Families that Eat Together, Stay Together
Filed under Features on March 5, 2010.
MEXICO CITY, JAN. 16, 2009 (Zenit.org).- It is no more complicated than sitting down together at the table, but according to an economist from the Catholic University of America, simply sharing family meals is key for children’s development. And, the economist suggested, strong families are good not just for the children given life within them. They are also good for the economy.
These were affirmations made by Maria Sophia Aguirre, a professor in the department of economics at Washington, D.C.’s Catholic University of America, during her address today at the 6th World Meeting of Families, underway in Mexico City.
Her presentation focused on the multiple benefits of stable families based on marriage, for all involved parties. She cited statistics such as marriage increases the likelihood of the father having good relations with children; divorce reduces the likelihood of children graduating from college and high school; and married mothers have lower levels of depression than single or co-habiting mothers.
Even physical health is better for families based on marriage, she said: Infant mortality is sharply reduced in this structure and there are lower probabilities of injury.
On the contrary, Aguirre noted, “the breakdown of the family is a symptom of a sick and weak society.”
Problems of all sorts increase in irregular families: Women are more likely to be abused, kids are more likely to use drugs, and women and children of broken families have a higher probability of living in poverty.
More than a meal
And though it cannot be the solution for every problem, Aguirre mentioned that the simple act of eating together as a family has an effect on the development of children.
According to a study done by the National Center on Substance and Addiction at Colombia University, when comparing adolescents who eat dinner 0-2 times a week with their families and those who eat dinner 5-7 times, those who eat with their families more frequently are 40% more like to talk to their parents about a problem. Meanwhile, 171% of the teens who don’t eat with their families note more tension at home.
Academic performance went up 38%. Kids were 142% less likely to smoke, 93% less likely to drink, 191% less likely to use marijuana and 169% less likely to have more than half of their friends be drug users.
And predictably, a family composed of both parents is 3.5 times more likely to have dinner as a family than a single-parent household.
More than money
Aguirre then turned her attention to the economic benefits of stable families based on marriage. Giving a review of nations ranging from Canada to Chile, the economist concluded that families are simply better for the economy.
“The breakdown of the family damages the economy and society since human, moral and social capital is reduced and social costs increase,” she explained.
Pope Takes up Justice as Theme for Lent, Says Man Must Accept His Reliance on God
Filed under Features on February 26, 2010.
In common usage, Pope Benedict XVI said, justice “implies ‘to render to every man his due.’ [...] In reality, however, this classical definition does not specify what ‘due’ is to be rendered to each person. What man needs most cannot be guaranteed to him by law. In order to live life to the full, something more intimate is necessary that can be granted only as a gift: We could say that man lives by that love which only God can communicate since he created the human person in his image and likeness.”
The human being is by nature “open to sharing freely,” he continued, “but he finds in his being a strange force of gravity that makes him turn in and affirm himself above and against others: This is egoism, the result of original sin.”
So how can man free himself from selfishness and open himself to love, Benedict XVI asked.
God and neighbor
The Holy Father expounded that “giving to the poor for the Israelite is none other than restoring what is owed to God, who had pity on the misery of his people.”
Christ’s justice, he said, “is the justice that comes from grace, where it is not man who makes amends, heals himself and others. [...] It is not man’s sacrifices that free him from the weight of his faults, but the loving act of God who opens himself in the extreme, even to the point of bearing in himself the ‘curse’ due to man so as to give in return the ‘blessing’ due to God.”
In this scheme, the Holy Father acknowledged, it seems that “each one receives the contrary of his ‘due.’”
But, he said, “In reality, here we discover divine justice, which is so profoundly different from its human counterpart. God has paid for us the price of the exchange in his Son, a price that is truly exorbitant. Before the justice of the cross, man may rebel for this reveals how man is not a self-sufficient being, but in need of Another in order to realize himself fully. Conversion to Christ, believing in the Gospel, ultimately means this: to exit the illusion of self-sufficiency in order to discover and accept one’s own need. [...] Humility is required to accept that I need Another to free me from ‘what is mine,’ to give me gratuitously ‘what is his.’”
Adapted from: http://filipspagnoli.files.wordpress.com/
Preparing for Lent: Inviting God into your Life
Filed under Features on February 20, 2010.
http://hubpages.com/hub/Preparing-for-Lent-Inviting-God-into-your-Life
Ash Wednesday begins the liturgical season of Lent. It is a time to focus on the Passion, Death and Resurrection of Our Lord, Jesus Christ; a time of spiritual renewal for all. For the forty days of Lent, Christians around the world will take time for reflection and renewal. During this penitential season we are all invited to draw closer to God.
