Scrap the Heung Yee Kuk, an out-of-touch mafia-like anachronism hindering Hong Kong’s development

My article in today's Ming Pao newspaper with the topic: 
"Article about me - in Oriental Daily!" is on Ming Pao website - click "Australian in HK". Free access to article with recording today from about noon to 8pm HK time. Text without recording 

'Baby bishops' get crash course in realities of the Church

Pope Francis told newly appointed bishops “The world is tired of lying spellbinders and 'trendy’ priests or bishops. The people sniff them out – they have God’s sense of smell – and they walk away when they recognize narcissists, manipulators, defenders of their own causes, auctioneers of vain crusades.”

Former triad member Chan Chi-cheung was released after 38 years in prison

‘I know I am a piece of rubbish’: How HK ex-convicts overcome gov’t prejudice to make a fresh start

Jeremiah 30-31

God told Jeremiah to tell the people these words:

"I will restore you to health. I will heal your wounds.

I have loved you with an everlasting love. Strong and constant is my love for you.

I will bring back the exiles and save them. I will change their sorrow into joy.

The days are coming when I will make a new agreement with my people. Deep within their hearts I will plant love of my Law.

I will be their God and they will be my people. I will forgive all their sins."

Lord, please plant love of you deep within my heart

Psalm 41

Blessed the person who helps the poor and the weak.

He himself will be helped by the Lord when he is sick and in trouble.

The Lord will help him on his bed of pain.

The Lord will bring him back from sickness to health.

Lord, please help me to do more for the poor

Recording 

Recommended: check these readings early morning, think about them during the day, check them again at night. This habit gives us extra energy, courage, motivation, peace and compassion for each day

1 John 4.7-16

Let us love one another. Love comes from God. God is love

God showed his love for us
by sending his Son as a sacrifice to take away our sins

Since God has loved us so much
we should love one another

God is love. Anyone who lives in love, lives in God, and God lives in him

Jesus, you are love itself. May I live in your love

Recording   

 Matthew 26.47-56

While Jesus was still speaking, Judas arrived. Judas had with him a large crowd of men with swords and clubs, sent by the religious leaders

Judas had told these men "The one I kiss is the man. Take him".
So Judas went up to Jesus, said "Greetings, Master" and kissed him. The men  then seized Jesus

Jesus said to them "Am I a robber that you needed to capture me with swords and clubs?  Day after day I was openly teaching in the Temple"

All of Jesus' apostles then deserted him and ran away

Jesus, when I feel I am being treated unfairly by other people,
may your arrest give me strength

Recording 

Denise Ho: The Cantopop Queen on a crusade against China's Communist party

The Joy of Love - Pope Francis' letter - on love in the family      Full English text

165: Recording

Love always gives life.

Conjugal love “does not end with the couple… The couple, in giving themselves to one another, give not just themselves but also the reality of children, who are a living reflection of their love, a permanent sign of their conjugal unity and a living and inseparable synthesis of their being a father and a mother”.

156: Recording

An integral ecology is inseparable from the notion of the common good, a central and unifying principle of social ethics. 

The common good is “the sum of those conditions of social life which allow social groups and their individual members relatively thorough and ready access to their own fulfilment”.[122]

161: Recording 

It would not be right to see this call to growth exclusively or primarily in terms of doctrinal formation. It has to do with “observing” all that the Lord has shown us as the way of responding to his love.

 Along with the virtues, this means above all the new commandment, the first and the greatest of the commandments, and the one that best identifies us as Christ’s disciples: “This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you”. 

At the weekly gathering for the poor at St Paul's Yau Ma Tei last Sunday night, two seconds after the M.C. invited everyone to join in singing a hymn to the Holy Spirit, a helicopter could be heard passing over the building!

Please join me in praying for one part of the world each day of the week:

Sun: Africa        Mon: Europe & Russia     Tues: South Asia      Wed: East Asia  
Thurs: S.E. Asia & Pacific       Frid: South America       Sat: Central & North America 
  
Jesus, today, Tuesday, please bless the people of South Asia

And praying for prisoners in one part of China each day of the month:
On this 20th of the month, Jesus please bless the prisoners of Sichuan

And praying for one of the world's poorest countries each day of the month:
On this 20th of the month, Jesus please bless the people of Gambia

And praying for one Islam-related intention each day of the week:
Jesus, please pacify Boko Haram 

Letters from (mainly African) inmates in Hong Kong prisons - and other drug trafficking items:   2016

This website's Tanzania File
(stopping Africans from being tricked into bringing drugs to HK)
- letters  from Tanzanian inmates  in Hong Kong prisons

This website's HK Asylum Seekers' File
(stopping South Asians from being "people smuggled" to HK)

"Only a fool says there is no God" 
 (Psalm 14)

Islam File    The New Translation

"Same-sex marriage" file

A most important and informative article about the history of one of HK's most powerful groups: Heung Yee Kuk

Why a shift in political fault lines threatens Hong Kong’s rural power brokers 

Why won’t the world tackle the refugee crisis?

