respect...honor...dignity.

There are so many different ways of honoring a person. Some earn honor by finishing from school with high grades. Others receive honor by earning medals and plaques of recognition. Some are honored by being members of selected groups of individuals such as associations, clubs and fraternities.

If there are different ways of honoring people, there are also ways of shaming and embarrassing people. People are shamed when you expose their faults in public and their weaknesses become the talk of the town. People are shamed when they are stripped naked in public.

During the time of the Lord, there were distinctive ways of honoring and shaming individuals.
Example: all males were born with honor because to be born male was to be an honorable person.
On the other hand, at that time, females were born with shame, because to be a woman was to have a defect in your personhood.

The Gospel of John 8: 1-11 tells us that at that time, if a woman committed adultery, her husband could divorce her but the Jewish custom stated that a wife could not divorce her husband who has committed concubinage. Only a husband could divorce his wife but not vice versa. When a husband committed the act of taking another woman, the one deemed guilty of sin was the woman he had taken as another wife.

This is how distorted, truncated and ill-fated the Jewish beliefs were about personhood, about womanhood, about manhood.
To be a man was honorable. To be a woman was a reason for shame. At that time, children were also considered inferior members of society.

Then Jesus Christ came forward and pointed out that it is wrong for a husband to divorce his wife so he can marry another. Both husband and wife commit adultery if they remarry.

The Lord said that in the beginning, God created males and females, co-equals in the life of grace. The Gospel of John says we are all equal.

Men and women are equal to one another. Man, woman and child are equal to each other.

If we look into our lives, we will see how far we are from the way the Lord wants us to live.

Example: we have broken marriages and homes right in Catholic families. Who suffers? Perhaps the husband and wife suffer. But don't you think and realize that the first and the most helpless victims are the children? This is a very serious injustice to them. If children are created equal to parents, why do they have to suffer needlessly, as a result of the stupidity of their parents?

If the husbands and wives are co-equals in the life of grace, why is the mother blamed solely for their failure in parenting? It should be noted that parenting is not the exclusive duty and responsibility of the mother only. Both parents are answerable to God for any failure in rearing their children. Not only the wife or the mother.

If men and women are co-equals in the life of grace, why are pornographic prints and videos of women dominately circulate in the metropolis?

We have reduced the equality of men and women to the point that we-men, forget our responsibility to respect you-dear women.

Dear friends , brothers and sisters, I can go on and on and cite countless issues. But I know that each of you have your own stories to tell.

The Lord created men, women and children, equal to one another. Dear parents, please remember that your sons and daughters are your first brothers and sisters on account of baptism.

God did not create us to shame us. God did not create us to embarrass us.

He created us to give us honor and dignity.

Let us treat each other with utmost dignity. Let us treat each other as co-equals with respect, honor and dignity.

Bless us all as we continue to observe the fourth week of Lent.