Questions And Answers

Posted on January 5, 2018 by Spirit Moments

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Man yearns and searches for certainty and answers.
A lot of questions usually crop up in his searching.
Easy answers answers are usually the wrong answers.
And so are obvious answers often.

Can a helpless baby born under simple, humble circumstances
be indeed the long awaited Messiah?
Obvious answer: No, because the Messiah was supposed to come in glory.
Real answer: Yes, the shepherds (insignificant people) and the Magi (foreigners, outcasts) came offering him gifts.

Can anything good come out of Nazareth?
Obvious answer: No, it is a hick town in the backwater parts of the country.
Real answer: Yes, it was where Christ grew up in age, wisdom and grace before God and men.

Can there be anything but a bitter ending in Calvary?
Obvious answer: No, this was the end, a shameful ending to a quixotic adventure.
Real answer: Yes, this is the prelude to the greatest event of all, the Resurrection.

Can I amount to anything at all?
Obvious answer: Come on you are so ordinary and one in billions.
What makes you think you are special?
Real answer: I am a child of the Universe no less than than the trees and the stars.

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The Magic Of Christmas

Posted on January 4, 2018 by Spirit Moments

Version 2

The magical season of Christmas is about to be over. Driving around the neighborhood today, I noticed that many homes have taken down their Christmas trees now laying by roadside waiting for pick-up by garbage collectors. The presents under the trees have been opened. The trimmings have been stowed away to be put up again next Christmas. The stars have faded away. The angels have sang their last “Gloria”. Bethlehem is again just a small town. And Santa slowly slips away from memory to resurrect later in the year when kids would start being good again to get on Santa’s list.

It makes a lot of difference when there are children in a home. There, Christmas lights replicate the stars in Bethlehem that guided the shepherds and the Magi. Christmas carols echo the angels that were heard on high singing on that first Christmas night. And when Christmas eve comes, there is that palpable expectation of Santa Claus coming by. Anabelle and I have noticed that homes with children often have more Christmas lights and Christmas trimmings.

As the kids grow up, the lights are less bright and the trimmings more austere. Parents no longer write letters to Santa with their kids or prepare some snacks to him and his reindeers. Instead, they now assist their teenagers in writing application letters for high school and college. The money that used to be spent on toys and presents is not being set aside for tuition, board and lodging and other expenses for grown up kids. The magic of Christmas will return when the grandchildren start coming.

There are homes, however, which never lose the magic of Christmas. The children may come and go; but the light and the trimmings and the carols are cheery and bright – year after year. In fact, even when it is not Christmas, there is still a certain joyful air about such homes and an abiding spirit of love and peace among the people who live there. There are the homes of people for whom Christmas is not about the magic of the season but about the reason why the Son was made flesh – For God so loved the world that He gave us His one and only Son

 

 

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The Lord Of The Gaps

Posted on January 4, 2018 by Spirit Moments

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“What are you looking for?” Jesus asked the two disciples of John.

What I am looking has many and different names:
happiness, success, eternal life, salvation,
meaning, significance, contribution, fulfillment.
I realize is there are a lot of gaps in me.
There is a lot missing or incomplete in my life.
There are many things I don’t understand.
There are many things I think I need.
There are many dreams I long for.

Whoever brought me here
must have kept some vital part of me
that keeps me looking and searching
until I come upon Him who has kept this missing part.

And then, I can become complete.
So I am restless until I fully encounter the Lord of the Gaps
And then, He will give me back my missing part
to fill in the gaping emptiness in me.

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The Fourth Candle

Posted on January 2, 2018 by Spirit Moments

In preparation for Christmas, we lighted four candles to get us ready for the coming of Jesus. Each candle represented four virtues that Jesus brought and taught to us.

The first candle is the candle of Hope. Christ is the light shining in the darkness. He is the light for us to see the way to the Father. And just as He was our light, He invites us to be a light to others, specially those lost in darkness. In spite of the dark and our being lost. we live in hope because we have Christ, the Light. All the stars and lights and Christmas trimmings we put up remind us of this fact.

The second candle is the candle of Love. Every child that is born is witness to the power of love. This takes on added meaning at Christmas because God, who is Love, takes on our human form. Facebook was aglow with love this season. With friends and families exchanging love-notes and love-wishes in their posts. It was a busy time on Facebook.