Two summits this week will try to address the 65 million displaced and 20 million in danger

Yesterday I launched one more dedicated website 
www.AsylumSeekerHK.com 

- with the hope that stories and reports at a specific website will do more good to bring about change in the increasingly complicated and messy asylum seeker situation in HK

Jeremiah 24-29

For 23 years Jeremiah spoke the message of the Lord, calling on people to do good and turn away from evil.

But the people, especially the leaders, refused to listen to Jeremiah. They eventually arrested Jeremiah and planned to kill him.

Jeremiah also sent a message to the exiles in Babylon. But they too refused his message.

Lord, please give me some of Jeremiah's courage and faith

My recording of this reading

Psalm 40

I waited, I waited for the Lord and he stooped down to me.
He heard my cry.

He saved me from distress. He put fresh hope into my heart.

How many, O Lord my God, are the times you have helped me.
They are too many for me to describe.

My God, in the depth of my heart I delight in your law. You do not want external offerings. You want my heart.

Lord, I offer you my heart, my love. You deserve all my love

Recording 

Matthew 26.30-46

Jesus was overcome with sadness and fear. He said to them "Sadness is filling my heart, as if my heart is dying. Please support me as I pray."

Then he fell on his face and prayed for about an hour: "Father, don't let this suffering continue. But your will be done".

He stood up and found that the apostles were asleep. He said to them "Couldn't you stay awake one hour to support me?"

Three times he prayed the same way. Three times the apostles went to sleep.

Then he said "Get ready.  The one who is betraying me is coming".

Recording 

Matthew 26.30-46

After their last meal, Jesus said to his apostles "Tonight all of you will desert me".

Peter said "I will never desert you". Jesus replied "Tonight before the rooster crows, you will deny me three times".

They came to a place with olive trees called Gethsemane. Jesus took Peter, James and John to a part of that area and asked them to pray with him.

Jesus, please help me give more time to prayer

Recording 

The Joy of Love - Pope Francis' letter - on love in the family     Full English text

164: Recording

In the course of every marriage physical appearances change, but this hardly means that love and attraction need fade. 

We love the other person for who they are, not simply for their body. Although the body ages, it still expresses that personal identity that first won our heart.

Even if others can no longer see the beauty of that identity, a spouse continues to see it with the eyes of love and so his or her affection does not diminish.

He or she reaffirms the decision to belong to the other and expresses that choice in faithful and loving closeness. 

The nobility of this decision, by its intensity and depth, gives rise to a new kind of emotion as they fulfil their marital mission.

For “emotion, caused by another human being as a person… does not per se tend toward the conjugal act”. It finds other sensible expressions. Indeed, love “is a single reality, but with different dimensions; at different times, one or other dimension may emerge more clearly”.

The marriage bond finds new forms of expression and constantly seeks new ways to grow in strength. These both preserve and strengthen the bond. They call for daily effort. None of this, however, is possible without praying to the Holy Spirit for an outpouring of his grace, his supernatural strength and his spiritual fire, to confirm, direct and transform our love in every new situation.

155b: Recording

Learning to accept our body, to care for it and to respect its fullest meaning, is an essential element of any genuine human ecology.

Also, valuing one’s own body in its femininity or masculinity is necessary if I am going to be able to recognize myself in an encounter with someone who is different.

In this way we can joyfully accept the specific gifts of another man or woman, the work of God the Creator, and find mutual enrichment. It is not a healthy attitude which would seek “to cancel out sexual difference because it no longer knows how to confront it”.[121]

160: Recording

The Lord’s missionary mandate includes a call to growth in faith: “Teach them to observe all that I have commanded you”. Hence it is clear that that the first proclamation also calls for ongoing formation and maturation. 

Evangelization aims at a process of growth which entails taking seriously each person and God’s plan for his or her life. All of us need to grow in Christ. Evangelization should stimulate a desire for this growth, so that each of us can say wholeheartedly: “It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me” 

Because I'm in Hong Kong, there are some English words I haven't used for 20 or 30 years. One of them came up last week when a prison inmate told me how she was tricked to carry a "kap chan gei" from A to B in HK ...only to be arrested at B because the "kap chan gei" contained drugs (..it was a set-up). Took me quite a few minutes to remember the English for "kap chan gei": vacuum cleaner!  (haven't seen or used one for decades..)

Please join me in praying for one part of the world each day of the week:

Sun: Africa        Mon: Europe & Russia     Tues: South Asia      Wed: East Asia  
Thurs: S.E. Asia & Pacific       Frid: South America       Sat: Central & North America 
  
Jesus, today, Monday,  please bless the people of Europe & Russia

And praying for prisoners in one part of China each day of the month:
On this 19th of the month,  Jesus please bless the prisoners of Shanxi

And praying for one of the world's poorest countries each day of the month:
On this 19th of the month, Jesus please bless the people of Sudan

And praying for one Islam-related intention each day of the week:
Jesus, please pacify ISIS 

Letters from (mainly African) inmates in Hong Kong prisons - and other drug trafficking items:   2016

This website's Tanzania File
(stopping Africans from being tricked into bringing drugs to HK)
- letters  from Tanzanian inmates  in Hong Kong prisons

