40 Shades of Lent by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II Solemnity of the Annunciation of the Lord, 25 March 2025 Isaiah 7:10-14;8:10 + Hebrews 10:4-10 + Luke 1:26-38
“Cestello Annunciation” by Botticelli painted in 1490; from en.wikipedia.org.
As we journey towards Easter, we thank you dear God our Father for the gift of this Solemnity of the Annunciation of the birth of Jesus to the Blessed Virgin Mary, teaching us how the Christ came into this world with the Blessed Virgin Mary's attitude and example worth emulating as our companion in this Lenten journey when she asked Archangel Gabriel, "How can this be, since I have no relations with a man?" (Luke 1:34).
Photo by author, Our Lady of the Poor, Sacred Heart Novitiate, Novaliches, QC, 17 March 2025.
Many times in life, we live as if there is no God, with us not only playing like you, O God but actually acting truly as God. We live our lives according to our own ways, to our own standards, to our own thinking that most often lead to more disasters, more problems and worst, broken self and broken relationships; we feel we know better than you than anyone.
Teach us, Jesus, to be humble like your Mother, the Blessed Virgin Mary: in her asking Archangel Gabriel "How can this be", she had already expressed her acceptance of the Father's invitation to be your Mother; many times, we refuse to even listen to God’s plan for us as we we rarely or have stopped praying at all so unlike Mary who must have been at prayer when Gabriel came. In her asking "How can this be?", Mary was already setting aside her own plans in life to give way to God's plan; in asking "How can this be?", Mary showed us the beauty of prayer as a relationship where there is true freedom and openness to God in you, Jesus.
Forgive us Jesus when we act like King Acaz so hypocrite, pretending not to test you when in fact we have already decided on our own without considering you at all. . How, O Lord, can we truly change our ways to follow God’s plans and most unique ways for nothing is impossible in him? Amen.
Photo by author, Our Lady of the Poor, Sacred Heart Novitiate, Novaliches, QC, 17 March 2025.
40 Shades of Lent by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II Third Week in Lent, Cycle C, 23 March 2025 Exodus 3:1-8, 13-15 + 1 Corinthians 10:1-6, 10-12 + Luke 13:1-9
Photo by author, Sacred Heart Novitiate, Novaliches, QC, 17 March 2025.
Thank you very much for all your birthday greetings yesterday, my 60th. Until now my heart overflows in joy from your expressions of love to me that confirmed God loves me so much in the most personal manner. Hence, my firm resolve in these senior years of my life to be able to love like God, to desire always the Cross for the love of our Crucified Lord Jesus Christ.
Yes, it is very ambitious, too idealistic but, that is God’s love for each one of us! Jesus became human like us so we may finally experience God’s immense love for each of us. And that is the invitation of Lent to us – that we go back to God, our very first love. Very often, we experience that very personal love of God for us in the desert of our lives when we are in darkness and emptiness like Moses in today’s first reading.
Moses was tending the flock of his father-in-law Jethro, the priest of Midian. Leading the flock across the desert, he came to Horeb, the mountain of God. There an angel of the Lord appeared to Moses in fire flaming out of a bush. As he looked on, he was surprised to see that the bush, though on fire, was not consumed (Exodus 13:1-2).
Fire is a very powerful sign not only in the Holy Bible but in every culture for the warmth it generates and the light it illuminates the surrounding. Fire signifies power because of its unique abilities to cleanse, purify and transform materials into something better. It is history’s most significant discovery of all time, facilitating our growth and development as peoples and nations with the advent of cooking that gave us food that delights and nourishes us.
That is the fiery love God has for each one of us we often find when we least expected like Moses in the first reading. Moses ended up in the wilderness tending sheep after fleeing from Egypt when he learned it was widely known that he had murdered an Egyptian maltreating a Hebrew slave.
What a beautiful image here of God’s love so fiery yet not burning us! In the burning bush, God revealed Himself as the omnipresent One always with us we are rarely aware of. There in the burning bush, God also reminded Moses and us today how this whole planet Earth is a sacred ground, His dwelling-place that we keep on desecrating with our sins.
