Wednesday of the 1st Week of Advent

Follow me and I will make you fishers of men.

This is an invitation Jesus extended to Peter and Andrew. It is an invitation He makes to us daily. Being Christian is more than just paying lip service and thinking only of my own salvation and happiness. It is about spreading the Good News, to bring the joy we feel to others who may need a boost in their lives. In this season of Advent, as we draw closer to the Lord, we need to find ways we can help others do the same. 

There are so many people around us hungry, lonely, oppressed and desperate. Do we hear the often silent cries of their hearts and respond? What can we do today that will reach out to our less fortunate brothers and sisters and make a difference in their lives. As Saint Paul reminded the Romans: as scripture says: The footsteps of those who bring good news are a welcome sound.

Dear Jesus, let my footsteps be a sound that brings relief, and even joy, to someone who needs it today.  

Tuesday of the 1st Week of Advent

Blessed are the eyes that see what you see. 

Knowing who I am, my identity, especially in Christ and His Father, has been one of the most pivotal points in my faith journey and my life. It took me a while to get there but when I did, the joy that today’s readings alludes to several times is very real. This joy that comes when we have the knowledge of the Lord is a prize that every Christian should possess. It may seem as if we need to give up a lot in order to attain it if we go by today’s relative and individualistic standards, but in truth, there is great freedom and inner peace. I love who I am and where I am, and it’s only because of Jesus. 

Enlighten my eyes day by day, O Lord, let me see you and who I am in your eyes.

Monday of the 1st Week of Advent

At every mass, just before we receive Communion we say:

Lord, I am not worthy that you should enter under my roof, but only say the word and my soul shall be healed.

I find this prayer which is the response the centurion made to Jesus in Matthew’s gospel full of the promise of Christ’s love. The more we believe in Him, the more we will experience a fuller extent of whatever we desire of Him. Faith is requisite. Faith, as we’ve been told, can move mountains, plant a mulberry tree in the sea; faith makes all things possible.

Although I believe in Christ, and I’ve experienced many miracles, I have to say, faith is not so easy to sustain, or is it just me? At times I do not think I am worthy of having my prayer answered. Or, it’s too ridiculous a request. I often place my own human limitations on what I feel Jesus can do. Thankfully He disregards my foibles and blesses me anyway. 

So today I ask for the singular faith of the centurion who recognizes the authority of Jesus. Say the word, Lord, and my soul shall be healed. 

Two years

Two years
Still missed
dented but 
your goodness
pulses within 
my being 
reminding me
to walk 
His ways
to be
in Him
Fully Alive
with Him
at peace
firmly centred
through him
strong witness
Reaching out
Always loving
Never forgetting 
Listening graciously
Allowing healing 
Thank God
for memories 
The gift
of you
never lost
marching on

Sunday of the 1st Week of Advent

Wake up now! This imperative from Saint Paul reminds us to be alert, prepared, for the Son of Man is coming at an hour you do not expect Saint Matthew goes on to remind us in todays gospel. Despite this eschatological warning, we must not forget that because we are believers, we are already living in the kingdom of God at present for Jesus, the Son of Man, has already come into our lives and made a huge difference. Or has He really? 

Do I experience the joy of His loving and supportive presence even when my day is going “badly”? Am I generously sharing this wonderful news of eternal salvation in thought, word and deed to everyone I meet? Do people, as the hymn goes, know I am Christian by my love? May this Advent be this great opportunity to sharpen my skills of Jesus love, no matter what or who comes my way. 

O Lord, please help me know you more clearly, love you more dearly and follow you more nearly, day by day.

Prayer of Saint Richard of Chichester

Thanks be to thee, my Lord Jesus Christ,

for all the benefits thou hast given me,

for all the pains and insults thou hast borne for me.

O most merciful redeemer, friend and brother,

may I know thee more clearly,

love thee more dearly,

and follow thee more nearly, day by day.

Amen.

Praying for the dying and the dead

It’s always a difficult time for me when we hit Q4 for I remember the last days of W and E who both passed away within six weeks of each other two years ago. I still remember the daily visits to the hospice in the last week of W’s and then to the hospital for E. It was important to me to be present and to pray for their peace and comfort in that last leg for there can be fear and spiritual suffering that accompanies the physical suffering. At that time, I was praying the prayer of Saint Bridget daily and I was reminded of how dying can be fraught with great struggle, and I witnessed frequently how praying actually calmed them down and offered respite. 

