This is Loyola House in Guelph, Ontario, Canada where I made my annual retreat Jan. 11 (Sun) to Jan. 16 (Fri). The reason I went to there was my desire to have a directed retreat according to Ignatian Spiritual Exercise. Canada was much colder than the United States. One day the temperature dropped to -8 […]
This is my beloved son (Baptism of the Lord)
Enlightenment! The Buddhist always strives to reach the enlightenment to understand who they are and what life is. In order to attain the enlightenment, the seekers have to study the mind in strict disciplines. The Buddha himself practiced the most extreme form of asceticism for six years. He consumed only one meager meal per week. His body was like skin stretched over a skeleton. But, despite his grueling penance, he felt he had not found what he was searching for. One day seated quietly beneath the Bodhi Tree, it came to the Buddha that by letting the mind settle in to the state of peace that he might discover the truth. This required nourishment for his body. At this moment a young woman offered milk-rice to him and he ate it. Seen this, his five companions ridiculed and were disgusted with him because they thought the Buddha deserted the way of asceticism, so they left him. Now nourished, he was determined not to get up from that spot until he had become fully awakened, even if he should die in that process. By the next morning, he had attained Nirvana, the Enlightenment.
I believe it is the baptism of Buddha, the baptism that connected him to something beyond himself. The Buddha was baptized to understand that attaining enlightenment was possible not by his own will but by the grace that went beyond his understanding.
Being “struck by grace,” so to speak, theologian Paul Tillich illustrates how such a religious truth can come in a powerful experience:
Do you know what it means to be struck by grace? … We cannot transform our lives, unless we allow them to be transformed by the stroke of grace. It happens or it does not happen. And certainly it does not happen if we try to force it upon ourselves, just as it shall not happen so long as we think, in our self-complacency, that we have no need of it. Grace strikes us when we are in great pain and restlessness. It strikes us when, year after year, the longed-for perfection of life does not appear, when despair destroys all joy and courage. Sometimes at that moment a shaft of light breaks into our darkness, and it is as though a voice were saying: “You are accepted. You are accepted,” accepted by that which is greater than you, and the name of which you do not know. Do not ask for the name now, perhaps you will find it later. Do not try to do anything; do not perform anything; do not intend anything. Simply accept the fact that you are accepted. If that happens to us, we experience grace … Sometimes it happens that we receive the power to say “yes” to ourselves, that peace enters into us and makes us whole, that self-hatred and self-contempt disappear, and that our self is reunited with itself. Then we can say that grace has come upon us.
Where is your star? (Epiphany)
When was the last time you went out to look up the sky and find a star? When was the last time your eyes were filled with wonder and awe, gazing at the stars? (Moving to the baptismal font) I am now standing under the stars that shine upon us. These stars radiating over the […]
Let It Be (Mary Mother of God)
Since I was a youngster, I love the song, one of the Beatles’ bests: “Let It Be.”
“When I find myself in times of trouble, Mother Mary comes to me speaking words of wisdom, let it be. And in my hour of darkness, she is standing right in front of me, speaking words of wisdom, let it be. Let it be … whisper words of wisdom, let it be.”
Although I didn’t have any idea about who Mother Mary was at that time, I thought the words of wisdom “let it be” were pretty good. And now I believe “let it be” may well express who Mary is especially as we think of her YES to the angel Gabriel’s annunciation: “Behold, I am the handmaid of the Lord. Let it be done to me according to your word.” This yes made the savior of the world conceived and brought about the unfailing hope to us.
From the beginning of my faith, I have been accustomed with Mary, especially the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary. First of all, this feast of the Blessed Virgin Mary holds the same patroness of the Korean Catholic Church like the United States. Secondly, the first bishop of the archdiocese of Deagu, South Korea where I come from took a vow before the Immaculate Conception when he first came to Korea. The bishop was French and there was nothing when the diocese was established in 1911. Since he loved the Immaculate Conception, he promised her to dedicate the best place in the diocese in the name of the Immaculate Conception if she helped him build a diocesan structure and a seminary. This was fulfilled in a couple of years and now we have a beautiful grotto next to the bishop’s house like the Lourdes’ in France. Every day the place is adorned by the faithful and the Immaculate Conception enjoys the first patroness of the archdiocese of Daegu. The United States is blessed as well by the Blessed Virgin Mary because Mary is the patroness of America under two titles: the Immaculate Conception and Our Lady of Guadalupe.
The Blessed Virgin Mary is also the mother of all priests. She took a position to take care of her son priests like Jesus Christ. Pope John Paul 2 was the one who prayed everyday to the mother. His favorite prayer he cited everyday was this: “I belong to you entirely. And all that I possess is yours. I take you into everything that is mine. Give me your heart, Mary!” When he was elected pope, Totus Tuus was his motto which means “Totally Yours” found in the first two words of his favorite prayer. And he made his coat of arm as a pope, putting a capital M in it which stands for Mary.
Holy Family
“Just as it is written in the law of the Lord, Every male that opens the womb shall be consecrated to the Lord,” Wait a minute here! What about the second or the third?
I was born as a second boy in the family. You can tell by just looking at me, easy and outgoing, quick to read and adjust. To me, my older brother was too slow and naïve to have a big ambition. But, everybody loved him because he was the first son of my father who was the first son in the family as well which means in Korea my brother has a special duty for the Kims in terms of family affairs especially conducting ancestral venerations. I was not happy to inherit old clothes that my brother wore before and I tried hard to catch up him but I couldn’t because there is always a three-year gap between us—he was in the high school when I went to the middle school; he in the university I in the high school; he in the university back I in the military. Every experience was new to the family because of my brother and yet it came to my turn it seemed secondary and lost attention.
I still remember my younger brother’s surprising coming to the family when I was five years old. On those days in Korea, it was common to give birth at home. When my mother was in labor helped by a midwife in the village, my brother and I were in the room next to it. My father was outside anxiously waiting for something that never happened to the family: a newborn girl. Finally the new life was born and the midwife shouted with joy, “It is a boy!” Immediately we heard the big bang sound of the outdoor slammed and my mom cried. Now what? I became in the middle of three brothers! Needless to say, it was not easy to find my place as the parents took care of the youngster with such love.
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