By Francis Van Uden When you think about the whole situation of the Eucharist and what we believe as Catholics, it is actually sooooooo crazy. We believe that Jesus is our Saviour and that He came to Earth and saved us from our sins. By dying on the cross He gave us the opportunity of ETERNAL life with Him. He is a loving, merciful God and wants to help us and be a part of everything we do on Earth. But if you think about it from an objective point of view, the fact that Catholics believe we are eating him is WEIRD. And then the symbol for our faith is his death, a horrible and painful crucifixion. But this craziness is exactly what brought me so much closer to God. God IS crazy. He is. But not in the sense that he is insane, or is irrational and impulsive as you might think when you imagine someone who is crazy. God is crazy in the sense that we can’t fully understand him. Because he is a spiritual being, we can’t imagine exactly what He is like in being. We can learn to recognize his Word and his voice, through the scriptures. And by doing this, we can recognize his presence in the world around us. But as humans, we don’t have the capacity to understand him. And for me, specifically this allows a lot of awe for the world around me. When I see a beautiful night sky, or the diversity and beauty of the coulees, the mountains, nature around me, I can only begin to comprehend that God made all of that. That that beauty was created, and by Him. There are so many details of our lives that God is present in, and he has blessed me in a way that I am able to easily recognize those crazy things. And even though I can’t comprehend it all, it makes me so joyous to be able to get a glimpse of God’s majesty. So yes, the Eucharistic is crazy. But God is just letting us in on that craziness by giving us the Eucharist. To be able to receive JESUS into us, to be full of the Holy Spirit and in true communion with God.
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Walking by faith is quite often confused with just being complacent, but it really is quite the opposite. When we walk by faith, we need to do so in active discernment. What that means is that in order to walk by faith, we need to be actively be listening to what God has called us to do in each moment. You see, God is always talking to us, it just isn’t always in the way of words.
Last winter, I was driving Brendan to my house. Now, I was being quite impatient and my windshield hadn’t defrosted yet, but I put it into drive and said, “We are gonna drive by faith tonight!” That’s not driving by faith, thats just plain lunacy! That was by no means walking by faith because it was me wanting to act purely out of a selfish desire to get somewhere faster rather than to be patient and get somewhere safely, which is what God would much rather prefer. When we walk by faith, and I mean really BY faith, it takes trust, and I think that one of my favourite examples of this has to be with the walking on water story. Picture this, you and your friends get on a boat and are a long ways from shore. There are waves crashing all around you. All of a sudden ya boi shows up walking on the water. He then points at you and says “come walk with me.” Would you get out of the boat? Most of us probably wouldn’t because, you know, common sense, but Peter responded differently. He knew that this was God calling him to go with Him, so he got out of the boat and walked- walked by faith. Now, that story isn’t over there. He was doing just fine walking on the water, but then he got distracted by everything else going on. He reached this point where he saw that this no longer made sense logically and he grew fearful. From this, he lost trust in what God had called him to do and he started to sink. Thankfully, he called out for help and Jesus helped him up, but he left him with these words: “Why did you doubt?” When we walk by faith, it is by no means an easy thing to do. Quite often it can seem like what we are called to do is not the most logical option. It could also be not what we really think we want in that moment, but the heart of walking by faith is trust- trusting in what God has called you to do and the He will make it possible. We have to remember that in those moments, we need to follow through in discernment as well. Every Christian is called to walk by faith in their everyday lives. While it isn’t the easiest thing to do, it is essential because when we are truly walking by faith, God takes us to be exactly where we are supposed to be. That is exactly what happened for me when I started working in youth ministry and even all throughout my time in it, but I have come to the time where God has called me to start to go elsewhere, so I will not be the person running Pulse next year. While it can be so hard to let go of things we have worked so hard on, we have to trust that God has it under control. I am certain that the person who takes over will also do a great job! Don’t worry! I will still be around the community and will still be running things here until the end of the month. If there is one thing I want you to take away from this talk, it is this: walking by faith is one of the best and scariest things you can do, but trust me, it is all worthwhile. By Pam Gonzalez During these challenging times, hope is seeked. Hope can sometimes mean having a positive attitude or being optimistic. Pope Francis, reminds us that true hope is built on God’s Word and His promise of salvation and eternal life.
