Category: holiness

Praying In Our Difficult Century

The Lord Is My Chef Breakfast Recipe for the Soul

Wednesday, Memorial of St. Maximilian Kolbe, 14 August 2019

Deuteronomy 34:1-12 >< )))*> >< )))*> Matthew 18:15-20

From Google.

My dear Lord Jesus,

Is it part of your grand design that this August which the pagans consider as “ghost month” is when we also celebrate the feasts of two great saints martyred at Auschwitz?

At a time when people thought you where absent, Lord, there was St. Benedicta Teresa dela Cruz (Edith Stein) witnessing to your presence in her works and courage when she offered her life to the gas chambers on August 09, 1942.

Today we remember the Polish Catholic priest St. Maximilian Kolbe who also died at Auschwitz a year earlier than her in 1941 when he volunteered to replace a married man who was rounded up for execution following the escape of a prisoner.

Like Moses in the first reading, you filled St. Maximilian with your radiance that prisoners and guards alike were stunned when he offered himself for the painful punishment.

His great love for you Jesus and deep devotion to your Blessed Mother kept him busy praying and comforting his fellow prisoners despite his frail health proving your words that “where two or three are gathered together in my name, there I am in the midst of them” (Mt.18:20).

After surviving two weeks of starvation and hard labor, St. Maximilian cheerfully offered the executioner his arm for the lethal injection of carbolic acid and died instantly in your bountiful grace, O Lord.

Your servant St. John Paul II declared in his 1982 canonization that St. Maximilian Kolbe as the Patron Saint of our “difficult century” where a culture of death continues to prevail in the name of economic progress and a wrong understanding of freedom.

Give us the courage and enthusiasm of St. Maximilian Kolbe to uphold the value of every person and to fight erroneous beliefs that disregard and remove God and morality from life.

We also pray on this day of his feast for the drug addicts and political prisoners who, because of their situation and beliefs, are taken for granted as lesser beings by some may still accorded with equal respect and dignity. Amen.

From Google.

A painting of St. Maximilian Kolbe with his prison jacket number “16670”, holding two crowns with the prison jacket of Francis Gajowniczek, the married man he volunteered to replace after being rounded up for execution following the escape of another prisoner.

In a vision when he was 13 years old, the Blessed Mother appeared to St. Maximilian asking him to choose a crown. He chose both, white and red crowns as he promised to enter the seminary to become a priest. Unknown to him, the crowns would symbolise later his martyrdom.

A day after his execution his body was cremated on 15 August 1941, a date that would later be declared as the Solemnity of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary whom St. Maximilian loved so dearly. Likewise, it fulfilled his desire to immolate himself completely when he wrote, “I would like to use myself completely up in the service of the Immaculate, and to disappear without leaving a trace, as the winds carry my ashes to the far corners of the world.”

Laugh and be holy!

The Lord Is My Chef Breakfast Recipe for the Soul
Saturday, Feast of St. Lawrence Deacon and Martyr, 10 August 2019
2 Corinthians 9:6-10 >< }}}*> <*{{{ >< John 12:24-26
“Martyrdom of Saint Lawrence, with Two Benedictine Nuns” by Jacobello del Fiero (1425) who introduced “International Gothic” painting style in Venice using elegant and bright colors. The two Benedictine “witnesses” are nuns believed to belonged to the San Lorenzo convent in Venice who commissioned del Fiero to paint the scene. Photo from Rijksmuseum via useum.org.

Praise and glory to you, God our loving Father for the gift of humor.

Yes, Lord, thank you in giving us funny bones, for enabling us to laugh – and be holy!

Each must do as already determined, without sadness or compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver.

2 Corinthians 9:7

Keep us cheerful always, Lord, like St. Lawrence, Deacon and Martyr, patron saint of chefs and comedians.

It was pure grace of love for Jesus Christ and his Church that St. Lawrence suffered so much with a lot of sense of humor and joy.

When Emperor Valerian asked your deacon St. Lawrence to bring him all the treasures of the Church of Rome he was tasked to safeguard, he asked permission to leave jail to gather them.

And he was so witty and courageous that when he returned, he came with the poor as “treasures of the Church” that made the emperor so furious and ordered St. Lawrence be roasted to death on a giant gridiron.

Again, in the midst of intense pain while being roasted alive, St. Lawrence never lost that spark of wit and humor when he told his tormentors to “turn me over, I am done on this side…have a bite.”

