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Tag: God

  • Unforgettable Firsts: My National Youth Day Journey

    Unforgettable Firsts: My National Youth Day Journey

    A Reflection by Richly Allin King B. Vildosola, Youth Minister

    “Experience is the best teacher, especially when it’s your first time.” This quote primarily refers on trying new things which can be transformative. Indeed, first-hand experiences shape our perspectives and understanding. 

    The National Youth Day (NYD) 2025, happened on June 10-14, in the Archdiocese of Caceres, Naga City. It was an encounter of young pilgrims of hope nationwide. It strengthens the relationship of the youth with God, our Father, and our Mother, the Inà ng Peñafrancia. 

    It was my first time attending and joining NYD, with heart full of hope and mind filled with uncertainty of “Why I am here?”

    I realized that I was there because I am His servant, His child, His son, and His believer. God sent me to the NYD because of many purposes. First, to reconnect with God. Second, to strengthen my faith with Him. And third, to beome a bearer of hope for my community and co-youth. 

    Attending the NYD was the highlight of this journey. Connecting with fellow youth from diverse backgrounds, sharing stories, and learning from inspiring speakers was life-changing. NYD taught me the value of community, faith, resilience and chastity. I realized that even in uncertainty, hope and determination can guide us forward.

    In addition, it reminds me to nurture my faith and develop my self that in every aspect of our individual lives there is God. The Lord is always there for us, giving us light and life. 

    These experiences have shaped me in ways I never thought were possible. They’ve broadened my perspective and fueled my passion for growth as a young person

    Alongside my NYD journey, there’s lot of things that happened to me. Such as boarding on a plane for the first time was amazing! The rush of takeoff, the view from above (city lights and clouds) – was breathtaking. Visiting Manila, the bustling city, was overwhelming yet thrilling.

    I had also the opportunity in exploring new places – (1)Going to Intramuros, a historic walled city with rich history and cultural significance from the colonization of Spaniards. (2) The Roman Catholic Churches, such as Baclaran Church, Manila Cathedral, Our Lady of Mt. Carmel Parish, Our Lady of Peñafrancia Parish, Naga Metropolitan Cathedral, Our Lady of Peñafrancia Minor Basilica and National Shrine and many more. (3) We went to Mall of Asia (MOA) a popular shopping and entertainment destination in Pasay City. (4) Bathing in Hot Spring in Panicuason, Naga City. It is a natural spring that emits warm or hot water. I got to eat as well some Naga special foods and delicacies, such as Bicol express, Laing, and Kinalas. 

    All in all, I’m grateful for these many firsts that i had, which have become cherished moments for me.  Those were memories that will always be remembered. They’ve shown me that life is full of possibilities and that stepping out of my comfort zone can lead to incredible growth. 

    Before I end this reflection, allow me to barrow a quote from Miss Karen Joy Caramoan, one of our resource speaker during the NYD 2025, she said, “If you are taking risk with the Lord, and for the Lord, do not be afraid.”

  • Sustained by His Body and Blood: A Journey of Faith and Healing

    Sustained by His Body and Blood: A Journey of Faith and Healing

    As we celebrate the Feast of Corpus Christi, I want to share how my deep faith in a loving God and my devotion to the Eucharist sustained me during the most difficult phase of my life.

    I was diagnosed with gynecological problems, which led to two surgical procedures—one minor and one major. God gave me ample time to prepare myself physically, psychologically, financially, and most of all, spiritually. The power of prayer, letting go, and letting God—being humble enough to surrender everything to a powerful God—was deeply meaningful during this time.

    During my hospitalization, I was blessed to be confined in a private hospital run by religious sisters, so I did not miss receiving the Body of Christ daily. Another blessing was having a first cousin-in-law who is a Eucharistic Minister in our parish, allowing me to receive the Eucharist every Sunday until I was well enough to attend Mass physically.

    Receiving the Body of Christ sustained me during this period of rest and recuperation. It strengthened me to read three dissertations and three theses for final defense. Just two days after my hospital discharge, I found myself reviewing their manuscripts, writing comments and suggestions for improvement.

    In the midst of pain, I was still able to fulfill my responsibility as a member of the Research Committee by attending their final defenses online. Seeing the students on stage during the hooding and graduation ceremony made my heart leap with joy. I looked up to the heavens and offered my endless gratitude to God—for blessing the efforts of these students and for giving me the good health to do my part in the completion of their degrees.

