Manna from Heaven

Hello from my heart to yours...


"I have proof that we're going to have food in Heaven! Man did eat angel's food... Manna!"                                  David Brandt Berg

Last night, the Christians entered into a new movement... the three days, the Holy Triduum, that are the core of our liturgical year, and indeed of the Christian faith.... on this night, in preparation for the Passover, Jesus celebrated the Last Supper with His disciples and thus gave, to those who believed that He was the Son of God, the New Covenant of grace.. He became the perfect sacrificial lamb sacrificing himself for our sins and instituting the Holy Eucharist that will be our unleavened bread or manna from Heaven....

The First Scripture Reading roots us deeply in our Jewish past ... celebrating the Passover with the Jewish people (Exodus 12:1-8, 11-14) .. It reminds us of the exit and liberation of the people in slavery in Egypt and the meal that commemorates it... "This day shall be a memorial feast for you, which all your generations shall celebrate." (Ex 12:14) .. that's what most of us pray for during our Lenten journey.. we desire a greater freedom, and a deeper liberation from the patterns that keep us from being free from the patterns that keep us far from God's grace.... we want to come to the Holy Thursday memorial with those desires alive with hunger and thirst....

... the Talmud says that manna from heaven was found near the homes of those with strong belief in God and far from the homes of those with doubts... it is what fed the Israelites during their time in the desert... it is what feeds us all.... all of us who believe in God.

Today is Good Friday... and the 4th day of Passover.. No Mass is celebrated on this day, but the service of Good Friday is called the "Mass of the Presanctified" because Communion, which had already been consecrated on Holy Thursday, is given to the people ... Today the Jewish blessing is "Blessed are You, L‑rd our G‑d, King of the universe, who has granted us life, sustained us, and enabled us to reach this occasion." ... I think it is a perfect blessing for Christians to say as well since we believe that when we eat the "Bread of life," we will never be hungry again... He sustains us....

Remember that we are loved beyond measure and are cherished blessings to the world... celebrate the connection we have to one another as children of one God ... there's enough manna from heaven for everyone.. share.....

Again, Happy Passover and Happy Easter !  May all my Jewish friends continue to celebrate a blessed Passover with their families, and as my Christian friends enter a weekend of "remembering", may we all sing "Alleluia" on Easter Sunday... Jesus Christ is Risen ! ....

With Love,
Elena

Freedom to Change

Hello from my heart to yours...

"We must always change, renew, rejuvenate ourselves; otherwise we harden."  Johan Wolfganf von Goethe

Happy Passover.... Happy Holy Week.... 

This is my absolute favorite time of the year... this is when I feel closest to my Jewish friends... amazingly, I have written about our connection to one another every year and always stated it as "the connection with the people of the world". However, in a religious census done in 2010, Christians and Jews only make up 32.2% of the worlds religious people... I thought the percentage was much higher than that, which is why I googled it in the first place... ...

Anyway, the "freedom" festival has begun... the "Holy" week has begun... and our hearts are filled with faith, hope and love in abundance... .

During Lent, I have been changing and renewing myself...my heart needed changing... a little piece of it was hardening... not because I did not have God in my heart, I just wasn't tending to the vineyard ...  I wasn't doing the "will" of my Father even though I had said I would... and when I saw a bit of dry soil in my vineyard, I chose to throw down my tools and give up instead of digging in and cultivating the soil so that my vineyard could thrive... so, I removed the weeds and rocks that were preventing me from having sweet grapes instead of sour ones and I am "Me" again... come Easter Sunday, I will be drinking the finest wine from my vineyard as I rejoice in the Resurrection of Jesus.... 

We all have a hard time with God's "Will" ... I think He expects us to.. I think that's how He teaches us to be the blessed people He intends for us to be.. by giving us different vineyards to choose from along our journey.. it's up to us if we stay and prepare the earth so the grapes grow.. or if we throw in the tools and hop over to another vineyard that someone else has already harvested and is serving the wine... it's up to us to change our hearts so that they aren't hardened and strangled by the weeds... but it takes strength and perseverance for sure... and a whole lot of praying...

When God told Moses that He had chosen him to free the Hebrews from slavery, he was not sure he could do it, however, he did not throw his staff and give up, he did the "will" of his father and simply said, "Let my people go." Of course, Pharaoh did not listen, and then, God sent the plagues... giving Pharaoh an opportunity to change his hardened heart each time, however, it wasn't until the 10th plague (where the Angel of Death "Passed Over" the Hebrew homes, which had been marked with lambs blood over the doorposts) that Pharaoh finally relented since his son was dead.

