Stained Glass

The photos below were taken last Sunday at Church. We went earlier so I got the chance to take some shots of the stained glass while there's not much people there yet.

 There were also other Fil-Am kids there so I took p a couple of shots of them  after the mass was over.

Wishing you a productive week ahead. 

Taking up the Cross

"Whoever wishes to come after me must deny himself, take up his cross, and follow me". Today's Bible readings deal with the theme of Taking up our Cross and following in our Lord's footsep. Our affluent society does all it can do away with the reality of suffering. In the eyes of those who are blind to the transcendent, suffering and pain are incompatible with happiness. Funeral homes makes it their profession to blur suffering. Medical science alleviates pain, the drug commercials on television advertise their pain killers and sleeping pills, and dope peddlers make it possible to escape a harsh reality. Not all of this is bad. It is service to alleviate pain, to arrange a worthy funeral, and to pray to God for help when we suffer.

However, we should regard as un-Christian an attitude that desires at any cost or dubius means (dope abuse) to do away with both mental and physical suffering that is unavoidable. Since our lives are patterned after the life, death, ressurection of the Lord, we should in faith be willing to die with him (die to our egoistic selves, which is painful process, and accept unavoidable suffering) in order to live with Him forever.

A photo taken after attending the Sunday Mass. Have a great week ahead folks!

Confession

I have confession to make! After so many Sundays that we did not go to church, we finally made it today. Our daughter asked us if we can go this time. I know, Bad ME! After my brother died, I skipped going to church but I thanked God for reminding me of my faith through my daughter. The theme for today's service is the Healing Activity of our Lord. This helped me out to rekindle my faith and relationship to HIM. To fully explained the theme, I copied the context through the leaflet that I took from church.

A healthy person, who seldom or never needs a physician, finds difficulty in understanding the anguish, frustration, and never-to-be fulfilled desires of the physically handicapped. In primitive societies and prescientific times, the condition of the handicapped is even worse than it is today. There were no rehabilitation programs for them, no wheelchairs or any equipment that gave them at least some relief. Since religious belief regarded their mesiry as related to sin and moral

guilt, they were often outcast for whom nobody cared.

We find it although natural, therefore, that the writers of the Bible used the wrenched situation of the lame, the blind , and the deaf, the epileptics, and the lepers (all of whom they believed to be in the power of the demons) as a figure to describe humankind's alination from Godand the healing of these people as a signof God's powerful and caring presence. Ethically speaking, we could be like some of those handicapped. Pray that the Lord may open your ears to listen to his message. "Ephphta!' - that is, Be Opened!"