CSS Arts Corner!

Wednesday, October 28, 2009

@ 20:31

Dearest friends,

As we all may already know, building a relationship with Christ is first and foremost, the vision of CSS Arts. As such, as a community initiative, in view of the importance of personal prayer as being the heart of faith formation, we hope to engage everyone to join us in praying for the community as one community in our own personal time.

If any of you have a personal intention to offer up and would like the community to lift it up together, just drop us an email at artscircleofprayer@gmail.com. Your intentions can also remain anonymous if you choose so(in the spirit of sacred trust, we will definitely keep it discreet).

We will send out an email in the beginning of the week (Monday night) to let you guys know the intentions for the week.

Do send us your intentions by Sunday night for it to be offered up the following week :)

God bless and with love,
Arts Comm.

0 spoke words of Love ♥

Wednesday, September 16, 2009

A time to relax with Him. @ 00:00

Hey everyone!

As we are a few days away from the brief gasp of fresh air that is RECESS WEEK (hello, finally?), Arts is inviting you to spend a day with Christ and the wonderful community that is CSS during this holiday :) We'll be having a day of recollection followed thereafter with a Mid Autumn gathering combined with Law FCG. Details are as follows:

21st September 2009, Monday

Day of Recollection
2pm, Church of Our Lady Queen of Peace

Mid Autumn Gathering with Law FCG
6pm, James Teo's house, 22 Sennett Terrace

Everyone's invited, so do come down and get to know each other better, growing in His love as one community (:

Feel free to contact me at 97832297 (Stef) or email the comm at artscomm0910@googlegroups.com for any queries! Hope to see you 'round! God bless.

with love,
Stef.

0 spoke words of Love ♥

Monday, September 7, 2009

Come down for daily prayers! @ 10:01

*blows the cobwebs off this thing*

Good morning everyone!
Daily Weekday prayers are ongoing @ The Arts Corner at The Deck - 930am & 4pm !

The recommended format for daily prayers we've raised to the prayer leaders is to reflect on the day's readings. However, it still depends on how these prayer leaders for the stipulated time-slot wish to go about doing it :)

If there are any prayer preferences any of you have, feel free to voice it out to any of the arts-commers. For e.g, I just received an email from one of you who has expressed your desire to recite the Daily Office, we'll try to implement it in a couple or so of the prayer sessions. The prayer sessions shouldn't take more than 10 minutes (prayer leaders, please take note of time constraints).

Have a good week ahead guys! Everyone's probably swarmed with assignments and what not, try not to stress yourself out too much. Remember that God provides! :)

Much Love,
Publicity on behalf of Arts Comm 09/10

0 spoke words of Love ♥

Saturday, January 31, 2009

I am a Catholic Awareness Week baby. @ 01:41

Catholic Awareness Week in NUS is just next week and i’m gonna try my best to lend my full support for the event, simply because i am a CAW baby.

Although many Catholic students on campus join the Catholic Students’ Society (CSS) through its Freshmen’s Orientation Camp (FOC) or through its booth at the matriculation fair or through friends even, i was one stubborn mule who took a full two years before allowing myself to be embraced by this wonderful community.

For the first two years of my university life, i meet CSS on an annual basis - through CAW. Whenever CAW drew near, i felt being awakened to that very special identity which was so intimately bestowed upon me through baptism - a child of God, a young Catholic boy (having been baptised only less then). I felt drawn to this community but also (unfortunately) intimidated by these people because of their maturity in the faith. But of course, they were nice and approachable people, only that my low self-esteem then didn’t allow me to feel ok around fellow Catholics very deep in their faith.

I remember CAW 2006 was an exceptionally huge one where the Central Library booth had various artefacts - different portrayals of Mother Mary in different cultures and much more. Besides being awestruck by the whole display (if i’m not wrong i came back again) the befrienders also played a big role in shaping my experience with the booth. The first person i probably met was Albert. He sincerely told me that he ain’t the expert and was pretty much eager to refer me to an ‘expert’ in the faith but it didn’t really matter. His sincerity and his company while i walked through each artefact, exclaiming at each one of them, was enough to help me to identify that experience as a glowing example of ‘Catholic hospitality’. I remember meeting Justin Yip too, although i’m quite sure he doesn’t remember since we never talked about it! hahaha.. i had no soul patch then as well.

CAW 2007 was the booth outside the central library i guess? I remember going to the booth with that same feeling… like i’m making one of those trips home to a relative i haven’t met for a long long time… like meeting semi-strangers, a distant relative and yet feeling that homey warmth in my heart. I met Felicia Yong and it was so easy to open up and share about my excitement about coming to the booth.

It was the befrienders that made the booth alive and filled with God’s love and that human touch was what kept me coming back and telling myself i must join CSS soon. I think i would have been quite disappointed if i didn’t have a befriender walk with me through the booth. it sounds like a very simple thing but after all i was a young needy Catholic boy and i needed a brother or a sister to walk with me and be my hero.

