Step #48-He is Risen

“They have taken the Lord from the tomb, and we don’t know where they put him.” John 20:2

Easter Sunday (April 12, 2009)

Congratulations! We made it! We have been walking together for 48 days and we finally reached our destination. Today is the best day of the year. Jesus Christ is risen!!! All the pain, all the suffering, finally has meaning. He is the hope that whatever we go through, that no matter how heavy our cross is, we will find the light at the end of our journey.

In today’s gospel, John tells us that Mary of Magdala and two of the disciples were confused when they found the tomb empty. Where was Jesus at this moment? Back in September, I attended the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola. We meditated on this passage and we imagined that at this very moment, when they were looking for Jesus, He was with His Blessed Mother. Even though it’s not in the Bible, it’s so obvious and it makes so much sense that the first person Jesus appeared to would be His Mother.

Close your eyes and imagine this encounter. Imagine the expression in Mary’s face when she sees her Son standing in front of her. Imagine the joy pouring out of every pore of her body and let her joy fill your entire being. Imagine the embrace between them and allow yourself to be embraced as well. Rejoice in this glorious moment, the moment when Mary realizes that her Son had defeated evil and achieved victory for all humanity. Today, the Annunciation and the Resurrection become one.

Jesus was born to die. He died for our sins and then He rose from the dead to save us. Salvation comes through Jesus Christ. Life is not over with death, it’s just a moment of transition that sends us into the next world. The resurrected Christ empowers us to go out into the world. If you go to mass today or the next time you go, listen to the message at the end of the mass: “Our mass is ended, let us go to love and serve the world.” Every mass is a mini resurrection where Jesus sends us into the world.

When we fully understand that life is only a transition path between life and death, the only thing that will truly matter is loving and serving God to get our souls ready for our final encounter with Him.

Jesus Christ is risen!!! He is risen indeed.

Easter Sunday (April 1, 2018)

I woke up this morning to a beautiful sunrise by the Sea of Galilee. How truly special. I could not have asked for a better Easter gift.

Yesterday, we got on a boat and heard mass in the place where Jesus walked on water. We visited the Church of the Multiplication, built on the spot where Jesus fed more than five thousand with just two pieces of bread and five fish. We stood on the same spot where Jesus asked Peter three times, “do you love me?” We went to Capernaum, known as the town of Jesus because He spent a lot of His time preaching and performing miracles in that area. We visited the house of Peter’s mother-in-law. Of course, it’s in ruins, but a church has been built over it and the floor is made of glass so we were able to see where the actual house stood.

Walking where Jesus walked, getting our feet wet in the Sea of Galilee where Jesus walked on its waters, where He commissioned His disciples, where He performed so many miracles was mind blowing. But more important than all of that was realizing that He did not stay in these places. He is present everywhere. It all started here, in the Holy Land, but it did not stay here. He commissioned His disciples, a group of simple fishermen, from a very humble town, to go out into the world and spread His word. And they did. He is asking the same of us. He gave it all for us. He is asking to give it all for Him. And we should not be afraid to entrust everything to Him, because just like He multiplied two loaves of bread and five small fish, He will multiply all we hold dear into everlasting life.

Happy Easter because He is Risen!!!

Our Pilgrimage into the Holy Land-Day 3

Holy Saturday, March 31, 2018: Sea of Galilee-Tabgah-Capharnaum-Golan Heights

“I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never be hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty.” John 6:35

We began our day with the typical buffet breakfast at the hotel. By 7:40 am we all met at the hotel lobby and we walked over to the marina to get on a boat. We sailed on the Sea of Galilee. Even though it’s called a “sea,” it’s actually a lake. It’s seven and a half miles long by thirteen miles wide.

Father Willie gave us a mass on the boat. How amazing, to listen to mass in the same place where so many of Jesus’ miracles took place. The gospel reading was the one found in Matthew 14:22-33 when Jesus walks on water. Father Willie asked us to close our eyes, and to place ourselves in that moment. It was easy imagine Jesus walking towards the boat, in the middle of the storm. Father Willie helped us put it into perspective by setting up the scene. Jesus had gone up the hill to pray by himself. He could see the lake from where He was, and He saw the storm approaching. He noticed that His friends are in trouble because their little boat is being tossed around by the winds. He goes to the shore, but can’t find any boat that is willing to go out on those conditions. So He decides to take matters into His own hands, and begins to walk towards the disciples. Of course, when they see Him, they are terrified because they think He is a ghost. When they realize that it’s the Lord, Peter asks Him to allow him to walk towards Him. Peter begins to walk on the water, but then gets scared, and begins to drown.

Father Willie then told us a story that we have heard a bunch of times, but we can hear it one hundred more because it’s pretty amazing. He told us about a time when He had been listening to confessions for a few hours. When He finally finished, outside in the parking lot a lady approached him, and asked him if he could hear her confession. His first intention was to say “no,” because after three hours, he couldn’t listen to another one. But of course, he said “yes.” The lady told him that she was pregnant, but her husband had lost his job, they already had a son, and they just couldn’t afford another baby, especially because they had found out that the baby would have Down Syndrome. She was on her way to the clinic to get an abortion, but decided to stop by the church first to ask God forgiveness for what she was about to do. Father Willie tried to convince her, but no matter what he said, he just couldn’t change her mind. She told him that the decision had been made and she was having the abortion. She asked him for absolution, and he said no. He told her that he could not give her absolution for a sin that she had not yet committed. He left feeling terrible. When he got to his house, one of the older priests was there and he began to sob. He told the other priest the story, and he said he felt like a failure because he had not been able to convince this lady not to have the abortion. The other priest told him that he could not feel responsible. He had done what he could, the rest was between the lady and God.

About a year later, he was giving mass in the same church. At the end of the mass, he was in the back talking to the parishioners, when the same lady approached him. He recognized her immediately because her face had been engraved in his mind. She told him that she had been trying to find him for a while to give him a picture of her baby girl. On her way to the abortion clinic, she thought of everything that he had said, and she changed her mind. She had her baby girl, and she was born completely healthy. She did not have Down Syndrome. Even though this happened more than a decade ago, Father Willie still carries a picture of the baby girl in his bible.

Father Willie tied the story to the fact that alone, we can’t do anything, but with Jesus, we can do everything. Father Willie thought that he had failed because he couldn’t change the lady’s mind. But he planted the seed, and Jesus did the rest. Peter began to drown when he lost his faith, and became scared, but when he called out to Jesus, Jesus extended His hand, and He kept Peter from drowning. We can do the same. If we turn to Jesus, nothing is impossible. If we plant seeds, Jesus, the eternal gardener, will provide the fertilizer, the water, and He will help them to grow.

