Showing posts with label Hope. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Hope. Show all posts

Thursday, April 30, 2015

A Reprieve for Mary Jane

We have won a reprieve for our Mary Jane. Let's make it count.


Kudos to our President BSAIII and his Indonesian counterpart, President Joko Widodo, to our DOJ, DFA and its Indonesian counterparts, to civil society from both our nations, and to the God of all nations.


Everything led to everything in the right way because of everybody who cared and prayed and labored to bring about this opportunity... the important thing now is to make it count.

Let us keep in mind there is still work to be done to obtain for Mary Jane that hoped for commutation of sentence. Other things may happen from there. But we have to get there first.

We have to continue to watch and pray and help in our own ways.

Let us also pray for the eternal repose of those eight who were executed early Wednesday morning. Let us remember their grieving relatives... and let us be humbled.

But for the grace of God go we, my brothers and sisters... Let's give thanks and make it count...

Salamat po sa Diyos at salamat sa ating laht!
---<--@

Update 20150505tue: My thoughts still return to the 8 who were executed Wednesday morning last week. Let us please pray for their souls. Learning about the stories of some of the ones besides our Mary Jane was as hard as it was sobering. I think a few more should have been spared. 

There really is no right way of killing a person.

Even through human institution, taking a human life is always an evil. Perhaps an evil weighed against a greater evil but an evil still... There truly is nothing good about it. If not for the safety it stands to gain for the community, capital punishment would have been an outright sin.

Perhaps capital punishment has lived out its usefulness in our days, perhaps not. One thing is for sure though, a person once dead can not be wished back to life again.

Sunday, April 26, 2015

Lessons from Hanukkah


Hanukkah teaches that the right response is not to curse at the darkness but to light a light.




Hanukkah teaches us not to rely on miracles.

It is a witness to strength of perseverance.

Did not the oil itself persevere?
---<--@





Hanukkah 2015 begins in the evening of Sunday, December 6 and ends in the evening of Monday, December 14.





















Though Hanukkah 2015 still lay in our tomorrow, its lessons remain so near to me... It's one of the two Jewish holidays I hold dear in my heart. The other one is Purim.

Both of them are holidays of national deliverance.
---<--@

"Ich Janke air fur all das cute, una liebe, una schone." - Anne Frank, 19440307tue

Thank You God for all that is good and dear and beautiful.

A prayer for Mary Jane and her companions













Heavenly Father, please do not forsake Mary Jane Veloso and her companions in their hour of need. As in Gethsemane You sent Your Holy Angel to comfort Your Son before His Passion, be there for them in their anguish also. Hear their prayers.

Comfort them. Comfort their families. Give them gentle counsel, O most merciful God. The forgiveness of their sins. Give them strength and courage to believe in the grace of Thy deliverance.

For Thou art God, able to produce good from any evil, and make the wild flowers grow from fields barren and accustomed to death; Who forsakes not and produces in each of us despite ourselves, the fruits of Thy ultimate and everlasting purposes, we shall pray to Thee and thank Thee for our prayers.

If today, O good and gracious LORD, Thou willed to receive them, deliver them swiftly. If today, dearest God, Thou willed to allow them to remain living here on earth with us, deliver them swiftly.

Let Thy will be done.

Amen.
---<--@

Personal Reflection:

I am fully convinced now that Mary Jane Veloso is a victim of circumstance.

A concatenation of adverse events to which she had little to no power to reverse has her now in thrall. My hope is that sharper minds and nobler hearts can unravel the truth before it's too late.

Hope still remains that Mary Jane will not be executed... Whatever happens though - we must move to make things better over here so as not to multiply victims like Mary Jane.

20150427mon: Whether we believe in the death penalty or not, as a Country, we have an obligation to ourselves as citizens to see to it that our rights to both life and liberty receive adequate legal protection - here or anywhere in the world.

The dignity of the human person in every Filipino citizen and the prestige of the entire Philippine State are goods reciprocal: To recognize one is to recognize the other, to respect one is to respect the other.

