#Fr someone teach me book binding.

[passerinesoncaffeine]

Sometimes. You read a fic so fucking good that you wish to be a medival monk so you could make illuminated manuscripts of it to pass onto generations after. And also so I could just live rent free in a monastery and do this all day.

[frmartinshomiliesandreflections]

23rd August >> Fr. Martin’s Gospel Reflections / Homilies on Matthew 16:13-20 for Twenty First Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year A: ‘Who do you say I am?’.

Twenty First Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year A

Gospel (Europe, Africa, New Zealand, Australia & Canada)

Matthew 16:13-20

You are Peter and on this rock I will build my Church

When Jesus came to the region of Caesarea Philippi he put this question to his disciples, ‘Who do people say the Son of Man is?’ And they said, ‘Some say he is John the Baptist, some Elijah, and others Jeremiah or one of the prophets.’ ‘But you,’ he said ‘who do you say I am?’ Then Simon Peter spoke up, ‘You are the Christ,’ he said, ‘the Son of the living God.’ Jesus replied, ‘Simon son of Jonah, you are a happy man! Because it was not flesh and blood that revealed this to you but my Father in heaven. So I now say to you: You are Peter and on this rock I will build my Church. And the gates of the underworld can never hold out against it. I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven: whatever you bind on earth shall be considered bound in heaven; whatever you loose on earth shall be considered loosed in heaven.’ Then he gave the disciples strict orders not to tell anyone that he was the Christ.

Gospel (USA)

Matthew 16:13–20

You are Peter, and to you I will give the keys of the kingdom of heaven.

Jesus went into the region of Caesarea Philippi and he asked his disciples, “Who do people say that the Son of Man is?” They replied, “Some say John the Baptist, others Elijah, still others Jeremiah or one of the prophets.” He said to them, “But who do you say that I am?” Simon Peter said in reply, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.” Jesus said to him in reply, “Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah. For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my heavenly Father. And so I say to you, you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church, and the gates of the netherworld shall not prevail against it. I will give you the keys to the kingdom of heaven. Whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven; and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.” Then he strictly ordered his disciples to tell no one that he was the Christ.

Reflections (5)

(i) Twenty First Sunday in Ordinary Time

There is a programme on television called ‘Who do you think you are?’ In each episode a well-known person traces their family tree. The question, ‘Who am I?’ is one of the big questions that we engage with throughout our lives. In trying to answer that question, we sometimes unearth the story of our grandparents, our great grandparents, and our great, great, grandparents. We know that who we are has been shaped by those who lived long before us. We can never fully answer the question, ‘Who am I?’ We remain something of a mystery to ourselves and to others, no matter how much delving we do.

Perhaps that is because, according to the Scriptures, we are made in the image and likeness of God, and God is ultimately mysterious. This is the conclusion that Paul arrives at in today’s second reading. He has just come to the end of a very long section of his letter to the Romans, in which he has explored God’s relationship with humanity from Adam to the coming of Christ. It is a challenging read in places, but very thought provoking. At the end of it all, he says, in the words of today’s second reading, ‘How rich are the depths of God – how deep his wisdom and knowledge – and how impossible to penetrate his motives or understand his methods’. Even Saint Paul, the greatest theologian in the early church, had to admit that the depths of God were beyond him. Another great theologian of the church who lived over a thousand years later was Saint Thomas Aquinas. Since his early youth, when he decided to become a Dominican and defend the faith, he studied and wrote. His greatest work was called a ‘Summary of Theology’. When he came to his early fifties, he couldn’t write any more. One of the brothers asked him, ‘Master, will you not return to your work?’ Thomas replied, ‘I can write no more. All I have written seems like straw’. He died some months later. He recognized that the mystery of God he had sought to probe was, in the end, beyond him.

Great thinkers like Saint Paul and Saint Thomas Aquinas remind us that there is so much more to God than we will ever know. If the question, ‘Who am I?’ is of the big questions of life, the question, ‘Who is God?’ is an infinitely bigger question. In today’s gospel reading, Jesus asks his disciples two questions. The first was, ‘Who do people say I am?’ The answers given by the disciples were all variations of one answer, ‘Jesus is a great prophet’. If Jesus were to ask us that question today, ‘Who do people say I am?’ we too could answer that some people, such as Jews and Muslims, say that Jesus is a great prophet. Jesus’ second question to his disciples shows that he knows there is so much more that could be said about him, ‘Who do you say that I am?’ He was saying, ‘You have been my close companions. You have seen what I have been doing and heard what I have been saying. What have you to say about me?’ As so often in the gospels, Peter speaks for the other disciples, ‘You are the Christ, the Son of the living God’. Peter is a spokesperson for us all. His confession of Jesus is contained within the Creed we recite every Sunday, ‘We believe in one Lord, Jesus, Christ, the only Son of God’. These words attempt to express the mystery of Jesus, without fully exhausting it. There is so much more to Jesus than any set of words could express. The evangelists themselves who wrote the gospels were very aware that their words could not express fully who Jesus is. The fourth evangelist finishes his gospel with the statement, ‘there are also many other things that Jesus did; if every one of them were written down, I suppose the world itself could not contain the books that would be written’.

