If there is one thing that's most surprising and unpredictable in my faith journey, then it has to be (not temptations, doubts or sufferings which are all given like thieves in the night when I least expect them; but I know that they're just lurking out there and ready to test my faith in Jesus Christ, anytime) the absence of advent or lack of preparation. And by that, I don't mean the preparations for the big feasts in the Christian calendar such as the Advent season leading to Christmas or the 40 days of Lent towards Easter, but rather advents to personal life journey on our way to Heaven, or specifically, faith journey in Christian marriage, raising children and supporting one's family in the Catholic tradition.
Don't get me wrong because, as a Catholic raised by Catholic parents, schooled in Catholic high school and college by Catholic lay teachers, Benedictine nuns, Columban fathers and Dominican priests and who taught and worked in Catholic universities and Catholic radio station, I got married in the Catholic Church, sent our kids to Catholic elementary and high school and raised them in a Catholic environment.
But how do you prepare yourself when your wonderful kids, and I mean really excellent in school and at work, law-abiding, parent-loving and respectful children who believe in God and come with you to Mass and receive Jesus in the Eucharist whenever they're home, don't get married in the Catholic Church?
Or, what do you do when your child who has a crush on the opposite sex in middle school and a boyfriend in high school comes to you before senior year and tells you that she's gay, brings a girlfriend home in college and is getting married to another woman seven years later?
Maybe, I was just caught off guard and God did really prepare me for these because I had come to know and believe what Jesus Christ Himself has said, that "If you want to be my disciple, deny your self, take up your cross, and follow me." Even then, it didn't lessen the pain of knowing that she will never be able to get married in the Catholic Church that she has come to love, served as an altar girl, choir member, sacristan and Eucharistic Minister in middle and high school, and embraced through all these years; and that I will never have a chance to dance with my beautiful daughter on her wedding day.
Gie and I am convinced that the marriage between one man and one woman is the Absolute Plan of God, not just in the teaching of the Catholic Church but most especially in the Sacred Scriptures that I'm sure Catholic parents, school and church's catechists taught the children entrusted to them by God, just as we did at home, and that our children knew. But like most young adults of today, after graduating from college, they don't subscribe anymore only to traditional marriage, maybe because of the prevailing culture, mass media and the Internet which are more powerful in shaping their feelings, customs and beliefs.
Does that mean that these institutions--the Catholic churches, schools, families or we, as Catholic parents, failed our children? I don't think so. Do I blame God for seemingly not listening to our prayers and preventing this? I don't; and I believe that God has a reason (obviously because He's Pure Reason) in allowing this thing/same sex marriage to happen. Therefore, I'm not going to judge my daughter Claire-Voe either for marrying Kendra because I have faith and hope in our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ Who forbids us from judging anyone. Besides, I don't know what's in their hearts and much less have I walked in their shoes!
This much, I know about Claire-Voe as her Dad, and that is: she's a loving daughter, sister, niece, cousin, relative and friend who prays and has a good heart and generosity for the less fortunate and those who have no voice. And most of all, she loves the Lord.
After so much agonizing and discussion with our son Osbert about the upcoming event, praying to God if we should attend her wedding or not, and talking to a priest during Confession who advised us to go, Gie and I praised and thanked the Lord because the Holy Spirit didn't leave us orphans and gave us Knowledge, Wisdom and Discernment to follow God's Will, through the 1st Letter of St. Paul to the Corinthians, and I quote, "If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. And if I give away all I have, and if I deliver my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing."
So, Gie and I decided to follow the Lord and showed our great and unending love for our daughter Claire-Voe in her time of need (even though our faith said don't go) by attending her civil wedding in New Jersey with Joy, Peace and Love of the Lord in our hearts!!!...Thank You Jesus...Thank You...
Don't get me wrong because, as a Catholic raised by Catholic parents, schooled in Catholic high school and college by Catholic lay teachers, Benedictine nuns, Columban fathers and Dominican priests and who taught and worked in Catholic universities and Catholic radio station, I got married in the Catholic Church, sent our kids to Catholic elementary and high school and raised them in a Catholic environment.
But how do you prepare yourself when your wonderful kids, and I mean really excellent in school and at work, law-abiding, parent-loving and respectful children who believe in God and come with you to Mass and receive Jesus in the Eucharist whenever they're home, don't get married in the Catholic Church?
Or, what do you do when your child who has a crush on the opposite sex in middle school and a boyfriend in high school comes to you before senior year and tells you that she's gay, brings a girlfriend home in college and is getting married to another woman seven years later?
Maybe, I was just caught off guard and God did really prepare me for these because I had come to know and believe what Jesus Christ Himself has said, that "If you want to be my disciple, deny your self, take up your cross, and follow me." Even then, it didn't lessen the pain of knowing that she will never be able to get married in the Catholic Church that she has come to love, served as an altar girl, choir member, sacristan and Eucharistic Minister in middle and high school, and embraced through all these years; and that I will never have a chance to dance with my beautiful daughter on her wedding day.
Gie and I am convinced that the marriage between one man and one woman is the Absolute Plan of God, not just in the teaching of the Catholic Church but most especially in the Sacred Scriptures that I'm sure Catholic parents, school and church's catechists taught the children entrusted to them by God, just as we did at home, and that our children knew. But like most young adults of today, after graduating from college, they don't subscribe anymore only to traditional marriage, maybe because of the prevailing culture, mass media and the Internet which are more powerful in shaping their feelings, customs and beliefs.
Does that mean that these institutions--the Catholic churches, schools, families or we, as Catholic parents, failed our children? I don't think so. Do I blame God for seemingly not listening to our prayers and preventing this? I don't; and I believe that God has a reason (obviously because He's Pure Reason) in allowing this thing/same sex marriage to happen. Therefore, I'm not going to judge my daughter Claire-Voe either for marrying Kendra because I have faith and hope in our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ Who forbids us from judging anyone. Besides, I don't know what's in their hearts and much less have I walked in their shoes!
This much, I know about Claire-Voe as her Dad, and that is: she's a loving daughter, sister, niece, cousin, relative and friend who prays and has a good heart and generosity for the less fortunate and those who have no voice. And most of all, she loves the Lord.
After so much agonizing and discussion with our son Osbert about the upcoming event, praying to God if we should attend her wedding or not, and talking to a priest during Confession who advised us to go, Gie and I praised and thanked the Lord because the Holy Spirit didn't leave us orphans and gave us Knowledge, Wisdom and Discernment to follow God's Will, through the 1st Letter of St. Paul to the Corinthians, and I quote, "If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. And if I give away all I have, and if I deliver my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing."
So, Gie and I decided to follow the Lord and showed our great and unending love for our daughter Claire-Voe in her time of need (even though our faith said don't go) by attending her civil wedding in New Jersey with Joy, Peace and Love of the Lord in our hearts!!!...Thank You Jesus...Thank You...
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