Letting Go - Fr Rob Galea

I'm standing here
Memories what could have been
Oh how I love you so
Held closer now than I could know

The thought of you would never fade
The love I had will ever grow
Till the day we made a prayer
As children love eternally

*I don't want to say goodbye
But I'm letting go
I'm letting go
Even though it's hard this time
I'm letting go
But I know that he loves you

Here I am letting go
Looking to tomorrow
My strength has been God alone
Who takes away all our sorrows

* x2

I'm letting go...
I'm letting go......
I'm letting go.........
I'm letting go............

BHS Musics~

Jonah Man Jazz
Composed and written by Michael John Hurd

Also, Captain Noah and His Floating Zoo 
... Such fond memories~

We Are Catholic.

Dance.

It's more like just a dance. Something the body remembers. It's a habit. The music plays, the body moves. It almost doesn't matter what else is happening.

A Remembering Heart

God, grant to me a heart that remembers the life in the seed that lies buried in dark night and the mystery you have revealed to me in the tapestry of my life
-- a remembering heart.

God, grant to me a heart that i faithful, as the Word is made flesh in the breaking of the bread, the call you speak to me, the song you sing in me, the desire for you, my God
-- a faithful heart.

God, grant to me a heart that is grateful, as the blind one who now sees sings in praise of your name, the gifts you give to me, the life you free in me, all the goodness you bestow
-- a grateful heart.

God, grant me a heart that truly loves, as the one who surrenders his life for his friends, that I may dare to be more true to you in the face of all who need
-- a loving heart.

Home.

What Makes a Christian Home.

It is a place of Love, Consideration, and Understanding.
It is a place where they pray for the homeless.
It is not a place where Father and Mother are always away at church meetings.
It is a place of Family Fun and Enjoyment.
It is a place where children are welcome.
It is a place of Welcome and Hospitality.
It is not just a home for the family. It is a plce where Stranger can feel at home.
It is a place where God is given thanks for all things.
It is a place where family can bring their Friends.
It is a place where parents pray for their family.
It is a place where children learn to pray.
It is not just a clean, respectable house.
It is a HOME.
A place where Jesus himself would feel at ease, a place where Jesus lives, and callers who come without doubts, fears, and sorrows will meet him. They will find Faith, Hope, and Love, Company, and Understanding.


- reflection: it doesn't have to be christian home, i think every home should be like that...

Theory of Light and Darkness

Does evil exist? Did God create evil?
The unversity professor challenged his students with this question.

"Did God create everything that exists?"
A student bravely replied, "Yes, he did!"
"God created everything?", the professor asked.

"Yes, sir.", the student replied.
The professor answered, "If God created everything, then God created evil, since evil exists, and according to the principle that our works define who we are, then God is evil."
The student became quiet before such an answer.
The professor, quite pleased with himself, boasted to the students that he had proven once more the religious faith was a myth.

Another student raised his hand and said, "Can I ask you a question, professor?"
"Of course," replied the professor.

The student stood up and asked, "Professor does cold exist?"
"What kind of a question is this? Of course it exists. Have you never been cold?"
The students snickered at the young man's question.

The young man replied, "In fact, sir, cold does not exist. According to the laws of physics, what we consider cold is in reality the absence of heat. Everybody or object is suceptible to study when it has or transmit energy, and heat is what makes a body or matter have or transmit energy.

Absolute zero (−273.15 °C) is the total absence of heat; all matter becomes inert and incapable of reaction at that temperature.
Cold does not exist. We have created this word to describe how we feel if we have no heat."

The student continued, "Professor, does darkness exist?"
The professor responded, "Of course it does."

The student replied, "Once again you are wrong, sir. Darkness does not exist either. Darkness is in reality the absence of light.
Light we can study, but not darkness. In fact we can use Newton's prism to break white light into many colours and study the various wavelengths of each colour.
You cannot measure darkness. A simple ray of light can break into a world of darkness and illuminate it.
How can you know how dark a certain space is?
You measure the amount of light present. Isn't this correct?
Darkness is a term used by man to describe what happens when there is no light present."