Our next stop was the Church of the Multiplication in Tabgha. We read the gospel from Matthew 14:13-21 about the miracle that took place in this very spot, when Jesus multiplied the fish and the bread. Father Willie explained to us that Jesus empowered his disciples. He did not enable them. A huge difference. When we enable someone, we make them dependent on us. He said that he sees this all the time with the boys at Belen. We, the parents, enable them instead of empowering them. By trying to help them, and resolve so many of their problems, we are actually hurting them. Jesus performed the miracle, but He asked the disciples to feed the people. And even though many people downplay the miracle by saying that the miracle itself was being able to share very little with many, a miracle really took place because at the end they collected 12 baskets with the leftovers. That would not have been possible from just two loaves of bread and five fish, when more than 5,000 men, women and children were fed. Father Willie also told us that the fact that it was 12 baskets was significant. The number 12 is very important in the Bible: 12 apostles, 12 tribes of Israel, etc.

From there, we walked over to the Church of the Primacy of St. Peter. This is the spot where Jesus asks Peter do you love me three times. Ana, our guide, read Jeremiah 16:16, and Father Willie John 21:1-23. Jeremiah predicted that when the Messiah came, the word would be spread by fishermen, which was significant since at the time, there were more shepherds than fishermen. Father Willie talked about the different types of love. The Greek language in which John wrote the gospel, has three different words for love. We only have one. Jesus asks Peter, do you agape me? And Peter, twice responds, I phileo you. Phileo is the word used for brotherly love. But Jesus is not satisfied. He wants it all. So he keeps asking him until finally Peter, on the third time, answers I agape you. He had to love Jesus with an agape love in order to build his church, and give his life for Jesus.

Jesus asks the same of us. He wants everything from us. He wants our jobs, our homes, our spouses, our children. And we should not be afraid to entrust everything to Jesus because He will bless it and multiply it in ways that we cannot even begin to imagine it.

We then took off our shoes, and we got our feet wet in the Sea of Galilee. How awesome to get our feet wet in the same spot where Jesus walked on water, where He performed the miracle of the multiplication, and where He spent so much time with His disciples.

Our next stop was Capharnaum, known as the town of Jesus because it was the location of many events and miracles in Jesus’ life. Capharnaum is one of the towns in which Jesus did the majority of his teaching. Farmers, fishermen, tax collectors, and Roman soldiers lived together here and built their homes using basalt, the local stone with a volcanic past.

Capharnaum is the city where Jesus goes to when He is rejected in Nazareth, His own town. In this reading, taken from Luke 4:16-29, Jesus is in the synagogue and they ask Him to read the Scriptures. He reads the prophesy of Isaiah 61 about the coming of the Messiah. He tells the people, “Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing” (Luke 4:21). But the people could not accept Him because they knew Him as the carpenter, the son of Joseph, so they rejected Him. Jesus tells them, “no prophet is accepted in the prophet’s hometown” (Luke 4:24). He then departs from Nazareth and goes to Capharnaum (Luke 4:31).

We sat under the trees and we read John 6:24-59 which is the reading when Jesus proclaims “I am the bread of life...” Jesus here is talking about the Eucharist and the mass when He says eat my flesh. Once again, Father Willie made the distinction between the Greek language and the English language. In the Greek language, what Jesus is really saying is chew my flesh and drink my blood. No wonder the Jews were scandalized. Father Willie made the comparison between a “palomilla” steak that he eats in five minutes, and a Ruth Chris steak that he chews and savors in order to get all the juices out. When we go to Communion, we must do the same. We must chew and savor the Eucharist, in order to get all of Jesus into us. He also said that when we go to Communion, we don’t receive Jesus. He receives us. We become one with Jesus.

In Capharnaum, we visited the ruins of a synagogue from the 5th century. When the archaeologists dogged below it, they found only one layer of civilization that dated back to the time of Jesus. That building they unearthed from the first century could very well have been the very synagogue in which Jesus spent considerable time preaching and worshipping.

We also visited Peter’s house (Matthew 8:14). A modern Catholic Church was built over it in 1991. The church is designed to look like a ship sailing on the Sea of Galilee. In the middle of the sanctuary, there is a clear window on the floor that allowed us to look down into the single room of an insula compound identified as the home of Peter. Father Willie mentioned the gospel passage when the paralytic is being brought through the roof into the house (Mark 2:1-12). He said: “when you look down into the hall, you can see what those people that brought the man asking for a miracle were seeing.” He also mentioned the miracle of Peter’s mother-in-law’s healing. She was cured in this house, and then, she began to serve. We are supposed to do the same. We are supposed to be empowered by this trip to go and spread the gospel to others back in Miami.

Shuki and Ana also mentioned that the word Church means assembly. When we gather at a Church, we are assembling together to hear the word of God. They also read from Luke 4:31-37, which talks about another miracle that takes place in Capharnaum when Jesus cures a man that was possessed by a demon.

It was so special to linger where Jesus did. We could almost listen to His voice as He spoke words of comfort and encouragement into our ears.

After visiting Capharnaum, we went to have lunch to a restaurant inside a gas station. It turned out to be better than yesterday’s place, except for the dessert. We had a bunch of appetizers (corn, hummus with pita bread, different types of cabbage) and for the main course fish and chips. Dessert was dates. Maybe with cream cheese they would have been better but by themselves they were pretty plain.

After lunch, we drove very close to Syria on our way to the Golan Heights. We were so close that we could actually see Syria in the near distance. The Golan Heights used to belong to Syria but in 1967, on the 6-day war, Israel conquered it. We had a great view of the entire Sea of Galilee from the opposite side of Tiberias. We could see the town but it was not clear enough to distinguish the hotel.

Once again, we had dinner at the hotel. It was the same type of buffet as yesterday, with the only difference that today we could eat meat. After dinner, we went for a walk. There is a walkway behind the hotel, bordering the Sea of Galilee, which was packed with people. We are not sure if it’s permanent, or if it was just there because of Passover, but there were rides for the kids, booths selling food, a type of flea market selling all kinds of items... It was very lively. We walked over to another hotel that our guides had recommended, the Scot, which is... Scottish. It was not kosher so Rafael and Paul had a drink, and we sat outside in the gardens which were very nice, and the temperature was very comfortable. We ran into a few people from our group that had the same idea as us.

Step #47-Spending time with Mama Mary

“Our old self was crucified with him, so that our sinful body might be done away with, that we might no longer be in slavery to sin." Romans 6:6

Holy Saturday (April 11, 2009)

My grandfather died twenty years ago today. It was the first time I lost a close relative. I remember the day after the burial was the worst. I felt such emptiness in my heart and such a feeling of desolation. I needed company. I needed noise. I had to leave the house because the walls were crowding in on me.

Today is that day for Mary. Last night, I spent a few hours with her. I had not planned on it. I went to sleep at 10 pm exhausted and I felt asleep the minute my head hit the pillow. An hour later my cell phone rang. I usually leave it in top of the night table, but last night I forgot. I got up and tried to find my purse in the darkness. By the time I got to the cell phone, I had missed the call and as I read “missed call from Rafi,” the house phone began to ring. I ran back to the night table, grabbed the phone and woke up completely to my son’s voice “mom, I’m in the hospital.”

