**Requisite for Experiencing Peace*

        We do not experience inner peace, only because we have not yet submitted ourselves entirely to God, that is, we are still rebelling against him. We'll never be able to rest in peace in God until we acknowledge that we are at his mercy and beg him to have mercy on us. 

What Are You Looking For?

        Jesus wants to give us eternal life. The only reason good enough for you to reject him would have to be that you are looking for or have found something even better.

What the Soul Needs Most

        The Mercy of God.        

To Be Rewarded Now or Later?

        Jesus has made it clear that those who live for themselves will have received their reward in this life, but if we live for him, we shall receive our reward in heaven. Therefore, love God and expect that some things are just not meant to happen to you in this life. It is a no-brainer that receiving your reward in heaven is infinitely superior than receiving it on earth.

***At God's Mercy

        On this trip, I walked so much that when I came upon a church, I looked forward to going inside to rest a while. I was so tired that I did not even bother to genuflect or kneel to pray first – I just plopped into a pew. I knew that Jesus would understand, recalling that he didn't even mind that his disciples picked the heads of grain in someone's field and eat them when they were hungry on a sabbath. Anyway, the fact that I wasn't quite inclined to do what I should do after entering the church made me realize that one day I won't be able to do anything, and that's the moment before my death when I shall be completely at God's mercy. Then I see that when we first came into this world, we were completely at his mercy too. The reality is that we are at God's mercy every moment of our life or I wouldn't be breathing and my heart wouldn't be beating now. Yet we live as if we do not need God most of the time. Wouldn't it be nice and wise to be aware that we are always at God's mercy when we are alive on earth?

**God's Love Triumphs

        In January, 2015, I blogged about the tragic terror attack on Charlie Hebdo that killed 12 in Paris. As you know, Charlie Hebdo is the controversial French satirical magazine which mocks politicians, governments, religious figures, or anything it chooses to laugh at. The terror attack was apparently triggered by the mockery made of the Prophet Muhammad. Recently, I saw a Charlie Hebdo poster depicting the Holy Mother holding Infant Jesus with both of his middle fingers up – the overall portrayal of him was sickening and grotesque. I believe that the image aims to show what Jesus thinks of the French president Emmanuel Macron, but it also succeeded in irreverently mocking the Lord. I would even say that the portrayal is sacrilegious! It hurt me deeply and made me angry. Then the infinite love of God made me see that I must pray for the offenders, for they know not what they're doing. (Click here to see this poster image.)

Christ the Fun Spoiler

        I went on a trip, the Lord guarded me, and I got home safely. The Lord deposited thoughts in my heart almost daily. On August 9. I read in a magazine about a group of Europeans who expressed themselves artistically by putting on art exhibits, music performances, fashion shows, etc. They were quite talented, for what they put on were innovative, beautiful, and might even cause a stir within you at first encounter. If I didn't know Christ, I could see myself being drawn to living exclusively for expressing myself too; but I am happy that Christ has spoiled all that fun, for living for him is so refreshing that everything that's considered fun in the world is no longer meaningful in the final analysis. 

Blessings to All!

        I must pause blogging for the next two weeks or so and hope to resume on the 25th of this month. We are so blessed to have such a great God who is a most loving Father. Rejoice in, praise, and thank him daily, and you'll be richly rewarded.

**What to Do With Your Free Will

        Today is the memorial of St. Dominic. In the Gospel reading from Matthew 15, Jesus tested the faith of a Canaanite woman. The fact that the Lord tests our faith shows that we are in full charge of choosing to believe or not to believe in him! You see, we've been given the free will. With that comes the responsibility to make the right choice. Believe in anything you want, but the best thing you can do with the free will is offering it back to God, then everything you do will be done according to his will and you are set free. 

A Realist Is One Who . . .

is aware of the presence of God at all times.       

Egoistic Fool

        Anyone who plans out his or her funeral to make sure that it will be impressive in the eyes of the public is being egoistic and foolish to the extreme. 

