Easter Joy

Holy Week each year is such a special time of being with the Lord. It's like staying beside your best friend as he or she goes through the greatest trial of his or her life. Letting him or her know that although we can not fully enter into his or her pain that is beyond human comprehension, we still hope that somehow our full presence beside Him can provide even a second of comfort and even a tiny relief in the weight of the cross He carries.

Amazing though how the Lord is never outdone in generosity. Whenever we try to give of ourselves to Him, He gives us more graces than we can hold and leaves us with a tender feeling of being loved so specially.

Interesting how in the past few days, the talks given by different priests from different places all seemed to revolve around the same theme. Either that was true or I may have been selectively listening.

A few days before the week began, we received from Fr. M. an excerpt from the book "The Reed of God". What beautiful insights on faith! It said that, "With faith we are like blind people learning, through the touch of caressing fingers, the features of the face that we cannot see... We discover the Face that we seek in every human face... we must seek with a more sensitive medium than sight.. we discern the invisible beauty of the Man abiding in mankind..."

Then during Holy Thursday, the talk in the morning revolved around the many faces of "the greatest love of all" and the truth that "nothing can separate us from the love of God." I thought to myself, we have heard this many times before and it makes everything seem so simple, and yet, how to really believe it with every fiber of my being and allow this love of His to really flow through to whoever He wishes it to reach... I couldn't help thinking that the talk was all about love, and yet unlike Valentines, here it was love within the embrace of the our cross/His cross... Then as if the Lord really wanted to drive home the point about His love and banish all doubts or lukewarm understanding of it, the homilist in the evening mass so eloquently reminded us about Pope Benedict's letter on hope, where he refers to "the INDESTRUCTIBLE LOVE of God" as the source of all our strength and hope. Meaningful beyond words!

After the mass, I wanted so much to sit in darkness and silence in front of the tabernacle. But the church was full of sounds and light, and people coming and going. I finally lifted it to Him saying, "Lord, you know how I really wish to be alone with you in the Garden on this night, to keep you company, to be with you in your agony." As I left the chapel and took a walk in the garden, I suddenly noticed a life-sized statue of our Lord on his knees in prayer. It was very dark, but the full moon peeking through the trees gave the sky a certain glow. I sat on the bench beside this statue and closed my eyes... What a pleasant surprise to be able to pray with Him alone, in silence, in the Garden... It was like a gift being received to suddenly be in the very setting I had just a few minutes earlier expressed to Him. The love of God never outdone!

At the start of Lent, I had asked for the grace to know His thoughts and feelings as He carried his cross and that somehow I could be with Him in it. I feel a tender feeling inside when I recall now how on Good Friday, sometime around dusk, while sharing with Him the heaviness I felt from wanting others to also discover the greatness of His love but somehow being met with responses different from what was hoped for, His words came and came in abundance. He reminded me to "Accept and take people where they are..." that love for Him can not be forced but only encouraged... that what I could do is to just continue sharing His love with them, allowing His love to flow to them... that His great love that He wanted to give them but that they were not really ready or open to receive yet... that is what He carries as His cross... and that I also help carry His cross whenever I also feel His hurt and pain, while taking people where they are with understanding and love, and just continue to let His love flow to them. Together we can carry the cross.. believing in that promise of our Father's "indestructible love", drawing strength from there and holding on to the hope that it promises...

Lord, with all these, what more can we say?

Then to top it all, the Easter Vigil was such a beautiful way to close the solemn days and to open up a new year of renewed faith, hope and love. It all came together. A reassurance of moving in the right direction, of our shared mission to bring His love where He wills, to those whom He wants to reach. The homilist flashed on screen photos of the many faces of Christ as hidden within people, especially people within our own country who live in poverty and hunger both materially, psycho-emotionally, spiritually - "...the features of the face that we cannot see... the Face that we seek in every human face... the invisible beauty of the Man abiding in mankind..."

