Another Christmas

On Thursday we, specially celebrated the birth of our Christ. The parties or gatherings were held with much fun, joy and merriment. The reunions and visitations among families created so much photo opportunities and were shared to the whole world in a matter of minutes. All these and many more activities of giving gifts, sharing, as well as, exchanging gifts and season's greetings are part of our Christmas.

The other important part of our celebrating Christmas is the time we are alone with our thoughts. This is the concern of our leaders in the church, nation and family. This personal aspect of being able to continuously transform oneself toward becoming a better member of the church, citizen and part of the family with faith translated into behavior.

I find the message given by Pope Francis to the Curia a good guide in learning more about Christmas by finding time for introspection on the following: How the “terrorism of gossip” can “kill the reputation of our colleagues and brothers in cold blood.”; how some suffer from “spiritual Alzheimer's,” forgetting what drew them to the priesthood in the first place; the “ailment of feeling immortal, immune or even indispensable”; and interestingly, some critiques could have been seen as worthy of praise: Working too hard and planning too much ahead. But even those traits came in for criticism as the Pope noted that people who don't take time off to be with family are overly stressed, and those who plan everything to a “T” don't allow themselves to be surprised by the “freshness, fantasy and novelty” of the Holy Spirit. At the end of the speech, Francis asked the prelates to pray that the “wounds of the sins that each one of us carries are healed” and that the Church and Curia itself are made healthy.

Let us end with a smile to encourage everyone to always try to find the positive side of life with the following anecdote. Once upon a time, a perfect man and a perfect woman met. After a perfect courtship, they had a perfect wedding. Their life was, of course "perfect."  One stormy Christmas Eve, this perfect couple was driving their perfect car (a SUV) along a winding road, when they noticed someone at the side of the road in distress. Being the perfect couple they stopped to help. There stood Santa Claus with a huge bundle of toys. Not wanting to disappoint any children on the eve of Christmas, the perfect couple loaded Santa and his toys into their vehicle. Soon they were driving along delivering the toys. Unfortunately, the driving conditions deteriorated and the perfect couple and Santa Claus had an accident. Only one of them survived the accident. 

 Who was the survivor? The perfect woman survived. She's the only one who really existed in the first place. Everyone knows there is no Santa Claus and there is no such thing as a perfect man. So, if there is no perfect man and no Santa Claus, the perfect woman must have been driving. This explains why there was an accident.*