Scripture Reflection and Prayer : Journeying together

Friday, 24 February 2023

OBJECTIVE OF FASTING IS FOR FEASTING WITH THE LORD

20230224 OBJECTIVE OF FASTING IS FOR FEASTING WITH THE LORD

24 February 2023, Friday after Ash Wednesday

First reading

Isaiah 58:1-9 ©

The sort of fast that pleases me

Thus says the Lord:

Shout for all you are worth,

raise your voice like a trumpet.

Proclaim their faults to my people,

their sins to the House of Jacob.

They seek me day after day,

they long to know my ways,

like a nation that wants to act with integrity

and not ignore the law of its God.

They ask me for laws that are just,

they long for God to draw near:

‘Why should we fast if you never see it,

why do penance if you never notice?’

Look, you do business on your fast-days,

you oppress all your workmen;

look, you quarrel and squabble when you fast

and strike the poor man with your fist.

Fasting like yours today

will never make your voice heard on high.

Is that the sort of fast that pleases me,

a truly penitential day for men?

Hanging your head like a reed,

lying down on sackcloth and ashes?

Is that what you call fasting,

a day acceptable to the Lord?

Is not this the sort of fast that pleases me

– it is the Lord who speaks –

to break unjust fetters and

undo the thongs of the yoke,

to let the oppressed go free,

and break every yoke,

to share your bread with the hungry,

and shelter the homeless poor,

to clothe the man you see to be naked

and not turn from your own kin?

Then will your light shine like the dawn

and your wound be quickly healed over.

Your integrity will go before you

and the glory of the Lord behind you.

Cry, and the Lord will answer;

call, and he will say, ‘I am here.’

Responsorial Psalm

Psalm 50(51):3-6,18-19 ©

A humbled, contrite heart, O God, you will not spurn.

Have mercy on me, God, in your kindness.

In your compassion blot out my offence.

O wash me more and more from my guilt

and cleanse me from my sin.

A humbled, contrite heart, O God, you will not spurn.

My offences truly I know them;

my sin is always before me

Against you, you alone, have I sinned;

what is evil in your sight I have done.

A humbled, contrite heart, O God, you will not spurn.

For in sacrifice you take no delight,

burnt offering from me you would refuse,

my sacrifice, a contrite spirit.

A humbled, contrite heart you will not spurn.

A humbled, contrite heart, O God, you will not spurn.

Gospel Acclamation

cf.Ps129:5,7

Glory and praise to you, O Christ!

My soul is waiting for the Lord,

I count on his word,

because with the Lord there is mercy

and fullness of redemption.

Glory and praise to you, O Christ!

Or:

cf.Amos5:14

Glory and praise to you, O Christ!

Seek good and not evil so that you may live,

and that the Lord God of hosts may really be with you.

Glory and praise to you, O Christ!

Gospel

Matthew 9:14-15 ©

When the bridegroom is taken from them, then they will fast

John’s disciples came to Jesus and said, ‘Why is it that we and the Pharisees fast, but your disciples do not?’ Jesus replied, ‘Surely the bridegroom’s attendants would never think of mourning as long as the bridegroom is still with them? But the time will come for the bridegroom to be taken away from them, and then they will fast.’

OBJECTIVE OF FASTING IS FOR FEASTING WITH THE LORD

SCRIPTURE READINGS: [ISAIAH 58:1-9; PS 51:3-6,18-19; MATTHEW 9:14-15]

The theme of today’s scripture readings is clear. Fasting of course is one of the three main pillars of the Lenten spiritual exercises. However, the liturgy is concerned with the right motivation and disposition for fasting. It is important that we get our perspective right from the outset when it comes to fasting lest we fast in vain.

Quite often people fast for the wrong reasons. This explains why fasting has not done them much good. Some fast simply out of habit and tradition, or simply because it is a Church law or admonition. Many fast for vanity reasons, like losing weight so that they look more presentable. Some fast for ostentatious reasons, such as to boast to others how religious they are. Others fast for selfish reasons, to save money. “Fasting like yours today will never make your voice heard on high. Is that the sort of fast that pleases me, a truly penitential day for men? Hanging your head like a reed, lying down on sackcloth and ashes? Is that what you call fasting, a day acceptable to the Lord?”

What, then, is the primary reason for fasting? The gospel hinted on the real reason for fasting when Jesus said, “Surely the bridegroom’s attendants would never think of mourning as long as the bridegroom is still with them? But the time will come for the bridegroom to be taken away from them and then they will fast.” In other words, the objective of fasting is to feast in the Kingdom of God, to celebrate our wedding with the Lord who is our bridegroom. Fasting is to be in union with the Lord in love and joy. This explains why even during the Lenten season, we do not fast on Sundays because they are solemn celebrations of the resurrection of the Lord. The forty days of fasting begins from Ash Wednesday and ends on Holy Saturday with the exclusion of all Sundays in Lent. Hence we speak of a 40-day fast in Lent when strictly speaking the season of Lent is not 40 days.

