Tag: Crying

When our weeping leads to Easter

The Lord Is My Chef Breakfast Recipe, Tuesday of Easter Octave, 14 April 2020

Acts 2:36-41 ><)))*> +++ <*(((>< John 20:11-18

Detail of Italian painter Giotto’s “Noli Me Tangere (Touch Me Not)” of the Risen Lord appearing to Mary Magdalene.

Lord Jesus Christ, you know very well how on this blessed season of Easter, so many of us are crying, weeping due to the threats and deaths brought about by corona virus worldwide.

Yes, it is the saddest Holy Week and Easter for many people in recent history.

But behind all these sadness, deep inside us, many have experienced your more meaningful presence and coming this Easter amid our tears of sadness, of weeping because this is also the time we have missed you so much, we have sought you so much.

How lovely, O dear Jesus, to contemplate the two occasions in the gospel today when Mary was asked why she was weeping.

Mary Magdalene stayed outside the tomb weeping. And as she wept, she bent over into the tomb and saw two angels in white sitting there… And they said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping?” She said, “They have taken my Lord, and I don’t know where they laid him.” When she had said this, she turned around and saw Jesus there, but did not know it was Jesus. Jesus said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping? Whom are you looking for?” She thought it was the gardener and said to him, “Sir, if you carried him away, tell me where you laid him, and I will take him.”

John 20:11-15

We cry, we weep whenever we lost someone or something so precious and valuable like the people we love – or even hardly knew – due to COVID-19.

Give us the grace of tears and realization that in this life, the most beautiful reason we can have in weeping, in crying is that of losing you, dearest Jesus. It is the most beautiful reason for us to cry and weep at this time of the corona virus as it leads us back to you like Mary Magdalene!

Like the listeners of Peter on that Pentecost day, “cut us in our hearts” and may we be like Mary Magdalene desiring only you, searching for you, longing for you alone for in you is our fulfillment in life.

Let us not waste our tears on trivial things and most specially “toxic persons” to help us move forward in your new directions in life amid this pandemic of COVID-19.

At the same time, we pray today for those crying and weeping for varied reasons, too, that they may see you soon to experience comfort and assurance in you. Amen.

When Our Cries Become a Prayer

FlevitS
The Lord Is My Chef Breakfast Recipe-Prayer
Thursday, 22 November 2018, Week XXXIII, Year II
Revelation 5:1-10///Luke 19:41-44

            Lord Jesus Christ, you taught us in your sermon on the mount that “Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted” (Mt.5:4).

            Thank you for blessing our crying, our weeping and most of all, thank you very much for crying with us, for crying for us:  “As Jesus drew near Jerusalem, he saw the city and wept over it” (Lk.19:41).  In our first reading today, your beloved disciple John “shed many tears because no one was found worthy to open or examine the scroll” (Rev.5:4).

            Thank you for the gift of tears, Jesus.  I pray for those crying, especially those who cry in silence, those who cry alone.  Crying is praying.  Tears are some of the sweetest prayers we can all offer to you because when we cry, we are blessed to be truly poor and helpless before you, relying only to your saving and healing powers.  When we cry, we are so blessed because we can sympathize and suffer with those who are suffering.  When we cry, our tears cleanse not only our eyes but also our hearts, slowly washing away the pains and hurts sins have left in us.

            The world refuses to cry, trying to hide or cover pains and hurts including sins with pleasures and other forms of diversion.  I pray also for them, Lord Jesus, that they may stop hiding their tears because when we refuse to cry, we deny your Holy Cross.

            Give me the grace, Lord Jesus Christ, to see things as they truly are.  Let me sympathize with those in pain and suffering, to “weep with those who weep” (Rom. 12:15) that together, you may all comfort and console us with your abiding love and mercy, might and presence.

             Let us join the choirs in heaven saw by John to sing the new hymn, “Worthy are you to receive the scroll and break open its seals, for you were slain and with your Blood you purchased for God those from every tribe and tongue, people and nation.  You made them a kingdom and priests for our God, and they will reign on earth” (Rev.5:9-10).  AMEN. Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II, Parokya ng San Juan Apostol at Ebanghelista, Gov. F. Halili Ave., Bagbaguin, Sta. Maria, Bulacan 3022.

*Photo by the author of the church Dominus Flevit (Latin for “the Lord wept”) with roof shaped like tears outside Jerusalem taken in April 2017.  It is believed to be the site where our gospel scene today took place. 

LMC