That sense that there is more to Jesus than we could ever express in words is, ultimately, very consoling. One of the most profound statements ever made about God is to found in the first letter of Saint John, ‘God is love’, and it was Jesus who revealed God to be Love. There is a richness and depth to the love of God made flesh in Jesus that we cannot fully grasp in this earthly life. Saint Paul, who claims to have met the risen Lord, was very aware of this. In his letter to the Ephesians, he prays that we would have ‘the power to comprehend… what is the breadth, and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge’. It is a wonderful prayer, that we would know, not just with our head, but with our heart, the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge. Paul then says that when we do come to know Jesus in this way, ‘we will be filled with all the fullness of God’. That sounds like our ultimate destiny, not one we will fully attain in this earthly life. It is a destiny worth journeying towards by allowing the Lord to be at the centre of our lives, here and now.

And/Or

(ii) Twenty First Sunday of the Year

 Most of us have at least one set of keys. If you are like me, you will loose one or other set from time to time. We worry until we find them again. We know that keys have the power to open and shut, and we do not like to think of that power falling into the hands of strangers. We are careful about who we give our keys to. We give them only to those we really trust. To give somebody a set of keys to our house is saying: ‘I trust you enough to give you the freedom to enter a place that means a great deal to me’.

 The first reading and gospel reading today make reference to the giving of keys to people. In the first reading, the Lord gives the key of the house of David to Eliakim. This key gave him the authority to open and to shut the palace in Jerusalem where the king, David’s successor, lived. In today’s gospel reading, Jesus promises to give the keys of the kingdom of heaven to Peter. The keys of a royal palace are one thing; the keys of the kingdom of heaven are quite another. Of course, Jesus was not speaking literally here. He would not hand over to Peter a physical set of keys. The kingdom of heaven is not a purely earthly kingdom; there are no keys to it in the sense in which we all have house keys. However, the language of giving keys suggests that Jesus is investing Peter with significant authority – authority not in the sense of power, but in the sense of responsibility and service. It is extraordinary that someone whom Peter had just addressed as the Christ, the Son of the living God, should give such responsibility to a human being, to flesh and blood. What was the responsibility given to Peter that was signified by the keys? The answer to that question is to be found in the phrase which sounds somewhat obscure to our ears: ‘whatever you bind on earth shall be considered bound in heaven; whatever you loose on earth shall be considered loosed in heaven’. The language of ‘binding’ and ‘loosing’ is a Jewish expression and it refers to teaching authority. Jewish rabbis had authority to bind and loose the Jewish law, to declare which parts of the law were binding and which could be interpreted loosely. Rabbis had the authority to interpret God’s law for people’s lives. What Jesus is portrayed as doing in our gospel reading today is giving Peter responsibility for interpreting, not the Jewish law, but the teaching of Jesus. Peter is given the task of interpreting the teaching of Jesus for the lives of the members of the church.

 This is not the time or place to explore the claim of the church that this responsibility has always resided and resides today in the Bishop of Rome. What is more relevant for our life today, perhaps, is the more general point that Jesus was willing to entrust enormous responsibility to human beings. He may have given special responsibility to Peter, but he also entrusted great responsibility to all his followers. At the very end of Mathew’s gospel he called on all his disciples to go forth and make disciples of all the nations. In the Our Father we pray, ‘Thy kingdom come’. We, thereby, recognize, that the coming of God’s kingdom is primarily God’s responsibility. We look to God to see to the coming of God’s kingdom. Yet, there is a great deal in the gospels to suggest that the coming of God’s kingdom is also our responsibility. Jesus has made the coming of God’s kingdom, the promotion of God’s values, dependant on all of us - on some more than on other, certainly, but on all the baptized. You could argue that Jesus was taking a tremendous risk in doing this. Peter, who was given the greatest responsibility, left a lot to be desired. In next Sunday’s gospel reading, which follows immediately after our gospel reading today, Jesus turns to Peter and says, ‘Get behind me Satan’. The rock on which the church was built immediately became an instrument of Satan. Yet, there is no indication in the gospel that Jesus then took back the responsibility he had given to Peter. Jesus presumably knew that he was dealing with very fickle instruments, and yet he entrusted enormous responsibility to them.

