Peace! Kalilintad! Shalom!

Tag: Attachments

  • Grace and Freedom in Letting Go

    Grace and Freedom in Letting Go

    May 29, 2025 – Thursday of the 6th Week of Easter

    Click here for the readings (https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/052925-thursday.cfm)

    When a thing or a person becomes important, essential and vital in our life, we also find it hard to let go of it when time calls us to. Moreover, there are also cases when a thing or a person, or an experience, though not so important and vital in our daily existence, that it becomes inseparable from us. Thus, when it becomes so attached to us emotionally, we find it so difficult to let go.

    When I was already about 6 years old, I still carried my baby bottle with me with milk, coffee, water or soda in it. Once, I brought it with me at school during my Kindergarten and my older sister found it out. The next day as I searched for my it in its usual place, I couldn’t find it. The baby bottle was gone. My sister threw it away. That was so cruel!

    I was so mad and cried hard for throwing that away. Perhaps, I thought the world was about to end at that time for losing my “dear baby bottle.” The day after that was just okay without it. The next day was fine too. The next days also seemed to be okay.

    Now, I realized, I must have been so attached to it that letting go of was surely difficult. In one way or another, others may find it challenging also those that have become so attached to them. These include not just material things. They also encompass our dreams and aspirations in life. Additionally, they include relationships and even our memories.

    Letting go is difficult. This is especially true with those we love deeply. We find it challenging due to emotional attachment. Our tendency is to keep those closer to us because we do not like them to leave from us. As a result, when we are confronted with the reality of loss, then, we experience pain. It breaks our heart. We become anxious and fearful.

    We may refuse to let go as a response. In the process, we become controlling and suffocating. We might manipulate those people we do not want to let go. We could become paranoid and obsessed. This happens because we linger and attach ourselves to a painful memory. We might also cling to a material thing, a desire, or a person.

    How are we invited now with this reality in life?

    Going into the process of letting go and the letting go itself is what makes life wonderful. It is in letting go that we actually find more life and express life, to find love and express love. This manifests grace and freedom in us.

    This is what Jesus asked from his disciples. The disciples who thought that they have lost Jesus when he was crucified rejoiced at his resurrection. When Jesus told them that soon, he will no longer be with them, they became anxious. He would go back to his father, and the disciples felt fearful. They wanted to keep Jesus closer to them. They believed that they were more confident if Jesus was nearby. They were not willing to let him go.

    However, this is not what God wants. Jesus had to leave to join his Father in heaven. He needed to become fully one with his Father. It will only be in this way that Jesus will be able to bring us closer to the Father. With the Father, Jesus opens a way for us to the heart of the Father. By this also, Jesus becomes ever closer to each one of us. Jesus becomes closer than what we can imagine because Jesus will be in our hearts and minds.

    Hence, the words of Jesus to his disciples, “A little while and you will no longer see me, and again a little while later and you will see me,” mean that Jesus becomes ever present in each of us.

    In this process of letting go of the Lord, then, the disciples also allowed God to work in them. This was how the early Church found grace and freedom in letting go.

    Today, we are also asked to let go whatever hinders us to encounter the Lord. We may ask ourselves, “What is it that I continue to linger? What is that attachment that I find difficult to let go for me to grow?”

    As we learn to let go, may we be filled with grace and freedom. Hinaut pa.

  • To Repent and To Believe

    To Repent and To Believe

    January 24, 2021 – Third Sunday in Ordinary Time; National Bible Sunday

    Click here for the readings (https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/012421.cfm)

    What if that something which you are so attached to is needed to be let go in order for you to grow? I remember when I was still a young boy, I was so attached with my baby bottle. I used that bottle until I was about 5 or 6 years old. However, I was asked to let it go and stop using it since I was already big enough and was about to start schooling. I wanted to start school with my friends but I found it very difficult to let go of my baby bottle. I was told that I could not bring it with me and the only way of going to school with my friends was to let go of that baby bottle.

    When we develop forms of attachments, whatever that may be, we could become rigid and stubborn. Our attachment will become the focus of our world that we may refuse to see what is beyond it. Thus, we would tend to limit ourselves from discovering more about ourselves and about others because we are already fixated to one or two. Nevertheless, there is certainly a need for us to look at our attachments and fixations and see if they are helpful or not in deepening our friendship with God and others.

    Our attachments or fixations in life may not just be about material things that we possess but they can also be our beliefs, our opinions and ideas, biases, prejudices and perspectives and even our way of life. Because they have become central in the way we think, in the way we relate with others and in the way we live our life, we also find comfort and familiarity in them. When these happen, they become difficult to let go because those attachments or fixations have gripped us already.

    As a result, we experience tensions and conflicts when we are also asked to detach ourselves from our attachments. We may feel being threatened because of the desire to remain in that state, to remain in that comfort and familiarity.