Hope is probably the most difficult of the three theological virtues to understand. It can be described as an unshakable trust that the promises of God will be fulfilled. This trust is based on what He has done for us in Jesus, through His Death and Resurrection. Hope is a gift of the Holy Spirit. God has placed, in each of our hearts, the desire and longing for true happiness and it helps us to place our trust in God. Hope is such a beautiful and important thing, hope allows us to approach situations with a positive mindset and when you have hope you place your trust in the potential of something good happening. Sometimes hope can be confused with anticipation and expectation. Think of a child opening his birthday presents, he may anticipate or expect a certain toy and when he doesn't receive it he may get upset, but hope isn’t tied to a specific outcome. We all get upset sometimes, it’s inevitable but God is always with us along the way whispering “There’s always hope.” We all face moments of anxiety or uncertainty, especially through hard times such as this pandemic so here are some things you can do to keep a strong sense of hope in our hearts.
Basically to recap, while hope is hard to maintain in hard times, such as this one, we must remember to trust that with God’s grace we will come out of this stronger because this too shall pass. I hope you guys are doing well, hang in there! By Francis Van Uden To watch this talk, go HERE. It’s more than just a commandment. God does ask us to obey our father and our mother, but obedience goes deeper than that. Obeying can sometimes be hard, it is for me. Your parents may tell you to do something, and even if you don’t think it’s fair, God still wants us to obey. The truth is, your parents are usually right. They know what is best for us, and see a bigger picture than we do. But God doesn’t want us to obey just because our parents are right, he wants us to obey our parents because they love us, and because He loves us, and asked us to. It is a great way to show love to your parents and to God when you obey your parents, especially in the times it may seem hard to. Putting your parents wishes before your own is a great selfless act, and can be learned through obedience. But did you know that the commandment “Honour thy father and mother” isn’t just talking about your mom and dad? And when the Catholic Church encourages obedience it also means obeying God, the Church and others?
By Sarah De Coste You can watch this talk HERE. Matthew 5:1313 “You are the salt of the earth; but if salt has lost its taste, how can its saltiness be restored? It is no longer good for anything, but is thrown out and trampled under foot.
14 “You are the light of the world. A city built on a hill cannot be hid. 15 No one after lighting a lamp puts it under the bushel basket, but on the lampstand, and it gives light to all in the house. 16 In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven. This verse is saying that when we hide, when we ignore the salt and light of Christ in ourselves, we can feel pointless, we can feel lost and confused. Our faith, when we experience God, when we embrace his love, and when we embrace his truth and goodness and let him change our life, it's like a lamp is lit, do you hide it? Do you allow your light to shine? Do you allow it to bring light to others? Do you allow it to show truth to others and yourself? Do you allow the light to guide you and lead you or do you leave it behind? Do you only bring out your light when you feel safe or is it the first thing others see? Let's break it down a bit more, Salt. i love salt. Salt is a beautiful thing, alone it isn't the greatest thing, if you have ever licked a salt block for cows you will understand this. Yet salt added to any dish can enhance what’s already there. Did you know that if you put a little bit of salt on a watermelon it will taste sweeter. Salt doesn't automatically make things saltier, what it does is enhance the natural flavour. So when scripture tells us we need to be the salt of the world, that doesn't mean that we are the only way people can know God, we are not the great all grand for humanity. Yes people can experience and should experience Christ through us, but for us being the salt to the world means that we don't make Christ be in others, but we bring him out of others. Every person has Christ in them, whether they acknowledge it or not we are all made in the image and likeness of God, and as such we are His children. For us to be the salt of the world means that we should bring Christ out in others, that we should inspire others to find Christ in themselves. He is already there, he already exists, but sometimes sins can make us feel so far from God, they can make us feel like we aren't good. That were evil and bad, but that's not true. God isn't evil, God can't be evil, and so if we are made in his image and likeness, we are inherently good. To show people this, to help people accept that they aren't evil is an interesting task, because it usually means showing our own imperfections. Testimonies are some of the most powerful messages. It shows us as sinners, that I'm not different than you, maybe my sins are different but they’re still sins. Showing someone that God still loves us, and is present in us in our imperfection is beautiful, because the world is VERY unforgiving, but God is. An easy way to be salt to people is through love. Scripture tells us God is love, and when we believe and understand that God is love, that means that when we help others to love, we are helping them to grow closer to God, to witness God in them. Wherever love is God is, so when any one does anything loving, they are uniting themselves to God who is love. The second part of the verse is about being a light to the world. Salt enhances what’s already there, light reveals it. Light allows us to see things we may not have noticed. Light brings truth, when you look into a room and its dark, any figures can take the form of something you don't recognize. What happens when you turn on