Last Wednesday evening I visited to anoint with oil one of your beloved poor patients in the government hospital. She died eventually two days after.
But what remained etched in my memory was the sight of some children crying in pain at the emergency room.
I have always wondered how difficult it must be for children to be sick when they cannot speak of what they feel that they simply cry and hold on to their mother and maybe trust her and the doctors attending.
“Whoever receives one child such as this in my name, receives me; and whoever receives me, receives not me but the One who sent me” (Mk.9:37).
Give me O Lord that same grace of children to suffer and bear all pains.
Teach me O Lord “to trust God and wait for His mercy, hope in Him and love in Him so my heart may be enlightened” (Sir.2:6-9).Amen.
Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II, Parokya ng San Juan Apostol at Ebanghelista, Gov. F. Halili Ave., Bagbaguin, Sta. Maria, Bulacan.
Quiet Storm by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II, 27 December 2018
Christmas is perhaps the toughest celebration we priests always have. More tiring and exhausting than the nine-day novena popularly known as “Simbang Gabi”, Christmas is the most emotionally challenging for us especially at this age of social media. I felt it so strong the other night as I tried catching up with Facebook. As I looked at everyone’s Christmas greeting with joyous photos of their families and friends, I felt some sense of bitterness within. The pain was more intense than all the Sunday evenings after Masses I have had as I sat at my desk with my laptop, literally stuck in my parish until New Year’s Day when I would be done with all my duties to finally visit my own family, especially my sick mother and some friends. How I wished I did not check on my Facebook that night! But then, I also remembered my homily that Christmas is about making a conscious decision to choose Jesus Christ. That there will always be darkness in life, people who would make life difficult for us but despite all these troubles, Christmas reminds us of our power to let God touch our hearts, to always create that room or space within us where Jesus could be born and dwell the whole year through. The late American scholar of the Church of the Latter-Day Saints Neal A. Maxwell said it right that “Each of us is an innkeeper who decides if there is room for Jesus” in our hearts.
Indeed, the best Christmas gift we can ever have is when we open and allow our hearts to be touched by God. Since 2011 when I arrived in this parish of the “beloved disciple”, the Lord has always revealed to me new and wonderful things not only about Christmas but about life itself. After seven years of laboring in love with so many hardships and sacrifices, I still consider it as a failure on my part to unite my parishioners. Majority of them refuse to cut the umbilical cord with the mother parish at the town proper or bayan where they prefer celebrating all the sacraments while others are simply divisive by nature, feeling a sense of superiority over the rest of us that they preferred celebrating Simbang Gabi and Christmas separate from the parish without realizing that the Holy Eucharist is the sacrament of unity. It is the most painful cut, the deepest I have had in my 20 years of priesthood to see some sheep going astray led by a shepherd filled with messianic complex. I have chosen to bear all these in silence, praying for them all as I opened my heart to Jesus to come and comfort me, eventually to heal me.
As I nursed those wounds within, Christmas Eve came when the four choirs of the parish serenaded us with some Christmas carols half an hour before our Midnight Mass. My eyes were in tears as I listened to their angelic voices and most especially when I saw the different choir members mostly from poor families with nothing else to offer the parish but their very selves and beautiful voices. Most moving were the poor children who came wearing simple clothes singing their hearts out for Jesus. I felt so blessed that there are people, even kids who love our parish so much, willing to support me their pastor with their very gift of presence. They never asked for anything during their practices, not even snacks though I tried providing them with some simple refreshments even meals when they practiced until supper time. I have learned from them that when Jesus Christ is preached and shared with the poor, they forget their poverty that they start to share everything they have including their very selves because they have felt that they are blessed and rich.