If one believes this as I do, one should likewise realize how we contradict ourselves whenever we choose to protect one and not the other. Both bases must be covered.

We can not dictate policy for other States but we can certainly accommodate for better here at home... Some improvements will be structural to the Republic and will be gradual but the most immediate ones I can suggest are these:

Screening for high-risk OFWs - criteria to be based on Country of destination, age, gender, level of education, average overseas experience and any adverse social conditions relevant and applicable.

The screening itself will either be in questionnaire form or through an interview. This will be done before the departure date and a clearance will be required by customs at the airport.

Voluntary for all Filipinos travelling overseas - either as OFWs or tourists. Mandatory for those who are travelling to particular Countries identified in the criteria.

Set up a Citizens Defense Fund. This fund is to be drawn from sources of income already being drawn by the State - sourcing it from relevant centers of revenue - and must not be passed on to the backs of those particular class of citizens it is intended to protect - to protect the prestige of the State.

The CDF will provide the financial capacity to sustain and carry out programs and information initiatives meant to shield and empower professions identified as vulnerable or high risk - OFWs and Journalists are two that I would like identified. This until such a time as statistics change and those categories have entered levels of risk considered to be nominal or other categories have been identified and included.

As these ideas are still in their formative stages... certainly, they can be improved on in due time.

Kwestyon en anser




Sa kabila ng mga kaguluhan sa mundo, sa gobyerno, sa kapayapaan, sa dagat sa kanluranan, at ang walang kasiguraduhan sa kilma, may pag-asa pa kaya ang Pilipinas nating lahat?










Schempre naman.





Kaya ipaglaban!













Sino pa?





Pasasalamat kina Ben Tisoy II, Z generation kutings, at Totoy Badboy.
This post has been approved by the Boom Boom Paw Foundation.


Seal of Quality







Hikahos














Hay hikahos! 

Buhay nga naman...
Talaga pala minsan.
Parang ngang gulong.
Umiikot. Umuusbong.
Dumarating. Lumalayo.
Nagtatagumpay. Nabibigo.

Ganun talaga.
Nananalig. Umaasa.
Natatapos. Naguumpisa.
Basta't may ligaya.
Minsan ma'y kadiliman.
Babangon muli. Umaga...
---<--@


Sunday, April 19, 2015

Happy Sunday

Let us give thanks... rest, refresh, renew.


























Let us pray for peace in our Country, in our region, in the Middle East, across Asia, in Europe, in Africa, in the Americas, in Australia and across Oceania. Let us pray also for Mary Jane Veloso and those who are in prison with her.

Let us pray for Persecuted Christians and all human beings who suffer unjustly for their faith.

Let us pray for more good will in the world, between nations and between human persons; more acts of kindness, more appreciation for the blessings of life, liberty, and Country; and more trust in the infinite goodness and Providential grace of God among all peoples of the earth.

Yes, let us be strong in diversity. united in adversity, and steadfast in hope!

Things change. It does not rain everyday. Behind gray skies, above the storm clouds, beyond reach of the tempest... perennial blue skies endure in golden days embraced by the sun.

Tomorrow could be worse, but let it not be today.
Today we will decide to act to make things better.
---<--@

























Sunday, March 15, 2015

Lolo Kiko, the Smiling Pope


Let me tell what I love most dear about our Holy Father Francis... it is his joy!

I think all the world has noticed how Lolo Kiko's smile warms the heart. I myself love that smile.

When our Holy Father visited our Country, I was watching live on TV as the Sri Lanka jet taxied to a stop in Villamor, waiting for that smile to touch my soul and for his feet to touch our soil.

How brilliant is that smile! 

The joy in his heart must be heroic. There must dwell a holy love in his soul, there must our blessed Savior be... 



There must our God dwell... in the kind of heart that enlightens other hearts. 

In the smile that penetrates into the soul, in the joy that even for a moment lifts up the sadness and gives hope to the witnessing of our faith, we might be seeing glimpses of Christ Jesus' own smile.

My life ain't problem free. I used to think my lot is better or worse than the next bloke. But hey, the truth out there is everybody in the world faces challenges daily. And I can not face mine eyes sideways. 