And there lies the great paradox of our lives where God lighting us, straightening our crooked path to help us find our way back to Him, to life and to meaning. God is the fire burning the impurities in us without us knowing in many instances while He prevents us from being consumed like the burning bush. In fact, many times unknown to us, the fires of our failures and disappointments, pains and trials have actually brought out the best in us. Unconsciously to us, we are like the burning bush aflame with God’s fiery love that transforms us into better persons and more committed disciples of Christ.
Some people told Jesus about the Galileans whose blood Pilate had mingled with the blood of their sacrifices. Jesus said to them in reply, “Do you think that because those Galileans suffered in this way they were greater sinners than all the other Galileans? by no means! But I tell, if you do not repent, you will perish as they did! Or those eighteen people who were killed when the tower of Siloam fell on them – do you think they were more guilty than everyone else who lived in Jerusalem? By no means! But I tell you, if you do not repent, you will perish as they did!” (Luke 13:1-5)
How timely is our gospel today, reminding us to go deeper into our very selves, into those dark places in our hearts to realize too God’s message to us in the light of recent turn of events in the country.
What a mess we are now into that we easily blame on others except us. We have become so divided as a nation that we have refused to find the face of God, choosing to remain in the level of personalism and worst, of politics.
Sin is not just a turning away from God nor a breaking of any law but a complete refusal to love. When there is no love, there is no trust, there is no other person, there is no God. Just one’s self. Sin, therefore, is selfishness, the thinking more of one’s self, not of others.
That was the very sin of the people after the exodus when they refused to love one another, grumbling against Moses and even God most of the time. St. Paul has a grim reminder to each of us this Sunday as he recalled that desert experience of the Israelites when he wrote:
I do no want you to be unaware, brothers and sisters, that our ancestors were all under the cloud and all passed through the sea… Yet God was not pleased with most of them, for they were struck down in the desert. These things happened as examples for us, so that we might not desire evil things, as they did. Therefore, whoever thinks he is standing secure should take not to fall (1 Corinthians 10:1, 5-6, 12).
Five years ago I celebrated my birthday on a Sunday, the fifth in Lent just before Palm Sunday. That was very memorable to me because it was the first Sunday during the COVID lockdown when public Masses were prohibited.
That afternoon, I decided to go on a motorized procession of the Blessed Sacrament around my parish with a handful of our parish volunteers using a borrowed F-150 truck of a generous parishioner. Oh how the people knelt while lining up the main highway and inner streets as we passed by with the Blessed Sacrament.
Halfway through our libot, it started to rain but I instructed my companions to still go on even if it there would be a downpour. As we approached the last purok of our parish, I saw a rainbow. And cried as I felt God telling me at that moment like Noah after the floods that He would not forsake us in that time of COVID.
God kept that promise until I left Parokya ni San Juan Ebanghelista in Bagbaguin, Sta. Maria, Bulacan that was the least affected barangay by COVID in the whole town during my term.
Reflecting on that scene of Moses before the burning bush, I remembered that rainbow during my 55th birthday at the start of the COVID pandemic and lockdown. God often comes to us in many disguises, enlightening us to see the present situation we are into especially when it is all dark. It is the time we look inside our hearts to find God and experience His love; if we can’t find God or feel His love, let us be converted. Let us do penance as Jesus told the people in the gospel. Only with a contrite heart that one can truly find love again because being sorry for one’s sin is the beginning of loving.
That is the surest sign of God’s love for us – when everything especially us and our relationships become visibly clear , no matter how slowly it may be, one step at a time. The more we experience the love of God, the more we resolve to love; that is when this life and world become brighter. Let us love like God by returning to Him in His love. Amen. Have a blessed week ahead.
40 Shades of Lent by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II, 19 March 2025 Solemnity of St. Joseph, Husband of the Blessed Virgin Mary 2 Samuel 7:4-5, 12-14, 16 + Romans 4:13, 16-18, 22 + Matthew 1:16, 18-21, 24
Photo by author, Sacred Heart Novitiate, Novaliches, QC, 17 March 2025.
God our most loving Father, thank you for this Solemnity of St. Joseph, the most chaste husband of the Blessed Virgin Mary who witnessed to us with his life of faith the important aspects of Lent that have become a rarity these days - silence and stillness in you.
In this world of 24-7 when everything is "instant", we have lost the sense and beauty of silence and stillness in you, O Lord, making us to drift farther away from you, not believing you, not obeying you relying more in our powers and control of everything.