2nd semester into CSS and the only regret was that i didn’t take that step sooner because i found in CSS many treasures & gifts. In CSS, i found a community that strives to love God even in the littlest of ways and to love each other in the most intimate of ways. In CSS i encountered God through the people who have loved me as a brother even though they never knew me.

In CSS i found a home in NUS, a place of rest, a place where even the littlest Catholic boy like me have a seat with God and His CSS family.

i met my heroes and they’re still walking with me

walk with me, be my hero… someone out there is calling out to us & i wanna make sure i’ll be there.

http://www.nuscss.org/bemyhero/

Ignatius 'Pinoy' Fu

2 spoke words of Love ♥

Thursday, January 29, 2009

My testimony @ 19:21

Hey guys, this is my first time writing in and I really hope it ain't the last. I just want to share with you guys my experience this past weeks. I finally discerned my major and it was thanks to HIS amazing grace. For the longest period of time, I was caught in a dilemma for my choice of major. There were 2 contenders: econs or social work. I know both majors are like 2 ends of the spectrum but it really felt like its what I really wanted to do. At the beginning of sem, one of the first people I met at the corner was Jessica. She was sharing with me that she forgot to declare her major, which was social work by the way, and that meant that she could not do her core modules this sem. I was half joking with her then that if I did become a social work major, I would do with her the core modules next sem. That Sunday as I went for mass, somehow I was touched by the hymn Here I am, Lord. I was tearing and I didn't know why. I was telling this to Gabriel and he told me that it must have happened for a reason but just that it was probably not made known to me yet. The following Sunday, I attended Mass alone. I kinda did my own mass preparation by praying not to be late and thank God I reached on time just as the procession was entering the back of the church. To my surprise, the celebrant was one of my favourite priest, who is Father Vas by the way, as I always felt he gave deep sermons. Anyways, as Mass started, I felt at peace and it was like I was in a zone or something. Ask me now what the hymns were or what texts were read during Mass and I really can't tell you. And it really seemed to me that He was calling me to do social work. I was really troubled by this actually but as I went for my monthly scripture prep for lectors later that morning, the advice that was given to me by my president was that if I finally made a decision and I felt at peace after that, then it would have been the right decision. It struck me that then that I had heard this some place else. As I pondered it after that, I finally realized that Victor had told me the same advice some time back. It really feels as if the whole event has came to a full circle and I really want to thank Him for this whole experience. It is a first for me and I feel truly humbled by the whole thing. And there you have it, a new social work major is born. I pray now that we will not be a dying breed in the CSS community in the years to come. Amen!

Gregory "giraffe" Li

4 spoke words of Love ♥

Friday, January 16, 2009

My Testimony @ 23:35

Hi everyone!

How has the first week of school been for you? I just want to share a quick testimony(:

Today, I walked into LT28 for mass with a heavy heart. I was feeling extremely frustrated with school, with people, with the weather, well, basically everything. I am aware that my frustration stamps from my indecisiveness. I took a very long time to decide on modules and now I cannot ballot for tutorials properly. Coupled with other factors, I was in a terrible mood as I prepare for mass.

However during the praise and worship before mass, I was suddenly struck with this thought, "why are you fighting yourself my child? Don't you know better to lift all your worries up to me and I'll take care of them?" And at once, I felt a great peace in me. I haven't felt so calm in the whole week.

I am not sure if this is God speaking to me because He has not spoken so directly to me before. Whatever it is, I am thankful for God's continued guidance and for being in my life. He will always be there for me even when I get so lost in my thoughts and fears and neglect Him.

So my brothers and sisters in Christ, even though the semester has just began and we are all still pretty free, I pray that we will continue to turn to God and I am sure that he will be there for us all the time(:

Joyce Yip

PS: I've settled my modules for this sem already! THANK YOU LORD!(:

1 spoke words of Love ♥

Friday, December 19, 2008

'tis the season @ 05:01

the 2nd week of advent: peace. and how ironic it was, the way i had to live out this week.

the week started with a flurry of activity, a restless continuity from the last. there was a weekend of cg planning, of Lourdes, of RCIA, of something i don’t remember, come monday a big celebration - our last and longest CG, a celebration of a whole semester.

peace was a far cry. there was too much going on.

not until it struck - crisis style.

it was a perfect reminder never to get complacent. days of plans fulfilled and activities successfully held, it could never get rosier than this. but everything came to a standstill as i succumb to a raging 39 degree fever burning through my temples right to my throat. i was utterly confused because as warm as i was, i felt a blistering cold against my skin and my nose was perpetually wet when my throat felt as parched and inflamed, like a desert, i would imagine. what more..my hands & feet were cold as ice, dead, as if all life were draining away through them. with the aid of medication, i slept for days. maybe i was shutting down.. i was gettin the rest i needed all semester. i was resting now ‘in peace’.

every waking moment was a difficulty. in a very twisted way, it was fortunate that i slept like 23 hours a day. for every waking moment, i had to come to terms with how my illness had ‘transformed’ me.