This website's HK Asylum Seekers' File
(stopping South Asians from being "people smuggled" to HK)

Islam File    The New Translation

"Same-sex marriage" file

Fat facts lay waste to sugar's sins

In the 1960s the sugar industry paid scientists to downplay the link between heart disease and sugar consumption, and to pin the blame on saturated fat instead. The consequences are  five decades of nutrition research tainted by the sugar industry's interference

What a great photo - from Here

Click other photos at bottom of link for beautiful enlargements

25-year-old Malaysian Chinese may have solved superbug problem

Scientists in Australia this week took a quantum leap in the war on superbugs. And the star of the show is a 25-year-old Chinese PhD candidate at the University of Melbourne

c.f. Readings for "Sunday 25"

Amos 1-9

It was God who formed the mountains and created the wind.
The Lord is his name.

He says to the House of Israel:

Seek me and you shall live. Do not go to the places of idol worship.

Seek good and not evil, so that you may live. Hate evil and love good.

Injustice and swindling, exploitation of the poor, this is the reason for earthquakes and disaster.

Lord, please help me to do good and avoid evil

My recording of this reading

Psalm 113

Praise, O friends of the Lord,
praise the name of the Lord.

May the name of the Lord be blessed both now and for evermore.

From the rising of the sun to its setting praised be the name of the Lord.

Who is like the Lord our God,
above the heavens his glory.

From the dust he lifts up the lowly, to put them in the company of royalty.

To the childless wife he gives a home and gladdens her heart with children.

May the Lord be praised from sunrise to sunset

Recording 

1 Timothy 1.18 - 2.8

Timothy, my son, as I give you advice for practical issues, remember how the church elders prayed over you that you would be a good leader

My first bit of advice is that there should be prayers offered for everyone, especially for kings and others in authority, so that we can live our life of faith in peace and quiet

God wants everyone to be saved and reach full knowledge of the truth

There is only one God, and there is only one mediator between God and humanity, himself a man, Christ Jesus, who sacrificed himself as a ransom for everyone

In every place, I want believers to lift up their hands in reverent prayer

God our Father, through Jesus your Son, I ask a blessing on the leaders of our world, especially the leaders of my own country

Recording  

Matthew 6.16-24

Jesus said to the crowds:

When you do a bit of fasting,
don't run round telling the world what you are doing. Secret fasting is spiritually powerful.

Your most  important account  is with the Bank of Heaven. Build up your deposit with lots of good deeds and prayers.

Physical blindness is a great tragedy. Greater still is spiritual blindness.

God must be number one in your life. Don't let money or anything else replace God.

Jesus, please be Number One in my life

Recording  

The Joy of Love - Pope Francis' letter - on love in the family      Full English text

163: Recording

Longer life spans now mean that close and exclusive relationships must last for four, five or even six decades; consequently, the initial decision has to be frequently renewed.

While one of the spouses may no longer experience an intense sexual desire for the other, he or she may still experience the pleasure of mutual belonging and the knowledge that neither of them is alone but has a “partner” with whom everything in life is shared.

He or she is a companion on life’s journey, one with whom to face life’s difficulties and enjoy its pleasures. This satisfaction is part of the affection proper to conjugal love. 

There is no guarantee that we will feel the same way all through life. Yet if a couple can come up with a shared and lasting life project, they can love one another and live as one until death do them part, enjoying an enriching intimacy.

The love they pledge is greater than any emotion, feeling or state of mind, although it may include all of these. It is a deeper love, a lifelong decision of the heart. 

Even amid unresolved conflicts and confused emotional situations, they daily reaffirm their decision to love, to belong to one another, to share their lives and to continue loving and forgiving. Each progresses along the path of personal growth and development. On this journey, love rejoices at every step and in every new stage.

 How Beijing manipulates legislative elections in Hong Kong

155a: Recording

Human ecology also implies another profound reality: the relationship between human life and the moral law, which is inscribed in our nature and is necessary for the creation of a more dignified environment. 

Pope Benedict XVI spoke of an “ecology of man”, based on the fact that “man too has a nature that he must respect and that he cannot manipulate at will”.[120] It is enough to recognize that our body itself establishes us in a direct relationship with the environment and with other living beings.

The acceptance of our bodies as God’s gift is vital for welcoming and accepting the entire world as a gift from the Father and our common home, whereas thinking that we enjoy absolute power over our own bodies turns, often subtly, into thinking that we enjoy absolute power over creation.

159: Recording

 Another feature of a good homily is that it is positive. It is not so much concerned with pointing out what shouldn’t be done, but with suggesting what we can do better.

 In any case, if it does draw attention to something negative, it will also attempt to point to a positive and attractive value, lest it remain mired in complaints, laments, criticisms and reproaches.

 Positive preaching always offers hope, points to the future, does not leave us trapped in negativity.

How good it is when priests, deacons and the laity gather periodically to discover resources which can make preaching more attractive!

