in his book, "Give Me Liberty" writes, “It completed the shift from the rights of Englishmen to the rights of mankind as the object of American Independence. No longer a set of specific rights, no longer a privilege to be enjoyed by a corporate body, liberty had become a universal entitlement.” Those words are prophetic indeed.

Dear Family!

In funerals, at times in anger and depression, we feel, “God’s voice had been reduced to paper, and even that paper had to be moderated and deciphered by the proper authorities and intellects. Nobody wanted God in a box, just in a book. Especially an expensive one bound in leather with gilt edges or was that guild edges?” (Shack p. 66)

Dear Family!

Understanding Divine Providence is beyond the powers of human reason. In the First Reading we see Job faced with the reality of how his own suffering and the conversations he has with friends challenges his faith. Job’s challenges at times make us wonder how little we know and understand the will of God even with great faith. “Therefore, I have uttered what I did not understand, things too wonderful for me, which I did not know.” (Job 42:3b-c)

Dear Family!

Happy Father’s Day to all the fathers! We thank God for placing fathers in the family as a sign of God’s enduring love and constant protection. May fathers everywhere be faithful to the examples shown in the scriptures: steadfast in love, forgiving and sustaining forces in their families by caring for those in need. We ask God to grant wisdom to fathers so that they may encourage and guide their children.

Dear Family!

As God created Adam and Eve in the original condition of holiness and justice (Catechism of the Catholic Church 375), we ask a genuine question as to what original holiness was as God intended. The catechism also teaches us that the Original Holiness was ‘friendship with his Creator’, based on sharing ‘divine life’ (CCC 374-375). And the Original Justice as intended by God is the harmony that existed ‘with himself & Eve, and with the creation around him (CCC 376).

Dear Family!

A wise priest once said, “when man stands before the throne of God... all joy is restored, then there is nothing else for him to offer but to give thanks. Hence, the Eucharist or “thanksgiving” is the state of the perfect man. The Eucharist is the life of Paradise.” Happy ‘Corpus Christi’ Sunday to all of you!

Dear Family!

Immediately after the Solemnity of Pentecost, the following Sundays are filled with festive aura that we continue to celebrate three most beloved Solemnities (May 26th - The Most Holy Trinity, June 2nd - Corpus Christi and June 7th- The Most Sacred Heart of Jesus, at the beginning of the Ordinary Season, Part 2 (Part 1 of the Ordinary Season usually runs from after the Baptism of Jesus to Ash Wednesday).

Dear Family!

We profess in the Creed, ‘I believe in the Holy Spirit’. 1 Cor 12:3 states that “No one can say ‘Jesus is Lord’ except by the Holy Spirit” and Gal 4:6 states that “God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying ‘Abba Father’” (our attempts to be united to the Father). The Catechism of the Catholic Church teaches us “to be in touch with Christ, we must have been touched by the Holy Spirit.”

Dear Family!

This Sunday as we celebrate the Solemnity of The Ascension of Our Lord, we reflect on the words of the Catechism of the Catholic Church 660, “First, it is clear that this is spoken of as a real, historical event. Christ was really taken up at a particular time in human history and from a particular place (the time was forty days after his Resurrection, the place was most likely Mount Olives near Jerusalem).

Dear Family!

As we are getting closer to the end of the Easter Season, on the 6th Sunday of Easter we continue to hear Jesus echo his message from the 5th Sunday’s Gospel ‘To remain in him’. We won’t get to hear the 6th Sunday’s Gospel instead we will pray with the Gospel of the 7th Sunday of Easter as our rubrics explain: Where the Ascension is transferred to Sunday, 12th May, the second reading and Gospel of the Seventh Sunday of Easter may be read on the Sixth Sunday of Easter.