Bless Me Father

Confession (Photo credit: Lawrence OP)

When I sit by the confessional booth, awaiting the next penitent. As with each waiting, I wonder if the penitents know the following: there is no such thing as a “bad” confession as long as you’ve come to the Sacrament with a contrite heart.

Priests Dancing?!...

Hahahahaha!....



iSay Amen to that!

(thanks to chiralcapers & the practicing catholic)

The Monday After...

Tired out today after all that Holy Week and Easter celebrations! :-P

Just moving along on cruise mode and hoping nothing else comes besides what are already on my plate today (see calendar). Tempted to automate the confessional later for evening mass but unfortunately the system and corresponding intentions that follow it do not allow.. ;-)

(cartoon by clive goddard)

Caring?

I have cleared a week of oral diarrhoe from all those confessions that, when put together, are enough to give anyone instant cancer and heart attack in one go! :-P

Despite those trying moments, it was a sort of sweet surrender savouring the very act of being able to be a conduit of God's forgiveness for all those penitents that came to receive that unconditional love which only He can give. It doesn't matter whether their disposition in receiving that love were perfect or not. It is just plain reassuring to know that SOMEONE cares even if no one here gives a damn...

And speaking of caring, the newspaper today was highlighting on the plight of maids who do not get enough to eat for their daily sustenance and end up going hungry for the rest of the day, daily! To think that in a civil and modern society like Singapore, we can have employers who treat domestic helpers like slaves and objects for abuse! What's even more in-the-face is this giant size poster just outside Katong Mall where a maid agency advertises for maids services and blatantly provides those that work for no leave at all, and all these for low pay! *sheesh* This one was previously mentioned by mrbrown.com before and till now the ad and the agency are still going strong with this service.

You'd think that after all that great strides in fair working standards and living for foreign workers and crackdowns on errant Singaporeans who mistreat their domestic workers (for whatever reasons they may have), we can have a conversion of hearts on how we treat other fellow human beings. The news recent news report and this sign outside the Mall remains a critical indictment on our lack of hospitality and service that point to a disturbing trend of an already consumerist and utilitarian society. Only this time persons are being made the object... *shake head*

Bless Me Father...

As we move closer into the last few weeks of Lent, the days tend to get more tedious and tempers appear more on the quick and easy. The flavours of each day seems rather bland and a sort of heavy cloud of atmosphere seems to cling around me as I move from day to the next... :-P Maybe it is the amount of reconciliation which the East District priests are undergoing, this week with the schools and next week with the parishes: bless me Father for I have sin...

This morning itself we had one recon session with the boys at St Stephen's Primary School near OLPS Church. They were sincere, as much as I can gather, with their confession and when they finished, I can feel their *sigh of relief* as they scampered off back to their classes. :-)

As for someone who has yet to return the remote to our Sea Avenue church premises, I really wonder if confession would make any different to this person:

*-------------------------
fc, hf cats said...
so it was you who place the jars of potted plants to prevent me from opening the gates with my spare remote....

now I must park elsewhere...
-------------------------*

Our own people some more! Utterly incredible! *shake head* :-P

Don't Care?

We begin our series of penitential services this week and into the middle of next week, as we edge closer towards Christmas.

Today's first opening session was at 10.30 am at Holy Family and we saw a relatively manageable crowd that joined in service which saw us till 11.30 am. One of the usual requests qhich we would remind the penitents before they come up to any priest for confession, is to get to the point and not to tell long 'grandmother stories'. However, there would still be those who would blissfully ignore this and carry on with their rambling with nary a care to others who are queuing up and those seated either waiting to come up for confession or are patiently waiting for the rest to finish as they pray for them. Makes you wonder if they understood what we said or do they just plain don't care?!....

Meanwhile, for those of you who have been patiently waiting for the radio interview or are searching for it over at rsi and could not find it, it is here.