Colors and shades of life

Quiet Storm by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II, 03 April 2019

A follower is protesting the title of my Lenten blogs called “40 Shades of Lent”. She, or he, wrote us that “Our Roman Catholic Church is pure and sacred to be associated with a title of a pornographic movie.” Our follower also suggested to us to “Please inform your Bishop and Priests before posting these titles on social media.”

Our follower is absolutely right that the title of my lenten reflections is indeed from E.L. James’ novel published in 2011 and later adapted into a movie in 2015. I have never read it nor seen any of its movie adaptations that were both a hit and a trending topic in 2016. At that time, I thought of having a series of reflections for Lent distinct from my regular Sunday homilies I have called “The Lord Is My Chef Sunday Recipe” since 2006. I thought that if everybody was talking about “50 Shades of Grey”, why not ride on the strong recall of the brand by having my “40 Shades of Lent” where people can find the many colors and meanings of our sacred season?! After all, Lent’s motif of the color violet comes in many shades and hues, too!

That’s it, pancit! In no way does the title “40 Shades of Lent” becomes erotic or, as our follower described, pornographic simply because of its similarity with the book or movie title “50 Shades of Grey”. But her, or his, contention has opened for us a springboard for discussion regarding the way we deal with modern media if you can bear with me.

We live in a “mass-mediated culture” where every baby is now born with a mouse. If Jesus were with us today, maybe He would have directed us priests to “feed my geeks” instead of telling us to “feed my sheep”. Since the time of the great St. John Paul II to Pope Francis today, the Holy Fathers have all recognized this reality, asking us to find ways in proclaiming the Gospel among the young people without losing our Christian identity.

“The question confronting the Church today is not any longer whether the man in the street can grasp a religious message, but how to employ the communications media so as to let him have the full impact of the gospel message.”
St. Pope John Paul II , “Religion in the Mass Media” (Message, 1989 World Communication Day

The need for an equilibrium in our approach with media.

The two most media savvy Popes, St. John Paul II and Pope Francis have both noted in their speeches that young people today practically live in the world of media; hence, the need to reach out to them. Problem with us in the Church, both among the clergy and the laity, is when we respond in both extremes when some end up succumbing to the world of media while there are those at the other end rejecting it altogether or in some forms. What we need is some degree of equilibrium wherein we try to keep technology and media in their proper places. See the many instances when priests embrace media and technology so much that churches lose the sense of sacred with giant video screens all over with a barrage of tarpaulins in all sizes that make one wonder if it is a house of worship or videoke bar. On the other hand, there are those who reject media and technology, stepping back in history like in a parish in Poland recently where priests and the faithful burned some books including the Harry Potter series they deemed as sacrilegious and have evil forces.

It is difficult to achieve such equilibrium or balance in our dealing and use of modern media in the ministry for as long as we remain in our Pharisaical stage, of associating almost everything in the world and of the world as evil and sinful especially books and music. The gospel accounts teem with many instances when the Pharisees and scribes questioned Jesus eating and drinking with tax collectors and known sinners of His time. How sad that until now we still don’t get what He had said during that time.

Nothing that enters one from outside can defile that person; but the things that come out from within are what defile.
Mark 7:15

Equilibrium is first achieved in the constant examination of our hearts so we can respond properly to the spirit of modernity not easily reconcilable with the demands of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Attaining that equilibrium calls for a return to the contemplative spirit where we try to maintain our spirit of silence and prayer amid the constant changes in thoughts and beliefs including values often due to the growing efficiency of technology. Let me share with you the very words of a communication expert to conclude this piece that I hope may enlighten us to see the various shades of colors, including shadows and lights that surround us in this modern world today.

The contemplative spirit is not easily acquired, but without it people find it hard to discern the valuable from the worthless, or the enduring from the transitory. Contemplation puts us in touch with reality in a world in which a host of communication technologies work to sustain a multitude of illusions and images: a media world. The contemplative spirit helps us to see and hear beyond and through the sights and sounds we take for granted. The contemplative spirit is an attitude of mind and heart that enables us to focus on the essential, important things. It refuses to be hurried into premature rejection or acceptance of technology. If we Christians allow it to inform our use of communication technologies we shall learn to be realistic, but always hopeful, able to love and reverence our culture even as we strive, with God’s help, to transform it.
James McDonnell, “Communicating the Gospel in a Technological Age: Rediscovering the Contemplative Spirit”.