As a deacon, teach us, O Lord, to serve like St. Lawrence with a deep sense of dedication and passion plus a lot of smiles and joy!

Everybody is so stressed out these days, Lord, for so many reasons like traffic and lousy services everywhere, including in our parishes.

Thanks be to you, O God, we do not have to suffer so much like St. Lawrence.

Give us the grace of wearing always a warm smile and cheerful face to serve those in pain and suffering.

Let us laugh a lot, Lord, to share with others the real fruits of our work in you. Amen.

Deacon’s dalmatic and stole. Photo by Lorenzo Atienza, 12 June 2019, Malolos City.

Magkaiba ang Mabait at Mabuti

Lawiswis ng Salita ni P. Nicanor F. Lalog II, 20 Hulyo 2019
Mula sa Google.
Noong ako'y bata pa
Aking pinagtataka
Bakit "mabait" ang tawag ni Ina
Sa mga daga?
Ngayong ako'y matanda na
Aking napagtanto ganyan din mga tao
Tinuturing nating mababait 
Parang bubwit kahit maliit ay buwisit.
Mabait daw ang tahimik at walang imik
Mga salitang sinasambit suwabe at walang sabit
Ngunit kung makapanlait
Malalasap pait ng kanilang pag-iisip.
Bulang-gugo kanilang mga kamay sa pagdamay
Hindi nakikipag-away kaya ating palagay
Sila'y makakasabay at laging aalalay
Ngunit sa paninindigan sila'y sablay.
Iyan ang malaking kaibahan ng mabuting tao:
May paninindigan kaya laging nakikipaglaban
Para sa katotohanan, katarungan, at kabutihan 
Magalit ka man o sino pa man. 
Sigurado sa sarili ang taong mabuti
Hindi nagpapadala sa mga sabi-sabi
May busilak kanyang puso at kalooban
Kung saan nananahan katarungan at pagmamahal.
Ang bait ng tao naroon sa kanyang isipan
Ngunit hindi sapat kung talino lamang ating sasandigan
Sapagkat maraming katotohanan 
Na tanging puso lamang ang nakatatalos.
Si Hesus na tanging Mabuti ang nagsabi
Mapapalad ang mayroong malinis na puso 
At makikita nila ang Diyos
Dahil silang mabubuti ang handang mapako sa krus.
Photo by Pixabay on Pexels.com

The Grace of Encouragement

The Lord Is My Chef Breakfast Recipe for the Soul
Tuesday, Week X, Year II, Feast of St. Barnabas, 11 June 2019
Acts 11:21-26;13:1-3 >< }}}*> >< }}}*> Matthew 5:13-16
From Google.

As we resume the longest season in our liturgical calendar called Ordinary Time, you give us a wonderful guide O Lord Jesus Christ in your Apostle St. Barnabas whose feast we celebrate today.

St. Barnabas lived out the meaning of his name, “son of encouragement” or “son of consolation” when he became instrumental in bringing Saul from Tarsus after his conversion to join the Apostles in Jerusalem. St. Barnabas was the first to vouch for the sincerity of Saul’s conversion who later came to be known as St. Paul.

When controversy arose among the early Christians, St. Barnabas encouraged St. Paul to join the discussions at the Council of Jerusalem so as to encourage too the Apostles to accept gentile converts into Christianity without going through the Jewish ritual of circumcision for men.

Eventually after that meeting, St. Barnabas encouraged St. Paul to direct their missionary efforts to the Gentiles that helped spread Christianity throughout the world.

When things went so wrong between him and St. Paul later due to their companion Mark at their second missionary journey that they have to part ways, eventually later before the death of St. Paul in Rome, St. Barnabas was able to encourage them to reconcile and let go of their differences before.

Grant us, Jesus Christ, the same gift of encouragement of St. Barnabas so we may be willing to transcend our weaknesses and sinfulness to cooperate with others to fulfill your work and mission.

We pray also for those losing hope, being discouraged by so many failures and events in their lives that push them to give up and abandon all your plans and dreams for them. Fill them with your Holy Spirit to be encouraged to persevere and to trust in you. Amen.

People with Disabilities being encouraged by Christian groups in Jordan to work in mosaic shops so they could hone their skills and earn for their family. Photo by author, May 2019.