 Most of us are reasonable aware of our own failings and limitations; the older we get, the more aware we become of them. I am afraid that our weaknesses do not let us off the hook. Jesus continues to entrust us with responsibility for the coming of God’s kingdom on earth. What else can he do? We are all he has. The choirs of angels cannot do the job he wants done. It is a job for flesh and blood, for flawed people who are, nevertheless, generous, and who can learn to trust the Lord as much as he trusts them. When it comes to doing the work of the Lord, whatever that might mean for any one of us, we are not on our own. The Lord is with us. We have his word for it. ‘I will be with you always until the end of the age’. The Lord will work within us and among us, if we grasp the responsibility he has given us. That is clear even from today’s gospel reading. When Peter made his marvellous confession, Jesus said to him, ‘It was not flesh and blood that revealed this to you, but my Father in heaven’. Jesus was saying to him, ‘Well done, but it was not all your doing’. It is never all our doing. If we do what only we can do, God will certainly do what only God can do.

And/Or

(iii) Twenty First Sunday in Ordinary Time

 We often struggle to get to know each other well. If we were to ask even close friends, ‘Who do you say I am?’ they might struggle to give an adequate answer to that question. If people are to know us, we need to reveal ourselves to them, and self-revelation does not come easy to us. Even if it does, there is always more to us than we can ever reveal. We are, all of us, mysterious. Having been made in the image and likeness of God, we share in the mystery that is God. In this morning’s second reading, St Paul seems awestruck by the mystery of God. He exclaims, ‘How rich are the depths of God – how deep his wisdom and knowledge – and how impossible to penetrate his motives or understand his methods’. This is coming from the greatest theologian of the early years of the church. Even he would have struggled to answer the question that God might have put to him, ‘Who do you say that I am?’ If Paul can say ‘How rich are the depths of God’, to a lesser extent we can say, ‘How rich are the depths of every human being’.

 We can certainly say of Jesus, ‘How rich are his depths’, because he was no ordinary human being; he was God in human form. The gospels suggest that people struggled to get to know the person of Jesus. When Jesus turns to his disciples in today’s gospel reading and asks them, ‘Who do people say the Son of Man is?’ the answer he got showed that the general perception of him was somewhat inadequate. Jesus was not John the Baptist, or Elijah, or Jeremiah, or one of the other prophets, even though he had something in common with all of them. When Jesus asked his disciples the more probing question, ‘But you, who do you say that I am?’ Peter’s answer on behalf of the others was much more satisfactory, ‘You are the Christ, the Son of the living God’. Here indeed was real insight into Jesus’ identity. Jesus acknowledges Peter’s insight, ‘Blessed are you, Simon’. However, he immediately declares that this insight of Peter was a God-given insight; it was not simply the result of Peter’s own natural abilities, ‘it was not flesh and blood that revealed this to you, but my Father in heaven’. What is true of Peter, in this regard, is true of all of us. If any of us are to come to know Jesus more fully, it is only with God’s help that we can do this; we need the light of God’s Spirit if we are to come to know God’s Son. It is above all the Spirit who leads us to the truth, who leads us to the one who said, ‘I am the way, the truth and the life’.

 According to the gospel reading, what singled Peter out from the other disciples was his God-given insight into the identity of Jesus. Peter knew Jesus better than any of the other disciples. It is because of this unique insight that Jesus gives Peter a unique role among his followers. He is to be the rock, the firm foundation, on which Jesus will build his church. It is an extraordinarily significant role for Jesus to give to any of his disciples. Peter’s role is further spelt out by Jesus promising him the keys of the kingdom of heaven. The image of the keys suggests authority and responsibility. Jesus spells out the nature of that authority in terms of binding and loosing. This is probably a reference to a teaching authority. Peter is responsible for discerning what aspects of Jesus’ teaching are binding and what elements can be interpreted more loosely. Peter is being entrusted with the task of authoritatively interpreting the teaching of Jesus for other members of the church. As Catholics, we believe that the teaching authority entrusted to Peter resides in a special way in the Bishop of Rome, the Pope. Later on in Matthew’s gospel Jesus will criticize the Pharisees for locking people out of the kingdom of God by their teaching. In contrast, Peter’s teaching is meant to pave the way for people to enter the kingdom of God. All Christians can look to Peter as the one to whom Jesus entrusted his own teaching role in a special way. He is, in that sense, the patron of all teachers of the faith. Peter shows us that authoritative teaching is grounded in insight into the person of Jesus. We all share that teaching role of Peter to some degree.

