Homily: June 14, 2023, Wednesday of the Tenth Week in Ordinary Time (Smallest Letter)

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 Amen, I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not the smallest letter or the smallest part of a letter will pass from the law.

What is the smallest letter of the law?

In my home diocese in India, the church belongs to the Syro-Malabar tradition and our liturgy is celebrated differently from the Roman rite we celebrate here.

The liturgical language used is East Syriac. Syriac is very similar to Aramaic, the language spoken by Jesus and His disciples. Both languages share the same alphabet, and within it, the smallest letter is the Yod (^), which resembles a small upside-down "V". One of our seminarian friends was nicknamed "Yod" because of his small physical stature. 

Despite its size, this letter holds great significance in the language. Yod is used to form all the other letters, and since the Jewish tradition holds that God uses all the letters as the building blocks of creation, Yod points to God's omnipresence. And creation is natural law.

So when Jesus says ‘the smallest letter’ of the law, He could be referring to the foundation of natural law, pointing to God’s intention for the creation of the world, love.

Until heaven and earth pass away, love will never pass.

Today, one of the biggest challenges of the Church's mission is relativism. To many people especially the young ones, everything is subjective. To them, morality is subjective, everything is relative, nothing is absolute, truth is personal. God’s law is thus disregarded.

For a nation, the supreme law of the state is its constitution. For the church, her constitution is the Gospel. A faithful citizen of the state will give utmost respect to its constitution. As faithful Catholics, do we also give utmost respect to God’s law?

Do we truly understand God’s law in matters like Euthanasia, abortion, same-sex union?

Do we live in obedience to the Gospel?

Or do we question its truth and expect it to follow the ways of the world, to keep up with modern times as some people like to say?

Which do you follow?

Everything in the Gospel is founded on love, agape self-giving, self-emptying love. Until heaven and earth pass away, love will never pass. Amen


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Homily, Wednesday,January 5, 2022, Memorial of Saint John Neumann, Bishop

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Readings:  https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/010522.cfm In the first reading, St. John writes, “Whoever acknowledges that Jesus is the Son of God, God remains in him and he in God”.  Do you truly and fully believe that Jesus is God? Do you know someone who does not believe so? Many, I am sure. Similarly in St. John’s time, there were many early Christian communities who questioned the divinity of Jesus. They followed Jesus’ teachings but regarded Him as simply a human person with the special power to perform miracles. They did not believe He is God. The disbelief stemmed from the humanity of Jesus. He was born from a woman like any other human, he grew from infancy to adulthood in the same way as the rest of humanity. He experienced hunger, pain, emotions and temptations like anyone. But He did not sin. Jesus was indeed fully human, so how could He also be fully divine? Human logic cannot explain it. Science cannot prove it. Thus, many could not accept it. God came to sav...
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Homily:August 18, 2024, Twentieth Sunday in Ordinary Time (Wisdom)

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Homilía: 3 Julio, 2022, XIV Domingo Ordinario

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Homily April 29, Memorial of Saint Catherine of Siena, Virgin and Doctor of the Church

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 “And all day long, both at the temple and in their homes, they did not stop teaching and proclaiming the Christ, Jesus”. Even after being flogged, all day long, the disciples continued teaching and preaching everywhere… Amazing, isn’t it?  These past few days, we have been reading from Acts of the Apostles. We see how the Jewish leaders and high priest tried to stop the apostles from preaching in the name of Jesus. But they failed. The Pharisee Gamaliel rightly said, “if it comes from God, you will not be able to destroy them; you may even find yourselves fighting against God.” How true. The church is from God. The disciples did not stop teaching and proclaiming. They even rejoiced at being flogged for what they were doing. They were on fire for Jesus. They were so eager and excited to tell everyone about Jesus. What about us? If there is a new restaurant serving delicious food or a store is having a great end-of-summer sale, we would hear many people talking about it. Some w...
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Homily: August 20, 2022, Saturday of the Twentieth Week in Ordinary Time

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Christmas Homily 2021,

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Homily: December 10, 2024, Tuesday of the second week In Advent (Word of God)

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Homily: November 2, 2024, The Commemoration of All the Faithful Departed (All Souls); Pleanary Indulgnce.

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