Finally the young man asked the professor, "Sir, does evil exist?"

Now uncertain, the professor responded, "Of course as I have already said. We see it everyday. It is in the daily example of man's inhumanity to man. It is the multitude of crime and violence everywhere in the world. These manifestations are nothing else but evil."

To this, the student replied, "Evil does not exist, sir. Or at least it does not exist unto itself. Evil is simply the absence of God. It is just like darkness and cold, a word that man has created to describe the absence of God. God did not create evil. Evil is the result of what happens when man does not have God's love present in his heart.

It's like the cold that comes when there is no heat or the darkness that comes when there is no light."

The professor sat down.
The young man's name -- Albert Einstein.

Perhaps it's a hoax that Albert Einstein was involved in this convo, but regardless of who the student is, it is still a good piece to read and ponder on...

Melbourne, March 2009

Click on pic for picasa album~

Sydney, April 2010

Click on pic for picasa album~

I rescued a human today.

Apparently this was written by a lady called Janine Allen


Her eyes met mine as she walked down the corridor peering apprehensively into the kennels. I felt her need instantly and knew I had to help her.

I wagged my tail, not too exuberantly, so she wouldn’t be afraid. As she stopped at my kennel I blocked her view from a little accident I had in the back of my cage. I didn’t want her to know that I hadn’t been walked today. Sometimes the overworked shelter keepers get too busy and I didn’t want her to think poorly of them.

As she read my kennel card I hoped that she wouldn’t feel sad about my past. I only have the future to look forward to and want to make a difference in someone’s life.

She got down on her knees and made little kissy sounds at me. I shoved my shoulder and side of my head up against the bars to comfort her. Gentle fingertips caressed my neck; she was desperate for companionship. A tear fell down her cheek and I raised my paw to assure her that all would be well.

Soon my kennel door opened and her smile was so bright that I instantly jumped into her arms.

I would promise to keep her safe
I would promise to always be by her side
I would promise to do everything I could to see that radiant smile and sparkle in her eyes.

I was so fortunate that she came down my corridor. So many more are out there who haven’t walked the corridors. So many more to be saved. At least I could save one.

I rescued a human today.

Your Veterinarian...

In the treatment of human beings, there are 35 medical specialists
Together they oversee human life from pre-natal procedures to palliative care.
And yet there is one practitioner who must be an:

• Anaesthetist
• Dermatiologist
• Emergency Medicine Specialist
• Obstetrician
• Neonatologist
• Gynaecologist
• Ophthalmologist
• Paediatrician
• Pathologist
• Psychiatrist
• Radiologist
• Physician
• Surgeon
• Dentist
• Public Health Specialist
• Physiotherapist
• Behaviourist
• Psychologist
• Immunologist
• Oncologist
• Preventative Medicine Specialist
• Plastic Surgeon
• Parapsychologist
• Neurologist
• Neurosurgeon
• Epidemiologist
• Cardiologist
• Dietitian
• Endocrinologist
• Geriatrician
• Lecturer/Researcher
• Urologist
• Proctologist
• Theriogenologist
• Sonologist

... all in one

This single person is responsible for the health of your pet throughout its entire life.

To you this person is your local Veterinarian,

To your pet this person is 35 doctors rolled into one… a pet’s best friend.

It's easier to be alone.

"There is a reason I said I'd be happy alone. It wasn't because I thought I would be happy alone. It was because I thought if I loved someone and then it fell apart, I might not make it. It's easier to be alone. Because what if you learn that you need love? And then you don't have it. What if you like it? And lean on it? What if you shape your life around it? And then it falls apart? Can you even survive that kind of pain? Losing love is like organ damage. It's like dying. The only difference is, death ends. This? It could go on forever..."

I'm blessed...

...with so many amazing and wonderful girls around me.

Most days I just wish I could be more like them... and if I was made up with all those beauty around me, I'd be amazing and wonderful too...

山不轉路轉，路不轉人轉，人不轉心轉

Fr. Justin Belitz.