When Jesus returned to Jerusalem on Thursday for "The Last Supper", he already knew what was going to happen to him, however, he was going to fulfill the "will" of his Father in order for our sins to be forgiven and so that we could have eternal life in heaven with him and God.. imagine if he would've left the Mount of Olives and run away avoiding what was to come instead of trusting God... 

Anyway, it's too early.. and I haven't even had breakfast yet.. but as part of my Lenten repentance, I offer this prayer: 

I am sorry God, although I say "yes" to You, I realize that I continue to stumble, and sometimes, I let myself be led totally off-course by those who do not bring me closer to You... but I am here and I promise to fight the good fight.. the sour grapes, well, they belong to me, but so do the sweet ones that I have cultivated during Lent.. Let me not forget that they are sweet because of You..... Thank You, God, for giving me strength to work in the vineyard.. help me to always get through the dry soil.. Give me the courage to destroy the toughest weeds and the grace to survive the pricks from the largest thorns... I trust You.. Your "will" be done .... and if I forget, help me to change my heart immediately... Amen, Amen.

May you all be able to change and renew your hearts always so that they are never hardened... remember that you are loved beyond measure and are a cherished blessing to the world.. come drink some sweet wine with me and let's celebrate OUR freedom ... 

With love,

Elena

p.s. This is a quick summary of our connection....

In Judaism, the people celebrate the beginning of the biblical year with two of the three pilgrimage festivals, Passover and Pentecost (Shavuot)... In Christianity, the believers celebrate Easter and Pentecost.  Our religious worlds are connected through Pentecost (Fiftieth Day)... 

On Passover, the Jewish people were freed from their enslavement to Pharoah; on Shavuot they were given the Torah and became a nation committed to serving God ...

On Easter, the Christian people were given the gift of eternal life in Heaven; on Pentecost they were given the Holy Spirit, thus creating the Holy Trinity and the Birthday of the Church.

... these holidays are always celebrated in the Spring.... making Spring the season of new hope and renewal for all who have faith in our one God..

Purpose

Hello from my heart to yours....

"Looking backward helps us to go forward with a sense of purpose."                                    Rod McKuen

This may seem like a strange quote being as though we usually hear that we shouldn't look back... that the past should stay in the past... and as a matter of fact, when I googled, I couldn't find any quote that said  "look back" ... however, I have always trusted Rod and his words... so, as I wrap up my Lenten journey, I have decided that I am going to glance back every once in awhile to remind me how wonderful this Holy time has been for me... and to ensure that I continue to move forward in God's grace ......with purpose...

All the moments in our lives thus lived are tools for moving forward... if we have experienced difficult times, we need to figure out a way to not go back there... EVER.... accept the lesson as learned and correct it as you move ahead... pray to God to give you the ability to open your eyes to see, open your ears to hear, and open your heart to feel all the little warnings... so that you can recognize when you are back there in that stagnate place .. and most of all, ask God for strength to run like heck out of there...

If there were better times in the past, then pray to God to help you remember how you saw things.. how you heard things.. how you felt things... to try to find a way to get that YOU back ... we can't re-live the moments and we shouldn't want to... we need to build on that happiness... reflect on what it was in ourselves that made us so happy during those times... ... maybe we had a better job... maybe we were surrounded by fabulous people... maybe, even, we had a better dog... sounds silly, I know... and it is... jobs and fabulous people and dogs don't make us happier... you were happier because YOU were happier... those things were just incidental...

So this weekend... glance backward for a minute or two... see what it is that can get you moving forward with a sense of purpose.... after all,. it's Spring.. a time of renewal.. it's Lent.. it's Passover... it's Easter ... ALL holidays that  free us from the bonds of the past... through prayer, penance, repentance and alms-giving, we ultimately REJOICE.. we are no longer slaves.. we are promised eternal life in heaven....  we can move forward with a purpose...  the light within us will illuminate our path... we are people of faith, hope and love..... 

This is my prayer affirmation... (using a quote by Og Mandino) ... 

Infinite Spirit of God help me to move forward.  I am loved beyond measure. I am a blessing to the world. I have a purpose in life and I live a purposeful life.  I have faith, hope and love ever present in my heart. "I am here for a purpose and that purpose is to grow into a mountain, not to shrink to a grain of sand. Henceforth will I apply all my efforts to become the highest mountain of all and I will strain my potential until it cries for mercy."  Thank you God for making this my truth.  Amen.