Never more so than during the period of dying have I seen how powerful prayer can be. I remember how E (who was with me on a call from the Philippines) and I prayed for my aunt, M, the night before she died and we could both sense the inner conflict my aunt was facing, and as we continued to pray, how she eventually turned a spiritual corner. 

Never more so than during those last moments of decline have I seen how merciful God can be. So it’s important not just to pray for the dead, which is what November is all about, but it is vital to pray as much as you can with someone you know or love when they are dying. It doesn’t even matter if you are not by their bedside. I remembered how my brother, mother and I prayed the Divine Mercy chaplet for my aunt, R, who was dying in Brisbane (we were all back in Melbourne after having gone to Brisbane to say goodbye to her earlier) and we were told later that day that she went peacefully. P was in the US on a work trip then, and he, too, had prayed for my aunt near her end. 

Often guilt over our sins can cause anguish and can create much fear - and we can be afraid to die, whether we believe in eternal life or not. P, a geriatrician, has witnessed among his patients how dying can be a difficult, lengthy process, especially when they are afraid of death. So never forget the mercy of God, something we can always count on. And, there is always redemption, if we want it. A good way of exercising that want is to try our best to lead spotless lives and to frequent the confessional. When we err, to quickly right the wrongs, making restitution speedily along with a heartfelt apology, and conversely, to forgive ceaselessly, allowing all grudges to slide off our backs with ease.

Just as much as I pray for the dying when the need arises, I pray for the dead every day: for the souls of the recently departed (especially people I know or loved ones of people I know), and for all holy souls in purgatory. Every November, the Feasts of All Saints and of All Souls commemorate those who have gone before us. It was revealed to Elizabeth Kindelmann that by praying one Hail Mary in honour of Our Mother’s Flame of Love, "10 souls" will be released from suffering in purgatory in November. Ordinarily we pray three Hail Marys to release a soul from purgatory. 

Even though I find praying the rosary daily a little onerous at times, what makes me persevere is the thought of how many people I can help through my intercessory efforts, besides saving my own soul through the transformative power of prayer. The rosary, the Divine Mercy chaplet and the Flame of Love chaplet, these are my staples of prayer for it is through such prayers that we can make a difference to those who are dying and to those who are still in purgatory. So let us pray. 

Vietnam adventures

P and I are flying home today from Vietnam. We were on vacation here for the last 10 days and it has been wonderful, not just for the luxe hotels, delicious food, beautiful scenery, friendly people and enriching cultural experiences which is what most people normally expect from time abroad, but we have been graced by God’s multiple blessings day to day and this has magnified our travel experience, making it a time of great spiritual joy and growth. 

Before I came, my prayer was that we would bless the people here as well as be blessed by all we meet and God has honoured my prayer through and through. The day we arrived in Saigon, we managed to attend a confirmation mass of 12 young adults presided by the Archbishop of the Mekong Delta and four other priests. We could feel the presence of the Holy Spirit and the mass was like a promise that He would journey with us as we travelled through Vietnam. 

P was bugged by a nose infection and he sprained his knee when we were in Dalat, so instead of hiking, we ended up visiting more Catholic churches, travelling to the areas where various ethnic tribes lived. When we visited Domaine de Marie which is a convent of the Daughters of Charity, sweet, friendly Soeur Pierre Ky invited us to visit the inner courtyard of the convent grounds. It was a rare privilege we both enjoyed and I got to practice my very rudimentary French. We also got to eat crickets and silkworms (P balked at that one) besides the pancakes and strawberries Dalat is known for. I love trying new food so I was in heaven and I am very inspired to try cooking some of what I have tasted on this trip. 

We then flew to Danang and travelled to Hue as our base to visit Lavang. Using A’s rain prayer we managed to tour the grounds of Our Lady of Lavang Shrine with minimal weather disruption. Even our guide was surprised for it was raining heavily on the way there. The moment we arrived at the shrine, there was only a fine drizzle. When we sat and prayed, the rain became heavier, but the moment we finished and wanted to walk around, the drizzle became fine again. 

As our guide’s brother was a priest, we managed to go inside the Benedictine monastery of Thien An this time around for his brother’s fellow seminarian, a monk, kindly took us on a tour of their 18-hectare grounds. We heard them chanting in prayer before we visited the old church built underground and we walked through their orchards of longans, oranges, pomelos, bananas, dragon fruit and tea tree bushes. We visited their farm area where they reared fish, chickens and cattle and we also saw the huge vats they used to produce the tea tree oil that they sold. It was a lovely, leisurely afternoon where we sat in the old chapel grounds and ate their oranges. We were recounted with tales of how the monastery was protected miraculously despite efforts to try and regain their land for development.