1) There is Beauty in Everyone and Everything.
- receive all persons (including yourself) and all life situations as beautiful, exactly as they are, and share only the good you see in others
- pass on some good news about: yourself, someone you dislike, someone with whom you are angry, and someone to whom you have been unkind.

2) You Can Change Yourself, You Cannot Change Others
- become the change you want to see in others
- choose someone with whom you want to build or improve a relationship. Do to, no for them, what you would like them to to, or for you.

3) You Can Take Control of Your Life
- consciously create your own reality: set specific goals and think creatively about the future
- write one goal that you would like to achieve during the next year

4) Giving Freely is Always Joyful
- give for the pleasure of giving, not for what you get in return
- give some non-material gift to someone you love

5) It is Important for Others to Give to You
- provide opportunities for others to give
- the next time someone wants to give you something, accept graciously

6) Difficulties and Pain are Opportunities for Growth
- see problems as challenges
- write down the advantages of some difficulty or pain that you are experiencing at this time in your life

7) The Divine Plan is Perfect
- expect the best - demand nothing.
- make a list of the people who love you, and in meditation, accept them where they are, especially with all their shortcomings, faults and failings


- photo: credits to dyanna.

george strait -- love without end, amen

I got sent home from school one day with a shiner on my eye.
Fightin' was against the rules and it didn't matter why.
When dad got home I told that story just like I'd rehearsed.
And then stood there on those tremblin' knees and waited for the worst.

And he said, "Let me tell you a secret about a father's love,
A secret that my daddy said was just between us."
He said, "Daddies don't just love their children every now and then.
It's a love without end, amen, it's a love without end, amen."

When I became a father in the spring of '81
There was no doubt that stubborn boy was just like my father's son.
And when I thought my patience had been tested to the end,
I took my daddy's secret and I passed it on to him.

And I said, "Let me tell you a secret about a father's love,
A secret that my daddy said was just between us."
I said, "Daddies don't just love their children every now and then.
It's a love without end, amen, it's a love without end, amen."

Last night I dreamed I died and stood outside those pearly gates.
When suddenly I realized there must be some mistake.
If they know half the things I've done, they'll never let me in.
And then somewhere from the other side I heard these words again.

And They said, "Let me tell you a secret about a father's love,
A secret that my daddy said was just between us.
You see Daddies don't just love their children every now and then.
It's a love without end, amen, it's a love without end, amen."


--louyakis.
i almost cried.

Chocolate eaters may have healthier hearts: study

Mon, Nov 8 2010

By Alison McCook
NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Older women who eat more chocolate are less likely to develop heart problems over a nearly 10-year-period, new study findings report.
The authors found that women older than 70 who ate chocolate at least once per week were 35 percent less likely to be hospitalized or die from heart disease over the course of the study, and nearly 60 percent less likely to be hospitalized or die from heart failure.
What's nice, study author Dr. Joshua Lewis told Reuters Health, is that women did not have to eat a ton of chocolate to see benefits.
"We would therefore caution against people eating foods with high sugar and fat regularly and believe our findings support moderate rather than frequent chocolate consumption," said Lewis, based at Sir Charles Gairdner Hospital in Australia.
But it is probably too early to begin recommending people eat more chocolate, cautioned Dr. Brian Buijsse at the German Institute of Human Nutrition, who did not participate in the study. And even if additional large studies confirmed its benefits, doctors still may not want to prescribe chocolate, he added.
"The danger is that many people will start eating more of it than is necessary, without cutting back in calories from other snacks, which will result in weight gain and will counteract any beneficial effects of chocolate," Buijsse said.
This is not the first study to tout chocolate's potential benefits: in 2008, Italian researchers found that eating dark chocolate regularly may help lower levels of inflammation, which is strongly associated with heart and blood vessel disease.
The previous year, another study showed that foods rich in antioxidants known as flavonoids - including dark chocolate and apples and red wine -- may help shield postmenopausal women from coronary heart disease, cardiovascular disease and stroke.
Flavonoids are thought to reduce the risk of heart disease, the leading cause of death in many industrialized countries, by helping to increase nitric oxide, which in turn helps boost the functioning of blood vessels and lower blood pressure.
To investigate further, the authors reviewed data collected from 1216 older women, who estimated how often they ate chocolate, and the amount. One serving consisted of the equivalent amount of cocoa in 1 cup of hot cocoa. The authors tracked the women for almost a decade, noting who was hospitalized or died from heart disease.
Roughly half of the women said they ate less than one serving of chocolate per week. Nearly 90 of those who ate chocolate rarely were hospitalized or died from heart disease during the study period, versus 65 women who ate chocolate more frequently.
Another 35 of the infrequent consumers experienced heart failure, while only 18 women who reported eating chocolate at least once per week were hospitalized or died from the same condition, the authors report in the Archives of Internal Medicine.
Although they grouped women who ate chocolate daily and weekly together, the authors also looked at each separately, and found that both appeared to fare equally well, suggesting that only one serving per week might suffice to get heart benefits.
The study's nature means researchers can't prove any cause-effect relationship. Given the growing body of evidence suggesting the benefits of chocolate, the next step should be a large clinical trial that vigorously tests chocolate's benefits, Lewis said in an e-mail.
Buijsse agreed that more research is needed, in part because other factors in the current study may explain its results. For instance, he said in an e-mail, elderly women with early signs of heart disease may have reduced their chocolate intake, perhaps because their doctors told them to adopt a healthy diet.
"For now, I would say that if people want to eat chocolate to improve their health, they should keep it to low amounts and replace it for other energy-dense snacks," Buijsse said.
SOURCE: link.reuters.com/fev96m Archives of Internal Medicine, November 8, 2010.