    This is the scenario behind the story of Prophet Jonah. Jonah, as a Jew, hated the Ninevites. Nineveh was the capital of city of their enemy, the Assyrians. The Jews were assaulted and attacked many times by the Assyrians. However, at this time, God asked Jonah to go there and proclaim God’s message to them. Jonah tried to escape from this because he did not want this. He hated them so much. Yet, because he could not escape from God, he went to Nineveh against his will and called the people to repentance. Jonah must have wished that the people would not repent and be punished by God because he wanted them, dead. However, the people repented and turned away from their sins and God showed mercy.

    This was something that Jonah found it difficult to understand. He thought and believed that God was only for the Jews. Yet, he realized too that God is beyond his limited understanding of God’s mercy. God is for everybody. God’s mercy is borderless. Jonah understood this later on because he was also able to let go of his biases against his enemies. Jonah let go of his prejudices against them and began to see life in God’s perspective.

    Indeed, the experience of Jonah teaches us how God shows His infinite and borderless mercy. In fact, it was not just the Ninevites who repented from their sins, Jonah also repented from his biases and hatred towards the people. This was how Jonah showed his growth as a person and as a prophet of God.

    In the same way, Paul in his first letter to the Corinthians brought this challenge not to be gripped and to be too attached to the things in this world. Though Paul did not say that everything we have in this life are unimportant, but, Paul brought out the essential aspect of what is to come. That is why, he said

    let those having wives act as not having them,

    those weeping as not weeping,

    those rejoicing as not rejoicing,

    those buying as not owning, 

    those using the world as not using it fully.

    For the world in its present form is passing away.

    Paul reminds us really of the danger to be too attached of what the world offers us. Our possessions and even our life itself is not ours. Again, making ourselves too absorbed with our attachments and fixations, deprives us to experience the fullness of life with others and with God. Thus, it is when we learn to give more emphasis on God that we also discover the boundless generosity and mercy of the Lord to us.

    This is the very story that we have also heard in today’s Gospel. The call of Simon, Andrew, James and John was a radical call to follow Jesus and to give more importance to God in their lives. As Jonah repented from his hatred and changed his perspective in God’s perspective, the disciples also turned away from their comforts in order to follow the Lord. By following Jesus, they too embraced a life that completely changed the course of their way of living from being fishermen into being missionaries.

    This is basically what Paul told us in the second reading – and that is in giving more importance to God’s offer to us. Remember, we can only do this and respond like the disciples when we also repent and change our way of life. Jesus, at the beginning of this Gospel, proclaimed, “Repent and believe in the gospel.”

    Indeed, these are the invitations for us this Sunday – TO REPENT AND TO BELIEVE in the gospel, in the Word of God made flesh.

    To repent is to turn away from our sins, as well us turning away from those attachments and fixations in us that are preventing us from growing to become mature in our relationships with one another and with God, and those that are preventing us to see life in the way God sees it to be.

    To believe in the Gospel is to respond with generosity and availability to God and to those who are in need of mercy. To believe in Jesus is also becoming dependent on God and in His providence that will allow us to embrace new perspective and fresh beginnings in life and to embrace change in our way of life according to God’s desire for us.

    May these invitations to repent and to believe, inspire growth  in us and bring us into the fullness of life with Jesus and with the Church. Hinaut pa.

  • Attachments and Conditions in Commitments

    Attachments and Conditions in Commitments

    September 30, 2020 – Wednesday of the 26th Week in Ordinary Time

    Memorial of St. Jerome, Priest and Doctor of the Church

    Click here for the readings (https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/093020.cfm)

    Homily

    What prevents us to fully commit ourselves to a relationship? Why are we being prevented and what makes it difficult to fully commit?

    A couple who was about to be married shared to me their thoughts and plans. They were surely in loved with each other and wanted to live as husband and wife. Yet, they too shared to me that as a couple they planned not to have a child. They just wanted to live as husband and wife. I asked them why. The two of them confirmed that, to have a child is difficult for them. Both of them were at the peak of their careers and their individual profession was so important that losing them was not a choice. Thus, if they will have a child then their careers will be affected.

    Christian marriage is not just limited between the union of husband and wife. This love and union should also overflow towards their children. Completely closing the doors to the possibility of having children, rearing, loving and nurturing them is after all, a non-commitment to Christian marriage.

    Thus, our many attachments can actually prevent us from fully committing to a relationship. It is indeed difficult when we are called to let go of our many attachments. These attachments could be our careers and jobs, positions and influence, power and wealth, or unfulfilled dreams and desires, our traumatic experiences or past broken relationships. These can also be our various addictions and compulsive behaviors, or just our family and circle of friends.

    These attachments prevent us to fully commit to a relationship because we are being held back and we allow ourselves to be caught up. This happened to those whom Jesus invited to follow him.

