Doubters' day

Many Catholics ask whether doubting the existence or the presence of God is a sin. Today's feast of St. Thomas, popularly known as the "Doubting Thomas" should answer that question. In the encounter between the Risen Christ and Thomas, our Lord granted Thomas' request: that he probe the nailprints and put his hands on our Lord's side. Jesus welcomed the doubts of Thomas and helped him through it and invited him to faith. Thomas' doubts, then, became a stepping stone to faith. And we are told that his profession of faith in Jesus as Lord and God the sums up all the other all previous professions of faith of the other characters in John's Gospel.

We are, then, in good company! Happy feastday, doubters!

What Makes a Pillar

Saints Peter and Paul are called the pillars of the Catholic Church. Peter is the "rock upon which the Church is built" (Mt 16:18) and Paul is the "chosen vessel through whom the Gospel is proclaimed to all nations" (Acts 9:15).

We usually think of a pillar as a rock, strong, sturdy, heavy. Are these the reasons why Peter and Paul are called pillars of our faith? Because they are strong, sturdy?

On the surface, it seems they were strong, but we know that their weaknesses got the better of them too. Their being "pillars of the Church" must be for some other reason.

In the post-resurrection encounter between Jesus and Peter, Jesus asks him: “Simon, son of John, do you love me more than these?” And Peter confesses his love for Christ, knowing fully well how he failed the Lord.

Paul, for his part, declares: “Though I myself have reason for confidence in the flesh also. If any other man thinks he has reason for confidence in the flesh, I have more:
But whatever gain I had, I counted as loss for the sake of Christ. Indeed I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them as refuse, in order that I may gain Christ” (Phil 3:4, 7-8)

Hence, it is their love, their love for Christ that made them pillars of our Church; their strength comes from their love for Christ.

What's the source of your strength?

We pray that like Peter and Paul, we may find in Christ our pillar of strength.

As Certain as the Dawn

The first reading this Sunday answers the question: Why is our Hope In Him Alone?

“Let us know, let us strive to know the LORD; as certain as the dawn is his coming, and his judgment shines forth like the light of day! He will come to us like the rain, like spring rain that waters the earth.”

In Him alone is our hope because only in God can we find certainty, security. Human hopes, human loves, as we know and have experienced it are ultimately fragile, conditional, transitory. This the prophet Hosea also illustrates by saying:

What can I do with you, Ephraim?
What can I do with you, Judah? Your piety is like a morning cloud,
like the dew that early passes away.

Let us, on this Sunday, reaffirm our hope and trust in the Lord as we sing:

In Him alone is our hope. In Him alone is our strength. In Him alone are we justified. In Him alone are we saved. [refrain of the song "In Him Alone" by MVFrancisco, in the album "The best of Bukaspalad vol. 2]

Through the Fire

A few beautiful lines from Pope Benedict's Spe Salvi, in connection with Pentecost, the coming down of the Holy Spirit upon the apostles and Mary as tongues of fire:

47. Some recent theologians are of the opinion that the fire which both burns and saves is Christ himself, the Judge and Saviour. The encounter with him is the decisive act of judgement. Before his gaze all falsehood melts away. This encounter with him, as it burns us, transforms and frees us, allowing us to become truly ourselves. All that we build during our lives can prove to be mere straw, pure bluster, and it collapses. Yet in the pain of this encounter, when the impurity and sickness of our lives become evident to us, there lies salvation. His gaze, the touch of his heart heals us through an undeniably painful transformation “as through fire”. But it is a blessed pain, in which the holy power of his love sears through us like a flame, enabling us to become totally ourselves and thus totally of God.

Let the psalm response in the Mass for Pentecost be our prayer too:

Lord, send forth your spirit, and renew the face of the earth!



