Homilies

Homily for The Feast of Sts. Peter & Paul, June 29, 2025

It should be encouraging for us to reflect upon the virtues of these two main pillars of our Church: St. Peter and St. Paul, because we can more easily identify with them and their flaws like ours.  Peter had the tendency of being cocky, overconfident. He thought of being better than the rest of the 12 first disciples and more loyal to Christ Jesus.  Of course, we know what happened when confronted by the slave girl in the courtyard of the high priest during Jesus’ trial. How he denied knowing Jesus three times.  We also know that Peter could be pe

Homilies

Homily for The Feast of Corpus Christi, June 22, 2025

Originally, Jesus gave his first followers sustenance and nourishment when they found themselves in a deserted place outside the town of Bethsaida.   He ministered to all their needs, bringing order, healing and meaning to their troubled lives.   Today, Corpus Christi, the feast of the Body of Christ, even as we renew our faith in his real presence in the sacred species of bread and wine; even as we worship him in all his humanity and divinity the way the angels in heaven worship God, we realize that the Lord wishes us to become Eucharist our

Homilies

Homily for The Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity, June 15, 2025

At least once a year, we need to venture into the infinitude of God and to explore it rather than shy away from such impossibility.  We wonder about this lure of the infinite that makes us feel so very small, so embarrassingly inept and yet so loved by the ultimate, most perfect Being, our Triune God from whom our very existence directly depends.  As our faith grows over time, we were taught, correctly so, that we cannot probe God’s mystery.   However, we still want to find out why he loves us despite our insignificance, despite our lack of me

Homilies

Homily for Pentecost, June 8, 2025

Mention of a strong, driving wind and tongues of fire, found in today’s 1st reading (Acts 2:1-11) offers fitting images of the unmatched power of the Holy Spirit.   The Holy Spirit is the very power and life of God; and we are destined to share in that power and life!  Today, we shall direct our attention to what Jesus did when he surprised the eleven with a display of power and life as they were locked up in the upper room in the evening of Easter Day.  …he breathed on them and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit. Whose sins you forgiv

Homilies

Homily for the Feast of the Ascension of the Lord, June 1, 2025

Even if it is incorrect because the earth is spherical, instinctively we look up in the sky whenever we think of heaven, and we look down into the bowels of the earth whenever we think of hell.  As always, the starting point should be the fundamental fact that we are living in Christ and with Christ as one, inseparable entity: Jesus the Head and we the members of the Body of Christ, i.e., the Church.  So, the Ascension into heaven doesn’t mark a separation, a going away of our Head from us the Body (that would be the end of our existence) but the marking

Homilies

Homily for the 6th Sunday of Easter, May 25, 2025

Nowadays, there is a lot of restlessness in our hearts and our minds deal frequently with heavy concerns.  Hence, as believers, we look toward heaven and sigh as if to tell the Lord that we are placing ourselves and our loved ones ever more firmly in his hands.  Aware of our predicament, Mother Church dares to offer us the picture of her splendor and glory.  The angel took me in spirit to a great, high mountain and showed me the holy city Jerusalem coming down out of heaven from God. Revelation 21:10  The Church knows that a part of her

Homilies

Homily for the 5th Sunday of Easter, May 18, 2025

Here is a very important question: what is our reaction to what Paul and Barnabas tell us today?   They tell us that it is necessary for us to undergo many hardships to enter the Kingdom of God. Acts 14:22  Before we answer that question, and point out our reaction to those inspired words, let me remind all of us that our God is the God of the living.  Being the God of the living, today, he uses Paul and Barnabas (who are glorious parts of the Body of Christ) to bring to us his message of concern and love.  It is necessary for us to unde

Homilies

Homily for the 4th Sunday of Easter, May 11, 2025

Jesus introduces himself as our Shepherd. Perhaps the Psalm most familiar and dearest to us is Psalm 23: “the Lord is my Shepherd; there is nothing I shall want.”  However, even in our familiarity with that Psalm we are in no way hardwired to appreciate the role of Christ as our Shepherd and, even less, to accept our role as his sheep.  Hence, first, we ought to delve into the Hebrew psyche as evidenced in the Bible if we want to benefit spiritually from this image.  For the Bible, shepherds and nomads in general are closer to God because they ar

Homilies

Homily for the 3rd Sunday of Easter, May 4, 2025

Undoubtedly, for us believers, no other event in history can equal the Resurrection, Christ’s victory over those enemies against whom we are powerless: all evils and death itself.  Thus, we should approach the Resurrection accounts as direct and personalized interventions of God to allay our fear of evil and death.  We all seek the comfort of someone’s presence as we face major frightening events in life.   It is because Jesus knows what fear can do to a human being that he is present in the lives of his first disciples after his resurrect

Homilies

Homily for Divine Mercy Sunday, April 27, 2025

While it is true that the Lord appreciates and counts on our contribution, symbolized by our Sunday collection and by the bread and wine we bring to the altar, what the Lord welcomes most of all is that part of our heart which can be dubbed “Doubting Thomas.”  He wants our “Doubting Thomas” to reshape it according to the Father’s plan.  This transformation is meant for all of God’s children, including those who have messed up as badly as Peter, Thomas, James, John, Paul or any of the others.  The readings of the Sundays after Easter cover the r