Third Sunday of Lent - Year C

 Our Lives Must Radiate The Presence And Love Of God In Our Actions

My sisters and brothers in Christ,  

 Today’s readings give us a bush that burns but is not burned up or consumed and a healthy fig tree that did not give any fruit. Much of our Scripture is given to us in symbols, parables and signs. The Old and the New Testaments are notHigh School or College textbooks that can be learned and followed like some kind of policy. Rather, they are the word of God teaching us Who He Is and who we are and we can truly live. Some of the teaching from our Scriptures are truly great stories that teach us how to know the Lord.

Just imagine for a moment that you were out hiking somewhere and saw some kind of shrub or bush that was burning. Many people today are very much aware of the problems of forest fires in the wilderness and forests. We would probably go over and look, just as Moses did. If we saw something that was burning but not burned up, we would be amazed. We would need a voice like God’s to tell us what was happening!  Of course, if we already knew the story of the burning bush, we might begin to get nervous about the presence of God.

Some of our ancestors in the faith seem to take it for granted that God will speak to them, even if they never see His face directly. Are we more comfortable having only the Word of God and the Sacraments rather than having God suddenly appear in front of us? We could wonder what God might say to us today if He were to appear right now? What are the injustices of our world? Who are the downtrodden? Who are those in need of salvation? If Christ were walking on the earth today, with whom would he associate?

These are wonderful questions to ponder during Lent. Sometimes we begin to think that we are automatically saved because we say that we believe. The whole point of today’s Gospel is that we must produce good works, that our lives must radiate the presence and love of God in our actions. It is always important to remember that our faith must produce actions in our lives that are of the Lord. The Scriptures tell us that faith without actions is dead faith.

The Second Letter to the Corinthians, in the passage we read today, gives us this same message: whoever thinks that he is standing secure should take care not to fall. This kind of teaching is not to give us scruples so that we are afraid to live. Rather it is meant to challenge us to live with energy and delight in the way of the Lord. Lent is a time of removing the daily grime of our human existence, according to Saint Leo, but it is also a time of renewing our inner desire for God.

May this Lent be a turning point in our lives so that we begin to choose more and more consistently for the Lord and His will—and less and less for the illusions of this world.

Your brother in the Lord,

Abbot Philip, OSB

The Vietnamese Catechetical Committee in the United States of America is organined with the purpose of helping the Vietnamese Catholic in America to grow in Faith in the Vietnamese spirit as Pope John Paul II said in the encyclical "The Church in Asia."  This spirit is to be faithful with the Gospel's Messages and to reserve and develop the beauty of the Vietnamese culture.  

• Publish catechetical documents in English-Vietnamese. 
• Organize Vietnamese Catechetical Assembly every other year.
• Conduct catechist formation and training at the Vietnamese churches and communities in the United States of America.
• Utilize mass media to reach American churches and Vietnamese catechist who are living in this country.