One evening during dinner, P discovered he had lost his wallet. We knew it was unlikely it was stolen so we prayed for its recovery. Thanks to the intercession of Saint Anthony and Our Mother, we quickly found it as we retraced the steps of our long walk before dinner. I somehow knew we would find it and we even knew roughly where we needed to look. This was, to us, a testament of how much the Lord loved and protected us yet again. Other instances include how the Spirit guided P to try the side door of a church in Kadon so that we could go in and pray; and also to cut short our trip by one day to avoid the imminent typhoon. Our guide told us this morning that the path of the typhoon altered overnight to favour us. We are currently sitting in the airport lounge in Danang where the weather is grey but dry outside, after leaving the rain in Hoi An this morning. 

So many blessings to write about but the one thing I feel most blessed by with this holiday is the greater realization that I have a lifelong companion who loves Jesus and Mary as much as I do and who seeks to bless others financially with a rare generosity of heart. There can be no greater blessing than to have a husband who is a man with clean hands and pure heart, a man who models himself after Jesus. For that I am most grateful. 

The business of gentle

Today is the first day in a very long week that I actually had a nice generous chunk of me time to reflect and write. Since the Feast Day of the Queenship of the Blessed Virgin Mary which fell on August 22, I felt a renewed desire to write but have had to put my intentions on the back burner for there was a need for me to put my energies into a domestic issue, thanks to COVID (no, I still haven’t gotten the coronavirus).

What really kept me sane and relatively civil was the first reading last weekend from Ecclesiasticus chapter three, verses 19-21:

My son, be gentle in carrying out your business, and you will be better loved than a lavish giver. The greater you are, the more you should behave humbly, and then you will find favour with the Lord; for great though the power of the Lord is, he accepts the homage of the humble.

Being generous, being a giver is not enough. I have to be gentle in carrying out my business, which implies humility as seen in the next sentence. This gentleness or meekness, a hallmark of our Blessed Mother, is something I have been attempting to acquire for some time now. I am never the most patient of people and my quick temper has often guided my tongue with regrettable harshness. So I have made a concerted effort to be ‘gentle’ even when I least felt like it, what with the pouring downfall in days past, both literally and figuratively. Although, I was eternally grateful for the rain for it meant one less task of having to water my plants.

I can only attribute all my triumphs to the Holy Spirit for this business of being gentle was my desire through this week. I have had the insight to know when to keep silent and what to proffer with humility in the different circumstances that have presented themselves and not go with my knee-jerk, bull-in-the-china-shop inclinations. I have been able to find joy in everything that I do and not find any task too onerous. Despite my physical aches and pains, my inability to sleep well, and my soaring kan cheong blood pressure, I have been able to keep my cool most of the time. Most of all, I have been able to recognize all the graces I have received in this last week of great challenges and be grateful.   

Truly I thank God for His mercies big and small. I have kept praying throughout, I have even asked for others to intercede for me, and I feel blessed that I have been able to use my gifts and talents in ways that have made a difference to others. May I continue to find favour with the Lord. 

Living a good life

M said to me yesterday at P’s father’s funeral what does it mean to live a good life? How does one live a good life especially in one’s “golden” years? 

At the funeral service the pastor chose Ecclesiastes chapter three and what he expounded on affirmed my own belief. Life without God is one which is futile for earthly life ends when one dies and there is nothing one can do to prevent this. The gift of eternal life is ours if we see and live our lives through the eyes of God, in faith and hope, and in love. 

For me, Ecclesiastes 3:11-13 reveals His truth precisely: 

He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the human heart; yet no one can fathom what God has done from beginning to end. I know that there is nothing better for people than to be happy and to do good while they live. That each of them may eat and drink, and find satisfaction in all their toil—this is the gift of God.

This chapter begins with this thought: there is a time for everything, a season for every activity. So the heartbeats in life are mapped out from the day we are born to the day we die. We cannot alter this timeline nor do we actually know when we will die for that singular moment is in God’s hands. What we can determine is how we live out each heartbeat, to compose the music of eternal life in our present lives by living a good life, not so much by seeking hedonistic pleasure but by doing good, cooperating with our Creator and living in step with the rhythms He has set in our lives.      

