Every year we await our birthdate to celebrate life. But more than that we await most Christmas without really realizing why.
Yesterday afternoon at five we entered your Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem. After more than three hours waiting in line, we reached your birthplace.
Thank so much for the grace to touch your birth site. We were so touched because we touched base with our very selves too. We felt your love for us, the joy of being alive,
Most of all, like the joy of being born, of being brought forth into the world that is dark and very cold – hostile like the apostles crossing Tiberias in today’s gospel without you in sight – your still come.
You actually stay in us, among us, and with us.
Teach us like the Eleven apostles to concentrate praying your word as we serve the needy. Let us stay in you, stay with you. Amen.
The Lord Is My Chef Breakfast Recipe for the Soul, Thursday, Easter Week II, 02 May 2019
O Lord Jesus Christ, grant us the courage you gave Peter before the Sanhedrin to boldly proclaim “We must obey God than men.”
So often in this modern world, modernity masked in relativism has become our new religion. We are more concerned with what people would say or think about us if we stand by your truth respecting life.
In the name of political correctness and human rights, we choose to be silent or tolerable with so many thoughts that run contradictory to the values of family, sanctity of marriage, sexuality, identity, and life itself.
Let us reflect on your words to Nicodemus “The one who comes from above is above all. The one who is of the earth is earthly and speaks of earthly things. But the one who comes from heaven is above all” (Jn.3:31).
The beautiful churches and rich culture of Madaba and Mt. Nebo in Jordan reflect these things “of the above”. Let us always look up to you and be healed and saved. Amen.
The Lord Is My Chef Breakfast Recipe
Feast of St. Joseph the Worker
01 May 2019 in Amman, Jordan
Dearest God our loving Father:
Thank you very much for the wonderful experience yesterday at Petra. Thank you in giving us a glimpse of your majesty, of the spectacular work of your hands.
Thank you for taking care of us here in Jordan. Continue to guide us, keep us and protect us as we head for your Holy Land.
So nice of you that as we celebrate today the Feast of St. Joseph the Worker, we head for his native town of Bethlehem in two days. And his workshop in Nazareth.
Cleanse us and purify our hearts that everything we say and do may be all out of love.
You called us into this pilgrimage.
Like the ancient people of Petra, though they did not know you or recognized you, they believed in eternal life with their great burial sites.
Like them, may we do things always in love, “the bond of perfection” (Col.3:19).
May “the peace of Jesus Christ control our hearts, the peace into which we were called in one Body. And be thankful” (Col.3:15). Amen.
Tuesday, Easter Week II, 30 April 2019, Amman, Jordan
We are all pilgrims on this earth, Lord God Almighty.
May we be like the early followers of Christ, “one heart and mind” in you. Let us keep in our hearts and minds that everything here on earth is yours to be shared with one another.
Let us seek more of the things of the above like Nicodemus.
Let us follow your directions in Christ through the Holy Spirit like the wind that blows.
Bind us all your children – fellow pilgrims -that we may care for this beautiful planet earth as we walk home to you O God our Father. Amen.
Photos on our way to Petra this morning via the King’s Highway or the ancient desert way.
Early morning view of the modern side of Jerusalem taken in April 2017.
My dearest followers, relatives and friends:
Tomorrow early morning we are leaving for the Holy Land. It is the only place here on earth that the Lord had blessed me to visit thrice. It is what I call in my homily today as an “a basta!” experience — there is something deep within me that make me confess like the Apostles that “Jesus is risen! Jesus is alive!” , and, “I have seen the Lord!”.
A basta! is all I can tell people why they have to visit the Holy Land even once in their lifetime. And the biggest surprise I have experienced the second time I went there in April 2017 courtesy of my friends from GMA-7 News, even if you visit again the same places you have seen before, Jesus has always something different for you. Very true.
