21-Sunday

21-Sunday in ordinary time

Good morning/evening every one, I am so happy to welcome you all for today’s Holy Mass. Our special welcome to all our parishioners, cottagers, visitors and every one here today. Dear friends, every time we come to church, we celebrate the divine word of God, we celebrate Christ’s miracles and wonders and every time we come to Church, we join the apostles and say to Christ, “To whom shall we go, you have the words of eternal life”.

Dear friends in Christ, These past four weeks, we have been hearing the powerful divine words of Christ our Lord and how He multiplied the bread and fish and thus He fed more than five thousand people. Then Christ our Lord saw in them a great longing to be physically and spiritually satisfied. They saw the suffering and pain of people to get every day meal and the wanting of their physical health. He noticed in people a deep cry to find God in everything they were doing and saying and that is why Christ our Lord called the people to Himself and said, “If you want to have endless life… you need to listen to the divine words of God and understand, you have to experience the presence of God in the world and you have to keep all the commandments of God and see the miracles and wonders happening in His name and I know by doing one thing, you could receive everything. The words, miracles, wonders, loving God and others, yes, everything will complete in doing one thing that is eating the flesh of the Son of Man. And the people who heard Him saying were confused and were shocked. And in today’s gospel, Christ our Lord continues saying,

He again insists them the importance of the spiritual celebration of eating His flesh. Yes, He is saying that even to have life, one should eat His flesh. Let us put endless life behind and think about the very life we have. In order to have life, one should eat His flesh and thus he may come to know that he is not alone but the Creator is with him always. Everything that we see and enjoy and everything that moves and has life is given by God almighty. How can a person live without light? If a person really wants to deepen himself into the divine reality, he has to open himself to the inner light that is Christ our Lord. No truth means no life and we are all constantly looking for truth and unless we go to Christ, we can never experience truth because Jesus is the truth. The very life comes from Christ alone. When people who were so obsessed with perishable things heard that He is the living bread that came down from heaven, they went away from Him criticizing. They laughed and ridiculed Him because they were struck in the mundane reality.

I am from above and He descended from heaven and as I ascend and then you will understand.

Then our Lord Jesus Christ who called the apostles in a special way to follow Him looked at them and asked, “ Do you also wish to go away from me?” It is a very powerful negative question that kindles their very core of their faith. They were all shocked to hear a negative question from Christ. Jesus always asked them questions such as what do people say that I am and what do you say that I am and this is the first time, He asked them a negative question saying, “Do you also wish to go away from me?”

And Simon Peter who in the name of all the apostles came forward and said, “Jesus My Lord and God where can we go?” You have the words of eternal life. Those apostles were all in their forties and fifties and they all had different worldly experiences. They knew so many things. Because of their age and experience, they said, where can we go, there is nothing in the world outside of you, as St. Augustine said, “Unless my soul rest in God, I will never rest”.  Jesus, where can we go? You are everywhere because everything belongs to you. You are the beginning and end. You are the creator, protector and sanctifier and where can we go? All good things come from you alone. You are the healer and good shepherd and where can we go. And above all else, you can the words of eternal life. We do not live on bread alone but every divine word that comes from your mouth because you are the bread of life. Jesus, give us this food every day.

Conclusion

Dear friends in Christ, as we come to Church and receive His precious body the one thing that will happen to us is a constant longing. Yes, a longing to find God in everything we do and say and a longing to get closer to Him day and night and a longing to find Christ in our neighbors and others and a longing to pray and meditate and thus to become like Christ. So let us receive the body of Christ and experience the deep longing in us. Amen.

The body of Christ( the flesh and blood) 20th sunday

Dear friends in Christ, I am so happy to welcome you all for today’s Holy Mass and our special welcome to all our parishioners, cottagers, visitors and everyone here today. Dear friends, every time we come to church we celebrate Christ who gives His the living bread, who gives His body as the source of life and every time we come to church, we eat His body and become like Him our Lord and God.

Past three weeks, we have been hearing the teaching of Christ our Lord who invites us to eat His body and drink His blood and thus to have life that would never end. Many people who saw Him speaking about the life giving bread and they criticized and put Him down. But they were keep coming to Him because He multiplied the five fish and the two fish and thus more than five thousand people ate and were satisfied but as He began to talk about the divine manna namely His own body, they began to murmur and complain against Him.

Today I would like to focus more on the two kinds of faith namely emotional faith and intellectual faith.