But life is not about doing and things as your Son Jesus have shown us: life is about being and loving, of persons in whom we find you and meaning of our lives.
Joseph her husband, since he was a righteous man, yet unwilling to expose her to shame, decided to divorce her quietly. Such was his intention when, behold, the angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, “Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary your wife into your home…She will bear a son and you are to name him Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins.” When Joseph awoke, he did as the angel of the Lord had commanded him and took his wife into his home (Matthew 1:19-20, 21, 24).
Photo by author, Sacred Heart Novitiate, Novaliches, QC, 17 March 2025.
Teach us, Jesus to be like St. Joseph your foster father to be holy and righteous: obedient to your laws but most of all, faithful and loving to God through one another.
Teach us, Jesus
to be like St. Joseph
your foster father
to be silent because
silence is the domain of trust:
let us trust you more
than our selves,
than our gadgets,
than our modern thoughts
and beliefs;
teach us Jesus
to be like St. Joseph
to be still in this time
when everyone is easily
agitated foolishly
by the cacophony of
various shouts and cries
in social media that are mostly
not true.
Photo by author, Sacred Heart Novitiate, Novaliches, QC, 20 March 2024.
Teach us, Jesus, that life is a daily Lent, of being silent and still in your presence, in your voice, in your plans so that like St. Joseph your foster father we may take care of you found in each one of us especially the weak and the poor. Amen.
40 Shades of Lent by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II Monday, Second Week in Lent, 17 March 2025 Daniel 9:4-10 + + + Luke 6:36-38
Photo by author, Canyon Woods Resort, Laurel, Batangas, 15 March 2025.
Lord Jesus Christ, on this first working day of Second Week in Lent, give me the grace to be shamefaced; give me the sense of embarrassment, the sense of sinfulness, a sense of humanity.
Yes, Lord, we have been so callous and numb, so thick-faced as in "kapal"!
“Lord, great and awesome god, you who keep your merciful covenant toward those who love you and observe your commandments! We have sinned, been wicked and done evil; we have rebelled and departed from your commandments and your laws. We have not obeyed your servants the prophets… Justice, O Lord, is on your side; we are shamefaced even to this day… O Lord, we are shamefaced, like our kings, our princes, and our fathers for having sinned against you” (Daniel 9:4-7, 8).
Do not let us sink deeper into sin and misery like your people in the time of your Prophet Daniel, Lord, for us to be shamefaced in admitting our sins, our treachery against you; our nation is so divided these days with no one having any sense of shame at all with the decadence we have sank into like excessive profanities, rampant fake news, overt personalisms, too much politics without any regard at all with what is right and wrong, with what is evil and what is good and worst of all, without any respect for one another and for life in general; many of us have discarded your image and likeness in us as we have lost our sense of sinfulness and shame.
Let us be shamefaced like Daniel, Jesus; mahiya naman kami, Lord!
Before we can be merciful with others, let us be shamefaced first; let us be shamefaced, Jesus, so we can be generous with others for without any shame at all like with what is happening now in our country, we are sinking deeper into the pit of destruction. Amen.
Photo by author, Canyon Woods Resort, Laurel, Batangas, 15 March 2025.
40 Shades of Lent by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II Second Sunday in Lent, Cycle C, 16 March 2025 Genesis 15:5-12, 17-18 + Philippians 3:17-4:1 + Luke 9:28-36
Photo by author, the metropolis at night from Timberland Highlands Resort, San Mateo, Rizal, 08 March 2025.
Both our first reading and gospel this Second Sunday in Lent are set in the darkness of the night. Despite being the favorite setting to portray evil and horror not only in movies but even in the Bible, the darkness of the night has a unique charm of its own.
It is in this darkness of the night when the moon and the stars shine brightest. It is in this darkness of the night when we are delighted with the most wonderful ensemble of sights and sound no stage could duplicate when a sparkle of fireflies outline a treetop while crickets and geckos – tuko – with all the other insects and animals sound like a live symphony orchestra.
So many things in this world and in this life are best seen and experienced in the darkness of the night to be truly appreciated. And that is the call to us this second Sunday in Lent – that we enter the darkness in our hearts with the light of Jesus Christ for us to be transformed and transfigured in his image as his disciples.
