FORGIVE THYSELF … My experience as a pilgrim on earth has made me realize how weak one can be without the grace of God. Frequently but unwillingly doing the wrong things and not doing the right things may bring about frustration and depression. However, it is good for the believer to acknowledge the truth that “no sin can stand a planck time before the mercy of God when genuinely confessed and renounced”. The weakeness of the flesh when it neglects the spirit may may lead one to committing an attrocious…
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SHOULD WE FORCE IT?
SHOULD WE FORCE IT? Can there be faith without patience or patience without faith? Many who profess faith today lack patience while many who claim to be patient lack faith. When a locked door is opened with a key and when the same locked door is forcefully opened without a key, the difference in the state of the door after its opening under the above respective imagined situations will be clear. Faith without patience is like forcefully opening a locked door simply because one can’t take the pain to waiting…
Read MoreONLY IN THE DICTIONARY
ONLY IN THE DICTIONARY We in live in world in which people often desire to win a prize but are not ready to stand the pain of the prize. Rome was not built in a day; neither was it finished in the night. There is a fast declining attitude to hard work founded on discipline, intergrity and determination in the modern world. God gave humanity the authority to conquer the universe at creation. God has created the country and has commanded us to make the town. Most times, we await…
Read MoreWISE PREPARATION…
Life embraces different types of preparations. Preparation to get an education, acquire a skill, begin a business, become a celibate, get married, have children, build a house, buy a car, occupy a prestige position, rise to fame, make a meaningful journey of destiny… are well accommodated in life’s room of preparations. We often here people say they are preparing for any of the afore shortlisted preparations above. It is a beautiful thing to prepare well as failure to plan or poor preparation is often a pre-planned failure. However, there is…
Read MoreCONFESSIONAL SECRECY III
Back to our Priest who received the knowledge of his Lunch being poisoned by the same cook who came to confession with him. Though he granted absolution to the penitent; instructing him to dispose the poisoned food as penance, the penitent (cook) refused to dispose the food. Has the priest the right not to eat the food? He may not eat the food SINCE GOD HAS HELPED HIM TO KNOW THAT IT WAS POISONED. The priest in question threw the food away by himself. In the evening of the same…
Read MoreCONFESSIONAL SECRECY II
The Sacrament of Reconciliation is day by day facing different attacks not only from other Christian denominations but more so from this present world of secularism. The different sexual abuses committed by some ministers only fuelled the attack. Confessional is now being viewed by some as a hide out for perpetrators where the sin is confessed with no public penalty or punishment. I once witnessed a City Council Representative addressing the Presbyters of a particular Diocese in the United States of America – stating that if anyone confesses sexual abuse…
Read MoreHEART OF HEARTS: A Reflection on the Solemnity of the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus Christ.
No other organ of the body tells more of us than the heart. The heart is the central organ of life. Life is in the blood and it is the heart that pumps blood to all parts of the body through the blood vessels to make existence possible. When the Word took flesh and dwelt among us, the Heart of hearts was born to die that other hearts might live. As hearts encountered the Heart while with us; hearts experienced true love, forgiveness, joy and peace which brought about spiritual…
Read MoreCONFESSIONAL SECRECY I
JESUS BREATHED ON THEM AND SAID TO THEM, “RECEIVE THE HOLY SPIRIT. “IF YOU FORGIVE THE SINS OF ANY, THEIR SINS HAVE BEEN FORGIVEN THEM; IF YOU RETAIN THE SINS OF ANY, THEY HAVE BEEN RETAINED” (JN. 20:22-23; CF. MATT 16:19) As the priest was about to go for his lunch, someone called him and said someone is desperately in need of confession in the church. He went to the confessional in the church waiting for the penitent. The person came and knelt at the other side saying in a…
Read MoreCONFESSION
I know I am a sinner (Rom 3:23), but I can’t understand why I keep sinning; even when I don’t want to, even after going for confession I still fall into sin. Now, I no longer go for confession. Why confessing to the priest and not God? Being a Christian is an on-going process. No Biblical hero (except Jesus who was also tempted – Heb. 4.15) or Saint who did not struggle with sin and sometimes fell. For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I…
Read MoreLOOK BEYOND THE BREAD AND WINE: A reflection on Corpus Christi.
We celebrate “Corpus Christi” God’s gift of Himself to us in the Person of His Son our Lord Jesus Christ, the centre and summit of our worship and the life in us. The Eucharist has always been with us. In the Old Testament as a figure and in the New Testament as an event. After the institution of the Eucharist by Jesus at the Last Supper, the Eucharist became a sacrament unto us; a prolongation of the event. We are often deceived by the senses not to completely acknowledge the…
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