God's Masterpiece of Mercy

Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception 

The context of today’s feast is found at the very beginning of the Bible. It is the story of the Fall of Man. Today’s first reading narrates the consequences of the Fall, the effect of original sin. The fall seems to take place quickly with no resistance at all. Neither Eve nor Adam raise so much as one word of protest or argument against the serpent. They appear to be easy prey for his cunning attack and wicked logic. Although Eve seems to have been the initiator and the more prominent character in the Fall, Adam’s sin was the more culpable. Eve, at least, recalled God’s instructions. Adam conveniently ignored that fact and took the fruit from Eve without a word. If creation speaks of order of authority where the chain of command descends from God to Adam to Eve and then to creature; the Fall reverses the divinely established authority. Now the creature instructs, Eve obeys and soon Adam follow suit. God’s command, however, is totally ignored.

The story ends on both a sad and happy note. None of the participants assumed responsibility for their actions and no one repents of their sins. They ended up blaming each other. That’s the sad part of the story. But the happy part of the story is that God did not abandon them to their sin. It is in the story of the Fall that we first see evidence of God’s mercy. The nakedness of man is covered by skins provided by God, so that men need not hide from His presence. Sin would bring about a curse upon humanity but sin would not have the last word. Written into the very fabric of the story of the Fall is the story of the cure.  Sin will not be the end of man’s hope, but the starting point. Sin does not slam the door on God’s blessings; it opens the door for His grace and mercy. Through the mercy of God, the Fall would be instrumental for God to send the final solution – The seed of the woman will bring about the destruction of Satan and the deliverance of man; sin and evil would be finally defeated.

That is why any discussion of God’s mercy must begin with the story of sin. In dealing with the sins of men, God’s mercy is revealed. In forgiving the sins of men, the mercy of God is manifested. Though, it may appear that everyone in the world hopes to hear a message of mercy, many are deluded by the falsifications of sin. Unfortunately, for most people, mercy often means the denial of sin. But there can be no true mercy without Truth. The reason for this confusion is because we live in a world that denies the existence of sin. Why is that? Because sin is an offence against God, and many have cease believing in God. Therefore, if there is no God, there cannot be any sin. But we are surrounded by sin and read about it and see it in the news media every day—murder, adultery, abortion, theft, lies and so forth. Of course, we call it by other names. We seek to normalise such behaviour and even institutionalise them.  Unless we recognise and acknowledge sin, unless we accept responsibility for our mistakes, the story of God’s salvation will make no sense to us. Those who do not acknowledge their sins see no need for God and His mercy. Only sinners require mercy.

I guess this is the reason why that the Holy Father has chosen this day as the start of the Extraordinary Jubilee of Mercy last year. Mary, the Immaculate Conception, the new Eve, is God’s greatest masterpiece of His mercy. It is no coincidence that the Hebrew word for “mercy” or “rechem” comes from the root word for womb, thus speaks to us of the connexion of mother and child. In Mary, we get to see what humankind would look like without the Fall, without Original Sin, without the curse. “Mary” as Pope St John Paul II wrote in his encyclical, Dives in Misericordia, 9, “is the one who experienced mercy in an exceptional way.” Mary is, therefore, the first to be shown God’s immense mercy, the first redeemed, the first Christian. Mary is the New Eve at the Annunciation; whereas the old Eve heeded the counsel of the serpent, the New Eve obeyed the message of God’s angel. Just as God prepared a paradise for Adam and Eve, so Mary is a “second” but more perfect sinless paradise where the Son of God dwelt nine months before his birth in Bethlehem. As the New Eve, Mary restored the relationship broken by the first Eve. If the first Eve was named as mother of all fallen humanity, the New Eve is the mother of all those born into new life through the grace in Christ. In Mary, the world comes to know that it no longer has to labour under the clutches of the curse, but we have now become recipients of God’s heavenly grace.