 This morning’s gospel reminds us that the church will always be a teaching church. Jesus intended it so from the very beginning. The church will always need teachers of the faith, teachers whose teaching, like that of Peter, is grounded in a God-given insight into the rich depths of the person of Jesus. The church, of course, is also a learning church, and all teachers of the faith are also learners. We are all learners when it comes to the ways of the Lord. None of us can ever adequately answer the Lord’s question, ‘Who do you say that I am?’ At most, we will only ever be on the way to answering that question. That is why we need, each one of us, to keep on invoking the coming of the Holy Spirit to lead us to the complete truth.

And/Or

(iv) Twenty First Sunday in Ordinary Time

 We struggle to know ourselves well. It is only with experience that we become aware of our strengths and weaknesses. There are probably levels to ourselves that we never fully know. If we struggle to know ourselves, it is even more of a struggle to know someone else. Even people we have been close to for years can remain something of a mystery to us. After many years they may reveal some side to themselves that we had not been aware of. We sudden realize that, perhaps, I don’t know this person as well as I thought.

 If we struggle to get to know others, even those who are closest to us, it was certainly a struggle for people around Jesus to get to know him. He was more mysterious than the average person. What Paul says of God in today’s second reading could equally be said of Jesus, ‘How deep his wisdom and knowledge! How impossible to penetrate his motives or understand his methods! Who could ever know the mind of the Lord?’ When Jesus asks his disciples in today’s gospel reading what people were saying about him, they answered, ‘John the Baptist, Elijah, Jeremiah, one of the prophets’. That answer is reasonable in some far as it goes. It is the answer that Moslems and Jews would give today. Jesus was a great prophet who proclaimed God’s word. However, Jesus himself did not find that answer adequate. That is why he turned to his disciples and asked them, ‘But who do you say I am?’ He wanted to know what the people who were closest to him thought. Simon Peter answered on behalf of them all, ‘You are the Christ (Messiah), the Son of the living God’. There is an answer which shows real insight into the identity of Jesus. Yet, even that fine answer was open to more than one interpretation. When Peter gave that answer, he wasn’t thinking of a crucified Christ, a Son of God who would be rejected and put to death. Peter, even with his rich confession of faith, was only beginning to understand who Jesus really was and what that meant for the life he was being called to live.

 Jesus’ question, ‘Who do you say that I am?’ is in some sense addressed to all of us. We are each asked to give our own answer to that question. It is not just an academic question that is looking for correct knowledge. That is certainly important. As Christians, we need to understand with our minds who Jesus is. We find the core of our understanding of Jesus in a section of the Creed which we will shortly recite together. A correct understanding of who Jesus is remains important for all of us as Christians today. The early church struggled for the first three hundred years of its existence to come up with an adequate answer to the question of Jesus’ identity. The great creeds were the fruit of that intellectual search. However, the question of Jesus has another dimension; it contains within itself another, more personal, question, ‘Who am I for you?’ ‘What place do I have in your life?’ ‘Where do I stand in your life?’ There is a modern religious song which I like very much and which the parish choir sometimes sing. The chorus goes, ‘You are the centre, you are my life’. That is one answer to that second way of understanding Jesus’ question. It is the answer, perhaps, that we would all like to give, and, yet, in our heart of hearts we often know that Jesus is not always at the centre of our lives. As Peter would soon discover, there can be a great deal of self at the centre of our lives. In a sense, the whole of our lives as Christians is a journey towards putting Jesus at the centre of our lives, or allowing Jesus to place himself at the centre of our lives. We are always on a journey in that regard. That is really what we mean by conversion, the process of putting the Lord at the centre of our lives, that continuous turning from self towards the Lord.