To Be Free of the World

        If you were going to die today, would you still care so much about all the things you've planned to do for yourself? I don't think so. But since you are not dying yet, shouldn't you at least care less about doing those things? Don't get yourself anchored to anything in this world, for you want your soul to be free to soar to God when the time comes.

Letting God Perfect Us

        Communion thoughts. God wants us to be perfect, but we know that we are finite and still imperfect. Good, because this is exactly what the Lord wants us to feel so that he can make us perfect. We only need to surrender ourselves to him even more, and receiving the Holy Eucharist certainly makes that possible.

*Preparing for Christ to Appear*

        Today is the Feast of the Transfiguration of the Lord. The Communion antiphon (1 John 3.2): When Christ appears, we shall be like him, and we shall see him as he is. No ones knows when Christ will appear again, but what if he appears right now, will you be overjoyed or shocked? How would you feel? How would you react? I believe that there will be a wide range of emotions felt and reactions displayed! Here is the best preparation for that moment. Seek and attain union with God to become like him as much as possible. When he appears, you will be overjoyed, knowing that he'll make you to be just like him!

Returning to God

        The moment we are born into this world, we get the choice to return to our creator or be sent away by him forever after our death. To tip the balance in our favor, listen to what Jesus said in Matthew 6, "Do not store up treasures on earth, where moth and decay destroy, and thieves break in and steal. But store up treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor decay destroys, nor thieves break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there also will your heart be." Loosely speaking, where you put your money makes all the difference. In everything you do, always choose heaven over earth. Set your heart on following the Lord in heaven and be detached from all things on earth, and you are on your way returning to our creator. 

*No Duplicity!

        In John 1, when Jesus saw Nathanael (his disciple-to-be) coming toward him, he said of him, "Here is a true Israelite. There is no duplicity in him." I love the description "no duplicity." To have no duplicity is to be honest with both yourself and others. It is having nothing to hide from God. It is to be genuine, no more "acting" – what others see is what you are. This is living most naturally. With no duplicity, you will surely be blessed by God.

***Learning Directly From God

        When God is in union with you, he reveals many things to you, leaving you with no doubt whatsoever. For example, I just know that the Lord exists and that my own existence depends entirely upon him. If you ask me how I can be sure, I can't say that he spoke to me aurally and produce a recording of his voice for you to hear or anything like that – all I can say is that he has simply deposited the knowledge in my heart. If you still have questions, you just have to seek union with God and find out for yourself. Know that I can tell you about God, but only he can reveal himself to you.

***Awesome Advantage***

        Communion experience. I went to Vigil Mass today because I liked the more traditional music. As I was consuming the Lord, these thoughts came from my heart. In Jesus' time, those who were with the Lord or followed him were inspired, awed, and personally transformed by the amazing things they saw he did and/or they heard he said. Today we believe in him by faith, but as Catholics, we do have this great advantage. When I receive the Lord in the Holy Eucharist, his true flesh and blood, he personally enters my heart and dwells therein. I don't need to see or hear him, since he now speaks directly to me from within my very heart. This is inspiring, awesome, and powerful in transforming the soul on an even more personal level!

**Discerning Satan's Presence*

        Both God and Satan fight for our soul. God allows various temptations to happen to test us. Here's the danger. Something happens to you that gives you great pleasure. You know that continuing pursuing it would be wrong, but you are so amazed it happened to you that your think perhaps God intends it for you. You are right, but his intention is to test you. Now you are at a crucial point. The weak of faith fail and turn their back on God – I've seen that happen in the churches I belong or once belonged to. The strong in faith eventually pull through, with bruises and all, but also a faith now stronger than ever. In general, if you experience great turmoil and unrest within you, Satan is churning you up. God will always wish you to have his peace.

**Killing Sins

        If sins are weeds, going through the sacrament of reconciliation to get them absolved is like removing the weeds with a hoe. In time, they can still grow back. But when you have attained union with God, it would be more like spraying the weeds with Roundup which systemically kills each plant, roots and all. Another reason for seeking union with God.

