The Lord Is My Chef Daily Recipe for the Soul by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II Wednesday, Third Week in Ordinary Time, Year I, 29 January 2025 Hebrews 10:11-18 ><]]]]'> + ><]]]]'> ><]]]]'> Mark 4:1-20
From Facebook, 11 March 2024.
Where there is forgiveness of these, there is no longer offering for sin (Hebrews 10:18).
How lovely and reassuring are these words from the author of the Letter to the Hebrews today, Lord Jesus Christ; thank you for coming to save us from our sins, for forgiving our sins, for teaching us to forgive others most especially by being more loving.
Thank you, Jesus, for being the Sower, always coming out to scatter seeds of love and mercy to us; open our ears, Lord, that we may ought to hear you: forgive us for being hard and harsh in our ways and words, forgive us for being easily pricked and agitated, forgive us for not listening at all to you, Jesus.
Let me open myself to you, Jesus, by opening myself too with others to listen to their points of view in order to understand them, not to judge them; open myself to your healing words so I may also soothe others pains and hurts than add salt to their injuries. Lastly, let me do your will Jesus by always listening and forgiving. Amen.
The Lord Is My Chef Daily Recipe for the Soul by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II Tuesday, Memorial of St. Thomas Aquinas, Priest & Doctor of the Church, 28 January 2025 Hebrews 10:1-10 ><))))*> + ><))))*> + ><))))*> Mark 3:31-35
Photo by author, St. Joseph Friary, Order of Friars Minor Conventual, Tagaytay City, 16 January 2025.
Lord Jesus Christ, I pray for one thing today: for us to be made whole again, for us to be one in union in God in you and through you; forgive us O Lord for being so fragmented, so divided with each to his/her own; everyone insisting one's self and many beliefs and views often truncated and far from you.
Make us realize that in your life, death and rising again, you have greatly changed the way we look at everything that was so fragmented before but it seems, we have returned to that situation again; worst, many of us have chosen to be separated, to be on our own, to remain fragmented.
Brothers and sisters: Since the law has only a shadow of the good things to come, and not the very image of them, it can never make perfect those who come to worship by the same sacrifices that they offer continually each year…Then he says, “Behold, I come to do your will.” He (Jesus) takes away the first to establish the second. By this “will”, we have been consecrated through then offering of the body of Jesus Christ once and for all (Hebrews 10:1, 9-10).
Like yesterday in our prayer, let us put on your lenses, Jesus so that we can see life and persons in your light not in our distorted and colored views; open us to see more of you and of your will so that "whoever does the will of God is my brother and sister and mother" (Mark 3:35)!
Grant us the humility and simplicity of St. Thomas Aquinas, the Angelic Doctor whose memorial we celebrate today that we may always turn away from sin in order to be in union with you always so we may have that peace because as he had taught us, "from the union of different appetites in man tending towards the same object that peace results" (Unio autem horum motuum est quidem de ratione pacis) Amen.
Photo by author, St. Joseph Friary, Order of Friars Minor Conventual, Tagaytay City, 16 January 2025.
The Lord Is My Chef Daily Recipe for the Soul by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II Monday, Third Week in Ordinary Time, Year I, 27 January 2025 Hebrews 9:15, 24-28 ><}}}}*> + ><}}}}*> + ><}}}}*> Mark 3:22-30
Lord Jesus Christ, take away our colored lenses that prevent us from seeing the real pictures in the world and of life; many times, our lenses are not only colored but even defective that make us see distorted images as the realities when they are not.
Like the Pharisees, we wear different lenses that prevent us from seeing your true self as full of good, of love and mercy; like the Pharisees, our views of others are distorted because we see only ourselves as better while at the same time, still like the Pharisees, we debate truth because we could not accept others as better than us, leaving us all trapped in self-condemned state of sinning that make us see everything as hopeless, worst, nothing is good at all in the world even in our very selves which is the sin agains the Holy Spirit.
Make us see through your loving and merciful lens our selves, others, the world around us, and most especially YOU; give us your lenses to see we have been saved and most of all, worth saving because we are loved by YOU and the Father in heaven.
Let us rejoice and relish your saving power, Lord, when You as the Christ, "Offered once to take away the sins of many, will appear a second time, not to take away sins but to bring salvation to those who eagerly await Him" (Hebrews 9:28). Amen.