Sanctify us, O Lord

The Lord Is My Chef Breakfast Recipe for the Soul, Wednesday, Easter VII, 05 June 2019
Acts 20:28-28 >< )))*> >< )))*> >< )))*> John 17:11-19
Facade of the Church of All Nations beside the Garden of Gethsemane where Jesus prayed his “high priestly prayer” consecrating us to the Father. Photo by author, 04 May 2019.

As I prayed last night, O Lord Jesus Christ, I felt out of words for all the love and joy you have poured me yesterday. As I looked back on the day that had passed and meditate on your words today, I do not know what else to say except thank you, thank you, and thank you.

Lifting up his eyes to heaven, Jesus prayed, saying: “Holy Father, keep them in your name that you have given me, so that they may be one just as we are one. Consecrate them in truth. Your word is truth. As you sent me into the world, so I send them into the world. And I consecrate myself for them, so that they also may be consecrated in truth.”

John 17:11,17-19

Wow…! How lovely to hear and experience being prayed for by you, Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God. How comforting to dwell on your prayer for us, consecrating us in truth, consecrating yourself for us so that we may be consecrated in truth.

All these despite our unworthiness. You still consecrated us priests, made us holy not because we are good or talented but all because of your love.

Help us to keep in our minds this great honor is not for our own sake but for the world, to continue your work and mission of consecrating the world to the Father.

Keep us united always in you, Jesus who is the Truth, the we may be able to do your work always of making you present among those in need, present especially in our lives, in our prayers, in our church, in our celebration of the Sacraments.

Lord, we have turned away from you. We have forgotten you. Please cast out from us all these prevailing thoughts in the Church of pomp and pageantry on the pretext of glorifying you with so much rituals and decorations in our churches and celebrations.

Consecration and sanctification can never be equated with silver and gold that adorn our churches while the flock go hungry, remaining in the darkness of ignorance and slavery to sins because we have never worked hard to teach them the truth, you.

How can we be holy, O Lord, when we have become of the world? When we have “perverted the truth to draw disciples away from the people” (Acts 20:30).

What a shame, Jesus our High Priest that we your priests cannot sincerely speak like St. Paul as he bid goodbye to his flock in the first reading:

“I have never wanted anyone’s silver or gold or clothing. You know well that these very hands have served my needs and my companions. In every way I have shown you that by hard work of that sort we must help the weak, and keep in mind the words of the Lord Jesus who himself said, ‘It is more blessed to give than to receive.'”

Acts 20:33-35

Consecrate us anew, Lord, sanctify us to be one with you again and to serve your truth with fervor and commitment. Forgive us your priests, Lord and let find our way back home to you. Amen.

Photo by Pixabay on Pexels.com
Please pray for us priests today.

Breaking the cycle of evil

The Lord Is My Chef Breakfast Recipe, Holy Monday, 15 April 2019
Isaiah 42:1-7///John 12:1-11
Dominican Hills, Baguio City, January 2019 by the author.

This Monday is supposed to be different from all the other Mondays of the year for it is supposed to be holy. It is a step to your Paschal Triduum, Lord Jesus Christ, that begins on Holy Thursday evening leading to the glory of your Easter Sunday.

Being holy, O Lord, is being filled with you, being like you, Isaiah’s “Suffering Servant”:

Here is my servant whom I uphold…upon whom I have put my Spirit; he shall bring forth justice to the nations, not crying out, not shouting, not making his voice heard in the street. A bruised reed he shall not break, and a smoldering wick he shall nto quench, until he establishes justice on the earth.

Isaiah 42:1-4

Yesterday I found a beautiful quotation from the Facebook page of the Franciscans that I strongly feel making it my prayer this Holy Monday. It is easier said than done, Lord, but it is doable with your grace.

From Be Like Francis/FB

Give us the courage and grace Lord Jesus this Holy Monday to break the cycle of evil in our midst, to act not like some of those people of your time who tried to plot not only against you but also against your friend Lazarus whom you have raised from the dead.

It is very difficult, and even crazy but it is your way as the Suffering Servant, our Christ who broke our cycle of hate and violence. Amen.

Lent and the Contemplative Spirit

40 Shades of Lent, 5th Sunday-C, 07 April 2019
Isaiah 43:16-21///Philippians 3:8-14///John 8:1-11 
From Google.
Sunrise at Lake of Galilee. Photo by author April 2017.

