John Believed

Easter Sunday of the Lord's Resurrection April 8, 2012 (Jn 20:1-9)

On the first day of the week, Mary of Magdala came to the tomb early in the morning, while it was still dark, and saw the stone removed from the tomb. So she ran and went to Simon Peter and to the other disciple whom Jesus loved, and told them, "They have taken the Lord from the tomb, and we don't know where they put him."

So Peter and the other disciple went out and came to the tomb. They both ran, but the other disciple ran faster than Peter and arrived at the tomb first; he bent down and saw the burial cloths there, but did not go in.

When Simon Peter arrived after him, he went into the tomb and saw the burial cloths there, and the cloth that had covered his head, not with the burial cloths but rolled up in a separate place. Then the other disciple also went in, the one who had arrived at the tomb first, and he saw and believed. For they did not yet understand the scripture that he had to rise from the dead.

Jesus is risen! He is truly risen!

The resurrection of Jesus is the cornerstone of our faith. It is inseparable with His passion and death. It is part of His redemptive act and is a sign that God's love triumphs over our sinfulness. Jesus tomb has been emptied, a sign that sin and death lost.

In the Gospel, we hear about how Jesus' followers witnessed the empty tomb. Mary of Magdala, Peter and John saw that the body of Jesus was no longer in the tomb. It is but human to resist the idea that Jesus has risen from the dead because resurrection is no ordinary human experience. But they saw the empty tomb. And Jesus spoke to them before about rising from the dead. So they might be asking, "Could it be that He is alive?" And it was John who first believed, even though he too didn't understand everything well.

It was John who first believed. He saw how Jesus was crucified. He saw how Jesus died on the cross and how Jesus was pierced, causing blood and water to flow out from Him. If you saw a person die, you would probably be the last to believe a news about the same person rising from the dead. But that was not the case for John. He was the first to believe! It was probably by the grace of God that he believed even without sufficient understanding.

In our lives, when we face trials and all kinds of problems, we lose hope and we fail to believe in God's goodness and to trust in His wisdom. Like John, we witness and even experience suffering. But unlike him, we easily lose hope most of the time and we fail to believe.

The fact that Jesus is alive should bring us hope! He is alive because evil is never stronger than good and because God's love is forever mightier than sin. Everything evil or bad will fade away eventually, and joy will soon come.

But John showed us a very important attitude - we must experience suffering with and in Christ in order to fully experience Easter joy. We must carry our crosses as Jesus asked us to do. We must never view our suffering as merely something we have to get over with as soon as we can. Suffering and sacrifice must always be united with Christ's suffering. We must offer our suffering for God, for His greater glory and for help to those who always suffer. This is what we learned during Lent. We cannot just face Easter immediately. We must experience sacrificing during Lent to prepare ourselves . We must experience Good Friday with Jesus before we can celebrate Easter Sunday!

As we celebrate Easter, may our lives be filled with the hope that as long as we remain faithful to God, He will never abandon us and He will raise us up again each time we fall. May we experience Christ's new life - a life free from sin and a life of confidence in Him. May we always be children of Easter, dead in sinfulness but alive in Christ!

Jesus' Hour

5th Sunday of Lent Mar. 25, 2012 (Jn 12:20-33)

Now there were some Greeks among those who had come up to worship at the feast. They came to Philip, who was from Bethsaida in Galilee, and asked him, "Sir, we would like to see Jesus."

Philip went and told Andrew; then Andrew and Philip went and told Jesus.

Jesus answered them, "The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. Amen, amen, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains just a grain of wheat; but if it dies, it produces much fruit.

Whoever loves his life loses it, and whoever hates his life in this world will preserve it for eternal life. Whoever serves me must follow me, and where I am, there also will my servant be. The Father will honor whoever serves me.

"I am troubled now. Yet what should I say? 'Father, save me from this hour'? But it was for this purpose that I came to this hour. Father, glorify your name."

Then a voice came from heaven, "I have glorified it and will glorify it again."

The crowd there heard it and said it was thunder; but others said, "An angel has spoken to him." Jesus answered and said, "This voice did not come for my sake but for yours. Now is the time of judgment on this world; now the ruler of this world will be driven out. And when I am lifted up from the earth, I will draw everyone to myself." He said this indicating the kind of death he would die.

