Love Letters to Lukewarm Souls

PART III *Months ago, I was visiting a favorite Catholic website of mine on Facebook and was reading a newly released article about our Blessed Virgin Mary. As I was reading various comments of Catholics regarding the article, I noticed one particular person who appears to be trolling under the comment box, unsolicitedly "refuting" different Catholic teachings to any one who would dare to read his comments and take the bait. As I skimmed through other articles of the site, I was baffled to see that same person trolling the comment boxes again under those respective articles, taking on anybody that challenges his varied assertions and accusations, one Catholic at a time that comes his way like in a one-man-versus-an-army martial arts fighting scene . I started to see his trend. If I recall correctly, he said he used to be Catholic and now belong to some strain of Protestantism (among the roughly 33,000 in existence today) and the Bible alone (Sola Scriptura) is hi...

Charismatic style of worship or popularly known as a Prayer Meeting, in a nutshell, is basically praising God together with fellow members in a Christian community. Usually it starts with an exhortation from the worship leader (to inspire or bring the congregation into the presence of the Holy Spirit), and then followed by fast and slow worship or gospel songs about 4 or 5 tracks. It is originally a Protestant style of worship, fairly novel (early 20th century innovation), and still the main, normative and typical type of worship being done in various Protestant denominations in their Sunday services today. However, this is allowable in Catholic settings as well (gained popularity in the 1960's), approved by Popes including Pope Paul VI, Pope St. John Paul II and others (although not to be substituted or replaced for the Mass), and adopted by Catholic Charismatic groups. I happened to belong to one particular ecumenical Charismatic-based Christian community here in ...

Good afternoon, brothers and sisters. I know the kids are all eager and excited to go trunk or treating this afternoon. So I will try to make it as short and sweet as I can. I’m pretty sure all parents would agree and can relate to this. That children, especially toddlers are utterly free. They don’t worry about anything. For example, my 2 year old son, or even my daughter for that matter, when we go for a ride in the van, they get in their car seats without asking "Where are we going, Daddy?" They fall asleep in those car seats and wake up somewhere else and never wonder what happen last night. My son loves to climb tables, chairs, and shelves like all typical boys do, he even loves to play in the stairs heading down the basement. On a couple of occasion, while he was playing on the stairs, he suddenly threw himself up in the air towards me without warning, catching me off guard. Good thing I caught him, or else I would have been in trouble. So kids are utt...

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...

Good afternoon. Before we begin. Short story. You know my 2 kids, they like to watch YouTube for Kids. (I know bad parenting, right? Give us parents some slack sometimes). Usually what I'll do I cast it on TV using the smartphone, so that they can watch it on TV instead of my phone. Few weeks ago when we were watching while having our meal, the clips that time were from Super Simple Songs (bunch of kids songs, nursery rhymes and original music, animation pretty good, professionally done). And one of the clips that came up was from a song called "The ants go marching". You know how the song goes... The song also teaches kids how to count. It will say one by one, two by two, etc. and they would show ants marching accordingly to those respective numbers. When the song hits seven, the lyrics went: "The little one stops to pray to heaven..." When my 5 year-old daughter heard the words, she laughed at me and said "Ants pray to heaven??" And asked me ...

Good Evening brothers and sisters. Few times I heard over the radio, a 42 year-old evangelist Chris Stefanick, once recount he and his wife had a fight. He said, after a fight with his wife, he was complaining to God "Why does this have to be about her?" "Can it be about me?" and God spoke to him in his heart. GOD said: "You have every right to make it all about you, to put your own needs 1st, you have every right to be average, to be ordinary and not to become a Saint." Suffice to say he retracted his prayer and in retrospect he think God wasn't only calling him to Holiness but to happiness. I think it is a good reminder for me being in the community as well, especially whenever I find myself complaining in my service, why do I have to sacrifice my family time and personal life for others, why cant I just do the bare minimum and just sit on the sideline? I always have the choice to make it all about me, to be average, to be ordinary. Come t...

On abuse and sex scandals in the Catholic Church For 2,000 years, the fact that bad priests or popes, scandals and corruptions had NOT been able to destroy the Catholic church is proof that the church was founded by Jesus Christ. Holding on to His promise in Matthew 16:18 that "You are Peter, and on this rock I will build my Church. And the gates of the underworld can never overpower it."  © EWTN 2018-3-1 Get paid to share your links!

