Podcast: Life

            St. Elizabeth was the Queen of Portugal; a tertiary of the Franciscan Order and is venerated as a saint of the Roman Catholic Church. I chose her as my role because she went through a lot in life and she did not lose her faith in God. But instead, her faith grew deeper and stronger. She was very humble to everyone around her. She was there for the poor and the needy. Her deep faith in God really inspired me, because out of all the things that she went through, she never lost faith in God. She inspires me to become a better person, to help the poor and the needy, and to love everyone around me. For me, peace is the answer to everything. Peace is the answer to our problems. I hope that someday I will become like Saint Elizabeth of Portugal and do my best to succeed. 

Faith Roots Our Relationship with God

Faith is the basic orientation and commitment of our whole being—a matter of heart and soul. It’s both a gift we receive within the Christian community and a choice we make. It’s trusting in God and relying on Him as the source and destiny of our lives. Faith is believing in God, giving Him our devoted loyalty and devotion. Faith is following Jesus, answering the call to be his disciples in the world.

God loves us and wants us to have a personal relationship with him. He loved us, even if we haven’t loved Him. Our relationship with Him has been broken by sin. We have all made choices showing we are inclined to be passively indifferent to God or actively opposed to Him but God had provided a solution for our lost relationship. “For God so loved the world He gave us His only begotten Son”. Jesus Christ came to do what we can’t do for ourselves. He came into this world to bring us to his Father. He died for us to pay the penalty of our sins and He rose from the dead to show that His claims were true.

Having a personal relationship with God means we should include God in our daily lives. We should pray to Him, read His word, and meditate on verses in an effort to get to know Him better. Jesus is the one who loves us enough to give His life for us, and He is the one who bridged the gap between us and God.

Giving people what they deserve

We all deserve to have justice but not all of us gets the justice that we need. We need justice to attain peace. It makes us feel that we are treated equally, that we are human beings and that we get what we deserve. Here in the Philippines, the justice that we receive depends on the money that we have. But it should not depend on the status of the person, it shouldn't matter if you are rich or poor. We should do what is just and follow the laws. But without love this would all mean nothing. We should all remember that we need justice to attain peace and without love, justice is empty.

Carpe Diem

           Have you ever heard of the saying "carpe diem; seize the day"? Well, now you do. I live my life through that quote. Why? We all have one life and we should cherish it and enjoy it while we're still living it. God created us out of love to be one, who would make the choice of our own free will to respond to the unspeakable love of our Father in Heaven has for us. It is the expression of his love—he wanted to share life and happiness with humans.

          This lesson has taught me that we should appreciate life, that we should do things out of love and to cherish every single living moment. God gave us this life to experience human things. To experience to be loved, to experience happiness, sadness and all of those things. This lesson taught me that we should be thankful for what we have and share my blessings. We should always have a helping hand, help those in need. We should be a God-centred person and to live life and to live life to the full. 

         

St. Elizabeth of Portugal

I chose St. Elizabeth of Portugal as the perfect role model for me to live out my faith because she was a wonderful model of kindness toward the poor and a successful peacemaker between members of her own family and between nations. She showed us how deep her faith is, and proved us that it is not impossible to love God and have faith with Him like the faith she had. She also teaches us that peace is important and it is what we all need. Although she was married at a young age and her husband caused her great suffering, she still proved him how much she loves him and took care of him until he died. She is my role model and I hope to be like her someday.

St Elizabeth, the peacemaker.

I chose Saint Elizabeth of Portugal as a perfect role model for me because while I was reading her stories in the internet, there was only one thing in my mind; I can see my parents in Saint Elizabeth’s story. Why? Because my parents are the people who have made my faith stronger and made me realize that there are a lot of better experiences when you are faithful to God. St. Elizabeth was devoted and she attended mass every day, and by that I can try to be like her so I could also have a strong faith to God. Saint Elizabeth was also a strong woman, selfless and she was not selfish. She was kind, caring, and loving. Since the fruits of the spirit were present in her life that means she used her gifts, as well as stayed close to God through prayer. The gifts of the spirit are: wisdom, understanding, knowledge, counsel, fortitude, piety, fear of the lord. Saint Elizabeth of Portugal was loving, kind, gentle, faithful, generous, and she had self-control. These are the attitudes that I want to achieve someday, especially on having self-control. I want to not be easily tempted to do stuff and by the help of St. Elizabeth, I will just pray for her to help attain this. I can relate to Saint Elizabeth’s struggles, because sometimes it’s hard to be a peacemaker and bring peace to a world of conflict. I would like to be like Saint Elizabeth because she was a princess and a peacemaker; however, I would not have liked to suffer through years of adultery and abuse like she did. I can relate to her struggles, because sometimes it’s hard to be a peacemaker. Saint Elizabeth is a good example to everyone on how to be a peacemaker and also how to be a good mother, wife and friend. We should all follow in Saint Elizabeth of Portugal the Peacemaker’s footsteps and make peace among us. You just need to start small then spread peace around the world. Saint Elizabeth had made peace between her family, friends, and many others.

St. Martin de Porres: The Ultimate Salvation of Mankind

           When I read the story of St. Martin de Porres, I thought that he would be the best role model for the youth today in light of the fact that he did not let the criticisms of other people stop him from doing righteous deeds to the people around him. Despite his tough childhood, he didn’t think it was a hindrance to do his task as a child of God, and that is to serve Him. At such a young age, he devoted himself to the Lord.

