Recognizing That my Brother is not my Enemy

We pray for the strength to forgive. We pray for the patience to interact. We pray to forget the wrongs dealt to us so that we may move forward. But how often do we still view those around us as the enemy we must pray for?

The Bible speaks about enemies and how we must treat our enemies with respect and forgiveness. Here are a few of the most common verses:

"Do not rejoice when your enemies fall into trouble. Don't be happy when they stumble." Proverbs 24:17

"If your enemies are hungry, give them food to eat. If they are thirsty, give them water to drink." Proverbs 25:21

"But I say, don't resist an evil person! If you are slapped on the right cheek, turn the other, too." Matthew 5:39

"But if you are willing to listen, I say, love your enemies. Do good to those who hate you." Luke 6:27

I pray for harmony and peace within the lives of my enemies, but are they truly enemies? The enemies spoken in the Bible are those who do not believe like Christians through their words or actions. That is to say, not all non-Christians are evil people and not all Christians are good people. But how we treat others speaks volume for how we are brought up and what we believe.

At the end of the day, our brother and sister aren't our enemies. Our enemies are those who tear us away from God, who threaten our belief in the Christ, who diminish our faith or desire to be faithful. Our true enemies are those individuals, and even things, that weaken our relationship with God.

If a friend hurts you, forgive them and reconcile. If you hurt your mother, seek forgiveness and reconcile. Even if you are not in a position to reconcile, recognize that the people who hurt you and who you hurt are not enemies in our sense of the word. Making a mistake doesn't make someone your enemy.

Clinging to temporary wrongs is what holds us back. I am extremely flawed in this department. I think my most prominent enemies are lost friends, ex-boyfriends, and mean co-workers or strangers. But that's not true. They are my brothers and sisters, and our relationships should be healed in order to better love and forgive in the future.

Forget the pain they inflicted, but leave behind naivety. Do not expect relationships to magically go back to where they were before your mistake. Your brothers and sisters need your spiritual support like you need theirs. Faith is best served in a community, but how can we have community when we think everyone is the enemy?

My brother is not my enemy. In fact, me treating my brother in this way hinders my relationship in Christ, and my inability to forgive and reconcile has made me an enemy against myself.

My Lord, may you bless us with Your never-ending strength. May we strive to better ourselves to better represent You and Your goodness. You forgive us, so may we forgive others in this unrelenting way. We are flawed, but we are still Your children, and as our Father, may You discipline us to be men and women who serve and love all people in Jesus' name. Amen.

Authentically Me: Grace with Maturity and St. Teresa of Avila

My prayer and self goal for 2018 is to seek and welcome peace into my mind, heart, and soul in whatever form God wills. I've struggled with impatience all my life, but recently, I feel impatient about where I am in life. I'm turning 26 this year, and by this point, I expected to be married, have babies, and live in my own house. But our timing does not match God's timing.

Feeling Graced

I started my faith journey when I was 20. I knew I wouldn't be sold overnight, but for some reason, I expect to be transformed overnight when I pray for peace, grace, and mercy. I want to feel free of anger and hurt, but just like I wasn't hurt from a single event, I can't expect to move on from it from a night's sleep.

I think for most of us, we don't want to feel graced in the sense that we're perfect. I think it's simpler: we want to feel graced to know that we don't need these negative feelings and memories to trap us into the devil's hands. When we constantly feel and remember the Lord, the devil has less of a hold on us. We're not made to be perfect, but God created us to be kind, loving, humble, and helpful. He did not intend for us to live in the sins of revenge, addiction, anger, and cruelty. 

For me, it was learning about how to accept grace and change gradually. Just like I won't obtain all my dreams on the same day, I won't obtain the best version of myself after one prayer session. However, with this realization, comes the understanding that waiting requires maturity. 

