Reflection for March 23, Monday of the Fifth Week of Lent; John 8:1-11

Gospel: John 8:1-11

Jesus went to the Mount of Olives. But early in the morning he arrived again in the temple area, and all the people started coming to him, and he sat down and taught them. Then the scribes and the Pharisees brought a woman who had been caught in adultery and made her stand in the middle. They said to him, “Teacher, this woman was caught in the very act of committing adultery. Now in the law, Moses commanded us to stone such women. So what do you say? They said this to test him, so that they could have some charge to bring against him. Jesus bent down and began to write on the ground with his finger. But when they continued asking him, he straightened up and said to them, “Let the one among you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her. Again he bent down and wrote on the ground. And in response, they went away one by one beginning with the elders. So he was left alone with the woman before him. Then Jesus straightened up and said to her “Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you? She replied, “No one, sir. Then Jesus said, “Neither do I condemn you. Go, and from now on do not sin any more.

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Reflection:

Are you sometimes quick to judge those whom you perceived to be sinners?  In the gospel the Pharisees and scribes were very quick to draw judgement from the woman caught committing adultery. They brought this woman to Jesus with the expectation that Jesus Himself would pronounce judgment upon her.

Yet Jesus never judged her for what she did, Jesus choose to highlight God’s mercy and compassion upon her. At the end of the gospel Jesus told her, “I do not condemn you, go and do not sin anymore (John 8:11). As if Jesus was telling her, go and start a new life forget the past for I have already forgiven you. This gospel episode is perhaps one of the best showcase of Jesus’ mercy and compassion.

Perhaps through this gospel Jesus is also inviting us to look at ourselves and have a self-reflection on how we relate with sinners. Do we also judge them quickly just like the Pharisees and scribes did? When we judge we also invite judgment on ourselves, when we judge we further push this person to commit more sins. And when we judge we only highlight the arrogance of the devil instead of the mercy and compassion of Jesus.

But who are we to condemn or judge when we are to be judge also. Who are we to judge when we are sinners also. Instead of judging let us always show the mercy and compassion of Jesus. In doing so we show the sinner that there’s a God who cares, a God who listens and surely a God who is always merciful and forgiving. – Marino J. Dasmarinas

Reflection for March 21, Saturday of the Fourth Week of Lent; John 7:40-53

Gospel: John 7:40-53

Some in the crowd who heard these words of Jesus said, “This is truly the Prophet. Others said, “This is the Christ. But others said, “The Christ will not come from Galilee, will he? Does not Scripture say that the Christ will be of David’s family and come from Bethlehem, the village where David lived? So a division occurred in the crowd because of him. Some of them even wanted to arrest him, but no one laid hands on him.

So the guards went to the chief priests and Pharisees, who asked them, “Why did you not bring him? The guards answered, “Never before has anyone spoken like this man. So the Pharisees answered them, “Have you also been deceived? Have any of the authorities or the Pharisees believed in him? But this crowd, which does not know the law, is accursed. Nicodemus, one of their members who had come to him earlier, said to them “Does our law condemn a man before it first hears him and finds out what he is doing? They answered and said to him “You are not from Galilee also, are you? Look and see that no prophet arises from Galilee.”

Then each went to his own house.

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Reflection:

What will happen to us if we try to read the words of Jesus in the bible with reverence and  reflection? It will change us and create a positive impact in our lives. There would be a life changing event that will renew us spiritually.

The guards who were supposed to arrest Jesus were suddenly changed by the very words of Jesus. Thus they were not able to carry out their mission they instead became secret followers of Jesus. This is the great mystery of the words of Jesus once we read it. It will capture and change our life for the better.

Just try reading His words in the bible with piety and notice how it will sink to you and how it will soon change and transform you. There’s great power in the words of Jesus if only we would try to read and reflect upon it.

But do we still have time to read His words in the bible? We should create time for this noble endeavor for this is our ticket to have a personal encounter with Him. This is our ticket to know Jesus more deeply and intimately.

Never mind if you will read the words of Jesus for the very first time in a very long time. For the Holy Spirit will always be there to open your mind and walk you through it. What is important is you take the initiative to listen to Jesus by reading His life transforming words. – Marino J. Dasmarinas 

Reflection for March 20, Friday of the Fourth Week of Lent; John 7:1-2, 10, 25-30

Gospel: John 7:1-2, 10, 25-30

Jesus moved about within Galilee; he did not wish to travel in Judea, because the Jews were trying to kill him. But the Jewish feast of Tabernacles was near. But when his brothers had gone up to the feast, he himself also went up, not openly but as it were in secret.

Some of the inhabitants of Jerusalem said, “Is he not the one they are trying to kill? And look, he is speaking openly and they say nothing to him. Could the authorities have realized that he is the Christ? But we know where he is from. When the Christ comes, no one will know where he is from.” So Jesus cried out in the temple area as he was teaching and said, “You know me and also know where I am from. Yet I did not come on my own, but the one who sent me, whom you do not know, is true. I know him, because I am from him, and he sent me. So they tried to arrest him, but no one laid a hand upon him, because his hour had not yet come.