Perfecting the Spiritual Life

        The spiritual life is defined by how much you are attached to God or detached from the world. You cannot love both God and the world. If you feel the world's tug stronger than God's, you are heading in the wrong direction. The perfect soul is attached to God alone, ready to soar to him. Again, I advocate seeking union with God and you'll find him to be more beautiful and attractive than anyone or anything in the world. Then you'll become attached to him alone with great joy.

***Facing Truth

        Truth is hard to face. Truth is reality. Try facing how good a person you really are. Try facing God, the hardest of all! But once you are brave (humble) enough to face God, you can face anything, for you are out of darkness. You are now free, as the truth has set you free!

How to Not Worry

        If you are willing to let God do everything for you, let him do the worrying for you too. Since God does not worry, you have nothing to worry about.

#WalkAway for Christians

        God wants all Christians to walk away from, in no particular order, the following: the lure of material goods, hypocrisy, lukewarmness, gossiping, you own ego, judging others, doing anything that fractures the body of Christ, boasting about your own righteousness, thinking that you know more than God, hiding yourself from God, not following God in everything, worrying about things, dwelling on the past, believing that God does not know everything you do, believing that you are a good enough person, thinking that God is not with you, attachment to your own interests, etc. (There is no need to memorize this list; seek union with God and you'll know.)

Ready for Jesus?

        As I was exercising on the treadmill at the gym this morning, the overhead TV had the very successful game show The Price Is Right on. In the show, contestants competed to win cash and prizes by guessing the pricing of merchandise. There was a lot of excitement – you saw people cheering, people jumping up and down, people embracing each other – the lure of money and material goods was great. This was all fun, but what if Jesus came, would they be ready?

***Urgent Call to Union With God

        To attain union with God requires surrendering yourself to God or abandoning yourself in God or simply letting God be your God. They all mean the same thing. To fight the spiritual battle in this dark world, it is not enough just to remain lukewarm – you must be perfect as the Lord calls you to be. My message is urgent, for your lifetime is brief. If calling for union somehow turns you off, it only shows that your need it. To limit yourself is to limit God, for nothing is impossible with him. You are not free completely only because you haven't gone all the way with him yet. The Lord is inviting you to be one with him – how more intimate can you possibly get? To desire union with him is to show that you do love him with all your heart. He has made us so that our joy is complete on earth only when we attain union with him. Let the Lord make you perfect.  

*Joy of "Thy Will Be Done"

        Today in meditating upon the Passion of Christ while praying the Sorrowful Mysteries of the Holy Rosary, I felt the horrific sufferings the Lord underwent, yet I was overcome by joy, for God has shown his love for us. He has succeeded in redeeming us, clearing our way to return to him. Even the Sorrowful Mysteries are to be celebrated! Never obstruct God and we can certainly rejoice always.

*Questioning Our Existence

        The fact that Jesus the Son of God actually came down to earth to suffer and die for us so that we might be saved shows how much God loves us. I know I sound cliché, but every person alive needs to pay attention and respond to this. Otherwise, why do we even exist?

Faith in True God Works

        From today's entrance antiphon at Mass from Psalm 68: God himself gives might and strength to his people. When we put our faith in God, we indeed receive might and strength. What if you say that I am simply fooling myself, believing that there is a God? I challenge you to imagine that there is a God and you put your faith in your mind-created god to see if you actually feel mightier and stronger. It won't work or you'd be deceiving yourself. Believe in God, the God of Christ, and things happen, for he is real and true.

**Most Important Selection Process

        In today's Gospel reading from Matthew 13, Jesus spoke to his disciples using another parable, "The Kingdom of heaven is like a net thrown into the sea, which collects fish of every kind. When it is full they haul it ashore and sit down to put what is good into buckets. What is bad hey throw away. Thus it will be at the end of age. The angles will go out and separate the wicked from the righteous and throw them into the fiery furnace, where there will be wailing and grinding of teeth." This makes me see that in life we basically go through a selection process. How we live our life will determine how we'll be selected by God at the end. We prepare ourselves hard to make sure that we get admitted into a university or the job we apply for, but it is infinitely more important that we prepare well so that we might be selected by God to keep us for all eternity. 

