Forgiveness and Reconciliation

Fun Fact 1: Forgiveness and reconciliation are NOT THE SAME! Forgiveness is directed more at the forgiver than the one being forgiven.


Fun Fact 2: Forgiving is never easy, and not meant to be easy. When we forgive, we should not try to immediately forget the incident. It will become harder and harder to let go - it becomes embedded deep in our subconscious as we relive the incident countless times when we keep trying getting rid of the memory.


Fun Fact 3: Forgiving is not a face-to-face process. If it were, we wouldn’t be able to forgive those people who have gone on before us.


So why is forgiveness important to catechists? By forgiving, we cleanse our mind, spirit and soul of all negativity. Without forgiving, we give ourselves in to the negative emotions and feelings in us, and this changes our being. Thus, forgiveness is very important as we will be able to keep our being that God has given us and be close to him. Remember, a good and strong relationship with God leads to good and strong relationships with others. And if you didn’t know, not forgiving others is a sin. Time to go for confession.

Who are we? What do we do?

What do we do, as catechists? We are not just teachers, but we are the lesson that we want the catechumens to learn and understand. As catechists, it is very important to have a strong relationship with God, deeply rooted in prayer. This is because a strong relationship with God would allow us to have strong relationships with people all around us, like family, friends and catechumens. With a better relationship, the connection between us and the catechumens can be more easily established and ultimately, lessons will be more effective.



So, what exactly is our ROLE as a catechist? We are an echo of God’s word. This is one of the reasons why understanding scripture is so important – so that we can communicate it effectively to the catechumens. We can bring it to life in others. In other words, we have to “give birth” to Jesus in the kids. As catechists, we must strive and concentrate on doing our best, using the best of what we have, because we are not alone when we teach. God said to Peter: “Upon this rock, I will build my church.” Thus, God is with us whenever we conduct catechism classes. We should use the best of what we have to help build the church.



Another role of the catechist is that of a mentor and a facilitator. The most important quality of a catechist is LOVE! (Remember Fr Luke always talking about love? “God love you all.”) If we want others to know more about God, we must show them who He is. And since we’re created in the image and likeness of God, we should exhibit Christ-like behaviour and his unconditional love! If we don’t conduct catechism classes with love, the catechumens won’t be able to get a clear image of God. Imagine – a catechist strolls into class late, shouts at the class to “shut up” and be quiet so that he can start the lesson, and then he says God is love. Doesn’t that seem a tad hard to believe?


As mentors, we must also assist in teaching the four pillars of the faith. The most important one of these four is the Creed, which is essentially what Catholicism is about. Worship and Sacraments, Morality (the life of Jesus) and Christian prayer are the other three. Whilst we try our utmost hardest to help the catechumens understand the four pillars, we must remember to take the subject slowly (and not rush through the lessons) and also remain focused on our purpose of helping them to understand.

CCC 27 - 32 28 Feb 2009

We have a desire for God in our hearts -no matter what religion, race or culture from which we hail, the desire is still present. It is across cultures. It's also because of this desire that we are attracted to people who are good, honest, just etc., like Mother Teresa and Pope JPII, because they live Christ-like lives. However, this desire is insatiable. We're always looking for something even better, someone even better, someone with such qualities to a higher degree. Why?

What we see in the people around us (good, honesty, justice) is not enough - it's not the supreme good/honesty/justice, thus it doesn't satisfy us. God is the supreme good. He gave the people whom we look up to some of this goodness, that's why we're so attracted to them. This thirst for the best will only be quenched (slaked) through God, because GOD IS THE SUPREME GOOD.

God. The supreme good. He is knowable, personable and wants to have a relationship with us. A personal relationship with each and every single one of us. So how is this relationship established? When we call God, "Father". Jesus preached saying that we can all call God, Father. This is why Christianity is a REVEALED RELIGION, God has been revealed to us through Jesus Christ! The other two revealed religions are Judaism and Islam. Important note: We should never forget that we have Jewish roots. Jesus and Mary and Joseph weren't Catholics.

As it says in Genesis, man was created in the image and likeness of God. This gives us dignity. What IS dignity?

Genesis actually may or may not be a factual account. Whether you believe that God created man and woman, or whether you believe that the existence of homo sapiens is due to evolution, you must not fail to acknowledge that original sin was present. When Adam and Eve ate the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge of good and evil, the consequence was original sin. Humans (descendents) began to think that they can live without God, since they know what's good and evil. They begin to use themselves as the reference - their lives are what is the "best". This is exactly what is happening to us now. Sometimes, we think we know what's good and what's not and we use our own lives as reference. This is when we become self-centred and thus, we sin. (Refer one of the previous posts on sin.) Self-centredness is the root of sin. We want our way; it is inborne, and so we have original sin.