The third candle is the candle of Joy. The Savior is almost here and will soon live among us. Alongside the Christmas greetings online, there were also numerous posts of joyful families and friends celebrating Christmas. It is the happiest season of all, when everyone wants to share love, joy and blessings with all those around.

And now as the Christmas season is coming to a close, I think of the fourth candle, the candle of Peace. Now is the time to incarnate in our lives the promise and hope and love and joy of Christmas.

I borrow the words of Howard Thurman, an African-American theologian, educator, and civil rights leader:

When the song of the angels is stilled,
when the star in the sky is gone,
when the kings and princes are home,
when the shepherds are back with their flocks,
the work of Christmas begins:
to find the lost,
to heal the broken,
to feed the hungry,
to release the prisoner,
to rebuild the nations,
to bring peace among the people,
to make music in the heart.

And indeed, if there is one more candle to light for this Christmas season, it would be the candle of Peace.

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Beginnings And Bridges

Posted on January 1, 2018 by Spirit Moments

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The New Year is a new beginning. Like every new day, it brings with it the promise and hope for better things. It is already a blessing to be celebrating the new year.

In the beginning, there was nothing – just the great abyss and the darkness. There is no reason why things should exist, except that God created the heavens and the earth. And because something came into being, everything else came to be.

In the beginning, I was just a gleam in my parents’ eyes. And through God’s continuing work of creation, I came to be. There is no compelling reason why I should be born. The universe would still exist, even if I did not come to be, except that God fashioned me in my mother’s womb. And because I am alive, everything is possible.

Every ending is also a beginning. The end of day is an announcement of the dawn of a new one. Pain, defeat, failures – they are the beginning of a new chapter in people’s lives. Moments of joy and happiness may be the turning point or new beginning in many lives.

Therefore, we should always welcome and encourages all beginnings.

Beginnings are like bridges. Sometimes, we clearly see what is on the other side. At other times, it all foggy and hazy and we do not know what awaits us once we cross. But unless we cross a bridge, we will never know nor find out what is on the other side.

Thereforem never be timid nor afraid of crossing bridges.

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A New Year’s Eve Spirit Moment

Posted on December 31, 2017 by Spirit Moments

Reposting my New Year’s reflection from five year ago. This blog is now into its sixth year.

Another Kairos/Chronos realization for me.
When we spend time, we are productive and make money. But it is sooner than later gone. This is Chronos time. It is about making a living.
When we make time, we store memories and create relationships. These stay with us forever. This is Kairos time. It is about making/having a life.

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Life And Spirit

Posted on December 30, 2017 by Spirit Moments

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I cannot see heat but I know it exists.
I can feel the warmth even if sometimes I do not know the source.
In winter, heat and warmth gives comfort against the cold.
In summer, the hot weather may cause some discomfort.
In the absence of heat, there is cold.
And a cold body is often a dead body.
I know I am alive because of the heat that energizes my body.

I do not see the air but I know it exists.
But I know the breeze that refreshes is caused by the wind.
And so is the destructive typhoon or hurricane.
I see smoke in the distance or clouds floating high above.
They are pushed by the wind and bring the water that sustains life.
The rustling of the trees. The crashing of the waves.
Even the birds on flight. Because of the wind.
I am alive because of the wind that energizes my body.

I do not see my Source but I know He exists.
There is no compelling reason why I should be here, now.
Yet here I am.
It is His will that I should be here.
I imagine myself be formed out of star dust.
After He has fashioned me out of clay and mud,
He fires me with heat to bake and make me.
And then He breathes air into me.
I am alive because of my Source who has created me
and gifted me with a body and soul.

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To Be A Child, Yet Again

Posted on December 29, 2017 by Spirit Moments

 

Version 2

For most adults, to see is to believe.
For children, to believe is to see.
Spanning his arms as wings, a child will believe he can fly.
To be a child is to live at the threshold of creation,
seeing and experiencing everything for the first time
with wide-eyed wonder and open-mouthed awe.
Seeing the promise there is in life,
a child will believe in forever.
For to be a child is to live in the eternal here and now,
beyond the adult’s categories of space and time,
relishing each moment and not wishing for the day to end
yet always hopeful for a better tomorrow to dawn.
To be a child is see goodness in everyone and everything:
in the playmates with whom he weaves his fantasies,
in the wide open fields he romps in all day long,
in the trees he climbs for their fruits but also to see beyond.
To be a child is not looking for a catch in kindness,
believing that kindness and goodness is the natural state of people and things,
To be a child is giving joy to all just by being one’s self.
Oh, to be a child.
Again.