Those are the words every parent dreads to hear, but at least this time it was him calling me so it couldn’t be so bad. He’s had a cold for over a week and can’t seem to get rid of a dry cough, in spite of the antibiotics and the cough medicine that the doctor prescribed last Monday. Yesterday, as he was coughing, he felt an intense pain in his chest, so they sent him to the hospital for X-rays. At this point, of course, I couldn’t go back to sleep. I sat in the living room, I prayed the rosary, I talked to Mary, and we consoled each other. I felt her pain because I figured, if I am feeling so helpless because my son is in New Jersey having X-rays in the middle of the night and I can’t be with him, how much worst Mary had to feel knowing that her Son had died such an unfair and horrific death just a few hours ago, and she couldn’t do anything about it. We sat side by side next to Jesus’ tomb and as I felt her weeping in my heart, she comforted me.

As Jesus was crucified, our old sinful self was crucified with Him. His crucifixion gives us hope that the death to our old self will leave us empty so that He can pour new life into us. As I sat by the tomb last night, waiting for my son to call me again, I felt the darkness of the hour Jesus had just lived. But I also saw a glimpse of the light that we will experience tomorrow in His Resurrection.

My son finally called me that his lungs were fine but even though they could not see it in the X-rays, they thought the coughing might have caused him to fracture a rib. They sent him back to the university health center with pain killers and a stronger antibiotic. They are keeping him at the clinic for a few days under observation. It’s a good thing I did not cancel my trip because of the plumbing disaster. Even though I wish I could hop in the next plane out to New Jersey, I know he’s in good hands and God willing, I will be with him on Wednesday night.

Today, I’ve experienced the same feelings I felt twenty years ago when my grandfather passed away. The same emptiness and the same feelings of desolation. The walls are crowding in on me. I imagine Mary sitting by herself, feeling the same way. She needs our company and our love. Can you spend a little time with her?

Holy Saturday at the Sea of Galilee (March 31, 2018)

I will be spending this morning at the Sea of Galilee, listening to mass on a boat. It is the same sea where Jesus went out fishing with his disciples, the same sea where He walked on water... later we will go to the place where the multiplication of the fish and bread took place, and we will eat a similar meal. Am I dreaming? I keep pinching myself, but it looks like it’s not a dream. I’m truly here. I feel so blessed.

Last night we had a service for Good Friday in Tiberias. The main thing that I took with me from the service is that Jesus willingly went to the cross because He loves each one of us so deeply. When we love someone, we are going to suffer because love and suffering go hand in hand. Mama Mary suffered because she loved Jesus so deeply. We suffer when we see someone that we love go through something difficult. And Jesus suffered because He loves us.

Let’s think about that today. How much do we love Him back? Are we willing to suffer for the love of Jesus?

Our Pilgrimage into the Holy Land-Day 2

Good Friday, March 30, 2018: TelAviv-Jaffa-Caesarea Maritima-Haifa-Mt. Carmel-Tiberias

“I truly understand that God shows no partiality, but in every nation anyone who fears him and does what is right is acceptable to him. You know the message he sent to the people of Israel, preaching peace by Jesus Christ—he is Lord of all." Acts 10:34-36

We woke up at 6 am, got ready, packed our bags, had breakfast, and by 8 am we were on the bus on our way to Jaffa. Today we met our second tour guide, Ana’s fiancée. We are in his bus. His name is Shuki. He explained some of the history on our way to Jaffa. Jaffa is the old city with a history of 5,000 years. In the Old Testament, the name was Joppa. TelAviv is the new city. The name derives from “Old-New Country.” Tel means “artificial hill” and Aviv means “spring.” Tel is old and Aviv is new.

We got off in Jaffa and visited some old ruins. The port of Joppa is mentioned in Jonah 1:3, and that is why they have the whale of Jonah on a fountain.

We then headed to the church of St. Peter where Father Willie said a few words. This church is based on the scripture reading from Acts of the Apostles chapter 10, where Joppa is also mentioned. In this reading, Peter felt into a trance, and he sees a sheet falling from heaven with pictures of all types of animals. He then hears a voice telling him to kill and eat. Peter responds: “By no means, Lord; for I have never eaten anything that is profane or unclean” (Acts 10:14). The voice replies: “What God has made clean, you must not call profane” (Acts 10:15). This is when Peter breaks from Judaism, and begins to do things differently. When Jesus resurrected, He broke all the boundaries. He is everywhere, and He came to save all humanity, not just the Jews. This is not our final home. We are on a pilgrimage towards our final home, which will be heaven. This dream that Peter had took place here in the location where the church was built.

Our next stop, Caesarea Maritima, was also Peter’s next stop after he had his dream. Up until this moment, the Jews did not associate themselves with the Gentiles. Peter’s dream changed everything. He realized that salvation was meant for everyone, not just the Jews.  

Aside from the Bible connections, this town has a very interesting history. We began our visit by watching a movie that explained it all. The city itself was built by Herod the Great, who had a dream to build the largest city in Palestine during the Roman Empire. The city was built between 22 and 10 BC, and Herod dedicated it to his patron, Caesarea Augustus. It was destroyed and rebuilt many times throughout the years. Today, there are some original ruins. Pontius Pilate spent some time here and they have found a rock that proves it.

After watching the movie, we walked over to a sort of amphitheater known as a “vomitario” because it vomits people in and out. We continued reading Acts 10. Peter goes to Caesarea, to the house of Cornelius, a Roman centurion. Cornelius was a gentile, so just visiting his home was not allowed for the Jews. A lot of gentiles gathered at Cornelius’ house, and Peter tells them: “I truly understand that God shows no partiality, but in every nation anyone who fears him and does what is right is acceptable to him” (Acts 10:34-35). Then, the Holy Spirit felt upon all who heard the word, both Jews and Gentiles. That’s what made Peter decide that baptism was not limited to the Jews. Who was he not to offer baptism to the gentiles when the Holy Spirit had decided otherwise? This brought about a series of questions. If they were baptized, did they also have to be circumcised? They created a council to discuss all these questions and they decided that Peter would have the final say since Jesus had named him first pope. In the end, it was decided that they did not need circumcision because they were breaking away from the old laws. Therefore, Caesarea marks the spot where the first Gentiles were baptized in the name of Jesus Christ. It was a Gentile Pentecost.

Caesarea is also the place from where they shipped Peter to Rome to have him crucified, and Paul was detained in this town for two years (Acts 23-24). Caesarea Maritima was Rome away from Rome. There was no better place for Paul to get to know Rome while still in the Middle East. So the Lord kept him in this setting for two years and enhanced his understanding of the Roman world. Then, when the time was right, Paul set sail for Rome from Caesarea’s harbor.

After leaving Caesarea, we went to Haifa where we had lunch. It was a large restaurant, which is a good thing since our group of 73 pretty much occupied almost half the space. The only problem was that they did not get the memo that today is Good Friday, and we don’t eat meat on Good Friday. The main course was chicken shish kabobs. Father Willie gave us permission to eat it. He said that being that was what they were providing, it would be rude to reject it, and we would not go to hell for eating the chicken. Aside from the chicken, we had white rice, fries, hummus with pita bread, an assortment of salads, eggplant, baklava and coffee. It was all served family style, and we ate it as one community of faith. We will get to know each other pretty well over the next ten days, which is awesome, and definitely a part of the experience.

