The Lord Is My Chef Daily Recipe for the Soul by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II
First Friday in the First Week of Advent, 02 December 2022
Isaiah 29:17-24 ><]]]]'> + ><]]]]'> + ><]]]]'> Matthew 9:27-31
Your words today,
O God our Father,
are so comforting,
so delightful!
Thus says the Lord God: but a very little while, and Lebanon shall be changed into an orchard, and the orchard be regarded as forest! On that day the deaf shall hear the words of a book; and out of gloom and darkness, the eyes of the blind shall see. The lowly will ever find joy in the Lord, and the poor rejoice in the Holy One of Israel.
Isaiah 29:17-19
In your Son's coming,
Jesus Christ,
all our shame were wiped away
including our sins;
this Advent, help us to rise
again from our falls
and failures, Lord Jesus;
remember us as we
remember our sinfulness,
as we acknowledge our
blindness.
We want to see again,
Lord Jesus, with heads
up high,
no longer ashamed of
our sins and infidelities
to you; wash and cleanse
us, Jesus this Advent season
as we reform our lives
and our ways
to reflect your coming,
your presence,
your love and
your dignity in us.
Amen.
The Lord Is My Chef Daily Recipe for the Soul by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II
Thursday, Feast of St. John Marie Vianney, Priest, 04 August 2022
Jeremiah 31:1-7 ><}}}*> + ><}}}*> + ><}}}*> Matthew 16:13-23
Photo by Mr. Jay Javier, Acacias at UP, Diliman, QC, April 2022.
Glory and praise to you,
dear Jesus for the gift of
priesthood!
Thank you for the grace of
St. John Marie Vianney our
patron who taught us that
"The priesthood is the love
of the heart of Jesus".
That is why on this day of the
priests, we pray like the psalmist:
A clean heart create for me, O God,
and a steadfast spirit renew within me.
Cast me not out from your presence,
and your Holy Spirit take not from me.
Give me back the joy of your salvation,
and a willing spirit sustain in me.
I will teach transgressors your ways,
and sinners shall return to you.
For you are not pleased with sacrifices;
should I offer a burnt offering,
you would not accept it.
My sacrifice, O God, is a contrite spirit;
a heart contrite and humbled,
O God, you will not spurn.
(Psalm 51:12-13, 14-15, 18-19)
Indeed, dear Jesus,
it is the heart of us your
priests that must be cleansed
and purified for it is where
your new covenant is written
as Jeremiah prophesied
in the first reading today:
"I will place my law within them,
and write it upon their hearts;
I will be their God,
and they shall be my people.
No longer will they have need to
teach their friends and relatives
how to know the Lord"
(Jeremiah 31:33-34).
In your many teachings, Jesus,
especially in the Beatitudes,
you have always declared the heart
as the wholeness of every person
that must be purified to be open
and free to see God because
our intellect is never enough;
like Peter when he confessed "you
are the Christ" at Caesarea Philippi,
let our hearts be silent to listen to
the voice of the Father revealing
you in our hearts (Matthew 16:16-17).
Most of all, purify and cleanse
the hearts of us your priests,
dear Jesus so that we may have
a loving heart that is obedient to you
in serving your people; a heart that
is one with you, O Lord, on the
Cross for it is only in humbling
ourselves, in going down like you
can we truly be loving to have a heart
like your Most Sacred Heart.
Amen.
St. John Marie Vianney,
Pray for us priests!
Photo by Ka Ruben, National Shrine of Our Lady of Fatima, 24 June 2022.
The Lord Is My Chef Daily Recipe for the Soul by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II
Tuesday, Week VI, Year II in Ordinary Time, 15 February 2022
James 1:12-18 ><))))*> + <*((((>< Mark 8:14-21
Photo by Philip Santiago, Lourdes, France, 2018.
Lord Jesus,
please remove the many
blindness I have in myself
that prevent me from seeing you
from understanding you
from following you.
Please remove that one
particular blindness in me
about temptations: they
do not come from God nor
God wills anyone of us to be tempted;
temptations come from deep
within each one of us!
No one experiencing temptation should say, “I am being tempted by God;” for God is not subject to temptation to evil, and he himself tempts no one. Rather, each person is tempted when he is lured and enticed by his desire. Then desire conceives and brings forth sins, and when sin reaches maturity it gives birth to death.
