A Christmas Grace and the age of persecution

 

    Is it just me or does it seem like the Spirit of Christmas is going under if not all together becoming extinguished?  This Christmas more than ever, I seem to notice how much The Savior's birthday has come under attack. Maybe I am not paying attention but the enthusiasm about Christmas of past seems to have been eroded  by a nonsensical political correctness or may I say atheistic bullying that has become rampant. The default "Merry Christmas" phrase has been replaced with "happy holidays," and anybody who dares to differ with the so called "culture" and use the earlier instead of the later is accused of not being inclusive and forcing their religion on others as if religion is a poison that should be avoided at all cost. Should I continue about all the headlines I've been reading about countless cases of people complaining and suing left and right to remove a simple nativity scene from a public park, a courthouse, or even a neighborhood entrance with the claims that they are offended by the Christian message. Or maybe is the parent who sues the school because their child was in a school assembly and someone sang a Christmas song. I can continue but I wish not to share the headache that I get from seeing such hatred being directed to Godly things that if embraced would bring great joy to any person with an open heart.
    The reality is that even 20 centuries later, the prophecy remains true that God "came to his own but his own people accepted him not." (John 1:11) But why so much hatred? If those who do not believe in God are as free as they claim to be, why do they feel the need to persecute and trash those who do. Will not the truly free man enjoy his freedom in security? the fact of the matter is that no one is free apart from God, and should one claim to be free apart from the one who is the Truth, the only freedom they have is that of deceiving themselves. Obviously, without passing any judgment upon those who've acted so, it's their lack of peace in a despairing position that defies God that leads them to act in a manner that wishes to bring everyone down with them to the pits of unbelief and hatred of all that is good. To this, may God help them to know Him and love Him.
       Having concluded so however, my fear is not this type which is already cold, rather its in the interior lukewarmness that we all may be tempted to fall into.  Many Christians have allowed the worldly distractions to settle in their hearts and replace the joyful anticipation of the birth of Christ.  Many have become trepid giving in to the intimidation and the pressures of the world.  Now I must confess that were it not for God's grace, I could have despaired and asked like St. Peter "who could be saved," but the Lord has brought me to an epiphany that has made this Christmas a great grace for me.So what is this?
    This epiphany is a simple phrase that a friend of mine said to me a couple of years ago straight from the book of Zechariah 13:9 "I will test them as gold is tested, they shall call my name and I will hear them." This phrase is a great example of what we are going through. In the recent attacks on Christmas and those of us who desire to celebrate it, the purity of our intention is tested and purified. It's in this crucible of suffering and persecution that God purifies our hearts so that we can accept and love him with a greater purity. Even in a natural sense, it's always simple to love others when things are great between us but when things get difficult, our love is tested and if it's found wanting, we abandon those relationships and deem them unworthy.  This is the same case under the current persecution.  Our hearts are purified so that we can Love God for who He Is, instead of loving him for any other selfish reason.
    I remember like it was yesterday when a couple of years ago I was so afraid of simply making a sign of the cross which is deemed a classic Catholic practice that if I had to say grace in a restaurant, I would near go under the table in fear of others seeing me make the sign of the cross. I now laugh at such timidity ,but eventually God started speaking to my conscious by reminding me of those words by Christ that "those who acknowledge me before others, I will acknowledge them before my Father in heaven and those who deny me before men, I will also deny them before my Father."  In the light of these words and by God's grace, I started realizing that by crossing myself and invoking the Holy Trinity even in public was a way of sharing my faith, and God gave me the courage to do so. The next time I was in the middle of a coliseum with non-Catholics and being the lone person crossing myself.  Now, may it be in public or private, I do it for pure love of God and when eyes turn on me with a look of disapproval, I rejoice in the fact that God has given me the opportunity to die to myself so that I can live for Him.

   Coming back to my Christmas observation, we should also take heart to stand with Christ and joyfully proclaim and celebrate His birth and whether we are accepted or rejected, we should be encouraged by his promise from the beatitudes where he stated that "happy are you when they persecute you for my sake, rejoice, for great is your reward in heaven." Again, we should know that God uses the fire of persecution and suffering to purify us just "like gold is purified through fire." Therefore, we should stand firm and receive our newborn King the very Son of God our Lord Jesus Christ with great anticipation and joy. I  joyfully wish all of you a MERRY CHRISTMAS and a Happy New Year. May the blessings of Our Lord reign upon our lives now and forever more.