    Jesus said “follow me.” The person certainly wanted to follow Jesus, BUT, in following Jesus, there were conditions attached. Jesus emphasized the urgency of following him but then the person was being held by his attachments. These attachments prevented him to follow the Lord by making conditions.

    This is something Job realized also in the first reading. The story of Job tells us about the human suffering of those who find themselves righteous and good. Yet, life is not under our control. God remains the author of life and decides about our life. Job here slowly realized that he was not the master of his life. All the things that he possessed are not his, including the life of his family and his very life. His suffering was a proof that attachments in life do not give security and contentment and that he can just set conditions in his relationships with God, the almighty.

    Today, Jesus also calls us to follow him freely and without conditions. Each of us is being invited, wherever we are and whoever we are. Whether you are working and married or single, unemployed or a simple vendor, a professional or a laborer, well and healthy or sick, a religious or a government official, young or old – the Lord calls us to commit ourselves to Him. When we commit ourselves, then, we too are challenged to let go of our attachments that may prevent us from fully following Jesus.

    Let us ask Mary, Our Mother of Perpetual Help, t to guide us in recognizing our unhealthy attachments so that we will be able to let go of them and realize the freedom and peace of choosing Jesus. Hopefully, in choosing to follow Jesus we may also discover the joy and the beauty of allowing God to be the center of our commitment in our relationships. Hinaut pa.

    Jom Baring, CSsR

  • Grace and Freedom in letting go

    Grace and Freedom in letting go

    Advertisements

    May 21, 2020 – Thursday of the 6th Week of Easter

    Click here for the readings (http://cms.usccb.org/bible/readings/052120-day.cfm)

    When a thing or a person becomes important, essential and vital in our life, we also find it hard to let go of it when time calls us to. Moreover, there are also cases when a thing or a person, or an experience, though not so important and vital in our daily existence, that it becomes inseparable from us. Thus, when it becomes so attached to us emotionally/psychologically, we find it then, so difficult to let go.

    When I was already about 6 years old, I would still carry my baby bottle with me and drink any liquid – milk, coffee, water or soda out of that. Once, I brought it with me at school during my Kindergarten and then my older sister found it out. The next day as I searched for my baby bottle in its usual place, I could not find it. The baby bottle was gone. My sister threw it away. So cruel! đź™‚

    I was so mad and cried really hard for throwing that away. Perhaps, I thought the world was about to end at that time of losing my “dear baby bottle.” Yet, the day after that and the next day and the following days seemed to be just okay without that baby bottle.

    Advertisements

    Now, I realized, I must have been so attached to that baby bottle that letting go of it was surely difficult. In one way or another, others may find it challenging also those that have become so attached to them. These are not just limited with material things but also our dreams and aspirations in life, relationships and even our memories.

    Thus, when we talk about letting go, we certainly find it  difficult especially with those that we love so much or so attached to our emotions. Our basic tendency is to keep those closer to us because we do not like them to leave from us. That is why, when we are confronted with the reality of loss, then, we experience pain. It breaks our heart. We become anxious and fearful because life may not be the same.

    As a response, we may refuse to let go and in the process become controlling, suffocating and manipulating particularly towards those people we do not want to let go. Moreover, we could become paranoid and obsessed because we continue to linger and attach ourselves with a painful memory, or to a material thing or in a desire.

    What really is the concern here?

    Going into the process of letting go and the letting go itself is what makes our life wonderful. It is in letting go that we actually find more life and express life, to find love and express love. This manifests grace and freedom in us.

    This is what Jesus was asking from his disciples. The disciples who thought that they have lost Jesus when he was crucified rejoiced at his resurrection. However, when Jesus told them that soon, he will no longer be with but will go back to his father, the disciples also became anxious and fearful. They wanted to keep Jesus closer to them. The disciples believed that they were more confident if Jesus was nearby. They were not willing to let him go.

    However, this is not what God wants. Jesus had to go so that he will be able to join and be one with his Father in heaven. It will only be in this way that Jesus will be able to bring us closer to the Father. By returning to the Father, Jesus will open a way for us to the heart of the Father. By this also, Jesus will become ever closer to each one of us, closer than what we can imagine because Jesus will be in our hearts and minds.

    Hence, the words of Jesus to his disciples, “A little while and you will no longer see me, and again a little while later and you will see me,” means that Jesus becomes ever present in each of us.

    In this process of letting go of the Lord, then, the disciples also allowed God to work in them. This was how the early Church found grace and freedom in letting go.

    Today, we are also asked to let go whatever is hindering us to encounter the Lord. We may ask ourselves, “What is it that I continue to linger? What is that attachment that I find difficult to let go for me to grow?”

    In identifying these, let us also ask the grace to courageously let go of those that hinder us so that we may find the grace for more life, more love and freedom. Hinaut pa.

    Jom Baring, CSsR

    Join 2,850 other subscribers