The Lord Is My Chef Sunday Recipe for the Soul by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II Third Sunday in Ordinary Time, Cycle C, 26 January 2025 Nehemiah 8:2-4, 5-6, 8-10 ><}}}*> 1 Corinthians 12:12-30 ><}}}*> Luke 1:1-4; 4:14-21
Doctors tell us that prolonged periods of sitting can lead to many health issues like increased risks of heart disease, diabetes, certain cancers, obesity as well as depression. They have been sounding the alarm for several decades with the rise of “couch potatoes” and now had worsened as we get tied to our seats due to continuous use of computers and other gadgets.
Along with this worsening scenario of our prolonged sitting is the growing “competition” among us these days – consciously or unconsciously – for our places of seat in jeepneys and buses or airplanes, in classrooms and offices, on dining tables, in meeting rooms and in churches. People are so concerned where to be seated not realizing that what really matters in life is where we stand than where we sit!
The verb “to stand” evokes firmness and stability not only in the physical sense but also emotionally and spiritually speaking. Very close to it is the word “stance” that indicates our “stand”, of where we “stand” with our beliefs and convictions regarding issues. Before the coming of social media where we often make our stand while seated, there were placards calling us to “make a stand”.
In this age when most people prefer to sit than to stand as well as kneel to pray, our Sunday readings today are very timely as they teem with the words and images of standing for God.
He came to Nazareth, where he had grown up, and went according to his custom into the synagogue on the sabbath day. He stood up to read and was handed a scroll of the prophet Isaiah. He unrolled the scroll and found the passage where it was written… (Luke 4:16-17).
“Jesus Unrolls Book In the Synagogue” painting by James Tissot (1886-1894), brooklynmuseum.org
We now dive into the Sunday Ordinary Time with Luke giving us a glimpse of how Jesus spent a typical sabbath day proclaiming the word of God by first “standing to read.”
It was not the first time Jesus stood to read as He always stood teaching and preaching to the people. Jesus was a man who literally stood for the Father, stood for what is true and good, stood for what is just and fair. Most of all, He stood for all of us that He died on the Cross.
This Sunday as He launched His public ministry in His hometown Nazareth in Galilee, Jesus made it clear that He is the “word who became flesh” as He stood to read the scripture, claiming what He proclaimed from the Prophet Isaiah:
“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring glad tidings to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim liberty to captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, and to proclaim a year acceptable to the Lord” (Luke 4:18-19).
Imagine present there. More than being spellbind, there must have been that feeling of fulfillment, of the true reality unfolding as Jesus clearly stood by the word of God because He is the word who became flesh.
Our Filipino word paninindigan evokes it so well like in Pinanindigan ni Jesus ang kanyang ipinahayag (Jesus stood by what He proclaimed). From its root tindig which is “to stand” in English, paninindigan is conviction. Jesus spoke with such conviction and authority that those in the synagogue were amazed with Him. Interestingly, our Filipino synonym for paninindigan is pangatawanan which is from the root katawan or “body” in English. Pangatawanan ang salita is to stand by one’s word, like Pinangatawanan ni Jesus ang Kanyang sinabi (Jesus stood by what He said).
See how our readings this Sunday are so interesting, so beautiful especially for us in the Philippines because the words of “standing” and “body” are related, capturing in our own language discipleship in Christ, our standing for Jesus and His gospel.
“Jesus Unrolls Book In the Synagogue” painting by James Tissot (1886-1894), brooklynmuseum.org
At the end of this scene in the synagogue, Luke told us how Jesus declared as He sat that His words were “fulfilled in your hearing” which amazed the people because Christ “walked the talk” even before this took place.
Anyone wishing to have any kind of fulfillment in life has to first make a stand for whatever he believes in. To walk the talk, one has to stand first. Nothing gets fulfilled by sitting. We have to make a stand for everything and everyone we care and love most.
Like Jesus, we can only bring glad tidings to the poor by standing by their side, standing with them to uplift them. In the same manner, liberty for captives and recovery of sight to the blind can only happen standing, by actually being present with them and never remotely from a distant office or setting where we are comfortably seated. The oppressed can only go free as we proclaim a jubilee like this 2025 when we stand for justice and truth instead of simply affixing our “like” to some posts “standing” for whatever causes.
Photo by author, ambo in our Chapel of the Angel of Peace, RISE Tower, Our Lady of Fatima University, Valenzuela City, 25 December 2024.