Dress and God: A call for modesty

Recently, I've been thinking about modesty in the light of the virtue of chastity. I admit that was it not for the assurance from the scriptures that "where sin abides, grace abides all the more," (Rom 5:20) I would have despaired by now. All it takes one to see how deprived we are of this virtue is to open his eyes. May it be sitting in the comfort of one's home and watching television, or being out in the markets of modern society, the observant man will conclude just from the fashion trends that we have either abandoned the once revered sense of modesty, or that we have abandoned it all together in search of a pseudo freedom that is not only destructive, but which has robbed many of the dignity that is due a person. I must confess that I have thought about writing on this topic for a long time but my procrastination syndrome to downright lack of ideas has kept me from it. This however was recently put to rest after reading an article titled "a letter to women" by my friend Brendan a university student whose courage has at least inspired me to give it a shot. Let me give you a taste of his no nonsense approach to the subject in a quote from his letter.
   "It is increasingly difficult for me to look at you without disrespecting you with my eyes. What else do you want me to think of when you wear skin-tight clothing? You have stripped yourself of everything that made you beautiful. You have offered yourself to many men and wonder why I do not treat you like the only woman in the world." You can read the rest of the letter here
    Before I continue, let me just make you aware that the this article was published in a university newspaper. Without saying anything further, you can already guess what kind of reaction this stirred to the credit of my friend whose courage was not deterred by an anticipated anger and downright lunacy. I am oft of the thought that especially for a young man and especially when it comes to chastity, being in a college campus is like "having one foot in hell and the other on a banana peel; either way you are going down." But like I stated before, where there is plenty of darkness, the light shines forth all the more, so in the same sentence, I think that the occasion to exercise the virtue of chastity is greatest in this circle.
 Since my friend has already addressed this topic with a forthright approach of which you can read in its entirelity here, I will take an alternate route and ride on the caution for the sake of the weak minded and the undiscerning hearts that may mistake the call to truth with personal attack.
    Now, why put God and dress in the same sentence? The answer can be found in 1 Corinthian 6:19; "do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit." This statement by the inspired Scripture writer forms the fundamental connection between God and how we dress. The first and foremost reason of why we should dress modestly is in honor of God whose love is so great that He has made our bodies a temple of His Holy Spirit and anything that is contrary to this truth is a lack of gratitude on our part of His gracious love. This alone should encourage all people of good will to take care of how they dress, and even in our hedonistic society where we think we have the sovereign right to our bodies to do with whatever we will, there lies a silent voice that tells us otherwise. I have often observed, especially in young girls whose consciences have not been fully desensitized, whereby while wearing either short dresses or tight clothing, there entire engagement when they sit is to try to pull their dresses to cover themselves more. This sense of shame goes to show that deep down inside, when we wear immodestly, we know that we have deviated from the good and our consciences condemn us. 
     However, our society has become so accustomed to this deviation, that we think it is the norm and even a good to let loose and wear or not wear anything and to think otherwise is to repress personal freedom that we have worked so long for.  This mindset goes to show that just like our first parents, in search for freedom apart from God, we succeed only to enter into the bondage of sin.  Unfortunately, the social sin of fashion trends that are meant only to deceive and to tempt have become the norm today.  Although not exclusive to women, this immodesty in clothing is at cancerous stages that only the grace of God and a rediscovery of truth can cure.  These days, the dress that was meant to be worn and sheepishly so in the nightclubs in now worn in the Church and revealing attire that only the unscrupulous of past generations wore has become the dress of choice regardless of where it's worn. The sense of shame is long gone and what is private in one's body has become public display as if it's a commodity to be admired by all.  Oh lost generation we are. So quickly to forget that we are the temple of the Holy Spirit and if undeterred by that to remember the words of Our Lord in Matthew 18:6 that; " whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in me to stumble, it would be better for him to have a heavy milestone hung around his neck and to be drowned in the depth of the sea." With words like these, we can see the dangers of immodesty both for the one dressed so and for the one who falls in the hands of their temptation. 
   I must say that dressing immodestly is not exclusive to women. While men are more prompt to fall from the women wearing short skirt, tight clothes and revealing tops among other things, men pulling their pants to their knees and showing their undergarments may be a cause of temptation for women. I however think that it might annoy them more than it tempts them. Men however fall mostly in their speech. The way they describe women and loosely use sexual terms in a disrespectful way does the same damage.  So what then?
    While I might point out multiple ways in which we have failed as a society with the promotion of immodest fashion trends to the point of leading some to despair, the prudent thing is to start addressing this issue in a truthful way. Being fallen like the rest, I can say that the premier step is to seek God's help first so that you yourself do not become an object of temptation for another, but also that you may not succumb to the temptations presented to you on a daily basis. This, pampered with speaking the truth in love whenever possible to those whose sense of modesty is all together eroded by society and trying to charitably arouse their consciences to the good that can be found in respecting one's body and not using it as an object of pleasure and allurement but rather as a temple of the Holy Spirit always ready to accept and give love both to God and neighbor. 
    Truly the damage has been done and it's great but once more we should not loose courage of acquiring the holy virtue of chastity which immodesty is its biggest casualty. I therefore urge you ladies to give thought to your dignity as the temple of the Holy Spirit  before you dress and how you ought to respect your body and you guys before you open you mouth to think of the same. It doesn't go without mentioning that the Purity of Jesus Our Lord and that of His holy mother Mary should be our standard. God help us all.

