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!
---<--@

Two pictures that make me smile...

With everything that is going on... it pays to have moments that remind one of life's simple joys.

I am simply grateful for this moment...

Colors over my Anne's Amsterdam...

Share thy Sunshine, Sunshine

Whenever
the sun shines
high above heaven,
- it may said that -
it smiles upon our earth.

Starshine,
when you too shall smile
- and let thy own heart shine -
do so like it were the sun.

So that,
my darling dear,
ever as thy smile is real,
not only is it warm -
it is golden...

to bless
all the living,
wherever it may touch.
---<--@

Awesome vs. Not Awesome

Estee Ackerman is awesome.

This dude ain't.

20110731

A pleasant Sunday evening to all!

It's a damp and rainy evening here in our Philippines so let's always remember to wear a smile, my constant friends, beloved compatriots, and brothers and sisters of the Promise - why?

"Because the weather that matters is the weather we keep inside of ourselves!"

Tomorrow is a new day, a new working week, and a new month. Let's start it all off in the right spirit!

---<--@

Mabuhay ang Pilipinas! God bless us all.

Smile

20110401

April 1

I am not one to say that April 1 is a day for fools. I think it would be a reckless thing to say so. I understand this day to be a day of humor - it is a time to smile.

I once had to answer a question, "what makes you laugh"?

Practical jokes!

What makes me laugh is the unconscious realization that I (and my friends) instantly have when something really unpredictably and harmlessly silly has just happened to someone who does not expect it.

In retrospect, I guess that's just one of the many facets of humor. Because there are many kinds of humor. Some of them are not to my liking. Some are downright crass and repulsive.

There is a limit to what is funny.

They say laughter is the best medicine. But laughter may only be considered medicinal if it does no one any harm. If the humanity of either the source of the humor or its intended recipients is left distorted or embittered, that is not humor.

I think humor is a form of communication. It is either written, spoken or expressed wholly in bodily gestures. But it goes deeper than that. What it conveys is essentially a return to innocence - the original essence of play. We are all creatures of play. Deep within ourselves, we all have a profound desire to return to a child-like state. It is an innocence we can never really outgrow; a certain sense of agelessness we receive from Beauty.

When God smiles and we are able to smile (or even laugh) with God (and with each other), that to me is humor. Therefore, humor is an art. It adds to the color and the wonder of living.

A wholesome sense of humor imparts in us a refreshing lightness that allows us to smile and to laugh from a heart that cares; a heart that is able to smile and to laugh with us - even at us, at me.

Like all of Sacred Life this humor is perennial. It is the spark from which arise all hearts of good cheer. It is like love, patient as well as constant. Its laughter is like a break in the storm; a pause of quiet realization in the silence of our unconscious skies, a moment's respite from the heaviness of this weary earth - echoes of a promised return into the realm of an everlasting happiness.

As an aid to our common human hopes a wholesome sense of humor is meant to help wear down animosities, grind against divisions, melt away discord and renew the perseverance of the human spirit.

---<--@

Mabuhay po tayong lahat! God love all nations.

"From somber, solemn, serious saints, deliver us o, Lord."

Saint Teresa of Avila

Smile.