Does that mean I surrendered? Mark Wahlberg in Pray40 for Lent in the Halo app led a session that surrendering was the foremost thing, more important than all the efforts put in. Firstly, we should surrender to give control to God. After saying “Jesus, I surrender myself to you several times, followed by silence and prayer, he prompted to do the next step, as prayer must lead to action. If we don’t know what it is, give it our best bet.
Messages this Lenten season:
Listen to the lessons, learn Hear how I sound, slow it down Observe, respond with grace
Finally logged into the app and ooo lovely greeting and one of my fav scripture passages!
If we carry the yoke of love, of mercy, with Jesus and not alone, it will not be a burden, but be light.
Matthew 11:28-30 has seemed to appear pretty regularly I noticed this year! This, in relation to the first reading when God revealed who He is “I Am” (always present and faithful) to Moses for his mission.
May this strengthen our confidence and bring forth the passion and fortitude we need for our own mission.
We are consuming more protein than we need. What we don’t realise is that none of the excess protein consumed can be stored anywhere in our body, unlike excess carbohydrates which are converted into a small store of glycogen which is hardly ever depleted in the modern day life, and fat which the body is capable of storing infinite amounts of!
Protein builds structure in our body like in our hair, nails and mostly in muscles, organs, skin and skeleton.
According to the Dietary Reference Intake report for macronutrients, a sedentary adult should consume 0.8 grams of protein per kilogram of body weight, or 0.36 grams per pound. That means that the average sedentary man should eat about 56 grams of protein per day, and the average woman should eat about 46 grams.
But according to the podcast above, this 0.8g per kg covers about 97% of the population and if you are active at working out, only a few more grams is required!
We often consume double the recommended amount through regular food without extra effort, so protein supplements are unnecessary
Whole food that contains sufficient protein is far more nutritious than protein supplements.
What’s more, as more than required amounts of protein are consumed daily and cannot be stored by the body, the excess protein becomes converted into fat and carbohydrates!
The key is consuming sufficient calories daily and eating in variety. Plants largely contain all the amino acids but in lesser amounts than meat but if a variety of plants are consumed this would make up for it. By consuming more plants, the body also gains fibre, phytonutrients, antioxidants etc, whereas with meat you also consume a large amount of saturated fat along with hormones.
In a recent study, it was proven that vegan athletes performed equally as omnivores.
And therefore, protein supplementation is a marketing scam!
Do these:
Eat more beans, tofu, tempeh, natto
Eat a good variety of vegetables
Don’t measure your protein intake instead feed your microbiome!
Start of the day: ‘how’s your new job?’ from my neighbour, whom I had a connection with when we were both in between jobs just over a year back.
End of the day: “how are you doing?” from my former regional director whom I had the earliest affirming conversation with after deciding to take a career break, just over a year back
The chances of these 2 significant encounters are only the work of God today!
Thanks be to God. Today’s Responsorial Psalm 8:2,5-9
How great is your name, O Lord our God, through all the earth!
Alleluia on the Monday of Easter octave! He is risen and He is Lord! Apparently we can’t just rejoice but we must proclaim too! Read that in CWG’s reflection today haha. See excerpt below:
“To confess that Jesus is Lord means that He will from now on be the centre of our life, our devotion, all that we live for and die for. In other words, “We do not live to ourselves, and we do not die to ourselves. If we live, we live to the Lord, and if we die, we die to the Lord; so then, whether we live or whether we die, we are the Lord’s. For to this end Christ died and lived again, so that he might be Lord of both the dead and the living.” (Rom 14:7-9) Jesus as Lord means that we will obey Him and take directions from Him because He is the Way, the Truth and the Life. Whatever we say or think, it will be rooted in the Lord and not from the wisdom of the world. We will from now on measure all things by Christ’s standards, not that of the world. With the psalmist, we pray, “I will bless the Lord who gives me counsel who even at night directs my heart. I keep the Lord ever in my sight. Since he is at my right hand, I shall stand firm.” We will no longer fear suffering and death. Even when we walk in the valley of death, we can trust that the Lord will rescue us and preserve us as He did for the Son. With the psalmist, we pray, “Preserve me, God, I take refuge in you. I say to the Lord: ‘You are my God. O Lord, it is you who are my portion and cup.’ It is you yourself who are my prize.” Finally, it means to announce to our brothers and sisters that Jesus is Lord. Jesus said to the women, “Do not be afraid; go and tell my brothers that they must leave for Galilee; they will see me there.” We are called to give hope to others and explain to them the reason for our hope. By our lives, our words, actions and testimony, we are called to witness to His resurrection. We are called to live adventurously and courageously. Be not afraid, is what the Lord told His disciples. We are called to live as freed men and women. Death has been overcome and life is certain, here and now and in the next life. We can surrender our lives and future to Him because God is faithful to us. Just as the Father showed His fidelity to His Son by raising Him from the dead, He too will be faithful to us. As the psalmist says, He will preserve us from death and rescue us from our enemies. “And so my heart rejoices, my soul is glad. Even my body shall rest in safety for you will not leave my soul among the dead, nor let your beloved know decay.””
Such a blissful, joy-filled Easter this 2023 with this happy lightness feeling of peace in my heart this year!
Felt it in the last minute transformative effect during the Triduum with the yearning to keep watch in adoration, Taize and morning prayer which ended in church hopping between St Mary’s and St Ig’s!!
My heart was really for Jesus, and all he could do heal and help me to conform – helping me to reach St Ig’s for morning prayer at 7.30am on Holy Sat by MRT!
And the fact that Alvin could make it for the long Easter Vigil duty! Thank you Jesus for prompting me to make the immunity elixir of tumeric, ginger, honey, garlic and EVOO!