The mystery of the Immaculate Conception is the expression of the first act of the heavenly Father's mercy in Mary's regard. Mercy is something we never deserve and we have not earned it in the least. It is an act of absolute gratuity. This is why we can see in it the Father's mercy in its pure state. We see a faint reflection of what happened to Mary in a parent’s love for a child. A child is loved by its parents not because the child has “earned” it, or deserved it, or even asked for it in any way. Rather, the parent’s love comes right from the start, a completely free gift, just because the child is the parent’s own child. That is human mercy “par excellence”, and yet this human mercy pales in comparison to the mercy of God.

Mary is a fitting image of God’s tender loving mercy and kindness. Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI tells us that “in her, God has impressed his own image, the image of the One who follows the lost sheep even up into the mountains and among the briars and thornbushes of the sins of this world, letting himself be spiked by the crown of thorns of these sins in order to take the sheep on his shoulders and bring it home.” Every day, we continue to struggle against temptation and sin. Yet, sin does not have the last word, it is Grace. He has not abandon us to our sin and to its curse. In fact, God takes what we have ruined by sin and makes it far better. He does so not because we merited it or deserved His graces. No. He gives it to us as an absolutely free gift.

Mary, conceived without sin, Pray for us! 

Mercy and Truth

Solemnity of Most Sacred Heart of Jesus

Today we celebrate the Solemnity of Most Sacred Heart of Jesus. The devotion to the Sacred Heart encouraged by many saints such as St. Margaret Mary Alacoque, St. Gertrude. Today's feast reminds us the Mercy of God. If mercy is about compassion, mutuality, and ultimately the welfare or salvation of the other, then it must be intimately linked to Truth. It was mercy that drove Christ to confront our sinfulness and our blindness. It was on the cross that the Truth of Christ’s mercy was revealed in all its depth and glory– that sin is the real cause of Jesus’ death on the cross, and in return for what our sin had done to him, Christ had only mercy to offer us – “Forgive them for they do not know what they are doing.” Christ is the personification of the depths of Divine mercy.  This is the wonder of the cross, that here we see the fullest measure of Truth and the fullest measure of mercy at the same time in the same place and all because of the same Saviour. At the cross, we see Truth and Mercy meet.

Today, we remind ourselves of God’s tender mercies – when we strive, more than ever, to let Him break through the locked doors of our hearts. But in order for him to do that, we must face the truth about our sinfulness. We need to “look the beast in the eye, so that the past wouldn’t hold us hostage anymore”. Christ has left the tomb. If we choose to, so can we. We can step out of the tomb of selfishness and sin.  We can feel the healing light of God’s care. We can take that second chance. God’s mercy, Divine Mercy, assures it.  The Sacrament of Penance enables it. We can be made new.

Mercy and Truth are not mutually exclusive

Second Sunday of Easter (Divine Mercy Sunday) - Year C

Today, the Risen Lord breaks through the walls of fear, shame, isolation, disappointment and failure to help us “look the beast in the eye, so that the past wouldn’t hold us hostage anymore”. Jesus appears to the disciples holding mercy in one hand, and truth in the other. This calls to mind a passage taken from the psalms. “Mercy and truth are met together” (Psalm 85:10). Mercy and truth—what a strange pair. We commonly believe that mercy entails relaxation, bending or burying the truth. The oft repeated cliché, ‘to forgive is to forget’ reflects this understanding. On the other hand, absolute Truth, is seen as harsh, judgmental, intolerant and the cause of conflict. Thus, it would appear that mercy and truth are incompatible. Today’s gospel exposes the error of this myth. Both mercy and truth are linked together numerous times in the Bible. Ultimately, both characterises the nature of God. God is a God of Truth and Justice, thus He cannot overlook sin. But He is equally a God of Love, whose overwhelming mercy has provided a way of salvation. As Pope Francis reminds us, “God never tires in forgiving us.  Never! It is we who get tired to ask for his forgiveness.”  

