Chavez Cyrillus Mariae Poon

As some of you may know, one of my personal hobbies is designing liturgical books — especially Orders of Holy Mass and other texts for liturgical use.

In the past, I relied on Microsoft Word to edit and compile these works. Recently, however, I have begun transitioning to LaTeX, a powerful typesetting system commonly used for theses, academic articles, and books. One of its greatest strengths is the ability to extend functionality through packages.

To my delight, I discovered a LaTeX package specifically designed for liturgical use within the Church. It is called “liturg”, and can be easily added using this command:

\usepackage{liturg}

Until now, I have completed two projects using LaTeX: an Order of Holy Mass in Latin (Novus Ordo), and the Pre-1955 Good Friday Mass of the Presanctified.

I have also set up a dedicated GitHub repository and website to host both the compiled PDFs and the TeX source files, so this will be my “Liturgical Database”.

Welcome to Palm Sunday and the beginning of Holy Week!

For me, this year’s Holy Week will be especially different and meaningful, as it is my first time spending Holy Week here in Walsingham.

Today, we welcomed a group of Filipino Catholic faithful who came here to Walsingham on pilgrimage. This is also the first major pilgrimage of the year. We are also expecting the Pilgrim Cross group to arrive this coming Friday. They will be staying with us during the Easter Triduum — Good Friday, Holy Saturday, and Easter Sunday.

It is often said that, as we follow Jesus through Holy Week, we are faced with a choice.

We can choose to be bystanders — part of the crowd, keeping a safe distance. We can shout “Hosanna!” enthusiastically on Palm Sunday, and then, just a few days later, cry out even more loudly, “Crucify Him!”

Or we can choose to be followers — like Our Lady and Saint John, standing faithfully at the foot of the Cross; like Veronica, who wiped the face of Jesus with her veil; or even like Simon of Cyrene, the foreigner and despised stranger, who helped Jesus to carry His Cross.

I am always deeply moved that, amidst all the cruelty and brutality of Holy Week, there are also these small yet heroic moments of kindness, tenderness, and compassion.

How will we follow Jesus? In what ways will we welcome Him — in our worship, in our homes, and in our hearts?

Yes, at times we may betray Him, as Judas did. But will we also accompany Him on His final journey to Jerusalem? Will we remain faithful to Him, or will we abandon Him like so many others?

Will we be bystanders or followers?

This is the challenge of Holy Week. This is our challenge.

Wishing you all a blessed Palm Sunday and a grace-filled Holy Week!

A winter’s day
In a deep and dark December;
I am alone,
Gazing from my window to the streets below
On a freshly fallen silent shroud of snow.
I am a rock,
I am an island.

I’ve built walls,
A fortress deep and mighty,
That none may penetrate.
I have no need for friendship; friendship causes pain.
It’s laughter and it loves I disdain.
I am a rock,
I am an island.

And a rock feels no pain;
And an island never cries.

In the Gospel, Jesus calls Peter a “rock”, which is an ambiguous nickname. Yes, as you know, rock is solid, reliable, and has a strong foundation. But a rock is also hard, immovable and in danger of isolation. Would you call yourself a rock?

I personally like this story in the bible. It is interesting because it involves a mutual name-giving between two people, Jesus and Simon Peter. Simon Peter calls Jesus the Messiah, the Son of the living God. This name means the anointed one, like a king. Jesus in turn names Simon Rock, in Greek, “Petros”, from where we get his most familiar name, Peter.

Naming is important in most cultures and especially religions. Indeed, in some cultures, it has a mystical, even magical aspect. You do not share your name too readily, knowing a person’s name can give one power over the other, as is illustrated in some stories like the Wizard of Earthsea by Ursula Le Guin. This is also evident in the stories in the bible, for example when Jacob wrestles all night with an unknown stranger and towards the end of the fight asks for the stranger’s name.

Notice again the mutuality in the attempt to learn the other’s name. But in this case, the stranger (God) does not give his name. Presumably, that would be to give too much away.

What is the meaning of your name? Does it have a history or a story behind it? Why was it chosen for you or by you?

The name of Jesus has meaning, both historically and spiritually. In terms of the biblical narrative, it was chosen by Mary through the revelation of an angel. The name “Jesus” is the Latin version of the Aramaic “Yeshua”, which is in English also the name “Joshua”. The name means “God saves”. Joshua was a hero of the Hebrew scriptures. He was a military leader who fought the Canaanites when the Hebrew people entered the promised land after their exodus from slavery in Egypt. Joshua was successful in battles and his most famous victory was at Jericho.

Jesus was not a military leader but he was a person of salvation. He brought healing to the sick, hope to the poor, and restored the outcast into society. Some Christians ascribe supernatural power to the name ‘Jesus’ which gives the power to cause miraculous healing.

I invite you to reflect on two questions.

First, what name do you give to Jesus? Is there a word or metaphor that can describe your own personal connection to Jesus? Can you think of something beyond the traditional names that describe the unique role Jesus takes in your life?

Secondly, what is the name that Jesus gives to you? Is it a name that describes your true being, the essential you? Or is it a name that says who you are becoming or a purpose that God has for you?

I would imagine that these two names are related. The name you give to Jesus will say something about who you are. The name you imagine that Jesus gives to you will say something about the nature of Jesus.