Today is the last Sunday of Lent. It is hoped that by this time since Ash Wednesday, we have slowly acquired or even regained our contemplative spirit of prayerful silence. It is something very essential not only during these 40 days and in the coming Holy Week. It is only in silent prayers can we truly find balance in life as we discover what is valuable and what is worthless, things that last and things that pass. Prayerful silence teaches us to slow down, to be more discerning, and more trusting. The contemplative spirit thus leads us to grow deeper in our faith, hope and love in God. It is in the contemplative spirit where God works best in us.

We find this invitation to a contemplative spirit in our beautiful gospel today of a woman caught committing adultery whom Jesus refused to condemn. Unlike the previous four weeks when we heard all gospels taken from Luke, this Sunday’s story is from John that perfectly fits last week’s parable of the prodigal son to show us God’s immense love and mercy for us sinners. Every conversion, every contrition of sins presupposes silence. Recall how the lost son last Sunday realized his sinfulness while silently tending swine in a far away land.

From Google.

Jesus went to the Mount of Olives. But early in the morning he arrived again in the temple area, and all the people started coming to him, and he sat down and taught them. Then the scribes and the Pharisees brought a woman who had been caught in adultery and made her stand in the middle. They said to him, “Teacher, this woman was caught in the very act of committing adultery. Now in the law, Moses commanded us to stone such women. So what do you say?” They said this to test him, so that they could have some charge to bring against him. Jesus bent down and began to write on the ground with his finger.

John 8:1-6

From Google.

We have seen how Jesus foiled other insidious plots against him through tricky questions but this one involving a woman caught committing adultery shows us a fine image of him as the Christ. His silence, his bending down and his writing on the ground are moving moments that touch our hearts and make us wonder all the more, who is this man?

More than addressing a question that concerns the many dilemmas we face in life, this episode shows us that it is something that directly concerns Jesus Christ himself, his being our Savior. Notice at the start of the story where Jesus is presented always going to the Mount of Olives to pray, to be one with the Father. This episode happened after he had entered Jerusalem on Palm Sunday, showing us how Jesus became more intense in praying, in being one with the Father when his final days were approaching. That is the contemplative spirit.

Now feel the atmosphere of those tense moments when people brought the woman caught committing adultery to Jesus: everybody was saying something, emotions were running high, just like us in our own time with social media around us. We live in so much noises where everybody and everything is talking that we fail to listen to our very selves, to others and most especially to God always silent. See how Jesus was so cool – or “chillax” as young people would say. It was an astonishing reaction to the situation. Only a person with deep contemplative spirit like Jesus can be so composed and silent in a tense situation like that. It is always easier to react and say something than be silent to weigh everything. Too often in the world today, words are so empty that they have to be shouted all around and repeated so often in the hope they become true, exactly what every election candidate is doing!

From Bing.com.

Jesus chose to be silent so we may realize that issues of sin and evil are best resolved in a contemplative spirit where we find the value of every person that we condemn the sin not the sinner. History has shown time and again how wars and violence or any other harsh methods like death penalty have proven ineffective in correcting any injustice or wrongdoing and preventing crimes. Where there is severity in measures against evil, we find only more deaths and burials happening but never peace and justice.

Now more than ever in Jesus Christ, we have found and experienced God’s mercy so abounding and closest to us sinners if we are truly sorry and ready to change. Like the woman caught committing adultery or the prodigal son last Sunday, we have to reach out to Christ to be forgiven from our sins. He assures us of never being condemned, of deleting our past sins and assuring us with a bright future to receive his promises if we “go and sin no more.”

We have to stress that Jesus does not approve sins. Never. He recognized the sinfulness of the woman when he told her “go and sin no more.” Likewise, Jesus never asked us to stop fighting sins. When he dared the people of whoever has no sin be the first to cast the stone, Jesus never meant us to be silent with the evil and wrongdoings happening around us. This encounter between Jesus and the woman committing adultery invites us to examine first, our own attitudes toward others guilty of serious sins. And secondly, to examine our own reactions when our misery meets with God’s mercy especially in the sacrament of penance or reconciliation.

Do we choose to be harsh like the crowd or be gentle like Christ?

How sad that even with our very selves we are so unforgiving, so severe that we hardly move on in life. Only in a contemplative spirit can we truly experience God’s liberating mercy and forgiveness within us and with others. The contemplative spirit enables us to trust God that no matter how sinful we are, his love and mercy are more powerful, able to transform us all into better persons, even saints! This is the promise of God in the first reading that he would do something greater than what he had done in liberating his people from Egypt – that he would send our Savior not only to forgive our many sins but even to share in his glory as saints.