Having reached the age where I am reminded of my years by muscle stiffness, creaky joints, a failing memory and constant physical exhaustion, I know it will only get worse with time. Ageing is not pretty, nor is it for the faint-hearted. And when illness set in, the end can look awfully grim. 

So why did God allow this season of returning to Him be one of disease and decay? I see it as a way to bring me to my senses, a reminder of my mortality so that perhaps I will strive harder each day to live out my mission here on earth more fervently and fruitfully. 

Can one bear fruit when one is diminished in physical capacity? I would like to think yes. I have only to look at the example of my father in his dying months when he needed help with everything, needing to be fed and cleaned like a baby. He accepted his state of life with humility and grace. He never complained. He taught me humility, courage, perseverance and hope. His faith shored up my faith. 

The jagged edges of our broken relationship melded together in those interminable days of being caregiver and care receiver, of love given and love received. God was in the details of that slow, agonizing journey of my father’s death and I was blessed, impossibly enriched to have been part of that journey. The Lord made everything beautiful even in those days of suffering and grief for it also marked the beginning of my wholehearted return to Him and His ways. 

I do not know how or when I will die. I do however know it will be sooner rather than later and if I want to spend eternity in bliss, my behaviour today determines this. I can only pray that I am guided to doing good till the end of life so that people who knew me will say she lived a good life meaning that I touched many lives in positive ways and brought about good, transforming people and their lives. 

In the meantime I also choose to lead a good life by being grateful for what I have been given today, to be full of joy, at peace with my ageing body and content to walk at the pace the Lord has set as I do His will.  

Mourning joy

Today I feel the weight of the losses in my life, of those whom I love and who are no longer here with me: my father who would have turned 90 just Sunday past but left us too soon in 2003; my Uncle H who left us slightly more than a year ago; my cousin who would’ve turned 59 on 13 June but passed away in November 2020; and A who went home to the Lord on 12 June. 

I feel bereft when I allow myself to think of their passing. What triggered this wave of mourning was a text conversation with M, a good friend of E’s who said to me: She loved you and often talked about you with me. Instant major waterworks.

The is the most painful part of loving - how do I reconcile the loss of the earthly presence of a particular someone with whom I have shared a meaningful and rich history? It gets easier with time, and it doesn’t. I do not feel any less love for those who are no longer here. I continue to love them with the same intensity and loyalty. 

And so I continue to miss them. I just don’t show it on the outside for I do not wish to be thought of as slightly unhinged or a tiresome weakIng filled with self-pity for that’s not who I am. I am strong with the love of Christ within me. I am redeemed by His agapeo and this redemption must play out as love, joy and hope in the pit of life. 

I therefore transmute this grief into a love for others, a concern and care for those around me, just as my deceased loved ones who have desired and done quite tangibly. The love that lives on in my past relationships lives on in my words and actions toward others in the here and now. 

Do I bring the joy of the Lord as A did the moment she entered a room? Do I exude the bonhomie of my uncle who made friends wherever he went? Do I go to the extent Daddy did to help others in need, he who always went the extra mile with his generous heart? Do I minister to others with the divine wisdom and healing openness E did?  

In every decision we are give the choice between life or death. I choose life always. I may not choose perfectly or enact my choice perfectly each time, but I do choose to turn my mourning into dancing, my grief into joy. May those around me experience that joy through me even if I may not be feeling it quite so much myself. 

Birthday gratitude

I will get to celebrate another birthday tomorrow and I look forward to my usual birthday treat of freshly shucked oysters, this time in Sydney. Thanks to P, we are on our first overseas trip since the coronavirus wreaked havoc these last couple of years. It’s been lovely walking around in the sunny and crisp cold of winter, revisiting places we enjoy and visiting new places. I am grateful for all the blessings we have experienced, the beautiful weather, good food and the friendly people we’ve met.

Reflecting on these last months I have to say my biggest learning lesson has to be the invitation to be open to whatever comes, not to be dismayed at unplanned for changes but to move in the flow of events as graciously as I can (I have to admit that can pose a great challenge to me at times as I can cling on to what I want quite stubbornly). I have also learnt to appreciate God’s timing and to allow myself to be open to His promptings and act on them. 

Being able to see things from a more mature and faith-filled perspective has helped me accept unwanted outcomes more readily and to see how I can act in new situations in a way that would do my heavenly Father proud. As a priest commented just this week in his homily, faith gives us vision so that even when tragedy occurs we can better deal with it for we know this is not the be all and end all of things.