This is a true story, at least according to James S. Hewitt. A retired teacher decided to volunteer some time tutoring children in a local children’s hospital. She was given the name and room number of a nine year old. There was also a note saying that the boy’s class in school was studying nouns and adverbs. The tutor got hold of her fourth grade material and headed over to the hospital. She was shocked to find that the boy was in the burn unit. She almost turned around and went home, but she got up her courage and went inside. He looked even worse than she feared. “Hi,” she said, “I’ll be your teacher while you’re here. It’s important that you learn about nouns and adverbs.” And she went right into the lesson. When she finished, she said she’d be back the next week. And she hurried away.

A few days later the teacher received a call from the boy’s mother asking if she would be coming for a lesson that day. Thinking that she had really done a poor job with the child and that the boy’s mother would rather he be left alone, the lady apologized for her nervousness and said that she would certainly understand if the boy’s Mom would rather she didn’t return. “No, no,” said the Mom, “You have it all wrong. I don’t know what you said to my son, but since your visit he has really been fighting hard to respond to his treatment. It seems that he has finally decided to live.”

The teacher returned the next day and found the child with a therapist and his mother. He was doing his best to cooperate with the therapist. When the boy saw the teacher he said to his mother, “I know I’m going to live. They wouldn’t send a teacher to work on nouns and adverbs with a kid who’s dying, would they?”

He has given us hope that we will live. God wouldn’t send his Son if we were a lost cause. He wouldn’t make Him a King if that King were to have no subjects. He wouldn’t allow him to die on the cross if He didn’t realize that some of us would call out to him with our lives, “Jesus, remember us, when you come into your kingdom.” Modern day prophets of doom who see negative in every aspect of life have given up on society.

But Jesus has not given up on us. He refuses to give up. He is the King who loves his subjects. He loves them to death.

Life just isn’t…

Life isn’t about keeping score. It’s not about how many people call you and it’s not about who you’ve dated, are dating or haven’t dated at all. It isn’t about who you’ve kissed, what sport you play, or which guy or girl likes you. It’s not about your shoes or your hair or the color of your skin or where you live or go to school. In fact, it’s not about grades, money, clothes or colleges that accept you or not. Life isn’t about if you have lots of friends, or if you are alone, and it’s not about how accepted or not accepted you are. Life just isn’t about that.

But life is about who you love and who you hurt. It’s about how you feel about yourself. It’s about trust, happiness and compassion. It’s about sticking up for your friends and replacing inner hate with love. Life is about avoiding jealousy, overcoming ignorance and building confidence. It’s about what you say and what you mean. It’s about seeing people for who they are and not what they have.

Most of all, it is about choosing to use your life to touch someone else’s in a way that could never have been achieved otherwise. These choices are what life’s about.

The confessional is truly a sacred space.

It is a doorway into the inner sanctuary of the human soul and the heart’s point of entry for Divine Light.

No one should be left to carry the burden of sin alone. The weight of our sinful choices and actions can press heavily upon our hearts and lives, wounding us interiorly and distancing us from God and from one another.

The Sacrament of Reconciliation is the place where the wounded come to be healed. It is there that they acknowledge their wounds and receive healing and peace through the forgiveness of the God of infinite love.

During His earthly ministry, Our Lord Jesus Christ, the only Son of God, exercised this divine authority to forgive sins: “Your sins are forgiven”

On the evening of Easter, He entrusted this same power to His Apostles when He appeared among them and said: “Receive the Holy Spirit. Whose sins you forgive are forgiven them, and whose sins you retain are retained”. In this moment, Christ instituted the Sacrament of Reconciliation.

The priest who sits in the confessional is therefore one who is deeply humbled. Though himself a sinner, he is called by God to stand in His place and to pronounce forgiveness in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. The priest-confessor is not the master of God’s mercy, but its servant.

The effects of the Sacrament of Confession are profound: reconciliation with God through the forgiveness of all sins; reconciliation with the Church, in which God desires us to make our home; and the restoration of the state of grace, enabling us to rediscover the person God created us to be.

Through this sacrament, the penitent also receives peace and serenity of conscience, spiritual consolation, and an increase of strength for the ongoing struggle of Christian life—a struggle which, through frequent confession, becomes a beautiful and grace-filled journey toward holiness.

Let us go to confession.

I had a discussion with my friends few months ago about how to evangilizing someone to let them know about the Catholic faith, many of them had their own ideas, but I want to share my idea which is a very good example about evangilizing people.

I remembered when I was in secondary school while I’m having my lunchbreak, I usually pray the rosary in the playground, then one day one of my classmate saw me praying the rosary, then he come over to me and asking what I’m doing, I told him that I’m praying the rosary, because my classmate is a non-Catholic, he was very interest about the rosary, so I briefly explained to him, after that, he decided to pray the rosary together with me then eventually, he was baptized as Catholic few years ago. Deo Gratias!

Jesus told us to spread the Gospel into the world, we should also know how to evangilize to the people, many people think they didn’t know more about the Gospel, it dosen’t matter, if you know how to pray, especially the rosary, try to pray either when you in the streets or inside the MTR.

Although some people might look at you what are you doing, but this ok, don’t be afrard, just pray for the person who are curious about what are you doing.

Most of all, try your best to evangilize the whole nations through your daily actions!