What Jesus did and what he said to his disciples after his resurrection stands out prominently. He returns to the very people who had abandoned him to the injustices of a kangaroo court, a summary trial and the indignity and pain of the cross. He returns to the very people who were responsible, directly and indirectly for the wounds which he now displays to them, one of whom betrayed him, another denied him not once but twice, and they all deserted him, like craven cowards and were now skulking behind closed doors. We would have understood perfectly had he been thoroughly miffed with them and spoken dismissively and even derisively of them. Well, what happens? It would have been startling to have called them his disciples after what they had done. And quite mind-boggling even to have called them friends and even reward them with the two fold gift – the gift of the Holy Spirit and the gift of the power to forgive sins. Now that really is quite unbelievable. But the truth is – it did happen!

Jesus came and stood among them and said, "Peace be with you." Jesus came not to bring judgment and call down God’s wrath on them. But neither did Jesus pretend that they had done no wrong. After he said this, he showed them his hands and his side which had been pierced as he hung dying. He did not sweep the Truth under the cover of false mercy. Rather, Jesus showed them the Truth of their actions, of their sinfulness, of their betrayal, of their lack of faith, by revealing these to them. This revelation was not an act of retribution, it was an act of mercy. He could have chosen to disguise his wounds and cover them up under the folds of his robes, but he realised that only the Truth will set them free, that only Truth could be a prerequisite of true peace. Peace that is attained under the cover of a lie, is never true peace – it is just a cowardly avoidance of conflict (which is sometimes necessary if there is to be growth); it is the tolerance of error and sin. True peace is never just the absence of conflict, the absence of poverty, the absence of inequality or discrimination, or the absence of troubles. For us Christians, peace is always about the presence of Christ.

Christ is our peace, He who came to reveal the truth about God, the truth about us, and the truth about sin. Christ is our peace, he who came to atone for our sins and to manifest the mercy of God to humanity who had been lost to sinfulness. Christ is our peace, a peace that comes through unconditional forgiveness, a forgiveness that invites us in turn to offer forgiveness to others. Christ is our peace, a peace that reconciles us to him and to the Father. Christ is our peace, a peace that comes from true repentance, a repentance which is a result of knowledge of the truth. Without the truth, reconciliation would not be possible.

On this Second Sunday of Easter, where we have gathered to celebrate the immense ocean of God’s mercy, we are reminded of the true essence of that mercy. Mercy is not pity in the sense that our culture understands pity. It is not feeling sorry for someone, nor is it preoccupation with pain. To reduce mercy to pity and pitiful feelings is to exile mercy altogether from our lives. The word ‘pity’ has evolved to mean something very different from mercy. Pity connotes condescension, and this condescension, in turn, implies separateness. “I feel sorry for you (because you are so different from me).” Pity regards the object as not only suffering, but weak or inferior. What passes as pity in today’s culture is often merely disguised gloating.   But, mercy means compassion. Compassion, from the Latin derivate ‘cum patior’ (to suffer with), is a participation in the sufferings of the other. Thus compassion, or mercy, is to suffer with, to undergo with, to share solidarity with. Compassion, one may say, works from a strength born of awareness of shared weakness, and not from someone else’s weakness, and from the awareness of the mutuality of us all.

If mercy is about compassion, mutuality, and ultimately the welfare or salvation of the other, then it must be intimately linked to Truth. It was mercy that drove Christ to confront our sinfulness and our blindness. It was on the cross that the Truth of Christ’s mercy was revealed in all its depth and glory– that sin is the real cause of Jesus’ death on the cross, and in return for what our sin had done to him, Christ had only mercy to offer us – “Forgive them for they do not know what they are doing.” Christ is the personification of the depths of Divine mercy.  This is the wonder of the cross, that here we see the fullest measure of Truth and the fullest measure of mercy at the same time in the same place and all because of the same Saviour. At the cross, we see Truth and Mercy meet.