"The souls of the just are in the hand of God" - A friend named Doug

   "And they will be God's people, and God will be with them. And God will wipe their tears away, and death will be no more." As those words echoed in the Church tonight, my heart jumped and the memories of my friend Doug fell afresh in my mind.
    During the memorial service of all the faithful departed and in the middle of the liturgy of the hours, the priest gave a reflection and then invited all who were willing to share a story of a departed loved one and then proceed to light a candle in their memory. As the people tricked down to the microphone and shared their stories and lit candles, I knew it was time to honor a dear friend. So I followed suit and after briefly sharing my story, I lit the candle in his honor and went back to my sit. But my memories took me back.
   5 years ago, I stood in the porch of my dear friend Doug, looking into the woods and believing that he would be approaching down the driveway anytime.  I stared into the deep for a good while until I realized that he wasn't coming and he would never drive down that driveway again and then my tears flowed down my cheeks like a flood. Yes indeed, the story was true that he had been killed in a car accident the night before by a drunk driver who was driving on the wrong side of the highway just a few miles from his home.  The joy that his wife and kids had felt when he called them and told them he was on the way home from a business trip turned into sorrow and grief for them and so many others.  That evening after realizing that he wasn't coming, A deep sorrow cut into my soul as I remembered his family all too young to loose a husband and a dad. After a few hours as we were leaving the house which was filled with people, I still continued to think that soon, I would receive the news that this was a big confusion, but that never happened. The next few days I grieved in such a manner that up until this time in my life I had never done.  but why? Was it because before this I was used to loosing loved ones to sicknesses that lasted a long time preparing me for their departure while for my friend, death refused to knock at the door and just came rushing in disregarding everyone who would be left? Is this the reason my heart was so broken? While that could be a legitimate reason, my answer lays in how God had used this friend to touch my soul. While indeed I have many a great influences in my life, this influence was different. His love for God and the testimony of his life had left deep imprints in my soul at a fragile time in my life, and I was feeling an acute pain of separation as did many other persons that had known this man of God.
 Tonight on this All Souls Day feast, as I lit that candle in honor of Doug, I knew that although many people have fallen, this friend of mine had fell right into the arms of Jesus whom he loved so much. This comforted me greatly and although I still am sorrowed for the pain that his family still undergoes, I lifted them up to the throne of God who is their comfort and commended them to the prayers of their husband and father, son and son in law.
    Yes indeed this is the story of many, but for our departed loved ones, the story is unique. While I have shed many a tears while reading the lives of great saints like St. Therese of Lisieux, St. Padre Pio, Blessed Mother Theresa of Culcutta and our beloved late Pope Blessed John Paul II, it's the encounter with people like Doug who made a great impact in my life that reminds me that often, God sends into our lives people who are not only saintly but who can inspire us to become saints ourselves.  This is what Doug did for me and even now does through all the memories that never left.  We met in business Doug, but we remain united from our shared love of Our Lord Jesus Christ and while the earlier may fade, the later is everlasting.
     To Doug, all my loved ones who have died and all the faithful departed, God grant them eternal rest and may Your perpetual light shine upon them. And to those of us who are left, Guide us through the darkness of grief and bring us safely to your heavenly kingdom, through Christ our Lord. Amen.

Striking a balance between Idealism and Reality

    "The world is ruled by its ideals, those who create the higher ideals lift all mankind."  The same author who wrote the above words has been a big influence in my life after reading a small book he wrote called "can we be saints." In this book, Frank Duff, who is the founder of one of the largest lay organization in the Catholic Church called the Legion of Mary invites the reader to ponder that question. He presents the ideal of Christian perfection and how we are all called to become saints. The first time I read that book, I was ready to get on a plane and go somewhere in the world where they were persecuting Christians and lay my life down as a martyr. The voice of reason persuaded me otherwise, but a few years later, I still realize the importance of subscribing to the ideals that will lead us to fulfillment and bring us to our end which  is union with God.  I have also come to realize the imminent danger of the Church not taking seriously its mission to spread the Gospel.
    In my late teens when most people are looking hard for an identity, I was presented with the ideology of self-help and materialism. Although I am not downing self-help, there lies within it great dangers. Being a nominal "malformed" Catholic who hadn't subscribed to the identity of Christ, I followed suit and that became my identity. Instead of stating that "I can do anything through Christ who strengthens me," I would claim that "I can do anything I set my mind to." The statements are close but while the first attributes its abilities to Christ, the later attributes them to self. Such is the condition of our society today. The bookstores are filled with books that seek to help us become the best we can be even at the expense of our souls. While some have a spiritual component to them, and they are written on the right foundation of becoming what God has destined for us, many if not most of them pull us away from this ideal and lead us on a path that while it promises self-actualization, it leads us to selfish ambitions that bring us to ruins. All was not lost on my part since at the same time, the Lord was penetrating my heart with His grace and started showing me a new set of ideals and heroes. While the wheat and the weed continue to grow together, today I toil on a field whose fruits I pray are eternal.

