Monthly Archives: May 2016

Saturday of the 7th Week in Ordinary Time (Year II)
James 5:13-20 | Psalm 140:1-3, 8 | Mark 10:13-16

St. James describes in today’s reading some precepts of true Christian life. In short:

• When you’re troubled, pray.
• When you’re happy, sing psalms.
• When you’re ill, ask for Anointing of the Sick.
• When someone else is ill, pray for him, and over him.
• Pray for others, period.
• Confess your sins regularly.
• Guide those who have sinned back towards God and away from eternal damnation.

Easily enumerated, but not so easily followed by us adults who have amassed a thousand cares in this world. However, aren’t these the very habits that we would like our own children to form?

Perhaps we should spend at least an hour each day being like the children that Jesus welcomed in Mark’s gospel, abandoning ourselves wholeheartedly to God and trusting Him to show us the right thing to do – which the above list pretty much covers.

Lord, remind us often of the innocence of love and trust that we enjoyed as little children, and help us experience all that again as we strive to love and trust You, and others through You. Amen.

Friday of the 7th Sunday in Ordinary Time (Year II)
James 5:9-12 | Psalm 102:1-4, 8-9, 11-12 | Mark 10:1-12

Above all, my brothers, do not swear by heaven or by the earth, or use any oaths at all. If you mean ‘yes’, you must say ‘yes’; if you mean ‘no’, say ‘no’. Otherwise you make yourselves liable to judgement. (James 5:12)

The juxtaposition of “oaths” and “judgement” in today’s reading prompted me to check what Singapore courts require of witnesses:

In the Witness Box

When you enter the witness box, a court official will ask you to ‘tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth’. (If you are a Christian, you will be asked to swear on the Bible).

Hah, can swear on Bible meh?

Well, yes, in a way. Here’s what the Catechism of the Catholic Church has to say on the subject:

2153. In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus explained the second commandment: “You have heard that it was said to the men of old, ‘You shall not swear falsely, but shall perform to the Lord what you have sworn.’ But I say to you, Do not swear at all. . . . Let what you say be simply ‘Yes’ or ‘No’; anything more than this comes from the evil one.” Jesus teaches that every oath involves a reference to God and that God’s presence and his truth must be honored in all speech. Discretion in calling upon God is allied with a respectful awareness of his presence, which all our assertions either witness to or mock.

2154. Following St. Paul, the tradition of the Church has understood Jesus’ words as not excluding oaths made for grave and right reasons (for example, in court). “An oath, that is the invocation of the divine name as a witness to truth, cannot be taken unless in truth, in judgment, and in justice.”

2155. The holiness of the divine name demands that we neither use it for trivial matters, nor take an oath which on the basis of the circumstances could be interpreted as approval of an authority unjustly requiring it. When an oath is required by illegitimate civil authorities, it may be refused. It must be refused when it is required for purposes contrary to the dignity of persons or to ecclesial communion.

So church tradition permits swearing on a Bible prior to giving testimony in court, provided your intent and action and the proceedings in question are in accordance with the truth. After all, you are solemnly swearing in the name of the Most High, on His Holy Word, to “tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth”. If you have no intention to do so, or cannot do so, or are ordered to swear thus in a “kangaroo court” or other situation in which you have no reasonable expectation of justice, you really shouldn’t swear at all, much less on a Bible.

Otherwise, as the traditional conclusion of that oath really means, “God help you.”

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We’re probably more familiar with a different aspect of swearing, the one along the lines of profanity and OH MY GOD HE’S SO CUTE!!! I keep telling people that casual name-of-God-dropping is a terrible form of evangelisation, simply because Western entertainment has overused it to the point of mundanity. That brings OMGushing to a screeching halt better than mentioning the 2nd Commandment, which just gets me branded as a old fuddy-duddy.

Lord, open our eyes to the ways in which we use and misuse Your Holy Name each day, and help us to always be mindful of You who deserve all our respect and love. Amen.

Thursday of the 7th Week in Ordinary Time (Year II)
James 5:1-6 | Psalm 48:14-20 | Mark 9:41-50

After yesterday’s tirade against the cocksure, St. James turns his guns on the rich today. He doesn’t pull any punches, condemning those who earn the riches off the sweat of their poorly-recompensed labourers. Thou shalt rot like thy ill-gotten gains, saith the Lord.

His message is supported by Jesus’ observation in today’s gospel, about how we should shun anything that leads us to sin. He makes special mention of the incompatibility between earthly and heavenly riches in Matthew’s gospel:

Jesus said to his disciples, ‘I tell you solemnly, it will be hard for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven. Yes, I tell you again, it is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven.’ (Matthew 19:23-24)

So hard, he said it twice.

But middle-class Singaporeans are actually considered materially rich, especially by regional standards. Are we therefore condemned to burn for all eternity then?