the light? You see things clearly. The person sitting on your chair is actually a pile of dirty clothes. The world is a foggy mess, it's like all the lights are off, Satan gives half truths to people, his mission is to keep us confused. The longer we’re confused, the longer we live in half truths, the longer we are away from the fullness of God, the longer we remain distant from Christ. Scripture says in John 14:6 Jesus is the way the truth and the life, He gives us clarity, he gives us understanding, knowledge, peace, and hope. So how can we give that to everyone else? The way we live our lives, the way we remain steadfast and honest in how we live for God, that is a light in the world. When we treat others with respect and love regardless of how they treat us we are showing the truth that everyone deserves love and respect no matter what. When we stand up to a bully, when we reach out and show a loner friendship. When we actively seek to include others. In all those small moments we are being a light to others. When we’re suffering, when there're hard times those are the moments we show what faith is. It's easy to have faith in God when our life is going great, but when we are suffering those are the moments we can unite ourselves to Jesus’ cross. Those are the moments we show that we don't believe in God because he makes our life easy, but we believe in him because he gets us through the hard times. When we remain faithful in hard times, when our life sucks and yet we still have joy I don't mean you fake that you're good, because i can have moments when i'm devastated and I'm hurting and in pain and yet I can still stop and laugh at something, when we hold onto the cross in our sufferings and unite them to Christs sufferings, because we know that suffering has a purpose, that we can offer it up, and that we can give it to God. Our whole lives can be a light to others, not because we're perfect, but because we try to be, because we don't give up. What about now? How can we in everyday life, no matter what that looks like be salt and light to the world. What do you spend your time on? Do you pray everyday and make sure that you are rooted in God, in his love? Do you read your bible? Do you listen to the words of God? Do you spread love through social media? Or do you share gossip? Do you spend your time focusing on the lives of people who inspire you to be better? Or people whose lives inspire greed? What type of accounts do you follow? Is God a genie to you? Is He someone you only pursue when you need help or is He a friend? Do you pursue him or ignore him? We have so many choices, and even though we mess up, even though we ignore him, we aren't perfect, He still sits there, with a smile on his face looking at you because he loves you. It doesn't matter what you've done, what matters is what you do next. By Francis Van Uden The video version is available HERE. Why are we happy as Catholics? Our symbol of faith is a crucifix: a man who has been brutally tortured and nailed to die on a cross. You may have met someone who is so happy and joyful just to have faith in Jesus. And yet, isn’t it kind of weird that this image of Jesus, their Saviour, dying is what their faith is represented by? As Christians, we believe in Heaven & hell, and that there is a man out there named Satan who tries to tempt us away from our God. And yet, people are still happy to believe in God? From the outside, having faith doesn’t really seem like a joyful thing. But it is!!
Faith is such a joyful thing and here are 5 reasons why:
So, to recap, God wants to have a relationship with us, loves us unconditionally, is there for us in whatever we do, humbled himself to die for us, and gave us the opportunity to spend eternity in Heaven, the greatest & most joyful place you couldn’t even bear to imagine. This is our faith as Christians and it’s such a joyful thing! Even in our struggles, Jesus is there for us, in prayer, through the people around us, the scriptures and in the Eucharist! It is a joyful thing to have such a father as the one we have as Christians, be joyful in it! For the video version of this talk, click HERE. We are finally here! We have endured the 40 days of Lent, that season of prayer, penance, and almsgiving, and we are finally at what we have been waiting for: Easter. Easter is the largest celebration we have in the Church. The season of Easter lasts for fifty days! That’s right, we are straight up having an epic time for FIFTY DAYS! That is almost two months! This then leads us to the question of: what is the big deal? Why is Easter so important? Easter is when we see Christ’s victory over death. It is when we see complete validation of His claims. We are able to see the undeniable truth that Christ is alive! You see, it was undeniable that Christ had died on that cross. They had done every measure imaginable to ensure that His body could not be stolen from the tomb. Then, as we see in the gospels, none of these measures were breached. We see in the gospels that there is a blinding light and an earthquake. Angels appeared and rolled the stone away (a feat that would usually take a few people working together) and greet the women in the usual way that angels do, telling them to not be afraid and that Christ is alive. Now, I know that this can seem to be a lofty claim, but there is evidence of these things occurring- most namely the Shroud of Turin. The Shroud of Turin is claimed to be the cloth that Jesus was buried in. The remarkable thing is that if you look at it, you can see the outline of a body, and even some aspects of facial features. When you examine the image, you can see the marks of crucifixion on the body. The image is also not painted or dyed into the cloth, but rather it has been imprinted from a large dose of radiation- something that would be akin to a blinding light. This relic has been very thoroughly investigated and there are still many who are skeptical of the authenticity of this relic, but I personally think that it checks enough boxes to be able to be considered true.
