Tag: 2014

We are the Easter People

Tina Leave a comment

I don’t know about you, but there’s really something about this particular Easter season that has me…well, joyful.

I suppose Easter is reason enough to be joyful, but in the past years, after Easter Sunday has come to a close, I go back to the daily grind, and well, forget that it is still Easter. I go back to work, to everyday life, and go back to my old struggles, like Easter didn’t happen at all.

But this year, I don’t know. I go to mass, and every time we pray the Regina Coeli, or recite Glory to God, I start tearing up. I love it when the priest says “Alleluia” at the end of his blessing, and I say, “Thanks be to God, alleluia, alleluia” back. I love it, and every time I remember the victory of Easter, I couldn’t stop smiling and singing inside because…well, it’s Easter!

I suppose it is because of knowing that I am truly forgiven and all. And I suppose it’s because this Easter is a stark contrast from last Easter, where everyday was a struggle to believe in the victory of Christ’s resurrection.

I remember reading somewhere, probably on Twitter, last year that Easter is the longest season in the church for a reason. I guess it’s because we frail and imperfect humans need a reminder that Jesus’ resurrection is really important, and it is a real cause for celebration. So we should celebrate. We should remember, and we should live it, until it gets ingrained in our hearts even after Easter is over. I mean, the resurrected Christ could have just showed up for a week, and then ascended, but He chose to stay with the people to teach them and equip them for 50 days. And what’s more, even after His ascension, He sends the Holy Spirit to prepare us even more and remind us that Hey, you are neveralone.

How amazing is that.

I guess one of the reasons why this Easter feels different is because…well, it is. It’s like I am finally waking up, like I have finally reached something and I am about to start a new journey.

It’s so incredibly exciting.

So yeah, it’s still Easter. And if you had a particularly good and blessed Holy Week and you’re wondering where it all went, remember this: IT IS STILL EASTER. There is still a lot of reasons for us to sing Hallelujah. :)

do-not-abandon-yourselves-to-despair-we-are-the-easter-people-and-hallelujah-is-our-song-pope-john-paul-ii

And today, the second Sunday of Easter, there is cause for more joy. It’s Divine Mercy Sunday (which I would write about in another blog post, but I think this one from Lifeteen has it covered :D), and the canonization of two Popes, Blessed John XXIII and Blessed John Paul II.

Truth be told, I knew nothing about Blessed John XXIII until recently, but I’m starting to read up about him and he’s pretty awesome, too. But JP2…he was the first Pope I knew in my lifetime. If you know me in real life, you know how much I love JP2, and how every time I read or watch something about him, I start crying. I didn’t get to see him when he was in Manila for World Youth Day 1995 because I was too young to appreciate it, but I knew, even in my young heart, that he was a great and good man. More than a decade later, when I started praying and preparing for WYD 2011, I asked for his intercession everyday for the pilgrimage. And I believe that it was because of his intercession that the WYD dream finally came true. :)

I love it that JP2 knew what it is to be an Easter person, to have Jesus’ resurrection in his heart and to believe in the love that redeemed us from the depths of our sin. This is a person who knew and believed in God’s mercy and grace, and lived it his whole life even in the face of death. This is someone who knows how to take delight for real, and who loves fully because he is loved.

So yeah, this Easter is definitely something. :) And we’re only just in the first week! Hallelujah, indeed.

Happy Divine Mercy and Canonization Sunday, everyone! St. John XXIII and St. John Paul the Great, pray for us! :)

My name is Forgiven

Tina 2 Comments

As soon as the Easter Vigil was done on midnight of Sunday morning, I felt an overwhelming sense of joy. It’s Easter, people! The tomb is empty! Jesus is risen! The Glory of God has defeated the night! Hallelujah!

And it was an amazing kind of joy, of delight, to know that it is Easter and Jesus is victorious, as He always is. Over the Holy Week, I pondered over how his disciples must have felt, right after Jesus expired on the cross. I couldn’t even fathom the idea of their pain, of their sense of loss and how life could possibly be after their friend was buried in the tomb. They didn’t know that Jesus was going to rise on Sunday. Jesus spoke of it, but I’m sure it was hard to understand then. What’s all this rising again mumbo-jumbo? Why is our friend speaking of death? Surely he didn’t mean it that way.

