Verbum Dei Philippines
  • Home
  • Watch + Listen
  • Read
    • News
    • Feature Stories
    • Community Updates
  • Events
  • Communities
    • Pasig City
    • Quezon City
    • Pandacan, Manila
    • Tagaytay City
    • Cebu City
    • Cagayan de Oro City
  • Centers
    • Verbum Dei Center (Tagaytay City)
    • Verbum Dei Center of Formation (Pasig City)
    • Verbum Dei Apostolate Center (Cebu City)
  • About
    • About Us
    • Our Spirituality
    • Our Founder
  • Contact
  • Home
  • Watch + Listen
  • Read
    • News
    • Feature Stories
    • Community Updates
  • Events
  • Communities
    • Pasig City
    • Quezon City
    • Pandacan, Manila
    • Tagaytay City
    • Cebu City
    • Cagayan de Oro City
  • Centers
    • Verbum Dei Center (Tagaytay City)
    • Verbum Dei Center of Formation (Pasig City)
    • Verbum Dei Apostolate Center (Cebu City)
  • About
    • About Us
    • Our Spirituality
    • Our Founder
  • Contact
Search by typing & pressing enter

YOUR CART

Reflections of Faith

​Read and be inspired by a reflection based on today's Gospel made by members of the Verbum Dei Family in Manila. 

4/22/2017 Comments

Peace Be With You - Reflections on the Word of God (April 22, 2017)

Picture

"Peace be with you"

Originally posted in Facebook by Fr. Michael Cheong, FMVD
The Gospel of today shows the disciples gathered in the upper room with fear. Jesus enters in their midst and greets them with his peace, showing them his wounds. At the sight of this, the disciples are filled with joy. It is as if the wounds of Christ in his resurrected body were a sign of hope for all the wounds that are still found in the world. As Christians, we are called to contemplate these wounds like the disciples in order to find peace - peace not in the fact that there are no more problems and struggles in the world, but peace in the faith that Christ has assumed all these wounds in his own body and will bring them all to healing in his own time and ways.
As we come to the end of the octave, we are met with a liturgical season in the Cburch that is even longer than Lent - Easter. Have you ever asked yourself why there is a need for the season of Easter? Have we not pondered enough the cross and the sufferings of Christ up to Holy week? Why is there still a need for yet another special season?

True enough, for most people, Easter is a matter of one day. We greet each other "happy easter" on Easter Sunday and feel as if all the Church festivities have come to an end. And yet, it is not over. The celebration of the Resurrection has just begun.

Easter is a time to progress in the Christian life. On Easter Sunday or the vigil, we renewed our baptismal promises by renouncing Satan and sin and professing our faith in God. These coming 7 weeks of Easter till Pentecost, I propose that we ponder the meaning of this renewal by pondering on what we truly renounce and what we profess in the practice of our Christian lives. In the Catholic tradition, there are 7 capital sins that we renounce and 7 opposite virtues in which we can progress. In each week, I would like to ponder on each sin and its opposing virtue, so that we can make our Christian progress effecive and real.

This week, let us begin with pride, the root and mother of all sins. Pride is the most subtle of all the sins and we know that it will accompany us until our deathbeds, and yet it is interesting to recognize when we are taken by it and how to increasingly overcome it. According to Scriptures, pride is basically the refusal to listen. True listening leads to change and that is why Jesus was constantly reprimanding the Pharisees for refusing to listen. When we consider that we are better than others, we will not listen to them. When we consider that we know better than God, we stop listening to Him too. Everybody struggles with pride, since it is mixed with the search for self-worth and a dignified life. But what helps us to overcome it is to practice stopping ourselves in our quick critiques or conclusions and to try to listen.

The opposing virtue is no mystery - it is humility. Humility is actually the Christian way of discovering my own sense of dignity as a person. On one hand, it is recognizing what I am, "humus" or earth. From dust we have come, and to dust we shall return. On the other hand, it is to recognize that there is a God who loves this piece of earth infinitely. In other words, humility is intimately connected to faith. If I believe in a God that is supremely good, then I can learn to trust Him and entrust myself to Him. It would be difficult to submit myself to anyone for that matter, unless I feel known and loved by that person. 

Jesus himself did not easily submit to his Passion, until He was convinced that the plan of the Father was greater and made a free and intelligent choice for love of God and for us. The cross is not a sign of the loss of freedom, but its fulfilment in divine Love. Let us try to ponder this mystery this week: Have I ever experienced that an act of humility on my part or of any other has led to the sense of true love and freedom?

Fr. Michael Cheong is a Singaporean missionary priest of the Verbum Dei Missionary Fraternity. His current assignment is in Rome, Italy.
Comments

    Archives

    August 2021
    July 2021
    June 2021
    May 2021
    April 2021
    March 2021
    February 2021
    January 2021
    December 2020
    November 2020
    October 2020
    September 2020
    August 2020
    July 2020
    June 2020
    May 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    January 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    October 2019
    September 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    September 2017
    August 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    December 2016

    Categories

    All Daily Guidelines Reflections On The Word Of God School Of The Word Thoughts From A Disciple

    RSS Feed

Picture
Vertical Divider

Subscribe for updates

© 2025.  Verbum Dei Philippines.