In the first reading we find the priest Ezra standing as he proclaimed the words of God from a book recovered after their exile from Jerusalem.
Ezra convinced the people so well in his proclamation of the scriptures that people cried and bowed their heads before finally prostrating themselves to God because they felt and experienced the Scriptures as so true.
The words “standing” and “stood” were repeated thrice to underscore not only the physical posture taken by Ezra and Nehemiah but most of all to indicate their emotional and spiritual bearings.
Going back to our gospel scene, see how before narrating to us Jesus in the synagogue, the Church had rightly chosen to include for this third Sunday the prologue of Luke where he laid down the reason for writing his gospel account – so that we “may realize the certainty of the teachings” about the Christ. In writing his prologue, Luke naturally sat but in mentioning that word “certainty”, he tells us a lot of standing he had to make in completing his two-volume work, the gospel and the Acts.
Here we find that like all the evangelists and saints for that matter, they spent much time standing than sitting, second only perhaps to kneeling or praying.
There is a beautiful prayer attributed to St. Teresa of Avila called “Christ has no body” which goes this way, “Christ has no body but yours, no hands, no feet on earth but yours.”
Can we make a stand for Jesus, stand with Jesus, and stand like Jesus to be His body as St. Paul explained to us in the second reading?
“Brothers and sisters: As a body is one though it has many parts, and all the parts of the body, though many, are one body, so also Christ… Now the body is not a single part, but many” (1 Corinthians 12:12, 14).
Photo by author, Chapel of Angel of Peace, RISE Tower, Our Lady of Fatima University, Valenzueal City, June 2024.
As we embark into this long journey of Ordinary Time with Luke as our guide every Sunday, may we do the work of Jesus by standing along with our fellow believers and disciples.
Together let us make that collective stand for truth and justice, for decency and reason in this time when people are so fragmented, held captive by so many thoughts and beliefs propagated from the arrogant chairs of entitlement by some lazy minds influencing the world remotely. Together we stand and experience life as it is in Jesus Christ, even at His Cross.Amen. Have a blessed week ahead as we close January 2025!
The Lord Is My Chef Daily Recipe for the Soul by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II Friday, Memorial of St. Francis de Sales, Bishop & Doctor of the Church, 24 January 2025 Hebrews 8:6-13 ><))))*> + ><))))*> + ><))))*> Mark 3:13-19
Photo by author, Sacred Heart Novitiate, Novaliches, QC, 20 March 2024.
Jesus went up the mountain and summoned those whom he wanted and they came to him (Mark 3:13).
How lovely to my ears, to my heart, to repeat over and over again as I bask into your warmth O Lord Jesus Christ with these powerful account by Saint Mark today: "summoned those whom he wanted and they came to him."
Thank you, Jesus, for the grace and courage to answer your call, to come to you, to follow you like the original Twelve; forgive me, Jesus when your call gets into my head than into my heart and arms and legs; forgive me, Jesus when your want for me inflates my ego to one extreme and makes me doubt myself at the other end; bless me, Jesus, to always cherish your call to me using my name as I also renew my yes to you; keep me faithful in being close to you so that I may share you whenever you send me.
I pray also, dear Jesus, for all the others you want, you call but refuse to respond and worst, doubt if you really wanted them; through the intercession of your tireless saint Francis de Sales we pray that you grant them the grace to move on with life, to let go of their past hurts and sins for you are now our perfect mediator of the perfect covenant (first reading); may your kindness and truth meet in them finally. Amen.
Photo by author, Sacred Heart Novitiate, Novaliches, QC, 20 March 2024.
The Lord Is My Chef Daily Recipe for the Soul by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II Thursday, Week II in Ordinary Time, Year I, 23 January 2025 Hebrews 7:25-8:6 <*{{{{>< + ><}}}}*> Mark 3:7-12
Photo by author, St. Paul Spirituality Center, Pico, La Trinidad, Benguet, 06 December 2024.
Let me come to you, Jesus, with confidence and humility to express to you my deepest longings and desires, my deepest needs and cries you know so well but I always deny or too shy to tell you completely.
Though I know very well how your death on the Cross is the single most important event in history for all times and for all peoples, I balk its realities not for lack of faith but due to low self-esteem, lack of self-acceptance that you do love me truly.