   Now to come back to our topic, I continue to quote Frank Duff who in the handbook he wrote for the organization he started. "If the young once form the habit of looking for purely worldly or even irreligious systems for the active idealism for which generous natures crave, a terrible harm has been done, for which future generations will pay." Anybody with eyes to see can see that we are already paying for the harm that has been done by the ideology of generations that preceded us and not in the distant past either. The "sexual revolution" of the 60s has yielded the "culture of death" whose influences are a threat to civilization as we know it. This is only one example but not the only one. We must not dwell on the evil since we know that God works out the best in everything for those who love Him, but that does not mean that we close our eyes to the reality and assume everything is okay. 

    The first step is to realize the reality of the opening statement that "the world is ruled by its ideals."  This means that as Christians, we must evangelize the world since we know that the Gospel is the only ideal that will bring about peace. To go even further, we must own to the fact that we are called to become saints, to grow in holiness is not for a chosen few, it's the universal call of all. Like saint Paul put it "This is the will of God, that you may be holy."  

         In my early 20s, I was introduced to this idea of becoming a saint after reading "can we be saints" and my search for something noble which so many young people are looking for came to an end. Like the knights of old who would traverse the lands looking for a worthy king to fight for, and when they found one they would bow down before them and pledge their loyalty, I found a noble King who is our Lord Jesus Christ. Many young people today are searching for an authentic cause and something noble to commit to. I wish to tell them that the answer lies in Christ and should they commit to follow him, they will have found the highest ideal that will transcend both time and space and bring them to everlasting happiness. The practical means of living this ideal is laid our in the doctrines and practices of the Church. 

      Now that we have established this, the reality is that our world today is in dire need of evangelization. The late pope Blessed John Paul II said that this is the time for a "new evangelization".  This presents the young and old alike a great work to engage in. May it be in the home as a mother to her kids, or in the social media, or in the pulpit, "if today you hear God's voice, harden not your hearts."  Our faith constantly calls us to let our actions prove our faith and answering this call is a great opportunity.

    From my restless search of something noble, God has presented to me an answer; in the organization of the Legion of Mary, he has helped me strike a balance between "idealism" and "action"  and I invite the young especially to find a way they can serve the Lord in their neighbor. In the vineyard of the Lord, there is plenty of harvest but the laborers are few. May the love of Christ bring us to peace.

Oh Lord, give us more generous souls who will answer your call.

END TIME PROPHECY, RAPTURE AND ESCAPISM MENTALITY

In the past couple of days, I have been thinking about the recent events of the predictions of the end of the world to the date. I have also been wondering what would be the reason why anyone would assign himself the task of trying to calculate the end of the world. Learning that this person; "Harlod Camping" is a proclaimed Christian almost took me by suprise but really did not shock me. The method of prediction being a mathematical equation was absurd, but although I can't judge his conscience, I can only speculate the motivation of such actions. Abandoning the task of trying to figure out why someone who reads the bible everyday would ignore a verse that Jesus said that "but of that day or hour, no one knows, neither the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father," (Mark 13:32) I will try to suggest and lay down a few observations from previously being inside circles of Christians who were really into the end time theory of "the rapture."  My first real introduction into this thinking came about as I watched the movie "left behind." Being young and gullible, I might have for one second started to believe what I was watching, but my skeptical mind and by God's grace sound reason started to play the part and I soon dismissed this jargon as a mix of delusion and misguided interpretation.  I didn't stop there in my observation. The Catholic Church being displayed as an evil institution and the Pope as the antichrist only concluded my fear that this was another erroneous private interpretation of the Scriptures. Fast forward a few years to May 2011, and the recent predictions of end time only confirms this for me. When people pick up the Bible and rely totally on their own private interpretations, there arises a great deal of chances for deception. The unfortunate thing is that many people fall prey to these teachings.
        The more I see such things, the more I see the importance of being inside the flock which is the Church and specifically the Catholic Church which is the only church that can rightfully claim the authority it teaches with being from Christ who founded it. To not listen to the voice of truth is to become prey to many false teachers. Indeed how true the words of Christ that "in the last days, there will be many false teachers."  Now, our task doesn't stop at exposing this but it goes further to acting out in charity to our brothers and sisters who have been misled in this way and help them begin to listen to the sound of the true Shepperd. Indeed prayer and love may conquer the evil of divisions among Christians and one day come to the unity that Christ prayed for "that they may be one as We are one."  The only thing we should be worried about doing is to "keep watch" since nobody know the day or the hour that he may return, but like many saints have stated, when He returns, "may He find me at my post."
Oh Lord, have mercy upon your poor children.