    This, to me, is life-giving—paying forward the gift of wholeness. I am sharing the generosity I received from God by being generous with my time and talent.

    I was also able to read and evaluate outputs submitted by my students in our Learning Management System during the midterm period. By God’s grace, I submitted their grades to the faculty member who handled my classes in my absence.

    Alongside these tasks, I continued to fulfill my role as Director of the St. Clement’s Pastoral Care and Counseling Ministry by managing our Facebook page, where clients request appointments. Just yesterday, I conducted an online counseling session with a client. This ministry always brings me joy and a deep sense of fulfillment.

    Because Christ in the Eucharist offered His life so we may live, I see myself as His instrument of healing and recovery for those who are broken. Because Jesus gifted me with a second life, I am inspired to give life to others—to journey with them toward wholeness and joy. Everyone deserves to live a joyful and purposeful life.

    I am deeply grateful to God for guiding me in making decisions about my health. I also thank my workplace for being so supportive during my two-month leave from teaching and other responsibilities. My colleagues took over my classes and workload. I am especially grateful to my medical team—most especially my loving OB-Gyne—my family, close friends, and all the beautiful and kind souls who stood by me during this challenging chapter of my life.

    I am slowly but surely returning to my usual routine. I am back at work at my university because God sustained me and granted me a second life. My medical condition taught me powerful lessons about self-care, letting go, setting priorities and boundaries, the power of prayer, deep faith in God and Mama Mary, and not taking things personally. Most of all, it taught me to hold on to God’s faithfulness, which is powerfully manifested in the Holy Eucharist.

    May we always make Christ the center of our lives and attend Sunday Mass regularly. And as a result, may we always find joy in sharing ourselves with others, even when life is not easy or comfortable. There is true bliss in giving life to others.

  • Loud Faith in our Small Voices

    Loud Faith in our Small Voices

    A Reflection by Robert Agustin, a Youth Minister

    As I have stepped on the ground of NYD Caceres 2025, I was overwhelmed with the vibrant faces and voices of the different people from all over the country. I was fascinated with their energy and their excitement. What made it more impressive was the great number of their delegates. There were many of them some have even reached hundreds. They were loud, energetic and lively as groups. From there, I began to question myself, what could we contribute? We were only six, negligible, minute and small. We even don’t have big banners, no loud cheers, booms and massive grand entrance. This was in this time where I started feeling the least amidst a well-represented groups of delegates.

    At the beginning of our sessions and activities, I witnessed how animated other delegates were. Each of them showed and gave their extraordinary best in their cheers, claps and performances. At first, I couldn’t help but to feel left out- maybe because of the reason that there were only few of us, with weaker and quieter voice compared to others. There were also moments where we became silent and simply observing while we were also participating in the different group activities. We didn’t talk that much because we were so shy. However, in our stillness we were able to realize something good. Being not the loudest is also sacred because in our quiet moments, we listen, we pray, we understand and we feel God’s presence. 

    Being a minority is no longer new to us. As Youth participants from a Muslim dominated area, we have been taught how to jive, mingle, adapt and respect our surroundings. Handling this kind of situation during NYD was a lot easier since the people around us were no different, they were our companions in the mission.

    One bright side of being few is that, we fully see and feel each other’s importance. Our small number allowed us to stay closer from each other. We got to know each other’s stories, backgrounds and even our good and bad personalities. It also allowed us to lean on each other’s comfort and support whenever things may go wrong. I felt that I’m not alone in the ministry. It seems like I have found new brothers and sisters who are willing to share their strength with me and help me in times of my weaknesses. Indeed, our small number gave us way to be more present in each other’s life. 

    We may be few in number but the love of God is huge. We feel so much love from our “katoods” or friends from the other dioceses. They had never overlooked us but instead they lifted us up, cheer for us, and accompanied us. Things had changed along the way, I began to understand that we were their neither to see the difference in number nor just to impress everyone. We were there to appreciate our similarities, to share our common hope and to live in faith in Christ. We were there to help carry each other’s cross, celebrate each other’s life and to be the living testament of God’s Love, mercy and compassion. 

