Glued!

(Mk 6:30-34)

Change is inevitable. Actually, as many philosophers would argue change is the only permanent thing in this world. But for someone to be able to adapt to change, the person needs to make a decision. Whatever choice there is available, one has to choose. People cannot have everything so they say but actually one can have everything by his/her choice. That’s the beauty in exercising our freedom to choose. It is liberating. It should be liberating.

But why many people unhappy and seemingly unfulfilled? Is it the product of a wrong decision or is it because of the fact a person cannot have everything and is limited with his/her choice? Again, one can get everything with one’s free and willing decision. I believe the greatest challenge lies not on how to possess every opportunity life presents but it is when the time the person stretches his/her limit to stick to his/her choice.

(from a 2011 calendar)

Jesus has a choice. He could have said no to everyone, “Sorry, we’re closed! Come back tomorrow.” But his choice was pushed to its edge by ‘and when He saw the crowd, he took pity on them, for they were like sheep without a shepherd.’ His choice was challenged by a more noble purpose. This is one among the many instances that invites Jesus’ followers to exercise the power to choose and fueled by that dignified cause, glued to make it happen no matter what.

This leaves us two truths about life, or in particular about making a choice:

1. Choice is the very foundation of our destiny.
2. Life is a series of choices. Nobility bridges the gap.

Finally, as St Agatha, virgin and martyr, and whose memorial we celebrate today aptly and beautifully uttered: "My courage and my thought be so firmly founded upon the firm stone of Jesus Christ, that for no pain it may not be changed; your words be but wind, your promises be but rain, and your menaces be as rivers that pass, and how well that all these things hurtle at the foundement of my courage, yet for that it shall not move."