(pix from http://home.indy.rr.com/legionofmary/images/HolySpirit2.jpg)

Langit sa Piling Mo

Langit ang buhay
sa tuwing ika'y hahagkan.
Anong ligaya sa tuwing mamasdan,
sa piling mo, ang gabi'y tila araw.
Ikaw ang pangarap, ikaw lamang.

what shall we say about heaven? What is heaven?
If we want a theological treatise on it,
we can consult various theologians and scholars. Can we maybe
summarize their point by saying that heaven is none other than

being with Christ (sa piling mo...)
, with Him is profound joy, (anong ligaya sa tuwing ika'y mamasdan)
for He is all we desire, (ikaw ang pangarap, ikaw lamang)
and with Him, nights are as days. (ang gabi'y tila araw)

May we experience the Risen Lord, the Unconquerable Sun,
transforming our nights into days, thereby allowing us to experience
heaven even while here on earth.

Orphans No More

The Gospel for the 6th Sunday of Easter reminded me of this verse from the song "So the Love of God".

Once we were lost
orphans of night
left but to wander
longing for the light
found by a love
that would not let us go
we are God's children
family forever.

Jesus promises His disciples that He will not leave them orphans.
The Holy Spirit will be their defender (the traditional task of the father of the family) and their teacher (the traditional task of the mother in the family).

At times when we feel orphaned, left alone, literally or figuratively by our biological or surrogate parents, or by those who are supposed to be our defenders and teachers, we can draw strength from the words of Jesus in today's Gospel, and of these lines from this song: "we are God's children, family forever."

pix from: imagecache2.allposters.com/images/pic/AGF/933...

A Place For Us

SOMEWHERE

There's a place for us,
Somewhere a place for us.
Peace and quiet and open air
Wait for us
Somewhere.

There's a time for us,
Some day a time for us,
Time together with time spare,
Time to learn, time to care,
Some day!

Somewhere.
We'll find a new way of living,
We'll find a way of forgiving
Somewhere . . .

There's a place for us,
A time and place for us.
Hold my hand and we're halfway there.
Hold my hand and I'll take you there
Somehow,
Some day,
Somewhere!

music by Leonard Bernstein; lyrics by Stephen Sondheim


This song just came to my mind as I was reading the Gospel for this Sunday,
the fifth of Easter: Taking the office of consoler, as Ignatius says of the Risen Lord in the 4th week of the Spiritual Exercises, Jesus assures us of a place, not just somewhere or anywhere, but in the house of his Father, who is our Father, too.

May these words of Jesus truly console us, that even if we find no place in this world, or in the hearts of the people of this world, even in those we love, there is always a place for us, especially made and prepared for us, in the house of the Father, in the Heart of Jesus, the Good Shepherd, our only Hope.

Shepherd of Hope

The theme of this Sunday's Gospel (Good Shepherd) continues last Sunday's theme (Walk to Emmaus). Picking up again from Pope Benedict's Spe Salvi, we get to know more deeply the source of our hope, Jesus, our Good Shepherd. And understand why He is our only hope:

“The Lord is my shepherd: I shall not want ... Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I fear no evil, because you are with me ...” (Ps 23 [22]:1, 4). The true shepherd is one who knows even the path that passes through the valley of death; one who walks with me even on the path of final solitude, where no one can accompany me, guiding me through: he himself has walked this path, he has descended into the kingdom of death, he has conquered death, and he has returned to accompany us now and to give us the certainty that, together with him, we can find a way through. The realization that there is One who even in death accompanies me, and with his “rod and his staff comforts me”, so that “I fear no evil” (cf. Ps 23 [22]:4)—this was the new “hope” that arose over the life of believers (SS 6).

What comfort and consolation indeed it is for us to realize that the roads we are afraid to tread, the mountains we are scared to climb and the rivers we are reluctant to cross, to all these Jesus Christ our Shepherd had been, and has come back to accompany us as we walk these roads, as we climb these mountains, as we cross these rivers...

"...and to assure us that together with Him, we shall find our way through."