In today's Gospel, Jesus speaks of the suffering and death that He was about to face. He explained the idea behind these things to come; He explained how a death can actually be life-giving. In this Gospel passage, we are reminded of the richness and depth of the Paschal Mystery which we will celebrate come Holy Week.

Jesus' suffering was redemptive. And Jesus makes it clear that our sacrifice and suffering can bear much fruit and be life-giving too. When we do good for others, we share our life with them. Even if we do not die to save other people, reaching out to them and trying to help them out makes us true disciples of Jesus who lived and died for others. Like the Greeks in today's Gospel, we also wish to see Jesus. But seeing and experiencing Christ will never be complete unless we become true Christians who are willing to follow Jesus.

The hour of Jesus' glory is the hour of His being lifted up on the cross. That is the moment of His triumph over sin and death. That hour is the hour of His total obedience to the Father. We too are called to that obedience. Our whole lives must be a witness to the glory of the Father.

As we are about to experience the celebration of Jesus' Paschal Mystery, may we learn to appreciate and meditate on the meaning of suffering and self-denial. Further, may we be true disciples of Jesus by faithfully following His example of sacrifice and obedience.

The Wisdom and Love in Suffering

22nd Sunday in Ordinary Time Aug. 28, 2011 (Mt 16:21-27)

From that time on, Jesus began to show his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and suffer greatly from the elders, the chief priests, and the scribes, and be killed and on the third day be raised.

Then Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him, "God forbid, Lord! No such thing shall ever happen to you."

He turned and said to Peter, "Get behind me, Satan! You are an obstacle to me. You are thinking not as God does, but as human beings do."

Then Jesus said to his disciples, "Whoever wishes to come after me must deny himself, take up his cross, and follow me. For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it. What profit would there be for one to gain the whole world and forfeit his life? Or what can one give in exchange for his life?"

"For the Son of Man will come with his angels in his Father's glory, and then he will repay everyone according to his conduct."

After Peter was able to profess through God's revelation that Jesus was the Messiah, Jesus explains what being the Messiah meant. The Jews were hoping that the Messiah will be the leader who will liberate them from the hands of their oppressors. But Jesus revealed to His apostles that He whom they have confirmed to be the Messiah will have to suffer, die and be raised on the third day.

This probably came as a shock for them. Peter could not accept this new revelation. He accepted and professed that Jesus is the Messiah; but he could not accept that this Messiah would have to suffer. Naturally, he was concerned for his Master so he didn't want him to suffer. But what he failed to realize is that the revelation that Jesus had to suffer, die and be raised is a revelation of how God, in His wisdom, has planned the salvation of men.

It sounded foolish to Peter and to the apostles that their expected liberator would have to suffer. As St. Paul said, "Jews demand signs and Greeks look for wisdom, but we proclaim Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles (1 Cor 1:22-23)." Yes, since Peter was not thinking as God does, he could not see Jesus' suffering and death as wise. Even we, thinking as human beings do, cannot fathom why or cannot appreciate that Jesus, the Messiah and the Son of God, had to suffer. But once we accept without doubt what God is revealing to us, we can see not only the wisdom of God's plan of salvation, but also the great love He has for us that He would let His Son die for us. Only then do we realize that "the foolishness of God is wiser than human wisdom (1 Cor 1:25)." And we marvel at this.

After rebuking Peter, Jesus explained that anyone who wishes to follow Him should take up His cross and be willing to lose their life for Him. This is a radical call. Jesus seems to be forgetting that man naturally loves what is comfortable and that man always clings to dear life. But again, this is a revelation. Jesus is warning His apostles, and even us who wish to follow Him, that becoming a Christian is no easy task. It is rewarding, but it is not easy.

Being a Christian means living out the values that Jesus taught us and rejecting the values of the world. Sometimes, we may be inconvenienced, ridiculed or even persecuted because we live as Christians, but we must remain loyal to Christ anyway. Again, it may be foolish to accept these difficulties instead of escaping them, but as in the case of Jesus who died for us, we do it anyway because we do it out of love - even if the world does not get it.

Jesus exhorts us today to think with the wisdom of God and to love with the love of God. Once we do, accepting suffering and carrying the cross will not seem foolish to us. It will be an expression of our love and loyalty to our Master who did the same, and even more, out of love for us.