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Don't Quit

Just something inspiration.
Cliche?  Pff. idc.

----

When things go wrong as the sometimes will,
When the road you're trudging seems all uphill,
When the funds are low and the debts are high,
and you want to smile, but you have to sigh,
When care is pressing you down a bit,
Rest, if you must, but don't you quit.

Life is queer with its twists and turns,
As everyone of us sometimes learns,
and many a failure turns about
When he might have won had he stuck it out;
Don't give up though the pace seems slow --
You may succeed with another blow.

Success is failure turned inside out--
The silver tint of the clouds of doubt,
and you never can tell how close you are,
It may be near when it seems so far;
So stick to the fight when you're hardest hit --
It's when things seem worst that
you must not quit.

interesting article...

Don't work. Avoid telling the truth. Be hated. Love someone.

-----
Written by Adrian Tan, author of The Teenage Textbook (1988), was the guest-of-honour at a recent NTU convocation ceremony. This was his speech to the graduating class of 2008.
-----

I must say thank you to the faculty and staff of the Wee Kim Wee School of Communication and Information for inviting me to give your convocation address. It's a wonderful honour and a privilege for me to speak here for ten minutes without fear of contradiction, defamation or retaliation. I say this as a Singaporean and more so as a husband.

My wife is a wonderful person and perfect in every way except one. She is the editor of a magazine. She corrects people for a living. She has honed her expert skills over a quarter of a century, mostly by practising at home during conversations between her and me.

On the other hand, I am a litigator. Essentially, I spend my day telling people how wrong they are. I make my living being disagreeable.

Nevertheless, there is perfect harmony in our matrimonial home. That is because when an editor and a litigator have an argument, the one who triumphs is always the wife.

And so I want to start by giving one piece of advice to the men: when you've already won her heart, you don't need to win every argument.

Marriage is considered one milestone of life. Some of you may already be married. Some of you may never be married. Some of you will be married. Some of you will enjoy the experience so much, you will be married many, many times. Good for you.

The next big milestone in your life is today: your graduation. The end of education. You're done learning.

You've probably been told the big lie that "Learning is a lifelong process" and that therefore you will continue studying and taking masters' degrees and doctorates and professorships and so on. You know the sort of people who tell you that? Teachers. Don't you think there is some measure of conflict of interest? They are in the business of learning, after all. Where would they be without you? They need you to be repeat customers.

The good news is that they're wrong.