10 years ago
 today

2006-09-18 Hong Kong OMI's Slawek and Thomas at Marco Polo, Bahkita and Mazenod
centers

Last Friday I fulfilled a promise to spend the Mid-Autumn public holiday with a special group of inmates at Hei Ling Chau Island drug treatment centre .... the 21 men of the "Garden" group ... mostly men who been in detention many times. They were very kind to me, even giving me lunch: a mug of tasty congee!

Please join me in praying for one part of the world each day of the week:

Sun: Africa        Mon: Europe & Russia     Tues: South Asia      Wed: East Asia  
Thurs: S.E. Asia & Pacific       Frid: South America       Sat: Central & North America 
  
Jesus, today, Sunday,  please bless the people of Africa

And praying for prisoners in one part of China each day of the month:
On this 18th of the month,  Jesus please bless the prisoners of Shandong

And praying for one of the world's poorest countries each day of the month:
On this 18th of the month, Jesus please bless the people of Ivory Coast

And praying for one Islam-related intention each day of the week:
Jesus, please bless all Muslims in my own country 

Letters from (mainly African) inmates in Hong Kong prisons - and other drug trafficking items:   2016

This website's Tanzania File
(stopping Africans from being tricked into bringing drugs to HK)
- letters  from Tanzanian inmates  in Hong Kong prisons

This website's HK Asylum Seekers' File
(stopping South Asians from being "people smuggled" to HK)

Islam File    The New Translation

"Same-sex marriage" file

At this link I've ordered the book ... and made a donation. Let's get involved before the February 11 marriage plebiscite in Australia!

At the link, see especially the 9 minute YouTube: “Cella's Story”  about "Safe Schools". It got half a million views on FaceBook in just five days. Powerful. How the LGBT agenda is infiltrating education.

This has importance for Hong Kong and so many other places

Letters from an Indonesian woman in prison in Hong Kong

This story has all the elements of a "set-up", an increasingly common happening in today's HK, sadly

Jeremiah 21-23

Jerusalem was under siege by the Chaldaeans. The Lord told Jeremiah to tell the leaders of Jerusalem to surrender.

But the leaders of Jerusalem did not obey Jeremiah's words. So the Lord got Jeremiah to say these words:

"Woe to the shepherds who allow my sheep to be scattered and killed. You have not taken care of my sheep.

Therefore I will raise up a leader who will be wise and just. He will be a good shepherd of my people."

Lord, please help our leaders to be good shepherds

My recording of this reading

Psalms 38-39

O Lord, please forgive my sins and heal me. Heal my body which is sick because of my sins.

Protect me, Lord, from those who gloat over me now that I am brought low and unable to help myself.

Lord, you have shown me how short a time I have on earth. Lord, give me wisdom of heart to live my life better.

Lord, help us understand the meaning of life

Recording  

1 John 3.16-21

This has taught us love: that Jesus gave up his life for us.
We too should give up our lives for others

If you see someone in need and refuse to help him, how can the love of God be in you?

Our love must be put into practice, not be just words.
Anyone who loves God must also love other people

Jesus, help me put my love into practice by helping people in need

Recording   

Matthew 26.17-29

On Passover Eve, Jesus ate a last meal with his apostles.

While they were eating, Jesus told them he knew he would be betrayed by one of them. He told Judas he knew he was the betrayer.

Then Jesus took some bread, blessed it and gave it to his apostles saying "Take this and eat it. This is my body".

Then he took a cup of wine, blessed it and gave it to them saying
"Take this and drink it. This is my blood".

Jesus, please help me understand how bread and wine become your body and blood when Christians celebrate the Eucharist

Recording  

4 surrender to police in Wukan ‘rebel’ village as police detain Shenzhen woman for sharing foreign news

The Joy of Love - Pope Francis' letter - on love in the family      Full English text

162: Recording

Celibacy can risk becoming a comfortable single life that provides the freedom to be independent, to move from one residence, work or option to another, to spend money as one sees fit and to spend time with others as one wants.

In such cases, the witness of married people becomes especially eloquent. 

Those called to virginity can encounter in some marriages a clear sign of God’s generous and steadfast fidelity to his covenant, and this can move them to a more concrete and generous availability to others.

Many married couples remain faithful when one of them has become physically unattractive, or fails to satisfy the other’s needs, despite the voices in our society that might encourage them to be unfaithful or to leave the other. 

A wife can care for her sick husband and thus, in drawing near to the Cross, renew her commitment to love unto death. In such love, the dignity of the true lover shines forth, inasmuch as it is more proper to charity to love than to be loved.

We could also point to the presence in many families of a capacity for selfless and loving service when children prove troublesome and even ungrateful. This makes those parents a sign of the free and selfless love of Jesus. 

Cases like these encourage celibate persons to live their commitment to the Kingdom with greater generosity and openness. 

Today, secularization has obscured the value of a life-long union and the beauty of the vocation to marriage. For this reason, it is “necessary to deepen an understanding of the positive aspects of conjugal love”.173

154: Recording 

Respect for our dignity as human beings often jars with the chaotic realities that people have to endure in city life. 

Yet this should not make us overlook the abandonment and neglect also experienced by some rural populations which lack access to essential services and where some workers are reduced to conditions of servitude, without rights or even the hope of a more dignified life.