After lunch, we climbed Mount Carmel. At the top of the mountain, we found a church, the Stella Maris. Inside the church, there is an image of our Lady of Carmel in the altar and underneath, a cave, where the prophet Elijah hid when the king tried to kill him. The story can be found in 1 Kings 17-18. Years later, in the 12th century AD, a group of men decided to come to Mount Carmel, and live as hermits in the same cave where Elijah hid. While they were there, our Lady appeared to them and gave them a gift. She gave them the scapular, and the order of the carmelites was formed. She also made them a promise. If they were to die wearing the scapular, they would avoid purgatory and go straight to heaven. The reason why the church is called the Stella Maris is because when the monks looked out towards the ocean, they saw the North Star. The North Star has always been associated with our Blessed Mother. Just as the North Star guides the sailors safely to shore, our Blessed Mother guides us safely to Her Son.

At 3 pm, we knelt in front of the church for a moment of silence since it is believed that was the hour that our Savior died. And we are in the Holy Land, the place where He died, so we truly stopped to reflect at the exact time that He passed away.

We then walked over to an observatory with beautiful views. We took pictures, got back on the bus, and made our way to another observatory to take more beautiful pictures. The second observatory was even prettier than the first one. It overlooked beautiful gardens on the side of the mountain. We took more pictures and then headed towards our hotel in Tiberias where we will spend the next three nights. On our way to the hotel, we prayed the Stations of the Cross.

We got to the hotel, the Leonardo Plaza, at 5 pm and had to be back down at 5:30 for our Good Friday services. The hotel is packed because in addition to our Cuban invasion, today is Passover so it’s full of Jews that are here to celebrate the Passover. We decided to carry our own luggage up to the room or else, we would not have enough time to at the very least freshen up.

Father Willie and Father Frank both led us on the Veneration of the Cross. We are so blessed to have them both on this pilgrimage. Father Willie was the one who did the homily, and in his usual style, it was amazing. He said that Good Friday makes him think of marriage. He talked about the three rings of marriage: the first one is the engagement ring; the second one is the wedding ring; and the third one is the “suffe”ring. He said that when two people commit to each other in marriage, they are committing to suffering for each other. When we make the choice to love someone, we are making the choice to suffer for that person because love and suffering go hand in hand. We are going to suffer, it’s inevitable. It may be because one person gets sick, or because one lost their job, or because of the children. Whatever the reason, there will be suffering combined with the joy. He then tied this to Jesus and the cross. Jesus experienced physical suffering, emotional suffering and spiritual suffering. The physical is pretty obvious. The emotional is when He saw that His disciples had abandoned him, and also seeing His mother at the foot of the cross suffering from seeing Her Son on the cross naked, beaten, and humiliated. And the spiritual suffering was when He felt abandoned by God. He felt desolation when He tells His Father, “why have You abandoned me?” And Jesus went through all this suffering because He loved us so much that He chose to go through this perfect suffering. Perfect love and perfect suffering go hand in hand, and Jesus went through both because of us.

After the service, we had dinner, also buffet style. Once again, they had a lot of meat choices which most of us bypassed. We ate salad (there was a huge assortment), hummus, baba ganoush, salmon, potatoes, broccoli, other types of vegetables, and an incredible assortment of desserts. We also drank kosher wine. The best part, though, was witnessing first hand how the Jewish celebrate their Passover. Even though they tried to kick us out, we joined in the celebrations.

Step #46-Our Blessed Mother

“When Jesus saw his mother and the disciple there whom he loved, he said to his mother, ‘Woman, behold, your son.’ Then he said to the disciple, ‘Behold, your mother.’" John 19:26-27

Good Friday (April 10, 2009)

I waited until the end of the day to meditate on this step. I wanted to live Good Friday, to experience it, before I sat down and shared what I felt.

I read the Passion this morning and then I took my morning walk. As I walked, I meditated on the different scenes: Judas’ betrayal, Peter’s denial, Pilate’s fears, the crucifixion… but all throughout, all I could think about was Mary. The sorrow and the pain she had to feel at that moment had to have been so intense, that just thinking about it brought tears to my eyes.

In the afternoon I went to the services. I heard the Passion again, I went to kiss the cross, I heard beautiful music, and again, all I could think about was Mary. Her courage and hope as she faced that moment, her motherly love for her son, her trust in God, her confidence that she did the right thing when she answered YES to God’s request to be the mother of His Son. The depth of her love is so profound that when Jesus sees her from the cross, the love He feels from her inspires Him to hand her over to us. It is at that moment in the cross when Mary becomes the mother of all humanity, our blessed Mother.

Jesus was born to die. He came to die for our sins. He gave His life for us. I don’t think Mary understood this at first, but I believe that even if she knew, she would still have answered YES. When Jesus gave her to us, He made her pain more bearable. We are her children and we honor Jesus’ sacrifice by saying YES to Him when He asks us to take her under our care. She trusted God and gave Him her all with her YES. We need to trust Jesus and give Him our YES by allowing Mary to truly be our Mother.

Our Mother understands better than anyone when we feel sorrow, when we suffer, when we feel insecure, when we are lonely, when we feel desperate, when we fail, when we feel insignificant, when we feel desolation, when we are defeated. We can open our hurting hearts to her because she comprehends, because she felt what we feel.

Mary has walked with us every step of this journey. She has listened to us, she has sat under the tree numerous times to talk to us. Now is our time to console her, to dry her tears and spend time with her. As we embrace her into our lives, we understand that Jesus did not die in vain, because through her we can feel that Jesus is still with us. He is in our hearts. He is present in our lives.

Good Friday (March 30, 2018)

We arrived to the Holy Land yesterday. As Father Willie told us last night, we are not here for tourism. We are on a spiritual pilgrimage. We are here to get to know Jesus better. We are here to follow in His footsteps. We are here to make the Bible come alive. We have read the same passages lots of times, now we will get to see first hand where Jesus celebrated His first mass, where He was born, where He died, where He was buried, where He performed His first miracle. But more than anything, we will need to find Him within our hearts. We will need to feel Him within us for this pilgrimage to truly come alive.

My prayer is that at the end of this ten-day pilgrimage, I will be able to know Him a little better. I also hope that I will feel closer to Mama Mary, and that I will be able to tell her, “Mama Mary, your Son did not die in vain. He is very much alive, not just here in Israel, but in the whole world.”

Our Pilgrimage into the Holy Land-Day 1

Holy Thursday, March 29, 2018: TelAviv

“Jesus went on with his disciples to the villages of Caesarea Philippi; and on the way he asked his disciples, ‘Who do people say that I am?’” Mark 8:27

We arrived to TelAviv around 2 pm local time. There is a difference of seven hours between Israel and Miami. We went through passport control, and picked up our luggage rather rapidly. We were surprised because we were expecting that security would be much tighter. The alarm even went off when we went through and nothing happened. They didn’t even come over to check us out.

We found our driver while we were waiting to go through passport control. She had a sign with our names: Romero's and Ingelmo's. Then, we found out that she did not have a car for us. Somehow, they had messed up our reservation, so we had to wait about an hour until they found a car with a new driver. Due to this delay, we got to our hotel, the Renaissance TelAviv, around 5 pm. 