James 1:13-15
Thank for this clarification and
reminder by St. James that
temptations originate from
one's self in three stages:
desires, sins, death.
Please open my eyes, Jesus,
enlighten my mind, my heart
and my soul to see the sources
of evil in me to see where these
are leading me.
At the same time, Lord,
let me count my blessings too
at how "God willed to give us
birth by the word of truth
that we may be a kind of
firstfruits of his creatures"
(James 1:18).
Open my eyes, dear Jesus,
remove my many blindness
like your apostles who readily
jumped into conclusions and
missed your whole point about
hypocrisies of the Pharisees,
thinking you were worried with
their lack of bread, totally forgetting
how you have multiplied bread twice
to feed thousands.
Sometimes too, we are so blinded
with our high regard for ourselves,
seeing more ourselves that we no
longer look at you nor see you
as our sole sole reference in
everything and everyone.
Amen.
The Lord Is My Chef Daily Recipe for the Soul by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II
Tuesday in Week I, Year I of Ordinary Time, 11 January 2022
1 Samuel 1:9-20 ><]]]]'> ><]]]]'> ><]]]]'> Mark 1:21-28
Photo by Mr. Red Santiago of his son Caius in January 2020.
“It isn’t that, my lord,” Hannah answered. “I am an unhappy woman. I have had neither wine nor liquor; I was only pouring out my troubles to the Lord. Do not think your handmaid a ne’er-do-well; my prayer has been prompted by my deep sorrow and misery.”
1 Samuel 1:15-16
In the midst of this new surge
in COVID infections, we identify
so well with Hannah, dear God
our loving Father: we are not happy,
and we are so sorry for this surge
that has affected almost every
family and household among us.
Listen to our pleadings to you, dear Lord,
heal our family members and friends
afflicted with the virus as well as those
most vulnerable like those bed-ridden
and those going through dialysis and
chemotheraphy and other treatments.
You know, O Lord, our deep longings and
desires; purify and cleanse us inside,
especially the sources of our pleadings
and speaking; whatever prompts us to
say and do may always be rooted in you
not in us nor in our pride and ambitions
like the scribes. May our promptings be
from the Holy Spirit always so that like
Jesus, we may speak with authority.
Amen.
I recently attended the 30th anniversary to the priesthood of my classmate from high school seminary who’s dying of a rare kind of cancer. Due to my being “mababa ang luha”, tears easily rolled from my eyes before the Mass started when I saw his mother sobbing as we brought him to his designated “lazy boy” at the altar.
This may sound weird but I must insist, I was not crying during that Mass for Fr. Sammy; just teary-eyed because everything was so touching.
In attendance were five of us classmates from the minor seminary, four priests and one lay, Fr. Sammy’s twin brother, Sannie. Main celebrant was our former prefect of discipline, Msgr. Albert while the homilist was the youngest in our class (1982) now our Vicar-General, Msgr. Pablo who recalled our high school seminary days when we were so young at 13-16 years old, and so thin, except me!
That was when more tears rolled from the corner of my eyes, making me wonder if there was any difference between shedding of tears and crying: my sight was never blurred without any need for me to wipe away my tears so often, and unlike in sobbing or crying, there was no gasping for air nor runny nose. I just felt there was a magical stream at the corner of my eyes overflowing with crystal-clear waters that felt so good as I reminisced our high school days.
But, I knew it was a lull in the storm… and soon, our dams of tears would surely break loose when the inevitable happens. For now, let’s not talk about it and just go back to my real topic, the shedding tears and crying.
Across the city of Jerusalem and way up from the Garden of Gethsemane is the Church of Dominus Flevit (the Lord Wept) whose roof is shaped like tears. It is the site believed to be where Jesus wept over Jerusalem for its coming destruction that eventually happened on the year 70 AD.
Photo by author, 2017, Church of Dominus Flevit, the Holy Land.
Notice that Jesus did not simply cry; he wept!
The Bible tells us that Jesus also wept was at the gravesite of his friend Lazarus whom he later raised to life (Jn.11).
How touching it must have been to see our Lord Jesus weeping, so human and most of all, so loving to his friends and for us all.