    As I left NYD 2025, I carried more than just photos, smiles and snapshots . I carried a deep sense of peace and hope towards the Filipino Youth. I was reminded that we don’t have to be many in order to see our strength. The strength is within us, within our hearts and mind. No matter how small we are, we can still do great things because God is with us. We don’t need to be at the center to shine. There is  beauty in being the least – a beauty rooted in humility like a child, in simplicity like our Lord Jesus Christ, and in the quiet confidence that we are exactly where we are meant to be.

  • How do I pray? What do I pray?  

    How do I pray? What do I pray?  

    June 19, 2025 – Thursday 11th Week in Ordinary Time

    Click here for the readings (https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/061925.cfm)

    (Homily on the Fourth Day of Novena for the Feast of Our Mother of Perpetual Help at St. Clement’s Church, Iloilo City)

    How do I pray? What do I pray? What are those that I usually ask from the Lord?

    Others pray spontaneously asking what they want and desire for themselves and for their loved ones. Others are more comfortable using the memorized prayers as forms of meditation and deeper reflection on the mystery of God.

    We too ask many things from the Lord. Others would even have a litany of requests and petitions. And as a form of asking God’s favor we even observe number of days of prayers. This is what we do in observing our Novenas, or the 9 days Misa de Gallo during December, believing that God would grant ones desires and prayers.

    In fact, this is what we do now as we prepare for the Feast of Mary, Our Mother of Perpetual Help, on this Fourth Day.

    Thus, it would be good to take a look in the way we do our prayers, to look at the intentions we make in our prayers. Let us also include the kind consciousness that we have in our prayers. This is something important because this will help us to evaluate our personal relationship with God and with others.

    Now, in today’s Gospel Jesus reminds his disciples of the importance of prayer and also of the importance of the kind of consciousness in their prayers.

    Jesus mentioned about the way the pagans prayed. These pagans loved to use many words in their prayers. They believed that it was in that way that they would be able to get the attention of their gods and goddesses. At the same time, pagans believed it would appease them. They believed that these gods and goddesses were unforgiving, impulsive and frightening. These pagans babbled in their prayers in order to get the favor from these difficult and terrifying deities.

    However, Jesus reminds his disciples that our God is not like that. God is not vengeful. God is not inconsistent. Our God is not terrifying. The Lord God is rather loving and forgiving. Hence, to use many words would not be necessary because God knows the desires of our heart.

    Moreover, as Jesus reminds his disciples, he also tells us now that our prayers are not meant to appease an angry and hateful god or to gain favor from a terrifying god. This also means that the content of our prayers should not be self-centered. To pray is not just to ask something for ourselves but also for others. That is why Jesus taught us his own prayer. His prayer expressed intimacy and closeness with the Father in heaven.

    This prayer starts with these two words, OUR FATHER. It did not say “My Father” and not even “Their Father.” This tells us that when we pray, we always remember others. We are always together as people, as brothers and sisters. Our relationship with God though can be personal but it is also founded in our community. That is why it starts with “OUR” because this includes you and me and everyone else.

    This prayer (Our Father/Lord’s Prayer) tells us that God is a Father. God relates to us personally. God is not somewhere out there who is so far away from us but God is here with us. God as our Father is, indeed, loving and faithful to us. This is evident at how the Lord God continually revealed the divine presence to us throughout our human history. This means also that we are invited to seek God’s will and God’s desire not just our desire. Most of the time, when we pray we only think of what we want and desire but we forget to ask, what is it that you desire for me Lord?

    It invites us also to become dependent on Him because He is generous and faithful to us. To pray, “give us this day our daily bread,” means to be more focused of today, this day not tomorrow because tomorrow has not yet come. Certainly, we can be too anxious of what will happen tomorrow that it will prevent us to see what is more important today. Thus, Jesus invites us to be more contented of today and to ask sustenance enough for today.

    Notice also that in this prayer, it recognizes our sinfulness and need to be forgiven. It is necessary that we become humble and ask God’s mercy because this is the way that we make ourselves open to God’s grace. When we remain arrogant and unrepentant of our sins, then we prevent God to transform us and prevent others to come into our life.

    And finally, we make ourselves aware that there is also the presence of the evil one around us. The evil one constantly tempts us to move away from God. The evil one wants us to cut our relationship from the Lord, thus from the grace of God.

    The evil will always try allure us to think that it is better not to pray and that we do not need God. The evil will seduce us to think that we can do everything in our power without the help of God and that we do no need to think of others but ourselves alone. Be careful then of these temptations.