 Because of Peter’s inspired insight into who Jesus was, Jesus gave him a momentous role within the emerging community of believers, the church. He was to be the rock, the foundation, on which Jesus would build his church. He was given keys as a symbol of authority - authority as understood within the kingdom of God, not the authority of domination, but the authority of service. That service would consist especially in binding and loosing. That language is a metaphor for teaching, for interpreting the words of Jesus for the other disciples. Peter was given this role, even though he was still at the beginning of his journey, and in the very next passage he would actually be addressed by Jesus as Satan. Yet, that is how the Lord works. Even as we struggle to grow in our relationship with him, as we try to know him better, with our heads and our hearts, he nevertheless entrusts all of us with great responsibility. He does not wait for us to be perfect before calling on us to share in his work. What he does ask, however, is that we are always open to ongoing conversion, just as Peter was.

And/Or

(v) Twenty First Sunday in Ordinary Time

 We know from our own experience how difficult it is to get to know someone, even someone whom we have been around or with whom we have lived for a very long time. We may think we know someone well and then we may suddenly discover something really important about them that we had never suspected. Some of you may have seen the film, the Dead, which is a film adaptation of the short story by James Joyce. At the end of the film the husband discovers something about his wife he had no inkling of up until then, her deep feelings for someone she knew as a young woman and who died tragically.

 Each of us is something of a mystery. We are all made in the image and likeness of God, and, in this morning’s second reading, Paul is very aware of the profound mystery that is God, ‘Who could ever know the mind of the Lord?’ We each reflect something of the mystery that is God. If that is true of each of us, it is even truer of Jesus, who was the perfect image of God. His own disciples, those who spent time with him, struggled to come to know him, and really only began to grasp him after his resurrection and the coming of the Spirit.

 When Jesus asks his disciples in this morning’s gospel reading - ‘Who do you say I am?’ - he was testing how well they had come to know him. The answer that Peter gave to that question was as good an answer as Jesus could have expected, ‘You are the Christ, the Son of the living God’. Here is an answer that has stood the test of time. We continue to give that same answer today. It is the faith of the church. In the creed we will be shortly reciting we say, ‘I believe in one Lord, Jesus Christ, the only begotten Son of God’. That statement goes a little bit further than Peter’s answer because it reflects the developed understanding of Jesus gained by the church over several hundred years. Yet, Peter’s confession of Jesus contains in nucleus what we profess in the Creed. It is a reminder to us that the roots of our faith today are to be found in the faith of those who were eyewitnesses of Jesus’ life and ministry.

 Yet, even though Peter’s confession of Jesus’ identity was accurate, at the time he didn’t fully understand the implications of what he said for his life. Jesus would show himself to be the Son of the living God above all by his faithfulness to God’s mission, and this faithfulness would take him to his passion and his crucifixion. The Son of the living God was also the suffering Son of Man. To follow such a Son of God would entail being ready to travel the way of the cross with him, and it soon transpired that this was something Peter was not prepared to do. He went on to deny Jesus publicly and then to abandon him. Although Peter spoke the right words, it took some time before those words really shaped his life.

 The question ‘Who do you say that I am?’ is addressed by the risen Lord to all of us. It is a question that isn’t just looking for correct information or an accurate verbal expression. It goes deeper than that. In asking, ‘Who do you say that I am?’ the Lord is asking ‘Who am I to you?’, ‘What part do I play in your life?’, ‘How deep is your relationship with me and to what extent does it shape all your other relationships, all you say and do?’ In a sense, Jesus is asking, ‘What difference do I make in your life?’ If Jesus is asking for knowledge in putting the question, ‘Who do you say that I am?’ it is as much a knowledge of the heart than a knowledge of the mind, the kind of knowledge that is the fruit of love, that flows from a loving fidelity to Jesus and all he stands for. It was this loving fidelity that Peter lacked initially but eventually went on to attain, as he gave his life for Jesus.

 In living out that loving fidelity to the Lord, we need the support of the community of the believers, what we call the church. In this morning’s gospel reading, Jesus speaks of ‘my church’. Because it is his church, he protects it; he promises Peter that the gates of the underworld will never hold out against it. The powers of death and evil will never destroy it. The church will always be there and we will always need it. This morning’s gospel suggests that Jesus gave Peter a special teaching role in his church. The language of binding and loosing is Jewish terminology for interpretation God’s law, God’s will. Peter has a special responsibility for interpreting the teaching of Jesus for the other members of the church. As Roman Catholics we believe that this special teaching role assigned to Peter continues to reside in the bishop of Rome, the Pope. We need the Lord’s church in all its dimensions if we are to live our faith to the full; we need each other’s lived witness and we need the church’s teaching and guidance.

Fr. Martin Hogan.