And that is what tears express, the deep love within us for one another, an outpouring of our love that look like beads of prayer.
While tears do come from ducts near our eyes that are automatically secreted when something foreign gets into our eyes to cleanse them, tears ultimately come from the soul that are deposited into the heart to cleanse and heal its wounds and scars left when we gave a part of ourselves in love. In the same manner, tears express our inner desires for love and acceptance, understanding and kindness, mercy and forgiveness, and most especially, for God and a loved one.
According to scientists, the chemical composition of tears vary depending on the emotion expressed why we cry; but, whether they are tears of joy or tears of sadness, tears are always a grace from God as they cleanse our eyes, our hearts and souls so we may see clearly everything in life, specially the face of the persons next to us or even far from us, whom to love, whom to trust, whom to believe again.
To be able to cry or to simply shed tears
means we are still alive,
that our heart is still beating,
still aching because we love.
Is there really a distinction between shedding tears and crying? I really do not know but what I am certain of is that tears are the most unique expressions of our human emotions that come from the deepest core of our being that when they flow in our crying and weeping, our whole body and very selves are fully involved. No wonder, crying can also be the most beautiful and eloquent prayer to God when our heart is overwhelmed with pain and sadness, even grief, or joy and happiness which our mouths cannot say but only our hearts can see.
That must be what Eric Clapton have felt when he wrote Tears in Heaven in 1992 following the tragic death of his four year old son Conor who accidentally fell from the 54th floor of their apartment in New York City.
To be able to cry – or to simply shed tears – means we are still alive, that our heart is still beating, still aching because we love and longing for love.
May our tears pave the way for beautiful smiles and joys in the heart in the days to come! Amen.
The Lord Is My Chef Daily Recipe for the Soul by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II
Tuesday, Feast of Dedication of the Lateran Basilica, 09 November 2021
Ezekiel 47:1-2, 8-9, 12 ><)))*> 1 Corinthians 3:9-13, 16-17 ><)))*> John 2:13-22
Photo by author, Jerusalem, 2017.
Glory and praise to you,
God our loving Father in heaven!
As we celebrate today the feast of
the dedication of the "mother and head
of all churches of Rome and the world" -
the Lateran Basilica - my thoughts
returned to Jerusalem where it all started
when your Son Jesus Christ cleansed
the Temple just before the Passover.
He found in the temple area those who sold oxen, sheep, and doves, as well as the money changers seated there. He made a whip out of cords and drove them all out of the temple area, with the sheep and oxen, and spilled the coins of the money changers and overturned their tables, and to those who sold doves he said, “Take these out of here, and stop making my Father’s house a marketplace.” His disciples recalled the words of Scripture, “Zeal for your house will consume me”.
John 2:14-17
Fill us with your Holy Spirit
to be like Jesus, full of zeal for you,
O God and for our Mother Church;
let us come to the church like Jesus
on that day in all humility and simplicity
"riding a donkey", with nothing else
except the desire to praise and serve you
by cleansing and purifying our very selves,
putting things in order in the church
where at the very core are always the
poor and needy with whom Jesus identified
himself with.
Like that "whip out of cords" that Jesus used to
drive the traders in the temple area, bind us
together as one again, ready and willing
to suffer and die on the Cross with Christ
for the sake of our unity and communion
in him, with him and through him.
We pray for more zeal in us as we journey
together as a Church in the ongoing "synod on
synodality" in preparation for the most unique
Synod of Bishops called by Pope Francis beginning
this October until 2023; may it be a journey for us
all in the spirit of sharing, reflecting, and listening
for a "synodal Church of communion, participation
and mission". Amen.
The Lord Is My Chef Daily Recipe for the Soul by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II
Friday, Week XXVII, Year I in Ordinary Time, 08 October 2021
Joel 1:13-15, 2:1-2 ><]]]]'> + ><]]]]'> + ><]]]]'> Luke 11:15-26
Photo by author, Franciscan Monastery on Mt. Nebo, Jordan, 2019.
God our merciful Father,
thank you very much for this
wonderful and blessed Friday!
Everybody loves Friday
primarily because it is the weekend
to work and school leading to
Saturday and Sunday rest.