    With all of these, we find Mary, Our Mother of Perpetual Help as our guide and best example. Mary showed us how such intimacy with the Lord makes us open and welcoming to the will of God. Mary showed us that to completely trust in the Lord is to make our heart full of love. Mary also showed us that by choosing the Lord, evil has no power over us.

    Being made aware of the consciousness behind the Lord’s Prayer and of Mary’s presence in our life and faith, we too shall grow in our relationship with God and with one another. We may become less self-centered and self-serving and rather become self-giving and life-giving as God desires us to be in our homes and communities. Kabay pa.

  • Holy Trinity-Gifted

    Holy Trinity-Gifted

    June 15, 2025 – Solemnity of the Most Holy Trinity

    Click here for the readings (https://bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/061525.cfm)

    Being gifted by someone special person in life is usually for us a joyous & meaningful experience. Because as we all know, the gift-received is not only about the importance of the gift-given, but also the giver of the gift, and the thought & ways of giving us itself the gift. And so, not only the gift, but also the giving & the giver matter most in our being gifted.

    As we have considered how it is to be gifted by the Holy Spirit last Sunday, this Sunday we reflect on our being gifted by the Holy Trinity.

    Today is the Solemnity of the Holy Trinity. We proclaim our faith in God as the Holy Trinity. In our faith in Christ, we believe in God who is the persons & dynamics of Father, Son & Holy Spirit. We fully trust in the God made known to us by our Lord Jesus as community of persons at work together for recreation & renewal of our lives for the better.

    And today, as always once again, we joyfully celebrate our being gifted by the Holy Trinity in our Christian faith & life.

    To appreciate our being gifted by the Holy Trinity, we must understand that the communal presence & actions of the Holy Trinity are considerably implied in the Holy Scriptures. And somehow this is articulated at its best in the word: “Behold” in the gospels.

    We remember here that “Behold” is said during the Annunciation (Mt 1:23) when it was foretold of Mary’s conceiving God’s child, during Jesus’ public ministry (Jn 1:29) when he is recognized as the Lamb of God, also on the cross (Jn 19:26-27) when Jesus endorsed Mary & the disciples to one another, and above all at the ascension when Jesus assured them of His presence forever as He commissioned His disciples to continue in with His mission (Mt 28:20).

    In all these instances in the Jesus story, especially when the word: “Behold” is said, we come to recognize the presence & dynamics of the Holy Trinity are at work on-mission (on-the-go), in tandem with one another, & in collaboration with us, believers & followers of Christ for the grace of our salvation & blessings.

    And so as our response for such a great gift, what are we to do as being gifted by Holy Trinity? Again, we consider the word “Behold” challenging us to respond to the presence & dynamics of the community of the Holy Trinity in us.

    In the gospel when he was saying on the cross: “Woman, behold your son”…”Son, behold your mother” (Jn 19:25-27)*** Jesus is more than just presenting & endorsing  Mary, his mother & the beloved disciple to one another, but rather call each other’s attention to give care to each other’s presence, and give importance to what is happening & about to happen in their lives.

    Here, we are reminded that in the scriptures, to behold signifies drawing attention to something significant, often revelations, event or divine message, to happen.

    Meaning, “Behold” in the scriptures is a “call to attention”, “a call to order” for us to recognize the significance of the present moment.  To behold then is more than just an expression of being present but more so to acknowledge the significance of the moment happening before us. The challenge for us to “Behold” is thus somehow calling us out that “There is something greater going on and better happening here. So, be aware & conscious of the great importance of the moment.”

    For us to behold then is to  be aware & be awed of the presence & dynamics of the Holy Trinity in our very lives. In other words, beholding for us Christians is to look significantly to our trinitarian God in our lives so that we may see, observe, discern & comprehend His presence & actions in our ordinary daily faith-life journey. Behold, then, for God’s salvation is upon us.

    As we continue on with our pilgrimage of faith, we pray that we may grow in great appreciation & significance of our being gifted by the Holy Trinity in our faith, as we behold God’s ever-present & dynamic blessings at work happening now in our present moment.

    With Mary, our Mother of perpetual Help, through Jesus Christ our Lord, now and always.

    Amen.

    *** We distinctively used this Gospel today since here in our parish church we are also celebrating the Feast of Our Mother of Perpetual Help, as our parish patroness here in Cebu, Philippines – which happen to come also on the Solemnity of the Holy Trinity this year.