Christ, our peace, calls us to keep our lamps burning and our hearts ready.

In a world still fractured by walls of enmity and distracted by the urgent noise of the present hour, Christ our peace calls us to keep our lamps burning and our hearts ready.

Today is Tuesday of the Twenty-ninth Week in Ordinary Time. It is also the optional memorial of St. Paul of the Cross, the eighteenth-century Italian priest and founder of the Passionists, whose life was spent keeping the memory of the Cross alive as the true source of reconciliation and peace.

The first reading from Ephesians 2:12-22 reminds us who we once were and who we have become. Once “far off,” strangers to the covenants and “without hope and without God in the world,” we have been brought near “by the blood of Christ.” He is our peace: in His flesh He broke down the dividing wall of hostility, abolished the enmity, and created “one new person” in place of the two, reconciling both to God in one body through the cross. We are no longer strangers but “fellow citizens with the holy ones and members of the household of God,” built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets with Christ Jesus Himself as the cornerstone, growing into a holy temple, a dwelling place of God in the Spirit. The Responsorial Psalm (Psalm 85) sings the same truth: “The Lord speaks of peace to his people… Kindness and truth shall meet; justice and peace shall kiss.”

This is not abstract theology. St. John Chrysostom, preaching on these verses, saw in Christ’s work the full reconciliation of human beings both with God and with one another, the creation of one new humanity. In our own time the walls remain visible: political polarization, economic inequality, digital echo chambers, family estrangements, and the lingering wounds of injustice in many nations, including our own. The Cross still stands as the only place where true peace is forged—not by ignoring difference, but by the self-giving love that absorbs enmity and offers new life.

The Gospel (Luke 12:35-38) then gives the practical shape of living this peace. Jesus tells the disciples: “Gird your loins and light your lamps and be like servants who await their master’s return from a wedding, ready to open immediately when he comes and knocks. Blessed are those servants whom the master finds vigilant… he will gird himself, have them recline at table, and proceed to wait on them.” Whether He comes in the second or third watch, those found prepared are blessed.

The early Fathers read these images with pastoral precision. St. Augustine explained that girding the loins means restraining disordered desires and departing from evil (temperance), while lighting the lamps means doing good with right intention (justice). St. Gregory the Great likewise saw girded loins as the discipline of chastity and self-control, and burning lamps as the light of good works that guide others. St. Cyril of Alexandria noted that whoever is found watching—whether young or old—receives the blessing of the Master who Himself serves. The Didache already urged the early Christians: “Watch for your life’s sake. Let not your lamps be quenched, nor your loins unloosed.”

The Second Vatican Council echoes this vision. Lumen Gentium describes the Church as the temple and household of God in which the faithful are living stones, built together in the Spirit (citing precisely the language of Ephesians 2). Gaudium et Spes insists that earthly peace is not merely the absence of war but “an enterprise of justice” and the “fruit of love,” ultimately the fruit of the peace Christ won on the cross. The Catechism of the Catholic Church (nn. 2849, 2730) teaches that vigilance is “custody of the heart,” the ongoing spiritual watchfulness that keeps us ready for the Lord who comes in the Eucharist, in the poor, and at the end of our lives. In the Philippine context, the call of the Second Plenary Council of the Philippines (PCP II) to become a Church of the Poor, a community of disciples, and a force for authentic social transformation continues to invite us to dismantle the walls that still divide our neighborhoods, families, and nation.

Three concrete practices can keep our lamps burning:

First, set aside a brief daily moment—perhaps at night or early morning—for an examination of conscience and a short prayer of surrender. Ask simply, “Lord, have I kept the lamp of faith and charity alight today?” This small act trains the heart in the vigilance Jesus asks.

Second, choose one concrete wall of division in your life and begin to dismantle it. It may be a long-standing resentment in the family, an unspoken grudge with a neighbor, or a refusal to listen to someone who differs from you. Reconciliation is the lived form of the peace Christ has already won.

Third, perform one deliberate act of humble service each day, especially toward someone who cannot repay you—the elderly, a child, a colleague under stress, or a person in material need. In doing so we imitate the Master who girds Himself and waits on His servants.

St. Paul of the Cross lived this readiness. After a series of visions, he withdrew for forty days of solitude, wrote the Rule of the Passionists under inspiration, and spent nearly fifty years preaching parish missions centered on the Passion of Christ as the “miracle of miracles” of divine love. In an age of growing rationalism and forgetfulness of the Cross, he kept his own lamp burning by constant prayer, severe penance, and tireless service of the poor and the sick. He was always ready—whether the Master came in the “second watch” of his long missionary journeys or the “third watch” of his final years in Rome. His life shows that contemplation of the Cross and active readiness are not opposed; they are the same flame.

Let us pray:

Lord Jesus, our Peace and our Cornerstone,
break down the walls that still divide our hearts, our families, and our world.
Gird our loins with temperance, light our lamps with works of justice and mercy,
and keep us watchful in love until You come.
Through the intercession of St. Paul of the Cross,
make us ready servants who open the door at once
and who find, even now, that You have already come to serve us.
Amen.

Based on the Tagalog Mass readings