Emotional faith

As our Lord Jesus Christ saw the crowd who listened to His divine words being tired and helpless, He had compassion for them and He multiplied the five loaves and the two fish and people who ate were all satisfied and then they began to praise and glorify Him saying, “He is the prophet who is to come into the world. Let us make Him king. Because of the food and physical satisfaction, they began to act emotionally. Their faith was not stronger since it was based on their emotions. When some amazing things happen to people in the name of God, they began to praise and glorify God for a while until they are being challenged intellectually. Once missionaries who went to preach the good news to distant counties, in order to attract poor people they gave them rice and people who got rice from the missionaries, immediately began to follow Christ. As the missionaries began to stop giving rice and start talking about faith and Christ, they went away from them criticizing and even people treated the missionaries bad. The gospels talk about so many incidents of emotional faith. For example, when a man saw Jesus doing amazing things coming to Him and said, “Jesus, I keep all the commandments and I should I do more to enter into the kingdom of god? And Christ said, “go and sell all your possessions and give to the poor and come and follow me”. The man was not happy because he was rich and He went away from Him. Today there are people who would like to die for Jesus and they will do anything for the kingdom of god until something happens to them. When they face certain challenges in their lives, they will immediately blame on God and go away from Him. A person’s faith that is based on his emotions will not take him to the kingdom of god, it is like a seed that falls on the path, and it will soon disappear.

These days we are seeing in the gospel, so many people coming to Jesus not because of His amazing teachings but because of His miracle the multiplication of the loaves and fish. When Jesus asked them to deepen their faith in Him they began to criticize and put Him down.

Intellectual faith 

Our Catholic Church invites us to have strong intellectual faith. It is so important to understand the four different types of body of Christ to deepen our faith in Him. they are physical body, resurrected body, mystical body and the sacramental body. The physical body of Christ was the visible one. Jesus was born at Bethlehem like you and me and lived among people doing every day chores for thirty plus three years and those years, people saw him as a person with body and soul. He was just human. The physical body of Christ was conditioned with so many things.

The resurrected body: Jesus after His resurrection appeared to His disciples with his resurrected body and asked them to believe in His name. For example, the two disciples on the way to Emmaus had the experience with the resurrected body. Then comes the mystical body namely the Church. The Catholic Church called the Mother Church of all churches is the mystical church. Because Christ is the one who founded and he is the one who leads the Church to His father. And that is why the Church is stronger than ever and it doing wonderful for two thousand years. And then the sacramental body, every time we come to Church and celebrate Mass, the mere bread and wine become the body and blood of Christ our Lord.

Unless we have a clear idea of these concepts of the body of Christ, it is not easy to deepen our faith in Christ our Lord.

Conclusion: today we are called to become the body of Christ namely giving life to lifeless, hope to hopeless and finally becoming everything for people who search for God in Christ. Amen.   

The bread of life

The Living Bread


Dear friends in Christ, I am so happy to welcome you all for today’s Holy Mass. My special welcome to all our parishioners, cottagers, visitors and every one here today, dear friends, every time we come to church, we celebrate our special calling to follow Christ our Lord, we celebrate our special meal that is the bread of life and every time we come to Church we become life giving source for our brothers and sisters in need.
Once a church received a new priest and while he was preaching the first time, he drank a whole pitcher of water. And after Mass a man asked his wife about the new priest and she said, “I like him very much and He is the first windmill that I ever saw that was run by water.
And one day the new priest noticed a man walking out during his homily and after Mass, the man’s wife came to the Father and said, “Father, please forgive me, I was so embarrassed to see my husband walking out during your homily and by the way Father, my husband walks in sleep ever since he was a child”.

In today’s gospel, Jesus continues to tell people, “ I am the bread of life that came down from heaven”. The very words I am are often used by our Lord Jesus Christ to indicate His divine centric human. He says I am the good shepherd, I am the light of world, I am the gate of the sheep and I am the beginning and end and every time He uses the words I am, they indicate His divine centric humanity. Yes, when Moses approached the burning bush and asked the voice, “ who are you Lord?” The voice responded saying, “I am who I am” Go and tell my people I am has sent you to them. Every time Christ uses the words I am, they indicate His divinity and God and Christ are the same.
That is why, when we use the words I am saying I am catholic, I am a follower of Christ or I am a disciple of Christ, it carries certain divine centric strength with them. Yes, every time we say I am catholic, we promise to Christ that we will put our faith into practice, we will act as Christ did loving God with who we are and loving our neighbor as ourselves.
Then Christ says I am the bread of life. The food that we eat helps to maintain our health and it strengths us physically but what about our spiritual side. There is a constant struggle between body and soul in every one of us. The tension between body and soul is continuously pulling us into two different directions, what about the loneliness we feel in us. Though we are found in a big crowed, we feel lonely and many of us are so comfortable sitting in front of the TV than coming out and be with others. All these emotional and psychological challenges can be met with only the bread of life. Any one who has Jesus with Him is not alone. This spiritual food helps us to find Christ in others and us. We then find Christ in everything we do and say.