With my three friends who are not only great news women who turned GMA-7 News to what it is today but great “prayer-warriors” too. Since my ordination to the priesthood in 1998, they have never failed to always ask me for prayers not only for themselves and loved ones but also for everyone in the news — as in everyone even form other news organizations who are sick or going through trying moments in their lives. This photo was taken after praying at the Wailing Wall of Jerusalem.
I am not sure if I could blog from there during these next two weeks as I have to lead a large group of pilgrims mostly from our parish. I have always considered myself as a “dinosaur” when it comes to new technology. But since June last year, I have overcome my fears with new technology that I feel I have grown in learning so many things about life and the world through the amazing internet and computers. As a priest, I have found a new calling from the Lord in blogging to reach out to more people with my prayers and sharing of the good news of Jesus Christ.
I shall be praying for you my dear followers, relatives and friends in a very special way during this pilgrimage. Do pray for me too and for my fellow pilgrims. Will surely share with you our experiences – and blessings – from the Lord in this journey in his Holy Land.
God bless you all!
fr. nick
At the sacristy of the Church of Dominus Flevit (The Lord Wept) with a painting of the historic meeting of St. Pope Paul VI and the Patriarch of the Orthodox Church in Jerusalem in 1970’s.
Yesterday I saw the Maundy Thursday letter of Archbishop Soc Villegas to us his brother priests. I have never had a death threat in my life but have experienced being the subject of a fake news on being dead in 2005. And like the good Bishop Soc, I also asked “why me for doing what is right?”
It was one of the darkest hours in my entire life. I was then assigned at our diocesan school for boys in Malolos when I initiated an investigation on two married teachers allegedly having an affair following a tip from some faculty members. Our school principal who was well-respected by everyone headed the board. After a few days into the investigation, the teachers concerned resigned after realizing the overwhelming evidences their accusers have gathered against them. We were so glad the case was peacefully and easily resolved.
A week later, a teacher woke me up very early morning with a call, asking if the text message they have received was true that I have died of a heart attack past midnight. My immediate response to the teacher was, “why did you call me if I have died already?” She was crying and was so concerned as I listened to her on the phone. Then I asked her to send me the text message, but, later I changed my mind, telling her “what if it were true?”
I was never able to get back to sleep that morning because everybody was asking about the fake news that spread so quickly. I had to call my family to assure them I am very alive and well. By eight o’clock I realized the gravity of the matter: nuns were praying and masses have been offered for my “untimely death” that some priests have in fact came to see me in the school. I tried to brushed it aside, taking it lightly with my usual jokes. I even held my classes that whole day, telling my students that even if I die, I would always come to teach them.
Things became so different later that day for me. Especially when I prayed first in our chapel that evening and later in my room. Alone, I cried, feeling a deep pain within, asking myself what have I done wrong to deserve such a fake news? It was a pain so different, something you could really piercing through one’s self, slashing and shredding every bit of my being. That night I felt I have finally grasped all those existential absurd and pessimistic stuffs by Abert Camus and Soren Kierkegaard. Like what young people would say these days, “gets ko na sila”.
Crucifixion at the altar of the Betania Retreat House, Tagaytay. Photo by author, 2017.
It did not stop there. The “mystery texter” eventually texted me, threatening me of so many things, cursing me that I would suffer so much before I die. With that, I sought help from my friends in the news who referred me to a text scam investigator whom I never met but was so kind to help me for free. With his technical skills plus my news background as well as pastoral psychology, I was able to eventually identify my mystery texter who was a co-teacher of the accusers of the teachers in the illicit affair. It turned out, she was so broken-hearted after being dumped by the male teacher for another co-teacher who was prettier and lovelier than her. And she’s also married! She thought I was protecting the accused male teacher who happened to be an ex-seminarian but later we learned he was notorious in having illicit affairs among his married co-teachers.
She eventually resigned from our school in 2006 along with her group of co-teachers who all end up miserable in life. Their leader got separated from her husband who was caught in the act in another school banging an employee in a vacant room during summer break. Another was widowed. The third just got uglier. And she? She went to teach abroad in 2007 but had to go back home after learning her husband’s extra-marital affairs. She was able to go back to our old school because I never told my rector my findings. After a year and a half, she was fired from our school when the wife of our school driver caught them having an affair. I have never seen her nor her group since I left our school in 2010.