*Sacred Heart Novitiate, Novaliches. Photo by author, July 2018.*

Lent is embracing God’s truth

40 Shades of Lent, Wednesday, Week-IV, 03 April 2019

Isaiah 49:8-15///John 5:17-30

How lovely are your words for us today, O God our loving Father! So refreshing, so reassuring especially at times when dark clouds loom above us, when we are in deep turmoils or when our pains hurt so much.

Thus says the Lord: In a time of favor I answer you, on the day of salvation I help you, and I have kept you and given you as a covenant to the people, to restore the land and allot the desolate heritages, saying to prisoners: Come out! To those in darkness, Show yourselves! Can a mother forget her infant, be without tenderness for the child of her womb? Even should she forget, I will never forget you.
Isaiah 49:8-9, 15

What an amazing God indeed! So close, so personal like anyone.

Yet, O God, how unfortunate that so often we are tempted to doubt your love, your truth, your presence! So often we choose not to believe that we are loved by you or by those closest to us.

We keep on denying you have chosen to love us, preferring to live trapped in the many worries of this life.

Give us the grace of faith to embrace your truth, your love, especially Jesus Christ your Son who had come to make you closest to us as our breath. Let us see your work continuing in Christ that may eventually continue them in us and among us. Amen.

*A snapshot from the painting exhibit we viewed at the Davao City Museum, August 2018. Too bad never had the chance to get artists and title of artworks.*

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.

Lent is always a fresh start, a coming home

40 Shades of Lent, Monday, Week IV, 01 April 2019

Isaiah 65:17-21///John 4:43-54

Good morning, Lord! Thank you very much for this Monday, the first day of the brand new month of April. A new beginning, a fresh start. Help us to make it a good one.

Make true your promise to us, O God, through your prophet that…

“…no longer shall there be in it an infant who lives but a few days, or an old man who does round out his full lifetime; he dies a mere youth who reaches but a hundred years, and he who fails of a hundred shall be thought accursed.”
Isaiah 65:20

Our lives have no meaning at all without you, when we are separated from you. Without you, O God, life is measured in time as an age that is merely a number; but, with you, life is about finding meaning, having its fullness in you regardless we lead short or long lives.

When Jesus Christ healed the son of a royal official from Capernaum while in Cana, Galilee with the words “your son will live”, it was more than escaping death and living for more years in his life. It was more of living meaningfully, of finding you in our lives.

It has been four weeks since we started this Lenten journey. Continue to lead me back home into you, O God. Help me find my way back home to you especially in those moments I am lost and separated from you. Most especially, help me find your Holy Will O Lord that I may always fulfill it because of love and nothing else. Amen.

*Early morning at the Assumption Sabbath Retreat House in Baguio City, January 2019.*

“I’ll Always Stay In Love This Way” by Boy Katindig feat. Baron Barbers (1983)

The Lord Is My Chef Sunday Music, 31 March 2019

*Detail of Rembrandt’s painting “Return of the Prodigal Son” from Bing.com.*

It was still very dark early yesterday when I left Tagaytay after giving a Friday retreat to a group of couples. There were two things in my mind as I drove back to my parish: watch the sunrise over the picturesque Taal Volcano and think of the song to feature in LordMyChef Sunday music today. Upon reaching the intersection leading to Manila still in darkness, I gave up all hopes of seeing the sunrise up there in Tagaytay, contenting myself with my music and the cold winds keeping me company in my traffic-free driving.

Suddenly, these lovely lyrics wafted through the air…

I have never lost the love that I have given you
With all the things that we have all been through
I’ve never stayed in love before
As much as I have stayed in love with you

The Lord answered my prayer! I have found our LordMyChef Sunday Music – “I’ll Always Stay In Love This Way” composed by US-based Filipino jazz artist Boy Katindig and released in 1983 as part of his album In My Inner Fantasies. The song relates how a man tries to convince the woman of his dream of his great love for her. The words and the music plus the muy simpatico voice of another US-based Filipino singer Baron Barbers make this song so lovely (not cheesy) and relevant with our Sunday gospel on the parable of the prodigal son. Moreover, Boy Katindig’s “I’ll Always Stay In Love This Way” is also attuned with the pink motif of rejoicing in our liturgy as we near our holiest days, the Holy Week and Easter Sunday.

Imagine God the Father singing Boy Katindig’s composition, assuring us of His immense love and mercy despite our sinfulness. Unlike Katindig’s song, God had proven His love for us by sending His Son Jesus Christ who died on the cross in order to save us and bring us back to life again in Him! Here are the rest of the lyrics of “I’ll Always Stay In Love This Way” and hope you like it too!