Jesus took Peter, John, and James and went up the mountain to pray. While he was praying his face changed in appearance and his clothing became dazzling white. And behold, two men were conversing with him, Moses and Elijah, who appeared in glory and spoke of his exodus he was going to accomplish in Jerusalem (Luke 9:28-31).
Mosaic inside the Basilica of the Transfiguration on Mt. Tabor, Israel from commons.wikimedia.org.
We have been saying since Ash Wednesday that life is a daily Lent, a daily exodus from darkness into light, from sin into forgiveness, from slavery into freedom.
Every day we “pass over” to many darkness in life like sickness, loss of a loved one, failures and other trials and sufferings that come our way. Sometimes so dark, sometimes not so dark. But most dark of all darkness we go through are those darkness of sin and evil along with its many scars left right in our hearts following the constant temptations by the devil for us to turn away from God, for us to refuse to love others and even our very selves.
Photo by author, St. Paul Spirituality Center, Mt. Pico, La Trinidad, Benguet, 06 January 2025.
Our readings this Sunday assure us that in that it is in those darkness we find God who had come nearest to us in Jesus Christ. It is during those darkness like an exodus that we pass from passion and death to resurrection where Christ is calling us; hence, the need for us to listen to him and follow him. It is from this passing over the darkness of sins and trials when we are purified and transformed, transfigured into better persons and disciples of Jesus because that is where his light is most visible too.
To enter into these dark places in our hearts is the beginning of our conversion, of our daily Lent when we return to God, to his covenant we keep on breaking in sin.
Photo by Ms. Analyn Dela Torre, 12 February 2024 in Bgy. Caypombo, Santa Maria, Bulacan.
Lent as a preparation to Easter is also a renewal this covenant we have in our baptism which we renew every year at the Masses of Easter. That is why we have the story of the covenant of God with Abraham in the first reading that was set at night with the darkness signifying the trials we go through in life.
As the sun was about to set, a trance fell upon Abram, and a deep, terrifying darkness enveloped him. When the sun had set and it was dark, there appeared a smoking brazier and a flaming torch, which passed between those pieces. It was on that occasion that the Lord made a covenant with Abram, saying: “To your descendants I give this land, from the Wadi of Egypt to the Great River, the Euphrates” (Genesis 15:17-18).
Feel the terrifying character of the event as narrated by the author of Genesis; but, remember also how God remained with Abraham that night. It was after this episode that God first promised Abraham to become the father of all nations with children as many as the stars above.
But it was not all light with Abraham after this episode as he went through a lot of darkness in life like when he wondered when God would finally give him his own son as he grew older. When Isaac was finally born and had grown, God tested Abraham, asking him to sacrifice to him Isaac. Abraham willingly obeyed God that as he was about to kill Isaac, an angel stopped him and told him how God was so pleased with him that he was doubly blessed anew! Abraham passed over that very dark night in his life by completely trusting God who never abandoned him in life! Most of all, because Abraham never backed out from darkness.
Photo by author, St. Paul Spirituality Center, Mt. Pico, La Trinidad, Benguet, 06 January 2025.
That is the charm of darkness: it can bring us fears and anxieties but as one poet said, only the brave who dare to walk the darkness of the night shall see the beauty of the moon and stars above. In a little while after all the uncertainties and difficulties of the night, we arrive at a new day. Darkness is the prelude to light and day.
Entering into those dark places in our hearts can be terrifying but it is the only path towards true freedom with Jesus as our companion in our exodus. Refusal to go into those dark places in our hearts will keep us only deeper in darkness – anxious and afraid, always wondering when we shall see light which will never come unless we come out and pass over the night.
Recent turn of events in our country are so Lenten in nature, our own passover and exodus – hopefully – from darkness into light.
After those long six years of darkness in the deadly war on drugs of the past administration, we finally saw the light of God’s mercy and justice coming with the arrest of the former president.
It must have been so tortuously painful to the families left behind by the thousands of victims of tokhang.
Though I feel so glad with the turn of events, I still refuse to celebrate nor even join the heated discussions. I feel more the need for us to pray and reflect, to find God and where he is leading us — maybe into those dark places in our hearts to see how we too have contributed to that dark period in our history.
A reporter-friend who volunteered in the care for orphans of the tokhang victims recently shared her reflections in these turn of events where she claimed “we are Duterte”.
Huh? It is chockful. And shocking.
