A love-ly year ahead

It is the last day of 2013. There is always something a little poignant to endings even though they usually herald new beginnings. In a way, I like that we celebrate Christmas, the birth of Christ, at the end of the year for it symbolizes for me the continuity of hope and joy into the new year.

Despite it being wintry cold in the Northern Hemisphere, the Nativity is the beacon of light in the darkness, bringing life, warmth and good cheer. It is the reminder that amidst tragedy, violence and loss, a baby was born in humble circumstances to become the one who will save the world. Goodness will triumph over evil. Peace, and joy, will prevail.

As with any superhero, life is never smooth sailing. There is even danger. Shortly after his birth, Jesus and his parents have to flee to Egypt and live in exile.

The Nativity story is one of privation, hardship and yawning uncertainty. It speaks of great trials for Mary and Joseph, from the time she said yes to carrying the Son of Man in her womb, and he said yes to protecting a pregnant woman and the life of a particular foetus.

This is what inspires me, these two remarkable people who were the parents of Jesus. Mary, a gutsy young woman who accepts the unusual gift of her son at incredible risk of shame and death.

Joseph, a man who undertakes to care for his affianced, and later her child, although he is under no obligation to do so. His deep and resilient faith his only guiding force in what seemed like a betrayal of the highest order.

Their faith and fidelity to God speaks of their great love for God. To go beyond the human inclination to give up, walk away in anger and disgust, choose the easier option or simply say no to definite heartache was possible only because they recognized and subscribed to what real love is.

Real love seeks the good of the other, even to the point of sacrifice that seems foolish to the rest of the world. True love is enduring and does not rely on emotion or reciprocity to keep on being loyal, affirming and life-giving. Pure love keeps forgiving and giving, beyond duty, sense, or even justice.

Joseph and Mary understood that and lived it out. Is it any wonder that their son, Jesus, grew up to be the man He was? His parents did real good by their fully human, fully divine son.

While I do not have children, I can still aspire to be as loving as they were. And I am ever hopeful because good people like Joseph and Mary do exist, as they did all those years ago.

May Jesus, Mary and Joseph carry you into the new year and bring you the hope and joy of the Nativity. Happy New Year.

 

God is with us

As the last candle was lit on the Advent wreath last Sunday, I felt deep sadness. I carried the hearts of all the people I recently met in my heart, their suffering and pain, and it felt heavy.

For I cannot change things, make their lives better... yet. For now, I can only remember them, and pray for them. Like them, I can only wait for the light of Emmanuel to come, and in the words of the Benedictus or Song of Zachariah, to "illuminate those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, and to direct our feet in the way of peace.”

This melancholic state represents my current mood. Some of it comes from the typical end of year reflection: What have I accomplished in this year that just sped by? All I feel is tired. I have rushed around doing a million things, without really accomplishing much. I have wasted precious time on mindless activity without giving more time to the Lord, as I so desired.

The other part of this emptiness comes from having to wait. My impatient soul demands instant gratification. Yet, Advent demands that I prepare my heart for the birth of Christ in a particular way. As Father Ron Rolheiser wrote in early December:

Advent is a gestation process that cannot be rushed. Tears, pain, and a long season of prayer are needed to create the conditions for the kind of pregnancy that brings forth a messiah into our world. Why? Because the real love and life can only be born when a long-suffering patience has created the correct space, the virginal womb, within which the sublime can be born. 

He goes on to add: Messiahs can only be born inside a particular kind of womb, namely, one within which there's enough patience and willingness to wait so as to let things happen on God's terms, not ours.  

I allowed God to lead my heart this Advent and He took me to the Philippines and showed me poverty, despair and injustice. He also showed me abundance, hope and love. One of the questions we reflected on at the close of reverse carolling was how does this experience of reverse carolling fit into my life back home?

This trip was made not to salve my conscience, boost my ego or help me become a more interesting conversationalist, rather, it was a personal invitation to participate in Advent in a more intimate manner, to wait and see how the Christ child will be born in my life in a new, unprecedented way.

I strongly felt that I was asked to be the voice of those without one. To remind others of those who were marginalized and easily forgotten. To make a difference by not remaining indifferent. To make my tears count.

As Father Rolheiser concludes:

Hence, ideally, every tear should bring the messiah closer. This isn't an unfathomable mystery: Every frustration should, ideally, make us more ready to love. Every tear should, ideally, make us more ready to forgive. Every heartache should, ideally, make us more ready to let go of some of our separateness. Every unfulfilled longing should, ideally, lead us into a deeper and more sincere prayer. And all of our pained impatience for a consummation that seems to forever elude us should, ideally, makes us feverish enough to burst into love's flame.

We commemorate the birth of Jesus this coming evening, an event that is the icon of pure, selfless love. It is right and just to give pause and simply adore Him.