CATHOLIC 101 Is Infant Baptism Biblical? © EWTN 2016-3-24

HISTORY We find it from the Fathers of the Church as early as the 2nd century (thousands of years before any other denominations were born). In the 4th century, St Basil said that the apostles 'taught us to mark with the sign of the cross those who put their hope in the Lord.' At first the cross was traced on the forehead and later evolved to include marking the breast and each shoulder as well. It was Pope Leo IX in the mid 9th century that gave instruction on making the practice what it still is today. WHY WE DO IT? It is far from just a gesture or worse, a superstition. Each time we sign ourselves with the Cross (the symbol of our salvation), we are asking for God's blessing and remembering our baptismal promises. (Matthew 28:19  Go, therefore...  baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the H oly Spirit.) CATHOLICS DID NOT INVENT SIGNS & SYMBOLS Outward signs are important to human beings. The use of symbols and signs is innatel...

Catholic Basics Series (Post #3) Why do Catholics emphasize Mary so much? Catholics believe that WORSHIP is due to God ALONE. Catholics do, however, VENERATE Mary. In other words, we HONOR our Blessed Mother with great reverence and devotion because she is the MOTHER OF GOD. Mary is the model of perfect love and obedience to Christ. God preserved Mary from sin, and she conceived our Lord by the power of the Holy Spirit, bringing Christ into our world. Catholics can’t help but honor the Blessed Virgin Mary, who is full of grace, the Mother of God and our Mother, for her “yes” to God that made the Incarnation possible. And without the Incarnation, we would not have salvation. Mary is the most beautiful model of total submission to the will of God. Catholics do not view Mary as equal to Christ, but rather venerate Mary because of her relationship to Christ. The Catechism of the Catholic Church explains, “Mary’s role in the Church is inseparable from her union with Ch...

Catholic Basics Series (Post#2) Matthew 16:18 is key to understanding Christ’s intent to pass on the authority to lead the Church to Peter and the apostles. Christ tells Peter that he is the rock on which He will build His church. When Catholics use the term apostolic succession, they are referring to the line of bishops that stretches all the way back to the apostles—to Peter—the first Pope. Apostolic tradition (the authentic teaching of the apostles) was handed from Christ to the apostles, and from them to their successors. This unbroken line of popes (the bishops of Rome) and all other bishops have guided the Church for the past 2,000 years, just as Christ intended (Matthew 28:19-20).  Christ sent His apostles out into the world with authority to teach and heal (Luke 9:1-2) and to forgive sins (John 20:23). This God-given authority is exercised by the bishops within the Catholic Church to this day. Here's the historical list of Pope from Peter down to cur...

Catholic Basics Series (Post #1)   The Catholic Church is the only church today that can claim to be the one church founded by Jesus Christ 2,000 years ago. Other denominations (collectively known as Protestants) can trace their origins back to various human founders at a later date in history (as early as 16th century with the exception of Eastern Orthodox in 1054) . Nice to know stuff: Catholicism is the largest faith community in the world (more than 1.2 billion) The Catholic church is the one that collected and compiled the Bible. For 2,000 years, the Catholic church has fed, clothed, and housed more people in need than any group or institution in history. The Catholic church founded the first school/education system. The Catholic church founded the first hospital/health care system. The church has been the largest benefactor of arts. The church remains the world's premier institutional defender of human rights. Peter is the very first Pope, appointed ...

I believe that Catholics should always go back to the basics if we haven't done so. To simply go back to the basics of our faith--why we practice what we practice, why we believe what we believe--and joyfully share the numerous treasures of our church to other nominal Catholic framily (friends and family) as well as non-Catholics brothers and sisters in Christ. I believe one of the major reasons why we Catholics are easily turned off or many turned away from the faith and are easily persuaded by others is because we don't know, perhaps don't even care about knowing and learning the faith we grew up with. Then when other religions question us, instead of going back to seek for answers, we ended up questioning the faith along with them. It is like criticizing and judging someone for his actions, without knowing the root cause, the history of it first. We Catholics are also seemingly not very good salesmen and women of faith, either. Plagued with non-Catholic stereotype and...

© 2003 Excerpt from "I Can Serve": A Community Journal written on 2003, 7th of June For us trying to lovingly draw our dear friends deeper to God, we may hear these responses: “I’d rather rest than spend time in church or join a Christian community.” “I know people from a Christian community who are not good examples. They don’t practice what they preach. They still live in sin. They get angry, they speak bad words, they hurt people. Why should I join?” “I’m also a member already of a sorority (or a fraternity or a club). They’re all the same as yours. We help the poor, we conduct self-development programs, etc. sometimes even more extensive and financially-organized than Christian communities.” “I’m ok and happy with my life. Why should I complicate it further by spending on spiritual affairs inconvenient and a waste of my time and schedules. I help out my friends in need better than they do.” Many of our friends and relatives right now, as I speak...