But for me and my brothers,
we love this because it is
"Miserere nobis" Friday
when we pray Psalm 51:
"Have mercy on me, God,
in your kindness. In your compassion
blot out my offense. O wash me
more and more from my guilt
and cleanse me from my sin."
Help us to cleanse our selves
most especially today in
memory of your Son's
Good Friday; may we heed
the call of your prophet on a
daily basis to keep ourselves
clean.
Gird yourselves and weep, O priests! Wail, O ministers of the altar! Come spend the night in sackcloth, O ministers of my God! The house of your God is deprived of offering and libation. Proclaim a fast, call an assembly; gather the elders, all who dwell in the land, into the house of the Lord, your God, and cry to the Lord!
Joel 1:13-14
So many are our sins against you,
O God, that people have not only turned
against us priests but most of all, they have
turned away from you largely because
we have misled and abused them.
Cleanse us with your mercy and
forgiveness in Jesus Christ your Son;
exorcise us of our many demons
possessing us, allowing ourselves
to be overrun by evil and sin.
“When an unclean spirit goes out of someone, it roams through arid regions searching for rest but, finding none, it says, ‘I shall return to my home from which I came.’ But upon returning, it finds it swept clean and put in order. Then it goes and brings back seven other spirits more wicked than itself who move in and dwell there, and the last condition of that man is worse than the first.”
Luke 11:24-26
Let Jesus your Son
reign in our hearts and soul,
let him be the sole power within us
for he is the most powerful of all,
the only power there is;
let us welcome him inside us
to keep us clean
lest we sin more
and become worst
than before.
Amen.
The Lord Is My Chef Sunday Recipe for the Soul by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II
Sunday XXII-B in Ordinary Time, 29 August 2021
Deuteronomy 4:1-2, 6-8 >+< James 1:17-18, 21-22, 27 >+< Mark 7:1-8, 14-15, 21-23
Photo by the author, the Holy Land, 2017.
After an interruption of five weeks, we go back to Mark’s Gospel this Sunday that shall guide us until the end of our liturgical calendar with the Solemnity of Christ the King in November. See the beauty of the Sacred Scriptures that those five weeks from John chapter six did not break the flow of narration that is so seamless!
Returning to Mark’s account today after the feeding of five thousand and the bread of life discourse at Capernaum from John, Jesus crossed the lake and proceeded with the Twelve to Gennesaret where he preached and healed until some of his enemies arrived and found an issue to raise against him.
When the Pharisees with some scribes who had come from Jerusalem gathered around Jesus, they observed that some of his disciples ate their meals with unclean, that is, unwashed hands. For the Pharisees and, in fact, all Jews, do not eat without carefully washing their hands, keeping the tradition of the elders. So the Pharisees and scribes questioned him, “Why do your disciples not follow the tradition of the elders but instead eat a meal with unclean hands?” He responded, “Well did Isaiah prophesy about you hypocrites… You disregard God’s commandment but cling to human tradition.”
Mark 7:1-3, 5-8
The Israelites have taken pride in their laws given by Moses from God at Mt. Sinai. Simply referred to as the Law or Torah, it had united them as God’s “chosen people”, making it the very center of their lives that they enlarged its meaning and scope that soon consisted of more than 600 other precepts and practices to observe and keep.
Obeying the laws and traditions became their standard for holiness so that instead of becoming a means to bring them closer to God and others, these became an end in itself that they have forgotten God and others in the process.
Photo by author, Sacred Heart Spirituality Center, Novaliches, QC, 2016.
Into our hearts and the heart of Jesus
Once again, our gospel is so timely and relevant to our situation right now we are in the midst of a pandemic when we are told to always wash our hands. And if Jesus were with us in person today, he would surely speak the same things about the hypocrisy we have in our washing of hands!
First of all, let us clarify that Jesus is not against the washing of hands before eating nor of any of their other traditions and laws; what he criticized was the greater importance given by his enemies with the outward signs of their laws and traditions, forgetting its inner dynamics and meaning. Thus, he never failed to clarify with the people that he had “not come to abolish the Law or the Prophets but to fulfill them” (Mt.5:17).
Here we find the same problem with the people at Capernaum and in our own time when people fail and refuse to look beyond material things to find the meaning of what is going on around us, of what we believe in and what we practice.