158b: Recording

The greatest risk for a preacher is that he becomes so accustomed to his own language that he thinks that everyone else naturally understands and uses it. If we wish to adapt to people’s language and to reach them with God’s word, we need to share in their lives and pay loving attention to them. 

Simplicity and clarity are two different things. Our language may be simple but our preaching not very clear. It can end up being incomprehensible because it is disorganized, lacks logical progression or tries to deal with too many things at one time. We need to ensure, then, that the homily has thematic unity, clear order and correlation between sentences, so that people can follow the preacher easily and grasp his line of argument. 

10 years ago
 on this day

At the start of this week there were media articles about a typhoon expected to hit HK Wed-Thurs-Friday ....spoiling the celebration of this year's Mid-Autumn Festival. Well, the typhoon never affected HK ....it unexpectedly veered sharply to the right and headed for Mainland China ....and people in HK were able to see a beautiful full moon on Thursday night. ..... and I know of a group of Christians in HK who prayed on Tuesday that the typhoon would miss HK!

Please join me in praying for one part of the world each day of the week:

Sun: Africa        Mon: Europe & Russia     Tues: South Asia      Wed: East Asia  
Thurs: S.E. Asia & Pacific       Frid: South America       Sat: Central & North America 
  
Jesus, today, Saturday,  please bless the people of Central & North America

And praying for prisoners in one part of China each day of the month:
On this 17th of the month,  Jesus please bless the prisoners of Shaanxi

And praying for one of the world's poorest countries each day of the month:
On this 17th of the month, Jesus please bless the people of Malawi

And praying for one Islam-related intention each day of the week:
Jesus, please pacify the Taliban

Letters from (mainly African) inmates in Hong Kong prisons - and other drug trafficking items:   2016

This website's Tanzania File
(stopping Africans from being tricked into bringing drugs to HK)
- letters  from Tanzanian inmates  in Hong Kong prisons

This website's HK Asylum Seekers' File
(stopping South Asians from being "people smuggled" to HK)

There's something extra special about the blue and white picture of Mother Teresa. Yesterday in the Hospital section of Lai Chi Kok Reception Centre as I gave out copies of the HK Catholic Diocesan (Chinese) paper ...whose current front page is a huge photo of Mother Teresa ....it had an almost magical effect on the drug addicts lying in pain ... the sight of MT caused an almost physical reaction on their faces....a semi-smile that I can't find words to describe 

Letter from a Kenyan women in prison in HK for drug trafficking.
Here (Aug 27)

Filipina tourist charged with trafficking cocaine worth $4 million

Letter from a Filipina in prison in HK for drug trafficking - how she was tricked by another Filipina - Jennifer Seibert Barlolong (link below has her photo) - to bring drugs from Dubai to Hong Kong. Here  (August 21)

Jeremiah 18-20

Some officials decided to get rid of Jeremiah. They did not want to listen to his message any more.
"Come on,", they said, "let us make a case against him."

Jeremiah prayed to God: "Lord, you know that people are plotting against me. Please help me and keep me safe."

One of the Temple priests had Jeremiah beaten and put in stocks for a day near the Temple.

Again Jeremiah prayed to God:
"You have seduced me, Lord.
You have told me to proclaim a harsh message for the people.

This has made me a laughing- stock. Being your messenger has caused me insult  all the day long.

At one stage I even thought of not speaking your message any more. But then I felt a fire burning in my heart. 

I could not stop thinking of you. 
I just had to speak your message."

Lord,  please increase my love for you. Please give me more courage to speak your message to my family, friends and people I meet

My recording of this reading

Psalms 35-37

O Lord, please save me from people who slander me, you who rescue the weak from the strong, you whose love is so precious,
you in whose light we see light.

We believe that if we find our delight in you, you will grant our heart's desire.

And so we commit our lives to you, confident you will help us in time of trouble.

Lord, please deepen our trust in you, especially in time of trouble

Recording  

1 John 3.1-3

Think of the love that the Father has lavished on us by letting us be called God's children

And God's love has even more in store for us in the future: we shall be like him because we shall see him as he really is

This is why we must try to live good lives. We must try to be as good as Christ

Jesus, please help me be more like you

Recording

Famous song 
- sung by children's group - "Behold what manner of love"

Matthew 26.1-16

A few days before the Passover festival, the religious leaders kept looking for a way to arrest Jesus and have him put to death

Jesus knew what was happening. He told his disciples "In a few days I will be crucified".

During these days Jesus had a meal at the home of Simon the leper.

At the meal, a woman put expensive burial oil on Jesus' head. The woman understood  that Jesus was soon to die.

One of Jesus' 12 apostles, Judas Iscariot, went to the religious leaders and offered to help them arrest Jesus at a convenient time.

The leaders paid Judas 30 pieces of silver. Judas looked for an opportunity to arrange the arrest.

