Gospel for July 16, 2015 (Thursday) Our Lady of Mt. Carmel

Mt 11:28-30

Jesus offers an invitation: "Come to me, all you who labor and are burdened, and I will give you rest.  Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am meek and humble of heart; and you will find rest for your selves.  For my yoke is easy, and my burden light."

The Word in other words

The effects of modern technology may two-sided.  Home appliances may shorten time spent in cooking, washing, cleaning and other household chores, but this "saved" time is often wasted in front of the television and the computer at home.  At the office, plenty of productivity time is lost answering e-mails and reading facebook posts and messages.  Mobile phones give digital access to social networks and real-time news.  But this ubiquitous accessibility of technology causes constant stress, which disrupts relaxation and recovery.  It encourages gadget addiction, which eventually hampers real social communication and personal encounter.

As if people in today's hectic world are not strained enough from the pressures of family and career work, many are yet faced with mounting and seemingly never-ending workloads.  We are expected to balance the demands between our jobs and ourselves.  We are torn apart between wants and needs.  Oftentimes personal creative projects are overtaken by practical concerns.  When unchecked, many stressed people suffer from burnout, feeling depleted and devoid of interest.  They often don't see any hope for positive change, nor do they find any exit from their stressful situations.

Jesus invites the burdened to come to him, because "his yoke is easy and his burden is light."  How does this apply to the modern predicament of work overload?  Jesus offers a change of mentality.  His gospel allows us to reassess our priorities.  Do we live in order to work or do we live for bread alone?  Can't we switch of our gadgets without feeling left out and take time to meditate and pray?  A healthy holistic spirituality entails taking care of our soul and body.  Jesus seems to tell those who are trapped in the web of modern entanglements to adopt healthy ways of eating, exercising, and sleeping.  Take a daily break from technology.  Even Jesus himself took him to pray and be alone after his public ministries.  Hermann Hesse, a German poet and novelist, once wrote, "Within you, there is a stillness and a sanctuary to which you can retreat at any time and be yourself."  In this inner sanctuary, one may find God.

              -  Fr. Simon Boiser, SVD (Hamburg, Germany)

Gospel for July 4, 2015 (Saturday) Feast of St. Elizabeth of Portugal

Mt 9:14-17

Then the disciples of John approached him and said,  "Why do we and the Pharisees fast (much), but your disciples do not fast?"  Jesus answered them, "Can the wedding guests mourn as long as the bridegroom is with them?  The days will come when the bridegroom is taken away from them, and then they will fast.  No one patches an old cloak with a piece of unshrunken cloth, for its fullness pulls away from the cloak and the tear gets worse.  People do not put new wine into old wineskins.  Otherwise the skins burst, the wine spills out, and the skins are ruined.  Rather, they pour new wine into fresh wineskins, and both are preserved."

The Word in other words

"Are you a KJ (kill joy)?"  Jesus must have asked John's disciples.  Fasting is done for varied reasons including health, discipline, atonement for sins, and even to "coerce" others.  However, when one is in and with Jesus, the only meaningful act of fasting would that of fasting from work.  When one is with Jesus, work is a feast where one has so much to do- for others and His Kingdom.  Didn't He say "I have food no one knows about" (Jn 4:32)?  Hence, eating is necessary to replenish the energy spent for others.  Fasting (from work, that is, or simply RESTING) becomes inevitable for the sake of the next round of service in and out for the Lord!  Didn't Jesus advise His disciples "to come away from work to a distant place to rest" (Mk 6:31)?  Even machines have to be stopped to keep from overheating.  This fasting from work thus has consequences to one's health.  Without rest one suffers from burnout.  Work will always be there, but rest and prayer are essential for us to be able to sustain our zeal for the work.  But we know that the disciples of John did not fast like that.

Secondly, fasting comes easy when "the bridegroom" dies.  That's what we call grieving, when one's energies go so slow that either one just wants to cry and the appetite seems to have left us too.  Besides, when the reason for the fast is gone, as in death, the reason for all the celebration dissipates into thin air; one really needs to sit down and feel "the blow" of the loss.  We may even feel like we have worked for nothing!  Hence, our fasting on Good Friday.

And of course, we know why the Church maintains fasting on Ash Wednesday, the beginning of Lent, one of the only two days in our church calendar in which we are required to fast.  This one seems to be the only acceptable reason: atonement and conversion from our sins.  Even Scriptures attest to this "powerful" coercive act of man which God looks so mercifully upon, remember the experience of the Ninevites in the book of Jonah?  We can never force God, by fasting, to do things our way.  Hence, when we fast so that we understand God's will for us, God is not coerced.  In fact, we go by the ways of God!

                       - Fr. Bernardo R. Collera, SVD (DWC, Legazpi, Albay)