May your weekend be blessed with purposeful moments,
with love,
Elena

Spring Itself

Hello from my heart to yours...

"When spring came, even the false spring, there were no problems except where to be happiest. The only thing that could spoil a day was people and if you could keep from making engagements, each day had no limits. People were always the limiters of happiness except for the very few that were as good as spring itself."                                     Ernest Hemingway (A Moveable Feast)

Today's quote sounds pretty cynical when all I write about is having faith in one another and blessing people so that you are blessed in return.. but I love HEM and I love this quote because it reminds me of all the people in my life who ARE as good as spring itself... 

                                                                                      and it's SPRING!!!..  

so.......... Today, I celebrate and salute my "Spring" people... 

You know who you are.. 

You are the ones who continue to receive my blessings (and maybe even sometimes) you are the ones who read them... lol...  

You are the ones who respond and thank me...and write me to ask me who I am and how you came to be on my blessing list in the first place....

You are the ones who secretly send me gifts like hand-knit socks, meditation pebbles, hand-made "cross" anklets and Buddha bracelets.... fleur-de-lis relics, angel wing necklaces,  letters and note cards,  hyacinths ready to bloom, ........ 

You are the ones who put hearts and happy faces on my facebook wall.. and post songs for me... and tag me in inspirational pictures.. 

You are the ones who ask me to sing in the middle of the night at retreats... and decorate prayer rooms.. and who invite me to break "challah" ... and walk the stations of the cross in the garden... 

You are the ones who build me up.. and have faith in me.. and trust me... and teach me.. and want me to grow...

You are the ones who make me laugh and cry and feel...  

You are the ones who call me Mama, Elena Maria, Ea, Laney, Lane, Hijita, Sissy, Sister-In-Christ, Tia, Auntie, Mon Ami, Beautiful, Sweetheart, Hippie, Loon... 

You are the ones who inspire me, who feed my light, who feed my soul... who bless me with an abundance of love... 

You are the ones who bring me closer to God....  

YOU are my "Spring" people.... and I love you all... 

...  e.e. cummings wrote:

 "sweet spring is your

time is my time is our

time for springtime is lovetime

and viva sweet love” 

YES!!! Viva the sweet love of all my "Spring" people.... for I am blessed... my days cannot be spoiled... the only problem I have is where to be happiest... I carry "happiness" in my heart always because of YOU... I am a blessed child of God... and so are all of you... you know who you are... 

YOU are cherished blessings to the world and to me... 

YOU are loved beyond measure always....

I celebrate Spring... and I celebrate and salute YOU....

May your days be filled with the unlimited love and happiness of all the people you know who are like YOU..................................................as good as Spring itself... 

With love,

Elena

Everything is a Blessing

Hello from my heart to yours....

"Learn to get in touch with the silence within yourself, and know that everything in life has purpose. There are no mistakes, no coincidences, all events are blessings given to us to learn from."  Elisabeth Kubler-Ross 

Amen, Amen.... but, that's a tough one to believe, isn't it? especially if you experience test after test, trial after trial, struggle after struggle... especially if you feel it's just one heartache after another... and seriously, everyone has asked, at one time or another, "Why God?.. how much more do I have to endure?" .. it's perfectly normal to question why, however, we need to step back and reflect.. we need to stop and look deep inside our hearts and try to find the blessing in it... of course, as I write that I can only think of Mother Teresa when she said, “I know God will not give me anything I can't handle. I just wish He didn't trust me so much.” ... lol... I find it so humorous really... maybe that's what we should all believe so that we don't feel so smothered by life....

Everything in our lives is a blessing, including ourselves. I have read so many definitions for the word "blessing" .. the dictionary one I like the most is, "a favor or gift bestowed by God, thereby bringing happiness"..  if we believe that our happiness is independent of our circumstances and that it is self-contained then, regardless of what is happening to us externally, we can be truly happy internally, and therefore, blessed... it's that simple... yeah, right...  it sounds simple enough, but here's where that "faith, hope and love" we are always supposed to have comes into play.. 

I believe that God is the source of all my blessings.. He is an eternally loving presence within me...He knows all about me and loves and adores me as I am.. and I believe that everyone has this eternally loving source within them, also..
 
Learning to accept, enjoy, and appreciate all the conditions in your life as somehow part of God's plan is difficult for sure, especially since we all know that many of the blessings bestowed upon us are not revealed immediately, but if we learn to be patient and meditate and pray, we will realize that everything we experience is a blessing, even if we don't like it.... the idea is to learn and grow... 
 