Jesus, please forgive me for the times when I have not been faithful  to you 

Recording  

Croatian athlete wins Olympic bronze, but takes spiritual gold

The Joy of Love - Pope Francis' letter - on love in the family      Full English text

161: Recording

The value of virginity lies in its symbolizing a love that has no need to possess the other; in this way it reflects the freedom of the Kingdom of Heaven. Virginity encourages married couples to live their own conjugal love against the backdrop of Christ’s definitive love, journeying together towards the fullness of the Kingdom. For its part, conjugal love symbolizes other values. On the one hand, it is a particular reflection of that full unity in distinction found in the Trinity. The family is also a sign of Christ. It manifests the closeness of God who is a part of every human life, since he became one with us through his incarnation, death and resurrection. Each spouse becomes “one flesh” with the other as a sign of willingness to share everything with him or her until death. Whereas virginity is an “eschatological” sign of the risen Christ, marriage is a “historical” sign for us living in this world, a sign of the earthly Christ who chose to become one with us and gave himself up for us even to shedding his blood. Virginity and marriage are, and must be, different ways of loving. For “man cannot live without love. He remains a being that is incomprehensible for himself, his life is senseless, if love is not revealed to him”.171

I know one good friend from HK who will be in Assisi for this gathering:
Pope's inter-faith summit in Assisi belongs to an ongoing revolution

Australian 'drug kingpin' arrested in Phuket bar

153: Recording

The quality of life in cities has much to do with systems of transport, which are often a source of much suffering for those who use them. 

Many cars, used by one or more people, circulate in cities, causing traffic congestion, raising the level of pollution, and consuming enormous quantities of non-renewable energy. This makes it necessary to build more roads and parking areas which spoil the urban landscape.

Many specialists agree on the need to give priority to public transportation. Yet some measures needed will not prove easily acceptable to society unless substantial improvements are made in the systems themselves, which in many cities force people to put up with undignified conditions due to crowding, inconvenience, infrequent service and lack of safety.

Austrian cardinal warns of 'Islamic conquest' of Europe

158a: Recording

Paul VI said that “the faithful… expect much from preaching, and will greatly benefit from it, provided that it is simple, clear, direct, well-adapted”. 

Simplicity has to do with the language we use. It must be one that people understand, lest we risk speaking to a void. Preachers often use words learned during their studies and in specialized settings which are not part of the ordinary language of their hearers. These are words that are suitable in theology or catechesis, but whose meaning is incomprehensible to the majority of Christians

10 years ago today

2006-09-16 Saturday- English class at Ricci Memorial Center, CAS overseas staff at Dynasty
dinner, Mrs Lee at San Mau Hospital

When I was in Tanzania in January 15 I took this photo of African woman with a bucket on her head ....a sample of the skill of African women able to carry large/heavy objects on their heads. In HK I'd never seen anything like it ...until yesterday...after my visit to Lai Chi Kok Reception Centre ...at LCK MTR (Metro) station ....going through the turnstyles....there was an African woman with a huge item on her head ...causing everyone around to ask the same question as I did in Tanzania: how does she do it?!

Please join me in praying for one part of the world each day of the week:

Sun: Africa        Mon: Europe & Russia     Tues: South Asia      Wed: East Asia  
Thurs: S.E. Asia & Pacific       Frid: South America       Sat: Central & North America 
  
Jesus, today, Friday,  please bless the people of South America

And praying for prisoners in one part of China each day of the month:
On this 16th of the month,  Jesus please bless the prisoners of Qinghai

And praying for one of the world's poorest countries each day of the month:
On this 16th of the month, Jesus please bless the people of Afghanistan

And praying for one Islam-related intention each day of the week:
Jesus, on this Muslim day of prayer, please bless all Muslims!

Letters from (mainly African) inmates in Hong Kong prisons - and other drug trafficking items:   2016

This website's Tanzania File
(stopping Africans from being tricked into bringing drugs to HK)
- letters  from Tanzanian inmates  in Hong Kong prisons

This website's HK Asylum Seekers' File
(stopping South Asians from being "people smuggled" to HK)

Yesterday morning I was at the High Court in support of a 22 year old Peru man sentenced for drug trafficking. He received a sentence of 11.8 years for 455 grams of cocaine.
In the afternoon I visited Pik Uk Prison (under 21 section) where I was saddened to see so many other young men - most of them local HK Chinese men -  facing long sentences for drug trafficking.     

Tonight Chinese families have a reunion meal for the Mid-Autumn Festival, the second most important day in the Chinese calendar after Lunar New Year. A holiday tomorrow in HK and other places. I wish all dear readers a Happy Mid-Autumn!

The Big Bang - How much do you know?

I got only 3/10! Can you beat that?!

HK$1.3 million drug bust - Two Colombian men may face life sentence in Hong Kong

Readings for Feast of Mary of Sorrows

Hebrews 5.7-9

During his life on earth, Christ offered up prayer and entreaty, aloud and in silent tears, to the one who had the power to save him out of death, and he submitted so humbly that his prayer was heard.

Although he was Son, he learnt to obey through suffering; but having been made perfect, he became for all who obey him the source of eternal salvation.

