Love Letters to Lukewarm Souls

How Catholic Worship (aka Mass) Is Different From Non-Catholic's "Worship" (aka Service)     One time in a party, I introduced a family new to our town to an old friend of mine. As we were all having nice conversation of pretty much anything the family needs to expect as newbies, my old friend (a fallen-away Catholic and now an active member of a certain evangelical ecclesiastic community) brought up in the conversation that they have a new pastor in their church that is smart and charismatic, and invited the new family to come and attend their worship service sometime. Now, as a Catholic, I always admire our Non-Catholic brethren's enthusiasm of inviting other people to their church. They always seem to make evangelizing so easy and natural than a Catholic would do the inviting. We can always learn from them, we grant them that. However, I also wonder how come is it this way? How come for some reason inviting someone to a Catholic Mass does not seem to have the sa...

Last Tuesday, we had our Cell Group meeting. Our point of discussion was about Sacrifice. We were sharing what are the sacrifices we can offer so that it may enrich the lives of others, in our family, our work and the community we are in. I felt it was a productive and fruitful discussion as it drives us away from ourselves for once and focus on living sacrificially for others more instead. In a similar sense, whenever we have a community gathering such as today, as I approach worship time, I like to put into heart what St. Paul wrote to the Romans in the very 1 st verse of Chapter 12: “I urge you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God, your spiritual worship.” Worship entails we sacrifice something. Without sacrifice, we are merely venerating or adoring somebody like we do the saints or our Blessed Mother Mary. If you are in a bad day of coming here today (where your heart and your body are in two...