Or live my life with an absent heart; one that looks back to what bitterness there was instead of shining into what hopes there could be.

I think the heart that listens is a heart that is steady and sure. It stirs not with the stirring of the world. But hearkens to the silence that calls to the soul from within... in the stillness, in that stillness..., a heart that hears is a heart that sees...

Lolo Kiko when he smiles is in his moment. 

Consider when you laugh, how we feel - when the many constraints that hold us a prisoner to our own fears momentarily lifts... dispelled by the joy in the now - how good it is to be in that moment!

I'm talking here about the effects of a good and wholesome humor. 

I am not referring to the garbage jokes that sell your soul bad, bitter, and contemptuous spirits. Hey, love the comedian or comedianne, but maybe sometimes, discreetly discard some of their jokes.

Indeed, laughter - born of good spirits - seem to make the darkness disappear: Fear of an imagined future time laughter dissipates, excessive concerns over present troubles it likewise dispels, even the pain of past things yet unreconciled to the heart laughter momentarily relieves from our feelings...

Truly, good laughter is good medicine.

These things are also in a smile... in our smile and in the smile others is the abiding sense of the joy of those moments... in every smile is the gentle reminder that life will not always incline our feelings toward sorrow, and our thinking toward fear - especially fear of a future yet unwritten...

This is how I feel when Lolo Kiko smiles or even when I think about him smiling... because through the joy in his heart, reflected in that shining moment... I regain sight of my own hopes.

How good it is to be in that moment!

Thank you Holy Father Francis, I may not always be that good of a follower of our Savior and Shepherd, our Lord Jesus Christ, but you are in my heart and shall be in my prayers always! 

Please pray for us also, this nation who loves you, whom you have sent. Pray for us so that peace may fully reign in the soul of our Country and justice and good will may dwell in the hearts of all Filipinos...

We love you, Lolo Kiko, mabuhay po kayo!
---<--@

Saturday, February 14, 2015

Preserve us all in Thy Peace



O LORD God, 
help us with our present work of peace.

Guide us through as You always have 
and see us through this difficult time.

Look with mercy upon our present distress, 
O LORD and one Sovereign of all human nations,
make Thy Countenance shine upon our Country,
let Thy Light dispel the enveloping darkness...

Counsel those who are in doubt.
Comfort those who are in sorrow.
Carry the needy forth from troubles.

Be our refuge and our strength!

Manifest to this one, faithful Republic 
in particular to our responsible leadership, 
Thy will of justice and good for all our peoples.

Preserve our common hopes as a human people.
Preserve our dream of a better Philippines.
Preserve us all in Thy Peace.

Amen.
---<--@





Wednesday, November 19, 2014

Judge not

When you can hold back the water from these falls and stop it all from falling... 


























You can be judge above all men and women. (not just among)

Judge not

Don't say jelly before the jelly sets...



Let's allow something wonderful to happen first. (better yet, let's help it along)

Saturday, September 6, 2014

Love is blind?


If love were blind,
why ponder the mind?
That's so unkind.

If love were blind,
why seek the heart?
Where to start?

If love were blind,
why must lovers begin...
where from within?
---<--@


Some say faith is a blindness that allows you to see. This is true, you know.

Hope is born of those little glimpses faith accords the eye of the heart...

And love, love is the sight that allows us to trust in faith.


We used to have those little autograph books in the sixth grade. In it there is always a blank that asks you for a favorite motto. I know a lot of us peek at answers others have given, I did too. One of the most famous answers was, "love is blind".

Hmmm... In retrospect. I must've thought this response mysterious enough to be universally considered a cool and appropriate sixth-grader response. Yup, I used to put it down a lot.

Intermission...

Love is not really blind though. It can be stupid to the eyes of the world. But what is wise to the unwise?

What love really does at times really, only love may really understand. And unless the love itself admits the heart into its inner council of love, one shall never see what is beautiful from the eye of its beholder.

You see, it is this world outside of ourselves that is blind after all. Not love.

