BLOG: Advent and Christmas,Reflections
*Update: My reflection is done! Check it out below: We are three days into our pilgrimage in the Holy Land. It’s been an absolutely incredible experience so far, walking in the footsteps of our Lord. We’ve had the chance to visit Nazareth and the house where Jesus was raised, Cana, where Jesus preformed his first ...read more
It seems that every year we have the same discussion around this time: what is the real meaning of Christmas? and let’s keep Christ in Christmas. There are even campaigns to boycott department stores that refuse to acknowledge the “reason for the season.” It’s so easy to jump onto that band wagon. To add to this, “Christmas” starts ...read more
Walking in the Light of the Lord & Remembering the Chilean Miners ...read more
 A fond memory I have growing up is that of fishing with my brother and my friends. There is something about the peace and calm that is necessary to fish that makes you more open in prayer and friendship. We read in the gospels that Jesus called his disciples right here on the shores of ...read more
It is here on the Mount of Beatitudes that many witnessed Jesus’ teaching on the Beatitudes. Here his voice carried over the hills, between the trees, mixed in the air with the sun, the hills, the birds, the grass and the people. We tend to want to picture and pray about this moment with a ...read more
A few weeks ago, I went to a mass of celebration for Sr. Corazon Beboso, FMA's 40th Anniversary of Religious Profession (Salesian Sisters of Don Bosco). Sr. Cora is one of my super learning models. Her youthful and energetic heart is always a booster drink for my soul. “Yes Lord, Yes Lord. Yes Yes Lord… Amen, Amen” is her favorite song. I would guess she has sang this song at every single event I have attended. And, we celebrated her “YES” to the Lord for 40 years. ...read more
I was not physically in Krakow for World Youth Day 2016. A series of scheduling practicalities made it necessary for me to stay in Toronto, anchoring Salt + Light’s coverage of WYD 2016. Still, there were moments when the line between living WYD and living it vicariously through my colleagues on the ground was blurred. ...read more
The flush region of Caesarea Philipi is about an hour’s drive north of the Sea of Galilee.  It was given to Herod the Great by Caesar Augustus around 20 BCE, who in turn handed it down to his son Philip.  Philip named it Caesarea in honor of Caesar, and his own name eventually became associated ...read more
“Apart from God’s Mercy, there is no other source of hope for human beings.” - Pope John Paul II ...read more
A couple of months before arriving in Jerusalem, I was driving my six-year-old daughter to school and she asked me about Jesus’ footprints. Not the real one located inside the Chapel of the Ascension, rather, she wanted to talk about the ones from famous poem called Footprints. She had seen the poster of it hung ...read more