PAN DE LA SEMANA

Pentecost Sunday (Year C) May 27, 2007 Readings: Acts 2:1-11 / 1 Cor 12:3-7, 12-13 / Jn 20:19-23 You would think that, with all the gifts that the early Church received on the day the Church was born, everything would go smooth as silk, and every relationship in the incipient faith-community unruffled. Paul, in his letter to the fractious and quarrelsome Corinthians (1 Cor 12), in fact enumerates a variety of gifts: being apostles, prophets, teachers, miracle workers, healers, assistants, administrators, and – that much coveted gift in our “charismatic renewal” times – the gift of tongues! But alas, the Corinthians’ and our very own experience tells us that there is a shadow side to those gifts. Gifts galore bring as much jubilation as consternation. With gifts come envy and jealousy, to name just two. With gifts come additional difficulties, as later Paul would acknowledge. But I am getting ahead of myself and the story. Today’s story is one of gifts abound...

4th Sunday of Easter (C) April 29, 2007 Readings: Acts 13:14, 43-52 / Rev 7:9, 14b-17 / Jn 10:27-30 HEARING, FOLLOWING, AND NEVER PERISHING! At one of my Masses during the recent Christmas Novena, a group of musicians were accompanying the choir hastily formed for the occasion. The choir sang well. The conductor did her role with both passion and panache. Somehow though, there was just something that sounded wrong to my mediocre musician’s ears. I could not exactly put a handle on the whole thing, until the Mass ended, and a former student of mine, whose musical talents are far superior to anybody else I knew both as a student and as an educator, came up and told me what was wrong. The man playing the bass guitar simply did not have it. He was way out of key. He was not attuned. And he was not following the rest of the ensemble, much less the conductor who, in retrospect, looked like she was distraught. There is something about lack of attunement that is connected to lack of ability to...

3rd Sunday of Easter (C) April 22, 2007 Readings: Acts 5:27-32, 40b-41 / Rv 5:11-14 / Jn 21:1-19 SEEING FULLY; LOVING TRULY; SERVING WHOLLY: THE POWER OF LOVE SHOWN IN BUNDLES OF THREES We smell and feel a sense of power in the readings of today. Peter, who, only days before appeared to be a weakling who could not even stand for the truth about his association with the condemned Jesus, is portrayed as someone who just had what we now call an “extreme makeover.” Expressly forbidden by the Sanhedrin to teach in Jesus’ name, Peter bellowed courageously: “We must obey God rather than men” (1st Reading). Power also unmistakably shines out in John’s vision of the victorious Lamb “seated” on his throne. Countless angels surround the Lamb to give witness to, and proclaim the reality of his power: “Worthy is the Lamb that was slain to receive power and riches, wisdom and strength, honor and glory and blessing” (2nd Reading). Quiet strength and discrete power characterize the Risen Lord who in...

2nd Sunday of Easter (C) April 15, 2007 Readings: Acts 5:12-16 / Rev 1:9-11a, 12-13, 17-19 / Jn 20:19-31 WONDERS, WORD, WITNESS & WORSHIP Two good, old, reliable methods of heightening truths are the use of comparison or contrasts, whether natural or contrived. Comparison capitalizes on similarities; contrast on dissimilarities. Both aim at clarifying and highlighting an important truth that otherwise may not be so obvious at first blush. I would like to think that today, the octave of Easter, contrast, not comparison, characterizes our rich Scriptural readings. The first contrasting image I discern is that of crowds – “a large number of people” (1st Reading) versus the image of a solitary John exiled in Patmos (2nd Reading). This is connected with a second contrasting picture – the presence of the disciples in the room where they were gathered “for fear of the Jews,” versus the conspicuous absence of “Thomas, called Didymus, one of the twelve [who] was not with them when Jesus ca...

Mass of the Lord’s Supper Holy Thursday April 5, 2007 Readings: Exodus 12:1-8, 11-14 / 1 Cor 11:23-26 / Jn 13:1-15 SIGN, SERVICE, SACRAMENT, SILENCE The Mass of the Lord’s Supper opens the Easter Triduum. Too bad, most people (at least in tropical Philippines) by this time will have gone to the beaches where there is a lot of sun, sand, sea, and surf. Those who stay, or have nowhere else to go would probably be taking advantage of the non-working holiday treat (at least in predominantly Christian countries) to catch up on their laundry, do their grocery shopping, or finally see the many daytime and reality TV shows to their hearts’ content, untrammeled and unhampered by work or other responsibilities. In exchange for tropical sun, sand, sea, and surf, I would like to propose that today, the Church would rather have us think of sign, service, sacrament, and silence. Sign. Everything we do in Church today (and in all liturgical celebrations) has to do with the world of signs. First and f...