The Biggest Announcement

3rd Sunday of Lent Mar. 7, 2010 (Lk 13:1-9)

At that time some people who were present there told him about the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mingled with the blood of their sacrifices. He said to them in reply, "Do you think that because these Galileans suffered in this way they were greater sinners than all other Galileans? By no means! But I tell you, if you do not repent, you will all perish as they did! Or those eighteen people who were killed when the tower at Siloam fell on them - do you think they were more guilty than everyone else who lived in Jerusalem? By no means! But I tell you, if you do not repent, you will all perish as they did!"

And he told them this parable: "There once was a person who had a fig tree planted in his orchard, and when he came in search of fruit on it but found none, he said to the gardener, 'For three years now I have come in search of fruit on this fig tree but have found none. So cut it down. Why should it exhaust the soil?' He said to him in reply, 'Sir, leave it for this year also, and I shall cultivate the ground around it and fertilize it; it may bear fruit in the future. If not you can cut it down.'"

The Jews held the belief that suffering and illnesses were due to the punishment of God. At one instance, the apostles even asked Jesus about a blind man, whether it was the blind man or his parents who sinned, that he was born blind (Jn 9:2).

As Christians, we need to erase this kind of mentality. In today's Gospel, Jesus explains that those who died a cruel death are not necessarily sinners being punished. Suffering is not necessarily a punishment from God. We need to see suffering in a better light. It is part of our life as humans of the fallen nature. Because of the example of Christ, we can see suffering not as useless pain. We can now see suffering as a purification, a purgation, something that can bring about something good in the end. The greatest example of salvific suffering is the murder of the most innocent Son of God that brought about the salvation of mankind.

As Jesus points out that not all suffering come from God, He also warns us that suffering will indeed come if we remain sinners. Yes, God does not punish men immediately in this world, but that doesn't mean that there is no punishment at all. His mercy cannot do anything against human freedom. His mercy also cannot contradict His justice. Therefore, Jesus took this opportunity to warn us about a fate worse than earthly suffering - eternal suffering.

Our Lenten season is an annual amplification of the call for repentance. In the Gospel today, we are the fig tree that God expects to bear fruit. God has been so patient with us. How many times have we sinned, repented and sinned again? Yet, even though we always fall into sin, God is ever faithful and merciful, though as was said, this is limited by His justice.

God gives us the necessary graces in order for us to bear fruit. He gives us fertilizer that we may grow. What is sad is that when we are given much graces to help us recognize God and realize that He is calling us to repentance, we give more attention to the graces and less to the Giver. God nourishes us physically and spiritually that we may bear fruit and that we may be strong enough to journey back to Him. The greatest nourishment God gave us is the Body and Blood of His only Son. Jesus' is the loudest announcement of God's call for repentance. The Calvary scene says so many things. Through this picture of a suffering innocent God-man, God tells us, "I love you enough that I paid your own debt to Me. Come back to Me now! Nothing can separate you from My love."

Jesus' death, being the greatest call for repentance, is God's last call. God said everything when He sent Jesus here. Jesus, the Word of God, is the last call. God can say no more. Let us heed God's call for repentance.

Our Destination and Companion

12th Sunday in Ordinary Time June 21, 2009 (Mk 4:35-41)

That day when evening came, he said to his disciples, "Let us go over to the other side." Leaving the crowd behind, they took him along, just as he was, in the boat. There were also other boats with him. A furious squall came up, and the waves broke over the boat, so that it was nearly swamped. Jesus was in the stern, sleeping on a cushion. The disciples woke him and said to him, "Teacher, don't you care if we drown?"

He got up, rebuked the wind and said to the waves, "Quiet! Be still!" Then the wind died down and it was completely calm.

He said to his disciples, "Why are you so afraid? Do you still have no faith?"

They were terrified and asked each other, "Who is this? Even the wind and the waves obey him!"

Life is full of problems. In fact, it is said that it is impossible for anyone not to have any problems at all. This is why life is often described as a journey. We encounter danger after danger until we reach our destination. Yes, such is the difficulty of life that we need a companion to help us go through it all.

As Christians, we believe that our destination and companion in life is but one person – God. We come from God and we shall return to God. But He, in His great love for us, does not just wait in heaven until we return to Him. He accompanies us as we journey towards Him. The image of Jesus calming the sea is the perfect image of God guiding His people towards the “other side”, towards the Kingdom of Heaven.