The mission of the Church and of every Christian today is to bear witness to that same truth and not allow it to be hidden under the cover of false mercy, known by its modern incarnation: ‘political correctness’.  Truth must be faced and dealt with. Truth cannot be changed, hidden, ran from, or ignored. We cannot disguise the truth about sin just by giving it some toothless euphemism. For some, truth is . . . “I’ve had an abortion.” “I was unfaithful to my wife.” “I’ve been on drugs.” “I’ve embezzled from my employer.” The hard, cold facts stare you in the face, and nothing can change them. Oh yes, we know the truth . . . about ourselves and about everybody else (we think). But the real truth is this: we are united with each other in our sinfulness. As St Paul reminds us, “For all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.” But don’t stop here. Mercy is not far away, for mercy and truth travel together. But the greater truth, the truth proclaimed by this Sunday’s celebration: because we are all sinners, therefore we are also recipients of God’s mercy and His saving grace.

There is probably none who understands truth and mercy better than Desmond Tutu and his good friend, Nelson Mandela. When Nelson Mandela left prison after 27 years, he could have called for vengeance, retribution against the Whites, he did not, he called for forgiveness. He called upon his old friend Desmond Tutu and asked him to chair the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. The rules were simple: the perpetrators had to tell the truth, the whole truth, and their victims were given the opportunity to forgive, to show mercy.

This Sunday, we mark Divine Mercy Sunday, when we embrace the power and beauty of God’s forgiveness and mercy. It is the Sunday in which we remind ourselves of God’s tender mercies – when we strive, more than ever, to let Him break through the locked doors of our hearts. But in order for him to do that, we must face the truth about our sinfulness. We need to “look the beast in the eye, so that the past wouldn’t hold us hostage anymore”. Christ has left the tomb. If we choose to, so can we. We can step out of the tomb of selfishness and sin.  We can feel the healing light of God’s care. We can take that second chance. God’s mercy, Divine Mercy, assures it.  The Sacrament of Penance enables it. We can be made new.

Mercy and Truth

Solemnity of Most Sacred Heart of Jesus

Today we celebrate the Solemnity of Most Sacred Heart of Jesus. The devotion to the Sacred Heart encouraged by many saints such as St. Margaret Mary Alacoque, St. Gertrude. Today's feast reminds us the Mercy of God. If mercy is about compassion, mutuality, and ultimately the welfare or salvation of the other, then it must be intimately linked to Truth. It was mercy that drove Christ to confront our sinfulness and our blindness. It was on the cross that the Truth of Christ’s mercy was revealed in all its depth and glory– that sin is the real cause of Jesus’ death on the cross, and in return for what our sin had done to him, Christ had only mercy to offer us – “Forgive them for they do not know what they are doing.” Christ is the personification of the depths of Divine mercy.  This is the wonder of the cross, that here we see the fullest measure of Truth and the fullest measure of mercy at the same time in the same place and all because of the same Saviour. At the cross, we see Truth and Mercy meet.

Today, we remind ourselves of God’s tender mercies – when we strive, more than ever, to let Him break through the locked doors of our hearts. But in order for him to do that, we must face the truth about our sinfulness. We need to “look the beast in the eye, so that the past wouldn’t hold us hostage anymore”. Christ has left the tomb. If we choose to, so can we. We can step out of the tomb of selfishness and sin.  We can feel the healing light of God’s care. We can take that second chance. God’s mercy, Divine Mercy, assures it.  The Sacrament of Penance enables it. We can be made new.

Lord, teach us how to pray?

I was once the president of the catholic society (now consider myself as the advisor to the society) in my campus. All of us (the members and I) will meet up every week to have prayers & devotion( eg: rosary, novena to the mother of perpetual help). Before we start our meeting on a particular day, usually, we will start it with an opening prayer. I think most of the students don't really like to lead in prayer, regardless of whether that is an opening prayer or closing prayer. The reason being is that most of us do not know what to pray or what to say in front of the crowd. Same like me, as a facilitator, when I first stand in front of the crowd to lead in prayer. I think most of us are facing the same problem together with the disciples in those day. we have the same commonality that "WE DO NOT KNOW HOW TO PRAY". Precisely, I guess most of us do not know what is the correct word that we should utter or using in our prayer. We want to pray, but how can we pray?