Missionary heart

I finally have time to reflect a little on my year, and what has been apparent is that I have been schooled these months in what it means to have a missionary heart.

I have always thought of missionaries as an intrepid, rare breed of people who went to distant places and suffered much hardship to bring about the salvation of people. Certainly not someone like me - full of faults and fears, not verbally articulate, nor socially adept.

However, this year has given me fresh insight: if one has the heart to share the joy of intimately knowing Christ, and one lives and moves according to where the Spirit leads, then it is possible to be missionary, wherever one is. This is what I've learnt.

JESUS FIRST & ALWAYS

If one must have tunnel vision, then let the focus be on Jesus, for only He is perfect in wisdom, knowledge and love, and thus steers with unerring precision. He alone leads me to be in union with God, who is the source and destiny of my being. 

Listening well and listening frequently to Him is necessary. Whether it was preparing for my exams or being on vacation, when I took the time to pray and thank the Lord for every moment of joy, frustration, despair or anger, He would gift me with insight, hope or strength, encouraging and affirming me.  

As an imperfect and broken vessel, my power to move mountains is largely non-existent. But when I deny my self, my prejudice and my pride, and I follow His lead, mountains become speed bumps that merely slow me down. 

I have recently begun to pray the Jesus Prayer* as well as a mantra taken from John 3:30 - Increase in me that I may decrease. These two are my bite-sized prayers on the go. Try them, they really work.

JOURNEYING WELL

I got to travel to many places this year. Interestingly enough, none were my choice of destination, save one, and that was my recent trip. One thing stuck out whether I was abroad or at home, that life is an on-going flow of events filled with constant change and uncertainty, and I could choose to meet and respond to God in the flow only if I recognized that each moment was pregnant with potential grace.

The funny thing about these grace-filled moments is you need to respond in a life-giving manner in order to experience its full effect. In other words, I had to walk the talk of my faith authentically, at times against my own inclinations, and in so doing, I then allowed ordinary circumstances to be transformed into burning bush encounters.

What surprised me, especially on vacation, were the many opportunities to speak a word of life-giving truth, facilitate healing in some way, or demonstrate God's love through compassion and forbearance. I realized there is no time off from doing good works.

As Pope Paul VI put it, we are called to be saints of daily life. Every day we are called to holiness and the mission of bearing good fruit. Every day the journey takes a turn that can lead us either closer or farther away from Him and His precepts.

To journey well requires being ready at all times, like a wise bridesmaid, or vigilant servant. With an open heart and attentive ear, ready to do the Lord's bidding, to say: Speak, Lord, your servant is listening (1 Samuel 3:10).

JOY ABOUNDING

No matter how disastrous a situation, no matter how badly we fail in life, no matter how life knocks us down, the one truth holds: Nothing can separate us from the love of Christ (Romans 8:35), for His love and grace are sufficient (2 Corinthians 12:9).

He was, is and will always be Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace (Isaiah 9:6). His love is unconditional, infinite, abundant, and most of all, gentle - a gift for everyone, for all eternity.

In accepting such an undeserved gift of pure love, I cannot help but feel joy, the joy of the Good News, the Gospel, that evil can never triumph. For Jesus came and He conquered sin and death out of love for you and me.

So as Christians, we are called to experience and express joy even in adversity, for we can see the bigger picture, the infinite glory of salvation history. And we are called to weave our own stories into this rich tapestry of faith, to sing in unison the chorus of joy as we welcome our Saviour into our hearts daily.

As Pope Francis wrote in Evangelii Gaudium, our lives must not be Lent without Easter. He shared a powerful quote from Pope Benedict XVI:

Being a Christian is not the result of an ethical choice or a lofty idea, but the encounter with an event, a person, which gives life a new horizon and a decisive direction.

Pope Francis goes on to elucidate it is in this encounter with God’s love, which blossoms into an enriching friendship, and we are liberated from our narrowness and self-absorption. We become fully human when we become more than human, when we let God bring us beyond ourselves in order to attain the fullest truth of our being. Here we find the source and inspiration of all our efforts at evangelization. For if we have received the love which restores meaning to our lives, how can we fail to share that love with others?  Evangelii Gaudium, 8

I began this year wanting to bring light to others. I am not sure how much I have succeeded given my natural disposition. However, if I do as Esther suggested during reverse carolling, to model Mother Mary in bringing the Christ child to others, then, like Mary, I may not know what the future portends, but as long as I agree to bear Baby Jesus within me, that is all that is needed for His glory to shine forth and bring joy into others' hearts. 

NB: For this entry, I draw content from Anna Capello's talk on ICPE missionary communities: an expression of lay spirituality.

* http://catholicism.about.com/od/prayers/qt/Jesus_Prayer.htm 

Reverse carolling impressions

I. TOUCHED IN BAGONG SILANG, December 7
I first noticed her as the attentive and still figure who eyes were trained on us as we sang, conversed and prayed with families in Bagong Silang, a slew of tiny zinc-roofed wooden "houses" that hugged the steep mountain side.