*pix from Von größter Schönheit

"But We Were Hoping..."

"But we were hoping that He would be the one to redeem Israel" (Lk 24:21).

The walk to Emmaus is really a walk of Hope. Two men who had hoped, who seemed to have given up hope, walk away from Jerusalem, the place where their hope had been crushed. Then suddenly, the risen Jesus walks with them to rekindle the flame of hope in their hearts. It is the accompanying presence of Jesus that awakens their hope. Because Christ is with them, they have hope. Pope Benedict makes this point in Spe Salvi, his encyclical on Christian Hope. He quotes from a letter of Paul Le-bhao-tin, a Vietnamese martyr who was imprisoned for the faith:

In the midst of these torments, which usually terrify others, I am, by the grace of God, full of joy and gladness, because I am not alone —Christ is with me ... (SS 37)

May we perceive Christ present in our journeys awakening the flame of hope in our hearts.

graphics from: www.jsmatt.com/custom4.html

The Rays of Divine Mercy

The image of Jesus King of the Divine Mercy shows our Lord pointing to His Heart where rays of light shine forth. Pope Benedict, in Spe Salvi, his encyclical on Christian hope speaks of the transformative power of this rays of light or fire of love:

Some recent theologians are of the opinion that the fire which both burns and saves is Christ himself, the Judge and Saviour. The encounter with him is the decisive act of judgement. Before his gaze all falsehood melts away. This encounter with him, as it burns us, transforms and frees us, allowing us to become truly ourselves. All that we build during our lives can prove to be mere straw, pure bluster, and it collapses. Yet in the pain of this encounter, when the impurity and sickness of our lives become evident to us, there lies salvation. His gaze, the touch of his heart heals us through an undeniably painful transformation “as through fire”. But it is a blessed pain, in which the holy power of his love sears through us like a flame, enabling us to become totally ourselves and thus totally of God (SS no. 47).

May the flame of love and mercy from the heart of Jesus, King of Mercy truly transform us as it did St Thomas, from a doubter to a believer.

Painting by Bernardo Strozzi; Oil on canvas, 89 x 98.2 cm

He Descended Into Hell

On Black Saturday, when we recall the day Christ was in the tomb, we also reflect on the phrase in the Creed, "He descended into the dead." Pope Benedict offers the following reflections from his latest encyclical Spe Salvi:

Christ descended into “Hell” and is therefore close to those cast into it, transforming their darkness into light. Suffering and torment is still terrible and well- nigh unbearable. Yet the star of hope has risen—the anchor of the heart reaches the very throne of God. Instead of evil being unleashed within man, the light shines victorious: suffering—without ceasing to be suffering—becomes, despite everything, a hymn of praise (SS 37).

Pope Benedict spoke of these points when he talked about suffering as setting for learning hope. To illustrate what hell is like, he used the experience of Vietnamese martyr, Paul Le Bao-Tinh, who amidst all the violence and cruelties of the prison, was able to find hope... precisely in his faith in Jesus Christ.

May, we, too, experience Jesus descending into the "hells of our lives" and transforming our darkness into the light of Easter!

Praying these Holy Days

These next three days, the Paschal Triduum, when we remember the great events of our faith, the mysteries of our faith, the passion, death and resurrection of the Lord, we are asked to pray more intensely. Hence we see many Christians, as individuals or in groups, flocking to Catholic Churches to spend time in quiet prayer before the Lord, especially during the Visita Iglesia or Vigil before the Blessed Sacrament Holy Thursday night.

Pope Benedict says something beautiful and worth noting when we pray these next three days and all throughout our life:

"To pray is not to step outside history and withdraw to our own private corner of happiness. When we pray properly we undergo a process of inner purification which opens us up to God and thus to our fellow human beings as well.

We must learn that we cannot pray against others. We must learn that we cannot ask for the superficial and comfortable things that we desire at this moment—that meagre, misplaced hope that leads us away from God. We must learn to purify our desires and our hopes (Spe Salvi 33).