TelAviv looked pretty crowded, a lot of traffic on the roads, huge high rises... it looked like a modern business type city. The hotel is right on the Mediterranean Sea.

It was very windy, so the sea was very rough. We checked in, went to our room, freshened up, and then went down to the lobby. We stepped outside to take a few pictures of the sunset.

The Jews are now celebrating their Passover. We found out that a lot of them go to hotels to celebrate it, so our hotel was pretty full, and here, everything is Kosher. We drank Kosher wine for the first time.

We met some other people from our group that had already arrived. We also met one of our two tour guides. Her name is Anna. She was born in Siberia, Russia, but she came to Israel when she was a baby. She’s Russian Jewish. She’s young, beautiful and passionate. She gave us some of the history of her birth country and of her heart country. She doesn’t feel any connection to Russia. But she is passionate about Israel. The other guide is her fiancée.

By seven we went to dinner because we were hungry. Dinner was included and it was buffet style. Some of the choices were lamb ossubuco, potatoes, broccoli soup, and chocolate cake.

We then stayed in the lobby talking to some of the members from our group. The rest of the group arrived past 10 pm. After traveling for almost 24 hours they were exhausted. We accompanied them to dinner, even though we did not eat again. It was too late for the mass that Father Willie had planned so he just said a few words about Holy Thursday.

He left us with a question from the reading where Jesus asks the disciples: “Who do people say that I am?” He asked us to imagine Jesus asking us the same question today. What will be our answer today? What will be our answer in ten days when we finish our pilgrimage? We are on a pilgrimage. We are not here for tourism. Our whole life is a pilgrimage. Our destination is heaven.

Step #45-Serve with Humility

"If I, therefore, the master and teacher, have washed your feet, you ought to wash one another's feet. I have given you a model to follow, so that as I have done for you, you should also do." John 13:14-15

Holy Thursday (April 9, 2009)

Today we celebrate the “Last Supper” of our Lord. Close your eyes for a second and place yourself in that room, with Jesus and the disciples. Imagine that you are one of the disciples and that Jesus is about to wash your feet. How would you react? Would you react like Peter who said: “You will never wash my feet.” (John 13:8) or would you give your feet willingly for Him to wash them? It’s not an easy answer. Sometimes is easier to serve than to be served. It is a very humbling experience to allow someone to serve us, especially if we consider that someone to be above us.

Jesus taught us how to serve and accept service with humility. During this entire journey we have seen Him serve us. His whole life was about service. He came to serve the poor, the sick, the abandoned, the forgotten, the sinners, etc. Even in his last hours, He was serving his disciples, including the one that was about to betray Him. He did not skip Judas in the washing of the feet. He washed his feet as well.

He wants us to do the same. He wants us to serve each other. Sometimes we will need to serve and sometimes we will need to be served. We need to learn to accept acts of kindness from others as a gift from Jesus. When we learn to accept these gifts in this way, we will be able to accept service from others with true gratitude and humility. He also wants us to serve others with humility. He does not want us to feel superior to anyone. If we help a poor person or someone undergoing economic hardships, we need to do it with love and mercy. We need to make sure that the person feels good, not inferior. If we go visit the sick, we need to take them our love. We cannot make them feel that what we are doing is a great sacrifice or an inconvenience.

Let’s spend some quiet time with Jesus tonight. Tomorrow, He will undergo the Passion and the Crucifixion. Let’s keep Him company in his last hours.

Holy Thursday (March 29, 2018)

In about four hours, God willing, I will be boarding an airplane which will take me to Israel. The past five days in Switzerland, I have felt as if I was in the desert. It’s ironic because Switzerland is nothing like a desert. Even though it’s still pretty cold, and I even saw snow up on the mountains, Switzerland is a very green country. And yet, to me, it still felt like the desert. Since it’s a Protestant country, the churches are bare. Every time I entered one, I felt a sense of desolation. No statues of saints or our Blessed Mother anywhere. Not even a cross on the altars. Only one church had a statue of the Pieta (Mama Mary carrying Jesus’ dead body).

Now that I am truly going to the desert, because I hear Israel’s climate is desert-like, and we will walk in the desert, I feel so excited. The feelings of desolation that I have experienced in the past few days are dissipating.

Jesus, take our hands and walk with us as we enter the Triduum.

Step #44-We Have a Choice

"Amen, I say to you, one of you will betray me." Matthew 26:21

Wednesday of Holy Week (April 8, 2009)

Today I feel very relaxed. How different from yesterday when I was on the verge of tears. What has changed? Not much on the outside. I still have the plumbing problem that needs to be resolved. However, much has changed on the inside. I have come to terms that regardless of my attitude, I have to face the problem. I have two choices, I can get upset and suffer through the whole ordeal or I can put a smile on my face, deal with the issues one at a time and take each day as it comes. I opted for the second choice and it made all the difference.

Jesus also had a choice. He knew what was coming His way. He knew that one of his disciples whom He considered a friend was about to betray Him. He could have chosen to sulk alone, hide by himself, away from everyone. He made a different choice. He chose to spend His last hours with his friends, in spite of the fact that one betrayed Him, one denied Him and others felt asleep when He asked them to keep Him company while He prayed.

We are all faced with choices everyday. Our journey is not an easy one. We may have days of sunshine but there are days that are full of clouds, storms and rain. We can choose to hide behind our sorrow, enjoy a lonely “pity-party” or we can choose to come out of our hiding places, put a smile on our faces and join the rest of the world. Yes, we will have to face those that betrayed us in the past, we may encounter those that hurt us or we may come face to face with that person that we have not been able to forgive yet. But if we choose to stay within ourselves, we may miss the smile of a friend, the hug of a child, the smell of the flowers or the song of the birds.

It’s our choice. No one can make it for us. Let’s sit down today with our Blessed Mother and have a heart to heart. She will help us decide what choice to make.

Step #43-My Reward is with the Lord

“Where I am going, you cannot follow me now, though you will follow later.” John 13:36

Tuesday of Holy Week (April 7, 2009)

Jesus has been announcing his death by giving us small hints through our journey, however, He has never come out and said it outright. Today, all He is telling us is that where He is going we cannot follow Him now, but we will follow Him later. Eventually, when our time comes to leave this earth, we will follow Him and meet Him in heaven. Now, we must do our job here on earth. He asks us to do something everyday, do we have ears to listen? Sometimes we need to open the ears of the heart to be able to understand the message.

Sometimes we are on a path and we are very happy because everything is going well, the path is smooth and we are actually enjoying ourselves. We think we are doing what God wants from us and when we think we finally figured it out, He throws us a “curve ball” and we have to change courses.