Come to think of it, I should write, "love is kind", as one of my favorite mottos next time around...

It's more true for me nowadays.
---<--@














      You're the star that shines in me...

Monday, April 21, 2014

Merry Easter 2014



I kept a running journal of my Lenten 2014 experience. Let me tell you, it had its ups and downs. There was a low like a valley, sunk in the shadow. 

And there was a point in that valley where I had to actively deny feelings of creeping despair an entrance into my soul. For I was a despair-er once in my life, my beloved brothers and sisters in the Lord Jesus.

My soul drank of the foul bilge water of that sunken kind of unbelief; that secret sense of doubt, in the glorious Redeeming power of Almighty God truly - present and active and alive - in all living souls.

But like the Apostle Paul and Silas in prison, the Spirit of God made a way out for me. 

In no uncertain terms can I be that way again. Yea, a sinner I shall always be but some sins whose taint the Father through the Son have deigned to remove from me, I can not somehow bear to allow my Jesus to bear again for me. They are my Quo Vadis, Domine! (At the forefront of these is my Recovery - which will not only profit me but many others like me).

Truly, our God is a mighty and amazing God! A God of Mercy and Justice and Love is He - the LORD, our Peace. In the pits and in the heights, the song I shall sing for Him is - Alleluia to God in the highest, Thou art mine, and I am Yours! 

So you see, I had to slog through some slow, uncertain days. Some days, I had to tell my impassioned spirit - be calm, and to sit still. Everything led me up - led us all up - to this Easter mountain high.



The Lord is Risen! He is truly Risen! 

If I am to summarize my experience of Lent 2014, I would encapsulate it in this way -

Good Friday - I am sorry, my Lord Jesus;
Holy Saturday - I love You, my Lord Jesus;
and Easter Sunday - Thank You, my Lord Jesus.

The 3 days correspond also to the 3 stages of the spiritual life - the Purgative, Illuminative, and Unitive.

One is redeemed by the Blood on the Cross of Christ, then justified by grace through faith in the Love of the Father in the Son, then through the Spirit of Truth united in Joy to the Joy of Christ and our Father. This Joy unites us to Jesus. So Christians must profess in Faith, witness in Love and justify it all - in Joy. No Lent can ever be without an Easter!

The Wounds our Savior retained in His Glorified Body - calls, leads, and then completes the Way of the Church. How awesome a God is our God!

sweet
Our Easter Vigil Mass at our Parish and Shrine was utterly magnificent. I hope yours was too.

God love our priests! God bless His faithful priests. God bless His faithful priests in our Parish. O what a blessing it is to be in the presence of His good and humble priests!

His good and humble deacons, priests, and bishops from all the Earth who along with Laity from every Nation - keep us truly Catholic.


Merry Easter greetings of Peace and the Goodwill of God to all Mankind!
---<--@

Thursday, October 24, 2013

At a time of falling leaves...

I asked the leaf
whether it was scared
because it was autumn
and the other leaves were falling.

The leaf told me,
"No. During the whole spring and summer 
I was very alive. I worked hard 
and helped nourish the tree, 
and much of me 
is in the tree.

(Thich Nhat Hanh)


I then asked the tree,
at a time of falling leaves, 
whether it was scared
to be as bereft of its lush greenery
and it said to me,

"No, seeker, 
for I am a tree".
---<--@

Thursday, November 22, 2012

Thanksgiving 2012

During my time in America,
Thanksgivings always felt magical...



In a land as diverse as her peoples,
there's something universally appealing about gratitude
that brings all these dreamers together...
even for one special night.

The spirit of thankfulness
brings into mind all the blessings that were
and so makes the heart ready to receive
all the blessings that are to be...

I guess that's why
I still believe in Thanksgiving,
for I am a dreamer as well...
and this fall 2012, well...

it refreshes the dream.
---<--@

Thursday, September 27, 2012

Salutation #4

Of the common human needs that make us responsible to each other as citizens, one to another, there are nine: Hunger, Thirst, Clothing, Shelter, Personal Security (i.e. Security of Person and Property), Basic (or Functional) Literacy, Just Society, Authentic Human Freedom, and Meaningful Existence.



