Eucharist

Approach Jesus on your knees during times of struggle.  In this way His consolation will enter your soul most profoundly.  Pope Benedict XVI said in 2010:

“The idea behind my current practice of having people kneel to receive Communion on the tongue was to send a signal and to underscore the Real Presence with an exclamation point. One very important reason is that there is a great danger of superficiality precisely in the kinds of mass events we hold at St. Peter’s, both in the Basilica and in the Square. I have heard of people who, after receiving Communion, stick the Host in their wallet to take home as a kind of souvenir. In this context, where people think that everyone is just automatically supposed to receive Communion — everyone else is going up, so I will, too — I wanted to send a clear signal. I wanted it to be clear: Something quite special is going on here! He is here, the One before whom we fall on our knees! Pay attention! This is not just some social ritual in which we can take part if we want to.”

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Scrupulosity

What Is Scrupulosity? In Catholic moral teaching, scrupulosity defines the spiritual and psychological state of a person who erroneously believes he is guilty of mortal sin and is therefore seldom in a state of grace. A scrupulous person has difficulty making choices and decisions even though he desires above all else to please God and to follow God's law. For a scrupulous person, it isn't that he doesn't "carefully attend to the sacred and certain teaching of the Church" (as the Catechism teaches), but that he becomes overwhelmed with the details and nuances that may be present in the decision.  An example of the "crooked thinking" of a scrupulous conscience may be helpful. All of us are aware of the need to abstain from all food and beverages for one hour before the reception of Communion at Mass. We are aware that this is one of the conditions the Church expects us to fulfill for the worthy reception of the sacrament. We are also aware that this is nowhere as demanding as the previous prescription for a three-hour fast — or the even older fast from midnight of the night before — that was once part of our spiritual practice. Most of us do not become preoccupied with the prescription because it is so easily followed.  This is not the case for a scrupulous person. One hour is sixty minutes fraught with the possibility of making a mistake. There is confusion over what constitutes breaking the fast. For example, does lipstick break the fast? Or say a piece of food is dislodged from your teeth, despite your best efforts at brushing and flossing, and you inadvertedly swallow it. Does this action break the fast? Or perhaps the celebrant is a little quicker today than normal and you are not sure you've fasted for the entire sixty-minute period. What to do? To receive Communion may well be to risk sacrilege, the deliberate and unworthy reception of the Body of Christ.  Imagine how a person might feel consumed in this way by the doubt, fear, and anxiety of scrupulosity. One author described the experience of scrupulosity as "a thousand frightening fantasies" and yet another author as the "doubting disease." Despite a person's best efforts, despite his absolute commitment to the moral teaching of the Church, and despite his desire to serve the Lord, he is unable to arrive at a point of peace, confident that he's done as much as can reasonably be required.

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Health Care

It is a little known fact that hospital is a Catholic invention.  In the Roman times, Christians in hiding began caring for those who were injured, solders and gladiators alike.  When Christianity became legal, they began to extend this care for the sick in houses of “hospitality”, which means places for strangers or guests.  This tradition was carried on in the monasteries for pilgrims, the poor and the sick.  The first hospital like what we have today was founded by Pope Innocent III in the Middle Ages, which became the model of hospitals all over the world.  The first medical schools were also founded around the same period in Italy.  At the time, hospitals were run by religious orders and there was an extraordinary rule they follow:  The sick was considered their Lord, and those who provided care were servants!  In those days, most of the care was undertaken by the clergy, monks and religious. Their model of care was primarily not technical, but spiritual and pastoral.  As we shall see, this changed with modernity.

The healthcare setting and especially the Catholic hospital can become a privileged place for  evangelization to happen. 

The Christian understanding on suffering is a truth that can offer an authentic relief to those in anguish.  Since we do not “live on bread alone,” there is always a need for love in addition to material healing.  Due to secularization, a gap has been developed between technological progress on the one hand and respect human dignity on the other.  In addition to a technological or managerial solution to illnesses, Christians are called to offer them solidarity, and the hospital can be a profound expression of “teandricity”—a place where God and man encounters each other.   

