We are troubled people. Even when we don’t go looking for trouble, it can come to us. We will realise by now that we cannot have control on everything happening to us. Our life can change as a consequent of another person’s action. Our path in life is often littered with such challenges. 

Two disciples were walking the path to Emmaus talking about events that had happened. When the Risen Christ walked beside them, they did not recognise him. Instead they expressed incredulity that he did not hear about the things that were happening. 

Of course for the two disciples it was about the crucifixion and their walk on the path of enlightenment about the resurrection. We as believers today have the benefit of faith to help us walk the path of our challenges. 

Some of us would have experienced events that had large-scale implications and affected a larger number of people in challenging ways. It can come from a government policy or changes at work where we have little choice but to accept. Worse still, we may be part of a retrenchment exercise in which we were short-changed and unjustifiably dealt with. We can also be found challenged as a consequence of the action of people holding power over us. 

When these things happen to us we are like the two disciples. We are anxious and in fear of what’s to happen. We are angry and bitter about the injustice. We are confused and lost. Even though we are blessed with the belief of the Risen Christ, we cannot recognise him in these events. Who can see Him in injustice, especially when it come from a system or a person we were taught to trust? 

But the Risen Christ recognise this about us and He patiently walk with us through our emotions, patiently guiding us and gently healing us. He does not create injustices to test us; the Risen Christ rose out of injustice to accompany us. Injustices are man-made. 

He sits with us as we huddle in groups venting our frustrations and listening to our words of anger. He allows it knowing that our human condition need a release. We want to hit back at the employer and the system but He works silently and unseen in our hearts to take away the strength to fight. In our tiredness he moves us on into the less violent pastures of grief. Here our tears flow; grieving is okay, it closes a chapter otherwise a new chapter cannot be opened. 

Overcoming challenges is a process; a walk we must walk. We cannot walk it alone. “Two disciples” represent companions. We were never meant to be alone; friends and family are gifts from God. We need one another in troubled times, to have the conversations so that we can hear him, and eventually recognise him in the breaking of bread.

In whatever challenging circumstances in life, we must encourage each other to walk on. In this walk together, we will recognise the Risen Christ walking with us. He is the one we can completely trust. We walk on Trust.

Two disciples walking the path to Emmaus at Nicopolis, Holy Land.

3rd Sunday of Easter

We live now in an over-informed age. At a click we have access to any sort of information on any topic; facts, analysis, speculative, sensationalised, real or fake. News tickers update us constantly exhausting us till we are tired of knowing. We find that we shut ourselves from listening and reading, and become selective to what we ‘click’. 

We shun knowing anything that doesn’t directly affect us. 

In this internet age we have easy access to so much news and information, some so incredulous that we are no longer even slightly amazed. It doesn’t matter if it is real or fake, we may not even be interested. If Jesus lived and died in these times and is resurrected from the dead and appeared to a handful of people, how many of us would not have grave doubts? Or actually be even interested if it didn’t directly affect us? 

We are the modern day Thomas. We cannot bring ourselves to simply ‘believe’. We demand that our ‘unless’ is fulfilled with a convincing proof. “Unless I can put my hands into his side, I refuse to believe”. Or perhaps there is no urgent need to ‘believe’ because at this moment we don’t need God in our lives. 

However, knowing is not enough. Catechetical knowledge is not sufficient. Knowing the facts is not enough to bring about ‘believe’.  ‘Believing’ is a process. It requires a personal experience to bring it about. This process actually begins not with knowledge but with a personal encounter with the Risen Christ. 

Incredulous as it may sound to the Thomas in us, this encounter is available to us every day. When life is running smoothly we find less need for an active faith life. Yet he is there hidden under our heavy work schedules and active social life. We pay little attention, or even worse, we reject his existence as the notion that God exists has become too incredulous. 

Often it is only when we face a crisis that we begin to look for signs of the Divine in life. In our desperate need, we want to ‘believe’ however ‘incredulous’ this has been for us before. Because ‘believe’ directly affects us now. But the long period of ‘unbelief’ in us mean that it will take a time process to get us around the incredulity. 