I got my “curve ball” yesterday. It’s a small detour on the road but it’s an unexpected detour. It looks like we have a major plumbing problem at home, a broken pipe underneath the kitchen floor. It’s the main pipe and that is why we’ve been having problems in the master bathroom. Today, the problems began in the other bathroom. It looks like we are going to need to move out of the house, probably cancel the trip we had scheduled for next week to visit our older son and a few other inconveniences… However, through this whole situation, I am trying really hard to remain positive and to focus on the fact that “my reward is with the Lord.” Isaiah 49:4

I started today’s step over two hours ago. I have been interrupted, I had to rush back to the house and it looks like it’s going to be a long day on this journey, but I am placing all my trust in the Lord that He will see me through this ordeal and at the end I will still be sane. The next few steps may be a bit disorganized. I may start them early in the morning or late in the day. If you don’t hear from me, keep me in your prayers since I may be running around trying to juggle everything. I know that as long as I keep Jesus in the center, I will be able to keep the rings in the air.

Whatever we are going through in life, whatever detours we find in our journey, whatever obstacles we have to jump, as long as we keep our attention focused on Jesus, everything will be all right. He is the reason for our existence and our reward is not in this world. We will find our reward when we encounter Him at the end of our journey.

Step #42-The Best We Have to Offer

“You always have the poor with you, but you do not always have me.” John 12:8

Monday of Holy Week (April 6, 2009)

In today’s gospel passage, Judas ridicules Mary, the sister of Martha and Lazarus, for wasting an expensive perfumed oil to anoint Jesus’ feet. Jesus defends her. It may seem by His answer that He did not care about the poor, but that was not the case at all. He knew Judas’ heart. He knew Judas did not care about the poor. He knew Judas was just thinking about himself and what he could do with the money if he sold the oil. That is why he tells him that he would not always have Jesus in his life. After Jesus died, the disciples would still have him because He would resurrect and return to them, but not to Judas. Judas was going straight to hell.

Sometimes we are ridiculed because we do something out of love for Jesus. The people at work may ridicule us because we don’t eat meat on Fridays. They just don’t see the point of it. Our sacrifices during Lent are a way to show our love to Jesus. By offering our sacrifices to allow us to get closer to Him, we are uniting ourselves to Him on the cross. If we combine our sacrifices with almsgiving, we are showing Him how much we love Him because we care for His children that are in need.

Jesus has shown us His love every step of this journey. We need to repay Him with our love. During this Holy Week, let us be like Mary who did not think of the price. She just thought that for Her Master she wanted the best. Let us give to Jesus the best we have to offer. Let us love those we encounter with all our heart. Let us smile to every person that comes in contact with us. Let us forgive those that hurt us. Let us be compassionate to those in need. Let Jesus’ love for us melt our hearts so that we can spread His love all around.

Step #41-He Died so We could Live

“Truly this man was the Son of God.” Mark 15:39

Palm Sunday (April 5, 2009)

Today is Palm Sunday, the beginning of Holy Week. I used to dread Holy Week. I saw it as a somber week. This year I have actually been looking forward to Holy Week. I have changed my perspective. I no longer see it as a somber week, I see it as a week of love.

Do you have someone that loves you so much that he or she would be willing to die for you? Do you have someone that you love so much that you would be willing to die for him or her? If you answered yes to one of these two questions, you are very blessed to experience that kind of love either in the receiving or the giving end. If you answered yes to both questions, you are doubly blessed because you are loved and you love unconditionally.

All of us should have answered yes to the first question. We all know someone that loves us so much that He died for us. Jesus loves us unconditionally, that is why He gave his life for us. This week represents the love that He feels for us. This week as we walk the last steps with Jesus we will realize how lucky we are because we are greatly loved by Him.

In today’s gospel for the first time a human being, the centurion, realizes that Jesus was indeed the Son of God. Jesus does not reveal who He is until His death. It’s the way He dies that gives it away. He died so we could live. How awesome is that? He died so we could live.

Step #40-Jesus Died for me

“Many of the Jews who had… seen what Jesus had done began to believe in him.” John 11:45

Saturday of the Fifth Week of Lent (April 4, 2009)

Jesus had to perform many signs to get the Jews to believe in Him. Even with the signs, many did not believe and planned to kill Him. Blessed are we because we have not seen yet we believe. We have to believe in Him otherwise we would not be walking this journey, we would not be following Him.

Our journey is about to get better, because we are approaching the end. We are entering Holy Week, the best part is yet to come. Every step we take from today until Easter will be very rewarding. We need to believe with all our heart to be able to stay on the path.

Jesus is about to die on the cross for each one of us, individually. How much more do we want from Him? We need to let Him touch our hearts, we need to let Him enter our hearts, we need to let Him use us for whatever it is He needs us. He is walking next to us, take the hand He is offering you. Don’t let Him get away. He will change your life.

Tell yourself over and over, “Jesus died for me.”

Saturday of the Fifth Week of Lent (March 24, 2018)

I am posting this earlier than usual because I will soon board an airplane on route to Switzerland. It will be the stepping stone to get me to Israel. This year, God willing, I will be spending the holiest days of our faith in Israel. It has been my biggest wish for many years to visit the Holy Land. It seems like the time has finally arrived. I will walk where Jesus walked. I will pray where Mama Mary prayed. I will renew my wedding vows where Jesus performed His first miracle. I still feel like I’m dreaming. Please keep the entire group of pilgrims that will be joining us on this pilgrimage in your prayers. I, in turn, will carry all of you and your prayer requests in my heart, and I will deposit them at the foot of the cross, where our Lord one day opened His arms, and gave His life for you and me.

Step #39-Let’s Open Our Eyes

“The Father is in me and I am in the Father.” John 10:38

Friday of the Fifth Week of Lent (April 3, 2009)

Is Jesus human or is He God? He was both. He was human and God at the same time. He is the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. The Trinity is one of the greatest mysteries of our faith. I remember when my three kids were little they all had an issue with this at different times. The easiest way that I found to explain it to them was by telling them that I was their mother, but I was also a wife, a daughter, a friend, an accountant… I was one person but I was a different person to different people. My clients don’t see me as a mother, they see me as their accountant, my husband sees me as his wife, my mother sees me as her daughter, but to my children, I will always be their mother.

I went on to explain that God is three persons in one. When we need protection and comfort, we pray to the Father. When we need a friend, someone to talk to and tell Him our deepest secrets, we pray to Jesus. When we need discernment, inspiration or a solution to a problem, we pray to the Holy Spirit. No matter to whom we address our prayer, we are praying to God. He is the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.

As hard as it is to understand, imagine how much harder it had to be for the Jews who knew the human side of Jesus. They grew up together, He was their neighbor, the son of Joseph, the carpenter, and Mary, his wife. They could not possibly see Him as God and that is why they accused Him of blasphemy.

Let’s ask Jesus to open our eyes so we can see all three persons in Him.

Step #38-We Need to Be Ready

“Amen, amen, I say to you, whoever keeps my word will never see death.” John 8:51

Thursday of the Fifth Week of Lent (April 2, 2009)

What did Jesus mean when He said “whoever keeps my word will never see death.” Of course, He was not referring to our physical death, He was talking about our spiritual death. If we don’t obey His word, if we don’t keep Him in our hearts, we will die spiritually.

He is also referring to dying to life as we know it, here on earth, but resurrecting to a new life, a life on heaven when we will never die. Jesus came to give us hope that there is more. Life does not end here on earth. Life begins when it ends. He came to die for our sins, to suffer a physical death in order to resurrect to a new life, an everlasting life. That is our hope and the heart of our faith. When we truly believe this in our hearts, we will stop being afraid of death.