During our Mass on the eve of the feast of our Patron Saint John the Evangelist last night, our guest celebrant Fr. Efren Basco shared in his homily how God touched his heart last Christmas after Mass at a housing project for the poor where he met a mother who could only afford one new pair of socks for her two sons – that is, one new sock for just one of their two feet! And when Fr. Efren saw the two brothers, they even boasted to him their new socks paired with an old one! Though Christmas is a reality, it is always a choice we have to make for we can only do as much in this world but only God can touch hearts to change the world. Let God touch your hearts to feel His Son Jesus born in your hearts this Christmas and the whole year through. A blessed Christmas and joyous New Year to everyone! (Photos from Google.)
LordMyChefSundayMusic//Solemnity of Christ the King-B//25 November 2018
What’s on your mind, Who’s in your heart?
The trial of Jesus before Pontius Pilate occupies a very important role in the gospel of John which is also full of symbolisms like our Sunday music by Sting of the Police. Unlike the other three evangelists, John mentioned only in passing – just a sentence – that Jesus was brought to the high priest Caiaphas (Jn.18:24) and spent great details in narrating to us His trial before Pilate. This is the first time, and the only time in all gospel accounts that Jesus is face to face with a representative of the world’s political power to show us that His kingdom is “in this world but not of this world.”
Jesus Christ is king when in our hearts He reigns supreme, when we see Him among others as our brothers and sisters in Him. More than our thoughts and ideas, more than our feelings and assumptions are persons to be loved and respected. To recognize Jesus our King is to follow Him by taking up our cross because His kingdom is based not on force or power but on love expressed in humility, kindness, patience, and mercy that are often seen as weakness in the world. Yes, one may say His kingship is out of this world but that is exactly what the world needs these days! Jesus Christ is the King of the Universe because He is also the “king of pain” who bore all sufferings for us because of His immense love for us.
“King of Pain” was written by Sting from their album “Synchronicity” released in 1983. Sting admits that “King of Pain” is about the pains of his separation from his first wife. To heal his soul, he went on a vacation to Jamaica and while looking at the sun with a friend who is now his second wife Trudie, Sting remarked “There’s a little black spot on the sun today.” He then paused a few minutes and said, “That’s my soul up there.” He went into his room to write its lyrics that evoke love and submission to pain, something not far from Christ’s call to us all that whoever wants to be great in His kingdom must be the slave of all like Him who came “not to be served but to serve and to give his life as ransom for many” (Mk.10:44-45).
There’s a little black spot on the sun today
It’s the same old thing as yesterday
There’s a black hat caught in the high tree top
There’s a flag pole rag and the wind won’t stop
I have stood here before inside the pouring rain
With the world turning circles running ’round my brain
I guess I’m always hoping that you’ll end this reign
But it’s my destiny to be the king of pain.
There’s a little black spot on the sun today, that’s my soul up there
It’s the same old thing as yesterday, that’s my soul up there
There’s a black hat caught in a high tree top, that’s my soul up there
There’s a flag pole rag and the wind won’t stop, that’s my soul up there
I have stood here before inside the pouring rain
With the world turning circles running ’round my brain
I guess I’m always hoping that you’ll end this reign
But it’s my destiny to be the king of pain.
There’s a fossil that’s trapped in a high cliff wall, that’s my soul up there
There’s a dead salmon frozen in a waterfall, that’s my soul up there
There’s a blue whale beached by a springtide’s ebb, that’s my soul up there
There’s a butterfly trapped in a spider’s web, that’s my soul up there
I have stood here before inside the pouring rain
With the world turning circles running ’round my brain
I guess I’m always hoping that you’ll end this reign
But it’s my destiny to be the king of pain.
There’s a king on a throne with his eyes torn out
There’s a blind man looking for a shadow of doubt
There’s a rich man sleeping on a golden bed
There’s a skeleton choking on a crust of bread
There’s a red fox torn by a huntmen’s pack, that’s my soul up there
There’s a black winged gull with a broken back, that’s my soul up there
There’s a little black spot on the sun today
It’s the same old thing as yesterday
I have stood here before inside the pouring rain
With the world turning circles running ’round my brain
I guess I’m always hoping that you’ll end this reign
But it’s my destiny to be the king of pain
King of pain
King of pain, king of pain, I always be king of pain
lordmychef.com 