Anyway.. when I saw the above quote, I thought I was going to write about "no coincidences" in life.. guess that wasn't in God's plan... lol... so, let me wrap it up...during Lent, we have been keep a "gratitude" journal whereby, we write down just one thing that we are grateful for in the day.. at first, I didn't know how to begin, but Giorgio, my 10 year old, showed me  (through his thoughts) that the deepest, most meaningful aspects of life to be grateful for, are the ones that appear to be ordinary and inconsequential... for example, "I am grateful that I have shoes on my feet"...or  "I am grateful to have my Mama"... sometimes, the blessing is as simple and as vital as, “I’m alive... I’m breathing... I’m here.” ...  all those "tests, trials, struggles and heartaches", well....., I can wait to see the blessing in them.... I can wait til God reveals them to me... there are no mistakes, no coincidences, all events are blessings for me to learn and grow into the blessed person God intends me to be... And so it is.....
 
May you all be able to believe that everything in life has purpose.. that everything is a blessing bestowed upon you by God to bring happiness to your heart because you are loved beyond measure.. you are a cherished blessing to the world...

May your day be blessed with all things good,
With love,
Elena

Light Within

Hello from my heart to yours....

For the past week or so.. this has been my daily affirmation... 

"I am the keeper of my own light ... it comes from within."

I have written so many blessings about the "light" we carry within ourselves, and yet, I have felt that my own light has been taken from me.. slowly (for the past 3 months especially) my light has been dimming ...  and the inability to write blessings is a visible sign of that..... but, last weekend I went to see my Emmaus Sisters at the Lenten Retreat, and low and behold, my heart began to burn within me... it was lighted with fire... I even did something I have never done in the 9 years that I have been attending the retreats... I sang from the altar!!! ... I am the "secret singer" at the retreats, but my lovely friend, Solangel, (Sun Angel) asked me to do the Responsorial Psalm ... "Taste and see the goodness of the Lord" .... how apropo really... anyway, all I remember is that I moved the mic away from myself and stood there swaying back and forth with my hands clasped behind my back for what seemed like hours.. I looked to the priest and then I looked to Sol, who nodded to go ahead, and I sang.... once I sang the first line, I could feel the light within me being ignited again....and I totally forgot I was on the altar.

Anyway, people can do this for us... they can help us be closer to God, and hence, help light our hearts again... and then, there are those people who are capable of blowing your light out without us even realizing it.. we just wake up one day and wonder who we are....  There in the house of God, surrounded by my sisters, how could my light not be ignited?  What we have to strive for is to make sure we have at least one person in our lives that reminds us to "taste and see the goodness of God" ... He is the light we carry in our hearts... we have to be aware of our light and make sure it is always on....

In our journey through life, we are all given challenges and tests... troubles and strife.. we all feel moments of hopelessness and despair.. it is part of our human experience, but we have it in us to accept those times and face them head-on.. armed with the light that we carry within us... if someone was able to take that light away from us, I can only believe that it is because we had forgotten that the faith, hope and love that we carry in our hearts can overcome any obstacle in our way... prayer and daily affirmations are a steadfast way to finding our way back to ourselves and to our light source.... 

I am finding my way back again... I don't think I "forgot" really... I simply became overwhelmed and was taking the easy way out until I did not recognize "ME" anymore...  I am a loner by nature (no one believes that, but it's true) ... and I am very detached... but, I do love.. I am in love with loving people, but am selective about who I allow to love me back ... so selfish of me, I know... but I know that there are those people who I love, who always keep me close to God, and then, there are, also, the opposite kind of people, who pull me away from the true source of light... I have to become better at recognizing who is who....  God's presence in my heart is the only way to replenish the light within.... 

So, I say this prayer now.....

"Infinite Spirit of God, I thank You for the love and light You have graciously placed in my heart. May I be able to draw upon its strength always... knowing that You are who replenishes it daily.. Thank you for the Spiritual beings you have chosen as my travel companions through life.. May our lights join so Divinely as to not allow anyone to be able to extinguish them... May we always be the blessed people You intend us to be.. Amen."

May you all love the light that guides you from within.. may you be a source of light for someone who needs a little push to find their way back... remember that this human experience you are having is only for a short time, as the cherished blessing that you are to the world, shine your love and light so that everyone realizes how loved beyond measure we all are....

May your afternoon be filled with light.

With love,

Elena