And in today’s gospel, Jesus our Lord says that I am the living bread that came down from heaven. Who can come down from heaven? Holy men and women, saints and angels can come down from heaven. They come down from heaven to help living beings. Those who come down are pure, holy, blameless, imperishable and beyond time and space and when Christ our Lord said that He came down from heaven, people began to criticize Him saying, we know your Father Joseph, your mother Mary and all your relatives, friends and family members and how can this carpenter from Nazareth acting more than a baker from Galilee saying, He came down from heaven. They began to complain, murmur and talk against Him as the people of Israel in the wilderness did. Yes, they went against Moses saying, “ Why did you want to liberate us?” we were suffering in the hand of Pharaoh but still we had enough food. Then Moses prayed to God and God gave them Manna from heaven. Because they were chosen people and God loved them without limit and likewise when people began to murmur, Jesus said, “ you can not come to me unless my Father blesses you, my father chooses you in a special way. The Old Testament says, God knows us even before we were born and called us by our names.
And Christ our Lord says that whoever comes to me, I will feed you with bread of life and as you eat the bread of life, you will have life everlasting. Yes, we will never die. Dear friends, as we enjoy life and have no death, we are here to spread the good news of everlasting life to all. Today so many people easily give up because of hopelessness and not finding any meaning for their lives. They need to hear Christ the living bread. And we should ever remember that if we do not have the bread of life, we are toast. Amen.

Good morning every one, I am so happy to welcome you all for today’s holy Mass and our special welcome to all our parishioners, cottagers, visitors and everyone here today. Dear friends, every time we come to church we celebrate Christ who is the way, the truth and the life and every time we come to church, we celebrate Christ who is the beginning and the end and every time we come to church, we celebrate Christ the bread of life.


Jesus our Lord after feeding more than five thousand people with five loaves and two fish that were multiplied heard from people saying, ‘This is indeed the prophet and come let us make him king and He withdrew from them because that was not the divine plan. The divine plan was Christ had to undergo great suffering in the hands of people and to die on the Cross and thus by dying, he would destroy death and by rising would bring life everlasting for those who believe in him.

When people could not find him many of them went home praising and glorying God but some of people began to search for Jesus and thus they came to Capernaum where they found Him and saying to him, “Master, when did you come here and we were looking for you. Jesus our Lord who knows the hearts of the people looked at them and said, ‘you are looking for perishable things from me but I am here to give you imperishable things. I am here to take you with me to the father so that where I am you may be too. And those people who were looking for physical satisfaction, food came all the way to Capernaum and they stopped doing their every day chores to get food from Christ and Christ said, “perishable things can be found by any human person but imperishable and eternal life be given only by me.

In the time of St. Paul, a group of people especially in Thessalonica, stopped working and were going around influencing people saying, ‘Jesus is coming. He is coming to judge us so stop doing what you are doing and spread the news to all” st. Paul who heard this wrote a letter to people saying, ‘those who do not work should not eat. The Christ who promised that he would come will come but we do not know when he is going to come until then let us do what we should do. He will not give perishable things to satisfy us and the material things and all the perishable things that we see have limited lifetime and they all have to pass away. We should know how to hold on to non-perishable or imperishable things such as love, kindness, forgiveness and divine grace. Now we know why God does not grand us certain things. Instead of asking food, we should ask him enough strength to work, instead of a man or woman, we should ask him to give us love and forgiveness and good characters so that you will find that right person in life.

But our God is full of love and kindness and we are all so precious in the sight of God and the people who came to him looking for food, the ordinary every day people who did not want to work, Jesus used them as an instrument to give wonderful message to the world. When they asked what should we do to get bread of life, Jesus said, ‘I am the bread of life and those who eat this bread will never die but will have everlasting life. What we consider small and useless becomes so important and precious in the sight of God. For example, when we look for God, we always look up to heaven. Even right after the ascension of Christ our Lord, the Angel looked at the apostles and said, “ o men of Galilee, what are you looking up in the heaven. The Christ who was taken up into heaven will come back”. It is our human understanding to look for God in heaven. But only in Christianity it happened that God was looking up for man. Yes, when zachias was in the tree, Jesus the only Son of God look up for him and said, “ come down I am here and I am going to be at your house today’. most of the time, people get so confused and disappointed looking for God in far away places. But the God who sent His only Son, the God who showered upon us all the spirit of life is with us. yes, when we look for God among humanity, we will find divinity and life will bring more meaning.



In today’s gospel Christ says, the Manna that your ancestors ate did not give them life and they all died. Koran the holy book of Muslim also speaks about Manna, it was like fine, flake like things God gave to Israel to continue their journey in the desert. It did not remove their original sin; it did not bring divine happiness and joy. Manna did not give them courage to call God Father; Manna did not heal them physically and mentally. It did not teach them that God not a punishing one but on the other hand the bread of life brought some thing new in every one of us. Every time we eat the body of Christ we become new and wonderful.



Yes, dear friends, Jesus is the bread of life and as we begin to help and accept others, the living bread that is we eat every time we come to church will begin to nourish us. let us put our faith into practice and draw more spiritual energy from the bread of life that we eat. Amen.