Infants, toddlers and the spiritual life

     
One of the greatest tragedies of our times have got to be the countless children who have been denied the opportunity of having any siblings.  Apart from the physical bonds that come from this, it will also deny them a great spiritual reflection that can only come from spending time with children. Being the last of five children myself, I didn't have this opportunity of having a younger sibling, but the lessons that I have learned lately while spending time with my two year old nephew have left me awe struck and has opened my eyes to an expedient strategy by the devil to make sure that the spiritual component of watching children grow is denied to many. I am extremely thankful to God for my parents and siblings, and though I am fully content with my place as the last born, I have lately thought what it would have been like to be the first born and watch all the rest being born and develop through all the inevitable stages that accompany human development. I guess I will never find out what it would have been like, and I will leave that to those who have younger sibling to answer while I move on to my findings of late. Maybe

Poetry for the soul: To The Sacred Heart of Jesus

Oh Sacred heart of Jesus
Wounded by love of man
I've treated you all too badly
I've heeded not your love

By my many sins pierced
What have I done to love
Which so generously poured
By you o lover of my soul
Yet unappreciated by me
For my life I've too often loved
Wishing not to lay it down
For you my greatest good
While yours you did not spare
For the sake of love
But all that will now change
My life I now surrender
To your tender and loving heart
Never again to be separated
From you my eternal love
I wish to return my soul proclaims
Love for love so greatly offered
But indeed all comes from you
Oh love who is above all
Pierce me with the arrow of your love
And my heart will never fail in love

A call to holiness

 

      "Patience is a virtue!"  Those words still ring in my head years after one of my friends at the time made that statement. Although I had heard that word before, this time it struck me in a very profound way. I can only attribute that to the movement of the Holy Spirit in my soul. To date, I thank God for her. Now in 2011 looking back, I can see how God works in ways we don't comprehend.
   To go further, this statement was said to me by my then girlfriend. At the same time, I was going through a period in my life where I was searching for something but I wasn't sure what it was. I knew I desired something, just wasn't sure what. When she said that however, my first reaction was anger, I was angry because that meant I had to wait for an answer that I wanted.  As much as I didn't like that, the word "virtue" being associated with patience made me think for a long time. I knew that she had said something very wise but I didn't understand. God took that statement however and opened a whole new world to me; one that I had taken for granted or was just ignorant of. Yes the "world of virtues."
   I started thinking what that meant, and the more I thought of it, the more I found the answers. At the same time, I was starting to read the lives of the saints. Their practice of virtues was the one thing that stood out in all of them. They all excelled in different virtues even to the heroic level. The more I read about the lives of the saints, the more I admired them and the more I wanted to imitate them. One question remained however, how were they able to distinguish themselves. That was answered by the great Apostle Paul in the scriptures "It is God's will that you may be holy".   One thing about the saints is that they were never double minded for like we hear in the book of James "a double minded person is unstable in all his ways"  The saints do God's will and they understand that to do God's will is to be holy and to be holy is to do God's will.
    My dilemma was making itself out of my mind more and more as I started realizing that while we are all called to do different things; some to teach, some to  preach, some to be doctors, others lawyers, some parents and others priests and religious, the universal call for all of us is that of holiness. We are all called to be holy without which no one will see God.
     Finally, I was able to make the connection between patience and virtue. Yes patience is one of the many virtues, and when we exercise virtues, we become more like Jesus who is our example and helper in everything. The more I strive to be virtuous, the more I realize that left to ourselves, we can never be virtuous, it is only by God's grace. But strive we must for we are called to be holy and be "perfect as Our Father in Heaven is Perfect."  Virtue simply put is the habit of being righteous. When habit overtakes our good practices, we can say that we grow into being more Christlike and hence become Holy. We ought to answer generously to that universal call to be Holy which God has called all of us to.
   Now whenever someone cuts me off in the traffic, before I react, I recall that statement, "patience is a virtue."

The sacrament of reconciliation: sin, repentance, confession and forgiveness.

       After coming back from confession today and receiving the sacrament of reconciliation, I've decided to write about this very subject since I've had many conversations with people lately about this. Though there are many words in the title of the post, we can truly summarize them in one; namely, Mercy.

    To be specific, I've had two defining conversations that have jolted me to maybe touch on this subject and though I am not expert, try to explain what the Catholic Church teaches on the subject of sin and reconciliation. The two conversations that I had, got me thinking of how people misunderstand or simply misrepresent the teachings of the Church. I only wish to hopefully but simply answer two statements that were mentioned in my conversations with biblical back up.

The first was this: Sin is sin and there is no venial or mortal sin. How comes the Church teaches that.