Then and now – right in the midst of this pandemic – Jesus is inviting us to deeper perspectives about our concepts and ways of doing and seeing things, of what is clean and not clean, of what is tradition and modern, of what is good and evil.
Jesus wants us to constantly examine our lives for our need of conversion of our hearts to him. He is inviting us to probe our hearts and see who or what dwells inside us because from the heart, everything flows outside not only to our mouth (cf. Lk.6:45, “out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks”) but also to our hands.
That is why I love that imagery of the heart between two arms and hands: the heart at the center of our being and consciousness that whatever comes out of the heart naturally flows to our arms and hands, even to our entire body. If there is something wrong in the heart, so with the messages it sends out.
He summoned the crowd again and said to them, “Hear me, all of you, and understand. Nothing that enters one from outside can defile that person; but the things that come out from within are what defile.” “From within people, from their hearts, come evil thoughts, unchastity, theft, murder, adultery, greed, malice, deceit, licentiousness, envy, blasphemy, arrogance, folly. All these evils from within and they defile.”
Mark 7:14-15, 21-23
Here we find the essential question we must ask ourselves always: Do I find Jesus Christ in my heart as the sole basis and foundation of what I believe which I also say and do?
If we cannot find Jesus at the center of the things we do and believe, most likely we do not find others in the picture too! In that case, most likely, it is all about me, mine, my, and I! Like the Pharisees and scribes of his time, washing of hands and other traditions were more of a show than something more essential which is to serve God through one another.
Jesus is now leading us to a sincere examination of our hearts,
of our interior and spiritual motivations,
of why we are doing the things we are doing,
of what we really believe in;
because, too often, many of the things we do and believe
are not really rooted in our hearts nor with God.
There are so many times in our lives
that we simply do things out of habit
and conventions without really understanding why.
Jesus is now leading us to a sincere examination of our hearts, of our interior and spiritual motivations, of why we are doing the things we are doing, of what we really believe in; because, too often, many of the things we do and believe are not really rooted in our hearts nor with God. There are so many times in our lives that we simply do things out of habit and conventions without really understanding why.
Simon Sinek said it so well in his bestselling book “Start with Why” – people buy products, patronize services, or are moved when they see the why you do things; they are willing to pay more not because of fad or prestige but more of the conviction in a belief espoused by a brand or company or by an individual.
Photo by Ezra Acayan/Getty Images in Paranaque City, 09 February 2020.
Washing of hands and eating, our hidden hypocrisies
One of the most frequently asked question by people to me as a priest these days is why despite all our prayers, God has seemed become deaf to our pleas for him to end this pandemic? The answer is simple: unless we see and accept the spiritual realities of this COVID-19 pandemic, it would linger with us longer than projected, even not be solved at all as it gets worst with new variants that have thrown back even some of the most vaccinated nations lately.
We can have all the soaps and alcohol to wash our hands during this pandemic but COVID-19 will persist for as long as we have no regard for the dignity of every person. See all the abuses and corruption going on that is more sickening than the virus itself!
That washing of hands is an imagery full of meanings we have lost since the time of Jesus. Inwardly, the washing of hands means washing of one’s heart, of cleansing ourselves of our sins and self-centeredness and other impurities.
So many times we have become like Pontius Pilate who washed his hands to free himself from any guilt in sentencing Christ to death without realizing the more he had implicated himself to the injustice by refusing to make a stand for what is true and just. Like us today, we keep on washing our hands in the hope that our conscience would be at peace or be not bothered with our indifference for what is true and good.
Photo by Mr. Red Santiago of his son, 2019.
Washing of hands has always been closely related with eating which is an act of “appropriating something we cannot fully have” like when Adam and Eve ate the forbidden fruit. They took something they cannot wholly take or “swallow” that is why all they could do was just take a “bite” that opened their eyes to something they could not fully realize and appreciate. There are so many realities in this life we just cannot fully grasp right away, requiring us to have more faith, more patience in trusting God and those above us.
But, like Adam and Eve, we keep on taking a bite, of eating whatever our limited minds and reason find as “good” to have. And we wash our hands in clear hypocrisies like the Pharisees and scribes in worship and prayer when we lead double lives, when we laugh and cheer at all kinds of lies and filth, when we silently approve attacks against human life like tokhang and abortion.