Maturity and St. Teresa of Avila's Example

I'm in the middle of reading 15 Days of Prayer with St. Teresa of Avila by Jean Abiven. On pages 22 to 23, Abiven explains one of our problems with waiting on God's transformation for us:

"First, [Lord Jesus] teach[es] us to be patient. We cannot make a plant grow by pulling on its leaves. It takes time for fruit to reach maturity. It accomplishes nothing to force the process. In the same way, we do not reach the stature of a perfect person in Christ overnight. Lord, You are patient with us because You are strong, and You know that You have to wait until Your time. And ours." 

St. Teresa is my patron saint, and her life involved a series of slipping from grace and having to reach it again. It wasn't until she was about 40 that she permanently managed to change her life to God completely and without desire to slip again. She had been a Catholic her entire life, but it took 40 years for her to become the woman God designed her to be.

This is the same for us. God wants us to transform based on His timeline, but it also depends on when we mature for the role He created. Maturity comes in the forms of forgetting the pain, smiling after betrayal, and strengthening relationships after we've been hurt. We cannot help someone if we're still clinging to the emotional pain they may have inflicted. It's not until we help for the sake of kindness that God moves us forward.

Maturity doesn't necessarily come with age, but experience. This is why people with the most maturity are usually older because they've had time to experience more. But there are young adults who are mature because they've seen things that were so traumatic or experienced such large events that they grew into the person they're meant to be sooner.

I want to change instantly, but that doesn't mean I'm emotionally, mentally, or spiritually ready. I need to be patient. If I am still angry, it could be because I'm overlooking the true reasons why I feel this way. Or, I am not allowing myself to be freed because I'm giving into temptation. Either way, something inside me needs to mature before I can move forward.

May the Lord allow us all to become our authentic selves in the way He intended. I pray you all experience the love of Christ Jesus and better understand yourselves and Him. May God be praised, Amen.

Praise to the Lord

Dear Heavenly Father,
I cannot stop being astounded by your great works.
You bring peace to my mind,
joy to my heart,
and peace to my life.
How you continue to raise me up after I have tried to bury myself I do not know.
But you are good, merciful, and here for me always.
Thank you my Lord
Thank you
Thank you
Thank you.
I would be lost without you. I would be alone, scared, and hopeless,
but you restore me to yourself and your grace.
Thank you.
Praise be to God!
Praise be to the risen Christ!
Praise him! Praise his masterful works!
I am your child who cannot learn from her mistakes,
yet you love me.
I am your servant who fails to complete the work,
yet you forgive me.
Please do not forsake me and your loving children.
We need you all the days of our lives,
from the moment we meet you spiritually until we meet you finally.
Thank you
Thank you
Thank you Father.
May all the people of this earth know you, seek you, find you,
and praise you.
My heart will burst from your goodness.
You rid my fear of the past and stress of the future
that I may live here, in the present, with you.
Praise be to God, our Lord, King of Heaven and earth.
Thanks be to God.
Amen.

Idolatry: Relationships

Being single makes it easy to focus on yourself. If you want to go out, you don't have to confer with someone else. There's no deliberating about food, chores, or money. There's also much more time to explore your relationship with God. Unfortunately for me, I always leave behind my relationship with God when I get into a new romantic relationship.

New Priorities 

Often times, we treat new relationships like the most important thing in our lives. I always make my boyfriend a priority so that he has a better idea of the kind of wife I would be. However, we all know that people will take advantage of too much kindness even without intention. I end up giving my all to showcase my love and sincerity, and each time I am rejected because they don't want to give it their all.

I had a boyfriend once tell me to not be too involved until marriage, but then, I worry that when I am married, the man won't change and I'll forever be treated like an after thought. I think that by giving my all, they will do the same and thus prove to the both of us that we're right for each other.

However, making someone my personal priority is one thing, but making them the ultimate priority is another. No man should come before my Lord; in fact, not even my future children should. As found in Psalm 127:3, "Children are a gift from the Lord; they are a reward from Him." My children belong to God first, and He will (hopefully) entrust me with children to raise in His name. But if my children come before God, I will fail them by showing an example of pushing God away for earthly relationships. It is possible to be available and still love God first.