The bad news is that you don't need further education because your entire life is over. It is gone. That may come as a shock to some of you. You're in your teens or early twenties. People may tell you that you will live to be 70, 80, 90 years old. That is your life expectancy.

I love that term: life expectancy. We all understand the term to mean the average life span of a group of people. But I'm here to talk about a bigger idea, which is what you expect from your life.

You may be very happy to know that Singapore is currently ranked as the country with the third highest life expectancy. We are behind Andorra and Japan, and tied with San Marino. It seems quite clear why people in those countries, and ours, live so long. We share one thing in common: our football teams are all hopeless. There's very little danger of any of our citizens having their pulses raised by watching us play in the World Cup. Spectators are more likely to be lulled into a gentle and restful nap.

Singaporeans have a life expectancy of 81.8 years. Singapore men live to an average of 79.21 years, while Singapore women live more than five years longer, probably to take into account the additional time they need to spend in the bathroom.

So here you are, in your twenties, thinking that you'll have another 40 years to go. Four decades in which to live long and prosper.

Bad news. Read the papers. There are people dropping dead when they're 50, 40, 30 years old. Or quite possibly just after finishing their convocation. They would be very disappointed that they didn't meet their life expectancy.

I'm here to tell you this. Forget about your life expectancy.

After all, it's calculated based on an average. And you never, ever want to expect being average.

Revisit those expectations. You might be looking forward to working, falling in love, marrying, raising a family. You are told that, as graduates, you should expect to find a job paying so much, where your hours are so much, where your responsibilities are so much.

That is what is expected of you. And if you live up to it, it will be an awful waste.

If you expect that, you will be limiting yourself. You will be living your life according to boundaries set by average people. I have nothing against average people. But no one should aspire to be them. And you don't need years of education by the best minds in Singapore to prepare you to be average.

What you should prepare for is mess. Life's a mess. You are not entitled to expect anything from it. Life is not fair. Everything does not balance out in the end. Life happens, and you have no control over it. Good and bad things happen to you day by day, hour by hour, moment by moment. Your degree is a poor armour against fate.

Don't expect anything. Erase all life expectancies. Just live. Your life is over as of today. At this point in time, you have grown as tall as you will ever be, you are physically the fittest you will ever be in your entire life and you are probably looking the best that you will ever look. This is as good as it gets. It is all downhill from here. Or up. No one knows.

What does this mean for you? It is good that your life is over.

Since your life is over, you are free. Let me tell you the many wonderful things that you can do when you are free.

The most important is this: do not work.

Work is anything that you are compelled to do. By its very nature, it is undesirable.

Work kills. The Japanese have a term "Karoshi", which means death from overwork. That's the most dramatic form of how work can kill. But it can also kill you in more subtle ways. If you work, then day by day, bit by bit, your soul is chipped away, disintegrating until there's nothing left. A rock has been ground into sand and dust.

There's a common misconception that work is necessary. You will meet people working at miserable jobs. They tell you they are "making a living". No, they're not. They're dying, frittering away their fast-extinguishing lives doing things which are, at best, meaningless and, at worst, harmful.

People will tell you that work ennobles you, that work lends you a certain dignity. Work makes you free. The slogan "Arbeit macht frei" was placed at the entrances to a number of Nazi concentration camps. Utter nonsense.

Do not waste the vast majority of your life doing something you hate so that you can spend the small remainder sliver of your life in modest comfort. You may never reach that end anyway.

Resist the temptation to get a job. Instead, play. Find something you enjoy doing. Do it. Over and over again. You will become good at it for two reasons: you like it, and you do it often. Soon, that will have value in itself.

I like arguing, and I love language. So, I became a litigator. I enjoy it and I would do it for free. If I didn't do that, I would've been in some other type of work that still involved writing fiction – probably a sports journalist.

So what should you do? You will find your own niche. I don't imagine you will need to look very hard. By this time in your life, you will have a very good idea of what you will want to do. In fact, I'll go further and say the ideal situation would be that you will not be able to stop yourself pursuing your passions. By this time you should know what your obsessions are. If you enjoy showing off your knowledge and feeling superior, you might become a teacher.

