It’s another lovely Sunday, another family day so to speak. Although I slept a little late last night, I woke up before 6am to catch Fr. Fernando Suarez , the main celebrant for Sunday TV mass on ABS CBN. It’s always a joy to listen to him and learn bits of wisdom from what he share in his ministry. It’s still my dream until now to attend one of his healing masses at Monte Maria. Anyway, I don’t regularly catch the 6am TV mass every Sunday since there are times that when I wake up, it’s already finished.
Lovell texted me earlier and asked me to pray with him for his safe trip to Japan. I called him up instead of texting back and learned that he earned a one-week exchange student grant. I was laughing when he said he has already checked-in and his flight leaves at 6:45am. I am so really happy for him because despite his hectic and busy schedule being a graduate school student, he still manages to divide his time in higher pursuit of learning. That’s what you call being dedicated. I am praying hard that he’ll be ordained soon. We have adopted him into the family (and I consider him as my oldest son) and it is always a joy to share with him every time we get a chance to talk and visit him at the seminary.
Hubby and I attended the 9am mass at St. Jude Thaddeus Parish. Wow, the altar looked so lovely, it was adorned with several flower arrangements. What a wonderful homily! The gospel for today speak of justice and generosity. It is when we truly give something of our self unselfishly that we experience joy, a far cry from what some people do, they give but they expect something in return and that does not speak of true giving. Being generous means you don’t count the cost, be it a simple gesture of helping those who are in need, in the sincerest way that you can. We were all laughing when Fr. Jordan recounted this anecdote when he was still a seminarian. They went to this newly opened Rockwell Mall in Makati and the priest who accompanied them said that they will watch a movie and gave him P200 pesos to buy tickets. He asked how much the tickets cost and he was told, maybe around P50. So off he went and came back scratching his head because the cost of a ticket was a staggering P350. Next he asked us, “what do you think a P50 peso could buy nowadays”? Some of us murmured ” a kilo of banana or a half-kilo of galunggong”. “So you see”, he said, “do you think that is much? Is P50 that much nowadays?” Again, we heard some churchgoers, “no, it’s not”. We were all laughing when Fr. Jordan said, “you think it is not much and yet, during the Offertory, some of you are still reluctant to give beyond P50 and prefer to drop those loose coins in your pockets to help the church.” I am sure that despite the laughter when he said that, a lot of us were thinking, “tama si Father.” It’s a perfect example to drive a point – generosity – are we generous? Do we freely give our time and effort without counting the cost? Because this to me is a perfect example of being generous.
Dreams And Escapes 