Assumption Sabbath Baguio, January 2019.

St. Paul in the second reading could speak of “considering everything as a loss in knowing Christ Jesus” because of the contemplative spirit he acquired after his conversion. His letters all reveal to us St. Paul’s contemplative spirit and intimacy with Jesus Christ that flowed out into his daily life, reaching its summit in his martyrdom.

As the season of Lent comes to a close on this fifth Sunday, we are reminded of the path of conversion we have followed these past four weeks under St. Luke’s guidance. Conversion leads to contemplation, a daily communion with God in prayerful silence and allow him to suffuse us with his love. Its fruits are seen in our daily lives. It is the work of God, not us. It is God who renews us in silence into a new creation. We simply have to remain in Christ and strive always “to go and sin no more”. Amen.

Lent is preparing for Baptism

40 Shades of Lent, Tuesday, Week IV, 02 April 2019
Ezekiel 47:1-9, 12///John 5:1-16

Dearest Jesus: Last night as I prayed amid the heat of summer, I realized that since the start of our 40-day journey of Lent, it is only now I have been reminded of one of the highlights of this Season, the sacrament of Baptism symbolized by water in the two readings today.

So often, Lord Jesus, we take water for granted, not realizing its value until it is gone.

Just like you, Lord.

Cleanse us, O Jesus, with your purifying waters of Baptism, keep us nourished like the trees seen in Ezekiel’s vision planted near the rivers, always filled with life, always green, always bearing fruits of good works.

Most of all, come to us Lord Jesus like in the pool at Bethesda or “house of mercy”.

Quench our thirsts for life’s meaning. Without you as our water, we are dehydrated, weakened, dried up by life’s so many demands and concerns. May you always refresh us, awaken us to many possibilities of life especially when the well runs dry. Amen.

Images from Google.

“Walang Laman”

Lawiswis ng Salita ni P. Nicanor F. Lalog II, Ika-11 ng Marso 2019

 
Apatnapung araw nag-ayuno si Kristo
Nang siya ay tinukso ng diyablo:
“Kung ikaw ang Anak ng Diyos,
Gawin mong tinapay itong bato.”


Gutom at walang laman tiyan ni Kristo
Ngunit hindi napatangay sa tukso ng diyablo
Hindi siya nalito, naging matibay tulad ng bato
Na buhay ng tao higit nakasalalay di lamang sa tinapay
Kungdi sa Salita ng Diyos na bumubuhay, gumagabay na tunay.


Ito ang pangunahing katotohanang
Dapat nating pakatandaan
Na hindi sapat, at lalong di dapat
Tayo ay mapuno at mabusog 
Ng mga bagay ng mundo upang hindi matukso at malito.


Maraming pagkakataon
Lalo tayong nababaon
Sa balon ng pagkagumon
Kapag lahat tayo ay mayroon
Na malayo naman sa naaayon.


Sa pag-aayuno tayo napapanuto
Tumitibay ating pagkatao
Nawawala pagkalito sa higit na totoo
Na si Hesu-Kristo naparito upang samahan tayo
Maiwaksi at malampasan maraming tukso.


Mangyayari lamang ito kung tulad ni Kristo
Masasaid natin ating sariling kalooban
Di lamang bawasan kungdi mawalan ng laman
Magkaroon ng puwang sa ating kalooban
Diyos na ating tanging yaman.
Larawan ng ilang sa Israel tulad marahil ng pinuntahan ni Hesus nang Siya ay tuksuhin ng Diyablo.  Kuha ng may-akda noong Abril 2017.  Ang unang larawan sa itaas ay mula sa Google.

Christ’s “Win-Win” Solution for Humanity

DSCF1159
The beautiful Church of the Beatitudes in the Holy Land.  Photo by the author, April 2017.

The Lord Is My Chef Sunday Recipe
23 February 2019, Week VII, Year C
1Samuel 26:2, 7-9, 12-13, 22-23///1Corinthians 15:45-49///Luke 6:27-38
Life, sometimes, is a series of “good news-bad news” situation like the Beatitudes preached by Jesus during His sermon on the plain last week:  the blessings are the good news while the woes are the bad news.
 
But, wait…!  Such a view is the way of the world, not of Christ’s disciples!  
 
