Who did you go to see?

When I was a child I enjoyed going to church not necessarily because I learnt anything (it’s too long ago for me to remember if I did) but because it was the one sure day in the week we dressed up. My mum will lay out our clothes with matching underwear and smart shoes (my love of fashion and matching clothes did not start today, na my mama born me). 

As a teenager, it was the thought of meeting up with friends and wondering if the guys had started to notice that I was budding in all the right places 😀😉. As a young adult it was time to catch up on gossip and of course to check people out and be checked out. No one was spared being checked out, not even the priests and ministers🤭

Talking about the mass itself, I enjoy music and have been in the choir off and on through the years. When the music was good I enjoyed it, when it was not I tuned off. Same thing with the homily. When it was good I enjoyed it, and even took notes. When it was not, I tuned off while wondering in my mind why the priest or minister did not prepare adequately or how he could be so boring 😴

I think some or all of the above statements may be familiar to some. The point here is that a good number of us go to church for every other reason except that which should be the main reason - to encounter Christ in the fellowship of the brethren, in the word and in the Eucharist. 

So who do you go to see?

Now I go for several reasons. I still enjoy dressing up to go to church, because I understand that God deserves that I approach his temple in my best, the same way we put on our best when dignitaries are visiting. Have you noticed how beautifully dressed are the guests at a wedding? Well the mass is the celebration of the wedding between Christ and her bride, the church. It deserves my Sunday best. 

I enjoy the music; singing along and dancing when it’s one I am particularly fond of or just listening if it’s not one i’m familiar with or perhaps don’t particularly like the tune of.

I have a little notepad I carry along with me for mass to take notes. Some days I write so much and fill up all the space I have, some other days I can’t seem to get anything from the homily and struggle to write one word. On such days I spend some more time going through the readings to get the key message. Like my parish deacon says, the homilist dishes the starter. To get the main course we need to do some self study.

The height of the celebration is during the liturgy of the Eucharist, same way the height of a wedding celebration is during the exchange of vows. If we did not listen to anything up to this time, this is the time to be entirely focused on our spouse, on Jesus, to prepare to receive him and to be one with him. It is the culmination of everything.

And when all of this is done, we leave church but take the experience into our day to day lives.

So who do you go to see in church?

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Our Mother - The Church

"Sweet mother, I no go forget you. For the suffer wey you suffer for me o." First lines from a popular Nigerian song by Prince Nico Mbarga.

And truly most mothers, if not all, suffer for their children. Some of the suffering comes from trying to take care of their children and provide for them, some of the suffering comes from the hurtful actions of their children.

The Cathechism of the Catholic Church teaches us that the church is our mother.  St. Paul sees the church as 'the Bride of Christ, the Mother from whose womb of grace each of us was born to a new life a life of Sonship'. 

How many of us Catholics truly see the church as our mother? And for those that do, do we treat her accordingly? Do we love, cherish, respect and bring her honour by our words and actions? Do we
obey her and listen to her wise counsel? Do we defend her and protect her from those who insult, libel and castigate her? Or do we betray her - by our words and silence, actions and inactions?

An excerpt from an article written by Mother M Angelica founderess of EWTN titled 'My Mother--The Church' is as follows

"The Church is a Mother because she is a Bride who is forever bringing forth children of light, pillars of holiness, sources of inspiration, challengers of truth, and defenders of the Faith. 

Yes, she has structures, laws, treasures, authority and human frailties mixed with Divine power, but we must look at the whole Church and not just part of her. What son of an earthly mother tells his friends that his mother is nothing but an ugly skeleton covered over with muscle and skin? What kind of son picks apart every fault and weakness in his mother and broadcasts it to everyone willing to listen? A child who concentrates only on the authority a mother has to correct and punish and refuses 
to see the deep love and concern behind the reproaches, leads an unbalanced existence a life of self-pity and childish peeves.

A true child of this God-given Mother is not one who is blind to her faults, weaknesses and wounds, but one who is discerning enough to see her need for improvement for healing for greater zeal and for generosity; loving enough to see her virtues, grace, truth and power and zealous enough to do something positive to help rather than something negative to destroy."

You can read the full excerpt of this article on https://www.ewtn.com/faith/teachings/churc2.htm

I think it's important that we always remember that the church is our mother and it behooves us to treat her well and make her proud. As a mother, she welcomes all her children, Saints and sinners alike, loving the sinner while hating the sin and praying that all her children 'Be perfect, just as your Heavenly Father is perfect' (Matthew 5:48).

It is so easy to get carried away by the things 'of the world' and so we must be on our guard. Let us be counted among those who are building up the church and not be found to be one of those bringing her down.

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Our obsession with Signs and Wonders

The gospel of John 4:48 says "None of you will ever believe unless you see signs and wonders".

Jesus knew what he was saying when he made this statement; for sure he did not mean it as a compliment. Several times he showed his frustration over the people of his time refusing to 'see' he was the messiah while they kept insisting on signs and wonders. Even when he worked many miracles, they just asked for more and more and more.

Unfortunately, we the people of our time seem to have inherited this 'signs and wonders' mentality even though quite frankly we should know better. Searching through the scriptures, we see that Jesus emphasized that 'belief in him (faith) and in his words far outweighed any works that he could have done. In fact he often talked about faith as the basis for every action and how everything is possible for the one who has faith.

Signs and wonders do not lead to increased faith. If we do not have faith, we would not appreciate the 'signs and wonder' no matter how magnificent the 'display' may be. It's all about faith and conviction (Read Luke 16:19-31).