**Facing God Alone

        Expect to face the Lord alone at judgment time. No one else will be there to witness or speak for you, and there will be no lawyers you can hire to help defend you. The Holy Mother may come forward to intercede, but you still need to have some redeeming value in you. Anyway, the time to take care of all your concerns and future problems is now in advance, and this is precisely the message of our Lord. You alone are responsible for your own future in eternity!  

*Jesus' Protection

        I thought about the Apostles who followed Jesus. Were they totally under his protection? Of course. But protection does not mean that they no longer had to face hardships or suffer in this life. In fact, with the exception of John, all got martyred in the end. Therefore, protection by the Lord means that he would make sure that they would receive eternal life in heaven with him, and that's good enough for me.

Humility, Essential Ingredient

        Communion thoughts. Even though the Holy Eucharist enables the communicant to become one with the Lord, ironically it has also caused division among his followers. As you know, most Protestants do not believe that Christ is really present in the consecrated bread and wine. There are many other dividing issues as well. The extreme enemies of the Church even believe that the Pope is the Antichrist. As long as they do not have the humility to be willing to study the history of the Early Church and the official teachings of the Church, the division remains. Humility is what we all need to enter the Kingdom of heaven.

The More Joyful Life

        In today's Gospel reading from Matthew 13, Jesus likens the Kingdom of heaven to a treasure buried in a field, which a person finds and hides again, and out of joy goes and sells all that he has and buys that field; and again, to a merchant searching for fine pearls, who, when he finds a pearl of great price, goes and sells all that he has and buys it. There is and should be great joy and excitement in finding Jesus. Of course, faith is not to be based upon emotions solely, but knowing the Lord well enough to feel excited about him surely can make your life a lot more joyful!

*Thought on Abortion

        The unborn baby is definitely not a part of the mother's body. God has designed for the baby to reside in the mother's womb for 9 months exclusively for the purpose of protecting and nurturing the infant before its birth. Therefore, to abort the unborn child is going directly against the will of God, let alone the commandment "Thou shalt not kill."

*How to Do Good

        Sometimes we feel inadequate at doing much good in this world, what with so many talented and capable people visibly doing so much. Let's think differently. God loves to help the weak, so we can rely upon him to do the work through us. Not only this trust pleases him, our intimate collaboration with him can also help us grow spiritually. Of course, we can always pray, asking the Lord to do good. We needn't know what he's going to do – we only need to believe that he's going to do it. Here, it's how sincerely we ask that counts, not necessarily how holy we are. 

*Melting Experience

        Communion experience. As Christ melted in my mouth, My spirit started to melt in him. It's a melting-into-each-other experience. Holy Communion is all about union.

**Special Class of Sinners*

        In today's Gospel reading from Matthew 13, Jesus again brought up final judgment in explaining the parable of the weeds to his disciples. He said, at that time his angels will collect out of his Kingdom all who cause others to sin and all evildoers and throw them into the fiery furnace. Note that the Lord actually mentioned those who cause others to sin and those who just sin in general. I have blogged in the past that anyone whose sin causes others to sin commits a graver sin than one whose sin is known only to him and God. Therefore, we must be a good example to our children, relatives, friends, colleagues, boss at work, et al. Cease sinning and we'll not have to be concerned about this. Again, I advocate seeking union with God, for he is the one who can make us perfect.

*Amazing Lord

        Today is the Memorial of Saint Ignatius of Loyola. The entrance antiphon from the 2nd letter of St. Paul to the Philippians reads: At the name of Jesus, every knee should bend, of those in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. This came from one who once notoriously persecuted Christians, and the Lord called and converted him. What is most amazing to me is that Jesus conquers and reigns in our hearts by sheer love alone!