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How God Is With Us

Posted on December 28, 2017 by Spirit Moments

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I look with joy at the Child in the manger and wonder,
“What Child is this who, laid to rest on Mary’s lap, is sleeping?”
And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us.
Emmanuel – God is with us.
The Lord of Creation shares in our humanity
so that we can begin to understand and know His divinity.
I can almost imagine myself holding the baby in swaddling clothes in my hands.
But it is actually I whom He has in the palm of His hands.

The next time Mary would have her son in her lap at the foot of the cross
and we wonder “Is this the God-man who has come to save us?”
The Messiah hang on the cross to save us.
The God who came for us.
He who made the moon and the stars,
who fashioned the earth from stardust,
shared in the weakness and imperfection of our humanity
so that we can rise up with Him in glory.
He came for us. To save us.

And then we stand and look at the empty tomb
together with Peter and the disciple whom Jesus loved to see,
believe and understand all of these things.
He lives and dwells within us.
He sends His Spirit who enfolds us in His care
and lives within the deepest part of our being
where we are most human.

God is with us, incarnated in Jesus, lying in a manger.
Jesus came for us to save us, nailed to a wooden cross.
God is within us, His Spirit enfolding us.

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The Day After Christmas

Posted on December 26, 2017 by Spirit Moments

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And just like that Christmas Day is over. Presents have been exchanged and opened. Christmas family meals have been shared. Things are all back to their normal routine. And people are back in their quest of wealth, power and fame. Some, just to the usual grind of earning a living.

Not in the Philippines, where Christmas is a season. Radio stations start playing Christmas carols as early as the ‘ber‘ months – September, October, November. But things really begin to look little by little like Christmas when the amihan winds start blowing in from the North, bringing cold and dry winds so redolent of the Yuletide season. Advent, and the earnest preparations for Christmas for begin. Then on the 16th of December, the novena of dawn masses (Simbang Gabi) is the not so subtle announcement that Christmas is here. Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, and the day after Christmas are not three days for most Filipinos. They are just one day of celebrations, reunions, get-togethers, masses and feasting. And the season does not end until the first weekend in January. Only then do things and people go back to their typical and customary ways. That gives Filipinos the time to visit and celebrate with all their friends and family.

Christmas in the US is the Chronos type of time. We count the hours and the minutes. Activities and events are scheduled by the hours. After the hours and the events are for just once and the done.

In the Philippines, Christmas is celebrated in Kairos time. Hours and minutes do not mean a thing. Everything is reckoned in –ish time, like nine-ish, ten-ish, eleven-ish, etc. Activities and events are not over until they are over. This is why Christmas day is a three-day event and Christmas is a season and not just a day.

Marianne, a dear niece, went home to the Philippines recently, spent time in a remote barrio (Siargao) and experienced the difference between chronos and kairos times. On the first few days, being the driven NYC girl that she is, she and her friend were itchy and antsy about what to do for the day. They wanted some ‘productive’ activities to spend their time on. But they were practically off the grid. And after a few says, the days simply flowed one into another. One morning on one of heir boat rides, she has to ask their boatman, “What day is it?” who replied, “Monday, I think. But I am not sure.” Marianne then realized that the people there counted the days not as Monday, Tuesday or Friday. Rather, there were only three days for them: yesterday, today and tomorrow. It was a liberating experience for Marianne. And immediately, she stopped counting the days and the hours. It was then that she noticed and was amazed by all the beauty surrounding her, the goodness in the people she was meeting and the truth in all her experiences and wanderings.

I feel Filipinos sense of time (the famous Filipino time) is of the the kairos rather than the chronos type. That to everything there is a season. Things get done when they need to get done. When it is time to go, it is time to go. When it is time to stay, it is time to stay. When the amihan starts blowing from the north, Christmas is coming. And when the habagat begins rushing from the south, the typhoons will soon bring rains and destruction.

These are my musings on the day after Christmas.

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