Yesterday was the Journey of the Cross and Icon for WYD in our Parish... It was amazing. I had a  great time and ... I can't explain the way I felt. I was the first one with the group of the WYD girls to carry the cross down toward our church... It was so heavy and today my shoulder is bruised a bit and is sore to the touch, but it was a very small price to pay .. and the symbolism of the whole event was just... beyond words.

I had made the decision that during the reflection and veneration of the cross and Icon at my church, I would lay my life down -- lay it all out for Jesus before that cross and just give over everything. It was just ... the most amazing feeling... I bowed before it, placed my hands upon it and just let everything go... everything that troubled my heart, stirred within me, anything that challenged me, I gave it away to God...

For those who don't know, like the olympic torch, before World Youth Day, the cross and Icon travel the world... all the way to where WYD is being held... and to know that many others have carried this cross... bearing a similar burden to Christ... wow.

I was messaging with my friends the whole day and sent out MMS pics of the event cos I so desperately wanted to share the amazingness of it all. I got home feeling SO proud and uplifted and ... with the kind of burning love that .. I don't even know what to do with! Unspeakable kind of feeling that can only pour out thru tears... Love ... God's love...

For those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted. - Luke 14:11

As humans we look so hard to further ourselves through any means possible.  It is easy to get caught up in the so-called race of life that we are all dramatically trying to run in some semblance of an effort to fit in to a mould that society has carefully and craftily built for us. We strive so hard to gain accolades and commendations from those around us, to push on, sometimes manipulatively to achieve a goal, fulfill a plan that we ourselves have set, or to accomplish something that will take us up another rung.

During this race, sometimes time flies so fast by that we are also quick to forget why we are here, who is in control and who to thank for the gifts that we receive. It is easy to build up possessions to impress others, to give in to temptations – to manipulate, deceive and scheme against our peers, colleagues and sometimes even friends and family.  Ironically, we do this so that we can receive praises, so that others will accept, love and respect us, be proud of us, talk about us, trump us up and make us feel important. Anything really, which will take us up the ladder, yet another rung.

With this comes an over-inflated sense of confidence – a sense of accomplishment and pride in achieving so-called success.

But guess what? God doesn’t care about your career status or your business status or what your friends think of you, what you possess or how much money you have in your bank.  How far you get in the race of life means nothing if you have done nothing righteous to show for it.

There have been times in life where I have felt like everyone is against me – and I submit myself to feelings of jealousy and envy toward others for having what seems like more in their life than I have; A loving partner, a clean bill of health, a close-knit family, a great career, possessions, or wealth that I could sure well do with. I could get a better paying job if I lied on a resume, I could quicker find a partner if I pretended that I was someone I wasn’t or was more willing to negotiate my beliefs, I could travel more often to see friends and family if I was okay with always owing money to someone –or rather, attaining everything that my very human heart wants, without involving God at all.

Every now and then I seem to have a birth of a thought followed by an “a-ha!” moment. I was thinking about how many blessings in my life to date are attributed to prayer. For instance, I prayed for a closer Christian family – and shortly after Christmas, I looked around to find that most of my friends are strong Christians. I asked for finances, and jobs kept popping up all around the place. It occurred to me that in order to have God bless us through prayer, we have to not only believe that He will provide, but also help ourselves by accepting an opportunity that God has provided.  You don’t get showered on by a bag of $1 coins just because you prayed for money (ouch!)… but God will serve you with a path that you can either ignore or take on – that will lead you to what you want or what you have asked for. So then I realized, I would have to more carefully watch for God’s signs or His lead that I may have missed earlier.

Almost as if confirming these thoughts, I was watching Evan Almighty, the other night – quite a funny movie based around Genesis and The Great Flood. Can you imagine my ears and eyes when “God” (played by the adorable Morgan Freeman, once again) revealed something to Evan’s wife? “If someone prays for patience, you think God gives them patience? Or does he give them the opportunity to be patient? If he prayed for courage, does God give him courage, or does he give him opportunities to be courageous?” (http://imdb.com/title/tt0413099/)

I recall a time late last year when I was buckled down with studies that I barely came up to breathe -- I was feeling extremely far from my faith and when questioned if I had been to Mass, my reply was a quick shrug and a feeble, “I’m too busy and I don’t have time” and I gave much the same answer when I was asked to stop and pray with a friend about my emotional state.  Almost immediately I found myself dealing with temptation all around me coupled closely with fear and shame. I suffered through the rest of my studies, and eventually realized that I’d made a mistake. I should have involved God in what was hammering me down. I should have laid down all my worries and fears at the cross, I should have “let go and let God.”

It was then that I realized that without God, I am nothing. Without God, we are nothing – just dust. I arrived at the conclusion that if I dedicated myself to being a humble servant of God, then He would provide just as the scripture promised. If I involve him in prayer – regardless of how little time I feel I have, if I ask for something that I feel is necessary, then God won’t just hand it to me on a platter, but will provide me with a path to take so that I can receive the blessings that He delights in providing to my loving and serving heart.

It is easy to become so self-assured, to believe that we are the most important people in our own little world. It is easy to believe that we are extremely clever for our achievements or talents. It is, though, hard to always recognize that it is not our doing and that God is to thank. It is harder to remember every time we receive commendation or so-called acceptance from our peers, to praise it back to God Almighty for the blessings that we have received.

