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Lord My Chef Daily Recipe for Soul by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II Friday, Nineteenth Week in Ordinary Time, Year II Memorial of St. Maximilian Kolbe, Priest & Martyr, 14 August 2026
O God our loving Father, help us to always remember - our origins and beginnings, our past especially the people who had cared and nurtured us, our parents and siblings, relatives and friends, those who gave us the breaks and sparks to begin our great journeys in life, the people who stood by when we were down and nobody believed us: dear God, remind us always of the basic fact, of the principle and foundation of our being: that we came from you and shall return to you.
Forgive us, Lord God, in forgetting you always, in forgetting others, in forgetting we are nothing without you; touch us, nudge us if needed whenever we forget you and our lowly beginnings; let us not be amazed by our feats and abilities.
But you were captivated by your own beauty, you used your renown to make yourself a harlot, and you lavished your harlotry on every passer-by, whose own you became. Yet I will remember the covenant I made with you when you were a girl, and I will set up an everlasting covenant with you, that you may remember and be covered with confusion, and that you may be utterly silenced for shame when I pardon you for all you have done, says the Lord God (Ezekiel 16:15, 60-63).
As we celebrate today the Memorial of your most faithful servant St. Maximilian Kolbe who offered himself not just once for a fellow prisoner in Auschwitz for he had dedicated himself to you entirely before World War II began, may we remember the lessons that led to the Holocaust; like St. Maximilian Kolbe may we continue to remember your covenant in Jesus Christ by making a stand against injustice and immorality, in defending life especially at its weakest points, and most of all, in remembering the equal dignity of every person created in your image and likeness; like what Jesus told the Pharisees, let us go back to Paradise, let us return to you, O God, as our Lord and Master alone, not ourselves, nor our pride and convenience, nor anyone nor their flimsy, modern thoughts and ideas; like St. Maximilian Kolbe, may we have the courage to always stand forward for what is true and good and holy. Amen.