(Light)

PEACE, I salute you.

Evil which is poison, when once by mischief,
allowed entrance into that Kingdom within
becomes the malice that corrupt the purity
of the human will's intention for good -
dividing the one House of that Man within
against the Sanctuary of the LORD in the heart
making the soul vulnerable against itself
inclining fallen Man to sinful things.

For malice is the corruption that is sown
upon the ground of the human heart
to become those manifold and diverse tares
which are the vicious habits of sin
that overgrow with choking weeds
that evergreen garden of the human soul
where we take our walks with our God
in the stillness of our wakeful prayers;
that same timeless garden
that one must through God's good graces
cultivate with much virtue and light.

And sin is a lie that creeps
upon the threshold of the heart
seeking to assault and overthrow
the reign of our sovereign LORD within
that it may slowly overcome with its darkness
the golden blue of our native skies.

Now, our LORD being the one God Who is
revealed unto all of our shared humanity
in complete and utter finality
through the Sacred Humanity
of the Incarnate Word,
Who is the Second Person
of the one triune Perfection -
our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ,
our one Truelight, our highest Exemplar,
and First of our First Magnitudes,
is the self-same God Whose Presence is
for all creatures, seen and unseen,
that one, holy and sustaining Light,
when once in exile time completely denied
by the arrival in the soul of Man
of an absolute and irrevocable choice
to embrace and to obey the will of evil,
which is the will of sin and the ambition of war,
become in absolute reality manifest
as a smoldering and inescapable wrath
for when the Daystar Sun is completely eclipsed
by rise of Wormwood, that false star of Satan,
this darkness shall by its terrible descent,
completely consume into dust and ashes
all that remains in that Man,
both body and soul,
suffering the first death
which is permanent
as well as the second death
which is everlasting.

What motivates Man in the heart
is either one - good or evil -
and so therefore, that tree of exile
that from our faded Eden cast
the singular lineage of Man
is that self-same malice that
in the garden of our hearts with God
must first be uprooted
and its poisonous darkness
overthrown from within our souls
that evil and its corrupting lie
may from our eternal good be cut off.

This is how we shall acquire
one standard of Liberty for all.

Therefore, let us be good,
beloved friends and constant companions,
let good things motivate us,
let us be a people of the good,
let us seek to dwell on true things,
knowing by heart unto where
and from Whom all good things come,
persevering always in prayer,
both in private but above all together,
with the seen as well as the unseen,
thus, becoming intimate with the Intimate,
and seek no more to profit from evil things
nor make provision in time for evil things
in the timeless abode of our hearts
dwelling with God, alone with the Alone.

For it is human weakness that is forgivable
but malice once by the Spirit of God challenged
when yet willfully and unrelentingly embraced
become that final, festering, poisonous rot
that shall turn into ashes
the timeless life of the spirit from within
that it may forever join Satan
and all that condemn itself to the hell
that shall soon claim all evil things.

Sin that is embraced with such utter finality
is indeed, truly unforgivable
not that our LORD is not merciful,
for our God is a merciful LORD
and kind to all creatures,
large and small, seen and unseen.
It is evil that is without virtue
and once made into a god
in place of our most beneficent LORD,
shall then execute its lethal reign
upon that unhappy soul.

Verily, none of us
should like to question motives
yet when motives are questionable,
indeed, one can not help but question them.

This is a root cause of division.

And so let us ever be mindful
of that constant counsel
that any division within our one peace
is the beginning of all evil.

What we should always question,
my beloved friends and constant companions,
are our methods together,
that we may never cease from seeking
to refine the many ways in which
the abundant grace of our God
that we though unworthy of such a good
have so abundantly merited through our Lord,
Jesus Christ, the one Redeemer of Mankind,
that we by our willing hands and loving hearts,
may become increasingly useful instruments
that diffuse as light into the darkness
this unmerited grace of God
shining for all souls without distinction
that God's loving Presence in time
may be a paternal comfort and a constant help
to our suffering humanity here in our poor world
so needful of heaven's timeless embrace
that hearts may be one in God,
and peace may be all in All.

