On the fourth Sunday of the month, we usually celebrate a youth mass with guitars and the drum set. But the rehearsal this morning did not start off well. James, the organist has injured his middle finger during the Lunar New Year and is not expected to be able to accompany the choir for the next couple of months. Matthew took part in a piano competition and would not come to Mass this morning. Joe and Kenneth, the two guitar soloists took part in the Hong Kong Marathon. Wulstan took the cello and left home for a performance somewhere ... The situation looked terribly grim! To handle this "crisis", I was prepared to switch back to organ accompaniment and sought help from Cecilia Choir. When Sing the vice chairman returned and informed me of his arrangement, I was much relieved. They were prepared. They had trained two younger kids to take up the guitar and today would be their "graduation recital". Joe and Kenneth would come back to join us during the mass. After all, the situation was not that bad and I should have greater faith in these young people.
Fr. Martin seemed to know of my worry. In his homily, he mentioned our needs of greater assurance from God. The first reading told us the story of God setting up a covenant with Abraham I mentioned yesterday (Genesis 15:5-12, 17-18). Previously, God had promised to give Abraham children who would inherit Canaan. Abraham was already 90 and Sarah his wife was barren. So, God reassured Abraham with a covenant. In the gospel reading today, Jesus brought his three closest disciples up a high mountain and revealed his glory (Luke 9:28-36). Previously, Jesus told them that he was going to Jerusalem to die. The disciples were troubled. They had given up everything to follow Jesus and it seemed that all would be in vain. So, Jesus reassured them with Transfiguration. I have reservation in accepting this interpretation. Anyway, Fr. Martin's interpretation is not wrong because the Bible speaks to us and our understanding is related to our present situation. In fact, I am in need of reassurance at this very moment too but the two passages do not ring as such to me.
In the afternoon, I attended the Deacons' monthly gathering. There were a lot of exciting news. Two of the aspirants would go through the Rite of Acceptance and become Deacon candidates in March and three of the candidates would be ordained this July. Moreover, the Vicar General was planning to send a team of deacons to North America to study their situations. In their sharings, they were talking about the pressures they experienced as deacons. Many find preparing Sunday homily a pressure. Remember, some of them are already in their seventies. They are experiencing memory losses and are afraid of forgetting their scripts or speaking the wrong things. As members of the hierarchy, deacons are conspicuous targets among people within and without the Church. People look up to them, their speech as well as their actions for solutions. There are encounters which they are not sure how to handle. Very soon, they returned to the gospel reading today, the story of Transfiguration again. How do they show the face of Christ to the people they encounter? I think this question is not the exclusive privilege for members of the hierarchy. It is a question for all Christians. But somehow, there must be a difference. As Christians, when we are able to make people feel vaguely the love of Christ, to make them see that Jesus is a loving caring friend, I think we have done our job. But as for deacons, it will be a different story. Deacons serve the Word and the needy. Therefore, they must make the Servant image of Christ visible among people they encounter. It will be more than just the washing of the feet of the selected twelve members from the parish on Maudy Thursday. I do not know how yet. I am only an aspirant and I know I still have a lot to learn from them.
Perhaps I should not deliberately do something in order to achieve a desired goal. Fr. Martin mentioned the suicide case in which a mother jumped off the Tsing Yi Bridge to her death with her 7-year-old son. He mentioned the sharing of another woman who attempted and survived suicide three times. This woman was walking up the roof to commit suicide with her daughter who told her mother that she was thirsty. The woman suddenly woke up from her confused state and gave up the suicide attempt. The next time, the woman decided to cut her wrist when her daughter was fast asleep. She went to the bed to take a last look at her daughter. A thought popped up her mind. What would happen to her daughter when she woke up only to find her mother lying in a messy pool of blood? She woke up a second time. The last time she wanted to commit suicide, her daughter told her that she wanted to go into the kitchen to get the knife to kill herself too. The mother was horrified to find that this suicidal tendency had passed on to her daughter. At last, she sought professional help. Her daughter was a godsend that saved her life three times. Fr. Martin was sure that the little daughter did not say or do anything on purpose. We don't need to. Walk in the footstep of Jesus and He will do the rest.
Dear Lord, allow us to follow You. All will be right. Amen.
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