   One of my friend said that and honestly without revealing their identity, I was shocked since it's someone who was Catholic and really should know the teaching of the Church and where they got that from. The answer to that statement is simple however. Now since most non-Catholics simply want an answer from the bible, the answer to that question comes from the first letter of John (1 John 5: 16-17) "If any one sees his brother sinning, if the sin is not deadly, he should pray to God ans he will give him life....All wrongdoing is sin, but there is sin that is not deadly." From that letter of John, we see that the gravity of sin varies as the Church teaches and what we call mortal sin "deadly",  can keep man from his final beatitude with God if not repented but "venial" sins wound charity in the heart of man without destroying it. This is best explained in the catechism paragraph (CCC 1855) "Mortal sin destroys charity in the heart of man by a grave violation of God's law; it turns man away from God, who is his ultimate end and his beatitude, by preferring an inferior good to him. Venial sin allows charity to subsist, even though it offends and wounds it". Anyway like our instruction from scripture to defend the hope that is in us, I forwarded those verses to my friend and now pray that he may see the truth.

The second statement from my other friend was: I can never confess my sins before a man, he is not God and I can't do that. 

     That statement was from a great friend of mine who is baptist and whom I won't reveal his identity either. Now this statement didn't come to me as a great shock. I knew that was just an attack to the Catholic church for the sacrament of confession whereby we confess our sins to the priest in the sacrament of reconciliation. It was the famous bishop Fulton Sheen who once said "there isn't 100 people in United States who hate the Catholic Church, but there are millions who hate what they think the Catholic Church is."  This was so true since that statement probably rooted from a misconception that the priest replaces God. The teaching of the Church however is that the priest acts "In Persona Christi" meaning in the person of Christ. Otherwise, my duty again was to go back and show the grounds of this teaching from the scriptures.
   The first scripture which completely shows that it is actually good to confess our sins to one another is the letter of (James 5:16) "Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The fervent prayer of a righteous person is very powerful." The second verses which more directly shows Jesus giving this power to forgive sins to his disciples is found in (John 20: 21-23), especially verse 23; "Whose sins you forgive are forgiven them, and whose sins you retain are retained."  Once again I did my duty to the truth and showed these verses to my other friend.
   Both those statements were answered from scriptures, but as we all know, we can answer as many questions as we can but still make no difference in people. That is where the power of grace comes in which can only come from God. I pray that God may give all of us the grace to recognize his mercy in establishing the sacrament of reconciliation and allowing us to confess our sins and have His very priest pronounce the words of absolution; "I absolve you of your sins in the name of The Father, The Son, and The Holy Spirit."
   St. Augustine defined a sacrament as "a visible sign of an invisible reality." Since we are still in the physical, God chooses to use our physical reality to convey His divine grace. In this case he choses to use His priest to forgive.
   One of the problems with man since the fall of Adam in the garden, he still wants to go to God on his own terms instead of going to God on God's term. Jesus instituted that Sacrament of Confession so that we can, as often as we need to approach his fountain of mercy and find forgiveness, but we still want to do it our way. Our world needs healing from sin more than ever and this sacrament brings both forgiveness of our sins and healing from the wounds that sin causes. I cannot start to express my gratitude to God for this sacrament. The more I realize my misery and sins, the more I love this sacrament. I wish that all may approach Jesus in this sacrament and bath in the ocean of His mercy.

prayer: Jesus, grant me the faith to believe your words and the humility to be obedient to them.

Tell me about your encounter with the sacrament of reconciliation or maybe if you are not Catholic, about your encounter with God's mercy.

Poetry for the soul: The innocent's cry; life must be defended

I know I said that I would post a poem on Friday's. Truth be told, I wasn't up to it yesterday but today is the day that the Lord has made. The following Poem is one I wrote from an inspiration against all the abortions that continue to occur. If life is not the fundamental thing to be defended, then to claim that we live in a just society is a lie. Remember that "Blessed are the merciful for they shall obtain mercy." 

THE INNOCENT'S CRY

do you not care that i am perishing

you ignore me as I am persecuted 

as the gift of my Creator is denied me

the light of the day i will not see

from my mother's womb declared an enemy

by  the one who should protect me

once a gift but now a burden

i am left in my darkness to die

as life freely given to me is stolen

and you sit aimlessly watching this

you turn your head from my cry

even as i am torn out of my mother's womb

like a toxic waste to be rid of

oh the horror of it all

i know that all this you can see

but you have declared in your heart

that you are not your brother's keeper

and you will not defend my cause

but this be sure of it now

that the one who gave me life

will not abandon me forever

neither watch as i am persecuted forever

but when He beckons you to answer

for these the least of His brethren

what excuse shall you have

Every year millions of babies are aborted around the world. If there is an injustice that the society has accepted as a norm is this one. The late venerable pope John Paul II called this "the culture of death".  But what can we do for reparation against this injustice? Prayer and action. We must "pray as if everything depends on God, (and it does) and work for pro-life end as if everything depended on us."  

