Joy of Following Christ

        When I was an avid photographer, capturing the desired image was extremely important to me. There was great excitement involved because you could come up with some great shots and with luck might even become well-known. But now, I experience even much greater satisfaction in communing with the Lord in private. No one needs to know about it and there is no desire to leave a trace in this world. In other worlds, I am free, no longer chasing after the passing world. The more we give up the world and ourselves, the greater our rewards will be in heaven. But I am not doing it for the reward either...I am doing it for the joy of following Christ (actually, it's all his doing).

On Bearing Our Cross

        As Catholics we learn to offer up our sufferings to God for the conversion of sinners and in reparation for sins committed against him. But for me there is one cross that's especially heavy to bear, and that is the pain I feel when I see other Catholics unknowingly hurting the Lord in various ways. Even after I offer up my pain, the cross does not seem to get any lighter because I see hurting continuing. I rather prefer that I be hurt alone and not the Lord. Then I see that when Jesus asked us to take up the cross and follow after him, he clearly meant all crosses. Also, I realize that if I truly trust in him, no cross is too big to offer up. I feel better.  

A Timely Question

        I finished reading Fr. Groeschel's Travelers Along the Way, The Men and Women Who Shaped My Life. I got a glimpse of how those 30+ man and women lived their lives. It made me see that a good question to ask ourselves is: "How do I really want to live my life?" We should not go on living without answering this question first because knowing the answer can save us a lot of life's time. Knowing how we want to live can make our living truly meaningful.

Jesus with Us Always

        Communion experience. I felt that I was at the Last Supper with Jesus himself giving me his body and blood. I knew that his promise "I am with you always, until the end of the age" (Matthew 28.20) was absolutely true.

One Judge Only

        In today's Gospel reading from Mark 2, when some Pharisees saw that Jesus was eating with sinners and tax collectors, they said to his disciples, "Why does he eat with tax collectors and sinners?" The Pharisees were being judgmental again. Jesus told us not to judge others. He is right because every single one of us is a sinner and God alone is our judge. Yes, there is only one qualified to be the judge in all of heaven and earth.

A Do-You-Know-God Test

        In today's first reading at Mass from Hebrews 4, Paul wrote: "The word of God is living and effective, sharper than any two-edged sword, penetrating even between soul and spirit, joints and marrow, and able to discern reflections and thoughts of the heart. No creature is concealed from him, but everything is naked and exposed to the eyes of him to whom we must render an account." If you don't feel it that way, then you don't really know the Lord yet. 

One Depiction of Life

        Today I see life as living on top of a precipice. If you strongly believe in God, then he has a strong cord tied around you to keep you safe. If your faith is weak, then the corresponding cord will be weak too. If you don't have any faith, then one careless slip and you fall off the cliff, heading straight toward the bottom, much like what happens to Wile E. Coyote sometimes when he fails to catch up with The Road Runner in one of their cartoon shorts.

God Makes Us Forgetful

        This echoes the post "Power of God's Love" two days ago. When we are fully occupied with or immersed in God, we forget all other things: our past, our enemies, our pains...you name it. You've heard the phrase "Ignorance is bliss." Now we can say that "Forgetfulness in God is bliss" and this is an even better bliss.       

A Law of Spirituality

        In today's Gospel reading from Mark 2, it's the familiar story of the paralytic being lowered through the roof to get to Jesus; his faith resulted in being healed by the Lord. We can unequivocally state that the more we lean upon Jesus, the more he's going to prop us up. Like Newton's law of action-reaction in physics, this is a law of spirituality. 

God Uplifts Us

        At church before Mass started this morning, I knew I was going to meet my most beloved, then I realized that he's already dwelling in me, and I felt great joy. I had experienced the crushing weight of sin in the past, but now everything about the Lord, including the crosses he gives me from time to time, was uplifting.  

Another Mark of Truth

        In past posts, I pointed out some of the things that to me mark Christianity as the truth. Here's another feature that came to my mind this morning. 

        Our God is demanding in that we must love him more than anything else, yet he is not demanding in the sense that he has given each one of us a free will to exercise. Thus faith is made fully meaningful. Imagine that you have a tyrannical god who lords it over you or a god or gods who don't challenge you much, making it easy for you to accept or ignore as is the case in some religion ~ neither would be satisfying to me. 