The main point of what has been said is this: we have such a high priest, who has taken his seat at the right hand of the throne of Majesty in heaven, a minister of the sanctuary and of the true tabernacle that the Lord, not man, set up. Now he has obtained so much more excellent a ministry as he is a mediator of a better covenant, enacted on better promises (Hebrews 8:1-2, 6).
Let me follow you, Jesus like the people in the gospel: let me not follow you only to the sea but even to the Cross to be one in you, one with you for you alone is truly one with me everywhere, all the time. Amen.
Photo by author, Mount Olis, Atok, Benguet, 27 December 2024.
The Lord Is My Chef Daily Recipe for the Soul by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II Wednesday, Memorial of St. Vincent, Deacon & Martyr, 22 January 2025 Hebrews 7:1-3, 15-17 <*((((>< + ><))))*> Mark 3:1-6
Dearest Jesus:
Your words today are
so difficult;
I cannot imagine
you angry
as you looked
at the Pharisees
"with anger and grieved
at their hardness
of heart" (Mark 3:5);
but, as I imagined your face, Lord,
I experienced deep in me
what made you angry enough
to do something so drastic like healing
the withered hand of a man
on a sabbath:
it was purely love,
it was not anger due to
hate and bitterness
but magnanimity
or generosity despite
and in spite of everything
because you are indeed,
Jesus our High Priest forever
according to the order
of Melchizedek:
Melchizedek, king of Salem and priest of God Most High… His name first means righteous king, and he was also “king of Salem,” that is, king of peace. Without father, mother, or ancestry, without beginning of days or end of life, thus made to resemble the Son of God, he remains a priest forever (Hebrews 7:1, 2-3).
Let me examine myself what is it about you, Jesus that I am so afraid of you and made me many times like the Pharisees be so hardened against you; take away my stony heart, dear Jesus and give me a natural heart that beats with firm faith, fervent hope, and unceasing love and charity for others especially those in need and those lost.
Like your deacon and martyr St. Vincent, the first martyr of Spain, fill me Jesus with your peace and tranquility to bear all sufferings that his jailer repented and was converted; make me magnanimous, Jesus, like you especially in this time when losers refuse to accept defeat that they insist on their wrongful ways due to hardened hearts. Amen.
Photo by author, Sakura Park, Atok, Benguet, 27 December 2024.
The Lord Is My Chef Daily Recipe for the Soul by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II Tuesday, Memorial of St. Agnes, Virgin & Martyr, 21 January 2025 Hebrews 6:10-20 <'[[[[>< + ><]]]]'> Mark 2:23-28
Photo by author, Nagsasa Cove, San Antonio, Zambales, 19 October 2024.
Brothers and sisters: God is not unjust so as to overlook your work and the love you have demonstrated for his name by having served and continuing to serve the holy ones… This we have as an anchor of the soul, sure and firm, which reaches into the interior behind the veil, where Jesus entered on our behalf as forerunner, becoming high priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek (Hebrews 6:10,19-20).
What a beautiful passage, so reassuring and timely in this Ordinary Jubilee of 2025 with the theme of Hope; in this world where promises are often made to be broken than kept, thank you dear Jesus in assuring us of your keeping your promises.
Like the anchor that keeps a ship or a boat stable while moored, you O Lord Jesus Christ as our anchor keeps us filled with hope because you never disappoint like most humans.
Forgive us, dear Jesus, when we anchor our hopes in rituals and things like the Pharisees who were so focused on the letters about sabbath, forgetting its essence as a good news, a break, a release and freedom from the burdens of work and time to be attentive to God our very root and life.
Forgive us, dear Jesus, when we are so afraid not to break rules but we break persons, we break promises to love and to be kind with one another; grant us the grace of courage to persevere holding on to your promises in the gospel like St. Agnes, Virgin and Martyr who opened herself to your Spirit because you alone, O Christ is able to "reach into the interior behind the veil" of the temple into the very presence of God in Heaven.
Grant us, O Lord, a true sabbath, a break from our harsh judgments of others based simply on incomplete videos and stories. Amen.
Photo by author, Nagsasa Cove, San Antonio, Zambales, 19 October 2024.
The Lord Is My Chef Daily Recipe for the Soul by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II Monday, Week II in Ordinary Time, Year I, 20 January 2025 Hebrews 5:1-10 <*((((>< + ><))))*> Mark 2:18-22
Photo by author, sunrise at St. Paul Spirituality Center, Pico, La Trinidad, Benguet, 06 January 2025.
