Surprising Grace

There is a typhoon tonight. We have closed all the windows and doors, but you can still hear it - the rain battering down, yes, but the wind - ah, that incredible wind - a constant roar, all around you in the dark. It is the kind of wind that brings down branches of trees and rips off roofs. Still, what we have here is only what they raise a 'signal 2' warning for. 'Signal 3' is being raised down in the south, where the full strength of the typhoon is passing, and where there has already been fierce destruction. Earlier today I had been frustrated about the slow progress of some work I'd been doing, intending to pick it up after dinner, but once the storm rose it hardly seemed important. We sat in the chapel for a while, lighting a few candles and simply listening to the storm. Prayer is wordless at a time like this, the words or concepts you might usually use dissolving in the raw power of nature around you. Your thoughts go to those who are suffering... But p...

  'We keep praying that our illusions will fall away. God erodes them from many sides, hoping they will fall. But we often remain trapped in what we call normalcy—“the way things are.” Life then revolves around problem-solving, fixing, explaining, and taking sides with winners and losers. It can be a pretty circular and even nonsensical existence. To get out of this unending cycle, we have to allow ourselves to be drawn into sacred space, into liminality. All transformation takes place here. We have to allow ourselves to be drawn out of “business as usual” and remain patiently on the “threshold” (limen, in Latin) where we are betwixt and between the familiar and the completely unknown. There alone is our old world left behind, while we are not yet sure of the new existence. That’s a good space where genuine newness can begin.' ***** So writes Richard Rohr in his beautifully insightful way. The various forms of 'lockdown' we have experienced in the past few m...

In the past weeks, I have often felt as if I was living in two worlds. When on the phone with family and friends in Singapore, while listening to international news, or joining in various prayer events against COVID-19, I am in a world where anxiety over the COVID pandemic is front and center, with its grievous toll of thousands dying alone, overburdened health systems, and the valiant sufferings of frontliners. This is a world of masks, hand-washing, daily case number updates, and - thankfully - inspiring acts of kindness between people. Some of the people around me in Metro Manila, though, live in another kind of world. I became acutely aware of this on the first day that we were locked down. Jose (not his real name), a homeless man whom we knew, rang the bell. I had never seen him so terrified. The local officials were asking him to get off the street or be arrested. But where could he go? The street was where he lived and collected recyclables for a living. He needed rent mone...

This reflection by Afra fcJ was inspired by the FCJ Constitutions, #276. I can only change myself….      What I cannot accept about others           reveals aspects of me that I haven’t fully accepted      What annoys me about others and my surroundings           speaks of disharmony inside me that calls out for balance      What triggers my disproportionate behaviours           points to brokenness within me that needs healing      What inspires me about others           awakens my deep desires      and what are my deep desires           but God’s desires in me, and for me? I can only change myself. The time for conversion is today,      is now. I don’t have to wait for tomorrow      because there is always something I can change about my...

I chatted with a friend a while ago who had recently moved abroad and was struggling to settle into her new surroundings. She talked about the disorientation she experienced - both in the physical environment, and a more interior confusion. She described in a rather amusing way her efforts to blend in with colleagues in her new workplace who came from different cultures and walks of life than she did (who loved eating fried chicken feet and talking about the birth weights of babies, both of which she was not familiar with!). She ended off saying with a sigh, "I'm not as good as I thought in communicating with different sorts of people." I was actually quite amazed by her account - by her efforts to 'insert' herself into an entirely different social, economic and cultural environment - and told her that. Actually, I don't know too many people who would have such openness and courage to go outside their comfort zones like that. On another level, her s...

This post was written on Saturday, 15 September 2018. A woman in Baggao, Philippines, where typhoon Mangkhut made landfall with winds of 205 km/h. ( Source ) As I write this, supertyphoon Mangkhut – what they say is the strongest typhoon of the year – is passing to the north of us. We have been expecting it for a while now – the weather these few days has been still, heavy and foreboding – and last night when we were asleep the rains and winds started. While we are not directly in the path of the storm, the power of the winds lashing the trees and houses is still awesome to behold. It also inspires fear. It strips away the illusion we usually have of control, and exposes our fundamental vulnerability before nature. My prayer this morning as I listened to the wind was a very uncomfortable one. I was uncomfortably aware that I was sitting safe and dry in a sturdy house with plenty of provisions to ride out the storm, but that countless other people in the same city were huddled ...