Today’s gospel concludes with this passage, “There were many other signs that Jesus worked and the disciples saw, but they are not recorded in this book” 

There are many signs of the workings of the Risen Christ in our lives and these are recorded in the book of our personal life. He has always been present silently working in every small detail. When crisis hit us, we must look into our past history and see how we had emerged from each crisis. There would have been ‘something’ each time that set us on the path of recovery. In that sign of a ‘something’ we see the Risen Christ. 

It is only when we encounter him in our personal situation and see the effect He has on our life, can we rise up to ‘believe’ and say in incredulity the words of Thomas, “My Lord and my God!”

A poster ad for a Landings event where Catholics who had left the Church and returned share how they came to ‘believe’ after encountering the Risen Christ in the chapters of their life story.

2^nd Sunday of Easter (A)

There had never been an occurrence when an emptiness said so much. Today we celebrate Easter when the stone was rolled away to uncover an empty tomb. Absent, unseen but present, seen with eyes of faith. An empty tomb filled with nothingness yet this nothingness was so full; full with new life. ‘New life’ made real because He has risen! 

This is the day the Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad. 

This is a newness we are invited to embrace; to live new each morning as each day brings new hope and new graces. We have no more reason to fear, entrusting our life journey into this presence of the Risen Christ so as to live with true joy and true happiness. Rejoice and be glad! 

But for some of us we cannot rise above the reality of our lives. This Easter joy fades away after a few days because we find that we live life stuck in between the crucifixion and resurrection. 

The resurrection is new energy, renewed each day to replace energies drained away by the reality of daily challenges. We face sufferings of all forms, always magnified to empty us. These hurts are stones from broken relationships, rejections, financial struggles, job loss, illnesses, worries, un-forgiveness, bitterness and this list extend as far as our life journey take us. But it is in this emptiness of our personal lives, just like the empty tomb, where we find Him to raise our lives from the dead. 

Today is a day to give thanks, rejoice and be filled with new hope and renewed faith. The disciples ran together to the tomb. When he went in; he saw and he believed. In that emptiness, worldly life fell into place. 

We too must run into the emptiness of our personal lives. We must look for clues in that emptiness like the linen cloth lying on the ground or the head cloth rolled up in a place by itself; we look for clues by going back into the events that emptied us, and the reasons that we are being emptied. We must move the stone to uncover what is behind the stone. We need to see his presence in our personal life to believe. 

Often it is from many of such events that our lives have taken a turn on its journey and led us to where and who we are today. Personal events, often those that broke and emptied us, become milestones on our worldly journey. People with renewed faith, returning Catholics who have come back, saw enough evidence in their emptiness to know that at each milestone, the Risen Christ was like a new fire that burnt a new path for us. 

We can wait between our crucifixion and resurrection or choose to run to see what is behind the stone. There is nothing there, a nothingness that is full of new life for you and me. Believe, so that we can live in joy and true happiness. Happy Easter!

“May the light of Christ rising in glory dispel the darkness of our hearts and minds” Celebrating the Easter Vigil with the new fire to burn a new path for us (Photo: St Joseph Church, Phuket)

Easter Sunday

Mass at Dawn, John 20:1-9

A woman crippled by rheumatoid arthritis has an itch of her back. Unable to move her bended arms, she cannot satisfy the itch. She patiently wait for the itch to go away. Suffering a betrayal in a relationship, wishing it was never such, the pain cripple us from moving on with life. Time becomes a valued friend in the healing process. We can only wait. 

Holy Week begins. A week to dwell in waiting with Christ as he waited for the suffering and dying that was coming his way. He humbly accepted, “if this cup cannot pass by without my drinking it, your will be done!” There is a holiness about waiting. 

A triumphant entry into Jerusalem suddenly turned to become a gruesome betrayal of a bloody death on a cross. The rhythm of our earthly life share this semblance of triumph contrasting with betrayal, of joys contrasting pains, often not totally within our own control. When the rhythm touches the troughs of sorrow and darkness, it is sometimes fruitless fighting this descend. We can only wait with trust. 