But another image from our Gospel narrative today seems to be the focus of reflection for many – the image of Jesus sleeping in the boat. Many people, because of the storms in their lives, are tempted to think that God is asleep. Some even think that God is dead, cruel, or not as powerful as we think He is. They find it difficult to understand why a good God allows us to face so many problems and sufferings. They come to think that God is either good, but not almighty or is almighty, but evil.

Scriptures will tell us that God allows evil in the world in order to draw out from it a greater good. Joseph was sold by his brothers as a slave; but God was with him and he was able to save Israel from famine. Jesus was killed through crucifixion; but through His death, He saved us from sin. In the same way, our problems in life are for our own benefit. They make us better persons. As a canyon is shaped by the flowing of the river, as rocks are shaped by the pounding of the waves, so we are shaped by the problems that God allows us to encounter.

We do not face problems alone; we face them with God on our side. We should not fear them, for it is the Lord, our God who fights for us (cf. Deut 3:22).

The Holy Spirit whispers to us whatever it was that God wanted to teach us through the problems we have already encountered, ensuring that we have gone through them with lessons learned.

God is with us as we journey towards His Kingdom. And if God is with us, who can be against us (Rom 8:31), what storm can scare us?

Believing and Living the Story

Easter Sunday of the Lord's Resurrection April 12, 2009 (Jn 20:1-9)

On the first day of the week, Mary of Magdala came to the tomb early in the morning, while it was still dark, and saw the stone removed from the tomb. So she ran and went to Simon Peter and to the other disciple whom Jesus loved, and told them, "They have taken the Lord from the tomb, and we don't know where they put him."

So Peter and the other disciple went out and came to the tomb. They both ran, but the other disciple ran faster than Peter and arrived at the tomb first; he bent down and saw the burial cloths there, but did not go in.

When Simon Peter arrived after him, he went into the tomb and saw the burial cloths there, and the cloth that had covered his head, not with the burial cloths but rolled up in a separate place. Then the other disciple also went in, the one who had arrived at the tomb first, and he saw and believed. For they did not yet understand the Scripture that he had to rise from the dead.

The Lord is truly risen, Alleluia! Today, the Church celebrates the greatest of all feasts, the feast of the Lord's triumph over sin and death, the Solemnity of Easter. Indeed, the importance of this great feast in our faith is so great that its celebration is extended for eight days until next Sunday, the Octave of Easter. It is further extended for seven weeks, the seventh Sunday being Pentecost Sunday, making the Easter celebration a season, the Easter Season.

The resurrection of Christ is the central point of our faith. It gave peace and hope to the apostles who where then very afraid and despairing. Had Christ not risen from the dead, our faith is in vain and death would have triumphed over love. But, as it was, God proved His love to be more powerful than death, indeed, tougher than nails!

The Gospel for Easter Sunday narrates to us how Mary of Magdala was surprised at seeing the first symbol of the resurrection, the empty tomb. Thinking that the body of her Lord was taken away, she ran to tell Peter and John (the beloved disciple) what she saw. John, the first apostle to arrive at the tomb, was also the first to believe. He believed upon seeing only the empty tomb and the burial cloths. He believed even if he did not understand perfectly. We too, as Christians, believe in the resurrection.

But more than being a major tenet of Christianity, the resurrection of Christ is also a challenge. Indeed, it is true that we who believe in Him will also be resurrected. But for us to experience resurrection, we must also suffer like Him. We need to strive for holiness amidst a world of sin, even if it means being persecuted for it. That is precisely what Jesus did and is calling us to do. He was hated by the world (Jn 15:18) because He did not conform to worldly ideals. But He showed the world that He was right through His resurrection.

If we follow Christ, the world will also persecute us as it persecuted Him (Jn 15:20). We too will have to suffer much if we choose to be holy. But we should not lose hope, because we know how this story would end - in our own resurrection.

The Gospel presents to us the symbol of the empty tomb. This tomb is empty because the "deadly things" have been destroyed by Christ's redemptive act. Christ is no longer in the tomb, because death cannot hold Him. Death will not be able to hold us too if we do not take pleasure in the "deadly things" - and what is "deadly" but sin?

Yes, Christ is risen and we believe it! We rejoice in the Lord's day! But more than just believing in the resurrection, as the beloved disciple did, we are challenged this Easter Season to live the resurrection story, to die to our sinful selves, to empty our tombs, to endure sufferings brought about by our striving for holiness, so that we may resurrect like our risen Lord.

Happy Easter to all! Alleluia! Alleluia!