As we continue into this Easer season, this great celebration of Christ’s triumph, I have a couple of quotes from saints to encourage us. "Do not abandon yourselves to despair. We are the Easter people and hallelujah is our song." - St Pope John Paul II "O Death, where is your sting? O Hell, where is your victory? Christ is risen, and you are overthrown. Christ is risen, and the demons are fallen. Christ is risen, and the angels rejoice. Christ is risen, and life reigns. Christ is risen, and not one dead remains in the grave. For Christ, being risen from the dead, is become the first fruits of those who have fallen asleep. To Him be glory and dominion unto ages of ages." -St. John Chrysostom Have a Joyous Easter and I pray all is well with you and your families! By Joshua Dobrowolski This talk is available as a video HERE. I had a really hard time writing this talk. Every time I sat down to begin writing, I felt my mind pulled away to other tasks I had to, or wanted to complete. My mind was letting those things take priority. We all have those things that distract us, that pull us away from the majesty of sitting in the presence of God. We all have desires - a will - if you will. Some of our desires are wonderful - perhaps it’s a desire to spend more time with friends, or to do better in school. Some of our desires lead us away from God. We fight those desires, but overtime, our will becomes weaker, and we may give in. Lent provides us an amazing opportunity to become aware of those areas of our life where we have compromised. Where we have given in to desires that lead us away from God. As we come into Holy Week, we are nearing the end of this period of preparation.
This week, Holy Week, we as Catholics are called to figuratively journey with Jesus through his ultimate sacrifice manifested in the passion. But, we are also called to follow Jesus in his service. A point which Pope Francis talked about in his homily this past Palm Sunday. Pope Francis said: "on Holy Thursday, he is portrayed as the servant who washes the feet of his disciples; on Good Friday, he is presented as the suffering and victorious servant; and tomorrow we will hear the prophecy of Isaiah about him: Behold my servant, whom I uphold” God saved us by serving us. We often THINK we are the ones who serve God. NO, he is the one who freely chose to serve us, for he loved us first. It is difficult to love and not be loved in return. And it is even more difficult to serve if we do not let ourselves be served by God." Too often, we allow our will to take priority over God’s. We feel in our heart that God is calling us to take a different path, but the path he is calling us to seems challenging or uncomfortable. Sometimes doing the right thing is uncomfortable, or even downright painful. Jesus expresses this pain in the garden of gethsemane when he says to God, “if it is possible, let this cup pass from Me.” The difference between our actions and Jesus’ often diverge in how we respond to the answer of that plea. Jesus weeps at God’s answer, BUT he follows through. He gives his life over to God. Completely and utterly trusting that God’s will will not lead him astray. Not only will God’s will not lead him astray, but that it will transform the world. If Jesus can make this choice faced with the crucifixion, why do we have such difficulty making this choice when it comes to things like loving our neighbour, or serving one another as Jesus modelled for us? We all fall into these traps. “If I follow my will, it will make ME feel good.”; “I know what I want, what I need.” Do you though? Like I said earlier, I had a really difficult time sitting down and writing this talk. I woke up for the last three days in a tug-a-war between my head and my heart. My mind raced with all of the projects I needed to get done, and then there was my heart; God’s call was not demanding, instead, it was the persistent and gentle pull of love. That call was asking me to spend some time reflecting with God, and reminded me that writing this talk would actually be a part of that rest. To remember that all the “projects I needed to get done” could wait. And yet, I ignored that call. I ignored God’s will and desire to be close with me, and instead chose to make my will the priority. You know how much work I got done on my projects? None. Because what I really needed was to rest. How often do we each ignore God’s call in our lives to pursue something that we think is more important? And how has Lent changed each of our responses to that call in preparation for Easter? God’s will is our will, our joy. They do not work against each other. That’s why Jesus sacrificed his life; so that each of us could live in the love of God for eternity; that is God’s will. I think we can sometimes view God’s will for us as a repressive force in our lives - something that holds us back or restricts us from doing whatever we want. This couldn’t be further from the truth. God knows our hearts better than we do, and God knows what will make us happy if we are only willing to listen. Have you ever felt the joy of helping someone who is in need; not for any reward, just to help? Isn’t that joy more meaningful than the happiness you experience after eating a chocolate. I know when I eat chocolate, 2 seconds later I’m looking for the next piece. There is so much more permanence in the joy of service. Choosing God’s will for us is something that we do every moment of every day. It’s not a choice that you make once and it’s done; it is a life-long dedication. Holy Week reminds us of why we choose that dedication, that God serves us, and wants the best for us, and when Easter comes, it is an opportunity to rejoice in the love that God has for each and every one of us. For the video, go HERE. This is a gift that I always felt weird about when I was growing up. My thought usually went along the lines of "why are we supposed to fear someone we love?" This continually ran as a paradox in my mind, even until I became an adult. This whole concept of fearing God while loving Him just did not make sense to me.