We are human beings
and therefore,
we are a becoming in time.
We share in our humanity,
a lack that can only be filled by the timeless.
A lack that is felt in our souls
as a reaching out to God
and manifest in our bodies
as common human needs.
And so, lacking, needful, bereft,
we are come to a knowledge of God
and of each other in God.

Verily, as our faith sets us apart,
our hopes join us together,
indeed, this is what makes us truly human -
our need for God and for each other -
and so in our belonging together in God
we must come together to build
through these, the generations of life,
those truly human communities
where all roads constantly lead to the dawn
towards the morning that return Mankind
to the one Love that has forever kept
all of our nations close to Its own bosom.

A society of need is a human society.
It is a society that goes hand in hand
with a government of gratitude.
Therefore, we must profess
a politics of thankfulness,
being a people of hope,
and work to enable a culture of peace
of which truth must be begun
in the darkness of exile time
by the first of the generations of life,
which is this, our generation
as well as those members of the elder generations
who are similarly called by our one LORD
and whose wise and steadfast companionship
our good God has so generously blessed us with,
ennobling us by the substance of their experiences
and the strength of their years.

War is a tension that is insufferable in this new age.
But hope is also a tension,
my beloved friends and constant companions,
and one that is more apt to liberate our nations
from the mire of poverty and despair.
It is an expression of God's own peace
which is the Peace of Jesus Christ
and an extension of the one paradigm of the peace
which contain in the one whole truth of itself
the reality of a promise of old to all our nations
made by the one God of our Father Abraham
that the numberless stars that we are each called to be,
shall bless the communities of Mankind -
when we shall in the darkness of exile time
by each of our own life's width and breadth
through our LORD's unfaltering Light be made to shine
for each other in, with, through and for God and Country -
here upon this, our poor world,
upon this inhabited earth in the grip of the midnight of war,
as a labor of hope upon this last wintering,
upon a time of falling tears.

Finally, as regards to our one peace,
we can not, as a whole, abide by lukewarm halves -
we must each enable each other through God's grace
to profess this as a one whole paradigm,
one whole truth in the universes within our souls,
one whole truth in our families,
one whole truth in our local communities,
one whole truth in our national communities,
one whole truth in our regions,
one whole truth in our continents,
and one whole truth in our one planetary whole -
in reality, wholes upon wholes aligned towards life,
built on winged truth, an ascendant motion in time,
advancing the cause of life which is lasting happiness
through civilizations that with our nameless and honest labors
rise like incense to give glory to the God of all life
as the one family of the nations of (the children of) Mankind.

If we shall give war an inch,
my beloved friends and constant companions,
if we shall willingly allow
a segment of our shared humanity
to become vulnerable to evil things,
if we freely and recklessly abandon
our Lord's poor,
in the weak, the defenseless,
the displaced, the dispossessed,
the widow, the stranger, the orphan,
we shall indeed soon find
that war and the ambition of war
has again overtaken us all
with the final defeat which is its curse.

For what war does to one, war does to all.
So let our one peace forever remain, one whole one.
---<--@

(produced 20090128)

Sunday, April 29, 2012

Salutation #123

This Salutation is about the national discourse, and illustrates the dynamism of our democracy, it bids us never forget that the LORD, our one, true God and Eternal King, is forever included in the continuing dialogue of our one Republic endeavor.



(The Plan)

THERE IS A PLAN;
a plan that must constantly
renew and reinvent itself.

For it must!

In this way,
it is a humble plan.

For one can not know it all.

Nor can one claim to own it all.

It is a simple plan;
a plan that one must be able
to express clearly and sincerely.

A plan that one must be able
to see and to share freely
in and among all of us
who are willing to build
and improve upon it.

It is a plan
for everybody
meant to be shared
by everybody.

It is a plan
one knows one can never finish
by one's own self alone
without you,
my fellow Filipinos.

For this plan,
my brothers and sisters of the Promise,
is a plan for the nation.