Find that pursuit that will energise you, consume you, become an obsession. Each day, you must rise with a restless enthusiasm. If you don't, you are working.

Most of you will end up in activities which involve communication. To those of you I have a second message: be wary of the truth. I'm not asking you to speak it, or write it, for there are times when it is dangerous or impossible to do those things. The truth has a great capacity to offend and injure, and you will find that the closer you are to someone, the more care you must take to disguise or even conceal the truth. Often, there is great virtue in being evasive, or equivocating. There is also great skill. Any child can blurt out the truth, without thought to the consequences. It takes great maturity to appreciate the value of silence.

In order to be wary of the truth, you must first know it. That requires great frankness to yourself. Never fool the person in the mirror.

I have told you that your life is over, that you should not work, and that you should avoid telling the truth. I now say this to you: be hated.

It's not as easy as it sounds. Do you know anyone who hates you? Yet every great figure who has contributed to the human race has been hated, not just by one person, but often by a great many. That hatred is so strong it has caused those great figures to be shunned, abused, murdered and in one famous instance, nailed to a cross.

One does not have to be evil to be hated. In fact, it's often the case that one is hated precisely because one is trying to do right by one's own convictions. It is far too easy to be liked, one merely has to be accommodating and hold no strong convictions. Then one will gravitate towards the centre and settle into the average. That cannot be your role. There are a great many bad people in the world, and if you are not offending them, you must be bad yourself. Popularity is a sure sign that you are doing something wrong.

The other side of the coin is this: fall in love.

I didn't say "be loved". That requires too much compromise. If one changes one's looks, personality and values, one can be loved by anyone.

Rather, I exhort you to love another human being. It may seem odd for me to tell you this. You may expect it to happen naturally, without deliberation. That is false. Modern society is anti-love. We've taken a microscope to everyone to bring out their flaws and shortcomings. It far easier to find a reason not to love someone, than otherwise. Rejection requires only one reason. Love requires complete acceptance. It is hard work – the only kind of work that I find palatable.

Loving someone has great benefits. There is admiration, learning, attraction and something which, for the want of a better word, we call happiness. In loving someone, we become inspired to better ourselves in every way. We learn the truth worthlessness of material things. We celebrate being human. Loving is good for the soul.

Loving someone is therefore very important, and it is also important to choose the right person. Despite popular culture, love doesn't happen by chance, at first sight, across a crowded dance floor. It grows slowly, sinking roots first before branching and blossoming. It is not a silly weed, but a mighty tree that weathers every storm.
You will find, that when you have someone to love, that the face is less important than the brain, and the body is less important than the heart.

You will also find that it is no great tragedy if your love is not reciprocated. You are not doing it to be loved back. Its value is to inspire you.

Finally, you will find that there is no half-measure when it comes to loving someone. You either don't, or you do with every cell in your body, completely and utterly, without reservation or apology. It consumes you, and you are reborn, all the better for it.

Don't work. Avoid telling the truth. Be hated. Love someone.

Sometimes - a reflection.

by Karen Chan on Sunday, 06 September 2009 at 23:09

*Something to share, thanks to Fr. Michael, he shared with us a few reflections on his Sunday sermon.


We must be hurt in order to grow,
We must fail in order to know,
We must lose in order to gain
Some lessons are learned best only through pain.

Sometimes...
Our vision clears only after our eyes are washed with tears.
We have to be broken, so we can be tender,
We are sick so we can rest and think better on things more important than work or fun,
We are taken for trip near death, so we can assess how we've run.

Sometimes...
We have to suffer lack, so we can know God's provision,
We have to feel another's pain, so we can have a sense of mission.
So take heart, if you don't understand today,
Instead of grumbling, ask God what He means to say,
In order to grow, you must stand and look beyond the hurt,
Trust in God's loving hand that takes what is Good, and gives what is Best,
And on this blessed thought, rest your anxious heart with all the questions,
God's hand only gives what His loving heart dictates,

Sometimes...
The Lord calms the storm,

Sometimes...
He lets the storm rage, and calms His child...
Better go through the storm with Him,
Than smooth waters without Him...