|
Homily for TET Mass of Celebration My dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ: It is with great joy that I wish you a blessed and happy New Year. Today here at Saint Andrew Dung-Lac Church, we rejoice to observe the beautiful traditional custom of TET. It is so wonderful that we can do this beginning within the celebration of the Eucharist. The Eucharist is the special gift of God to us. It is all about life. The Eucharist commemorates the life, death and resurrection of Jesus. Therefore, it is not only about life on this earth but truly about eternal life. TET is also about life but a life limited to the now and the next twelve months. Then the new year becomes old. Indeed, it is then over and done! The Eucharist on the other hand is about life now and forever. Therefore, by celebrating the TET in the context of the Mass, we are able to ask God for His blessings of life for all the days of our lives into and including life everlasting. Today’s Gospel, which we just heard, is all about life. Jesus is moved with pity for the crowd. He does not want to send them home hungry. Therefore, he asks the Apostles to feed the people. They reply that they cannot and they also imply that there is no way for them to get enough food in such a deserted place. They only have a few loaves of bread and a few fish. Jesus knew what He would do. He blessed the bread and fish and directed His Apostles to distribute this food to the people. They fed four thousand people and had seven baskets of food left over. Jesus multiplied the bread and fish out of concern for the lives of the people. This multiplication of the bread and fish was also a lesson for the Apostles and for us. Just as Jesus had compassion on the crowd when they were physically hungry, so does He have compassion on us since we are spiritually hungry. Thus He feeds us. He feeds us with His own Body and Blood. He feeds us so that we can have life and have it more abundantly. He feeds us to bring us to life everlasting in heaven. As we celebrate TET today, let us thank God for the blessings of a new year. And let us ask Him to help us in our daily lives. We ask for His help not to become rich or famous or powerful. We ask for His help to become good and holy and faithful and happy people now so that we can have eternal happiness with Him forever. How do we become good and holy and faithful and happy people now and forever? Actually the answer is simple but the accomplishment is sometimes difficult. The answer which Jesus gave us is “Keep the Commandments.” When we obey the Commandments of God, we are fulfilling His Will, His plan for us. Through the Commandments, which Jesus summarized for us as love of God and love of neighbor, we discover God’s plan for us. His plan for the human race is that we come to know Him, to love Him and to serve Him so that someday we can have life everlasting with Him in heaven. Jesus knew that since we are sinners, it might sometime be hard for us to obey the Commandments so He said: “Take up your cross and follow Me.” This was to encourage us to make choices and decisions that are based on truth. Remember, the truth always sets us free. Therefore, choices and decisions based on truth enable us to keep the Commandments. When we do this, we discover that carrying our daily crosses and obeying the Commandments puts us on the right track for living a good and holy and happy life. I want to assure you of my prayers for each of you, members of Saint Andrew Dung Lac Church and friends and visitors of this Vietnamese Catholic Community. I pray that you will have a wonderful celebration of TET this year and all the years of your life on this earth. I pray that after each of you has completed all your TETS on this earth, you will be granted a truly new and everlasting life in the Kingdom of Heaven. “Chuc mung nam moi.” Most
Reverend Eusebius J. Beltran |