***Most Urgent Reminder!

      At this hour, there are 16 wildfires burning across California. I live in Central California. Yesterday I already noticed that the sunlight that came through the window of my living room appeared extra warm against the light-colored tiled floor, right off reminding me of flames. It looked somewhat eerie. And I thought of the fires of hell, which had to be more terrifying than eerie. The attacks we face from Satan and his followers in this world are nothing compared the eternal punishment the evildoers will suffer in hell. There will be final judgment, so I wish to wake everyone up: turn and latch onto Christ before it's too late, for eternal punishment is so horrible that you must avoid at any cost. Remember that if you risk your soul for Christ, you soul shall be saved!  

*Belonging to Jesus

        Communion experience. John 15.16: It was not you who chose me, says the Lord, but I who chose you to go and bear fruit, fruit that will last. Jesus has chosen me, captivated me, captured me, and made me his.

**Facing Death

        We all die one day and we feel differently about death. Those who know they are in grave sin may face the greatest fear. Again, they could turn to God in their last moment and be saved. Therefore, dying suddenly or in sleep is not necessarily a blessing, for you are robbed of the chance to repent. Some people do not know what's going to happen after death and are more or less resigned to entering the unknown – this can be a very uneasy experience. Anyway, the best way to leave this world is to let Christ into your life as much as possible to the point that you become one with him. In deep love with the Lord, you long to be with him forever, thus banishing all fear of death. Death now is the gateway to total fulfillment and contentment.   

**Prophecies Meant for Us

        In today's reading from Matthew13, Jesus spoke to the crowds in parables to fulfill what had been said through the prophet: I will open my mouth in parables, I will announce what has lain hidden from the foundation of the world. In the time of the Old Testament, I am sure that all the prophecies about the coming Messiah couldn't have impacted the people much, for they have not yet been fulfilled. The prophecies mean so much more to us now that we are able to see how Jesus' had come and fulfilled them all. (You can easily find dozens of prophecies fulfilled by Jesus concerning his coming and in his passion, death, resurrection, and ascension.) Time to believe!

**A Sin Is a Sin

        We cannot say to God that we are a little bad now, but we are really good at other times, for the good doesn't cancel the bad. All our sins need to be absolved by God. Being more good than bad won't get us anywhere. Getting the Lord to forgive all our sins is the only way out.

Dream Realization

        I see wild, enthusiastic audiences at popular music festivals completely letting themselves go under the spell of the performers and/or music. The Woodstock Festival of 1969 amazingly attracted an audience of more than 400,000 and many attendees lost all their inhibitions by going naked and using drugs freely. My thought is how beautiful it would be if we can all abandon ourselves completely in the Lord God instead! That would indeed turn earth into heaven. 

*Alternative Viewpoint

        You may see yourself living in freedom on your own without God; but in fact, you are only living in a prison built by you to keep God out.

Alternative View

        If you do not believe in Jesus, rather than questioning yourself why you should believe in him, look into why you shouldn't believe in him, and you may realize that he is to be accepted, followed, worshipped, and loved with all your heart and all your soul.  

*Urgent Call to Arms

        Beyond just believing in the Lord, we must realize that we are to fight to win the spiritual warfare in which he is engaged. To be a good soldier, we cannot afford to remain complacent. The least we could do is to pray hard for ourselves and our enemies. To love the Lord with all our heart is to fight for him with all our spirit.

***Our Inside Track

        Everything we do God knows and therefore affects him. Whatever we do, whether we know it or not, is either for or against him. If we are not being honest with someone, we are not being honest with God, period. If we love someone, God feels loved by us, period. This is beautiful, for it makes living our life meaningful – we actually have the inside track in shaping our own life and our future the way we like! Once again, it's time to rejoice in the Lord.

God Offering His Love

        Communion time thought. When Jesus was ready to enter me, he was ready to offer me his most tender, humble love.