The Cross of Christ atop the church of our Lady of Lourdes in France. Photo by my former student Arch. Philip Santiago during his pilgrimage in 2018.
Thank you for bearing with me with my long story. It is the first time I have shared it with anyone except with one good teacher I have kept as a friend. Since yesterday I have been telling you about the “hour” of Jesus Christ, his passion that started at the Last Supper, culminating at his crucifixion. We said the darkest hour of Jesus Christ is also his finest hour because of his immense love. In the end, it was his love that triumphed over sin and evil. And that is why we call this Friday as Good.
When I recall that episode in my life, I thank God. You know when I was being attacked then by that mystery texter, that was the same year God gifted me my first trip to the US when my Ninang’s daughter got married. Life has become harder for me since then but has become “betterer”.
Of course I was scared at that time, checking on everything I was doing. Everything in my life has to be planned and calculated; I hate surprises that is why I am not fond of gifts, that I do not readily open them. But, was I angry or mad? No. Even at that time. I even pitied our teacher for being fooled. There is still pain in my heart when I remember those people behind those things but overall, I have transcended the episode. And I feel I have been transformed by it. The incident made me more resolved to be good and better as a person, as a priest. Most of all, it had taught me that like Jesus Christ, we always have to make a stand for what is true, what is good, what is just. It is always painful, lonely and scary to be on the cross. But it is on the Cross of Christ where we shine and share in his glory. It is only at the Cross of Christ where we are truly transformed into better persons because of love. It is only on the Cross of Christ where we realize the value and beauty of this gift of life, of every person in our lives that we start living authentically. At the Cross of Christ, we are assured always of a bright new day to get better and stat anew in life. A blessed weekend to you!
The Crucifix by National Artist Napoleon Abueva at the Holy Sacrifice Parish at UP Diliman. Here we find Good Friday and Easter Sunday, Death and Glory of Christ always together, a hairline apart from each other. See also the long arms of Christ that seem to be disproportionate to his body. According to a story, the UP Chaplain who commissioned that crucifix, the Jesuit Fr. John Delaney asked Abueva to make the arms of Christ longer than usual to show Jesus welcomes everyone; there’s a room for everyone in the Lord’s Cross, especially those suffering. Photo from Google.
Today we begin the Holy Week. And here is my piece of good news for you: you do not have to necessarily listen to religious music to reflect on the immense love and mercy of God for us expressed in the Passion, Death, and Resurrection of Jesus Christ.
Exactly twenty years ago today, St. John Paul II asserted in his “Letter to the Artists” that every artistic inspiration is always from the Great Artist himself, God. This is very true in music which always speaks about love.
For our LordMyChef Music on this Palm Sunday of the Lord’s Passion, I offer to you one of my favorite from David Benoit’s 1986 album “This Side Up” called “Land of the Loving” featuring the vocals of the great Diane Reeves. Of course, the song is about romantic love, of how a woman had found a love so true and sublime with a another person, with a man who must be so rare. Raise it to the highest level, it is no one else but Jesus Christ.
Photo from Google.
Deep in your eyes is a promise Love can be ours if we want it Starting tonight Every dream I ever knew Here in your arms I’m believin’ Finally my life has A meaning of its own Here in the land of the loving I am home
In today’s gospel, one can find the remarkable – even striking – character of Jesus who, after being crucified, prayed for his enemies, “Father, forgive them for they know not what they do.” No hatred nor revenge. But pure love and friendship. Sometimes, our sins become our religious experience for it is through its darkness that God makes us experience him or find him.
Photo from bing.com.
I was alone in the city Searchin’ for someone to find me Cold empty nights and a million strangers’ eyes Here in your arms I’m beginning To leave behind all the loneliness I knew Here in the land of loving there is you.