As we have reflected last Sunday, the Beatitudes are the paradoxical happiness of the disciples of Christ because they all run directly against the ways of the world.  Today we hear more paradoxical teachings from Jesus that are actually His “win-win” solution for our many problems like wars and other forms of enmities.  Unfortunately, we have never given them a try because we always complain the ways of the Lord as being far from realities of life, impossible to imitate because He is God and we are not.
Today let us set aside all these reservations and arguments to reflect on this new set of paradoxical teachings by the Lord:  Jesus said to his disciples:  “To you who hear I say, love your enemies.od to those who hate you, bless those who curse, pray for those who mistreat you… But rather, love your enemies and do good to them.  Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful.  For the measure with which you measure will in turn be measured out to you” (Lk.6:27-28, 35, 36, 38).  
It is very striking that Jesus repeated twice His call to “love your enemies”.
Does He not care about us who have to bear with the sins of evil people?  What a good news to those who hate us, curse us, and mistreat us!  Suwerte sila!   We would surely say they must be so lucky, even blessed with us who strive to heed the calls of Jesus to love them our enemies.
But, on deeper reflections, we are actually more blessed when we try to love our enemies because that is when we elevate – or “level up” as kids would say – our hearts to be merciful like God.  Experts claim that the best way to exact revenge against people who have hurt us is to shower them with good deeds and kindness from us they have offended.  According to these experts in counselling and psychology, evil people get disappointed and angrier with themselves when their evil plots fail especially when their targets do not react negatively.  They sound understandable because evil people derive joy in making people miserable.  So, why be miserable?
 
 
Far from being their “punching bag”, the Lord simply wants us to teach our enemies to respect us, to be kind to us by not being like themselves.  In loving our enemies, we teach evil people that more powerful than sin is the power of love.  Sin and evil consume a person while love and kindness make a person grow and mature and bloom to fullness. 
Far from being passive, to love our enemies by returning evil with good is always the most active method in fighting sins.  When Jesus asked us to offer the other side of our cheeks to those who slap our face or when we give them our tunic when they demand our cloak, we are showing these evil people that love is never exhausted unlike evil.  Love is boundless and the more we love, the more we have it, the more we keep on doing it.  Evil, on the other hand, reaches a saturation point that we get fed up with it, then we we stop doing it because it is exhausting and worst, consumes us within that in the
process destroys us.  Think of the most evil person you have known and surely, you find that person so ugly, so zapped of life and energy, eaten up from within by a festering wound.  Evil people will never have peace and joy within, glow on their face and skin because they are rotting inside like zombies.
In the first reading we heard how David as a type of Christ foregoing vengeance by holding on to God, trusting Him completely that he chose not to strike King Saul who was then trying to kill him out of jealousy.  As disciples of the Lord, we have to trust in the Word of God that can transform our hearts of stone into natural hearts filled with love and mercy like Him.  This is the point being explained by St. Paul in the second reading wherein Christ as the “second Adam from heaven” had made us bear the “heavenly image”despite our “earthly image” that is weak and sinful having come from the “first Adam from earth”.  Through Baptism, we have been endowed with all the necessary grace from God, transforming us into better persons of heaven.
 
 

One of my favorite sayings came from the desk of a friend of mine I used to visit in their office that says “If you have love in your heart, you have been blessed by God; if you have been loved, you have been touched by God.” 

See how God has loved us so immensely without measure!  Remember that scene two Sundays ago when Jesus borrowed the boat of Simon as He would do with our voice, with our hands, with our total selves?  Who are we or what do we really have and own that the almighty God would borrow from us?  Nothing!  Yet, Jesus comes to us daily with all His love without measure to bless us with everything we need.  So, who are we now to love by measuring everything, loving only those who love us, lending only to those who could repay us? 

Imagine how astonishingly disproportionate is the love of God with our kind of love.  It is in this light must we see the meaning of Christ’s final lesson this Sunday: “For the measure with which you measure will in turn be measured out to you.”   So paradoxical and provocative yet so true!  This Sunday, may we share God’s love in our hearts with others, especially with our enemies so they may also experience the loving and merciful touch of God.  Then we begin to realize too the “win-win” solution of Christ to humanity. Amen.  Have a blessed week! Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II, Parokya ng San Juan Apostol at Ebanghelista, Gov. F. Halili Ave., Bagbaguin, Sta. Maria, Bulacan.

DSCF1160
Side garden of the Church of the Beatitudes with the Lake of Galilee at the background.  Photo by the author, April 2017.