- Preparing our home: In our home, Lent is a quiet time, a time of reflection, fasting and prayer. In order to free my time and my thoughts for this season I like to get any major household chores accomplished before Ash Wednesday. I will also do any major shopping (both for clothes or groceries) so that I am freed from spending too much time on consumer related activities during Lent.
- Preparing our hearts: Preparing our home and thinking about Lent before it actually begins is a respectful way of honoring this penitential season. Instead of making last minute or hasty preparations, we put thought into what this season means to us and how we are going to use this time to grow closer to God.
- What to Give Up? During Lent we are invited to give up something that we find pleasure in. Not only is this an act of penance for our sins but it can help us to identify with Christ’s sufferings. It can become a wonderful discipline for self-control not only during Lent but at other times of the year when we find ourselves too caught up in our materialistic society.
- What to Add?
During Lent I also like to add something to my regular routine. Typically I will find a spiritual book or two and commit to reading them during Lent. In addition to my morning and evening prayers, I will also make the effort to attend daily Mass. I also enjoy attending Stations of the Cross during Lent - it is a powerful reminder of what Lent and Easter are about. But adding simple things are also important. Perform community service, pray for someone who is in need of prayers, read scripture. The point is to keep God first and foremost in our daily life.
Chinese New Year: Foods!
Filed under Features on February 12, 2010.
Chinese New Year season extends officially about two weeks, with many days preparing in advance. It is the most elaborate and important holiday in the Chinese calendar. Food plays a vital part in most of the festivities. The Chinese congratulate each other on having passed through another year and feast together. Chinese New Year’s Eve dinner is the most important family occasion of the year.
New Year’s Eve dinner is usually a feast of sybolic seafood and dumplings. These include prawns for liveliness, dried oysters (ho xi) for all things good; raw fish salad (yu sheng) for good luck; “fai-hai” an edible angel hair-like seaweed for prosperity and dumplings boiled in water to recover a long-lost good wish for the family. Everyone wears red to ward off evil spirits and avoids the black and white which represent death and mourning.
Pomelos symbolize abundance and prosperity. Gourds are Chinese symbols of health and longevity. Tangerines and oranges, symbols of abundance happiness, are a must gift item when visiting family or friends during the two-week long New Year celebration. Tangerines with leaves intact assure that one’s relationship with the other remains secure. For newlyweds, this represents the branching of the couple into a family with many children.
When visiting relatives, it’s customary for the Chinese to offer guests tea, along with a round or octagonal tray filled with a variety of treats, from nuts to sweets. This is known as chyuhn haap, or the Tray of Togetherness.
Traditionally, the tray was made of wood, with eight interior dishes of porcelain, but nowadays many people opt for plastic. I prefer the look of rosewood — it shows more class.
The tray usually contains an inner set of eight compartments to help keep the goodies separated. Each compartment is filled with a special symbolic food:
• Candy Melon (growth and good health)
• Coconut (unity)
• Kumquat (gold; for prosperity)
• Longan (many good sons)
• Lotus Seeds (fertility)
• Lychee Nut (close family relationships)
• Peanuts (longevity)
• Red Melon Seeds (red; for happiness, joy, honesty and sincerity)
Source:
http://www.foodmuseum.com/chinesenew.html#pomelos
Last Days of Cure D’Ars’ Relics in Philippines
Filed under Features on January 28, 2010.
ST. JOHN MARY VIANNEY, the patron saint of priests, and on whose 150th Dies Natalis the Catholic world celebrates the Year for Priests, was venerated through his relics in time for the Second National Congress of the Clergy last Jan. 25-29, at the World Trade Center in Pasay.
Theme of the congress was “Faithfulness of Christ, Faithfulness of Priests,” which the Pope had chosen as the official slogan for the celebration of the “Year of the Priests” (2009-2010).
The Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines through its Episcopal Commission on the Clergy organized the retreat-style national congress which will be facilitated by Preacher to the Papal Household, Fr. Raniero Cantalamessa, OFMCap.
A part of the body together with his stole and breviary relics of St. John Mary Vianney arrived from France accompanied by two French priests. The relics were on display at the congress and in parish churches on Jan. 23-Feb. 1.