Nothing brings this lesson home so much as the scant past weeks where instead of visiting a sick friend, A, and spending time with her, I got to instead attend her wake and funeral. While I am saddened I couldn’t break bread and laugh with her one final time, I am also glad she didn’t suffer more than necessary for I have seen too many times how excruciating the slow descent into death by cancer can be and I am happy she was comfortable and slipped away quickly. I felt privileged just to be there to send her off with a confident prayer that she was with God. A joyous thing indeed. I also got to see the younger A through the eyes of her friends, and to witness how beloved she was by family and her kampung. 

Life will always be filled with surprises, even unpleasant shocks, but the constant decision to surrender to God and to let Him lead, especially in unsought for and undesirable circumstances has helped me tremendously all these months. I can even see the little miracles in what may seem like disasters, and how the Lord has placed His protective hand on me and those whom I love. And I can be grateful for His mercies, both big and small. My biggest takeaway this past year, as in previous years is to pray unceasingly, with every breath, if possible. Prayer is the discipline that enables sharpened vision, effects miracles and spawns gratitude and inner peace. Prayer is the only way I can tell Jesus how much I truly love Him and to let Him increase in me. Prayer is what makes possible all things. 

Thank you, Lord, for your constant guidance and protection in these past 12 months, for all the love you have showered on me through P and all who love me. Thank you for this amazing journey of life, with you waking by my side. I continue to humbly seek the ability to see your face and hear your voice every day. 

Thank you for giving me life, my life. So blessed. 

Happy birthday

Thinking of you today

Sad I cannot greet you face to face, hug you

Yet I am glad you are there with the Father

Advocating for me, guiding me still

Through your uncompromising zeal for the Lord

Your undivided love for Jesus

Your unrelenting heart of compassion for others 

While the pain of missing you has eased

You are and always will be ached for

In innumerable ways. Still

Blessed to have known you and loved you. 

A goodbye song

Looking back on days past

I realize how precious those times were

Especially now you are gone

Slipped away just this morning 

Silently. Peacefully. 

On a Sunday celebrating the Holy Trinity

Fitting really.

I didn’t think to mark it then

The days we lived with carefree spirits

Laughter mingled with the solemn focus

Of bringing the joy of Baby Jesus

Through song, prayer and a hamper full of goodies

To those who needed hope, love 

And the knowledge that they were not forgotten.

Thank you for helping me worship Him more dearly,

Thank you for your warm hospitality in Rome and Melaka.

Your perfectly timed levity, your infectious joy.

I shall miss you dearest A, more than you’ll ever know

Wish E happy birthday for me tomorrow!

Heaven is where my heart is

Now that you two are in residence there.

Pray for us who are left straggling behind. 

Celebrating new ways

All I knew when I began my Lenten journey this year was that I wished to draw closer to the Lord in a new way. It would seem that that was precisely what happened – although not quite in the way I envisioned it.

P got dengue a week into Lent, had a fall in the shower and ended up being hospitalized for four days. It was one of the most terrifying moments in my life when he fell, for, at that moment, I had no idea how badly he had hurt himself. Plus the day he fell ill, we were initially unsure if it was COVID or not, although I instinctively knew it wasn’t and opted to share the room with him the first night. Watching him suffer quite badly over the initial period of 10 days and the subsequent slow period of convalescing was hard. I felt helpless and useless. I even prayed to God to take some of his pain away and give it to me, I was happy to bear it for him.

Then the grandchildren fell victim to gastroenteritis and one had to be hospitalized for almost an entire day. I was on an emotional rollercoaster ride that didn’t seem to end. And yet, I couldn’t really allow myself to fall apart for I had many errands to run, clients to teach, and Lenten duties to perform.

My disciplines of prayer and walking were what got me through the Lenten season. In all that time, I could only trust that the protection and mercy of God had not abandoned my family, and that we would all get through it. Praying the Stations of the Cross daily made the Passion so real for me and I could feel myself living parts of it, journeying with the Lord on the way to Calvary.  

Jesus sent angels my way to impart wisdom and actual help: E gave me something to help boost P’s energy, S told me about papaya leaf extract to boost platelet count levels, D gave me probiotics for the grandkids to help them beat the stomach bug, and my close friends and community brothers and sisters offered prayer up for healing. S offered help any time, should I need it. B took me for a walk and fed me dinner which made me feel loved – it was nice that someone else was taking care of me instead of me taking care of everyone and everything. I could really feel Jesus loving me providentially through friends and family.      