Every day we wash our hands and keep them clean to avoid contaminating our food and body in hypocrisy as we agree and support in the name of “modernism” these trends of same sex relationships, promiscuity, and divorce. Or of graft and corruption we have resigned to accept as a fact of daily life.
To wash our hands is to wash our hearts clean of all kinds of evil, of mediocrity and indifference, of taking a stand to “pass over” from sin into grace by witnessing God’s goodness in our lives as Moses reminded Israel in the first reading.
The hands and the heart always go together as expressed in the Jewish thought of “mercy of the heart” and “mercy of the hand” when God’s mercy is more than a feeling but an act of righteousness, of justice and love.
Let us heed the reminder of the Apostle in the second reading to be truly clean in our hands and in our hearts: “Be doers of the word and not hearers only, deluding yourselves. Religion that is pure and undefiled before God and the Father is this: to care for orphans and widows in their affliction and to keep oneself unstained by the world” (James 1:22, 27).
Stay safe everyone. Have a blessed week ahead! Amen.
The Lord Is My Chef Breakfast Recipe for the Soul by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II
Friday, Week XXXIII, Year II in Ordinary Time, 20 November 2020
Revelation 10:8-11 >><)))*> + >><)))*> + >><)))*> Luke 19:45-48
Photo by author, National Bible Sunday, 26 January 2020.
Praise and glory to you, Lord Jesus that through this pandemic, you continue to bless us, teaching us valuable lessons we have taken for granted for so long. For the past eight months, we have been doing many quarantine measures to cleanse us and keep us COVID free and healthy, reminding us of the truth of that “cleanliness is next to Godliness”.
Today’s gospel reminds us so well of this need to cleanse ourselves first before we can cleanse people and institutions.
Jesus entered the temple area and proceeded to drive out those who were selling things, saying to them, “It is written, My house shall be a house of prayer, but you have made it a den of thieves.” And every day he was teaching in the temple area. The chief priests, the scribes, and the leaders of the people, meanwhile, were seeking to put him to death, but they could find no way to accomplish their purpose because all the people were hanging on his words.
Luke 19:45-48
People were “hanging on your words”, Lord Jesus, because they could feel power and authority in them for you are the Word who became flesh and dwelt among us.
Purify us, Jesus, like you so that our words may be filled with you.
Let your words not remain sweet only on our lips as experienced by St. John when he ate the small scroll given by the angel to him; let your words disturb us, turn our stomach sour (Rev.10:10) to cleanse us first inside, emptying us of our pride so you can fill us with your Holy Spirit to proclaim your good news of salvation.
May we desire more of being disturbed by your words than being pleased with its beauty that is superficial and can be misleading.
Most of all, may we keep in mind that it is you, dear Jesus, who must increase, who must be known not us in sharing and proclaiming your words. Amen.
Quiet Storm by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II, 22 September 2020
Photo by Ms. Ria De Vera of our parish church, August 2020.
Lately I have been watching old movies that I wonder why I still cry even if I have seen them more than twice before at the cinema and cable TV. It seems that my being born with “mababa ang luha” (easy to cry) is getting more “mababa” as I get old.
Tears are a gift from God, the most beautiful prayer we can ever express courtesy of the Holy Spirit because when we run out of words for our pains and sadness or when we are overjoyed, he makes us cry to heal and comfort us or complete our joys, assuring us of his loving presence.
That is the reason why we call “home” in Tagalog as “tahanan”: home is where we “stop crying”, that is, “tahan na” because that is where we find all the support we need in times of crisis. Indeed, home is where the heart is.
True to its function, tears cleanse us physically, emotionally and spiritually. I have read two decades ago that researchers at a university in the US have found the chemical composition of our tears differ if we cry because of pain and sadness or due to joy and laughter.
Is it not wonderful and amazing how we take for granted crying and tears without realizing its chemical process within that can transform our very selves?
Photo from Reuters.com, July 2020.
Tears and crying mark our life's coming to full circle.
When I was five years old, I saw the picture of a newborn baby crying in the Book Section of the Reader’s Digest. I asked my mom why the baby was crying. In her usual motherly way of explaining things, she told me that if the baby cries upon birth, it means he/she is alive; if the baby does not cry, he/she is dead.