Then her face appeared again, and again as we went from home to home. We locked eyes, exchanged smiles from time to time, and finally at our last three homes, we made contact.

From behind, I gently cupped her face and turned her head from side to side in play. She immediately melted and clung to my side, refusing to let go of my arm. When we prayed and I had to let go of her hand, she would lean into my side, maintaining body contact as she prayed along with us. I fell in love then as I held her tiny, cold hand in mine again.

Here was a kindred spirit, a child who shared my love language of touch. I savoured this brief moment of pure, innocent trust. How did I get so lucky to deserve this unexpected expression of love?

During a moment of reflection later on, I felt that Jesus was assuring me that He loved me dearly and unconditionally through Riza. Even though I felt unloveable and unworthy of being loved (this always happens when I am thrust into a group of people I do not know very well and my old insecurities rear their heads), He thought otherwise.

Riza continued to follow us up the hillside to our van. She became my little assistant when I was trying to teach a child how to say thank you for the lollipop I gave him. She demanded that he say thank you in Tagalog, which he quickly did.

When it came time to leave, I sought her out and planted a kiss on her forehead. It was a benediction for her that immediately bounced back onto me. Jesus was telling her she was precious and loved, just as He was telling me the same thing.

It was a moment of pure grace. I encountered Christ in Riza, and she, in me.

II. BOHOL RETROSPECTIVE, December 12
P said something doing a debriefing in Bohol, that God was unfair for there was such a huge disparity between the poor and the rich. My immediate reaction was that it wasn't God who was unfair, but rather people who were greedy, and therefore unfair.

God created the world with enough to go around for everyone. However, humanity with a view to acquiring personal wealth, fight wars to gain territories in order to attain power, assets and monetary wealth. It is avarice that has caused this imbalance in the world, where the majority of the world goes without that a few may live in the lap of luxury.

I am back in Tagaytay for a day having spent three days in Bohol. In collaboration with the Bohol Chamber of Commerce*, we visited some 100 homes to sing and pray with the families and leave them with food hampers. We also threw a Christmas party for over 200 children in a school in Buenavista.

It is disconcerting and depressing to come face to face with such poverty and hardship. People who live in tiny, dark, nipa palm-roofed shacks, dressed in hand-me-down clothes, with not enough to eat.

Suffering is written in every line of their prematurely aged, tanned features, their eyes are dead and lifeless, blank expressions pasted on their visages. They are a people in darkest despair.

Some of the homes we visited in Batuan are so remote that the people we met seem socially maladjusted. They are unable to express any emotion and the children stare back, slack-jawed, with no reaction to friendly overtures. This, for me, was the saddest, for a smile has been a universal response to my own, until now. They were like zombies.

The incongruity of the beauty of the padi fields and the backbreaking work they represent to the farmers (who have no time to appreciate the beauty of their surroundings) hit me hard.

Worse, they do not reap the entire harvest for all their efforts, only a third which is barely sufficient. Two-thirds go to the landowners who don't even know their property exists except during harvest time.

When asked what they wish to pray for, the families we visited sought for enough food to eat and did not even desire riches. Mostly they asked for good health as well for sickness is a curse in such abject poverty.

Although we did not visit those who were directly affected by the quake in Bohol, we visited the very poor, some affected by the typhoon, and those who were living in such remote, difficult-to-access places that they had no contact with outsiders and received little assistance.

The CHARIS**-sponsored water filters, and the mosquito nets we gave out were received with such gratitude that I was ashamed of how much I took for granted potable water, electricity and decent plumbing.

These families I encountered during the two days of reverse carolling in Bohol shout to me in their despondence. What Jitka said during our orientation rang deafeningly, that the biggest sin against the poor was indifference.

As I made ready to leave her home after we sang the finale, Artemia said to me in Visayan, remember me, as she held my hand. Although I felt our efforts were ineffectual and too piecemeal a gesture to make a significant difference, I can remember and honour those I met by fulfilling my wants less and channelling more of my income towards alleviating the plight of the forgotten and the less fortunate.

Perhaps, then, the balance will shift in favour of people like Artemia who deserve much more than this meagre and grim existence and life will not seem so unfair.

* We were aided by Reyna Deloso and her amazing team of colleagues who showed us their caring hearts for their Boholano brethren, and we also met some lovely community leaders in the barangays we visited.

** CHARIS stands for Caritas Humanitarian Aid & Relief Initiatives, Singapore and is the umbrella body for overseas humanitarian aid by the Archdiocese of Singapore.

III. MONTALBAN NIGHTMARE, December 14
From the beauty of Tagaytay and Bohol, we entered the hell of the dumpsite in Montalban. As the mountains of trash formed a wasteland of post-Apocalyptic desolation, the stench assailed our nostrils, making my stomach turn.