I think not, but it’ll take a lot of mental work. See, I believe that the heavenly roadblock rich people face is really their preoccupation with their riches. Here’s my “easy” four-step eternal life recipe for fat cats:

1. Come by your riches honestly. Don’t lie, cheat and steal your way to your millions. Pay your workers a proper wage, and don’t enslave them.
2. Thank God for your wealth. Early and often, but not like the proud Pharisee who praised himself over the tax collector (Luke 18:9-14).
3. Shun excess. You only have one pair of hands, so six iPads is a bit much.
4. Share with the needy. Consider donating your extra iPads and significant wealth to charitable causes, and your time to bettering others’ lives.

If you can do all that, I think you’re well on your way to justifying a ride to heaven…on the back of a midget camel that’s about to thread a building-sized needle. ?

Lord, you have given us so many gifts for our journey here on earth. Remind us always to generously share these gifts and their fruits with others, all for the glory of You. Amen.

Wednesday of the 7th Week in Ordinary Time (Year II)
James 4:13-17 | Psalm 48:2-3, 6-11 | Mark 9:38-40

Today’s reading is basically a warning from St. James to the cocksure – those who, consciously or otherwise, act as if the world bends to their will.

To be sure, science has advanced to such a degree that this almost seems to be true, feeding the illusion that we are masters of our world. After all, we can have year-round air-conditioning that easily defeats tropical heat and humidity, super-fast computers that put the totality of human knowledge at our fingertips, and foods from every time zone at our local supermarkets.

But we still have no answer to the earthquakes that pancake buildings onto our vulnerable heads, to the gravity that drags us (and our selfie cameras) off slippery cliffs to our doom, or even to the inattentive drivers who T-bone us in our cars to a premature death.

Sure, everyone says “life is short, so let’s make the most of it,” but it’s instructive that after we escape our death-beds, or otherwise taste our own mortality, we almost never redouble our efforts to squeeze as much secular enjoyment out of whatever little time we now know we have left.

Instead, we tend to have a conversion experience, becoming more introspective yet more aware of our environment. We spend less time on personal indulgences, and more time on the people around us. We, in fact, usually grow closer to God.

St. James reminds us that life is fleeting indeed. If we knowingly do wrong in the pursuit of personal gain, or ignore our suffering brethren for more time with our favourite video game or TV show, we may intend to make amends for our sins later, but we may also be called to premature judgement by a freak accident or sudden illness.

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Gamers would instantly recognize the significance of today’s title: in the world of side-scrolling games, your player character is always being propelled in a specific direction. If you fail to catch a falling power-up, or flip a critical switch, you don’t get to go back and try again. You’ll just have to deal with the consequences of your failure later in the game.

Wait, what was that? Aw nuts, too late…

So in the words of a familiar-sounding poem:

Through this toilsome world, alas!
Once and only once I pass;
If a kindness I may show,
If a good deed I may do
To a suffering fellow man,
Let me do it while I can.
No delay, for it is plain
I shall not pass this way again.
(Author unknown, “I Shall Not Pass This Way Again.”)

Lord, remind us to carpe diem, to seize the day not for ourselves but for our brethren who do not have the gifts you have given us. May we find it in our hearts always to share our physical bounty and our spiritual joy with those in this world who want for both. Amen.

Tuesday of the 7th Week in Ordinary Time (Year II)
James 4:1-10 | Psalm 54:7-11, 23 | Mark 9:30-37

Why you don’t have what you want is because you don’t pray for it; when you do pray and don’t get it, it is because you have not prayed properly, you have prayed for something to indulge your own desires. (James 4:2-3)

Isn’t it ironic that I learned the truth of St. James’ words first-hand by trying to write this very blog entry?

I’ve been struggling for almost two hours to come up with something to post, only to realise belatedly that I’d indeed fallen prey to praying for “something to indulge my own desire” – to put both this blog and my body to bed. ? (Yes, dear reader, every daily entry you see was written the night before. I’m not the early bird my “7am” posts seem to suggest.)

Indeed, I’d forgotten that publishing this blog wasn’t the point; daily examination of the Word of God and my imperfect self was. Oh vanity of vanities! (Ecclesiastes 1:2) If I’d only humbled myself and spent time listening to the quiet inner voice of the Holy Spirit…

But perhaps that was the Spirit’s intent after all:

• to get me to sink to the point where I’d “give in to God” (James 4:7) and “clear my mind” (James 4:8),
• to “be miserable instead of laughing, gloomy instead of happy” (James 4:9) from the futility of my own efforts,
• to “humble myself before the Lord, so he would lift me up” (James 4:10), and
• to eventually open my eyes to how today’s reading neatly fits into my immediate experience.

Or in the words of a certain jaundiced cartoon character:

Lord, you examine me and know me.
The word is not even on my tongue, Lord, before you know all about it.
Where could I go to escape your spirit? Where could I flee from your presence?
It was you who created my inmost self, and put me together in my mother’s womb;
for all these mysteries I thank you: for the wonder of myself, for the wonder of your works. You know me through and through.
Lord, examine me and know my heart, probe me and know my thoughts;
make sure I do not follow pernicious ways, and guide me in the way that is everlasting. Amen. (Psalm 139:1, 4, 7, 13, 14, 23, 24)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ANXaULLUM6A