Youth 2000 Meditation.

[I apologize ahead of time that this entry is again long, arduous, unorganized, and, if anything else, vague; but such is the nature of the topic of discussion at this moment, I will write another entry completing this meditation, perhaps with more vivid story telling. But right now, I seek to understand and analyze, so abstract-ness is probably better. As far as vagueness goes, you know what I am talking about if you know what I am talking about, I made it that way.]

Youth 2000 is a retreat organized by the Franciscan Friars of Renewal from the Diocese of New York. This retreat is usually held in the Diocese of Fort Worth in Texas and many of the North Texans come to this event to enrich and grow in their spiritual life.

The last time I went on this retreat, I was a high schooler, and still trying to understand my faith and reconciling that with my life. And I don't remember much details from that retreat. Several things took place in my life since last Christmas and the New Year befell, and I felt drawn and compelled to attend this retreat, though I do have my reservations and in my mind, I wondered how much spiritual growth I would obtain. Actually, at the same time I am afraid of the growth that I might get, implying responsibility and suffering. Surprisingly, in many ways it has given me much food for thought and meditation -- that perhaps will take me years to unravel my experience this past weekend.

The Eucharist is exposed during the entire weekend of the retreat until the Mass of Divine Mercy on Sunday. And Adoration is perpetual except during Mass. And after my years at college, I realize that this retreat has so much love of Jesus packed into it, my head is kind of in shock and ache right now as I sit in front of my laptop typing out my experience. I wanted to share a small part of my experiencing of this retreat. And some of the things that I had been meditating on.

It is importantly that I recall some things that was on my mind. These were my reading reflections from Fulton Sheen, Frank Sheed, Christopher West, and JPII. It sort of sets up my mind frame right now and when I was meditating on Saturday (I put them in one big paragraph, so you can skip over for time's sake):

Jesus was the only man in history Who's birth is to foreshadow His suffering, His Cross, and His Resurrection. No other man was born to die as He did. Why did our Blessed Lord have to do this? Because God loves us. It is a Love that is infinite. Think of the biggest number you got, and it's bigger than that. Well, God's Love is so great for us, humans, that He is willing to take on the form of human flesh and blood -- to experience what we experience, to see, to hear, to eat, to drink, and to suffer -- to redeem us to His Grace. Why? Because human kind fell from that original state of innocence when they took bite out of the tree of knowledge of good and evil. Adam and Eve, from a state of innocence in "solitude, unity, and sacred nakedness" (TOB, C. West) lived with God's glory shining through them. And in the original state of innocence, when God created male and female, He blessed them and told them to be fruitful and to multiply. And God did so, creating humans in male and female, in His Divine image of the Trinity. The Father loves the Son, and the Son is obedient to the Father in His love, and from thence, this Love overflows and is the Holy Spirit. Three persons, but one nature, the Divine. And such Love, as unseen as any one on earth could ever imagine or feel, are not altogether unreachable. For in the image of the male and the female persons, God in His infinite wisdom, placed marks and signs of reminder to the Divine Trinitarian Love. And it is in this love that the union between Adam and Eve in the beginning was so. And in that grievous Fault, Adam and Eve became ashamed and obstructed of this love. [My use of language here is very loose, paraphrasing from what I remembered, and it is jumping around because it is my train of thought unedited]. Why? Well, before the Fall, in the beginning, man and woman see and know each other without fear and without reserve, because their love is that of selfless giving, out of their freedom in total giving of self to each other. The urges of lust had not entered into the picture, nor has the idea of using one another as means to pleasure been there. And when man and woman first sow fig leaves to cover themselves, this complete, total, selfless giving is obstructed by lust and other sins. And the glory of God certainly could not permeate through our First Parents as such, when the truth of love is rejected. And the mission of the Christ, our blessed Lord, is to redeem this "fallen nature" of ours, and to bring again to union that Divine Love with the human flesh, as is evident in His Incarnation. And it is precisely in His act of selfless giving, completely out of free will, that Jesus demonstrated to us what love is like before sin. And any union between Man and Woman, must necessarily again, follow this principle for it to be holy.

-- Back to my actual thoughts --

Such were the some of the ideas on my mind on Saturday. I said a prayer for love during Mass and asked God what does He want of me after Holy Communion. Well, throughout the night, and even back during in the day also, God spoke to me in many different ways. But one thing that came to my mind, when Jesus passed by me, during the Eucharist Procession, was the love that God has for me. And it is in that precise manner of love that He expected in return from me -- total giving of the self, in my free will -- to love. And it is in that precise moment that I realized that I don't know if I could totally give of myself without kicking and screaming, and all sorts of misery!

And I was afraid, how could I say that I love God but unable to say to God that I am will to give of myself freely to all that He wills? But I realize that I do not love God any less than I did just a minute ago, but there seemed to be more distance now. And in reflection, how can I say that I love someone, if I cannot give of myself freely without reserve? And I keep telling myself that for one I would -- but then what about the Holy One of the Lord? There seems to be a slight disconnect between my love for Jesus and my love for another. I could say with some degree of certainty that if another had asked me of anything, I would have done with all my being, what is asked of me, well, except in the case where Jesus and the other would ask for this other same thing. Coming back, I do not know if I could say with the same degree of certainty that if Jesus had asked of me that of my love, the same very "love" that I claimed to have, would drive me to do all things.

