Misa de Gracia of Sto. Niño Parish
Camalig, Meycauayan, Bulacan

Homily by Rev. Msgr. Andres S. Valera, HP
Parish Priest, Sto. Niño Parish

Minor Basilica of Our Lady of Manaoag,
Manaoag, Pangasinan
17 May 2022
[video]

We began this week with the last testament and will of Jesus telling us to love one another as he had loved us. Love permeates this week’s first reading and the gospel. It is this kind of love that allows Paul to get up after being left for dead and returned to the cities that rejected him (cf. Acts 14, 19). It is the love for Jesus and the love for his gospel that if he had been rejected, he went back to the city to preach again. It is this kind of love that allows us not to let our hearts be troubled or afraid as Jesus tells us in the gospel.

This selfless love is at the heart of being a Christian. This love offers the world what the world cannot give. Of course, that makes sense what peace is there in our lives in a world except when it comes from our love.

We won’t find peace by buying the latest cool pairs of shoes or new gadgets or new phone or iPhone or eating a fancy places and restaurants or taking all our pictures and saying “my day”? No. You know it seems to be that people think that after that everything will give them peace.

But you see, my dear sisters and brothers, more than ever peace today seems impossible and divided factions in our country and the warring nations that we see all over the world especially in Ukraine and Russia tells us that we need this peace of Christ and our love of God and ourselves and our neighbour.

Practice with fierceness transcends all fear and trouble unlocks the key to peace as Jesus assures us indeed. It is necessary to undergo many hardships to enter the kingdom of God a kingdom that is at hand and like Paul, like Barnabas in the first reading and the rest of the early disciples we overlook those hardships in the face of our service to the lord. Our service of love and when we have that and in that we will find the peace of Christ. Amen.