I remember that a few years back, when I was still an undergraduate, I received the news that a teacher who had taught me at Junior College had passed on. I had briefly bumped into her at the university's library just a couple of months shortly prior and in our brief conversation, I understood that she was in the midst [...]
We learn from the first reading that the Persian king, Cyrus was called by name and anointed by the Lord to subdue nations before him with a mission to free the Jewish exiles from captivity in Babylon. Similarly, by virtue of our baptism, we are called by name and anointed as priest, prophet and king and thus commissioned with a [...]
How do we gift others the abundance we have received from God? There are many ways, and one of the simplest are to look for opportunities to reach out with hospitality and gift the love we have received from God, to one another. "It is not about how much you do, but how much love you put into it [...]
Let no evil talk come out of your mouths, but only what is useful for building up, as there is need, so that your words may give grace to those who hear. (Ephesians 4:29) We are called to respond, not to react to the words of others. As human beings, we have the tendency to react according to how [...]
We know that one of Singaporeans’ favourite indulgences is food. Our conversation comes alive and we talk fondly of our favourite dishes or delicacies. In today’s first reading, Isaiah describes the lavish banquet for all people, and speaks of juicy, rich food and refined, aged wine. What is more, at this banquet, death and shame will be lifted from [...]
The presence of COVID-19 has made manifest the undercurrent fissures and cracks that the Catholic Church has been facing for a very long time, but which we forgot about, swept under the carpet, ignored, or were so busy doing a million and one things except the things that we were supposed to do that we were distracted from sitting down [...]
Those of us who have tried growing herbs or veggies will probably find the message from today’s readings familiar with our experiences. Such is the case in the first reading, where the vine-owner “had a vineyard on a fertile hillside; he spaded it, cleared it of stones, and planted the choicest vines; within it he built a watchtower, and [...]
While these statistics are expected from a Church that has moved from being in complacency, and maintenance mode, to a state of being in utter decline, it is still nonetheless shocking to revisit these numbers again. A survey that Pew Research Center conducted in 2009, and updated in 2011, showed that those who left the Catholic Church outnumber those who [...]
At this stage of my youth, my heart grows restless at the thought of the mundane working life that approaches me. In my head, I would envision stepping into the working world as being parallel to running a long marathon race, a race with an unknown yet daunting distance to be covered. The finishing line of the race would be [...]
In the Scripture text where Peter says to Jesus who is walking on the water, "Lord, if it is you, bid me, come to you on the water." (Matthew 14: 28) and Jesus calls out to him. Things go swimmingly well, Peter defies gravity and the laws of Physics and begins to walk on water like Jesus did. However, we [...]