How then does fasting help us to achieve our union with the Lord?

Firstly, fasting helps us to strengthen our prayer life as it gives us the disposition for prayer. Fasting is the soul of prayer and the power of prayer. Prayer is the first pillar of the Lenten exercise. For prayers to be efficacious and fervent, it must be complemented by fasting. By fasting, it shows our earnestness and sincerity in what we are praying for. Even if we do not have any urgent petition to ask from the Lord, fasting gives us the right spirit for prayer. It helps us to be more attentive to the prompting of the Spirit.

Secondly, fasting helps us to identify with the sufferings of our fellowmen. It helps us to feel with the hunger of the poor, which in turn can help us to understand our own spiritual hunger. Hence, fasting strengthens the third pillar of the Lenten exercises, which is almsgiving. True prayer and fasting must lead to works of charity. The fruit of prayer is always charity. Without charity, our prayer and fasting become mere spiritual exercises and external performances. The Lord reprimanded His people, “Is not this the sort of fast that pleases me – it is the Lord who speaks – to break unjust fetters and undo the thongs of the yoke, to let the oppressed go free, and break every yoke, to share your bread with the hungry, and shelter the homeless poor, to clothe the man you see to be naked and not turn from your own kin? Then will your light shine like the dawn and your wound be quickly healed over.”

Thirdly, fasting helps us to discipline ourselves. It teaches us self-discipline. If we cannot discipline our body, how can we discipline our mind and our tongues and our thoughts? All sins we know begin with a thought and a desire in the heart before it gives birth to action. So we cannot have real control over our sensual needs if we do not first control our mind, the way we think. Fasting is meant to create positive thoughts in us by contemplating on the passion and the suffering of Christ. As we meditate on His passion and vicarious sacrifice for us, His innocent and unjust suffering on the cross, we too find strength to surrender our body and our will to the Lord. We too can find strength to suffer with the Lord and for His people in mind and in heart. So fasting is a necessary means to overcome the temptations of the Evil One. This explains why Jesus fasted before facing the temptations of the Evil One.

In the final analysis, fasting is to fast from our sins and vices. The Lord says, “Look, you do business on your fast days, you oppress all your workmen; look, you quarrel and squabble when you fast and strike the poor man with your fist.” If we want to seek the Lord, we need to live a life of integrity. “Your integrity will go before you and the glory of the Lord behind you. Cry, and the Lord will answer; call, and he will say, ‘I am here.'” This presupposes that we fight against sin in our lives. “Shout for all you are worth, raise your voice like a trumpet. Proclaim their faults to my people, their sins to the House of Jacob. They seek me day after day, they long to know my ways, like a nation that wants to act with integrity and not ignore the law of its God.” By so doing, we live a life in union with Christ in love and truth.

WHAT IS LIFE AND PROSPERITY?

20230223 WHAT IS LIFE AND PROSPERITY?

23 February 2023, Thursday after Ash Wednesday

First reading

Deuteronomy 30:15-20 ©

I set before you today life or death, blessing or curse

Moses said to the people: ‘See, today I set before you life and prosperity, death and disaster. If you obey the commandments of the Lord your God that I enjoin on you today, if you love the Lord your God and follow his ways, if you keep his commandments, his laws, his customs, you will live and increase, and the Lord your God will bless you in the land which you are entering to make your own. But if your heart strays, if you refuse to listen, if you let yourself be drawn into worshipping other gods and serving them, I tell you today, you will most certainly perish; you will not live long in the land you are crossing the Jordan to enter and possess. I call heaven and earth to witness against you today: I set before you life or death, blessing or curse. Choose life, then, so that you and your descendants may live, in the love of the Lord your God, obeying his voice, clinging to him; for in this your life consists, and on this depends your long stay in the land which the Lord swore to your fathers Abraham, Isaac and Jacob he would give them.’

Responsorial Psalm

Psalm 1:1-4,6 ©

Happy the man who has placed his trust in the Lord.

Happy indeed is the man

who follows not the counsel of the wicked;

nor lingers in the way of sinners

nor sits in the company of scorners,

but whose delight is the law of the Lord

and who ponders his law day and night.

Happy the man who has placed his trust in the Lord.

He is like a tree that is planted

beside the flowing waters,

that yields its fruit in due season

and whose leaves shall never fade;

and all that he does shall prosper.

Happy the man who has placed his trust in the Lord.

Not so are the wicked, not so!

For they like winnowed chaff

shall be driven away by the wind:

for the Lord guards the way of the just

but the way of the wicked leads to doom.

Happy the man who has placed his trust in the Lord.