Of all the versions of "Ang Puso Ko'y Nagpupuri", I really like the one sung acapela by the Hangad choir. I would often play it in the car, and it never fails to leave my heart feeling like it would want to burst with love for Him. Last night, it was the Hangad choir who sang at mass. And lo and behold, at the very end of the mass, they burst into song, filling the whole church with "Ang Puso Ko'y Nagpupuri"! A taste of heaven!!!

"Lord, what more can I say? From the very start, with the beautiful excerpts sent to us, to the insightful talks on Holy Thursday, to our being together in the Garden at night, to your revelation on how to really be with you daily in the carrying of your cross, our cross, to the beautiful music played last night, the words of the song which You know very well speaks of overflowing love... You are really such a generous God!"

He is a universal God and yet also so personal.

Happy Easter!

(Photo of Jesus: by F. Chow)

The Seed First

Recently eight of us high school classmates had a really fun trip together in Davao. 30 years (!?!!) of out high school, it was a special number of days get together - gamely posing for the camera at every opportunity, very hearty appetites inspite of all the talk about diet and aging, screaming our heads off in the wild water rafting whenever huge waves threatened to throw us off board! It was really great that we were all able to take off from our busy schedules to do this trip, hopefully the first of more to come.

Our trip got me thinking about the words of one of our favorite mass songs during high school and what they mean now. (The '70s was the era of guitar and pop music at mass.) I though about how each of us girls have since gone on different roads, how our life journeys have unfolded so far, and continue to unfold. How for us and also for so many others as young (hehe) as us, after three decades, this song takes on so much more meaning now than when we first began to sing it. Yes, we have learned, there's so much, we have learned.


THE SEED FIRST
(from the album of Lorie Lieberman)

The seed first, and then the flower
The chime first, and then the hour
The cloud burst, and then the shower
She must learn, there's so much she must learn

The danger, and then the warning
The loving, and then the scorning
The passing, and then the mourning
She must learn, there's so much she must learn

Long ago, yesterday, the world was an apple in her hand
First you taste enough, to understand
Then the new day came to wake her
And the old clock came to take her from the fair

She thinks first, before she feels now
She asks first, if love is real now
She knows life, and she can deal now
She has learned, there's so much she has learned (2x)

With You in Lent

Dearest Lord,

I pray that for the remainder of this Lenten Season
You will allow me to know more intimately
What thoughts and feelings you experienced
As You carried Your cross on the road to Calvary

If it means spending more time alone with You
Then may I purposely prioritize more time with You in prayer
If it means being highly attuned to your presence around me
Then my I listen with great care as You speak through others

If You want me to venture outside of my comfort zone
May I wholeheartedly and courageously do so for You
If it somehow means experiencing pain or suffering
As long as it is for You, then without a doubt it will still be worth it

May I be like Simon of Cyrene
Assisting You as You carry Your cross
Letting You know that You are not alone
And hopefully lightening Your heavy burden even just a bit

Bless this desire to be one with You in thoughts and feelings
Purify it so that it goes beyond being just mere words
Transform it into a more committed and purer love for You
That can somehow provide You comfort along Your way to Calvary

Thank you, dearest Lord.

+

Going to Our Center

This artwork is the type of design that one can just sit in front of and get lulled into meditative state. I saw it in a museum and found it quite interesting. (The photo though, does not do justice to the actual work.) When you look at it for a long time, it begins to look like a representation of our core. Each one of us has a center within us, that part of us that is home to the deepest gifts that were given to us.

At work, it is always a joy to help people become more aware of their particular set of skills and talents and to guide them into moving themselves along the path that honors these special talents of theirs. Sometimes people are afraid and would prefer to stay within their comfort zone. Until the pull to move elsewhere or beyond gets stronger and a word of encouragement then goes a long way in helping them take that next bold step. Sometimes, people are confused because they are so good at listening to what everyone tells them about themselves, but are not used to listening to their own inner wisdom. And when they learn to take time off to really listen to their desires and passions, they come much closer to knowing their special gifts that reside in the the core of who they really are.

The most beautiful thing about all these is that touching our core is really touching God. For here at our center, we encounter Him, the creative genius and source of our being.