Breaking my Idol

I treat boyfriends like idols, and that is God's greatest commandment: "Do not worship any other gods before me" (Exodus 20:3). I put my romantic relationships above everything. I still attend church, but my prayer and reading life suffers because I dedicate my free time to them. I would only get involved with my faith life when I knew I had no other plans.

The problem is, I know how my life is different when I'm single instead of dating. I see now, especially with this blog, my growth in the last few months. I also know how deep in my studies I was before my last relationship. The lesson I need to remember is that those I choose to date will not offer me the security and love that God already has. 

It's not easy to break this mindset. Some people do it with their children, parents, or favorite celebrities and athletes. It's hard to remember that while we must care for those around us, they do not need to be treated like royalty. And more importantly, we must not spoil individuals who would never return the treatment. That in turn breaks us emotionally as well as spiritually, and then we are not in any shape to care for others.

It's not easy to give up idols because we treat them like a god. But I assure everyone that these boyfriends never gave me the peace, love, and forgiveness like the Lord. Perhaps God has left me single to help me learn this lesson permanently, that with my next relationship, I will maintain my faith and keep my man in an earthly place of endearment. 

May God give us guidance to remember Him first. Amen. 

Authentically Me: Realizing My Need for Detachment

My prayer and self goal for 2018 is to seek and welcome peace into my mind, heart, and soul in whatever form God wills. I have talked on end about my anger and how it attributes to bitterness in my current and previous relationships (even if previous relationships are only scenarios played in my head), but something reached out to me in 15 Days of Prayer with St. Teresa of Avila: in order to truly follow God, we need to practice detachment to everything in this life, including people.

How Detachment Can Help

Firstly, detachment from all material things and people does not mean selling your home and car and leaving your family for spiritual training in a remote part of the world. While some are called to the religious life, most of us are needed for evangelizing and discipleship within our family, work place, and community. The kind of detachment that helps us in coming closer to God is the acceptance that no one and nothing comes before our relationship with the Lord.

To paraphrase 15 Days of Prayer with St. Teresa of Avila, St. Teresa encourages three steps to feel happy and fulfilled: love for one another, detachment from things, and true humility (Abiven 47-53). Love for one another means that we strive to love each other like Jesus loves all people. True humility brings us closer to God within our heart and soul and strengthens the love we have for others. While both of these are great starting places, the detachment from worldly things reached out to me first.

Detachment means not loving money or food or success over our Lord, but what about with people? Detachment doesn't mean cutting out everyone (although most of us probably think this will be the easiest option). Rather, detachment means not holding anyone over the Lord and even over others. Children are loans from God, but so are our parents, our spouses, and our friends. Our love for them must always be second place to God, or we risk setting God aside for them.

My Need for Detachment

I hold a lot of regret in my soul, and something a friend told me this past weekend was that she reached a point in a toxic relationship where she finally dropped to her knees and asked God to take the burden off her shoulders. For her, it was reconciliation.

For my previous romantic relationship, I haven't spoken to him in a few weeks and I avoid the places he goes. I know I still hold hurt in my heart, so I do my best to maintain distance so that I do not end up saying something in anger I would regret. 

However, there are also relationships I have that I hold higher than others because of the loyalty these individuals have given me. While I love them, I am constantly being reminded, from this book and others, that my love for them shouldn't be so great that I place them in the same height that I do my Savior. 

In order to love all people equally in the way that Jesus does, I need to forgive and to equalize all my relationships. I know I am able to say yes or no to a request ("Just say a simple, 'Yes, I will,' or 'No, I won't.' Your word is enough" [Matthew 5:38]; "But most of all, dear brothers and sisters, never take an oath, by heaven or earth or anything else. Just a simple yes or no so that you will not sin and be condemned for it" [James 5:12]). It all comes down to not automatically saying yes or no depending on who the individual is and the kind of relationship we currently have.