My recording of this reading

Psalm 31:

Recording

A traditional prayer on this day: The Stabat Mater

At the Cross her station keeping, stood the mournful Mother weeping, close to her Son to the last

Luke 2.33-35

As the child’s father and mother stood there wondering at the things that were being said about him, Simeon blessed them and said to Mary his mother:

‘You see this child: he is destined for the fall and for the rising of many in Israel, destined to be a sign that is rejected – and a sword will pierce your own soul too – so that the secret thoughts of many may be laid bare.’

Recording

John 19.25-27

Near the cross of Jesus stood his mother and his mother’s sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary of Magdala.

Seeing his mother and the disciple he loved standing near her, Jesus said to his mother, ‘Woman, this is your son. 

Then to the disciple he said, ‘This is your mother.’ And from that moment the disciple made a place for her in his home

Recording

O dear Mother, fount of love.
Touch my spirit from above,
make my heart with thine accord:

Make me feel as thou hast felt;
make my soul to glow and melt
with the love of Christ my Lord.

The Joy of Love - Pope Francis' letter - on love in the family      Full English text

160: Recording

Consequently, “it is not a matter of diminishing the value of matrimony in favour of continence”.

 “There is no basis for playing one off against the other… If, following a certain theological tradition, one speaks of a ‘state of perfection’ (status perfectionis), this has to do not with continence in itself, but with the entirety of a life based on the evangelical counsels”.

A married person can experience the highest degree of charity and thus “reach the perfection which flows from charity, through fidelity to the spirit of those counsels. Such perfection is possible and accessible to every man and woman”.

152: Recording 

Lack of housing is a grave problem in many parts of the world, both in rural areas and in large cities, since state budgets usually cover only a small portion of the demand. 

Not only the poor, but many other members of society as well, find it difficult to own a home. Having a home has much to do with a sense of personal dignity and the growth of families.

This is a major issue for human ecology. In some places, where makeshift shanty towns have sprung up, this will mean developing those neighbourhoods rather than razing or displacing them.

When the poor live in unsanitary slums or in dangerous tenements, “in cases where it is necessary to relocate them, in order not to heap suffering upon suffering, adequate information needs to be given beforehand, with choices of decent housing offered, and the people directly involved must be part of the process”.[118] 

At the same time, creativity should be shown in integrating rundown neighbourhoods into a welcoming city: “How beautiful those cities which overcome paralyzing mistrust, integrate those who are different and make this very integration a new factor of development! How attractive are those cities which, even in their architectural design, are full of spaces which connect, relate and favour the recognition of others!”[119]

152: Recording

There is one particular way of listening to what the Lord wishes to tell us in his word and of letting ourselves be transformed by the Spirit. It is what we call lectio divina.

It consists of reading God’s word in a moment of prayer and allowing it to enlighten and renew us.

This prayerful reading of the Bible is not something separate from the study undertaken by the preacher to ascertain the central message of the text; on the contrary, it should begin with that study and then go on to discern how that same message speaks to his own life. 

The spiritual reading of a text must start with its literal sense. Otherwise we can easily make the text say what we think is convenient, useful for confirming us in our previous decisions, suited to our own patterns of thought. Ultimately this would be tantamount to using something sacred for our own benefit and then passing on this confusion to God’s people. We must never forget that sometimes “even Satan disguises himself as an angel of light” (2 Cor 11:14).

10 years ago today

Yesterday a local Chinese man not long out of prison phoned me to arrange a get-together. He said I know him. I couldn't remember him at first, so I asked him how long he had been in prison. He answered "26 years"! Which I got him to repeat a couple of times to make sure I wasn't mishearing him!

Please join me in praying for one part of the world each day of the week:

Sun: Africa        Mon: Europe & Russia     Tues: South Asia      Wed: East Asia  
Thurs: S.E. Asia & Pacific       Frid: South America       Sat: Central & North America 
  
Jesus, today, Thursday,  please bless the people of S.E. Asia & Pacific

And praying for prisoners in one part of China each day of the month:
On this 15th of the month,  Jesus please bless the prisoners of Liaoning

And praying for one of the world's poorest countries each day of the month:
On this 15th of the month, Jesus please bless the people of Zimbabwe

And praying for one Islam-related intention each day of the week:
Jesus, please pacify Al-Qaeda

Letters from (mainly African) inmates in Hong Kong prisons - and other drug trafficking items:   2016

This website's Tanzania File
(stopping Africans from being tricked into bringing drugs to HK)
- letters  from Tanzanian inmates  in Hong Kong prisons

This website's HK Asylum Seekers' File
(stopping South Asians from being "people smuggled" to HK)

If same-sex marriage becomes law, you will not be able to stop this

“Safe Schools” founder Roz Ward is to today lead a class of nine-year olds in Melbourne in the gender change of a child

Pope okays Argentine document on Communion for divorced & remarried

30 year old woman arrested at HK airport

$3.9M cocaine shipment intercepted from Manila

Maybe the woman was sent by one Chris Williams in Manila - as in this case

Chris McDonnell   (UK blogger)

Repairing the damaged
beam before it fails

There are times when you need to challenge in order to come to a deeper understanding of truth

Readings for Feast of The Cross

Numbers 21: 

In order to avoid the land of Edom, the Israelites headed towards the coastline.

But the people again criticized God and Moses.

So God sent snakes among the people, and many people died.