Gospel Acclamation

Ps50:12,14

Praise and honour to you, Lord Jesus!

A pure heart create for me, O God,

and give me again the joy of your help.

Praise and honour to you, Lord Jesus!

Or:

Mt4:17

Praise and honour to you, Lord Jesus!

Repent, says the Lord,

for the kingdom of heaven is close at hand.

Praise and honour to you, Lord Jesus!

Gospel

Luke 9:22-25 ©

Whoever loses his life for my sake will save it

Jesus said to his disciples:

‘The Son of Man is destined to suffer grievously, to be rejected by the elders and chief priests and scribes and to be put to death, and to be raised up on the third day.’

Then to all he said:

‘If anyone wants to be a follower of mine, let him renounce himself and take up his cross every day and follow me. For anyone who wants to save his life will lose it; but anyone who loses his life for my sake, that man will save it. What gain, then, is it for a man to have won the whole world and to have lost or ruined his very self?’

WHAT IS LIFE AND PROSPERITY?

SCRIPTURE READINGS: [Dt 30:15-20; Ps 1:1-4,6; Lk 9:22-25]

Moses said to the people, “See, today I set before you life and prosperity, death and disaster.” What will you choose? Obviously, no one chooses death and disaster or poverty unless he or she is suicidal! The real problem perhaps lies in the understanding of what is life and prosperity. How to make a choice unless we know what we are choosing? Once we are clear of what we are choosing, we can then think of the strategy and approaches.

So what is life? For many people, life is identified with pleasure, wealth, status and power. But look at what King Solomon found out at the end of his life. He said, “I thought to myself, ‘Very well, I will try pleasure and see what enjoyment has to offer.’ And there it was: vanity again! This laughter, I reflected, is a madness, this pleasure no use at all. I resolved to have my body cheered with wine, my heart still devoted to wisdom; I resolved to embrace folly to see what made mankind happy, and what men do under heaven in the few days they have to live.” (Eccl 2:1-3) Indeed, those who spend their whole life like King Solomon will come to the point at the height of their success when they realize that even the pleasures of life cannot satisfy them. On the contrary, for indulging in the pleasures of life and immoral activities, we destroy our body and mind. Greed and lust destroy loving relationships. Drugs and gambling destroy our minds and take away the peace from our hearts by making us anxious and addictive. Alcohol and over eating harm our bodies. Indeed, to such people, Moses said, “you will not live long in the land you are crossing the Jordan to enter and possess.” With all our success, our life and happiness will be shortened.

Is life just work and achievements, money and worldly success? Some work so hard and become so successful only to realize that they have been left out in life. While all their friends have found their partners and are having happy families, they are all alone. Some, because of ambition and prolonged hours working day and night, from Monday to Sunday, suffer deterioration in their health. Life becomes empty even with all the money and success they have made for themselves. Again, Qoheleth says, “For so it is that a man who has laboured wisely, skilfully and successfully must leave what is his own to someone who has not toiled for it at all. This, too, is vanity and great injustice; for what does he gain for all the toil and strain that he has undergone under the sun? What of all his laborious days, his cares of office, his restless nights? This, too, is vanity.” (Eccl 2:21-23)

These are the false gods that we are warned about in today’s scripture readings. “But if your heart strays, if you refuse to listen, if you let yourself be drawn into worshipping other gods and serving them, I tell you today, you will most certainly perish; you will not live long in the land you are crossing the Jordan to enter and possess.” To work for nothing means to waste our efforts, time and energy on the false gods in our lives. That is why Jesus cautioned us, “What gain, then, is it for a man to have the whole world and to have lost or ruined his very self?”

Life is more than worldly satisfactions. It has to do with love and relationships. We are not mere bodies, but we have a spirit. We are called to a transcendent life. This means that life requires meaning if we are to live joyfully and purposefully. Moses says, life is to “live in the love of the Lord your God, obeying his voice, clinging to him; for in this your life consists, and on this depends your long stay in the land which the Lord swore to your fathers.”

Living in the love of the Lord is what gives us life. There is nothing that can satisfy the human soul except God alone. Even human friendship which is part of this life cannot sustain us because our friends will leave us, no matter how close we are. Only the love of God remains forever and goes beyond this life. Only when we love God, would we choose Him above everything else. To choose other things before God would be to choose the inferior things of life since all other things are created by Him. All other works of creation would be less than the author of creation.

How, then, can we live in the love of the Lord? Moses said, “If you obey the commandments of the Lord your God that I enjoin on you today, if you love the Lord your God and follow his ways, if you keep his commandments, his laws, his customs, you will live and increase, and the Lord your God will bless you in the land which you are entering to make your own.” When we love God, we will obey His voice and His commandments. In the gospel, Jesus said, “Whoever has my commands and keeps them is the one who loves me. The one who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I too will love them and show myself to them.” (Jn 14:21) He also said, “If you keep my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commands and remain in his love.” (Jn 15:10) We cannot claim we love God if we do not keep His commands.