We need to make God a part of everything in our lives – to turn to prayer in difficult times. We need to constantly give prayers of thanks and for the graces to keep our hearts humble. We need to recognize that what others think, matters not in the eyes of God – it is how we treat others and how we honor God. We shouldn’t assume to be the most important person – we don’t have the right to treat those around us as though they are inferiors because we may have a higher job status or more money, or the ability to word ourselves more cleverly – we need to treat others how Jesus asked us to.

Once I overheard one friend marvel out loud to another friend about her generosity and her humble reply really struck a chord with me. It was a simple yet effective statement that confirmed my own revelations to be true. She said, “God blesses those who bless others.”

And it’s true, Jesus said it clearly in the gospel of St. Luke – Honor God, and you will be honored, don’t succumb to your own ego, but rather humble yourself with prayer and serving and worshiping the Lord – and then you will be blessed.

Do not let any occasion of gaining merit pass without taking care to draw some spiritual profit from it; as, for example, from a sharp word which someone may say to you; from an act of obedience imposed against your will; from an opportunity which may occur to humble yourself, or to practice charity, sweetness, and patience. All of these occasions are gain for you, and you should seek to procure them; and at the close of that day, when the greatest number of them have come to you, you should go to rest most cheerful and pleased, as the merchant does on the day when he had had most chance for making money; for on that day business has prospered with him. --Saint Ignatius Loyola

Oprah is a complete idiot. This, I have always known. I don't know that there is anyone who is as self-obsessed and self-righteous as Oprah Winfrey and a lot of things have drawn me to this conclusion. I wonder if she would do half of the charitable things that she does without public awareness. And what I mean by that is, instead of creating an entire 60 minute advertisement for her "giving side" maybe she could silently build a town in New Orleans as a mystery financer... Or maybe she could create a school selflessly in Africa for children without expecting world-wide praise and again, having to make multiple shows about it...

And maybe, just maybe... while she is at it, she can stop talking on behalf of God as though she is the superior fountain of knowledge and wealth of spiritual insight.

I saw this on youtube the other day and it made me angry.


and this;


Oprah thinks she is fantastically spiritually enlightened. She was having a whinge about God as a jealous God, but if she actually used the scripture in context it makes sense. Our God is a jealous God only because He does not want us to worship false idols and when we do, it angers Him; hence being a jealous God and that is what it is in relation to. God isn't jealous of our human life --or the relationships we possess. Oprah is in a position of power and she needs to stop promoting herself as a Christian if she is not one.

I am tired of seeing people call themselves Christians and then teaching falsified beliefs to others with the knowledge that they are making up their own rules as they go on. She whinged also about going to church and "all the rules" ... Get over it, in life there are all kinds of rules -- including the law which I'm sure she follows like everyone else. And I won't be made to feel a fool for following the laws of Christ as best as I can.

What I loathe about the entire video is that she speaks as if she is the voice of reason and how dare those audience members be contradicting her. She spoke to them as if they were crazy for their beliefs and tried to shut that woman down because she got rolled and tried to write the lady off as a fundamentalist. "I can't have an argument over religion with you" ... She has no idea....

Oprah has no right to look down upon, to chop and change something that is still untouched (the Church rules, doctrines, teachings, etc) from centuries and centuries ago just because it didn't sit well with her when she was 20. Maybe if she had of researched her entire belief foundation she would have been able to understand and fully comprehend the reasons behind the teachings and the full context of the scripture she was so ready to tear up and look down upon.

She's Oprah Winfrey, not God ... She needs to be reminded now and then, and so does her audience.

"A final Word: Be strong in the Lord and in His mighty power." -Ephesians 6:10

I have discovered that fear is one of the easiest ways that an enemy can attack us. If we succumb to fear in any aspect of the word, God's whole plan for can be changed and the blessings that Jesus has promised us become harder to attain.

For example, about 2 and a half years ago, I wanted to start a web design business. I researched it in and out and a couple of friends were interested in hiring me for their businesses and I was a bit scared to actually pull out the big guns and submit to their requests for fear that I would let them down. (Even though I let them down by not following through with their jobs) And then an ex friend contacted me out of the blue and said that she knew the manager of this musical band that were starting out in Melbourne. When I realised that the manager was actually a well known Australian musician, I freaked out and thought I would never be able to do the job well enough and made up some half-hearted excuse about how I didn't have the time and I let the job go -- even though it wasn't a difficult job to begin with.

Fast forward to about a year and a half ago, I was in the car with my friend and discussing about how I had fallen victim to not following through with amazing opportunities out of fear. I then told him my bit about the band, and the website and my fear and he sat wide-eyed in shock and stared at me in disbelief and informed me that the band (that I hadn't really heard too much about except a myspace page at that point) had just signed to a major record label - SonyBMG... !!!!!!!  He blatantly told me, "you're an idiot" ... we sort of had a laugh and a "oh well, what can you do?" ... and then just last week I was in a music chain store and saw this bands debut cd in the CD display ... and I realised I'd made a stupid mistake because I let someone less powerful than God whisper things in to my ear that I believed over Christ's words.

And that is one of many, many little examples as to how my life has been ruled by something or someone else instilling fear in to my heart - and having been consumed by that and turning away from God's promise.

If you decide one day that you wont take on a job, you won't take an opportunity that you feel is possibly pulling you -- if you succumb to not participating in something due to laziness or don't work to your very potential ... these minor little things can possibly deter the ultimate plan that God has for each of us. He wants us to be the very best that we can, He wants us to do everything for the Glory of His name, not someone else's...

BIG revelation!

Also.......