Indeed, may we truly be purified by our prayers these days and be mindful of the needs of others and lift them up to God together with our own.

Eternal Life... What is It?

What kind of life is Jesus offering when he says, "“I am the resurrection and the life; whoever believes in me, even if he dies, will live, and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die”?

Pope Benedict helps us reflect on this question with these excerpts from his latest encyclical Spe Salvi:

Obviously there is a contradiction in our attitude, which points to an inner contradiction in our very existence. On the one hand, we do not want to die; above all, those who love us do not want us to die. Yet on the other hand, neither do we want to continue living indefinitely… To continue living for ever —endlessly—appears more like a curse than a gift. Death, admittedly, one would wish to postpone for as long as possible. But to live always, without end—this, all things considered, can only be monotonous and ultimately unbearable (SS 11).

To imagine ourselves outside the temporality that imprisons us and in some way to sense that eternity is not an unending succession of days in the calendar, but something more like the supreme moment of satisfaction, in which totality embraces us and we embrace totality—this we can only attempt. It would be like plunging into the ocean of infinite love, a moment in which time—the before and after—no longer exists. We can only attempt to grasp the idea that such a moment is life in the full sense, a plunging ever anew into the vastness of being, in which we are simply overwhelmed with joy (SS 12).

Each of us has a desire waiting to be fulfilled, a wish waiting to come true, ultimately it is the desire for this eternal life being offered by Jesus Christ. But oftentimes, these are buried deep in our hearts, under our earthly, carnal and fleeting desires which we often mistake to be the lasting and truest desires. Like Lazarus in the grave, this desire for eternal life, for that supreme moment of satisfaction in which totality embraces us and we embrace totality…is waiting to be called by Jesus,. O

n this last week of Lent, as we come closer to Holy Week, let us allow Jesus to visit our graves, and call to life our deepest and truest desires by breathing the Spirit of life into our hearts, for He is our only hope and by this hope in Him, we are saved. Spe Salvi factus sumus.

From our Own Little Corner

Being geographically distant from Manila, it is a real temptation for those of us in
Mindanao not to be bothered by the turn of events in the capital city of the country, and dismiss the mass actions as mere political noise of disgruntled
citizens. But it can not be the case if one takes seriously the Filipino saying
'ang sakit ng kalingkingan ay sakit ng buong katawan' (the ailment of the pinky
finger is the ailment of the entire body) and the Pauline treatise on the Body of Christ, one can not simply remain indifferent to the socio-political situation of the
country, especially when it involves the blatant suppression of truth and shameless
greed and corruption in government.

Hence, it was a consoling and encouraging experience to see Catholics, and perhaps non-catholics also gathering at the Gaston Park, in front of the CDO Cathedral attending the Mass for Truth and the brief program that followed. I hope that this will not be the last of such activities, but simply the beginning of a series of
activities that will involve not just Catholics, but all people of good will and not just during elections, but all throughout the year, monitoring the public officials and demanding from them accountability, honesty and integrity while they are in office.

From our little corner of the archipelago, let the light of truth shine!

What makes you shine?

The transfiguration story presents Jesus' face and clothes shining and dazzlingly white. We are told that this episode is a preview of his resurrection which will occur after his passion and death. So what brought about the Resurrection which raised Jesus to an entirely new life and made him shine and dazzle in all glory. The answer lies in the event following the transfiguration and preceding the resurrection: the passion and death of Jesus. Jesus is proclaimed "SON" by the Father in the transfiguration. But he claims this sonship as his identity as he hangs on the cross and says: "Father, into your hands I entrust my Spirit." On the cross, Jesus proclaims God as His Father, thereby sealing the indissoluble love between the Father and the Son. A love so powerful it overcame death. And so we say, "Dying, you destroyed death. Rising, you restored life. Come again in glory."

What makes you shine?