When our life descend into darkness, we tend to look to God and ask, “Why?” Often it is life circumstances that resulted in this trough of challenges; God did not impose suffering on us. Often it is a consequence of our own or another’s decision and action. What we do as people affect others around us. 

It is not God’s will that a large cross falls across our shoulders but God will accompany us on our earthly journey carrying our crosses. As we have reflected during Lent, Christ will be glorified in our suffering lives as he was in the Samaritan woman, the man born blind and in Lazarus. Christ wants to roll away the stone that entombs us.

By our human nature, we fight and struggle against times we do not want. In our weariness, our faith is challenged. We do not wish to drink from this cup. In anger or in fear, we walk away from faith. The cock crow in our life. “’Before the cock crows you will have disowned me three times’. And he went outside and wept bitterly”. In between the tears of bitterness, we realise that the only way to triumph is to wait in holiness. 

Self-giving makes waiting holy. Because self-giving is love for others, and hence life-giving. At the end of this Holy Week, Christ will out of love, die on the cross to give his life to all of us. His patient waiting and humble acceptance is glorified. 

This Holy Week we join him in this holiness as his humble acceptance joins him to our personal sufferings. As he entered Jerusalem, the donkey carried him toward events which he has no control of in his human state. His life, and what happened was to be a consequence of other man’s decision and action. We pray for this Christ-like humility, “He was humbler yet, even to accepting death, death on a cross”, to trust in God and wait patiently as he glorifies our life. 

Waiting in holiness. Quiet waiting. We are waiting for the stone to be rolled away. Wait.

Venerating at Calvary where Christ was crucified

Passion Sunday

A few years back, I experienced job loss. It took me awhile to get over the shock and come to terms with this new state of reality. I felt a deep sense of injustice and battled through periods of anxiety. I journeyed through anger looking for peace but instead discovered a thirst for revenge. I tried seeking justice in the courts but only the rich can afford that. 

It took a couple of years before I found calm acceptance. I had to move on but I found myself trapped in a tomb of bitterness. Early in this episode, a friend had taken me aside and shared a Mandela quote, “As I walked out the door toward the gate that would lead to my freedom, I knew if I didn’t leave my bitterness and hatred behind, I’d still be in prison”. Dwelling deep into this wisdom, I finally followed Mandela out of prison.

“Take the stone away.” I am indebted to this friend for moving away the stone that covered the opening to the tomb I was in.

The story of the raising of Lazarus from the dead teaches us two things: the need to constantly search our inner selves and the reliance of a community of friends to journey life with. The consequent impact can be life changing bringing fresh hope and new meaning to life. 

Everyday events that are negative can bind us especially if we face them alone. From simple anger to devouring bitterness, from innocent dislike to soul destroying hatred, from mild anxiety to deep seated worry, from improper lifestyles to severed relationships, from addictions to sins; layer by layer they bind us like the bands of burial cloth that covered Lazarus. These send us down into the darkness of a tomb.

Each of us have areas in our life that we rather put away. We hide from them pushing them deep into our inner selves. These can be things we have done that is not quite correct, sins we have committed, or things that have hurt us. Left in our inner selves, they become big stones that weigh us down; just like my stone of bitterness that was gnawing me inside, slowly destroying who I am. 

The message of Lazarus tell of the need to be in community. The nature of our earthly journey and our human nature is such that we may find ourselves entombed from time to time. The nature of God is that he want to always heal and forgive so that we can journey in freedom and joy. Life is not a competitive race but our journey together. And the Risen Christ walk with us.

Alone in this darkness where hope seem to all but disappear, we hear the echoes of our name being called, “Come out!” It is Christ coming to our graves to raise us up from the death in our tombs to restore us to new life. He brings healing and reconciliation.

This is our mission: to help to roll away the stone. And when we emerge from the tomb, we will need help from many others to unbind us. “Unbind him, let him go free”. We witness not death but God’s glory, and through it the Son of God will be glorified”. Witnessing the joys of being set free is life-giving; it give us the true meaning of life. 

We need to make “move that stone” our mission.

Our community visited the Tomb of Lazarus in Bethany, two miles from Jerusalem

Fifth Sunday in Lent