Praise and glory to you, God our loving Father! Thank you for this wonderful Monday as we pray for one another, especially to those still baffled with life's many mysteries, its many paradoxes beginning to appear anew as we dive into Ordinary Time.
Teach us to take into heart Jesus Christ's teaching today:
“Likewise, no one pours new wine into old wineskins. Otherwise, the wine will burst the skins, and both the wine and the skins are ruined. Rather, new wine is poured into fresh wineskins” (Mark 2:22).
Help us change our attitudes in life, Jesus: make us realize that like your life, our life is always a mixture of joy and sufferings; most of all, make us experience in your coming into our human reality as our Eternal High Priest, you have brought newness and significance in storage and taste of wine that symbolizes life itself, as you put a new vigor of spirit in celebrating life.
Photo by author, sunset in Atok, Benguet, 27 December 2024.
“Son though he was, he learned obedience from what he suffered; and when he was made perfect, he became the source of eternal salvation for all who obey him…” (Hebrews 5:8-9).
How lovely and wonderful to realize how your true humanity, dear Jesus, actually makes you more than less an effective Priest to truly "bridge" us with the Father and one another; like you Jesus, we pray the Father to take away our pains but in your example on the Cross, we learn how God is actually found in pain!
Change our attitudes to be like you, Jesus who came to join us in our many sufferings to show us that in our dealing with our own pain and the pain of others, that is when we grow in strength and maturity, in love and compassion that eventually lead us to deeper and true joy in you our Lord.
Help us embrace this paradox of life, Jesus, that a life devoid of the challenge of pain is an incomplete life; and when we are puzzled by the many sufferings in us and around us, let us gaze into your Cross to reflect, "Why did God not spare you his own Son?" Amen.
Photo by author, St. Paul Spirituality Center, Pico, La Trinidad, Benguet, 04 January 2025.
The Lord Is My Chef Sunday Recipe for the Soul by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II Feast of the Sto. Niño, Cycle C, 19 January 2025 Isaiah 9:1-6 ><}}}}*> Ephesians 1:3-6, 15-18 ><}}}}*> Luke 2:41-52
I have never liked children especially infants not until these last twenty years of my life. Before, I could not understand when parents especially mothers giggled with joy in seeing babies, describing how handsome or pretty they are when they all look the same to me.
Everything changed when I became a priest especially when I turned 40 and had my own nieces and nephew. Suddenly, I realized how children could be so nice with their energy and laughter and wits too. As I now approach my 60th birthday serving as a chaplain in a University with a hospital since 2021, I have come to love children that I have been telling my sister to push her two daughters to get married so we could have babies again in the family!
As my attitudes with children changed, the more I understand why our Lord Jesus Christ had insisted in His teachings the need for us to become like them. Until His death, Jesus showed us the importance of being like a child not only in trusting and having faith in the Father but most of all on the true meaning of freedom.
Photo by author, Tagaytay City, 17 January 2025.
Contrary to common beliefs of many, freedom is not the ability to do whatever one likes; freedom is choosing to do what is good. That is why freedom is never absolute. In the Book of Genesis we find God telling Adam and Eve to eat every fruit of trees in Eden except the fruit of the tree in the middle of the garden (cf. Gen. 3:2-3). And we have seen how in the abuse of their freedom, they including us today have become “unfree”.
In Christ’s coming, He made us recover our freedom, giving us the grace to always choose and do what is good, to be free from sin and free to love, free to forgive, free to be kind. This essence of freedom He taught even at His early age as the true Son of God.
Each year his parents went to Jerusalem for the feast of Passover, and when he was twelve years old, they went up according to festival custom. After they had completed its days, as they were returning, the boy Jesus remained behind in Jerusalem but his parents did not know it… After three days they found in the temple, sitting in the midst of the teachers, listening to them and asking them question, and all who heard him were astounded at his understanding and his answers. When his parents saw him, they were astonished, and his mother said to him, “Son, why have you done this to us? Your father and I have been looking for you with great anxiety.” And he said to them, “Why were you looking for me? Did you not know that I must be in my Father’s house?” (Luke 2:41-43, 46-49)
“The Finding of the Savior at the Temple” painting by William Holman Hunt (1860) from en.wikipedia.org.