It is a plan for us.

- selah -

Indeed,
God has a plan for you, my Country.
But I can not tell you of this plan...

I can tell you it's a wonderful plan. 
I can tell you its a plan meant for our good. 
I can tell you its a plan of happiness. 
I can tell you its a plan for all Filipinos
(as citizens and human beings to each other
and as a nation among one family of nations).

Deep in our soul, it is written;
a promise of victory,
a song of songs!

You know this plan, my compatriots.

For God has a plan for us, my nation.

But I can not tell us of this plan...
we have to tell it to each other.
---<--@

This Sunday is Good Shepherd Sunday 2012alleluia!



Sunday, April 8, 2012

Salutation #114



(Easter 2012)

LET the depths of the earth
and the heights of heaven proclaim!

LET all of God's creatures rejoice
and the souls of all living beings exclaim!

Today is the day!

Jesus Christ the Lord is Risen!

Our Faith became. His Love overcame.

And Hope received from God our Father
her wings and her crown
.

Glory to God, Glory to God, Glory to God - 

Alleluia to the LORD on high!
---<--@

Wednesday, April 4, 2012

Prayer for Peace to Mary, the Light of Hope



Immaculate Heart of Mary,
help us to conquer the menace of evil,
which so easily takes root
in the hearts of the people of today,
and whose immeasurable effects already
weigh down upon our modern world
and seem to block the paths toward the future.

From famine and war, deliver us.

From nuclear war, from incalculable self destruction,
from every kind of war, deliver us.

From sins against human life from its very beginning,
deliver us.

From hatred and from the demeaning of the dignity
of the children of God, deliver us.

From readiness to trample on the commandments
of God, deliver us.

From the loss of awareness of good and evil,
deliver us.

From sins against the Holy Spirit,
deliver us.

Accept, O Mother of Christ,
this cry laden with the sufferings of all individual human beings,
laden with the sufferings of whole societies.

Help us with the power of the Holy Spirit to conquer all sin:
individual sin and the "sin of the world,"
sin in all its manifestations.

Let there be revealed once more
in the history of the world
the infinite saving power of the Redemption:
the power of the merciful love.

May it put a stop to evil.

May it transform consciences.

May your Immaculate Heart
reveal for all the light of hope.

AMEN.


by Blessed John Paul II

Wednesday, November 2, 2011

A Meditation on Hope



FAITH is the life of Christian community.
LOVE is the heart of Christian community.

HOPE is the atmosphere of Christian community.
It is both our breath and our breathing together.

Hope is the eternal spaces between our souls
that distinguish us from love to Love.

It is our faith reversed from the view of the Divine
and our faith received into the welcome hearts of others.

It is a thing that awaits our embrace
existing not in the past nor the future
but always in the present moment.

Hope floats from the deep of God's mystery -
Those timeless little white flowers that grow
upon those wide, open plains and rolling hills,
those evergreen valleys and high mountaintops
of the Eternal Kingdom of our Lord Christ
born from seasons of life's comings and goings
anchored firmly upon the Rock of Ages.

Hope is a promise of something good
and a reality that awaits unredeemed
to be perceived by the eyes of our faith
and received by arms of our souls
into the embrace of the love of Jesus Christ
living by the grace of God in our heart of hearts.

It is the unseen substance of the faith
of individuals and families, tribes and nations,
the vital heritage of entire civilizations -
the numberless promises of lives left behind,
suspended in time between heaven and earth,
living in the ether of a sacred silence
as something for our hearts to embrace...
hopes awaiting the community of other hopes
like the past awaiting the quickening of the present
within the eternal remembrance of God.

My precious friend,
from always to always.
Our faith is ever always our own.
It is something we allow.
It is something we nourish.
Like a sacred union professed,
one love alone with the One Love alone,
ever longing profoundly for Itself.
It is something personal and private
and bears its fruits for the Beloved.