The exposition and visit of the relics of St. John Mary Vianney will officially begin at the National Shrine of the Sacred Heart in San Antonio Village, and end at the St. John Mary Vianney Parish in Barangay Cembo, two churches that were decreed “Pilgrim Churches on the Year for Priests.”
This means that people who undertake pilgrimages and pious exercises at these churches during the Year for Priests are granted plenary indulgence (under the ordinary conditions) as decreed by the Apostolic Penitentiary of the Holy See.
The remaining schedule of the relics’ exposition is as follows: Jan. 30, Minor Basilica of the Black Nazarene or Quiapo Church/St. John The Baptist Parish, 12 nn; Jan. 31, St. John Mary Vianney Parish at 12 nn; and Feb. 1, departure at NAIA, 11:30 a.m.
St. John Mary Vianney (May 8, 1786-Aug. 4, 1859) was a parish priest in Ars, France. He was known for his priestly and pastoral work in his parish, whose members and pilgrims grew from a mere 200 to around 20,000.
Catholics attribute this phenomenon to Vianney’s saintly life, mortification and persevering ministry in the sacrament of confession.
Mabuhay ang Kabataang Pilipino
Filed under Features on January 22, 2010.
Last January 16, I had the privilege to attend the YouthPinoy launch. Instead of raving over the event, which I cannot do, since I was only able to spend three hours out of an almost eight-hour event, I’d rather that I give you some information on what YouthPinoy is.
{Who Are We?}
YouthPinoy is an alliance of young Filipinos who bear witness to their Catholic faith through creative means of expression published in the World Wide Web. We may have come from different parishes, organizations and schools with different charisms, but we are one in sharing the mission of evangelization through online media.
{Why Are We Different?}
A YouthPinoy member is similar to a religious or lay missionary who braves distances and faces culture shock just to spread the Good News. But unlike missionaries who are known for their public-speaking skills, we use our talents in writing, music, photography, film, and art to reach out to the “unchurched” and our non-practicing brethren through cyber space. Our spiritual blogs, praise songs, and Bible reflections hope to revitalize the dormant Christian in others.
{What Do We Stand For?}
YouthPinoy is the face of the younger sector of the laity who echoes the same stance of the Catholic Church on religious and political issues. We uphold the social teachings of the Church in dealing with concerns in our communities in particular, and the society in general. Our stand is best described stressed by our battle cry “Winning the World through the Word.”
{What Is Our Mandate?}
YouthPinoy was established by the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines in response to the Holy Father’s call to use the Internet as the new forum for proclaiming the Gospel. Through the CBCP’s Episcopal Commission on Youth and the Office on Mass Media, we were gathered to pull our resources and talents together to give life to the YouthPinoy portal.
{Are You One of Us?}
Every young Catholic Filipinos are technically one of us. But for those who want step up and heed the Pope’s call to become God’s messenger to his fellow youth, you are invited to join our community of creative online missionaries. After all, there are plenty of rooms in cyberspace to accommodate us!
What are you waiting for?
Visit www.youthpinoy.com
Are You Man Enough
Filed under Features on January 16, 2010.
By: Kuya Derek Ross
http://www.tlw.ph/blog/are-you-man-enough/
Christ is the supreme example. He was strong and He was pure, because His sole aim in life was to be obedient to the Father. His very obedience made Him most manly-responsible, committed, courageous, courteous, and full of love. A Christian man’s obedience to God will make him more of a man than anything else in the world. Consider these qualities:
Responsibility
Commitment
Courage
Courtesy
Purity
Here is the one part young men should know.
COMMITMENT - He must be a man of his word, no matter what it costs. Never tell a woman you love her until you are ready to follow that immediately with, “Will you marry me?” In other words, a man’s love for a woman, if deep and abiding, leads to a lifetime commitment to her. Many heartaches would be avoided if he held back any expressions of love until he is ready to make that commitment. Once promised, he never goes back on that word.
SO…. WARNING_WARNING_WARNING…
Never tell a woman you love her until you are ready to follow that immediately with, “Will you marry me?” and The second great part of the passage above was ANY EXPRESSION OF LOVE
The first part is obvious, don’t say I love you, kasi walang saysay.
Because, what you’re really saying is I love you for 2 months, or 1 year or 5 years but then I am going to leave you…
What’s that? Nothing! I nothing you for 2 months, or I nothing you for1 year, or I nothing you for 5 years and then I am going to nothing you for ever.
But the second part needs illumination. What represents any expression of love.
That would be anything that would move toward borrowing the affections of a woman’s heart; candy, flowers, strong words with wrong motive like wow your hair is beautiful, poems, simple sweet messages on text, a necklace, more flowers, more candy etc.
