Homily: March 6, 2022, First Sunday of Lent

-

For forty days and nights, satan was waiting, to strike when Jesus was most hungry, at His weakest.

First temptation: “Command this stone to become bread.” Jesus needed food indeed. Satan did not give food, but suggested Jesus to abuse His divine power to create food for Himself. He makes us think our needs and wants are most important. And suggests shortcuts to satisfy ourselves. Selfish desires turn us away from God.

Second temptation: “I shall give to you all this power and glory…worship me.” Jesus’ mission is to preach the good news to all nations. Satan tries to persuade Jesus to take the easy way, to receive power and glory from him. satan is the father of lies. Nothing belongs to him.

satan tries to make us believe that money will give us power and earthly possessions will give us glory. He tempts us with quick and convenient ways to achieve our ambitions. Greed and vanity block us from holy virtues.

Third temptation: “If you are the son of God, throw yourself down from here…” Jesus is the Messiah, the world needs to know. Satan quoted scripture to convince Jesus to show off His status as the Son of God, to declare to the world with an impressive performance. Satan is a cheat. He uses scripture only to trick us into believing that we can take God’s blessings for granted.

He tempts us to be proud of our knowledge, intelligence, and achievements. He tempts us to question and quarrel with anyone with a different opinion so that we can show off our superior status. Pride makes us walk in opposition to the Lord.

satan’s ways are deceit. He makes sin appear pleasing, twist solutions to look clever, and hides ugliness with beautiful exteriors.

As Venerable Fulton Sheen warned, ‘Before the sin, satan assures us that it is of no consequence; after the sin, he persuades us that it is unforgivable’. Beware!

Would we fall into all his temptations?

Jesus overcame all these with the word of God, quoting from Deuteronomy chapters 6 to 9. The Word of God is the weapon against the evil one. We need the word of God to help us when we are at our weakest, when temptations are strongest.

Are you able to quote the word of God when in need?

In our family prayer, we used to recite Psalm 91 every day. It is the responsorial psalm today. I have used this psalm to help me through many difficult moments.

satan too quoted it at his third temptation, but he used only the verses convenient to him. Why do you think he is familiar with this psalm?

Because it is used by priests at every exorcism. satan gets hit and beaten by this psalm all the time.

His intention behind all the temptations is to take us away from God. He tries to turn our attention away, convinces us to disobey God and makes us challenge His plans.

If you have been occupied by matters of the world, Lent is a time to step out and turn back to God. If you can’t remember any scripture text, try to memorise Psalm 91 or Psalm 23 ‘The Divine Shepherd’.

Let us not fall in satan’s tricks. Let us crush his head with the Word of God. 

Amen.

Fr. Nivin Scaria 


Comments

  1. Lisa Schwarte6 March 2022 at 14:58

    Thank you for pointing out that often our greatest temptations fall into the categories of pleasure (food, drink, etc.), possessions (you can have everything), and power/glory (you can be like god). It is so easy for us to fall into these temptations. We must pray daily the Our Father "and lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil." Plus Psalm 91

    Another good quote from the Venerable Fulton Sheen, ‘Before the sin, satan assures us that it is of no consequence; after the sin, he persuades us that it is unforgivable’.

    I also heard this week, that priests in their Liturgy of the Hours, pray this prayer at night: Lord, we beg you to visit this house and banish from it all the deadly power of the enemy. May your holy angels dwell here to keep us in peace, and may your blessing be upon us always." Something good for all of us to pray each night!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Word of God 7 March 2022 at 09:51

      Thanks so much Lisa. I love your feedback.

      Delete

Post a Comment

Read

Homily: April 23, 2024, Tuesday of the Fourth Week of Easter (Exciting news).

-
Those who had been scattered by the persecution that arose because of Stephen went as far as Phoenicia, Cyprus, and Antioch. Antioch is approximately 300 miles from Jerusalem. So it seems that the good news of Christ had spread out far and wide very fast since the death of Stephen. Look at these early converted believers, how excited they are to receive and share the good news. When was the last time you were super excited about something and had to share it with everyone you know? A few days ago, a young friend of mine got enlisted into the US military, he called eagerly to tell me, "Father, I am a soldier." And in a few hours, he came to my office and told me again the same news. He was so excited, it was the best news he had been waiting for, and he went around telling all his friends about it within that morning. Little children are not good at containing their excitement. Often when my young nephews and nieces got new toys, they would immediately FaceTime with me to show
Read more

Homily: April 6, 2024, Saturday in the octave of Easter (First five saturday devotion.)