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Reflection:

Does Jesus fear death? Yes, He feared death, yet Jesus did not allow His fear of death to paralyze His movement and desire to do His mission for God. He continued with His mission and became more creative in doing it until He reached His appointed time of arrest, persecution and death on the cross.

We see this in the gospel reading for today, Jesus did not want to travel to Judea for the reason that the Jews were planning to kill Him. But it was the feast of tabernacles, a sacred Jewish feast that He should observe. So Jesus went albeit secretly and there He preached with passion as if there was no threat on His life.    

Do you also have fear/s in your life? Whatever your fears are don’t let it paralyze you. You have to face it so that you could conquer or defeat it. If Jesus let His fear of death overcome Him  there would have been no triumphant death on the cross and there would have been no salvation for all of us.

When we face our fears we live our dreams and we are able to achieve great things in life. Fear is an instrument of the devil to prevent us from achieving great things for us and for God. What are your fears? Ask Jesus to help you defeat it for He will surely help you. – Marino J. Dasmarinas  

Reflection for March 18, Wednesday of the Fourth Week of Lent; John 5:17-30

Gospel: John 5:17-30

Jesus answered the Jews: “My Father is at work until now, so I am at work.” For this reason they tried all the more to kill him, because he not only broke the Sabbath but he also called God his own father, making himself equal to God.

Jesus answered and said to them, “Amen, amen, I say to you, the Son cannot do anything on his own, but only what he sees the Father doing; for what he does, the Son will do also. For the Father loves the Son and shows him everything that he himself does, and he will show him greater works than these, so that you may be amazed. For just as the Father raises the dead and gives life, so also does the Son give life to whomever he wishes. Nor does the Father judge anyone, but he has given all judgment to the Son, so that all may honor the Son just as they honor the Father. Whoever does not honor the Son does not honor the Father who sent him. Amen, amen, I say to you, whoever hears my word and believes in the one who sent me has eternal life and will not come to condemnation, but has passed from death to life. Amen, amen, I say to you, the hour is coming and is now here when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God, and those who hear will live. For just as the Father has life in himself, so also he gave to the Son the possession of life in himself. And he gave him power to exercise judgment because he is the Son of Man. Do not be amazed at this, because the hour is coming in which all who are in the tombs will hear his voice and will come out those who have done good deeds to the resurrection of life, but those who have done wicked deeds to the resurrection of condemnation.

“I cannot do anything on my own;I judge as I hear, and my judgment is just, because I do not seek my own will but the will of the one who sent me.”

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Reflection:

Do you believe that Jesus and the Father are one and the same? The critics of Jesus did not believe this oneness of the father and the son. The critics of Jesus did not believe because their mindset was based on their human understanding which is always subject to limitations.

What separates us from the critics of Jesus in our gospel? We believe in the oneness of the father and the son, we believe because we have faith. Faith that is not subject to  what our eyes and ears can see and hear.

If our faith is confined to what we could only see and hear this in actually not faith because true faith or deep faith requires believing even without seeing.  Through our faith in both the father and the son we are able to further discover the many truths about our catholic faith.  And we are also able to grow more in faith and knowledge about our universal church.

Perhaps some of us may ask, Why am I not growing in faith? The answer to this is we lack something perhaps this something is our lack of faithful adherence to the teachings of our universal faith.

Say for example our lack of adherence to the insolubility of the Sacrament of Matrimony, the Sanctity of human life, the healing and cleansing value of the Sacrament of Reconciliation and the many more teachings of our catholic faith. We will not grow in faith if we don’t believe these teachings.  

Do you believe in the oneness of the Son and the Father and do you also believe the teachings of our catholic faith? – Marino J. Dasmarinas

Reflection for March 17, Tuesday of the Fourth Week of Lent; John 5:1-16

Gospel: John 5:1-16

There was a feast of the Jews, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. Now there is in Jerusalem at the Sheep Gate a pool called in Hebrew Bethesda, with five porticoes. In these lay a large number of ill, blind, lame, and crippled. One man was there who had been ill for thirty-eight years. When Jesus saw him lying there and knew that he had been ill for a long time, he said to him, “Do you want to be well?” The sick man answered him, “Sir, I have no one to put me into the pool when the water is stirred up; while I am on my way, someone else gets down there before me. Jesus said to him, “Rise, take up your mat, and walk. Immediately the man became well, took up his mat, and walked.

Now that day was a sabbath. So the Jews said to the man who was cured, “It is the sabbath, and it is not lawful for you to carry your mat. He answered them, “The man who made me well told me, ‘Take up your mat and walk. They asked him, “Who is the man who told you, ‘Take it up and walk’? The man who was healed did not know who it was for Jesus had slipped away, since there was a crowd there. After this Jesus found him in the temple area and said to him “Look, you are well; do not sin any more, so that nothing worse may happen to you.” The man went and told the Jews that Jesus was the one who had made him well. Therefore, the Jews began to persecute Jesus because he did this on a sabbath.