Alleluia! Rejoice! Rejoice in the hope of His resurrection!!
“How often does my heart cross over?”, asked Friar Derrick. Are we so comfortable on being on this side of the door, because we know the fear of the unknown on the other side, that we don’t want to consider crossing over? Today’s Gospel, rich (unnamed) and poor (named Lazarus). Can we cross the space to see the needs of someone outside the door to help, especially when we know they are there? During Lent we are invited to cross over, and our Lord is searching the heart – first reading of Jeremiah – actions come from our heart so if our heart is not able to leap over neither is our body. The door we refuse to cross over, could be forgiveness, or forgiving ourselves, or we cannot forgive God, or wanting to go discover something we feel bubbling in our souls and God is inviting us into an adventure but we are afraid to cross to the other side, so in this second week of Lent, allow ourselves and our heart to be open to God’s grace, and allow our hearts to leap and cross over to the other side where there is life, adventure with the Lord, and know that the Lord with you on this adventure so do not be afraid and just cross over.
The Lord speaks right to me today with his Word. From Jeremiah 17:5-10, where man sees no life in things of the flesh but where the blessing is from the man who puts his trust in the Lord, directly linked to my ultimate favourite Psalm 1, Happy the man who has placed his trust in the Lord, who avoids the company of sinners and delights in the Lord and ponders his law day and night!!
And then He speaks to me in the Gospel to cross over with my heart …in Luke 16:19-31, with the parable of the rich man and poor Lazarus, where the rich man learned after he died that he did not serve those next to him in need. May this leap of faith in my heart, crossing over help bring me closer to God in serving those I have failed to, because I have failed to stay close to God during this season.
This is what I journaled on the Amen app:
Have mercy on me Lord, it has taken me this significant milestone especially during Lent to drop my net in my current career to listen and run back to you. Where Jeremiah 17:5-10 “A curse on the man who puts his trust in man and turns from the Lord” links to my ultimate favourite Psalm 1 of all time “Happy the man who has placed his trust in the Lord” and the rich man and Lazarus in Luke 16:19-31 – to speak loudly to me and yet console me close by my side. Thank you Lord
Today is the day I crossed over in a leap of faith into the unknown . I dropped the net and followed my heart. I left my job!!
Everyone and everything we have now and today is given to us, gifted by God. We came into our life without anything and we also leave without anything. Put another way, all we have now is on loan to us from God and He will take it all back from us when we leave this earth. So if we do not have God now, when we die, what will we have? Without a proper relationship now, will we recognise God as we enter eternal life? Moreover, the kingdom of God is here and now, brought onto this earth by His son. What are we doing right here, right now, other than thinking and fending for ourselves? Then let us pray. That we may know Him and live with Him alive in us seeing His glory through all created things and be His face to one another.
Yesterday and today were equally madly hectic at work, but today there was something starkly different. I felt light, airy, not burdensome, not heavy at all, in good spirits despite not getting down to proper work til the END of the work day in an attempt again to clear obstacles. I reflected after during Gubbio’s walk, and concluded after at home that I believe someone has been praying for me! Thank you Lord, praise you Lord!!
Back in 2016 I learned through LRBM via Ascension Press that:
The Book of Psalms is The School of Prayer
Then on The Feast of the Holy Family on 27th December, this year in 2020, l learned via Friar Derrick’s children mass homily that:
The home is the first school of Christian life (CCC 1657)
As we know Faith begins at home in the Domestic Church (CCC 1655)
Now that’s 2 instant schools I have access to, to learn how to pray and to live our Christian life!
In a LRBM retreat earlier in October 2020, I learned more on the role of the Laity through a Decree and an Exhortation:
Apostolicam Actuositatem – Second Vatican Council’s Decree on the Apostolate of the Laity, promulgated by Pope Paul VI on 18 November 1965
Christifideles Laici– Post-synodal Apostolic Exhortation of His Holiness John Paul II on the Vocation and the Mission of the Lay Faithful in the Church and in the world, 30 December 1988
And this was my reflection after the retreat:
Apostolate to sanctify and renew the temporal order. For me it is profound. Calls out. Appreciate this knowledge from the apostolate encyclical for the laity to read into —-Apostolicam Actuositatem as I only roughly knew as lay we had a role to play as a baptised catholic to serve in our mission and evangelise, but knowing deeper on the spirituality of Lay people, saying success of lay apostolate depends on the laity living in union with Christ ———-not only to bring out the Gospel message but I liked what it said about the church’s mission to———— penetrate and perfect the temporal order with the spirit of the Gospel—————— So not only to “go out go out to all the world and share the Good News”, but, to me that feels like infusion, to infuse love in others and it really builds upon how to live an integrated life together with family, as well as my own spiritual life too, so very helpful to know this. And how COVID-19 accelerated this by being at home to serve domestic church from home together with the fundamental as families building the parishes to the wider church. If I am in union with Christ then the fruit should be joy and to attract and inspire others by being as life-giving as possible.
CCC 1657: All members of family exercise for priesthood of the Baptised in a privileged way —-by reception of the sacraments, prayer and thanksgiving, the witness of a holy life, self denial (purification) and active charity. Because The Lord loved us first.
This all follows on from learning about Encyclical Letter Fratelli Tutti from 3 October 2020 of the Holy Father Francis on fraternity and social friendship, and previously the year prior in the last LRBM retreat on how Christus Vivit reaches out to the youth. Also learned about the dogmatic constitution on Divine Revelation through Dei Verbum. We have so many connected resources to teach us; we have school surroundings to learn from wherever we are!
My takeaway reflection from 2020 is the richness of the lay apostolate, how there is really a lot to learn about the life of the laity with the above resources and how we as family or singledom must use our gifts to sanctify the world by how we live as witnesses to Christ.