Fortunately, in the church we have the amazing opportunity to be able to look things up and find answers. So when I was making my way back to the church, this became one of the many topics I wanted to figure out. Fear of the Lord is not being solely terrified of God, but rather it is also a reverence of God and knowing His greatness. It is an acknowledgement that God is vast and that we are so small in comparison, and this humbles us and helps us to realize that despite us being so seemingly insignificant in comparison, He loves us so unconditionally. Another aspect of this gift is that it calls us away from sin. In the same way that we really don't want to disappoint our parents, we don't want to sin. With our parents, we are afraid that when we do something wrong that there will be a consequence. There is the same idea with sin. We are afraid of the consequence of being disobedient to God (sin), which is Hell. This convicts us to do our best each day to avoid sin, and in the event that we do sin (because we are sinners), we become convicted to attend the sacrament of reconciliation. The beauty of this gift is that it proves to us that we are fallible people (people who can be wrong) and that through our perseverance, we are able to continue the battle against sin. It also shows us that God is infinite in His glory, and as such, we are unable to even begin to comprehend the entirety of Him. In this, we are able to maintain the reverence we need to continue to live our lives in humility. As we are approaching Holy Week, we need to keep our eyes open to the amazing work that God has done in our lives and throughout history. Our reverence of God is made ever more when we begin to look at the sacrifice of love that happened at Calvary through the crucifixion of Jesus. There is a reason that an angel always declares "Do not be afraid," when it appears to someone in scripture. That person is filled with a holy fear at the sight of an angel, and that is only a drop in the ocean of the greatness of God. From this we can see that this gift helps us to understand our place with God and how He calls us to go forth; unafraid of the journey, cognizant of actions, and humbly with God. The gift of counsel is something we quite often forget about. This is usually due to many people not being sure as to what it looks like in our everyday lives. I think that the same can be said with all of these gifts we have been looking at. Much like what Brendan said in his talk about knowledge and wisdom, when we are able to recognize what these gifts look like, we are able to see them as more present in our lives. So, what is counsel? I think Pope Francis described it quite well in his general audience on May 7, 2014 when he said,
Council is the perfection of prudence. It is the ability to have right judgement and informs making the correct choice. It aids us in discernment and guides us to advise others. In other words, counsel is very important in our lives.
In reflecting on this gift, I can think of a few examples of where it has been very clearly present. There have been a few times where I am talking to somebody about a difficult situation that they are going through and I give some advice that is so perfect and profound that afterwards I can only say, "That was clearly not from my brain." There are also many times where I am about to do something and out of seemingly nowhere I begin to question "Is this what Christ would want me to do?" The gift of counsel can quite often work in this quiet way. It, like many of the other gifts, can sometimes be elusive to put our finger on, but I can say that as God has us grow in this gift, the more often we will be able to ask ourselves, "will this lead me closer to Christ," and act accordingly. God has a plan for us and wants us to guide us along the right paths. The real question is, are we willing to listen to Him as he advises us? |
PulsePulse is our Jr High group (Grades 6-9) for those who want to be journeying to learn more about God and how He fits into this crazy thing called life! From Saint of the Day to talks to activities, we work to understand more about our faith and its importance in our everyday lives as we all work to become modern day saints. Categories
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