This made me think that he’s the perfect example for our youth today for the reason that he didn’t give up in times of darkness. He searched for the light with His guidance, and indeed, he found it when God endowed him with miraculous knowledge, instantaneous cures, and a remarkable rapport with animals. And despite this, he still lived an austere lifestyle. St. Martin’s love was all-embracing, shown equally to human beings and animals as well.

I want to be like him when I grow up so I could be a role model to my youth as well. I could start the change with myself and persuade other people to do the same. I want to share God’s blessings to other people who are in need of enlightenment and courage by showing love and sympathy to mankind. Someday, I want to improve the world like he did and put an end to scarcity and other crises we’re currently facing today. 

"Compassion, my dear Brothers, is preferable to cleanliness. Reflect that with a little soap I can easily clean my bed covers, but even with a torrent of tears I would never wash from my soul the stain that my harshness toward the unfortunate would create." - St. Martin de Porres

 St. Martin de Porres #Rivera #37

  St. Martin de Porres was the saint of charity and broom. He was a saint who provided knowledge for the poor. Who taught them the lesson they should know. And the one who could communicate with the animals because he was good with animals.

     Saint Martin is my model because, i want to be like him when i grow up. I would like to put up a charity of my own and i want to help out the poor and put up charities and orphanages, be the one to take care of them and give their needs because, nobody will take care of them if they'll just be in streets. I wanna help because, i am blessed with what i have and it wouldn't be bad id i could share them.

St. Elizabeth of Portugal: A Faithful Queen and Saint, A Peacemaker

It was Saint Elizabeth of Portugal who had especially caught my eye and heart among the 3 saints although they are all amazing saints but she's the perfect role model for me. Like Saint Elizabeth, I've been through a lot but still remained strong because of our faith in God. Truly deserving of sainthood, Saint Elizabeth rose above the embarrassment and pain she surely felt.

Known for her charity and piety, Saint Elizabeth strove to live out her faith by attending daily Mass, praying the Divine Office, and caring for her family while also reaching out to the poor in her community. I want to be like her, she was responsible from the beggining until her last breath and she never doubted her faith in God. She truly is an amazing role model to all women like me.

SHARING YOUR TALENTS WITH EVERYONE (poster)

Faith Without Works is Dead

Understanding the relationship between faith and works is important because it helps us avoid temptation. For centuries Churches became the heart of the community, the place where families gathered. In many ways this is what schools have become. Parents have the responsibility to guide their children according to the values they hold so the place of faith in schools needs to be something that is discussed. With the help of our teachers, they teach us good morals and how to live them out and I hope that faith remains in the picture, as this adds to the richness of community.

The basic value is freedom of religion, not freedom from religion. Faith is a mystery. I don’t have the answers to many of the great problems people face, I’m definitely not perfect, but I have the confidence that my life has hope and purpose, that there is a God in heaven who loves me and I couldn’t live my life any other way.

Faith is a personal relationship with GOD

Reflection about the Founders and Foundresses of SSpS

The Founders and Foundresses of SSpS did a great job by doing their mission.

St. Arnold Janssen, Blessed Maria Helena Stollenwork and Blessed Josepha Stenmanns were in the mission together and was able to make a difference. They accepted the tasks God has given to them and they were able to develop a congregation that filled their intense passion for the mission apostolate.

They trusted God in leading them to a life that He knows they can handle and they accepted all the challenges that came in their life. These three were ordinary people that lived their life spreading their faith.

Because of these three it made me believe that everything is truly possible if you have faith. They may have faced difficulties in doing what they wanted to do but they never stopped. They did their best for God.

These three extraordinary figures were all in the mission together and their hard work was not all in vain because now we're celebrating 125 years of the SSpS. We should always remember them because they were the brave ones who said "Yes" to God and was not afraid to live their life by serving God.

My Role Model: St. Elizabeth of Portugal.

Saint Elizabeth of Portugal is my role model because she dedicated her life to the poor and was the peacemaker of her family and between nations.

She is royalty but that never stopped her from caring to all the people. When I first read about her I was shocked to know that she was a Princess that became a Queen later on when she married the King of Portugal. Usually when you think of someone with that status they would be someone who looked down upon people who were poor and would have no patience but St. Elizabeth wasn't like that at all.

She devoted her life to the poor, she spent her youth in devotion to God. She once said that God made her Queen so that she may serve others. She is my role model because she is a peacemaker that had the ability to influence people. I look up to her because she had deep faith and devotion to God.

The things she did may be considered as hard to do these days but I will do my best to be like my role model that loved and served the poor. This 2015 is a new year for all of us and one of my New Year resolutions this year would be to have peace in my life and work hard to have more faith and have a deeper connection with God.

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Justice we need and deserve

Having no justice is one of our problems. Nowadays there are so many cases of abuse,discrimination and more. That's why we should have justice in each and every country. Justice shouldn't be classified as poor vs rich people. Most successful people use their power when it comes to financial and connections because they know that the victims are empty-handed. Justice without love is empty because it is love that makes difference in every situation. We should have unity for us to succeed in what people have been longing for.

Woman of Faith and Action

St. Elizabeth of Portugal is known as a Patron of Peace. She was humble even if she was the Queen of Portugal. You can tell her spiritual life is healthy because the fruits of the Holy Spirit were evident in her life. She stands as my role model because she has a deep Faith in God. Even if she experienced a lot of struggles in her life her Faith in God did not fade, in fact it became deeper and stronger. She taught me how to have more confidence and faith in myself that I could pass through all the obstacles that I will be facing. I'm looking forward to be known like St. Elizabeth when I grow older.