First thing we notice in our gospel regarding freedom as the ability to choose what is good is Luke’s portrayal of Joseph and Mary as devout Jews who regularly went on pilgrimage to Jerusalem.
Each year his parents went to Jerusalem for the feast of Passover, and when he was twelve years old, they went up according to festival custom.
What a simple expression of the essence of freedom of choosing what is good, choosing God: the parents of Jesus devoutly practiced their faith that Jesus fully imbibed. The gospels teem with many stories of Jesus regularly going to the synagogues on sabbath to proclaim the word and to preach to the people.
This is something many parents today are missing, the Sunday devotion. No wonder that many children today do not understand the meaning and importance of the Sunday Mass, even the preeminence of God in our lives. How sad that many families even on holy days of obligation choose malls and vacation than choose God to worship Him in the church.
And many have the gall to defend this as part of their freedom, an expression of unity as family. But, where is God among them? Most of all, have we really become free by not going to the Sunday Mass?
Definitely not. Even at the surface some people would not seem to have any qualms at all in skipping Sunday Masses, deep inside many are bothered. Many of them feel an emptiness within, a kind of darkness that Isaiah described in the first reading. See how despite the affluence of many people today than three decades ago yet more and more are feeling lost and depressed because they have lost their roots in God who leads us to our rootedness in ourselves and with others.
Photo by author, January 2022.
Speaking of roots, its Latin origin is radix from which the word radical came from.
When we hear the word radical, we associate it always with someone who is a revolutionary, someone who literally or figuratively “destabilizes” our status and ways of thinking like Jesus Christ.
Very often, we find Jesus presented to us as one who was radical in His teachings who was thought to have been a revolutionary member of the Zealot party that worked to overthrow the Roman occupiers in ancient Israel. It was one of the accusations hurled against Him at His trial, citing His declaration to destroy the temple that He would rebuild in three days after its cleansing. Of course, these are not true; Jesus was not a radical revolutionary like the communists or power grabbers of modern century.
However, if we examine His teachings and mission, Jesus was a radical revolutionary because He preached and worked to bring humanity back to our very “root” – radix – who is God Himself. Listen to His words to His Mother after being found in the temple…
And he said to them, "Why were you looking for me? Did you not know that I must be in my Father's house?"
Photo by author, Parish of St. Joseph, Pacdal, Baguio City, 28 December 2024.
Here Jesus showed His Mother and us today that true freedom is being one always with the Father. Jesus was a truly free person because even at His early age, He was totally united with the Father’s will.
All throughout His life and mission, Jesus helped us all attain that freedom of inner communion with God our Father to be truly free from sin and evil to be free to love, free to understand, free to serve and whatever is good.
See how Jesus spoke so plainly to Mary and Joseph, as if reminding them and us today that our roots is in God alone and that is what we must always be concerned with, of how we must remain rooted in God as His children.
In the fourth gospel, we find this imagery of remaining rooted in God in Jesus Christ so beautifully explained during the Lord’s Last Supper discourses specifically in that of the vine and the branches (Jn. 15:15:1-17).
That’s the paradox of true freedom in Christ: being one in God does not limit but rather expands one’s freedom as a person. Any freedom outside of God is a fake and most likely, leads only to bondage because it is only in doing what is good when we truly grow and mature as persons.
Photo by author, Malolos Cathedral January 2022.
This Sunday we celebrate an extra day of Christmas for the Feast of the Sto. Niño in recognition of its great role in the spread of Christianity to our country since its coming in 1521 when Magellan gifted Queen Juana of Cebu with a Sto. Niño image.
The late Nick Joaquin rightly claimed in his many writings that the Philippines was actually conquered by the Sto. Niño than by the guns and cannons of the invading Spaniards more than 500 years ago. That’s probably because of this lesson on true freedom by the Child Jesus.
Let us learn and grow in true freedom by first choosing God especially on Sundays by celebrating the Lord’s Supper, the Holy Mass. Like the Child Jesus, let us remain in the Father, be free to ask most of all to listen and learn about life.
Like Mary and Joseph, it takes time before we can truly understand the words of Jesus Christ; what matters is like them, we keep on choosing always Jesus, only Jesus because Jesus is the truth. May the Lord “enlighten the eyes of our hearts so we may know what is the hope that belongs to his call, what are the riches of glory in his inheritance” (Eph.1:18). Amen. Have a blessed and free week ahead!
lordmychef.com 