PAN DE LA SEMANA

[BREAKING THE BREAD OF GOD’S WORD] 20 th Sunday OT_B August 16, 2015 WISDOM ON ALL LEVELS; WISDOM IN ALL SENSES Wisdom is definitely what binds all three readings today. The first reading extols it, and exhorts all to pursue it: “Forsake foolishness that you may live!” The second reading makes much of it, and Paul tells us to “live, not as foolish persons but as wise, making the most of the opportunity, because days are evil.” The Gospel presents to us who the Wisdom incarnate is … Jesus presents himself as God’s wisdom in human form, as Daniel Donovan puts it. Now, pray, tell me … who among us does not need a good dose of this wisdom? Who among us would refuse the gift of such wisdom? The “days are evil,” yes … We feel lost. We are confused. We can’t tell who speaks the truth. We can’t anymore decide whether what we see and hear in mainstream media, in surveys, in polls, and in opinion pages, is really the truth, nothing else, nothing less, and nothing mor...

[BREAKING THE BREAD OF GOD’S WORD] 18 th Sunday in Ordinary Time – B August 2, 2015 COMPLAINING, CRAVING & CHANGING Complaints are a daily reality everywhere. I complain when it rains. I complain when it’s hot. I complain when traffic is snarled (now, that means I complain almost everyday!) The Israelites, blessed enough to be free from slavery, soon found reasons enough to complain. Food wasn’t good enough. The meat wasn’t tasty enough, for want of spices they got so used to back in the day when they were slaves in Egypt. But God, who always hears the cries of the poor and the needy, according to Biblical tradition, supplied them with manna and meat. Moses, ever the wise leader, reminded them that what they ate was “the bread that the Lord had given them to eat.” We humans are a curious lot. We never are satisfied. There is always something missing. There is always something better, something more, something worth pinning our covetous eyes on. The other...

August 5, 2012 18 th Sunday Year B FOOD THAT PERISHES, OR FOOD THAT ENDURES? We complain about many things. We complain about the traffic, now getting worse and worse by the day. We complained a lot last week when a “shallow low pressure area” (whatever that means, caught us all off-guard) and wrought havoc all over complacent Metro Manila area. We complain about leaders when they don’t   deliver as promised. We rant and rave about a multiplicity of things, mostly, to be sure, about things that don’t last … things that don’t matter much except satisfy us for a short while, and not much more. The Israelites were brought out willingly from slavery in Egypt. They were not forced. They were not misled. They were not prevailed upon. But soon, the complaints started pouring, even as manna kept coming. The bitterness got growing, and the growling became more intense, even as the quails kept them filled – but never satisfied! The complaints were all directed a...