But our hope for it to become
is always the promise of something received,
of a good that we can share with another.
It is something that awaits us
like a herald of the benevolent Prince
that bid us to come into His Eternal Kingdom.
Hope is something to be fulfilled
not by the bearer to whom it is promised
but by the beneficent reality of its Provider
and bears its fruits for the one possessed.
For how can one hope in one's own self
without killing the faith that enable us to see?

Indeed, our hope is in Jesus Christ!
It is our LORD's peace that we share.
It is God's promise for you and me
that matters very, very much!

It is His promise that we must hold on to
through our love and faith in Him
for it is to our God that we must trust.

Hope is what keeps us together.
It is our quite common longing as human beings.
It is always something to be shared
and lends warmth to our being human.
It feeds our hearts with goodwill
and keeps our souls good company.

It is the rarefied space where mercy acts
in the timeless moment of the now
to redeem from despair the truth
that live in other peoples lives.


It fills the sails that advance our common humanity.
It is the unselfish pride and excitement we feel
when we honor something true and worthy of praise
in the excellence within the person of another.

It feeds the fire that keeps us Christian
keeping us ever ready and agile
to serve all souls without distinction.

Glory to the God of heaven and earth,
Adoration to Jesus Christ, our Lord!

Peace and Godspeed to our Holy Father,
Pope Benedict XVI,
and all Bishops in communion
with the successor of Saint Peter.

Peace and Godspeed to our Holy Mother Church!
With much prayers for our Church Suffering -
all our beloved Holy Souls
of family and friends
forever transformed
by their final encounter with God.
All who lived so bravely
and loved us so tenderly,
all whose final hopes on earth
they have now lovingly entrusted to us.

Much prayers and loving support
to all our clergy, our religious and
to each other as Christian laity -
all who live to serve the one God of life
in spirit and in truth.

Peace and Godspeed to all of blessed Christendom
and to all the just who walk this world with us -
may we all work together towards a better world
for all men, women and children of all nations
of the one family of the nations of Mankind.

God be with all of us - now and forever.



So lets pick those little white flowers for Jesus,
and give each day our Savior a lovely bouquet -
joyously extend the Love of God to those in need
these make our Savior's Heart very glad, indeed!
---<--@

Hope Taking Wing


Tuesday, November 1, 2011

Salutation #64

The color black is the color of hope. Green is the color of the perennial nature of hope.

For hope is upon the earth, in a constant state of subtle transformation, rising and falling as all things ascend to God, in steady cycles of loss and fulfillment.

When black is used to remember death, it is not used to signal the finality of death, but to remind us of the hope that is invested in death - for black is also the color of the expectation of life.


(Death)

All the death that we see
upon this world of earth and fire
- with our physical sight -
is a temporal death.

But there is a hidden death
- the second death -
the death of the soul of Man.

Of this hidden death,
the soul of Man implicitly knows and naturally fears
for it is the death of his life.

And though reason might oftentimes confuse the two,
we human beings should truly fear the death of the soul.

For this is the true death!

But temporal death is a transformation -
for those who value life to the point of giving it - everlasting life.
for those who hate life to the point of taking it - everlasting death.

So today,
we honor our brethren and sisters
who have passed away from life into everlasting life -
all the official Saints of our Holy Mother Church
but especially those Saints of God who are known to God alone
each those Saints who are especially chosen by the LORD
to become known to each of us alone - as our special friends -
who are all those who are victorious against death.

So let us express our love for them today
all our victorious dead - let us remember them
- solemnly and meaningfully and sincerely -
every beloved one of ours - all our family and friends -
who has passed away from the sight of our eyes
into the quickening Light of the Vision of the LORD;
all those who loved us with the love of God till the end.

Let us rest assured
in the knowledge of the faith
that they are well and that we shall one day
be one with them in God and in all truth - forever.

For life is life and death is death.

- selah -

Glorified be God - forever -
in all His Angels and in all His Saints, alleluia.
---<--@

Everybody have a safe and meaningful All Saints' Day 2011.

Glory to God the Father!
Adoration to Jesus Christ!

Alleluia, peace be unto our nation
and peace be unto all our nations;
good will to all men and women of Peace.


To lose Love is to die.