The people then said to Moses "We have sinned; please pray 
for us to save us".

Moses prayed for them, and God heard his prayer.

God told Moses to make a bronze snake and put it on a pole. Anyone bitten by a snake could then look at the bronze snake
and live

Jesus' words (John 3.13):  "The Son of Man must be lifted up
as Moses lifted up the serpent in the desert, so that everyone who believes may have eternal life in him".

Recording 

Psalm  78 (b)

May future generations not be like our ancestors who so often were unfaithful to God.

Even though our ancestors had seen God part the sea, even though they had seen him provide food and water for them in the desert, still they went on sinning.

Yet he who is full of compassion forgave and spared them. He remembered they were only weak humans.

Eventually he brought them to the promised land and gave a home to each of Israel's tribes.

But still they sinned by building mountain shrines and serving idols.

Then God raised up David to be their leader. God called him from looking after sheep to be the shepherd of his people.

Lord, help us not to forget all you have done for us

Recording   

Philippians 2.6-11

Recording 
(song: The Philippians Hymn)

For today's Feast of The Cross,
a beautiful poem: Retreat
by James McAuley

Verses 2 & 3:

Soon you must return to tasks
That sicken and appall:
The calumnies will never cease,
Look only to the sign of peace,
The Cross upon the wall.  

This is that sole instrument
That measures every chart;
This square and level overrules
The subtle calculus of fools
By a celestial art.  

John 3.13-16

Recording

The Joy of Love - Pope Francis' letter - on love in the family     Full English text

159: Recording

Virginity is a form of love.

As a sign, it speaks to us of the coming of the Kingdom and the need for complete devotion to the cause of the Gospel (cf. 1 Cor 7:32). It is also a reflection of the fullness of heaven, where “they neither marry nor are given in marriage” (Mt 22:30).

Saint Paul recommended virginity because he expected Jesus’ imminent return and he wanted everyone to concentrate only on spreading the Gospel: “the appointed time has grown very short” (1 Cor 7:29). Nonetheless, he made it clear that this was his personal opinion and preference (cf. 1 Cor 7:6-9), not something demanded by Christ: “I have no command in the Lord” (1 Cor 7:25). All the same, he recognized the value of the different callings: “Each has his or her own special gift from God, one of one kind and one of another” (1 Cor 7:7).

Reflecting on this, Saint John Paul II noted that the biblical texts “give no reason to assert the ‘inferiority’ of marriage, nor the ‘superiority’ of virginity or celibacy” based on sexual abstinence.

Rather than speak absolutely of the superiority of virginity, it should be enough to point out that the different states of life complement one another, and consequently that some can be more perfect in one way and others in another. Alexander of Hales, for example, stated that in one sense marriage may be considered superior to the other sacraments, inasmuch as it symbolizes the great reality of “Christ’s union with the Church, or the union of his divine and human natures”.

151: Recording 

There is also a need to protect those common areas, visual landmarks and urban landscapes which increase our sense of belonging, of rootedness, of “feeling at home” within a city which includes us and brings us together. 

It is important that the different parts of a city be well integrated and that those who live there have a sense of the whole, rather than being confined to one neighbourhood and failing to see the larger city as space which they share with others.

Interventions which affect the urban or rural landscape should take into account how various elements combine to form a whole which is perceived by its inhabitants as a coherent and meaningful framework for their lives. Others will then no longer be seen as strangers, but as part of a “we” which all of us are working to create. For this same reason, in both urban and rural settings, it is helpful to set aside some places which can be preserved and protected from constant changes brought by human intervention.

157: Recording

Simply using a few examples, let us recall some practical resources which can enrich our preaching and make it more attractive. 

One of the most important things is to learn how to use images in preaching, how to appeal to imagery. Sometimes examples are used to clarify a certain point, but these examples usually appeal only to the mind; images, on the other hand, help people better to appreciate and accept the message we wish to communicate.

An attractive image makes the message seem familiar, close to home, practical and related to everyday life. A successful image can make people savour the message, awaken a desire and move the will towards the Gospel. A good homily, an old teacher once told me, should have “an idea, a sentiment, an image.”

Please join me in praying for one part of the world each day of the week:

Sun: Africa        Mon: Europe & Russia     Tues: South Asia      Wed: East Asia  
Thurs: S.E. Asia & Pacific       Frid: South America       Sat: Central & North America 
  
Jesus, today, Wednesday,  please bless the people of East Asia

And praying for prisoners in one part of China each day of the month:
On this 14th of the month,  Jesus please bless the prisoners of Jilin

And praying for one of the world's poorest countries each day of the month:
On this 14th of the month, Jesus please bless the people of Ethiopia

And praying for one Islam-related intention each day of the week:
Jesus, please pacify Al-Shabaab 

Letters from (mainly African) inmates in Hong Kong prisons - and other drug trafficking items:   2016

This website's Tanzania File
(stopping Africans from being tricked into bringing drugs to HK)
- letters  from Tanzanian inmates  in Hong Kong prisons

This website's HK Asylum Seekers' File
(stopping South Asians from being "people smuggled" to HK)