Having the determination to get there!

All of us, at least once, had an occasion where we decided to start doing some exercises, weights at the gym or running or walking. The first week is tough: shortness of breath and muscle pains! But slowly with patience and perseverance, one manages to see some results. Those who go to the gym are admired for how much determination and perseverance invest in training their body. It requires great sacrifices to build a muscular body or lose weight as desired. With heavier and harder exercises, repeating the same movement they achieve better results. But if you want to take fitness seriously you can’t afford to eat ice cream every day. Sweets, alcohol, junk foods are all excluded from the diet. You need a lot of discipline but even breaks are important to regenerate the muscles.

But with determination, perseverance and sacrifices, day after day, month after month, today many aim for a strong and sculpted body, not just for summer days but for various reasons! Whether it is health, narcissism, or a healthy body, the gyms are open twenty-four hours, seven days a week!

Imagine if this sacrifice, this determination and this constancy would occur not only for the visible body but even for the inner life. We are not saying that whoever is beautiful from the outside is not from the inside as well, but that if there would be a balance between them, the world would be a much more beautiful place!

Caring for our body, mind and soul

We are formed by BODY, MIND and SOUL!  Three dimensions that we must take care of if we want to succeed! The inner life deserves as much time and attention as we give to our bodies! If we do that, the world would be much more of an earthly paradise filled with genuine people!

Maybe it’s harder to give meaning to life, to know yourself more, your emotions, to grow in relationships with those around you. These are all part of the spiritual and inner life. This is indispensable for a person to be happy in his life and it is essential that together with those we live with, we form a better society. So as we train to have a body like Michelangelo’s David, we must also train to have a soul like that of Jesus Christ.

Getting ready to train the soul

And just like in the body workout, even for the soul, you have to do the exercises with perseverance, sacrifices, determination, discipline. You even need to rest between workouts. There are dedicated exercises even for the soul, such as spiritual reading, silence, meditation, prayer, and sometimes even a personal trainer who can guide you in your training.

St. Paul, who is a great fitness coach for the soul, says: “Do you not know that in a race all the runners run, but only one gets the prize? Run in such a way as to get the prize. Everyone who competes in the games goes into strict training. They do it to get a crown that will not last, but we do it to get a crown that will last forever. Therefore, I do not run like someone running aimlessly; I do not fight like a boxer beating the air. No, I strike a blow to my body and make it my slave so that after I have preached to others, I myself will not be disqualified for the prize.” (1 Cor 9:24-27)

As a conclusion, we could say that it is good to take care of the body but woe to us if we forget the rest.  Let’s use the same constancy and attention we give to our body to be beautiful, even to be beautiful on the inside! We are created and called to do this both from the outside and from the inside. If you did not make any new year resolutions yet, don’t worry! You always have the chance to begin everyday.

Peace and Goodness from us

Fr Mario and Fr Joseph administer the Facebook page in Maltese: Najn – Vjaġġ għall-ħajja

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The post New Year Resolution 2021 appeared first on Universe of Faith.

Breaking new year’s resolutions is so common that some people refrain from committing to them in the first place. Dan Neuharth, in his book If You Had Controlling Parents gives an example of two people on a diet who both break it. The first dieter thinks “It’s hopeless, I will never loose weight. I have no will power.” The second dieter thinks, “I had one slip. It’s a setback, but my diet is still in effect. Things must be getting to me today.”

In these moments we have a choice to make; we can choose pessimism like the first dieter or or we can choose hope, the second dieter. This also reminds us when Jesus talked about wheat and weeds growing together, “If you pull up the weeds, then the good plants will come up with them. Let them both grow together until the harvest time” (Mt 13: 29-30). Here we are being encouraged to not be too quick to sort out the good and the bad, our weaknesses and our strengths; but trusting in God that we will eventually come to live peacefully with both the strengths and the weaknesses within us and within those around us.

Article written by Universe of Faith

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The post Breaking New Year’s Resolutions appeared first on Universe of Faith.

We all desire newness! We don’t want to be stuck in a rut nor do we want to be conditioned by the past, especially by our mistakes. We feel that our past is littered with them and our future is still pure. In this sense our future seems pristine, exciting, beckons to us. Our hope is that we can live differently; that our lives are not simply tragic; that we can be creative. It is this hope that lies behind every smile or laugh. It is this hope that makes every artistic or musical inspiration possible.

We cannot simply overcome the past

Indeed, art and music are amongst our most original creations every piece is unique and speaks of a refreshing newness. Smiles, laughs, artistic creations are all somehow the fruit of hope. Of course, we know that we cannot simply overcome the past its joys and sorrows remain present. And we also know that we cannot create anything absolutely new even in art it is always in some way true that there is nothing new under the sun. After all, all art is a transformation , marvellous and unique as it is , of matter.