Love did it.

As teenagers we seek freedom, but do we really become free  Today as I was driving down the road, I had that encounter that brought back so many memories of my teens.
Just like you thought, I stopped at the lights, and beside me, was a car full of teens; five of them, two girls in the front and two boys and a girl in the back seat. Minding my business, my head turned just as one of the boys in the back with the window rolled down was blowing a small pipe turned towards my car and waving. I took that as an invitation, and I rolled down my passenger window in response. With both their windows open, laughter was coming from both the front and the back of their car and they started talking to me, asking me where I was going and the like with the greatest simplicity and ease. The lights turned green and they drove off. As I rolled up my window, I caught all the writings on their car with hearts all over and in the back, with a beautiful calligraphy read "I love Sarah, she is my best friend." That finally confirmed my observations that what I had encountered was a company of friends who were enjoying each others company, and beyond that, they were also extending their joy to outsiders; and yes, I had been invited to taste that. The next five minutes as I drove, I couldn't help but feel joyous, but it also brought back both memories of my teenage, and memories of my conversion.
  Now to go back to my initial question, I think the problem is that as we grow older, we tend to stop living in the moment. We carry all the burdens of our past and all the anxieties of the future. This weighs us down and we miss the present moment which is where God is best to be encountered. We miss the opportunity to enjoy His company freely and hence we cannot be joyous.
   I remember when I was rediscovering my faith or may I say reverting back to Christ after a deadening lukewarmness. I so enjoyed His company that I could have spent hours in prayer. But just like those teenagers, I wanted to share that joy so much that I saw no boundary. Truly it was a company of friends. I would only say that "It was going back to my first love." Now if you have encountered that love of Christ, you can clearly relate. Best description of that love is in the canticles of canticles (8:6-7) "Set me as a seal on your heart, as a seal on your arm; For stern as death is love,..." 
   When we don't foster that devotion to love, we loose it and sadly that is the state of many. After that encounter with those teenagers, I had to reflect on how I have lived that commitment or how I've by God's grace maintained it. My answer is again from the canticles of canticles (1: 7) "Tell me, you whom my heart loves, where you pasture your flock, where you give them rest at midday, Lest I be found wandering after the flocks of your companions." From the answer that follows in verse 8; "Follow the tracks of the flock and pasture the young ones near the shepherds' camps."  
  From this conversation in the songs of songs, I can only say that the way that joy has and can be maintained is to stay near the "shepherds camps" so as to be fed. With Christ as our Shepherd, He feeds us with His own body and blood in the Eucharist and if we stay in his camps (The Church), we never stop having that joy of companionship, friendship and love like I encountered this afternoon. But those teenagers didn't just enjoy their companionship, they extended it. That is what every Christian is called to do, having encountered the love of Christ, we must invite others to come in and with the words of prophet Jeremiah from God, to "taste and see how God is good."
  We can all rediscover that love of Christ which after having put us aflame, will demand that we share it and then "Our joy may be complete".   Finally like those teens, we can truly say " I love Jesus, He is my best friend."

Poetry for the soul: truth

"To be or not to be: that is the question." that is the opening line of a soliloquy of Shakespeare's play Hamlet. I can still remember my English teacher
and how she made this play come alive. If I can summarize, I would say that this play raised our emotions and imaginations to great heights. Fast forward a few years later, I  still enjoy that play. Lately however one of my friends mentioned something to me as I was driving her home from a prayer meeting which we had just left. We were discussing the songs and she was expressing how we needed a group that would be willing to practice regularly so as to deliver a better praise session. Before I asked why she was so passionate about it, she said "music raises our minds to God." She had explained in one sentence how exactly I felt after singing gospel songs or hymns; my mind would be elevated above the million distractions in the world and I would think of God and easily enter into prayer.
      So we've seen how good plays can raise our emotions and imaginations to great heights and how good singing can raise our minds to God. That brings me to my third love and that is poetry. Maybe you remember how you felt after you read your first poem, or maybe you even wrote a poem to the girl or boy you liked in junior high. Well I remember both. I can also say that poetry stole my heart. From the book of psalms to the songs of songs, we encounter the beauty of poetry, and we can say that good poetry penetrates our heart and help us to open our hearts to God if it points towards Him. From that, I wish to share a series of some of the poems I have written and I will start with one I wrote conversing with truth.

                                                                         truth

My heart can no longer deny you

I must embrace you for a better view

Day by day I arise from the dungeons of my misery

From fighting against you with a cold sweat I am weary

I have taken a sip of you but now what

Is it not enough for me to expel my doubt

Yet it seems that if I don't take the whole cup of you

You turn into poison that will destroy me but not you

A little bit of you has thrown my heart into chaos

I want your full benefits but without the vows

My yearning is great but who can move my afflicted heart

Which is stuck in the lies that I have lived

But fears the truth I have now found

The time is now my heart declares

To break the chains on my daily affairs

And embrace you whose name is truth

So my heart can be free at last

To follow Christ who is my very first

for future poems, tune in on Fridays.