Often times Jesus chastised his disciples for their lack of faith, and the people in general for their failure to believe in his words. However he made it very clear that what is required is belief in his words and conviction in the gospel. Every other thing is secondary. Actually if we really look at it, the people that benefitted the most from Jesus were the people that believed in his words and demonstrated that faith by their actions.

Matthew 8:5-9, Luke 7:1-10. The story of the centurion who told Jesus 'But just say the word, and my servant will be healed'
Matthew 12:38-42, Matthew 16:1-4, Luke 11:29-32. In this passage Jesus chastised the Pharisees who requested for a sign from him and called them a 'wicked and adulterous generation'.
John 20:24-29. The story of 'doubting' Thomas who insisted on seeing the risen Christ instead of believing his fellow apostles when they told him Jesus had risen.

Enough said. It's now up to us to decide if we want to be word-believing Christians or sign-believing Christians.

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Created for A Purpose

Let me start by asking a few fundamental questions

1) who are you?
2) why are you here on earth?
3) what do you think is your purpose in life?

Before I put down my few words, I would just like to state that my objective in writing this is not to tell anyone what their individual purpose in life is, that is something you will need to discover yourselves. What I will try to do is give pointers, a direction to how one can discover that purpose; and when you have discovered it, what to do with it.

My pointers to help answer the questions above are as below:-

Who are you?
I am not an accident. None of us here, regardless of the circumstance of our birth, is an accident. We often here people say 'Oh, this child was not planned, or 'I got pregnant by accident, or 'it was a mistake'. Please let's all remove that from our heads and if you hear people saying that, correct them. No human being was created by accident. Isaiah 44:2 says 'I am The Lord who created you and formed you in the womb'. God has a hand in the forming of every single one of us in our mothers' wombs, there is no accident to it.

Why are you here on earth?
Your being here on earth is not about you. Put in another way, your purpose for being created is not about you. Colossians 1:16 says 'God created the whole universe through him and for him'. He made it all and he alone knows why he made us. So many times we spend so much time thinking about why we were created, we do not think to ask our creator, our father 'Lord, tell me why I am here on earth, the purpose for which I man created'. There is nothing we cannot ask of our Heavenly Father, even something as simple as 'Lord tell me what my purpose is on earth'.
Also 'Life is a trust and a test.' When I say life is a trust, I mean our lives have being given to us in trust. We do not own ourselves, God owns us and everything we have and are. But he has given it to us in trust that we might 'know him, love him and serve him in this life and be with him forever in the next - basic cathechism'. Gen 2:15 says 'The lord placed man in charge of the garden of Eden, to cultivate and guard it'. Our lives have been given to us on trust, our possessions have been given to us on trust, our talents have been given to us on trust. It is important that we realize this and make sure that we are using all these 'gifts' from God to know him, love him and serve him.
We should always remember there is more to life than just here and now. 1 John 2:17 'The world and it's desires are passing away, temporary, but whoever does the will of God lives forever. If we look around we see signs of people, places, things that have passed away. We read of structures coming down, tsunamis, floods, earthquakes, volcanoes that have wiped out communities, villages, cities. In our country especially in the east erosion has wiped out roads, houses in villages. Some of us here have lost loved ones who have passed for this life. We must never forget that this world is passing and we need to prepare for eternal life. That is one of the reasons God made us, to be with him forever. Our actions here on earth will determine that.

What do you think is your purpose in life?
Your purpose in life may not be disconnected with your natural talent. All of us, every single one of us, has been given a talent,  a gift by God. It is important that we discover what this talent is, and then use it to achieve your purpose. Often times we think our talent must be something 'big', unique, awe inspiring and out of this world.  This is not true. In most cases our talent is something 'little' which we may even tend to overlook but when well harnessed, can deliver much.

Let me give you a few examples we can relate with. I will cite some examples and you can judge yourselves if these people used their talent to achieve their purpose

- Queen Esther (beauty)
- Hitler (natural leader)
- Samson (strength)
- Chimamanda Adichie
- Martin Luther King (natural orator)
- Malala Yousafzai (academician)
- David (prowess)

In conclusion, I want to invite you all to think about your life, examine yourselves. A famous philosopher said 'Man know thyself' and 'an up examined life is not worth living'. No one can tell you your talent, that thing that will lead you to achieve your purpose. You are in the best position to know. The most important thing we must not forget is that knowing God, loving God and serving God is the main focus of your life and your purpose should lead you to this.

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10 Daily Habits of A Christian

Culled from the Holy Cross Cathedral Archdiocese of Lagos Bulletin published on 1st September 2013

1) Offer a short prayer when you wake up from sleep in the morning

2) Ask God's blessing and protection for yourself and family before you leave home for work daily

3) Say a short prayer in your office or shop before you begin to work

4) Read a short passage from the bible and reflect on it

5) Spend a few minutes of silence with God everyday

6) Receive the Holy Eucharist daily (if it possible) for nourishment and strength

7) Tell someone about Christ, or share his word with someone

8) Reach out to help a neighbour (Charity)

9) Ask for the intercession of the Blessed Virgin Mary, and all the saints

10) Do a brief examination of conscience and give thanks to God before you go to bed

Looking at all these, it appears that only Catholics truly deserve the title Christians because there are clearly some items listed above that non-Catholics do not believe in and/or do not practise. Or what do you think?

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