[ilegnangeli]

Random May Thought #3

The monsoon season is almost upon us. I don’t know if I’ll ever be ready for rain. I was born in September. I’m used to the monsoon season breaking my heart because it’s almost always raining on my birthday but I never get used to it, I don’t love it.

I am sat right in front of our window as I stare at the cloudy grey skies. Our family’s group chat is full of pictures of the skies and I kinda actually don’t miss the cerulean skies right now—specifically because I’ve been praying for rain for some time now. It’s just so hot in the Philippines. I guess everywhere else in the world, too. At least in the northern hemisphere. It must be nice to be somewhere in the southern hemisphere right now. I know these are conflicting statements BUT I would love it if it rained right now. But I don’t like the rain, okay? Lol

Anyway, this week was full of surprises. I got transferred to a different section. Praise God! Fr, I’ve been praying for this to happen and now that it’s finally happened, I have no words but THANK YOU, GOD!

I feel like I’m going to miss the Board members. I’ll miss asking them for their meals. I’ll miss joking around with them. I mean I’ve only worked with them for a couple of months but it felt like we’ve known each other longer than that. It was a privilege serving you, honorable members of the Board for recruitment and promotion. But here’s me, officially signing off.

There’s a bittersweetness to it. I loved being with the people in the recruitment and promotion section of our organization but God, I just wanted out. And you made a way. Thank you, Father. My heart will never be at peace if I stayed there longer. I would have eventually broken down (again and again) and never recuperated. It was just that bad. It was really dark for me to be in that place. It was just heartbreaking. I wasn’t growing. I was just THERE.

Plus, it felt like I won’t be able to improve things in the system because it isn’t up to me and I don’t want to be impeded like that. I don’t want to stay blinded by practices that go against my principles. I don’t want to keep on pleasing people. It’s tiring. And I’m knocked out. Totally.

I do pray for the people who need to remain in that darkness. And those who have newly joined and rejoined the team. My goodness. I pray that they keep their principles in tact. I pray that they don’t feel gaslighted like I did. I pray that God sustains them. I had to tap out because I couldn’t take the abuse any longer. I even cried in front of the Board members because of how heavy it felt to be in that section. Dear LORD, thank you for coming to my rescue.

Everything’s new to me in the section I was recently assigned to. I have never been assigned in the records section before. But what’s nice about it is that I’m already familiar with some of the things that I’ll be “chief” of from now on. I actually hate being called “chief” of anything because I’ve never been a chief of a section before. Lmao. There was an order from last year that made me “acting” chief of a section but lmao, I never felt like I was the chief because there was someone else who kept on “taking” the role so I never really “got the hang of it” nor did I get to “embrace” it. Because I might take the spotlight away from that person. And I don’t play dirty like that. I actually never knew my place there. In fact, I even wondered myself which “section” was I “acting chief” of since I never really got to call the shots. There was someone always in the way. I sighed, my goodness. I was even often told I was already “receiving so much help” that I wasn’t even “performing” well enough because I might be “getting overwhelmed” of so many tasks.

I’ve never felt so manipulated.

Truth be told, I was truly bombarded by tasks without proper timelines nor prioritization. The decision makers were indecisive and I was being blamed for their incompetence. Their lack of direction. Their lack of accountability. Their lack of responsibility. And I also began questioning myself if I was underperforming. Was I? Was I unprofessional? I started blaming myself for not being ENOUGH for them. I was losing myself. It was a dark tunnel I journeyed the past few weeks, if not months. I hope when these people get a chance to read this, I hope you understand how it felt like for me to be there. I was as confused as you were. At least have some empathy for your co-workers. Your co-workers aren’t robots. If that was how your previous bosses treated you (like shit), please don’t do that to us. We’re not being snowflakes, we’re ACTUAL human beings with feelings, if you know what I mean. Just like you?

The lack of proper communication and the amount of talking behind other people's backs and the amount of misunderstandings. The worst. I don't want to be in that place. EVER AGAIN.

This is why I always pray that I get mentors who have the same ideals or principles as I do. But it's so hard to find those kind of people.

However, I’m just glad I’m out of that tunnel now. I get to breathe again.

On another topic, our air-conditioner broke. It’s eight years old so it’s understandable. But I kinda feel sad that electronic appliances’ life spans are so short nowadays. Our aunt’s air-conditioner from MY CHILDHOOD still lives. They even got to bring it to their new house lmao. Meanwhile this air-con from only eight years back has given up on us. Anyway, my sister and I are getting a new one tomorrow. So I pray it rains tonight so I won’t have to endure this midsummer night’s heat.