In today's gospel," Jesus was praying in a certain place, and when he had finished, one of his disciples said to him,
“Lord, teach us to pray just as John taught his disciples.”  He said to them, “When you pray, say:Father, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come.
Give us each day our daily bread
and forgive us our sins for we ourselves forgive everyone in debt to us,
and do not subject us to the final test.” (LK11:1-4)

When Jesus taught his disciples to pray he gave them the disciple's prayer, what we call the Our Father or Lord's Prayer. What does Jesus' prayer tell us about God and about ourselves? First, it tells us that God is both Father in being the Creator and Author of all that he has made, the first origin of everything and transcendent authority, and he is eternally Father by his relationship to his only begotten Son who, reciprocally is Son only in relation to his Father (Matthew 11:27). All fatherhood and motherhood is derived from him (Ephesians 3:14-15). In the Lord Jesus Christ we are spiritually reborn and made new, and we become the adopted children of God (John 1:12-13; 3:3).

Jesus teaches us to address God as "our Father" and to confidently ask him for the things we need to live as his sons and daughters. We can approach God our Father with confidence and boldness because Jesus Christ has opened the way to heaven for us through his death and resurrection. When we ask God for help, he fortunately does not give us what we deserve. Instead, he responds with grace and mercy. He is kind and forgiving towards us and he expects us to treat our neighbor the same. We can pray with expectant faith because our heavenly Father loves us and treats us as his children. He delights to give us what is good. His love and grace transforms us and makes us like himself. Through his grace and power we can love and serve one another as Jesus taught with grace, mercy, and loving-kindness. 

Now, do you treat others as they deserve, or do you treat them as the Lord would with grace and mercy? Jesus' prayer includes an injunction that we must ask God to forgive us in proportion as we forgive those who have wronged us. Are you ready to forgive as Jesus forgives?

If a neighbor can be imposed upon and coerced into giving bread in the middle of the night, will not God, our heavenly Father and provider, also treat us with kind  and generous care no matter how troubling or inconvenient the circumstances might appear? Jesus states emphatically, How much more will the heavenly Father give! St. Augustine of Hippo (340-425 AD) reminds us that "God, who does not sleep and who awakens us from sleep that we may ask, gives much more graciously." The Lord Jesus assures us that we can bring our needs to our heavenly Father who is always ready to give not only what we need, but more than we can ask. God gives the best he has. He freely pours out the blessing of his Holy Spirit upon us so that we may be filled with the abundance of his provision. Do you approach your heavenly Father with confidence in his mercy and kindness towards you?

Pope John Paul II, at the end of his first encyclical letter, The Redeemer of Man, maintained that our prayer must be "great, intense, and growing." He also emphasized that the Lord wants our prayer to be combined with fasting, for the Lord has decided at this time to make prayer and fasting the first and most effective weapons against our culture of death (The Gospel of Life, 100). According to these criteria, is your prayer life satisfactory to the Lord?

To pray as the Lord wants us to pray, we must see God as our loving Father. That is the first thing Jesus taught us about prayer (see Lk 11:2). We must be aware that our Father sees our prayer and fasting (Mt 6:6, 18). Abraham stopped short in his prayer for the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah to be spared destruction. His prayer was limited because he:

• wasn't sure whether God was just (see Gn 18:25),
• was even less sure of God's mercy, and
• projected his own interior conflicts onto God and thereby accused God of being impatient (Gn 18:30) and angry (Gn 18:32).

Abraham had little concept of God being a loving Father, and he prayed and did not pray accordingly.

We who are in Christ can and must pray always with loving, tender confidence in our Father. In that way, we will pray as we ought (Rm 8:26).

