Total surrender to God and putting our life in Him

Jesus’ last words are very powerful and compelling, I asked myself, why despite his agony, the humiliation he experienced, and unbearable pain on the cross, Jesus never blamed his Father. He instead uttered these words like a perfect prayer from the depths of his heart “Father into your hands, I commend my spirit.”

Oftentimes, when we are faced with problems and difficulties, when we are carrying heavy crosses, our human tendency is that we lose track of our faith. We rely much on our human capacities and strengths. We become too focused on our suffering and pain, on what we can do to the extent that our energies are depleted, and we become exhausted. We start to complain, self-pity, regret, become anxious about what the future holds, and perhaps blame others, or even blame God. Jesus has given us a glorious example of total surrendering to God. Continue reading Total surrender to God and putting our life in Him

Bringing Jesus into our tombs

“Each of us has a small tomb”. Though still alive and breathing, we also know that somehow somewhere deep within us something is dead or dying. These are the small tombs – our dark caves or secret holes and sides, our hurts and pains, sufferings, failures, hate, anger, hopelessness, frustrations, fears and worries, addictions, sins and shadows that we usually bury and hide from ourselves and others in our lives.

As for Pope Francis’ advice: “We identify these today – our little tombs we have inside, and there invite Jesus.” With these tombs, the invitation is really for us not to hide and suppress, but to recognize and confront them with care. And most importantly, to invite Jesus into our tombs and allow Him to be part of our death and dying inside our tombs. He can only resurrect us and bring back to life again our death and dying if only we invite and allow the Lord to be part and be with our journey & struggles in life.Continue reading Bringing Jesus into our tombs

FORGIVENESS: A RADICAL LOVE

We look back to the scene where Jesus uttered these words, Jesus at this hour was on the brink of death, nailed to the Cross with the Roman soldiers at his feet. As he addressed these men, we could picture how exhausting the scene was. By this time, these Roman soldiers had been executing many criminals and had seen death day after day. They are reduced to mere functionaries. They have no choice and freedom to do what is just and right at that moment as they were only following orders. Familiarity with violence and brutality causes these soldiers to be numb and deaf with their emotions. Their society has allowed them to be stripped of their dignity as human persons gifted with freedom and compassion. It is in this human frailty and desperate condition where Jesus uttered to them, “Father, forgive them for they do not know what they are doing?”Continue reading FORGIVENESS: A RADICAL LOVE