So I printed my manuscript and have been editing some of my poems for binding. I’m thinking of giving this away as a gift to my friends for my 30th birthday or for Christmas this year, idk. I’m still thinking about it. IF I COULD AFFORD PUBLISHING IT. Lmao. But I’ll pray about it. I found an independent book publisher but I haven’t had the courage to inquire about their service fees. I’m afraid I can’t afford it. BUT GOD WILL PROVIDE lol. I’ll just be faithfully saving up for my book’s publication.

We did a general cleaning inside the house today. And I found so many boxes of the many things I bought from January 2020 up to present. When I think about it, I could have saved so much money right now. If I only had been patient enough. But dang, I wouldn’t be typing on this laptop right now if I didn’t dare purchase one lol.

The pandemic has ruined my timeline for EVERYTHING I had planned after returning from China. I planned that after two years, I would leave the organization. I would be teaching in Japan. And I would live on my own. But COVID-19 had to happen. I have postponed my graduate studies. I haven’t thought about leaving the country. And I am still dependently living with my sister and/or sometimes my parents lmao. I’m sorry. I WANT TO LIVE INDEPENDENTLY BUT THINGS ARE HARD RIGHT NOW. And also I really hoped and prayed for autumn, winter, and spring. But you can’t have everything.

LMAO, I was just having this conversation with my sister, like right now. She told me that she was going to check if she’s won the lottery, I told her that if she won, we should resign immediately and I would just leech off from her. And SHE SAID YES! Whoa! That’s UNCONDITIONAL LOVE right there. Lolol

Oh I just wanted to share another story because this was a conversation I really liked about this week, too. My lovely co-worker and I had a chat about her plans of getting married. This biatch, let’s just say that she is my biatch, we are each other’s bitches. Whatever. We’re friends, I get to call her that and she’s also welcome to call me her bitch. Capisce? Comprende? Alright, on with this story:

She told me that she and her boyfriend have spoken about settling down. CUTE RIGHT? But they’ve been talking about whether having a kid first or getting a house first. So she’s thinking about saving up for a house or applying for a loan so they could get a house and start saving for their wedding.

Ah, it’s cute, isn’t it? How like just six months ago, THIS BITCH TOLD ME SHE IS DONE DATING AND WILL JUST PROBABLY DIE ALONE, LIKE ME! AND NOW THIS BITCH IS ALREADY PLANNING A FUTURE WITH SOMEONE—HER BOYFRIEND! Okay, I’m not even angry or disappointed but it’s just somehow ridiculous and surprising at the same time. They say that when the right one comes, you’ll know. But man, I feel like THE RIGHT ONE for me got hit by a bus or something. WHERE THE HELL ARE YOU? Lmao

To be honest, I don’t feel like in a hurry dating or marrying. Even though the rest of the world feels like I’m running out of time. I don’t live by the world’s standards—at least not anymore. Even though I often hear these resounding statements: “You’re just saying that,” “You’ll change your mind about it,” “You should explore because you’re at your prime,” and “You need a boyfriend.” I don’t feel pressured. Though I’ve been thinking about it a lot recently because these people keep putting these thoughts in my head LMAO. Should I be grateful though? Thank you?

But I have people surrounding me who pray for me and for my future partner or spouse or whatever the hell he will be (but I hope he’s in human form, okay?). Because for now, I know it’s insane and a pity (for you guys, but not me), I just enjoy watching other people’s blooming love lives. And I get happy and excited for them, like no other. I feel genuine happiness for people who are settling down right now, getting engaged right now, and falling in love right now. Because it’s their time. Not mine. So I will stay and I will wait. Because until I meet THE ONE, I can’t mess up fate. So I don’t mind, if you come into my life late.

P.S. Whoever you are, wherever you are, I’m excited to spend the rest of my life with you.

P.P.S. I’m already feeling the heat and it sucks we can’t turn on our air-conditioner. Imma cry.

[headandheartcatholic]

Cafeteria Catholicism

For the Head

It’s not uncommon to encounter Catholics, often public figures, who maintain that they are Catholics in good standing while publicly disagreeing with numerous teachings of the Church.   Issues they frequently mention include:  abortion, same – sex marriage, contraception and embryonic stem cell research.  

Is picking and choosing what we like about the faith while leaving the rest behind, allowed? Does this coincide with the Church’s understanding of what it means to believe?  In other words, is it OK to be a cafeteria Catholic?

The short answer is no.  Why?