whenever i woke up, i could feel the heat from my fever burning through my eyes, so much so that daylight took on a different shade, a strange yellow hue. whenever i was awake, i tried to pray but could only manage a cry to the Lord before i slip back into unconsciousness again. whenever i woke up, i felt the burning gash in my throat and my whole nasal tract swollen. i thought twice and hard about swallowing a next mouthful of saliva. sometimes i sat there staring into space, paralysed by this pain and by the fear of swallowing the already accumulating saliva in my mouth. eating was worse. whenever i could manage a few spoonfuls of a ‘blended diet’ which i couldn’t taste, i found myself exhausted and unable to continue. for swallowing was not only painful but swallowing meant ceasing a moment of breathing, which made it even more tiring and more difficult in coping with the pain.

i was reduced to nothing - bedridden and useless.

it took time. but fortunately after five days, i was able to garner more waking hours, which gave me precious time to ponder and pray. i spent most of these hours just sitting down, groaning sometimes (in pain), but most importantly pondering.

five days gone and i was still recovering. and i wondered how the chronically sick and terminally ill lived like this. this i wondered, with the Lourdes experience still fresh in my mind (during which i witnessed first hand, the fragility of our human body). five days and i was already starting to show signs of despair. yet these people’s experiences would have been a million times worse than mine and they would have had to cope with their ailments for weeks or months! i only had a mere fever, flu and an inflamed throat.

imagine a patient robbed of his basic bodily functions, his ability to care for himself, his reliance on somebody else to give him the most basic care that you and i are capable of doing - bathing ourselves, going to the bathroom, eating & drinking etc. some may be prone to despair. they would feel not just robbed of these basic capabilities but also robbed of their dignity as a human being. they would feel less of a human. how hard it is to see hope. how hard it is to see God in times like these.

this i pondered hard.. during the week of peace, about hope and about the anticipation of Christmas - the birth of our Lord, His 1st coming and the 2nd to come. how would a sick person feel in this time of Advent? what is there to anticipate when he lives by the day and when looking forward can be a painful and scary thing to do because there could be no tomorrow?

as the week of peace drew to a close and the week of joy came… i was gradually being relieved of my symptoms and of my pain. how much i can now savour joy… as i do so, my heart continues to dwell on the many sick people laying helplessly in their beds and the many poor and homeless who have had to worry everyday about their livelihood.

how significant the season of Advent and Christmas will be for these people… that during the season of Advent, as we fix our eyes on the coming of the Lord, we recognise that…

this coming of the Lord were, more than a future event, a spiritual place in which we ALREADY WALK in the present, during the wait, and in which we are perfectly vigilant in every personal dimension. In effect, this is exactly what we live in the liturgy: celebrating the liturgical seasons, we actualize the mystery — in this case, the coming of the Lord — in such a way as to be able, so to speak, to “walk in it” towards its full realization, at the end of time, but already drawing sanctifying virtue from it from the moment that the last times have already begun with the death and resurrection of Christ. The word that sums up this particular state in which we await something that is supposed to manifest itself but which we also already have a glimpse and foretaste of, is “hope”.- from the Papal Advent Homily Nov. 30 2008

this has far reaching implications for the suffering for this hope becomes so vital to them. this hope IS a reality in their lives that if recognised can empower them to rise above any proneness to despair. for if we already ‘walk in it’ and already have access to the ’sanctifying virtue’, then the coming of the Lord and His saving us is already NOW.

As we fix our eyes on the 1st and 2nd coming of the Lord this season, we begin to see how our very lives are woven into the history of salvation and how in this seamless timeline of history, we already have access to a saving grace that helps us to live fulfilled Christian lives in the midst of human fraility and human circumstances.

imagine what this would mean for the sick. despite all the pain and suffering, i have always been loved by a God who grants me His sanctifying graces that not only helps me cope with my human circumstances but also helps me recognise my dignity as a daughter or son of God in my relationship with Abba Our Father.

imagine what this would mean for the terminally ill. His graces not only help me cope with all the challenges and difficulties i have had to face in my life and all its circumstances but it helps me to cope with the end of my human life - my death. Christmas then takes on an even greater significance. For the celebration of Jesus’ birth and 1st coming helps the dying to see the ‘hope’ explicated above - that Lord Jesus came and that He filled the human essence with God’s love, so much so that it conquers death. So much so that we NOW can ‘walk in it’, in this journey of love as a reality of our lives. how significant can this be, for a patient with possibly no tomorrow.

in this light, i believe we can better appreciate our Holy Father Pope Benedict’s call at the beginning of Advent - that the whole church ’become a sign and an instrument of hope for all men’. if we were to celebrate Christmas by feasting away and partying as hard as we can while a sick person lays alone in his bed in despair or while a kid sits outside in the street cold and hungry, then we must be very mistaken or ignorant about the whole meaning of Advent and Christmas.

Ignatius Fu

0 spoke words of Love ♥