Temptations...temptations

The Gospel for First Sunday of Lent on Year A is the Temptation of Christ in the desert. It shows Jesus triumphant over the devil who wanted to trip him off into choosing the easy way out, the popular way, the highest way. But Jesus would not let himself be deceived by the devil. He ultimately placed his trust in the Father who will fill his hunger, who will protect him, whom He alone adores. May we learn from Christ to put our trust entirely on the Lord, and not be deceived by the empty promises of the devil.

Bible Sunday 2008

Word of God: Source of Reconciliation, Justice and Peace. This is the theme of this year's celebration of the National Bible Week. I think it has been fittingly chosen especially in the light of the just concluded Year of Social Concerns in the Catholic Church. Our society and our world badly need these three gifts from God: reconciliation, justice and peace. And this theme invites us to consider the treasure and potential of the Word of God to bring about reconciliation justice and peace. By a daily reading of the Bible, may we discover and be inspired by its stories, poems and narratives and become, with God's grace agents of reconciliation, justice and peace!

God Bless Our Families

Oftentimes we have the tendency to romanticize the first Christmas, what with the carols and poems composed to commemmorate and celebrate the unique event of the becoming man of God. Indeed the awe and wonder evoked by the mystery can not be expressed in mere prose. It always appeals to the poet in us. But the harsh realities surrounding the birth of Jesus Christ must not escape us, for they carry as much significance as the mystery of the incarnation.

And the Gospel on the feast of the Holy Family illustrates the danger and threat the child Jesus had to face right after his birth. Herod, perceiving him to be a threat to his throne, plotted to have the child killed. And in his anger at being deceived by the magi, he ordered all male children 2 years and below to be killed. Thus, the slaughter of the Holy innocents. How ironic it is that a small helpless clueless innocent child be considered a threat by a king who has at his disposal all the elements of earthly power. Which goes to show us how pathetically insecure he is even with the greatest and strongest of armed troops and high fortress. Translated to our times, how terribly threatened one is even with one's millions in the banks and mansions in gated subdivisions.

May this Christmas season lead us to the true treasure which is found not in the king's palaces or the banker's chest, but in the lowly manger of Bethlehem, in our time, in the quiet place before the sacred host of the blessed sacrament, as well as in the poor and downtrodden in the margins of society.

Happy Feast of the Holy Family!

Emmanuel... God with us

Christmas comes every year... it repeats itself, but the magic, er, the mystery
does not wane away. For it is not simply a thing like any other.

It speaks of what is deepest in the heart of the human being... the desire to be close to, to be united with, to be associated with another human being. Hence, no person wants to spend Christmas alone. Not the OFWs, not the soldiers in duty at Basilan and Jolo, not the security guards at the MRTS stations, not the priest in the convent or the nurse in clinic. Right where they are, they have cellphones in hand to greet their loved ones.

Because that was what happened on the first Christmas, God throught to be far away, far on high, far above us, has come to be with us, in Emmanuel. Hence, no person can ever claim to be alone, to be disconnected, to be unrelated, for whereever he or she is, God with with him/ her.

"If I go the high heavens, or the lowest earth, you are there with me" (Psalm 139).
"Though I walk in the valley of darkness, I fear no evil for you are with me"
(Psalm 23)


Merry Christmas!

The Forgiving King

Christ the King is a strange king. While kings are usually seated on an ornate throne, surrounded by heavily armed guards, Christ the King hangs on the cross, flanked by two thieves. Instead of applauses and praises, he gets mockery and insults. Do we want to be followers of this kind of king?

And he is a forgiving king! He grants forgiveness to the repentant thief, welcomes rather than condemn him, assures him of a place in His kingdom. Who of us do not wish to be forgiven by God for our many sins against Him? If only for this, let us approach the throne of grace, as St. Paul says, and receive mercy from Christ, the King of Divine Mercy.

Long live Christ the King, the King of Divine Mercy!