-
Thank you all for continuing to come for Saturday morning Mass. When I was little, my family used to attend Saturday morning Mass together and will always end with the Novena to Our Lady of Perpetual Help. To me, that is a beautiful devotion for the whole family. I have wanted to start Saturday morning Mass when I first came to SAC but didn’t know if it will catch on with the parishioners. Last year, I attended an evening talk about Our Lady of Fatima at St. Augustine Parish and came to know about the First Five Saturday devotion, and I was again motivated. Finally, today being the first Saturday of the month, we can begin. Let me share a bit more about this devotion. Sr. Lucia was one of the three shepherd children visionaries to whom our Blessed Mother appeared for six months in 1917 in Fatima. Later when Lucia grew up and joined the convent in Spain, our Blessed Mother appeared to her again on December 10, 1925, with this message, “Behold, my daughter, my Heart encircled with thorns
Read more

Homily: June 19, 2023, Monday of the Eleventh Week in Ordinary Time (parish Treasure)

-
Image
"As unrecognized and yet acknowledged; as dying and behold we live; as chastised and yet not put to death; as sorrowful yet always rejoicing; as poor yet enriching many; as having nothing and yet possessing all things." In today’s first reading, we see St. Paul’s wisdom as he writes to the faith community in Corinth. He is teaching them to see positivity in every hardship, every problem, every suffering. To him, every situation, seemingly good or bad, is a blessing, if we have eyes of faith to see it. A good example is our St. Ambrose parish. In the diocese, we are one of the poorest parishes, despite being the Cathedral. Seventy percent of our parishioners are refugees, living every day in survival mode, working hard to build a basic home, to educate their children, simply to live in peace. They left their war-torn country to find a new home, starting from zero. They brought nothing with them, only faith and hope. Materially, they have next to nothing, so they are not able t
Read more

Homily: November 7, 2023, Tuesday of the Thirty-first Week in Ordinary Time (Invitation).

-
“Go out quickly into the streets and alleys of the town and bring in here the poor and the crippled, the blind and the lame." Today’s gospel story really struck me deep. The poor, the crippled, the blind, the lame: who are they? At the time of Jesus, these were the people who were despised, considered imperfect and looked upon by society as people abandoned by God, cursed and thus without the blessing of wealth nor health. And because of their imperfections, being rejected by society, they can't do many things on their own, opportunities are blocked, doors are closed to them. They only have one hope - God. They have no one else to depend on. Conversely, those who were better off, those blessed with wealth and health, who were the first guests invited to the grand dinner, were so busy with their own affairs, and engrossed in their own world that they had little or no regard for the invitation.  They were independent, they did not think they needed to deepen their relationship w
Read more

Homily: June 5, 2023, Monday of the Ninth Week in Ordinary Time (Bury the dead).

-
 "And I wept. Then at sunset, I went out, dug a grave, and buried him." I love reading the book of Tobit and the book of Jonah from the Old Testament, especially Tobit, which provides deep moral insights. Tobit was a righteous man, ever ready to get into acts of mercy. In today’s first reading, Tobit’s meal of ‘many different dishes’ was served. But before he ate, he asked his son to go out to find a poor man to share his meal, a fellow Israelite whom he may not even know personally, he regarded everyone as family. And when he heard about the Israelite whose dead body was left on the streets, he ‘sprang to (his) feet’ to bring the body back so as to bury him after sunset. His immediate reaction showed how important that work of mercy was to him, an act which took courage and sacrifice. Tobit and his family were in exile, and to bury a fellow countryman who was killed by the Assyrians will put his life in danger. Yet to leave a body unburied was an act of disrespect to the one
Read more

Homily: April 22, 2024 Monday of the fourth week of Easter (Uncircumcized).