“Kapag umiyak, buhay; walang iyak, patay.“
My young mind easily absorbed her words that would remain to be one of the most profound lessons I had ever learned about life at a very young age. As I grew up watching TV and movies, I would always sigh with relief whenever I heard the sounds “uha-uha” because the story would surely be nice and not tragic.
Imagine the great inverse that happens with crying and tears to signal the coming to the outside world of life of another human, of how we have to cry to be alive from then on until we die when it becomes our family and friends’ turn to cry and shed tears for us when we are gone.
But there is something more deeper than this great inverse on crying in life and death I had learned only in 2013 through my best friend Gil, a classmate in our minor seminary.
It was late February of that year on the 40th day of the death of his youngest sister Claire when he was diagnosed with cancer. We could not believe the news because Gil was the most health conscious in our “band of brothers” from high school who never smoked, rarely ate meat, and was active in sports like golf and badminton. Unlike most of us, he was never overweight, looked so healthy in our mid-40’s.
Imagine the hurt within him that every time we would visit him, he would cry not really in pain but more on the why of getting cancer. We tried visiting him as often as we can to cheer him up and lift his spirits specially after his surgery when his chemotherapy sessions began.
By September on that same year, we all had to rush and visit him at Makati Med one Sunday afternoon when informed by his Ate Lily that doctors have given up on him. His cancer cells were “ferocious” and nothing could be done anymore except to wait for the inevitable.
That was when I noticed the greater inverse about crying when Gil had finally accepted his condition and life direction, that was when he was most joyous and peaceful too while we were the ones so sad and worried, crying. How our roles were reversed with Gil now telling us to stop crying – tahan na – which we used to tell him months earlier! (Gil died peacefully the following Sunday, 22 September 2013.)
“Mater Dolorosa” as “Blue Madonna” (1616) by Carlo Dolci. Photo from Wikimedia Commons.
I noticed it happening so many times with some friends and parishioners I have come to love in my ministry, those I have pastorally cared for some time after being diagnosed with serious conditions like cancer.
Yes, I have cried despite holding my tears for them while administering the Holy Viaticum and Anointing of Oil. The patients in turn would just glance at me, so dignified and calm like Mary our Lady of Sorrows as if trying to comfort me with their sweet thank you.
As I prayed on those experiences, I realized how life comes to full circle through our crying and tears.
I believe that patients cry when they start undergoing treatment of their sickness due to fears and uncertainty of what would happen next to them; later as they come to terms with their condition, they stop crying because they already knew where they were going, of what was coming next.
We who would be left behind cry and begin to shed tears at thoughts of their dying because admittedly, we are actually the ones more uncertain of where we are going to or how our lives would go through when our loved ones are gone.
That is the greatest pain we feel in the death of a beloved when we grapple with the realities of the many uncertainties of life without them.
And that is why we need to love as much as we can our family and friends while still alive. This quarantine period of the pandemic are grace-filled moments to shower them with our love and presence we have taken for granted for so long as we pursued many things in our lives.
Photo by Dr. Mylene A. Santos, MD at Infanta, Quezon, April 2020.
Tears and crying lead us to heaven.
Death and sickness, like life, become a blessing if we are filled with gratitude not regrets because we have truly loved. When a beloved is gone and we begin to cry, the tears wash away our pains of losing them, cleansing us within to leave us with all the beautiful memories and love we have shared. Then, every remembering becomes truly a re-membering, making a lost loved one a member of the present again.
When we cry, tears polish the love we have shared with everybody until later when our time comes, our visions are also cleared of what is going to happen next, of where we are going. Crying becomes wonderful and truly a grace after all not only in sharing and being one with the grief and pain of another in the present but sooner or later, in having a glimpse of the life after.
In the Gospel of John (11:1-44), we find the story of the raising of Lazarus whom Jesus loved so much that he wept – not just cried – at his death. Jesus raised him up back to life, his final miracle – or “seventh sign” according to John – to show he is the Christ before his own Resurrection at Easter after his “final hour” of Crucifixion on Good Friday.
From then on, Christ sanctified crying and tears to enable us to see beyond pains and hurts, even death especially if you have truly loved.
Sometimes in life, it is always good to let those tears flow, like love even if it is painful, to have a good cry and real cleansing inside. A blessed day to you!
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