But here is my last encouraging rebuke. For every young man. He needs to look far into the future and see his wife whom he has not yet met.
Does any young man want another man to give any expressions of love to his future wife? Would this young man want to magically know who his future wife is and see another man sitting with her, kissing her, reading poems to her or running his fingers through her hair. Would young man say “Well, the guy seems to love my future wife at least for that day?”
No man wants that. He wants his future wife to be pure and unblemished. Kaya,…. We should be the men, to those women around us that we want the men surrounding our future wives to be. Medyo malalim but think about it. This has to be what God wants. Going back.
Christ is the supreme example, He was strong he was pure. His sole aim in life was to please his father.
When you look into a young woman’s eyes and you run your fingers through her hair. Ask yourself, “Is this what my father wants” or “Is this my desire?”
Home Remedies
Filed under Features on January 8, 2010.
MANILA, Philippines — Have a headache? Eat fish, whose oil helps reduce inflammation. Or ginger, which lessens pain. How about a stomachache? Eat bananas. For pregnant women, ginger can help soothe morning sickness and nausea. For those suffering from premenstrual syndrome, a diet of cornflakes, rich in carbohydrates, can help reduce depression, anxiety and fatigue. A stuffed nose? Garlic can fight colds, and by the way, it lowers cholesterol, too.
Suffering from diarrhea? My child consumes apples and bananas. Can’t remember your anniversary? Zinc in oysters can improve mental functioning. Can’t sleep? Take honey before bedtime. Its sedative effect is soothing, besides its great taste.
Food as medicine
Medicines are expensive today, so we should keep ourselves healthy. But food can ease common ailments. Fruits, vegetables, and other foods have been used for centuries around the world to alleviate or prevent symptoms of many diseases, such as the following:
• Strokes — Aside from baby aspirin, which has been proven to thin the blood (but which can be dangerous for someone whose blood does not easily clot), why not consume green tea? Green tea may prevent buildup of fatty deposits in arteries. The mono unsaturated fat in avocados can also lower cholesterol.
• High blood pressure — Olive oil and celery can lower blood pressure.
• Diabetes — The chromium in broccoli and peanuts helps regulate insulin and blood sugar.
• Constipation — Guava, which is rich in fiber, can help prevent constipation.
• Stomach problems — Eat yogurt with healthy bacteria to maintain balance in your stomach.
• Kidney stones — Orange can dissolve kidney stones, and may even help prevent colon cancer.
• Asthma — Despite their raw smell, onions can help ease the constriction of bronchial tubes.
• Arthritis — The omega oils in fish can prevent or delay the onset of arthritis.
• Osteoporosis — The manganese in pineapples can help ease bone problems.
• Ulcers — Cabbage has chemicals to heal gastric and duodenal ulcers.
• Urinary tract infection — I personally swear by this. I consume cranberry juice (unsweetened) every day. The acid content of cranberry juice helps control harmful bacteria.
• Breast cancer — Eat wheat, bran, and cabbage, which can help maintain estrogen at healthy levels.
• Lung cancer — Think of beta carotene in dark green and orange vegetables such as carrots, spinach and lettuce.
• Cancer — Watermelon helps boost our immune system and its lycopene is a cancer-fighting oxidant.
• Immune system disorders — Strawberries (and other berries) are great antioxidants.
Ask your doctor
Of course, for serious medical problems, see your doctor. The information above is not meant to replace doctor’s advice, and use your common sense. If you are allergic to any of the foods above, don’t consume them. In fact, before you start eating any of them, please seek your doctor’s advice first.
I bear no responsibility for reader use of the aforementioned advice. I hereby acknowledge the help of my friend Nerisa Fernandez, who forwarded the said information.
Tipid Tips for Christmas
Filed under Features on December 18, 2009.
1. Send postcards or letters (better yet e-cards), instead of Christmas cards.
2. For friends and family that live out of state or out of the country make a brief phone call and your loved ones would probably much rather hear your voice than receive a card in the mail.
3. Use pretty magazine pages to wrap small gifts.
4. Use your children’s artwork, or create your own on plain paper for wrapping… the large reams of packing paper are great for this, contact anyone who’s in the process of moving!
5. Cut up old Christmas cards make wonderful gift tags too!
6. If you sew, you could also use scrap material to wrap gifts.
7. Don’t decorate with expensive things!!!
8. The stores have incredible sales every year for decorations, buy close to the holiday or even better, after the holiday! You could fill your house with beautiful holiday decorations every year (if you wanted to), for a small fraction of what they originally cost!
