The healing of a crippled beggar took place at the Temple gate called Beautiful. This made me reflect on beauty and its power to heal. Beauty attracts first, then captivates, and heals. Such is the power of beauty. But why and how? Let's find out from...
This title is in quotation marks because it is not mine but Bishop Robert Barron's simple way of explaining the mysterious change of the substances of bread and wine into the Body and Blood of Jesus during the Holy Mass. This changed-reality is called Transubstantiation...
This is the English of "Quien a Dios tiene nada le falta". This was forgotten in last week's Shalom where St. Teresa's Spanish six-line poem "Nada te turbe" was reproduced. There are many similar translations in our tradition of spirituality. To St. Teresa of Avila...
St. Teresa of Avila, a 16th century Spanish Carmelite nun, a reformer of the Carmelite Order, and a doctor of the Church, wrote a short poem in her own penmanship and language which has become famous even today. It is considered a very profound basis...
I had a funny but meaningful experience last April 13, Monday after Easter Sunday. Fr. Joel Caasi, parish priest of San Lorenzo Parish, Talomo, Davao City, sent me 3 dressed chicken! An hour before he had inquired about my present situation at my residence, which I...
Last week's Shalom article cited Pope Francis' words from no. 88 of his Evangelii Gaudium (Joy of the Gospel. NB. The original was written in Spanish). The words are "revolution of tenderness". I added the thought that this kind of strong social change would be...
In the last paragraph of last week's Shalom, I wrote: "So, can we get close to knowing something of God's will by being Awake, Alert, Aware? Is it possible to experience such intimacy in moments like this happening called Covid-19? The answer is Yes. I...
This has become a very common and popular saying among people. Being expressed in the negative it sounds hallow. The positive form sounds immediate and real: "Everything that happens has a reason." As it sounds now for Church people it stands as a moral and spiritual...
For believers, people with faith in the unseen, like almost all Filipinos, a human being lives in, and with, two realities: the temporal or transitory realities and the eternal realities. Of the first we are easily aware; of the second, we are not. We can...
In the promotion of the culture of dialogue (see also Nota Bene), we often take for granted the importance of good presence. This does not mean that you and your dialogue partner can see, hear or touch each other. Nor does it mean your distance...