Then I realized that I actually knew that pain. I felt it, too. I felt it in a miniscule way when every time I was disappointed, I felt it in a bigger way in the times when my heart got broken. I knew a variation of that pain, that sense of loss in realizing that what I had known for the past few days, weeks, months, years is just…gone. And there is nothing I can do to get it back.

Of course I knew that pain.

Earlier in Holy Week, I was reflecting on Jesus’ pain as the week went by. Apparently, Holy Wednesday is also known as Spy Wednesday, because it was day when Judas went to the Pharisees to turn Jesus in. The Gospel that day felt like a knife to my heart:

Then one of the twelve, named Judas Iscariot, went to the chief priestsand said, “What are you willing to give me to betray Him to you?” And they weighed out thirtypieces of silver to him.From then on he began looking for a good opportunity to betray Jesus. (Matthew 24:14-16)

I could only imagine Jesus’ pain then, knowing that one of his closest friends betrayed him. For thirty pieces of silver. There was so much pain for him in the next few days, but I think the pain of this betrayal — and Peter’s later denial — was even worse than the pain of the crown and the scourging and the nails.

How terrible it is to be betrayed by a friend.

Even more terrible when I realized that there is very little difference between me and Judas.

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That one place

Tina 1 Comment

I was deep into making an Osaka-Kyoto itinerary the other day for our upcoming Japan trip this May when I realized that I was actually falling in like with the country during my research. I’ve always been curious about Japan, but I’m not one of those people who just really want to go there. I mean, sure, there was a time when I liked my share of anime, and I tried to learn some Japanese words, but those faded away, and I didn’t really put Japan in the places I really must go to.

Then my friends booked us a flight, and as with almost all my travels, I just went, Hey, why not? Let’s go. 

So there. I started planning an itinerary so we had options, and as I did my research, the excitement grew. I know nothing about the country except for what my friends who have been there told me, and as I read and read and read and figured out their train systems (I loooove trains) so we could get from one point to another, I started looking forward to it. So much that I was already thinking that I would probably go back, just so I could go and experience the other things we might miss.

And then I started thinking about how some people I know have that one place. You know, the one place they keep on going back to, the one place they would always visit and come back to. It doesn’t have to be another country — it could just be another province — but it’s their place. Their own place, the one that feels like home even if it’s so far away from their real home.

Then I wondered: where is my place?

Image from we heart it, edited by me, words from Kristen Hubbard's Wanderlove
Image from we heart it, edited by me, words from Kristen Hubbard’s Wanderlove

Sometimes it feels like I’m so late in the game, especially since I know of younger people who really pursue their passion to travel. It’s not that I’m really old, or that I didn’t travel when I was younger. I mean, if there’s any time that’s easier to travel, it’s now, with all the seat sales and travel blogs and such. It’s just that sometimes, I feel that maybe I should have started a few more years back — perhaps when I started at my first job or something like that. Which wasn’t really that feasible, now that I think about it, because I didn’t earn much back then. I only get to travel now because my job pays me well. I just wish that I could have been to other countries and places when I was 23, 24. That I was brave enough to go on my own, or that I could have dragged friends and family to go with me wherever back then.

But then again…it’s never too late, right?

Ramble, ramble. My point is, I want to have my place, too. That place where I would always go to, the one that feels like home even if I didn’t grow up there. The one I would always return to, and the one that would be my default place to travel whenever I feel the itch to go and still be amazed at the new things I discover despite the number of times I’ve been there. I want to have that.

I wonder where it is. That place. My place. Could it be in Japan? Could it be Thailand, or Cambodia? (Hello, October Indochina trip! Thank you, Cebu Pacific seat sale! :D) Australia? NYC, perhaps? (Haha, why not. :P) Or maybe it is in Europe? (Oh, I would go back in a heartbeat, if I can!)

Or maybe it’s just in the next province? Palawan? Batanes? Davao? Ilocos? Dumaguete?

Hmm. I guess the only way I’ll find out is if I go there. :)