I know this is vague, but in essence, there is a disconnect between my love of a creature and my love of the Creator. The creature is a sign, a reminder to us, a road sign if you will of how far Heaven is, and what it is like in the Divine Love of God. But if I am obstructed by the road sign, I cannot see the road further. Similarly, I cannot myself be obstructing others on my journey, lest God strike me down for such attempts. But it feels to me that in this day and age, it is already hard enough to find love that satisfies, and that it is immensely more so increasing in difficult to seek that perfect Love of God. I recognize this, and try really hard to always ask the Holy Spirit to guide my thoughts that they may be centered on God. But in life, there ensues a much harder struggle.

The struggle sets in tihs delinma that we are all called to seek that perfect Love, and ask God for that strength, but unless I myself would open my heart to let the Holy Spirit in to guide me in practicing and loving God in all that I am, my faith life is lacking and miserable. But the reverse is also true, because in the giving of self, I would have to sacrifice what I had, what I have, and what I might have in the future, which I realized is the hardest thing to give up of, which makes me equally miserable. I guess it is the problem of obedience versus free will. If I were to be obedient, which is quite easy for me to do in various occasions, growing up in the Asian families trains most kids to be automatic in such issues, I no longer contemplate of my "free will". And in matters that I do, it seems like my obedience binds me in chains and sometimes to things I do not desire but otherwise of guilt and shame for not doing so.

Contrary to most people's experience about finding peace in that "moment" of confirmation, or the retreat high that people get, this is not to say the retreat is bad, I came out affirming my faith, but with a huge bag of questions, thoughts, and anxieties that I had not thought of before. In fact, I find all the singing during Adoration to be quite distracting with the hand motions, it takes away my mind from Jesus and my contemplations. And I do have to say, at the conclusion of the retreat, God had given me what I asked for when I set out to come to Youth 2000. I'm still in the kicking and screaming mode -- and possibly false rationalization stage...

I'm gonna need some major prayers on this one...maybe I have always needed this big prayer, just that I am way to distracted by other stuff...and have finally come to the realization of this "ship" that I am.


TMH

Our Lady of Guadalupe, pray for us!

Struggles. Point of Divergence.

I realize that I'm behind on my second discussion on career and all, but I feel that this is much more relevant to my thoughts and feelings right now. I will return to my discussion on my career soon. (Note the use of the word "soon", that could mean anything in today's term...hehe)

Anycase, I wish to discuss Struggles in life. To clarify, in looking at one's life, we don't always see one consistent image, if it was so, that person is probably really boring...I don't know, humans make mistake -- and I don't have to say much more about that. History itself is a living proof of the statement. But this is where many have drawn their observation on when the life of one is evaluated, but more importantly in one's own self-examination, do we see ripples? Do we see struggles in life, against those vices that we're born with? Do we struggle against those things that we undo us of our humanity? It is an a testament of our will more so than our accomplishments while on this earth.

Many people think of those who are religious, and particularly of Christians, are so holy and pure. True is, not so much, maybe for one that is very much sheltered, that is someone who lives in their own world segregated from the rest of the world. I cannot say if being sheltered is a good thing or not, but even the sheltered ones will have flaws and problems that they struggle with -- so are the so-called Christians. A friend of mine once divided up the people attending Mass at church into segments of people: the pious hypocrites, the Christians wanna-be, the friend-seekers, and this and that. Well, that is perhaps so, who doesn't struggle? We Christians proclaims the Gospel of Truth and Love, and that Gospel is the exact thing we believe will set us free from these earthly struggles we experience. We're not immune from it. And that is the main point -- we are Christians because we have heard of the Gospel, the Good News, of the Lord -- of Life after death, of family in Heaven, of Love unbound -- one that transcends time and space, even death! That good news is our risen Lord -- Jesus Christ. And in following Him, we give of ourselves away to God's purpose. But we're human, not some perfect machine, and more importantly, we are given free will.

It is through our utmost will that we put forth our life in communion with God's will. And there are the times when we fall -- we become the hypocrites. Funny thing is, some of us are better at hiding our vices than others. So here comes the often sentiments that if someone is a priest they are pure and holy and can never make mistakes -- well, I beg to differ.

Life without struggle -- however pure and however nice -- doesn't provide testimony of one's life. And demanding any religious person to not have any faults or desires of their own -- is just as foolish as those religious ones that condemns those without religions. But further, to take advantage of one suffering of one's own gain, and to demand them to endure the suffering due to their believe thereof, against ones free will, is an outcry to community, to society as a whole.

If anything these four years in college has taught me to embrace my own faults and stand back up to fight another day, to submit myself fully and completely to God's love. A friend of mine loved this line from Mother Teresa -- to be a pencil in God's hands. If anything, what I've learned is that this pencil will break and dull from time to time, and it definitely need some sharpenin'. A pencil that never break -- well, is not a pencil, and one that is broken and not sharpened just need a hand to make it new. And no one can promise a pleasant and easy sharpening process, in fact, it will probably hurt like world's gonna end...but that's where life begins -- if you catch my drift.

I'm not saying though that you go out and make mistakes and what not, but rather, every time it happens, sharpen that pencil and bring yourself back to the line -- get ready to start over again.

What is the meaning of life you ask me? Well, today my answer is -- to struggle and not be strangled.

TMH