In this simple room magic is made Though the world seems unchanged Leave the lights on I’m a bit afraid This might be just a sweet dream.
Deep in the night love is growing Though I had no way of knowing That when I found you I found ev’rything I need Here in your love I’ll be staying Fin’lly my life won’t be living all alone Here in the land of the loving I am home.
May Jesus find you, fill your heart with more peace and joy this Holy Week so you may rejoice in his Resurrection in Easter. Amen.
Sunset at San Juan, La Union. Photo by the author, January 2018.
Quiet Storm by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II, 22 March 2019
Moss on a pathway in Malagos Garden Resort, Davao, August 2018. Photo by author.
Last midnight I waited for my 54th birthday in our church to thank God for another year in my life. I just wanted to be with Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament and all I could tell Him was, “Lord, you have given me with so much and I have given you with so little. Teach me to give more of myself and most especially of YOU with others. Amen.”
As I sat alone in darkness, I thought of the many blessings and its lessons I have learned lately.
Everything indeed is grace. Whatever we get in life is always a blessing from God like love, patience, kindness, joy, mercy, knowledge and understanding as well every material thing we have. They are all from God. Share them, or better give them away to make life easier.
We only have two choices in life, either we become better or bitter.
Life is not about destinations but directions. Destinations are just points in life you reach or achieve, often connected with lines. And that’s it. So structured. But directions are about persons we journey with in life, something like your favorite pen or crayon that you pick to write or draw anything. It is always there, either following you or leading you wherever your writing or drawing flows into without any definite pattern, often in curves and circular motions. Always funny and enjoyable. Even crazy.
We do not find God, He finds us. Sooner or later in life and that is for sure.
In every situation in life, always look for Jesus Christ. Without Him, there’s no meaning in life or anything. And we find Jesus always on the cross.
Liars know very well the truth and that is why they lie. So, do not worry about gossips and lies they spread even if some people would believe them. Don’t waste time convincing them of the truth. They know it but refuse to accept it.
Anyone who is afraid to make enemies will never be able to stand for what is true and good.
Sad to say, life is not about intelligence. That is why we have so many stupid leaders everywhere – government, society, and even the Church! No one is gifted with everything in life because we are meant to relate and help each other. Like liars, stupids are not good company. Remember, only intelligent people go to heaven because St. Thomas said, the more we know things, the more we avoid sins and become holy. Idiots and liars are the most evil as they refuse to accept their sinfulness. Pray for them.
Enjoy life. Stop pleasing everybody except God alone.
Always handle life with prayers. No matter what happens with us, prayer is the final straw we are always left with to start anew in life.
40 Shades of Lent, Ash Wednesday, 06 March 2019 Joel 2:12-18///2 Corinthians 5:20-6:2///Matthew 6:1-6,16-18
Life is a daily Lent. According to St. Benedict, every day we go on our own “exodus” or “crossing over” – a pasch – from sinfulness to holiness, from slavery to freedom, from darkness to light; hence, Lent, like life, is a journey.
But, as a journey, Lent is
more about direction than a destination.
It is a journey with Jesus
Christ and in Jesus Christ. It is a journey that begins right inside our
hearts.
“Even now, says the Lord, return to me with your whole heart, with fasting, and weeping, and mourning; Rend your hearts, not your garments, and return to the Lord, your God.”
(Joel 2:12-13)
In the gospel, Jesus
stressed to us the importance of this inner journey into one’s heart:
“Take care not to perform righteous deeds in order that people may see them; otherwise, you will have no recompense from your heavenly Father.” (Mt.6:1)
(Mt.6:1)
The 40 days of Lent that begin today in our celebration of Ash Wednesday are not mere number of days to be followed but signify to us perfection which is an ongoing process in life. During the early days of Christianity, all baptisms took place on Easter and the 40 days of Lent (cuaresma) were spent preparing candidates for Baptism. It still remains the key point in this sacred season that during the Easter celebrations, we renew our baptismal promises which we continue to do daily by renewing our faith in God, rejecting temptations of the devil by choosing and doing what is good. The practices of fasting, alms giving, and contrition for sins help us in staying on course in the direction of Christ.