The latter part of Lent was spent just trying to recover from my physical exhaustion and ensuring P got stronger and better every day. We actually spent Holy Week on a staycation and it was lovely to celebrate 64 months of marriage with some R & R. I felt we really met Jesus during that week as we began walking each day in the darkness of pre-dawn, only to see how light lit up the dawn sky and the sun rising up from the horizon. The majesty and awesomeness of the Creator sang out to me through the beauty that enveloped me. It made me realize how present He was in our lives, in every moment, and it is always a question of whether I see Him or not, of whether I choose to see Him or not.   

Although I bemoaned the lack of opportunity and my inability to quieten down and be more contemplative this Lent, and I felt guilty that I couldn’t really fast this Lent for I got hypoglycemic due to my state of physical exhaustion, I did get to experience Jesus in a different way. I learnt to trust in Him and hope in Him in new ways, and I was given ample opportunity to love in very real and practical ways. I am grateful for all the moments this Lent when I felt His presence, during Mass, in my solitary walks, and most of all in the people He has placed in my life.

The joy of the alleluias I sang at the Easter Vigil Mass was transformational. This promise of eternal life that comes from Jesus choosing to save me via the Cross inspires me to love others as He loves them.

He is alive in the love P and I feel for each other, in our marital vows that He blesses with such incredible divine graces. He is triumphant in the love between me and  my mother, and in my family. He reigns in the love found in my friendships with those He has placed in my life, and especially my community brothers and sisters.

I look forward to the songs of Easter, to singing new ways of love, dancing new ways of joy, for great is His faithfulness.  Alleluia! 

Remembering

 

That last morning we met

Sitting together in church

Our last greeting of peace

Side hy side we gave thanks

For His love in our lives and

The gifts we were to each other

Through the years of kinship

Kindred spirits, most beloved

You are still missed beyond words

Six years on it still rains in my heart

Salty sweet, bittersweet memories

It will never get easier

As it should be - our love

You, should never be forgotten.

Valentine affirming

I recently came across a quote by Khalil Gibran that resonated so strongly with me for it held such truth in it:

Between what is said and not meant, 

and meant and not said, 

most of love is lost.

That’s so me. I often utter churlish, petty comments to my better half that I don’t mean. I don’t mean to hurt, denigrate, dismiss, criticize or irritate with my words, and yet, I do. The deep feelings of love he evokes in me, the gratitude and joy I feel, I keep inside for I don’t quite know how to verbalize them. Shy, lah, as we say in SG speak. Somehow I am also afraid that by saying them, they may not be received in the tender spirit they are given, or the words once out are somehow adulterated and sullied by imperfect communication. 

Plus both P and I are pretty much cut from the same cloth as in we prefer to let our actions do the talking. I often get embarrassed when I receive words of affirmation from people who love me, thinking often to myself, they are just saying it to make me feel good and I don’t think that’s accurate or true about me. I guess this is a throwback to how I was brought up where the only words I received about what others thought of me were often negative ones. Any hint of encouragement or love could only be found in letters and those words were rare and far between. 

Now I feel quite differently for the many words of affirmation I received from my late cousin E I keep in my heart and they are most precious to me. I knew she spoke them from a place of love that was objective, and they were, and still are, life-giving to me. They have helped me see myself as God sees me, and this true reflection of who I am was instrumental in giving me a healthy sense of self and self-worth.  In a way, the Father was expressing His words of love and affirmation through her to me. 

I see this gift of affirmation that E had in spades as something I need to work on myself, especially in my marriage for P means the world to me. I love him with a love that is rich, full of flavour, precious, filled very much with the agape love of Christ. I desire only the good, the better of him and I would do anything within my power to effect that. Yet often I fall short when it comes to actually embodying my love, especially in the spoken word. 

Therefore this Valentine’s Day I made the effort to give him flowers (from my garden but very beautiful nonetheless) and a card that expressed how I felt about him. And he planted a tender kiss on my forehead last night that spoke volumes to me and made my heart melt. We dined at home, I helped feed the grandchildren, affirming them for their good behaviour, and we went for a walk after dinner. It was a simple day filed with work and mundane activities. There were no roses, no fancy dinner, but it was a fancy day when it came to love. May each day be lived with as much affirming love as it was yesterday.  