One person from our time that taught us a lot about death was our previous pope, John Paul II. I always admired him during his life, but he gained my respect during his death. Today is the fourth anniversary of his death. That year and the previous one were especially hard. I lost a dear friend to cancer, we lost a father and three children at Belen in a tragic accident… it just seemed like every other week I was in a funeral. I remember I began to have a lot of doubts: What was the point of praying for someone that was sick if they were going to die anyway? Why had the father and three kids died in the accident, yet the mother had survived? Did they forget to pray before they went on their vacation? I was going nuts trying to make sense of it all. It took the Emmaus group, various meetings with a priest and a lot of prayer to begin to see a small ray of light in the horizon. The following year, 2006, I lost another dear friend in a tragic accident, and it was during her funeral mass that my eyes were completely opened. Her husband talked about her life, which she had dedicated to serve the Lord as a wife, mother, CCD teacher and director, plus many other ministries that she served through the years. He had such an amazing faith that God had called her because she was ready to be with Him, that I began to understand the meaning of life and death.

Jesus came to teach us that in dying we are born again. He suffered tremendously, yet He showed us that if we place our hope in the resurrection, we will be able to endure our cross. We have a lot of saints that we can read about who truly believed this and that is why they were able to withstand horrific deaths. More recent, we have John Paul II who taught us how to die with dignity, how to suffer in silence and how to release ourselves completely to God.

Nobody knows when God will call us to join Him in His kingdom. We all need to be ready. We need to be spiritually alive. We need to follow Him, obey Him, ask Him to forgive our sins and attempt to live a life of grace.

Our Mother can help us achieve this. Let’s sit under the tree with her and share our fears and our doubts.

Step #37-Our Strength is in God

“Everyone who commits sin is a slave of sin.” John 8:34

Wednesday of the Fifth Week of Lent (April 1, 2009)

Sin can easily become a habit, a bad habit. If we allow it to take a hold of our life. Do you know anyone who lies? When a person has a tendency to lie, lying becomes a bad habit that is very difficult to shake off. It’s the same with gossip, stealing, even adultery. Once we commit the first sin, if we don’t grab on to Jesus and make a serious commitment to stop sinning, we can easily become “a slave of that sin.”

We are all very weak and that is why we continue to sin, despite our good intentions to sin no more. I cannot tell you the number of times that I have gone to confession and the same day, I’ve committed a sin, sometimes the same sin I confessed just a few hours before. Our strength is in God. He recognizes our weaknesses and that is why He forgives us over and over. The more we sin, the more we need to rely on God to give us the strength to be able to overcome that sin. During this Lent I have been trying to overcome one particular sin. I have many, but I figured it would be easier to concentrate on just one for now. I am having the hardest time with it. The enemy tempts me every step of the way. Of course, since I am fully aware of this sin, I notice every time I fall. It’s sort of become a joke between my husband and I because my sin is his greatest virtue. Almost daily I tell him, “oops, I did it again.” He just laughs because he knows I’ve been dealing with this issue for years. Saturday I went to confession and if it wasn’t because it is a venial sin, I would need to go again because I’ve fallen twice already since Saturday. The good thing is that it used to happen daily, now I’m down to every other day, so there’s hope.

Sometimes I feel that I am unworthy of God’s mercy. He is so good to me and I am so ungrateful. This journey has helped me tremendously because it has made me aware of my weaknesses and my imperfections. I know that I have a long way to go, but all I can do is walk one step at a time.

Lent is a time of cleansing, a time to look within our hearts and discover all those sins that are keeping us apart from God. We need to place them at the foot of the cross and talk to Jesus about our weaknesses, so that He can help us overcome them. The sacrifices that we have been doing during Lent, the fasting, the praying and the almsgiving are tools to help make us stronger in our resolution to sin no more.

Holy Mary, mother of God, intercede for us sinners so that your Son may have mercy on us, so that He may cleanse us from our stains, so that our hearts may be pure by Easter. We humbly implore you. Amen.

Step #36-Share Your Talent

“I do nothing on my own, but I say only what the Father taught me.” John 8:28

Tuesday of the Fifth Week of Lent (March 31, 2009)

Johnny, Johnny, Johnny… today’s Gospel is very deep. I could take each sentence, analyze it separately and probably come up short. I’ve made a decision during this journey to join a Bible class or Bible study group in May. In the meantime, just bear with me… and feel free to add your own thoughts.

I chose the above sentence for this step because it seems to be a topic I’ve been discussing with my older son a lot lately. We cannot do anything on our own. Everything we have, our intelligence, our talents, our jobs, our families, comes from the Father. Yes, we had to put our part to get where we are today, but we would also not be where we are today if the Father had not been with us during our journey. He gives us the talents, it’s up to us to develop them and use them. We may be gifted with a beautiful voice, but unless we use it, practice and even take lessons, we may not be able to reach our full potential. On the other hand, I can tell you that the Father did not give me a beautiful voice, so even if I sing every day to the top of my lungs, even if I take singing lessons, even if I practice, I will never be able to sing in the choir. We need to discover our talents and our gifts and then we need to develop them with our Father’s help.

There are things that may not come easy to us, but with effort and hard work we may be able to accomplish them. There are magnificent people that have a lot of limitations and yet they have been able to do great things. Nothing is impossible if you have the will, and with God, we can do anything, however, there are certain things that come easier to some than to others and it is very sad to waste a God given talent. It is like telling God, I don’t accept your gift.

As we take the next step, let’s look within our hearts and ask: “What is my talent? What gift has God given me? Am I using His gift to the best of my ability? Or am I so ungrateful that I am keeping it in hiding?”

Let’s ask Mary to teach us how we can use our talents, our intelligence and everything that we are to help improve the Kingdom of God.

Step #35-We Are Never Alone

“Let the one among you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.” John 8:7

Monday of the Fifth Week of Lent (March 30, 2009)

We are all guilty of throwing stones. We are all guilty of judging others. We are all guilty of accusing others, sometimes unjustly. Today’s reading is addressed to each one of us.

How many times do we talk bad about others? Gossip is a serious sin. Even if the other person does not know that we are talking about him or her and we think what we say cannot hurt them, we are still sinning. It is none of our business what other people do and how they act. If we truly love them, we may talk to them in a loving way because we care, but if we are going to talk about them on their backs or if we are going to accuse them in a mean way, it is better to keep our mouths shut. The tongue is a very dangerous weapon, which can easily cause us to sin. We need to learn to keep it under control.

Sometimes we may find ourselves in the receiving end. We may be the ones that are being hit with the stones. When that happens we may feel angry or hurt, especially if we are innocent of what we are being accused. We need to know that Jesus is the only one that we need to worry about. If we are innocent, He knows it and He embraces us. If we are guilty, it does not matter if the whole world judges us. If we ask Jesus for forgiveness, He will forgive us. Yesterday in mass the priest said a sentence that stayed with me: “Jesus loves us unconditionally, forgives us completely and we are never alone.” When we go to confession, we are forgiven completely. We do not need to continue carrying all that baggage with us. He has forgiven us, COMPLETELY, because He loves us so much that He gave His life for us… and He is always with us. We are never alone.