Why do I say direction of Christ, not destination of Christ?
So often we live our lives following a destination. In this age of WAZE and GPS, we can easily seek directions to a particular destination. Focus is more on the destination, not really the directions. Problem with being focused more on destination is we miss the fun and adventure of every journey. When we reach our destination, what do we do? We cross out from our list of travel goals every destination that we make and start looking for new places to visit until we have been to every place on earth! So, we plan to visit the Moon or Marss next? Eventually we get tired with travels and after covering so many distances and destination, we still feel lacking or incomplete.
Just like in life. We set goals which is very important but not everything. First we set our sights to finishing studies like a destination to reach. After graduation, we start a career or a job. We just keep on creating new goals, new destinations, raising our bars further that after proving how good we are, we are still empty. There is no more destination to go to that we confront ourselves with the existential question, is this really what I need most in life? Is this all?
“Ito na nga ba? Dito ba talaga ako?”
When we see life more as directional like in Lent which we celebrate every year and its spirit we live daily, it does not really matter what God wants me to do or if this is what He really wants from me. To see life more as a direction means to find its meaning in God that we keep on maturing, we keep on sustaining our journey in Him and with Him. It does not matter wherever He leads me or where I go or stay. No need to face the dilemma of “should I stay or should I go” because what matters most is I am in and with God.
Lent is entering God in and through Jesus Christ. It is going back to Him, staying in Him and with Him in love. This is the reason why we fast, we empty ourselves even our sights and other senses so that we become more sensitive to God’s presence. Notice how our churches and the liturgy are very plain and simple: no flowers, no decors, no Alleluia, no Gloria. Everything is bare essential so we are not distracted in finding and following God right in our hearts.
Recall the first time you fell truly in love when you see and hear and even smell your beloved everywhere and in everyone. You think every lady you meet is your beloved one like in the song “You Are Everything, and Everything Is You” by the Stylistics. When we truly love, the time and place are no longer important because all we have are the here and the now together.
Oh how easy to say we love God or somebody! But if we try to probe deeper into ourselves, we find that we have not truly loved God or anyone that much because in many instances, we always prevail over them. We choose our own will than God’s or our beloved’s. That is when we sin as we turned away from God and our beloved, changing our direction in life.
Lent is the wonderful season of finding again our direction in life, our true love, God. Love needs no justifications. And we can only love persons, not things. To be able to truly love, we first need to be “reconciled with God” (2 Cor.5:20) which this holy season of Lent offers us in prayers and liturgy. The beauty of finding our life direction in God this Lent is that it is not just a personal journey but a communal one as well. When you find your direction, you find God. If you truly find God as your direction, you would surely meet and find your neighbors.
And that is when you find
joy and peace.
And that is Easter, the direction and ultimate destination of every Lent and life.
Amen.
The shore of Tiberias where Jesus asked Simon thrice after Easter if he loves Him; then He asked Simon to “follow me.” Like Simon Peter, we must first love Jesus so we can follow Him to whatever direction, not destination. Photo by author, April 2017.
Life, sometimes, is a series of “good news-bad news” situation like the Beatitudes preached by Jesus during His sermon on the plain last week: the blessings are the good news while the woes are the bad news.
But, wait…! Such a view is the way of the world, not of Christ’s disciples!
As we have reflected last Sunday, the Beatitudes are the paradoxical happiness of the disciples of Christ because they all run directly against the ways of the world. Today we hear more paradoxical teachings from Jesus that are actually His “win-win” solution for our many problems like wars and other forms of enmities. Unfortunately, we have never given them a try because we always complain the ways of the Lord as being far from realities of life, impossible to imitate because He is God and we are not.