10K step obsession

Just six days before last Christmas, P and I embarked on our bid to get fit and healthy. P had just undergone his medical check-up and the doctor's recommendation was a change in lifestyle to ensure optimum health in the long run. Apart from less sodium, carb and animal protein (fish was the approved protein), exercise was touted. Thus we began walking again.

My exercise regime has been patchy in recent years and it hit an all-time low thanks to COVID. For fear of getting the coronavirus, I just stayed home and only went out on necessary errands. When I taught Pilates, I mainly exercised my vocal cords. I transformed into a major slug. My body bit back in a big way last December. Aches and pain of a wide variety and magnitude plagued me. I also had poor sleep, low moods, extra weight, fatigue... I had it all. The last straw was when my hips began to hurt and I knew this severely sedentary lifestyle was no longer sustainable.  

P's inspiration to get moving was timely for me, I needed that big push to get out of my black hole of physical inactivity. It has taken just over a month of regular walking, stretching and Pilates to get to what I would term as a barely fit level, where I am actually enjoying walking (no protesting twinges of pain in each step).

I am quite appalled at how deconditioned my body had become. The fight to get to where I am today has been painful, unpleasant and extremely challenging. I have had to force myself to go out there and walk even when my legs and feet were screaming stop and I needed multiple visits to the physio for some pretty excruciating muscle release work. It helps when one has a workout partner who is quite obsessive about walking, so thank you, P, for literally pushing me along. (P very sweetly pushes me up with his hand on my back when we hit slopes.) 

Seeing how P and his siblings were doing all their annual medical check-ups, I decided to follow suit. The good news is I am in fairly good health, just need to watch my cholesterol levels. The not so good news was the bone density scan which revealed low bone density - no surprises there seeing as I am genetically pre-disposed from both my parents. 

My whole point in posting this is when one comes to a certain age, 40 is a nice health defining number especially for women who are usually peri-menopausal (brace yourselves for the whole slew of possible issues here, sisters), it is vital to do annual medical check-ups, self-monitor undesired changes in one's body, watch one's diet and exercise. There are no two ways about it. Educate yourself on what's happening in your body and what you can do to alleviate symptoms, then do it regularly. Do not allow yourself to come to a point where you need to pop pills to control a chronic disease. There is always a better way and it involves discipline early on. 

Watching one's weight has nothing to do with vanity, but it has everything to do with good health, both physically and mentally, even spiritually. If you pride yourself on being the temple of God, surely the temple should present itself as a pristine picture of health both interiorly and exteriorly; spiritually, emotionally and physically? 

My SD just reminded me yesterday that as a woman I needed to be pretty and still have passion in and for life. I agree with him wholeheartedly. I need to be a fitting bride to my Bridegroom, one who takes care to be beautiful inside and out, a woman who attracts and brings others to Him. How can I attend to others successfully when my energy levels are low and I am in pain? How can I even attempt to cultivate virtues of wisdom, determination, gentleness, generosity, patience and peace when I am grouchy, slightly depressed and dull-witted from lack of rest? 

Loving the Lord is not merely a spiritual matter for we are both body and spirit. We need our bodies to be in good working order so that we can accomplish what He asks of us, walking where He sends us, and working indefatigably with good cheer. 

I have become quite obsessed with walking my 10,000 steps every day, and I have to say I do feel much better for it, even virtuous when I start my day with a walk. I do my intercessory prayer as I walk and I am given many moments in my walk to thank God for all the beauty of nature that surrounds me. I feel more spiritually centred after my walk and I feel good - strong and calm - in my body, mentally ready to take on whatever comes my way in the busy day.    

As disciples of Christ, we are meant to be on the move, as can be seen from how the disciples followed Jesus from place to place in His public ministry years. Move toward Him and keep up with Him by walking with Him in a healthy and fit body. It isn't always easy to be motivated, but I do highly recommend it. 

For Adela and Bev

Two little girls sitting side by side

Solemnly contemplating the world

What does the future hold? 

Now one is gone and one remains

Yet the bond of sisterhood still binds

A bond stronger than death

Lasting longer than Time

Love never fades but transcends

Swirling softly within the Father’s hands

Pure joy lighter than a cloud, or a sigh

It is but a short walk to Eternity 

Where they will sit side by side again.

Till then the one who’s gone will smile

Blessings upon the sister she loves 

And the one who remains will weep

Tears of gratitude mingled with grief.