9. Save your children’s (or grandchildren’s) holiday crafts and artwork from school each year, after a few years you’ll have a houseful of free and beautiful decorations! And the joy your child will feel seeing his/her artwork proudly displayed year after year is priceless.
10. Invest in a good quality artificial tree after Christmas - when they go on CLEARANCE SALE! Buy good quality because they will last many more years.
11. And don’t try to get all your tree ornaments in one year (this one is especially true for young people just starting out), it took your parents years to collect what they have… and each ornament is more special because of it.
12. Another great and frugal way to entertain the family through the holidays is to take a drive around your town, or another town nearby to see their Christmas lights (Go see the lights and sounds show at the Ayala Triangle)
Source: http://www.betterbudgeting.com/articles/holidays/saveatchristmas.htm
On God’s Presence and Coming
Filed under Features on December 12, 2009.
On God’s Presence and Coming
An excerpt from the Holy Father’s homily at First Vespers of the first Sunday of Advent from http://www.zenit.org/article-27703?l=english
Dear brothers and sisters,
* * *
Advent, this intense liturgical time that we are beginning, invites us to pause in silence to grasp a presence. It is an invitation to understand that every event of the day is a gesture that God directs to us, sign of the care he has for each one of us. How many times God makes us perceive something of his love! To have, so to speak, an “interior diary” of this love would be a beautiful and salutary task for our life! Advent invites and stimulates us to contemplate the Lord who is present. Should not the certainty of his presence help us to see the world with different eyes? Should it not help us to see our whole existence as a “visit,” as a way in which he can come to us and be close to us, in each situation?
Another essential element of Advent is expectation, expectation that at the same time is hope. Advent drives us to understand the meaning of time and history as “kairos,” as a favorable occasion for our salvation. Jesus illustrated this mysterious reality in many parables: in the account of the servants invited to await the return of their master; in the parable of the virgins who await the bridegroom; or in those of the sowing and harvesting. Man, in his life, is in constant waiting: When he is a child he wants to grow, as an adult he tends to his realization and success, growing in age, he aspires to his deserved rest. However the time comes in which he discovers that he has waited too little if, beyond his profession or social position, he has no choice but to wait. Hope marks the path of humanity, but for Christians it is animated by a certainty: The Lord is present in the course of our life, he accompanies us and one day he will also dry our tears. In a not too distant day, everything will find its fulfillment in the Kingdom of God, Kingdom of justice and peace.
However, there are very different ways of waiting. If time is not filled by a present gifted with meaning, the waiting runs the risk of becoming unbearable; if something is expected, but at this moment there is nothing, namely, if the present is empty, every instant that passes seems exaggeratedly long, and the waiting is transformed into a weight that is too heavy because the future is totally uncertain. When, instead, time is gifted with meaning and we perceive in every instant something specific and valuable, then the joy of waiting makes the present more precious.
Dear brothers and sisters, let us live the present intensely, when we already have the gifts of the Lord, let us live it projected to the future, a future full of hope. The Christian Advent thus becomes an occasion to reawaken in ourselves the true meaning of waiting, returning to the heart of our faith which is the mystery of Christ, the Messiah awaited for long centuries and born in the poverty of Bethlehem. Coming among us, he has brought us and continues to offer us the gift of his love and of his salvation. Present among us, he speaks to us in many ways: in sacred Scripture, in the liturgical year, in the saints, in the events of daily life, in the whole of creation, which changes in aspect if he is behind it or if it is obfuscated by the mist of an uncertain origin and an uncertain future. In turn, we can speak to him, present to him the sufferings that afflict us, impatience, the questions that spring from the heart. We are certain that he always hears us! And if Jesus is present, there is no time deprived of meaning and void. If he is present, we can continue to wait also when others can no longer give us their support, even when the present is exhausting.
Dear friends, Advent is the time of the presence and the expectation of the eternal. Precisely for this reason it is, in a particular way, the time of joy, of an internalized joy, that no suffering can erase. Joy because of the fact that God became a child. This joy, invisibly present in us, encourages us to walk with confidence. Model and support of this profound joy is the Virgin Mary, through whom the Child Jesus has been given to us. May she, faithful disciple of her Son, obtain for us the grace to live this liturgical time vigilant and diligent in waiting. Amen.
Greetings in the name of our LORD JESUS!