PASSION SUNDAY April 1, 2007 WHO REMEMBERS ME DOT COM: REMEMBERING AND CELEBRATING IN HOLY WEEK As I write these reflections, the thought of that “persistent” web site that forms part of the whole “social engineering” scheme in cyberspace, keeps on surfacing in my mind. Known simply as WRM that stands for “Who Remembers Me,” it captures email addresses from all over the world, generates a “personalized” invitation for every one to join, and links them up with one another in some way, by playing on that natural and innate human need for connectivity, for bonding, and some form of emotional attachment to each other, albeit on shallow and tenuous – if, a bit suspicious - grounds. Who remembers me dot com … What a cute way of supplying a “fast food” style of affirmation, remembrance, and affiliation to a group, no matter the fact that it is really only virtual, and possibly unreal. Today, Passion Sunday, the liturgy of the Church, among other things, reminds us of him who really remembers...

PAN DE VIDA 5th Sunday of Lent (C) March 25, 2007 See also: http://pandelasemana.blogspot.com Readings: Is 43:16-21 / Phil 3:8-14 / Jn 8:1-11 FORGETTING, PURSUING, FORGIVING! By Fr. Chito Dimaranan, SDB The desert path to discovery that we began on the First Sunday of Lent comes full circle today, and takes on a joyful tone: “The Lord has done great things for us; we are filled with joy” (Responsorial Psalm). We are filled with joy, for like the Jews of old, who were a people of memory, we remember Him “who opens a way in the sea and a path in the mighty waters” (1st Reading). We are full of joy, for although we, too, are a people of memory, we are told today to “remember not the events of the past” but focus our sights on the future that is already unfolding here and now: “See, I am doing something new! … In the desert I make a way, in the wasteland, rivers.” The first reading from Isaiah tells us to forget something past and pursue something newer and better. St. Paul takes up a simi...

PAN DE VIDA 4th Sunday of Lent (C) – 2007 March 18, 2007 See also Readings: Jos 5:9a, 10-12 / 2 Cor 5:17-21 / Lk 15:1-3, 11-32 SETUP, UPSET, RESET: GOD’S LOVE IN BUNDLES OF THREES!* By Fr. Chito Dimaranan, SDB We started our Sunday Lenten reflections around the ideas of desert and desolation. The Israelites’ wandering in the desert for all of 40 years and Jesus’ own desert experience where he was tempted to the hilt, both led to discovery, to a more intense devotion and attachment to the God of promises. On the second Sunday of Lent, we reflected on the need for us to be awake, aware, and alive with and for God, to enable us to see for ourselves the unfolding glory of the Lord in his Transfiguration – a foretaste of good and better things to come. Last Sunday, we spoke of a love of this God of promises and fulfillment as, at one and the same time, tender, tough, and true. His is a love that is compassionate, but His, too, is a love that demands, a love that commands a loving response i...

PAN DE VIDA 3rd Sunday of Lent (C) March 11, 2007 Readings: Ex 3:1-8a, 13-15 / 1 Cor 10:1-6, 10-12 / Lk 13:1-9 TENDER, TOUGH, & TRUE By Fr. Chito Dimaranan, SDB Today, some of God’s multi-faceted nature shines out in all three readings. God waxes tender in the first reading. He proclaims compassion for his suffering people through Moses: “I have witnessed the affliction of my people in Egypt and have heard their cry of complaint against their slave drivers so I know well what they are suffering. Therefore I have come down to rescue them from the hands of the Egyptians and lead them out of that land into a good and spacious land, a land flowing with milk and honey.” Along with the revelation of his name (I AM) came a revelation of his nature – a “kind and merciful” God (Responsorial Psalm). St. Paul, though, offers us a glimpse into a contrasting picture of the same God - an image that exudes toughness. For Paul, who makes allusion to the same desert experience of the Israelites of...