As I prayed and reflected on it, I agreed with her. Prior to Duterte’s coming to power, we as a nation have allowed the forces of darkness to come upon us with the RH bill later followed by bills and proposals for divorce, same sex marriage, and return of capital punishment. There was already this great darkness hovering above us even before Duterte came to power.
Sad to say, that darkness started in our hearts which St. John Paul II referred in his encyclical Evangelium Vitae as “culture of death”.
Let us heed the calls by St. Paul in today’s second reading to “stand firm” in Jesus (Phil. 4:1) because to conduct ourselves as “enemies of the cross” of Christ will surely lead only to “destruction” (Phil. 3:18-19). Let us avert our total destruction as a nation by finally confronting the many darkness within us in Jesus Christ. Amen.Have a blessed week ahead.
*Photos in the collage are not mine but from various sources like TIME magazine and Mr. Howie Severino of GMA7 News.
God our loving Father, as we end this first week in Lent, teach us more on the need to be empty of ourselves, empty of our pride for us to be consistent and most especially, kind.
We have been so filled with the world that our hearts burn with anger and hate, totally disregarding reason and morals with so many parents still in grief, crying for their children mercilessly killed on mere suspicions while friends and neighbors even family are caught in a huge web of lies everyone believes; worst, everyone sees one's self being so right while others so wrong, even accusing you, O God, of being "unfair" like during the time of Ezekiel.
How sad in this age of boundless and instant communications, our world had shrunk into little worlds and galaxies of "me and mine and I"; teach us your way of kindness in Jesus so we may see everyone as a "kin" - a kindred, a one of us filled with goodwill for one another; remind us always, Jesus, that it is not enough that we do not just kill anyone but most of all has goodwill with everyone right in our hearts as a sign of true worship for it is only when we see each one as a kin that loving can begin consistently. Amen.
Photo by author, Northern Blossoms Farm, Atok, Benguet, 27 December 2024.
40 Shades of Lent by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II Thursday, First Week in Lent, 13 March 2025 Esther C:12, 14-16, 23-35 + + + Matthew 7:7-12
Jesus said to his disciples: “Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you shall find; knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks, receives; and the one who seeks, finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened” (Matthew 7:7-8).
Today dear Jesus I pray for all those loved ones left behind by the thousands of people killed during the deadly war on drugs of the previous administration; thank you in answering our prayers and their prayers most especially that finally, justice has come for them and their loved ones.
Forgive me, Lord Jesus, if I ask, or wonder... surely, those people murdered without due process prayed too; what happened to their prayers?
Yes, I am sure, you answer every prayer but I wonder why people, especially the innocent and good ones usually young and helpless for various reasons have to die senselessly?
May we continue
to await your coming,
your answers
to our many
prayers;
may we have the courage
to obey you,
to do your will that
finally, we become our
brother and sister's keeper,
listening to their silent cries
in cold, dark nights of poverty
and indifference among us.
Thank you for clearly answering our prayers the other day, in granting us the same prayer of Queen Esther, of finally saving us from the hand of our enemies, of turning our mourning into gladness and our sorrows into wholeness (Esther 25).
We pray hard today, dear Jesus, that you soften the hearts of those people blinded by their power like the devil that tempted you to prove one's worth by doing everything even if they have to kill; open our eyes to see our worth in our being, in our personhood that never shall it happen again we fail to see you in one another. Amen.
*Photos used in collage taken during Duterte's deadly war on drugs by various photographers we pray for their courage in documenting the evils that pervaded during those years.
40 Shades of Lent by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II Wednesday, First Week in Lent, 12 March 2025 Jonah 3:1-10 + + + Luke 11:29-32
Photo by author, Timberland Highlands Resort, San Mateo, Rizal, 08 March 2025.
Fill me, O God, with wonder and awe for you like Jonah! Surprise me always of your goodness among your peoples; help me in my unbelief!
The word of the Lord came to Jonah a second time: “Set out for the great city of Nineveh, and announce to it the message that I will tell you.” So Jonah made ready and went to Nineveh, according to the Lord’s bidding. Now Nineveh was an enormously large city; it took three days to go through it. Jonah began his journey through the city, and had gone but a single day’s walk announcing, “Forty days more and Nineveh shall be destroyed,” when the people of Nineveh believed God; they proclaimed a fast and all of them, great and small, put on sackcloth (Jonah 3:1-5).