To answer that we have to see why we believe anything the Church teaches.  There are two primary reasons.  First, we believe that Christ is truly the Son of God.  As a result, we believe that what He says is authoritative, period.   Secondly, we believe that the Church speaks truly and faithfully for Christ, particularly in matters of faith and morality.  If either of these two points is not sustained then we have to discard Christianity all together not just some of it.  If Christ is not God as He claimed to be, then He would either be a liar or insane[1].  Why would I listen to Him at all?  It would make no sense to love Him more than my mother and father, to take up my cross and follow Him[2], or to do anything that He said.  It is precisely because we hold Him to be God that we follow Him, which implies obeying Him.

The second piece of the puzzle however is equally as important.  Whenever you believe a news report to be true, you do so precisely because you trust that the messenger is not just sincere but correct in their reporting on the matter.  If you doubt the messenger, you doubt the message.  Christ is the message, the Church is the messenger.   We would know nothing, or almost nothing, about Christ were it not for the Church communicating the ‘Good News.’   The Protestant solution of using the Bible as the only source of authoritative teaching in order to get around the need for a Church just doesn’t work. The Bible itself didn’t fall from the sky but rather came from God through the Church.  Someone had to decide which books were inspired and which were not.  As Peter Kreeft, a noted Catholic author, said, "you can’t have an infallible effect without an infallible cause.[3]” Granted, the Church is a secondary cause to God, but a cause or instrument nonetheless.

So when the Church communicates its understanding of Christ’s teachings, it either has the authority to do so or it doesn’t.  If I believe that the Church is guided by the Holy Spirit and teaches the truth about faith and morals, then I accept it.  If it doesn’t, then I ultimately have no foundation to believe any of its teachings.  So if I, as a practicing Catholic,  think that the Church is wrong regarding homosexual marriage, contraception and abortion, upon what foundation do I accept its teachings about social justice and kindness?   I may agree with the Church on certain issues, but the fact that I agree becomes merely coincidental.  I may agree with Muslims that religion is important and with Marxists that there is oppression in the world, but those shared opinions would make me neither a Muslim nor a Marxist.  In other words, it wouldn’t be faith.

As Cardinal Pell wrote, “For many people today, conscience suggests freedom to judge God's law by our own personal resources and the right to reject the notion or reformulate this law as we think best. I imagine that to non-Christians this must seem rather odd: If moral and religious teachings bind only to the extent that one's individual mind and will enthuse about them, then pretty clearly the teachings do not bind at all. What "binds" is simply the autonomous self, with all the limitations that our selves are prey to. And to say "I am bound by me" is hardly to make a meaningful moral utterance.[4]”

The Catholic faith isn’t first and foremost a list of rules.  It is an encounter with the living God in the person of Jesus Christ, an encounter with His love and His forgiveness.  Yet this grace, this invitation to communion with God, challenges us to leave our selfish and sinful ways behind.  This is hard, but possible with Christ’s help.  It is only when this challenge is accepted that we begin to truly become what we were created to be.  The moral norms are the necessary guidelines in this process.  Who are we to tell God we know better than He does?

So, what do we do if we sincerely have a hard time grasping or accepting some points of the faith? We pray and we study. “Where a Catholic disagrees with the Church on some serious matter, the responses should not be “that’s that’ I can’t follow the Church here”; instead we should kneel and pray that God will lead our weak steps and enlighten our fragile minds.[5]” This may seem like a hard and arduous road, but do not get discouraged. Christ told us that if we seek we shall find.[6]

As Pope Benedict stated, “In the uncertainty of this time in history and of our society, (we must) offer people the certainty of the complete faith of the Church. The clarity and beauty of the Catholic faith are such that they brighten human life even today! This is particularly true if it is presented by enthusiastic and convincing witnesses.[7]”

Christ has guaranteed complete certainty of faith to the Church, through the power of the Holy Spirit. This is a gift and grace He has freely given us in order that we may have eternal life. Why would we want to leave anything of such a beautiful gift behind?

by Fr. John Bullock, LC

Re-published November 10, 2018

[Originally published April 23, 2009]

TKC!

cf. Fulton Sheen, Life of Christ ↑

cf. Mt 10:37 – 38 ↑

Peter Kreeft, Yes or No, Dialogue 1 ↑

Cardinal Pell on True and False Conscience, Feb 10, 2005, Zenit.org. ↑

ibid ↑

cf. Mt 7:7 ↑

Benedict XVI to Austrian Bishops - Zenith - 2 dec 2005 ↑