This is yet another thing that won't happen overnight, but any learning I receive gets me one step closer to recognizing my sin and my problems and knowing how to become more Christian in my interactions.

My Lord, You are mighty and merciful. May You bless all your children in their journeys of self-discovery and love. May You help us to love You, Your Son, ourselves, and all those we encounter. We thank you for Your glory, my God. Together we pray, Amen.

My Patron Saint: St. Teresa of Avila

I underwent my Confirmation classes from August 2016 to April 2017 and was inducted into the Church on the Easter Vigil of 2017. Part of our acceptance ceremony involved announcing our chosen patron saint. This saint is someone we aspire to be like or someone who inspires us through their life and choices.

I researched saints a few times, but never took it seriously until March when I realized I was running out of time. At this point in my life, my headaches were at an all-time high, so I put in a Google search for "patron saint of headaches."

St. Teresa of Avila came up, and I never looked back.

St. Teresa of Avila is the patron saint of headache sufferers, bodily illnesses, mental illnesses, and those who have lost a parent. She is also the patron saint of Spanish writers. Although at the time I no longer considered myself a writer, it was also fitting that the two greatest eras of my life up to that point (writing and chronic pain) were matched to one person.

While I hope to not suffer from chronic headaches anymore, I read half of her memoir, The Book of My Life, and I would be foolish to step away from her example now. She spent most of her life in a convent, and still she fell from grace dozens of times throughout her life.

She indulged in the secular world, largely through reading fiction. She entertained men intellectually because she liked the attention. St. Teresa of Avila loved the Lord with her entire being, but she remained tied to the wonders of the world.

I often fall short of grace because I get too involved in relationships or give in to anger and doubt. I am a strong Christian until I date someone new and then try to do and be everything for them. I practice forgiveness and aim to have control of my emotions and reactions until I bubble over and lash out. I wonder how many times I can be forgiven for repeating the same sins over and over.

But as Jesus said, we should forgive our friends seven times seventy times, and if our friends can do this, how much greater is the Lord's forgiveness? (Matthew 18:21-22). I fall short, but God still wants me back. He wants me to return to Him like every parent wants their child to come back to them after they move away.

St. Teresa of Avila relates to me so well, I can't imagine looking to any other mortal person to see how I need to improve. She did so many things right, but she also did things wrong and tried to right herself. I can only hope to right myself as often as needed to permanently improve my character.

May Our Lord give us strength and perseverance to keep improving even after we fail. Our sin does not define us, but our grace, so I ask, O Lord, for Thy Will to guide us into our best selves. Amen.

Lil Bean Book Recs: February 2018

One of my lifestyle changes for 2018 was to always have a book on my nightstand and to read 30 minutes minimum daily. I didn't read as much as I planned in February because of my surgery, but these are the Christian titles I finished in February 2018.

The Church of Mercy

The Church of Mercy is a collection of homilies given by Pope Francis in 2013. I have liked Pope Francis' ideas since he came into papacy, and I didn't start attending Catholic services until two years later. I appreciate that he is allowing the Church to openly accept more types of members (one of his biggest was letting divorced women be treated better despite their status), but I also think he can do good in a world that is falling apart.

We all need to go out and help others. That is what constitutes his homilies. He doesn't want us to hole up and become academics, or theologians, of the faith. No, that won't help anyone. He wants more people out in the battlefield to feed the poor, to assist the shelters, and show through action how a Christian is supposed to live.

This is a very short read, but it took me a few weeks to get through it because I would be hit by a message and then meditate on it. Pope Francis is a positive influence for the world, and right now, we don't have a whole lot.

I definitely recommend this title because of its strength in brevity. If you can push individuals to help their community with only a fifteen minute speech, you must be saying something right. What we wait for now is whether we stand up and fight against this poverty and violence consuming our society, or settle for feeling "better" with a few pretty words.