-
So when Peter went up to Jerusalem, the circumcised believers confronted him, saying, “You entered the house of uncircumcised people and ate with them.” This incident happened soon after the Pentecost event. Peter was going around Jerusalem and its neighboring towns thus most of the newly converted were Jews, Orthodox Jews who were strictly faithful to the Mosaic laws and Jewish traditions and practices like circumcision, separating from the Gentiles, and even religious dietary restrictions. They wanted to follow Christ but were not ready to let go of their old way of life. They were not ready to live alongside the Gentiles who also accepted Christ and so could not include them into their community. They embraced Jesus’ resurrection but could not discard their deep rejection of the Gentile people. If the apostles and their successors had also maintained the same disposition, the church would not have grown. It was only when the good news spread to the Gentiles and non-Jews that the chu
Read more

Homily: June 4, 2023, The Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity (Trinity-Love-Power)

-
 "For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through Him." When I was a child, I wished to be tall, strong and muscular; I dreamed of winning every fight and imagined myself being feared by others. But the truth is I was always thin and small in stature compared to my peers and was bullied by others. To compensate for my lack, I decided that my God is powerful and mighty and will defeat all my enemies.  Growing up in a predominantly Hindu country, I was fascinated by the stories of Hindu deities who were victorious in every battle, they were superheroes. In school, my Hindu friends and I would argue whose god would win in a wrestling competition: Jesus or Krishna and Shiva the Hindu gods. But Jesus does not even possess any weapon, has never been in fights and would never kill, how could He win? I secretly wished that Jesus and His angels were powerful, invincible  warriors.   So, what is our God? Our God is unlike any
Read more

Homily March 20, 2022, Third Sunday of Lent Year A Readings (For RCIA)

-
  Readings: https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/032022-YearA.cfm “Come see a man who told me everything I have done. Could he possibly be the Christ?” We all love a good story, especially true stories that start with challenges, but end good. My grandfather used to tell us many stories about his life. My siblings and I never get bored hearing about his adventures with king cobras and tigers.  He would always end by praising God for leading him to safety in all his encounters. I would often imagine myself in those same exciting situations. Today’s Gospel is about a beautiful story of a woman, with a dark past, living with rejection in her life, who heard her life story retold by a holy man she met, in an unlikely situation. Nobody draws water at noon time, no Jew talks to a Samaritan.  But that encounter changed her life totally. Her darkness was dispersed into bursts of joy and hope. ‘Jesus and the Samaritan woman’ is a story about God breaking barriers – social, physical and spirit
Read more

Homily: Tuesday, January 4, 2022, Memorial of Saint Elizabeth Ann Seton, Religious.

-
 Two things Jesus said in today’s gospel struck me. First, “How many loaves do you have?” and second, “Give them some food yourselves.” Today’s miracle event reminds me of another parallel event, the miracle of water-turned-into-wine at the wedding feast in Cana. Both situations started with a problem which was brought to Jesus – running out of wine for wedding guests and having no food for the crowd. In both situations, Jesus asked for contribution to the solution. At the wedding event, He asked for six jars of water. At today’s event, He asked His disciples to provide whatever food they had. He then transformed and multiplied these. For the wine, He presented the new wine to the master of the banquet while the servants distributed it to all the guests. For the loaves and fish, Jesus gave the multiplied food to the disciples who distributed to the crowd. In both these miracles, Jesus did not work alone, He involved others. God works through us. These miracles teach us that we cannot b
Read more

Homily: September 25, 2022, Twenty-sixth Sunday in Ordinary Time.

-
From the gospel, “He raised his eyes and saw Abraham far off and Lazarus at his side”. The poor man who went to heaven in this parable had a name: Lazarus. The rich man who went to hell had no name. Our name is our identity. Our relationship to God is our identity. And we are all children of God, He calls each of us by name, both on earth and in heaven. In another gospel passage Jesus told his disciples, “Rejoice because your names are written in heaven” (Luke 10:20). The rich man may have enjoyed a life of comfort and luxury on earth, but he did not have a relationship with God. Thus in Jesus’ story, he had no name. Now, how did Lazarus get to heaven? Was it because of his poverty. No. How did the rich man end up in hell? Was it because of his wealth? Of course, not. What we have or have not, is not the deciding factor of our destiny after this life.  Our eternity depends on how we use what we have been given. We do not know if the rich man committed any mortal sins in his life, but w
Read more