Today let us set aside all these reservations and arguments to reflect on this new set of paradoxical teachings by the Lord: Jesus said to his disciples: “To you who hear I say, love your enemies.od to those who hate you, bless those who curse, pray for those who mistreat you… But rather, love your enemies and do good to them. Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful. For the measure with which you measure will in turn be measured out to you” (Lk.6:27-28, 35, 36, 38).
It is very striking that Jesus repeated twice His call to “love your enemies”.
Does He not care about us who have to bear with the sins of evil people? What a good news to those who hate us, curse us, and mistreat us! Suwerte sila! We would surely say they must be so lucky, even blessed with us who strive to heed the calls of Jesus to love them our enemies.
But, on deeper reflections, we are actually more blessed when we try to love our enemies because that is when we elevate – or “level up” as kids would say – our hearts to be merciful like God. Experts claim that the best way to exact revenge against people who have hurt us is to shower them with good deeds and kindness from us they have offended. According to these experts in counselling and psychology, evil people get disappointed and angrier with themselves when their evil plots fail especially when their targets do not react negatively. They sound understandable because evil people derive joy in making people miserable. So, why be miserable?
Far from being their “punching bag”, the Lord simply wants us to teach our enemies to respect us, to be kind to us by not being like themselves. In loving our enemies, we teach evil people that more powerful than sin is the power of love. Sin and evil consume a person while love and kindness make a person grow and mature and bloom to fullness.
Far from being passive, to love our enemies by returning evil with good is always the most active method in fighting sins. When Jesus asked us to offer the other side of our cheeks to those who slap our face or when we give them our tunic when they demand our cloak, we are showing these evil people that love is never exhausted unlike evil. Love is boundless and the more we love, the more we have it, the more we keep on doing it. Evil, on the other hand, reaches a saturation point that we get fed up with it, then we we stop doing it because it is exhausting and worst, consumes us within that in the
process destroys us. Think of the most evil person you have known and surely, you find that person so ugly, so zapped of life and energy, eaten up from within by a festering wound. Evil people will never have peace and joy within, glow on their face and skin because they are rotting inside like zombies.
In the first reading we heard how David as a type of Christ foregoing vengeance by holding on to God, trusting Him completely that he chose not to strike King Saul who was then trying to kill him out of jealousy. As disciples of the Lord, we have to trust in the Word of God that can transform our hearts of stone into natural hearts filled with love and mercy like Him. This is the point being explained by St. Paul in the second reading wherein Christ as the “second Adam from heaven” had made us bear the “heavenly image”despite our “earthly image” that is weak and sinful having come from the “first Adam from earth”. Through Baptism, we have been endowed with all the necessary grace from God, transforming us into better persons of heaven.
One of my favorite sayings came from the desk of a friend of mine I used to visit in their office that says “If you have love in your heart, you have been blessed by God; if you have been loved, you have been touched by God.”
See how God has loved us so immensely without measure! Remember that scene two Sundays ago when Jesus borrowed the boat of Simon as He would do with our voice, with our hands, with our total selves? Who are we or what do we really have and own that the almighty God would borrow from us? Nothing! Yet, Jesus comes to us daily with all His love without measure to bless us with everything we need. So, who are we now to love by measuring everything, loving only those who love us, lending only to those who could repay us?
Imagine how astonishingly disproportionate is the love of God with our kind of love. It is in this light must we see the meaning of Christ’s final lesson this Sunday: “For the measure with which you measure will in turn be measured out to you.” So paradoxical and provocative yet so true! This Sunday, may we share God’s love in our hearts with others, especially with our enemies so they may also experience the loving and merciful touch of God. Then we begin to realize too the “win-win” solution of Christ to humanity. Amen.Have a blessed week!Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II, Parokya ng San Juan Apostol at Ebanghelista, Gov. F. Halili Ave., Bagbaguin, Sta. Maria, Bulacan.
Side garden of the Church of the Beatitudes with the Lake of Galilee at the background. Photo by the author, April 2017.
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