The Right Thing to Do

        Surrendering to God is surrendering to love and truth! It is totally the right thing to do because love shall keep you safe and truth shall set you free. There is nothing more to ask. 

Pleading with God

         In one of the stories in Fr. Groeschel book Travelers Along the Way, he mentions a Sister Mary who quoted something by memory from St. Teresa of Avila. Apparently St. Teresa's brother had been in serious trouble with the law. In desperation the saint prayed: "Dear Lord, if I were You and he were Your brother, I would see to it that he was saved." It would be hard to argue with that.

       I also pray for the salvation of various, specific individuals, some of whom may not be that holy, but I love them and have no problem forgiving them. So I reason (and realize) that the Lord is infinitely more merciful than I, and if I am willing to forgive them, certainly he'd be even more willing to do so. Creative pleading? 

Chosen by the Humility of God

        I've started reading my third book by Fr. Benedict Groeschel titled Travelers Along the Way, in which he wrote about 30+ men and women who shaped his life. One of them was none other than Mother Teresa. Fr. Groeschel was at the time the liaison between Mother and the New York archdiocese in which some houses were opened for her Missionaries of Charity. Once when Fr. Groeschel felt discouraged that he couldn't handle what he was told to do well enough and thought of resigning his post, Mother Teresa asked him pointedly why he thought God had chosen him to be a priest. Father had trouble coming up with a right answer and Mother Teresa looked at him and said, "You are chosen because of the humility of God. God chooses the weakest and the poorest, the most inappropriate persons to use." She followed up with what Fr. Groeschel considered to be extremely revealing, something he would never forget: "I pray that my place will be taken by the most unattractive and ungifted of all the sisters. Then everyone will know that this is not our work but God's work. Don't ever forget that you are chosen by the humility of God." [I hope that Fr. Groeschel wouldn't mind my quoting these sayings directly from his book.]

        It's true that the Holy Mother appeared to the poor and uneducated rather than the strong, rich, wise or gifted. And Jesus called a bunch of fishermen, not any learned scholars, to follow him. The lesson here is that when we are called to serve the Lord in whatever way, we should realize that God has chosen us, no matter how inadequate we might feel. It's an honor and the Lord knows exactly what he is doing.   

God's Will vs. Our Will

         In today's Gospel reading from Mark 1 at morning Mass, Jesus, moved with pity, touched a leper and made him clean. Then he said to him, "See that you tell no one anything, but go, show yourself to the priest and offer for your cleansing what Moses prescribed." The man went away and began to publicize the whole matter. He spread the report abroad so that it was impossible for Jesus to enter a town openly.

       The lesson here is that we can be so much like the healed leper, getting carried away by something exciting happening to us and forget all about obeying God's will ~ we must listen to God first and obey without thinking about anything else. To do God's will, we must ignore our own will.

Nations in Mortal Sin

        The Church teaches that if we are in a state of mortal (serious) sin, then we risk losing our souls. This makes perfect sense. I dare say that practically all of the nations in the world are in the state of mortal sin ~ look at the suicide bombings, killing of innocent civilians, genocides, assassination of political enemies, legalization of abortion, and many others. The nations are definitely risking losing their souls. Only repentance and returning to God can save them. Since only believers pray to God, they bear the responsibility of praying for the world. Therefore, pray hard to the Lord for his mercy.

God Only Knows How to Love

        You can love God or fear God. We should fear him because he is our ultimate judge, but I choose to concentrate on loving him as St. Therese of Lisieux did. Both logic and common sense tell me that if I do this, then I really don't need to be concerned about anything else, including being judged by him. It also simplifies things, perfectly suiting someone simpleminded like me. If you truly love God, you don't care what he's going to do with you ~ what else can Love do besides loving you? The Lord wipes out all my worries ~ how can you not love him?

Following the Sure Way

        I am half way through reading Fr. Groeschel's A Still, Small Voice, A Practical Guide on Reported Revelations. I found out that even saints had misinterpreted or recorded wrongly the revelations they had received, to the point of contradicting the teachings of the Church in one case. Therefore, I am not going to pay much attention to any private apparitions, visions, etc., especially those the Church has not officially approved yet. I already know the sure way, that is, to focus upon Jesus alone who has revealed to us all we need to know and to follow the public teachings of his Church.