Step #34-He is Helping Us Carry Our Cross

“Whoever serves me must follow me, and where I am, there also will my servant be. The Father will honor whoever serves me.” John 12:26

Fifth Sunday of Lent (March 29, 2009)

This week has been a complete disaster as far as walking these steps with you early in the morning, and for that I apologize. However, today was a mini Easter celebration for me. I don’t know if you recall, but back on Step #6 we talked about the fact that every Sunday during Lent we would celebrate a “little Easter.” Usually every year, I go to confession on Good Friday. Yesterday I decided I was not going to wait until Good Friday this year and I went to confession in the afternoon. It was a total cleansing of soul and spirit. I felt renewed and invigorated. Now, I just have to try very hard to remain sinless until Easter Sunday. It won’t be easy.

Today I woke up very early to take my son Rafi to the airport. He came down from New Jersey, where he goes to school, on Thursday night, and the whole weekend felt like a hurricane. This child of mine, God bless him, can be so complex and difficult at times. The things he comes up with… anyway, that’s a whole different story. This morning on the way to the airport we had a long talk. I almost had to walk with him through security because he would not stop talking. Once he left, I felt complete peace. I just knew in my heart that everything would be fine. I grabbed my husband by the hand and we did something out of the ordinary. We went to Hollywood Beach for breakfast. We just sat at a café and we cherished the moment. We realized that sometimes we may not have all the answers but once we plant a seed, that seed will eventually grow. We saw the future promise of that seed this morning and it truly felt like a “little Easter.”

When we decide to follow Jesus, we are making a promise to Him that we will serve Him. We may not see the results of our service in our lifetime. All we can do is plant seeds and pray that one day they will grow. Sometimes He may ask us to water the seeds that others planted. The important thing is to know that we cannot do everything, we can only do a tiny fraction of His work. He is only asking us to walk one step at a time, a step along this journey that will eventually take us to Him, with the knowledge that if we serve Him, the Father will honor us and reward us at the end of our journey.

I am very happy today. I can already see the light in the distance. Easter is just two weeks away. This week my cross was a bit heavy to carry, but I felt Jesus next to me helping me. I don’t know how the next two weeks will be, but I do know that I am not alone. Jesus is walking with me and that is the message I would like for all of you to hear today. Only you know how hard this walk has been for you. You may be afraid of what awaits you as this journey concludes, but I want you to know that you are not alone. No matter how heavy your cross is, Jesus is walking with you and He is helping you carry your cross.

Step #33-Unite not Divide

“A division occurred in the crowd because of Him.” John 7:43

Saturday of the Fourth Week of Lent (March 28, 2009)

I took this step this morning in front of the Blessed Sacrament. I felt such peace in my heart it made me wonder why I don’t spend more time in the Blessed Sacrament.

As I read today’s gospel, upon seeing how divided the people were 2000 years ago, I couldn’t help think that we are still very divided today.

Christians are completely divided. I don’t know exactly how many different religions we have under the Christian denomination. There is even division within our own Catholic Church.

Our families seem to be divided too. I know parents that don’t even talk to their sons or daughters. There’s sibling rivalry that causes separation between brothers and sisters. There are grandparents forgotten in nursing homes. Many families don’t even have time to sit down and have dinner together.

Jesus came to unite, not to divide. We need to bring Him back to the center of our lives. We need to place Him in the midst of our families. Once we do, we will unite once again and instead of pain and anger residing in our hearts, love will take its place.

Step #32-Be Ready to be Surprised

"When the Christ comes, no one will know where he is from." John 7:27

Friday of the Fourth Week of Lent (March 27, 2009)

Something I had been praying for happened yesterday. It happened in such an unexpected way, I was having doubts whether God had actually answered my prayers or if what was happening was not really coming from God.

The same thing happened to the Jews. They were expecting the Christ, but Jesus did not meet their expectations. I have no idea what they were expecting, maybe they thought He would arrive in a cloud or surrounded by an indescribable light. They definitely were not expecting Him to be the son of a carpenter or someone poor from their neighborhood.

If Jesus were to come today, would we recognize Him? Would we believe He is truly whom He says He is or would we think He is someone pretending to be the Christ? Most likely, we would be a little fearful and we would have doubts. Even the Catholic Church takes years to accept a miracle. We want to believe, but we have to be cautious. That is exactly what happened 2000 years ago and it’s exactly what happened to me yesterday.

We pray and we pray and we pray for something. Most likely, when Jesus answers our prayer, He will do so in the most unexpected way. He knows what is best for us and sometimes what we ask for needs a little twist. We need to be ready when we ask for something. He may surprise us in the most amazing way.

Step #31-We Cannot Lead Two Lives

"I do not accept human praise; moreover, I know that you do not have the love of God in you. I came in the name of my Father, but you do not accept me; yet if another comes in his own name, you will accept him.” John 5:41-43

Thursday of the Fourth Week of Lent (March 26, 2009)

From now until Easter, all of the weekday Gospels (except the Wednesday of Holy Week) will be from John. I need to pray a lot for the Holy Spirit to enlighten me because I have never taken any Bible classes and I find John’s Gospels to be the most difficult to interpret. He is way too philosophical for me… and sometimes he leaves me on cloud nine. Last night, since I knew I had a doctor’s appointment this morning, I tried to get ahead of myself. I read the readings, I read the little black book and I did not understand a thing. Maybe the fact that I had a very long day and was pretty burned out had something to do with it, but there’s nothing like a walk before sunrise and the fresh air to awaken my brain.

The message was so clear to me this morning. Jesus came and His own people did not accept Him. It was easier for them to accept anyone else that claimed to be a prophet than it was to accept Jesus. Jesus came to shake their world. He did not respect the Sabbath, He told them their laws were irrational, He ate with sinners, He talked to women, He called them hypocrites, He told them to love and forgive their enemies… no wonder they crucified Him. How about today? Are we any different? If we listen to a preacher that is very charismatic, do we believe everything he or she tells us? Is it easier for us to accept someone whose ideas are more in tune with ours than it is to accept the truth, even if it hurts?

Today, we turn our backs on Jesus too. He is telling us to love and forgive our enemies. Have we done it? I certainly have not. I’m still holding grudges… and I still have not gone to confession. If He came today, would He also call us hypocrites? I’m pretty sure that’s exactly what He would call me. Here I am, trying to transmit His message of love and I’m the first one that is not carrying it out. Jesus shakes our world every day. Are we ready to give Him a resounding YES or are we going to continue postponing it? Every time we tune out His message to us, every time we postpone answering Him, every time we tell Him not right now, maybe later, we are hammering one nail in His cross, we are pushing another thorn into His head and into His heart…

We are seventeen days from Easter, how much longer is it going to take us to accept Him? He does not want 50% or 75%, He wants a full 100%. We have to choose, we cannot lead two lives, is all or nothing.

If we are not ready to make Him a part of our life, then it’s time to stop this journey.