Families lived in cramped rows of wooden huts on the fringe of the dumpsite. The ground was littered in waste and muck, flies covered anything remotely looking like food to them.

It is unthinkable and an outrage to think that people should call this severely polluted environment home. Young children ran around with huge sores and scars on their skinny limbs. Adults were emaciated and wizened, their eyes dulled in perpetual misery.

What broke my heart was when a young woman asked me if I would buy her toddler son whom she
clearly loved. She lived in equal parts of hope and anguish that I would say yes.

We threw a party for the children in the barangay, and Ate Noralyn persuaded two raggedy boys (one with a bulbous eye) who were scavenging for plastic to enter by grabbing their bags of trash into the hall. They could not have been more than 10 years old.

The activities did not interest them for they no longer knew how to play and soon, they snuck out. As Joan commented later in our debrief, they may be beaten by their parents if they did not bring home their usual quota of discarded plastic so they did not have time to loiter.

There were so many stories of tragedy as these families shared their lives with us, and yet, there are also stories of beauty and hope.

The women in the Balikatan Ministry who have been journeying for some years with Esther, Jitka and Joan (more recently with Gemma as well), ICPE Mission Philippines missionaries, were a joy to behold. These are women who live in Montalban and some of them work also as scavengers.

They were committed to reverse carolling and touching the lives of their neighbours in ways their own lives had been touched. To share the good news of the Christ child with others. Working together, they displayed a bond of sisterhood and demonstrated that despite the difficulties of life, they could still laugh and have fun. They exemplified Isaiah 9:2: The people walking in darkness have seen a great light.

CONCLUSION
There is still much for me to process as I end reverse carolling this year.

However, one thing stands out, I cannot go back to my old life. I can and must do much more to help the poor and I invite those of you who read this to do the same.

Thus, the world we live in can become as beautiful as it was created to be.

Reverse carolling epiphanies

I am currently in Tagaytay, Philippines for reverse carolling with ICPE Mission Philippines. We spent the first day preparing ourselves spiritually before we began our outreach efforts proper and I had many little epiphanies that day.

I first understood more fully what the Pope meant when he said that the Church was not an NGO, for our efforts to serve the poor need to involve our spirituality, chiefly our belief in Christ.

It is because of our faith in Christ that we love and help "the least of our brethren". But much more than that, we are called to proclaim the Word "with simplicity" a simplicity that gives way to the power of the Word of God. And thus we can proclaim the Gospel as grace.

This good news, as Pope Francis pointed out in his hot-off-the-press Apostolic Exhortation Evangelii Gaudium, is too good to be kept to ourselves:

Those who accept his offer of salvation are set free from sin, sorrow, inner emptiness and loneliness.

It is indeed awesome news and our responsibility to share this message of joy that was brought to fulfilment in the person of Jesus Christ is meant for everyone.

The second thing I understood more wholly was the Church's social teaching of preferential treatment for the poor. Why are we exhorted to love the poor?

Again it is to follow in the footsteps of Christ, who not only claimed the prophecy from Isaiah, but then went on to do just that: He brought good news to the poor, healed the contrite of heart, released the captive, restored sight to the blind and set the downtrodden free.

Plus, Jesus Himself chose to be born in humble circumstances. To have for a crib a manger, a trough used to feed animals; to have to flee, like a refugee, to Egypt to avoid persecution; to be brought up as a carpenter's son; his deliberate self-abasing choices showed His preferential love for and identification with the poor.

Therefore when we reach out to the poor, we are, in essence, encountering Christ Himself in them. So whatever kind deed we perform for them is not equal to the blessing we, in turn, receive in our encounter with our Servant King.

We may think that we are giving much, but if we truly see the situation for what it is, we are receiving so much more in return.

The final insight I received in our preparation is how prayer must be the foundation of all our efforts. It is only with prayer that we can truly empty ourselves of self, and be filled with Christ's Spirit so that whoever we meet will indeed experience Christ through us.

It is also only with prayer that we can ensure we work through our different emotions to know that it does not matter how we feel, especially feelings of anger, frustration and helplessness. Everything is in God's hands, we are but His willing instruments. We can but do our best and leave the multiplication of loaves to Him.

Today we gave out 30 Christmas hampers to homes in Bagong Silang. We were in Magallanes yesterday where we also gave out 36 hampers and threw a party for 80 children.

While the poverty is appalling for the hovels that passed for homes are cramped, dark and bare, yet I can only marvel at how the human spirit is unquenchable. Signs of hope can be found in the attempts to beautify their homes, in the home-made Christmas decorations, the pride they take in their appearance, and most of all, in the smiles of the children.

 

I pray that the joy and pleasure I found in the smiles of those I met echo somehow in their hearts.