You, you never thought the feelings
Meant for you were true
‘Coz everytime we’re all alone you wonder
If I’ll really never change
And if I’ll really stay in love with you

Love, it needs just you and me to stay together
Even if there’s nothing more
The best is there forever
Love, we have to stay this way in love forever
Even if you change your ways
I’ll always stay this way’

Coz I, I will always stay this way in love with you
I will always stay this way in love with you
I will always stay in love this way

You, you never thought the feelings
Meant for you were true
‘Coz everytime we’re all alone you wonder
If I’ll really never change
And if I’ll really stay in love with you

Love…
It needs just you and me to stay together
Even if there’s nothing more
The best is there forever
Love…
We have to stay this way in love forever
Even if you change your ways
I’ll always stay this way

‘Coz I, I will always stay this way in love with you
I will always stay this way in love with you
I will always stay this way in love with you
I will always stay this way in love with you

Lent is understanding Sin

40 Shades of Lent, Sunday Week IV-C, 31 March 2019

Joshua 5:9,10-12///2Corinthians 5:17-21///Luke 15:1-3,11-32

Sin can be mysterious at times because it can also be a religious experience that leads us back to God and holiness. We have a saying that “every saint has a sinful past and every sinner can have a saintly future.” So many men and women who were so notorious in their lives have proven this so true like St. Paul and St. Augustine.

After reflecting on the call for conversion last Sunday, our gospel today tells us a lot about the nature of sin. Unless we understand what is sin and why we sin, then we get imprisoned by sin as we keep on committing it no matter how hard we try to be better persons. But once we understand even a little bit of it, its hows and whys, then we sin less often as we slowly break free from its bondage.

“A man had two sons, and the younger son said to his father, ‘Father, give me the share of your estate that should come to me.’ So the father divided the property between them.”
Luke 15:11-12

Sin is when we separate from the Father like the younger son when we ask for our “share of your estate that should come to me” referring to that part of this whole life only God can have in its fullness. We always have the idea that it must be so vast and huge that even just a part of it would be more than enough for us. We want to be on our own that we break away from Him, thinking wrongly that the share we have is more than enough for us without truly realizing how great and so vast is the Father’s estate which is life itself!

And so it happens, we break away from God and live on our own that sooner or later, our share dissipates until we lose everything.

This estate, this very life of God will never be gone like Him, will never diminish nor dissipate. We shall always have it, enjoy it for as long as we are with Him, our loving Father! This is also the point of the Father to the elder son when he refused to join their celebration when his younger brother returned. Life, love, kindness, family, everything that is good dissipates when held individually away from God. But when we share it with the Father through Christ, it is like the river that never runs dry.

When he had freely spent everything, a severe famine struck that country, and he found himself in dire need… And he longed to eat his fill of the pods on which the swine fed, but nobody gave him any.
Luke 15:14,16

Sin always gives us the sense of “freedom” like the young son who “freely spent everything”. There is always that wrong understanding of freedom as the ability to do everything and anything, feeling that everything in this life is ours alone. Freedom is first of all choosing what is truly good. To be free is to be loving, being a part of the whole and never separated from the whole. To be truly free is always to be one. This explains why when we are deep into sin and all alone, separated from others, we suddenly long to be one with others. The sense of belonging suddenly pops up within us because we find ourselves incomplete when in sin.

“My son, you are here with me always; everything I have is yours.”
Luke 15:31

Here lies the problem also with the elder son who has always been present with their father but had never been one with him, never belonging to him. He is guilty of “sin of omission” when he felt nothing seems to be wrong with him as he breaks no rules of their father – except their relationship and ties. The apostle James wrote in his letter that “a person is tempted when he is lured and enticed by own desire” (Jas.1:14). Sin is always the desire to be sufficiently alone, to be powerful, to be God! See how since the beginning, we have never outgrown that sin of Adam and Eve of becoming like God, of playing god.

My dear sisters and brothers, like Paul in our second reading today, let us be reconciled to God in Christ. To be reconciled is to be one, to belong, to become a part again of God. In the dryness and desolation of sin like the desert in the experience of Joshua and the Hebrew people, God continues to bless us with so many gifts, so many blessings. The two brothers in the parable are both sinners but loved by their father. And so are we.

More than avoiding sins, our gospel parable this Sunday invites us to love God more by seeking His will always. Yes, we have all been hurt by someone else’s sins and we have also caused pain on others with our sins. Let us focus more on this vast gift of life and love expressed in God’s mercy and forgiveness that no sin could ever diminish. And the good news is that it is all free and totally being given to us by Jesus Christ especially in our Sunday Eucharist. A blessed week to you!