Remember something about revelation and Jesus revealing something to us, mentioned earlier? Jesus also reveals to us the way back to a sinless life. The way back to the pre-fruit era, to living as Christ did.

Check back for the next session. :)

Scripture - 23 Aug 2008

Scripture is the mother of all theological sciences. Theology – break up the word. “Theo” means God, and “logy” means science of study. Put it together, and you get “Science of God!”


What is Bible experience?

1. Read – it goes into your head
2. Reflect – it goes into your heart.
3. React – the words challenge you
4. Recognize – why you feel the way you feel
5. Respond – repent/reaffirm
6. Resolve – an action that you take / a change of heart you have

If a murder occurs, in CSI, there’s evidence. Fingerprints, trails, bloodstains. They look for witnesses. Similarly, we have evidence of our relationship with God – feelings, our very existence, and the Bible.

When you get closer to someone, you become friends, and have a very intimate relationship (in terms of sharing with each other). When you really, really, REALLY like someone, you’ll always ask the person to go out with you. It’s the same for God, that’s what he wants our relationship with him to become. God invites us through the Word, to develop our friendship with him till it reaches that level.

Scripture is not secular history. There’s no physical evidence for it, it’s not a primary source of information. But, it is SALVATION HISTORY. It is the history of how the whole human race is going to be saved. That’s what makes it so importantly COOL. :)

The Bible, which is written by people with many knowledge of God, uses the language of relationship. It communicates experience. It’s unlike the language of science, where everything’s linear, factual and can be verified.

You may ask, “How can we trust the Bible? Things don’t make sense in it.” The language of relationship used explains this – people who wrote the books of the Bible were so excited about spreading God’s Word that they exaggerate, but in context. They so badly want to communicate the love of God, that the events that happened may not seem to be logical. Focus on the RELATIONSHIP that the Bible shows to us, not the nitty gritty details of it.

Fun fact for the day:

There are 173 books in the Bible, including the Deuterocanonicals! :D

Lenten Pilgrimage.

The term "pilgrimage" is defined as a "journey to a shrine or sacred place". This definition falls woefully short of the modern idea of a pilgrimage. Today, a pilgrimage is a spiritual journey, in the widest sense of the term.

The spirituality itself is inherent in pilgrimage, through the very motivation to make one. Without the spiritual element, a pilgrimage would become a vacation; it would become nothing more than an exotic diversion. Thus, we bear in mind the crosses of the parish that we carry on our journey, and together with our own, offer them up in prayer. As such, the pilgrimage can be viewed as a form of penance.

In our context, I would say that the late hour at which we are making our pilgrimage, as well as the sheer distance we have to cover by foot, both conspire to add up to a challenging experience. It is hoped that as pilgrims on our walk with Jesus, we may be able to reflect on our earthly course and consider every step of the way as a step closer to the heavenly gates that we see at our journey's end.

Fr Luke's talk on Sin

Sin.

No one is free from sin, all of which start with lies. Satan's the Father of Lies. Every sin is founded on at least one lie. You think that you will have a certain satisfaction from committing the sin but it's actually not true, it's a lie. One example is people who watch pornography - "Everyone's watching it, I HAVE to watch it too to be in the in crowd."

S-I-N.

What's in the middle of sin? You're in the middle of sin. When you sin, you focus on "my joy, my happiness". You become the centre of your life, the centre of the world. That's not how we should live. We should be like Christ - He thought of others all the time, he was "others-centred" and not "self-centred". So were the martyrs and saints. Always remind yourself, my needs and my desires are not the most important things. Always give, share and care for others.

Prayer is communication with God. Each of us is so unconditionally loved by God, we get this unshakable foundation and we don't need to turn to other things in order to get that sense of belonging with God. But, not everyone can feel this unconditional love. They will habitually sin to substitute for it - they drink excessively, they take drugs, amongst other sins, just to tell themselves "I love myself" because they don't know God loves them unconditionally. Let's prevent this and spread this unconditional love from God to the people around us, especially to those we catechize.

Nowadays there's poison in families. Children grow up with the thinking that they're not lovable, they need to show their talents to be loved. In other words, they have no/little realization of God's love for them. In school, it's the same thing. The kids have to have a certain criteria before they're allowed entry into "elite" groups of friends. The poison spreads from home to school. So many of the young we teach are caught in this poison river. But how many can actually get out?

