Inspirations at your Fingertips!

Tuesday of the 5th Week in Ordinary time Mark 7:1-13 Faith in God cannot be limited simply be tradition.  God is the author of tradition. What he wants is mercy and not sacrifice. Solomon's prayer reflects true love for the Lord.  He asks for God's constant and abiding presence in the temple. Search for a more dynamic relationship witht the Lord.  Search for him in everyday life. Let us adjust to a living, dynamic form of prayer that is truly reflective of an active relationship of love with God.  This authentic pray moves us now to life as we embrace the mission to share Jesus to others. May the prayer in our hearts moves us to experience Jesus in our daily lives.

Real prayer Mark 7:1-13 Solomon's prayer shows his utmost respect to God and his temple.  However, in the Gospel, it seems that the Pharisees have lost all sensitivities to God's presence.  Instead, they relied on age-old written tradition. Faith in God is not simply based on tradition.  Rather, it depends on a dynamic relationship with the living God. The Eucharist is also not a series of rubrics.  Rather, each moment opens us up to the real presence of Jesus who now involves us in His own sacrifice.  We must adjust to a living, dynamic form of prayer that is truly reflective of an active relationship of love with God.  The Word of God read to us symbolizes that deep intention of God to remove the blindness from our eye, deafness from our ears, and hardness from our hearts caused by sin.  The Liturgy of Eucharist if Jesus' way of celebrating His incarnation, that in a way, after the whole celebration, He is incarnated in each one of us. ...

How to pray Matthew 7:7-12 In the readings, Jesus taught about prayer while Queen Esther prayed. It seems that prayer is automatic for all of us.  But how is prayer like when it is a way of life? St. Benedict has a very popular idiom for prayer: ora et labora, "pray and work."  For St. Benedict believed in the combination of contemplation and action.  For St. Ignatius, there is what we call "contemplatives in the world" for people who are actively participating in the transformation of the world. Prayer is a life of active relationship with the Lord. It is not just about asking for intentions.  Rather, my own personhood is marked by a life of unconditional relationship to God and my every action proves it. "Ask and you will receive" involves total faith in the providence of God while "the Father knows what to give to his children" implies that even before praying for something, we believe in the innate good intentions of the Father t...

On prayer and life Matthew 7:7-12 Esther's prayer is a prayer of oblation or total offering of self to God. Her life is a prayer. I would like to focus on prayer as an act of love of God for us. Prayer is God's gift - we pray because it is grace planted into our hearts prayer is a covenant - God's promise that he will stay always with us. Prayer is communion - a picture of heaven in our love for God and one another.

His love Matthew 7:7-12 I also used to pray and ask for a million intentions.  I even memorized Jesus' words from my youth, "Ask and you will receive; seek and you will find; knock and it shall be opened unto you." I dreamt to receive all these graces with such fervor and commitment that I was not ready to let them go. But as time passed, I realized that indeed, God heard all my prayers, and much more.  He revealed himself to me as a friend that I can turn to.  At the core of all those prayers is an invitation to get to know Him who loves me through and through. Now, I still pray as I did when I was a child.  But these do are nothing compared to the real grace I receive every moment of my life - Jesus' very own heart that I desire.

Every new year, our hearts are always filled with hope that things would be better. Be assured, they would be. We just need to purge our hearts from all sorts of negativities and start the journey to healing. We would not travel much if we are carrying the baggages of past hurts. Thus, thus, in this prayer, may I invite everyone to be healed from the following: 1. separation from God, the primary source of life itself. We have paid little attention to how much He is willing to change our lives. We say sorry for the many times we held on to what we thought was right for us but actually, were wrong; 2. separation from others, especially family and friends. The greatest scars are caused within the home where love should abound. I pray for all those who are close to me and have hurt me in one way or the other. I pray as Jesus prayed for those he loved, even his enemies, "Father, forgive them for they do not know what they do." 3. separation from myself - I caused myself ...

“In everything by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God." – Philippians 4:6 Pastor and author AB Simpson told about an old farmer who plowed around a large rock in his field year after year. He had broken one cultivator and two plowshares by hitting it. Each time he saw that obstacle, he grumbled about how much trouble the rock had caused. One day he decided to dig it up and be done with it. Putting a large crowbar under one side, he found to his surprise that the rock was less than a foot thick. Soon he had pried it out of the ground and was carting it away in his wagon. He smiled to think how that “big” old rock had caused him so much needless frustration. Not every trouble can be removed as easily as that stone. But prayer is an effective way to handle difficulties of all sizes. Paul told us to use prayer in every situation. (Phil 4:6) Sometimes when we pray, God dispels difficulty as easily as the ...