Divine Mercy Sunday

Source: Catholic Web

Today is the day where the Catholic Church celebrate the feast day of Divine Mercy, as recorded in the diary of Saint Faustina, receives from Jesus himself the biggest promise of Grace related to the devotion of Divine Mercy. The church usually will celebrate it on the Sunday after Easter, the octave of Easter. The devotion was actively promoted by Pope John Paul II.

The Divine Mercy Sunday is a Roman Catholic devotion to the merciful love of God and the desire to let that love and mercy flow through one's own heart towards those in need of it. The devotion is due to the apparitions of the Lord, Jesus received by Saint Mary Faustina Kowalska, who is known as the Apostle of Mercy.

Faustina Kowalska reported a number of apparitions, visions and conversations with Jesus which she wrote in her diary, and later published as the book : Diary: Divine Mercy in My Soul. The three main themes of the devotion are to ask for and obtain the mercy of God, to trust in Christ's abundant of mercy, and finally to show mercy to others and act as a conduit for God's mercy towards them.

Power of Your Love

Today, Friday! This is not an ordinary Friday that use to be throughout the year. Today is a very special day where Christ willingly enter into his passion, and die on the cross for us. The reason of Christ doing this is simple, because He loves us so much that he die for our sins so the way to heaven can be open to all of us.

The word 'LOVE' with four simple alphabet, sound so simple in life. In reality, that will not be easy for people to act upon it. In a relationship, often we hear the couple saying"How much do you love me?'' One of them might answer' My love for you is just like the height of a mountain'. But in the real sense, how many of us, for the sake of our beloved one, willing to die for them?

Now, Jesus willing to do that for us, because of His Love for us. Despite our sinfulness and wickedness, His love for us will never cease. He wants to bring Salvation for us so they we may reunited with Him in His Heavenly kingdom. The cross brings us face to face with Jesus suffering. And his death was agonizing and and humiliating.

Normally a crucified man could last for several days on a cross. Jesus' had already been scourged, beaten with rods, and a crown of thorns pressed into his skull. It is no wonder that he died mid-afternoon. Jesus was crucified for his claim to be king. The Jews had understood that the Messiah would come as king to establish God's reign for them. They wanted a king who would free them from tyranny and foreign domination. Many had high hopes that Jesus would be the Messianic King. Little did they understand what kind of kingship Jesus claimed to have. Jesus came to conquer hearts and souls for an imperishable kingdom, rather than to conquer perishable lands and entitlements.

We can find no greater proof of God's love for us that the willing sacrifice of his son on the cross. Jesus' parting words, "It is finished " express triumph rather than defeat. Jesus bowed his head and gave up his spirit knowing that the strife was now over and the battle was won. Even on the cross, Jesus knew the joy of victory. What the Father sent him into the world to do has now been accomplished. Christ offered himself and without blemish to God and he put away sin by the sacrifice of himself. (See Hebrews 9:24-26)

St.Augustine comments on those who stood at the cross of Jesus: 'As they were looking on, so we too gaze on his wounds as he hangs. We see his blood as he dies. We see the price offered by the redeemer, touch the scars of his resurrection. He bows his head, as if to kiss you. His heart is made bare open, as it were, in love to you. His arms are extended that he may embrace you. His whole body is displayed for your redemption. Ponder how great these things are. Let all this be rightly weighed in your mind: as He was once fixed on the cross in every part of his body for you, so he may now be fixed in every part of your soul.

In the cross of Christ, we see the triumph of Jesus over his enemies, sin, Satan, and death. The cross of Christ is the safe guard of our faith, the assurance of our hope, and the throne of love. It is also the sign of God's mercy and the proof of forgiveness. By his cross, Jesus Christ has pardoned us and set us free from the tyranny of sin. He paid the price for us when he made atonement for our sins.

The way to peace, joy, and righteousness in the kingdom of God and the way to victory over sin and corruption, fear and defeat, despair and death is through the cross of Jesus Christ. Now, do you follow the Lord Jesus in his way of the cross with joy, hope and confidence?