God's unconditional love gives you security and confidence. They're not things every 14/15 year old has, in fact maybe only about 0.05% of them have it. These kids know their place in the world. They be the best son/daughter/boyfriend/girlfriend and they know they're at their best. But those who don't recognize God's love, they will be insecure and needy. "Please please please, love me?" Find these people and teach them to recognize God's love.

When secure and confident people come together, they radiate positive energy. They bring joy and are comfortable to be with. For these people, God is at the centre of their lives. If they're not members of the faith, then at least LOVE is at the centre of their lives. They know they're cherished by God, and this is the antidote for the poison in the river. The knowledge that you are cherished and loved by God unconditionally.

This knowledge and the security and confidence that comes along with it will lead you to fulfil your fullest potential, and that's to be a SAINT! The greatest tragedy is when you're not in a saint (you're not in heaven). You haven't reached your highest potential.

Reach out to fulfil your potential and be a saint. Join God in his party with the Father and Holy Spirit. :D Be part of his life.

is God real?

I stumbled upon this article on the Newsweek website that speaks of the debate between believers and atheists. It presents many interesting arguments for and against the faith and goes in line with what we've been doing in YC all these months. Have fun chewing on it! I hope I'm not breaching any copyright laws...

Is God Real?
by Jon Meacham
Newsweek

April 9, 2007 issue - All men need the gods.
—Homer, ca. 800 B.C.

A certain portion of mankind do not believe at all in the existence of the gods.
—Plato, ca. 400 B.C

Later, when Blaise Pascal tried to get it all down on paper, he wrote in bursts, capturing flashes of what he thought he had seen in the vision—a vision that, by empirical standards, could only be called fantastical. There was no doubt in Pascal's mind, though, that it had happened, and happened in time and space, in a way his mathematically trained brain conceived of things as happening. Pascal remembered the exact time—between the hours of half past 10 and half past midnight on Monday, Nov. 23, 1654, the feast day, in the Christian calendar, of Saint Clement, pope and martyr. Jesus appeared to him; God was real; the Christian story true: "Certainty, certainty, heartfelt, joy, peace. God of Jesus Christ. God of Jesus Christ. My God and your God." In a collection of writings found after his death, published as "Pensées," Pascal blended his two passions, mathematics and faith, to lay out what has come to be known as Pascal's Wager. It is rather simple: it is smarter to bet that God exists, and to believe in him, because if it turns out that he is real, you win everything; if he is not, you lose nothing. So why not take the leap of faith?
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There are many levels of argument between believers and atheists; Warren and Harris touch on many of them. Here are just a few. There has to be a God, the religious say, for the Bible (or the Qur'an) says so; this is the assertion of the literalist, and depends on an uncritical reading of Scriptures that some believers say were written (or dictated) by God. There is the moral-sense argument—there must be a God, the religious say, because human beings have an innate understanding of right and wrong, an understanding that God planted in every heart. There is the design argument—that the world is so complex and makes so much sense that there had to be a guiding intelligence at the center of it all.
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There are, of course, religious counter-counter-arguments to these counter-arguments; the debate goes on world without end. With the exception of explaining the origin of the physical law that brought the universe into being 14 billion years ago, atheists can easily mock the religious for believing in fantastical stories of ascending saviors, parting seas and burning bushes. With little trouble the atheists can pose devastating questions; if God is great, then why do babies get cancer? Why do the innocent suffer? Why do the religious kill in the name of their God, when their God is supposed to be love incarnate? Why did God stop performing miracles on a large scale a couple of months after the first Pentecost?

© 2007 Newsweek, Inc.

Click here for the complete article.

Crushed By Time

On a sunny summer Singapore afternoon, Virtual Girl and Squirrel Boy decided to commit themselves to a relationship. They initially enjoyed moments of peachy happiness, but cracks soon started to surface. Virtual Girl had involved herself in too many other things, letting them take priority over her relationship. In an effort to still make room for Squirrel Boy, she attempted to slot him in to different aspects of her life; he was always there, but not necessarily with her. Eventually, Squirrel Boy could no longer stand being second in Virtual Girl's life and gave the ultimatum...

The questions, then, to ask ourselves are: Are we guilty of crushing God into powder and strewing him into our lives as and when we see fit? Do we only involve Him when we need Him (or when we feel like cutting His throat)? Are we balancing our lives and setting aside enough time to build our relationship with God? Is God The priority in our lives?

I'd think many of us are fully guilty of not placing God as a top priority, very often stifling or blocking out his presence in our lives. During this season of Lent, let us all reflect on our relationship with God and find ways to continually grow closer to Him.