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Reflection:

How does it feel to be sick? Those who got sick already would answer that it doesn’t feel good to be sick for you feel weak and can’t function properly. Absurd as it may sound but sickness is sometimes God’s gift to us for it’s through our sickness that we get to know God more deeply. It’s through our getting sick that we become aware of the majestic healing power of God.

The blind man in our gospel had this kind of experience. He was beside the pool waiting for someone to help him immerse in the pool. He didn’t know Jesus thus he did not ask Jesus to heal him.  Jesus by Himself desired to appear to this man and heal him right there. If the man was not sick Jesus would not have appeared to him.  

It’s through our sickness often times that Jesus strongly manifest Himself to us. Through our getting sick we get a clearer picture of who Jesus is. If Jesus healed the man in our gospel without asking for it,  will He not heal us as well? We who know Him and we who always pray to Him.   

There's always hidden silver lining when we get sick, we may not know it immediately but there's certainly silver lining. And one of this is to get to know more Jesus deeply and to have this up close and personal encounter with Him. – Marino J. Dasmarinas

1Reflection for Sunday March 15, Fourth Sunday of Lent; John 3:14-21

Gospel: John 3:14-21

Jesus said to Nicodemus: “Just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the desert, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, so that everyone who believes in him may have eternal life.”

For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him might not perish but might have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through him. Whoever believes in him will not be condemned, but whoever does not believe has already been condemned, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God. And this is the verdict, that the light came into the world, but people preferred darkness to light, because their works were evil. For everyone who does wicked things hates the light and does not come toward the light, so that his works might not be exposed. But whoever lives the truth comes to the light, so that his works may be clearly seen as done in God.

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Reflection:

Why do some people decide to end their life? There are many reasons but perhaps one of those reasons is the lack of knowledge about the infinite love of God. If only they know beforehand the encompassing love of God they wouldn’t dare decide to end their life.

This is the tragedy of our modern times; many of us strive to know how to use high-tech gadgets. Yet many of us also do not exert any effort to know this great love of God that He freely offers to each and every one of us.

Take for instance our Sunday Holy Mass obligation. If we attend Holy Mass with fidelity and devotion the Holy Spirit will open our mind so that we would know this redemptive and salvific love of God.  But sad to say, many do not give priority to this sacred Sunday Holy Mass obligation.    

God’s love for us is encompassing. For example, if someone committed a mortal sin such as abortion.  Does this make the person already unloved by God? The love of God is by no means constrained by our sins even mortal sins. For God’s love is always there for us, it’s ours to take! We have to own this love of God that He freely gives to us.

What kind of love is this that God gives us so freely? This is a salvific love and a redemptive love a love that saves a sinner like you and me. Yes we sin every so often but the sin that we commit does not diminish the salvific and redemptive love of God for us.

During this season of lent let us embrace this encompassing, salvific and redemptive love of God. By humbly submitting ourselves to the Sacrament of Reconciliation. – Marino J. Dasmarinas 

Reflection for March 14, Saturday of the Third Week of Lent; Luke 18:9-14

Gospel: Luke 18:9-14

Jesus addressed this parable to those who were convinced of their own righteousness and despised everyone else. “Two people went up to the temple area to pray; one was a Pharisee and the other was a tax collector. The Pharisee took up his position and spoke this prayer to himself, ‘O God, I thank you that I am not like the rest of humanity — greedy, dishonest, adulterous — or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week, and I pay tithes on my whole income.’ But the tax collector stood off at a distance and would not even raise his eyes to heaven but beat his breast and prayed, ‘O God, be merciful to me a sinner. I tell you, the latter went home justified, not the former; for everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and the one who humbles himself will be exalted.

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Reflection:

Is humility the passageway to the heart of God? Yes it is! By our humility we are able to access the sacred passageway to the heart of God. By our humility we are able to make God smile at us and we are able to make God embrace us.  

Humility is not only the passageway to the heart of God for this is also the passageway to the heart of our fellowmen. We are silently admired and respected if we are always humble and if we don’t raise ourselves to be exalted by our fellowmen.

In our gospel reading this Saturday there’s this Pharisee who boasted about his good qualities before God. Why did he boast? Perhaps the Pharisee thought that in so doing God would take notice and be impressed of his good qualities. But we cannot impress God, we cannot bully our way to the heart of God.

On the other hand the tax collector and perceived to be sinner by many humbled himself before God. He did nothing except to humbly acknowledge his own sinfulness in front of God. By humbly admitting his own sinfulness and shortcomings the tax collector gained the mercy and favor of God.

Do you also want to gain the mercy and favor of God? – Marino J. Dasmarinas