*All images from Google.

Our lists and God’s only wish

40 Shades of Lent, Friday, Week III, 29 March 2019

Hosea 14:2-10///Mark 12:28-34

Dear God: This may sound funny but really, there is no doubt that you are indeed God. And a very loving and patient Father at that!

Like in the gospel today, I really can’t imagine how we would always talk to you, asking you so many things that preoccupy us most of the time like our endless lists.

One of the scribes came to Jesus and asked him, “Which is the first of all the commandments?”
Mark 12:28

Everything has to be categorized with us, from the first to the last, from the biggest to the smallest, from the shortest to the longest, and so forth and so on.

But you, O Lord, never asked us with any lists. You simply ask us to live which is to love.

All these things you have asked through the prophet Hosea mean one thing which is to go back to you in love. Sometimes, the most basic and ordinary thing to do becomes the most difficult and complicated like love when we try to rank everything and even every one among us.

Teach us, O God, to simply love, love, and love.

Because where there is love, you are surely there. Amen.

Lent is confronting evil

40 Shades of Lent, Thursday, Week III, 28 March 2019

Jeremiah 7:23-28///Luke 11:14-23

What a shame, dear God, to read in the gospel today your Son Jesus Christ busy confronting evil, driving out a demon that was mute from a man while we in this age deny its very existence.

In the name of modernity and keeping up with the time, we have taken sin and evil for granted, short of imitating the contemporaries of Jesus of accusing Him of driving out demons by the power of Beelzebul, the prince of demons.

How true were the words of your prophet Jeremiah that “we have walked in the hardness of our hearts and turned our back, not our faces, to you. Faithfulness has disappeared, even the very word from our speech.” (Jer.7:24,28)

Let us heed today’s responsorial psalm, “If today you hear his voice, harden not your hearts.”

Give us the courage, O God, to be like your Son Jesus Christ fighting evil and sin by being firm in keeping your commandments. Amen.

Images from Google; above is The Temptations of Christ, a 12th century mosaic at St. Mark’s Basilica, Venice, Italy.

Forgiving from the heart

40 Shades of Lent, Tuesday, Week III, 26 March 2019

Daniel 3:25, 34-43///Matthew 18:21-35

Praise and glory to you, O Lord Jesus Christ!

Here we are now O Lord being confronted by this topic of sin and forgiveness. Every day we pray the “Our Father” and you know very well how mechanical it had become for us asking God “to forgive us our sins as we forgive those who sinned against us.”

Like Peter, we often feel at a loss at how to forgive those who have hurt us. No… not just hurt or wronged us but, hurt or wronged us so deeply.

The pain is so deep in our hearts, Jesus. And that is why you want us all to forgive from our hearts, not from our lips or from our minds but from our hearts where the pains hurt us most.

We really do not know how. Your parable seems inadequate though you make an absolutely valid point of forgiving others because we have been forgiven too.

Like Daniel your prophet in the Old Testament, we beg you to “Deliver us by your wonders” – surprise us O Lord with your gentle mercy, with your kindness that like you we may be moved to forgiving those who have terribly wronged us. Amen.

From Google.

Pagkakaiba ng Panaginip at Pangarap

Lawiswis ng Salita ni P. Nicanor F. Lalog II, ika-25 ng Marso 2019

Minsan ako'y nainip 
Walang maisip kaya nanaginip
Sa pagbabaka-sakaling makamit
Sari-saring mithi maging pagngingitngit.

Sa gitna ng aking mga lakbay-diwa
Aking nabatid malaking pagkakaiba 
Nitong panaginip at pangarap
Na tila baga ay iisa.

Kapag nananaginip
Madalas isipa'y nasa himpapawirin
Bahala na kung saan makarating
Basta masiyahan kalooban natin.

Napakadaling managinip
Dahil mga mata lamang ay ipipikit
At dagliang sasagitsit 
Mga pantasyang katha ng isip.

Ang taong nangangarap o yaong may pangarap
Malalim kanyang nilalayon at hinahangad sa hinaharap
Inaapuhap kung paanong matutupad
Kaganapan ng pangarap sa kinabukasan.

Sino mang nangangarap o basta mayroong pangarap 
Kanyang diwa ay tiyak na matalas
Mga mata'y laging nakadilat at gising
Handang abutin at tamuhin mga tanawing siya lamang nakatingin.

Nasasalamin sa buhay natin kung tutuusin
Ang mas hilig gawin natin:
Ang managinip at magising
O mangarap at tupdin misyon natin.