PAN DE LA SEMANA

Pentecost Sunday June 8, 2014 MANY. DIFFERENT. SPIRIT. SOURCE. ONE Everything we hear today smacks of differences. Every concrete image spoken of in the readings shows diversity. The first reading speaks of Parthians, Medes, & Elamites, to name but a few. St. Paul talks about different gifts, different forms of service, different workings, and many parts in the body. Even preschool kids know this by heart: “I have two hands, the left and the right” … etc. I have lived in this planet for many decades by now. I have lived in different parts of the same planet for as many years, and dealt with many different types of character and personality. Some of them are easy to live with; others are a proverbial pain the neck, maybe including me, as far as many others are concerned. The event reported in today’s readings also speak of “tongues of fire” … many, not few. The tongues of fire eventually produced different tongues on the pa...

Pentecost Sunday (Year C) May 19, 2013 RECEIVE! RESPOND! RETURN! I would like to summarize today’s great feast in three words: received, responded to, and returned in kind. Pentecost is all about receiving. The Gospel passage is very clear. The Lord says, “receive the Holy Spirit.” Let us go direct to the point. Christian life is such because we are gifted. Christian life is characterized primarily with receiving something that is not ours by our own merit, but by grace. Today, the so-called birthday of the Church, we focus our sights on being gifted, on being recipients, on being enriched by the same God who created us, the same God who saved us, and the same God who now calls us to return what we received in kind. The internet world is awash in articles that point to a growing narcissism epidemic. More and more people, young and old alike, are   becoming self-centered and spoiled brats who think they are burgeoning “ce...

Pentecost Sunday June 12, 2011 N.B. I am posting for the first time two reflections for Pentecost which I wrote some 5 years ago. My past two weeks have been a journey filled with surprises and serendipity. First in the list is my first time ever in the “land of surprises,” Papua New Guinea, at the capital city of Port Moresby, where I spent some time to do some “formative” work with our congregation’s pre-novices (seminarians).   Topping the list of “surprises” was the sight of what the Salesians have done in a period of 26 years, despite massive challenges posed by so many aspects of PNG life, not excluding the culture, characterized for the most part by what sociologists and cultural anthropologists refer to as “cargo cult mentality,” a sort of dependent attitude that looks more at what they can get that what they can give in return. Despite this huge obstacle, Salesians and so many other brave missionaries continue on toiling for the Kingdom, despite seemingly little succes...

Catholic Homily/Sunday Reflection Solemnity of the Pentecost May 23, 2010 I take my cue for today’s reflection from the Entrance Antiphon of the Mass during the Day: “The Spirit of the Lord fills the whole world. It holds all things together and knows every word spoken by man, alleluia” (Wisdom 1:7) . Holding all things together … a beautiful thought, a heartwarming concept, an energizing pledge and promise for a world “waiting with eager longing for the revelation of the children of God” (Romans 8:19) … a world ripped and torn apart by so many conflicting allegiances and loyalties on all imaginable fronts, be they political, economic, social, ecclesial, religious and spiritual. The Solemnity of Pentecost, the memorial celebration of diversity, of pluralism, of a mosaic-like reality of a human family originally intended by God, the Creator, to be a rich quilt-like tapestry of freedom and individuality, on the one hand, yet balanced by social solidarity, unity, and brot...