Loving God our Father, you are so great and awesome, more wide than the great city of Nineveh yet so mysterious that Jonah himself could not believe what he had seen: the people of Nineveh believed in you and repented a mere half day yet when he proclaimed your message to them!
Many times in life, we are like Jonah - very reluctant in following you, in obeying you because your ways are so different, even beyond comprehension yet so real; many times, we feel we know more than you know; most of all, most of the time, we insist our own even to you. Sorry, Lord.
Photo by author, Hidden Valley Springs Resort, Calauan, Laguna, 20 February 2025.
In this Season of Lent, banish our evil thoughts, banish the many reasons and explanations we have to open our minds and our hearts to your mysteries so we may read your many signs of presence and power, love and mercy for us even in this time in the world when it has become more difficult to believe in you due to modern trends, most especially of our own stubbornness; grant us that same disposition you gave Jonah who finally believed and obeyed you in doing your work in the way you want it done. Amen.
40 Shades of Lent by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II Tuesday, First Week in Lent, 11 March 2025 Isaiah 55:10-11 + + + Matthew 6:7-15
Photo by author, 10 March 2025.
How lovely, dear Jesus that every time I receive a plant or flower from anyone, automatically I offer them to you on my prayer altar; and here now, my newest plant "abloom" with my prayer today!
Thus says the Lord: Just as from the heavens the rain and snow come down and do not return there till they have watered the earth, making it fertile and fruitful, giving seed to him who sows and bread to him who eats, so shall my word be that goes forth from my mouth. It shall not return to me void, but shall do my will, achieving the end for which I send it (Isaiah 55:10-11).
Photo by author, 10 March 2025.
In a few days I am turning 60 years old and in a month, I shall have been a priest for 28 years; in all those years, Lord, it is prayer that has sustained me, that has nourished me, that has always been my life even many times I never knew it; you have nurtured me in prayers that at first was like a chore taught to me by my parents that later like a rain - sometimes an outpour, many times a drizzle, and most often just a dew to keep me moist.
Photo by author, 10 March 2025.
Keep me fertile like the soil, Jesus, and keep my leaves green even without flowers or fruit; just keep me soaked in your words, gently, subtly and intimately to quench my thirst for you, for meaning, for life that in the end, I come and open myself daily to God in your prayer, saying, "our Father". Amen.
Quiet Storm by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II, 10 March 2025
When the devil first tempted Jesus "If you are the Son of God, command this stone to become bread" the devil tempts us too to forget our being beloved children of God by doing everything and anything for us to be reduced to human doing forgetting we are human being.
And so, Jesus told
the devil, "One does not live
by bread alone",
he tells us too today
even if we cannot do anything
because we are weak and sick,
even if we fail to do something
because we have forgotten or
was so afraid,
we are still loved
for God is greater than
our hearts who cannot be seen
yet so true and so real,
fulfilling not just satisfying
than any bread.
Photo by author, Timberland Highlands Resort, San Mateo, Rizal, 08 March 2025.
When the devil tempted Jesus the third time, "If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down from here", the devil tempts us too to totally forget God because, after all, whatever we do, God still loves us; of course, that is true: we are humans loved and cared in our being not in our doing.
And so, Jesus told the devil "You should not put the Lord, your God to the test", he tells us too today for us to stop pushing the limits of morality and decency, and simply let the mysteries of God and of life wrap us because they are greater than us, not problems to be solved nor principles to be understood.
Photo by author, 10 March 2025.
Life is a daily Lent, a journey towards Easter, a return to our first love, - God in Jesus Christ his Son in whom we have been baptized and adopted as his beloved children as our being and identity: so let us simply be our true selves - his beloved since the beginning - loving him totally in our loving service to others.
This Lent let us journey in Jesus in prayer to be one in him; in fasting to create space for him within; in alms-giving to be one with fellow human beings for we are not human doings who cannot do everything who cannot know and explain everything except to wonder more, to love more, to appreciate more, to believe and trust God more.
*Collage are photos of our students last February 09, 2025 spending a Sunday afternoon of love with children with cerebral palsy and family.
**Special thanks to our sister in faith, Nicola who gave us the idea for this poem, the beautiful terms "human being, human doing" from her blog https://eaglesight.blog/2025/03/02/rest-and-replenish/.
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