In loving God, we love our neighbours as well because that is also the command of the Lord. “‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no commandment greater than these.” (Mk 12:31) In the ministry and teaching of Jesus, He gave great emphasis to loving our neighbours, including even our enemies. A man can be said to love God truly when he also loves his neighbours absolutely, without discrimination, simply because they are God’s beloved as well. Thus, we cannot keep our wealth and resources to ourselves. Like God, we give generously to each man according to his needs, not his greed. In imitating the goodness and generosity of God, a man demonstrates that he loves God and lives in His love. This is because he shares in the mind and heart of God, in His attitude towards the world, humanity and created things.

Secondly, to live in the love of the Lord is to live an enlightened life. The psalmist says, “Happy indeed is the man who follows not the counsel of the wicked; nor lingers in the way of sinners nor sits in the company of scorners, but whose delight is the law of the Lord and who ponders his law day and night.” The fool walks in darkness but the wise man walks in the light. Pondering over the Word of God keeps us focused, for the Word of God is a light for our path. “Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path.” (Ps 119:105) When we build our lives on the Word of God, we can be sure of how we can live our lives.

Thirdly, to live in the love of the Lord is to cling to Him for our security and not the passing world. The psalmist says, Happy the man who has placed his trust in the Lord. He is like a tree that is planted beside the flowing waters, that yields its fruit in due season and whose leaves shall never fade; and all that he does shall prosper.” We need to draw strength from the Lord like the Samaritan woman at the well. Only the Lord can give us the living water that springs up like a fountain in us. Those who cling to the Lord will bear much fruit as our Lord promised us. “I am the vine, you are the branches. He who abides in me, and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing.” (Jn 15:5)

What is prosperity? Being prosperous is not to be rich in this world’s goods but to be rich in love and service. Jesus said, “Anyone who wants to save his life will lose it; but anyone who loses his life for my sake, that man will save it.” True prosperity is when we prosper with good works because of the wealth of love and compassion in our hearts. This was how Jesus lived His life. He came not just to serve us but to die for us. Jesus said, “The Son of Man is destined to suffer grievously, to be rejected by the elders and chief priests and scribes and to be put to death, and to be raised up on the third day.”

Secondly, to be rich is to be free for love and in love. It is a freedom from self and the attachments to the world. Jesus taught us, “If anyone wants to be a follower of mine, let him renounce himself and take up his cross every day and follow me.” When we are able to deny ourselves for the love of Christ and of our brothers and sisters, we will find life. This is the joy of a Christian who is rich in unconditional love and service. He enjoys good relationships with all those people of good will. In this way, through his selfless service, he wins people over and becomes their friend. The wealth of the generous man is in his relationships, love and fellowship. This is what the Lord promised the Israelites, “you will live and increase, and the Lord your God will bless you in the land which you are entering to make your own.” This is what the Lord promised to Abraham and His disciples as well. “Truly, I say to you, there is no man who has left house or wife or brothers or parents or children, for the sake of the kingdom of God,who will not receive manifold more in this time, and in the age to come eternal life.” (Lk 18:29f)

The choice is therefore ours. What will we choose? There is no choice really. Not to choose God is to choose death. But that is our choice as well. If want life and happiness, then choose God! Let us take heed of the Word of God. “Not so are the wicked, not so! For they like winnowed chaff shall be driven away by the wind for the Lord guards the way of the just but the way of the wicked leads to doom.”

SEASON OF GRACE

20230222 SEASON OF GRACE

22 February 2023, Ash Wednesday

First reading

Joel 2:12-18 ©

Let your hearts be broken, not your garments torn

‘Now, now – it is the Lord who speaks –

come back to me with all your heart,

fasting, weeping, mourning.’

Let your hearts be broken, not your garments torn,

turn to the Lord your God again,

for he is all tenderness and compassion,

slow to anger, rich in graciousness,

and ready to relent.

Who knows if he will not turn again, will not relent,

will not leave a blessing as he passes,

oblation and libation

for the Lord your God?

Sound the trumpet in Zion!

Order a fast,

proclaim a solemn assembly,

call the people together,

summon the community,

assemble the elders,

gather the children,

even the infants at the breast.

Let the bridegroom leave his bedroom

and the bride her alcove.

Between vestibule and altar let the priests,

the ministers of the Lord, lament.

Let them say,

‘Spare your people, Lord!

Do not make your heritage a thing of shame,

a byword for the nations.

Why should it be said among the nations,

“Where is their God?”’

Then the Lord, jealous on behalf of his land,

took pity on his people.

Responsorial Psalm