Life after the prodigal son returns

"It's yet another night. I have exploited everything on television and I am feeling a little guilty".  That was the conversation that I would have with myself many nights a few years ago and still do sometimes even now. The only difference between then and now is what I would do next. No! I didn't take the remote and throw it at the television and swear not to do it again. I did something most people are familiar with; tune in to one of the channels where a very well spoken person would be preaching. Yes the televangelist. Everyone has their favorite, but at this time I seemed to listen to any. A couple of minutes later I would be praying for forgiveness and I would feel like the prodigal son. Yes truly that moment felt good being received back by my Father, but after a few days, the feeling would wear off, I would go off and then be back to the door knocking as the prodigal son. I had joined the "perpetual prodigal son's return club."  I had enjoyed the feelings of the reception so much that I wanted them to last. In reality, I wasn't so much concerned about what God wanted, as much as what I felt. In reality, I was after the gift more than the giver. After countless episodes like this, I soon realized that I had succeeded in self deception. Although I had stayed clear of despairing since I knew of God's mercy, I had probably crossed over to presumption, forgetting His justice.
  This was until one day I heard someone

Does anybody care about the truth?
   I remember like it was yesterday  praying unceasingly to God that he may not allow me to be deceived. I also remember the joy that I felt when that prayer was answered to me in a very special way. I was at a point where so many voices were speaking to me and I simply couldn't discern which one to listen to. In the midst of this darkness, the Lord made known to me that he was the answer, and ever since He has shown me the path. Ever since I can trust what He speaks through His Church and those he left in His place. Its a challenge to accept the truth sometimes because it makes demands of us but the freedom that accompanies it is worth it.  Now the more I try to share it, the more I learn that few people want to embrace it. But do people care about the truth?
   Today I was pondering about this and I have come to the conclusion that many people don't want to know the truth. Many would rather remain in the company of lies than even take a glimpse of the truth. Its almost true to all that if asked, we would proclaim that we are lovers of truth, but once it's presented to us, we reject it immediately without giving it a chance and even close our ears so that we may not hear it, or like Jesus put it "listening they do not hear." As St. Thomas Aquinas put it, "the first reaction to truth is anger."  Oh how true this is. I can relate to this in a most personal way for I know that most often, when I hear some truth, it challenges me to change and this at first will cause us to be angry. Now the reason for this is that truth always challenges us to change for the better, and we all know that this is not a walk in the park. It is this same thing that caused Our Lord to be crucified. He spoke the truth to his contemporaries, and rather than change their ways, they wanted to get rid of him. He came to set them free and give them light, but many "preferred darkness than light." Its through His crucifixion that we have been set free but, even 2000 yrs later, many still prefer darkness other than the light, lies over truth and bondage over freedom. Jesus told his disciples that "My people die for the lack of knowledge."  Now more than ever we need knowledge and truth. St. Paul says that "the Church is the pillar and foundation of truth" (1 Timothy 3:15 ) so we need to remain in this pillar, or we will fall prey to the devil who is like "the roaring lion seeking whom he may devour".   Let us pray that we may not be deceived, and Our Lord is good to grant this who is our true Shepherd who loves his flock.

What's this?

     Six years ago, I thought I knew everything there was to know. Now I am 24yrs and I've come with terms with how very little I know. I have to confess that at 17, I thought I knew everything. I won't even start going through all the different fields like science, math, astronomy, theology and philosophy or the other numerous fields out there, each with its own experts. But that's not why I decided to start a blog. My reason is simply; TRUTH The more I wanted to know, the more I became concerned with that simple word. I, like many young people had ambitions beyond description. I simply wanted to be the best. The problem I ran into is that what one person would describe as best, another wouldn't. My best may not be your best. So a problem for me was what then should I aspire to be the best in? I was open and had many great people in my life who spoke towards that same thing. 
    After a restlessness that couldn't be overcome with anything, I found myself on a Wednesday evening in a Catholic Church. I was met by a lady in the hall who seemed very peaceful and I proceeded to ask her what was going on inside. After she asked me whether I was a Catholic, she explained that they were having adoration, and although I had been raised a Catholic, I wasn't sure what that was. When I entered however, I remembered having seen something like that in my growing up, where inside a most beautiful golden monstrance, they had Jesus exposed in the sacrament. Without much understanding, I knelt in imitation of the other people there and started praying. For the first time in a long time, I felt not only the greatest peace, but I also felt a certain surety that I had entered into the presence of God. Ever since that day, I couldn't stop going back Wednesday after Wednesday. I felt a certain pull towards what I had come across that evening. Now a few years later, I understand more what had started that Wednesday evening. I had met Jesus that evening but in a very special way. But what did that mean?