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Distaste for Suffering

We should not always be eager to escape suffering at all costs.  Embracing suffering can be helpful, even therapeutic.  It defeats the need for pleasure.

By the passionate and unbridled desire of living a life of pleasure, our minds are weakened, and if they do not entirely succumb, they become demoralized and miserably cower and sink under the hardships of the battle of life.

Suffering helps us realize that our earthly lives are temporary and the real goal is to strengthen our will for the good and to defeat evil.  The eternal reward is heaven (everlasting peace). 

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Freedom

We yearn to be free from the sufferings, pains and vicissitudes of life.  The crosses we bear must ultimately give us the strength to shed them

What is true freedom? 

Freedom is what makes man to be man.  Freedom is what distinguishes man from the rest of visible reality—sun, moon, stars, elements, plants and animals.  On the natural level, freedom is man’s greatest gift or quality.

What is freedom?  Freedom is the ability to choose between various goods; it means that man is not determined to one way of acting—the way elements, plants and animals are.  Atheists and believers disagree on many important points, but they agree on the value and importance of freedom.

We all want to be happy and we sense that there is no happiness without love, and no love without freedom.  Love is the gift of self to the other as an act of benevolence, not in order to get something out of it.  That is what we mean by the love of friendship.  Because he is free, man can love and he can make a free gift of himself to the other; animals are not capable of this.

Interior freedom is gained by loving God and one’s neighbor , and by not being inordinately attached to any created thing.  Many people lack this love because they do not have faith and hope.  Faith in God, and his goodness, gives rise to hope, and hope leads to love.

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Mystery

God is mystery.  So are we. 

Man is truly a mystery to himself.  Do we really know who we are?

Our true identity is revealed to us through Christ.  Only in Him can we come to true understanding.

We really do not know ourselves all that well.  We, in fact, are a mystery to ourselves but not to the Lord.   In the light of the love of the Lord we know by faith, there are certain conversations with ourselves that we must renounce.   We should not attend to that self-occupied conversation in which we pat ourselves on the back for our piety.  Neither should we attend to that inner dialogue our ego holds with itself about how unimportant we are.   Neither of conversations of pride or self-pity speak to us with the voice by which the Lord speaks to us in our depths.  Neither of these voices knows the truth about who we are before Christ Jesus.  Neither of these voices understands how much He cherishes us and yearns to share everything with us.

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From Darkness Turn to Jesus

"In the midst of the darkness of this tragedy we turn to the light of Jesus Christ, the light that was evident in the lives of people who immediately turned to help those in need today."

These are the words from Cardinal O'Malley after the tragic event in Boston.  Even though much suffering takes place, peace can come from the grace of Jesus Christ!

Blaming God for Evil

I know many people who lose faith, or don't have faith because of the question suffering and evil in the world.  Some people just can't seem to justify an all-loving God with the presence of evil.

Much evil has nothing to do with God but humanity who uses free will to disregard God's law.  An extreme and horrific example of this is the U.S. abortionist who freely chooses to inflict suffering on others.

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God and Mercy

Pope Francis recently gave insight into how God thinks.  Remember God responds to us always with mercy.

God always thinks with mercy: do not forget this. God always thinks with mercy: our merciful Father. God thinks like a father who awaits the return of his child and goes to meet him, sees him coming when he is still far away ... What does this mean? That each and every day he went out to see if his son was coming home. This is our merciful Father. It is the sign that he was waiting for him from the terrace of his house; God thinks like the Samaritan that does not approach the victim to commiserate with him, or look the other way, but to rescue him without asking for anything in return, without asking if he was Jew, if he was pagan, a Samaritan, rich or poor: he does not ask anything – he does not ask these things, he asks for nothing. He goes to his aid: This is how God thinks. God thinks like the shepherd who gives his life to defend and save his sheep.

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Pope Francis and Pain

Our Holy Father is no stranger to personal pain and suffering.  Perhaps this is the reason he reaches out to others who struggle.  Once he found strength in a nun's declaration that he was "imitating Jesus" through suffering which caused him to reply, "Pain is not a virtue in itself," Bergoglio told his biographers, "but the way that one handles it can be."