The future is unknown

Perhaps, this is why, we all seem to be somewhat nostalgic we also appear to have a tendency to romanticise the past. The past seems to be ‘home’; the future is, of course, unknown. We become frightened and often succumb to the tendency to live in our memories. Or we can succumb to an opposing tendency: that of rebelling in our creativity. It may seem that we are destined either to a sweet melancholy or to a raging swirl of destructive creativity.

The newness in the birth of Christ

But perhaps that is not the case: maybe one, maybe the only, concrete experience of real newness is the birth of a child. Every child is new, unique in a way that is extraordinary. Every first smile is absolutely fresh. But even there, we quickly notice that , apart from the immense beauty of the new child , old human tendencies and faults are quickly discernible: from hard-headedness to self-centredness. It seems that there is a ‘historical’ memory of human faultiness which we cannot escape. It really seems that only God could save us!

Strengthening our hope in Christ

Well, as we celebrate the first days of the civil year, the Church celebrates Mary, the Mother of God. Her child is new in an altogether extraordinary way because he is the Son of God. And as Irenaeus the Church Father put it…
– this child brings all newness in bringing himself;
– this child brings forgiveness which is a new creation;
– he gives hope in hopeless situations,
– he brings new life forth from losses;
– he sprouts new fruit from dead branches.
We have radical hope: we are works of art not only in our own hands but in the hands of this child who treats us firmly yet tenderly.

Trusting in God that we may share the hope within us

This is why we do not need to be nostalgic we can trust that our home is not in the past but in the present and in the future: our home is not somewhere but in the person of this child who is ‘God with us’. This is why we do not need to be violently creative we can trust that this child is creative in a way that we can never be, and we can trust that he is faithful. This is why we need never be sweetly despondent: we have a future and it is pure and loving creativity. It is open to us to the extent that we trust him. It is this relationship on which all new hope is founded.

Read more from Fr Mark Sultana:

• Vacation or staycation? The role of rest and leisure in our life
• What are we living for? Why does humanity exist?
• Finding Time for God
• Carnivor, vegeterian, vegan, fast foods. Any insights from the faith regarding what to eat?
• The fact that Jesus did not sin, can we say that he was fully human?
• If Christ said “Do this in memory of me” why does the Church teach that there is the real presence of Jesus in the bread and the wine?
• Why does the Church keep maintaining that the inclination of homosexuality must be seen as an “objective disorder”?

The post New Year Christian Message on Newness and Hope appeared first on Universe of Faith.

NY Bible Verse 1 – There Is Hope For A Better Future:

“For surely I know the plans I have for you, says the Lord, plans for your welfare and not for harm, to give you a future with hope.”
Jeremiah 29:11

NY Bible Verse 2 – Becoming Close With Christ Makes Us New:

“So if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation: everything old has passed away; see, everything has become new!”
2 Corinthians 5:17

NY Bible Verse 3 – God Cleanses Our Heart:

 “…from all your idols I will cleanse you.  A new heart I will give you, and a new spirit I will put within you; and I will remove from your body the heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. I will put my spirit within you, and make you follow my statutes and be careful to observe my ordinances.”
Ezekiel 36:25-27

NY Bible Verse 4 – Forget The Past, Focus On Moving Forward:

“Brothers and sisters, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus.”
Philippians 3:13-14

NY Bible Verse 5 – Learn From Past Mistakes

“Our fathers disciplined us for a short time as seemed best to them, but he disciplines us for our good, in order that we may share his holiness. Now, discipline always seems painful rather than pleasant at the time, but later it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it.”
Hebrews 12:10-11

NY Bible Verse 6 – Wait On The Lord:

“Be still before the Lord and wait patiently for him;
do not fret when people succeed in their ways,
when they carry out their wicked schemes.” Psalm 37:7
“those who hope in the Lord will renew their strength.
They will soar on wings like eagles;
they will run and not grow weary,
they will walk and not be faint.” Isaiah 40:31

NY Bible Verse 6 – God’s Timing Is Perfect:

“He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the human heart; yet no one can fathom what God has done from beginning to end.”
Ecclesiastes 3:11

NY Bible Verse 8 – Each New Day Is Special:

“The unfailing love of the Lord never ends! By his mercies we have been kept from complete destruction. Great is his faithfulness, his mercies begin afresh each day. I say to myself, “The Lord is my inheritance; therefore, I will hope in him!”
Lamentations 3:22-24

Wishing all our readers a Happy New Year 2021!

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The post Great Bible Verses for New Year 2021 appeared first on Universe of Faith.