My scattered thoughts on the last days at St. John's

I've been here for 2 months and I have served 2 burial Masses, one Anglo, one Hispanic. Father asked me to move out quick or there would be another one, who knows it may be for a Vietnamese this time. On my last days here, however, I have to bury 5 baby fish. Poor little things. Probably I'm gonna name them after the guys who helped me clean the pool at the beginning of summer: Tony, Kenny, Michael, Thinh ... who else was there on that day, oh yeah, Ed (my pastor, Fr. Edward). There you go, RIP - Tony, Kenny, Micheal, Thinh and Ed.


I got to drive a school bus this summer, how cool is that. It's a small one though, but I got to turn open the Stop sign, and open the door to look when passing the railroad track. I don't know, I've always wanted to to that.

At White Water Park, in the afternoon, I actually told the kids, "You guys go on and play, I'm taking a nap." I actually took a nap next to some lady chaperons. *sigh* old age!



I've never eaten out this much. There is no cook in the Rectory, so I have to go out technically every meal, unless someone invites me to their homes. I understand now why priests usually have big belly. I think I'm good in that sense, because mine is ... noticeable :(

I've learned from doing fundraising in this parish that each ethnic community has a different approach to doing it: Bake Sale and cash donation work well w/ the Anglo and African-
American community, while raffle off religious articles and selling fruits work like magic for the Hispanic community. And for the Vietnamese ... I don't know. I only saw them at Mass, but they all disappeared before I finished blowing out the candles at the altar.

Speaking of which, I've wondered why the Vietnamese who go to this Church rarely talked to me over the time I was here while the other communities talked and joked around and hugged and kissed me like crazy. Probably because of the false announcement at the beginning of Summer: "Tri Nguyen, Seminarian of the Archdiocese of Atlanta, fluent in English, French and Spanish."

Though I'm on full-time assignment this summer, I think I've spent more time w/ my friends and the people from TNTT group at my parish, even more than before I joined the seminary.

I have once more proved to myself that online class doesn't work for me. I think I read more newspapers, watched more movies and youtube, and spent more time on facebook this summer. Every time I had to sit down to do online study for my Philosophy class, I found myself in those places after a short while. What else did I pick up this summer? Gardening and taking care of the fish. You know why, because the garden and the fish pond are far from my desk where I keep the Philosophy book.

I hope my mind is not this saturated by the time we get back to school at the end of August.

"The Apprentice" at St. John's

Remember that Donald Trump's show on NBC? Well, St. John the Evangelist, where I am assigned this summer, has its own version and I am the one and only participant this show. This is why I see it that way:

Goal:
- Organizing one or two youth events for the parish's youth. This has to happen before I leave, July 31.

Settings:
- Parish is made up of:
* 50% Hispanics, speak very little English, the largest number of youth (Mass in Spanish)
* Caucasians and African Americans
* Vietnamese, Filipinos, other Asian nationalities
* Nigerians
* Haitians (celebrated Mass in French or Creole)
- Many youth go to the PreK-8 parochial school; many parishioners work in that school.
- No youth minister, no youth group.
- Groups in existence at Church: Knights of Peter Claver (English, men, women, youth), Knights of Columbus (English, men), Spanish Mass choir.
- Most people travel out of town in summer, school faculty and staff are on vacation in summer.
- Few live in the close distance to the Church.

Challenges:
- I speak no Spanish nor French
- Fr. Hernan, the Spanish speaking priest is on vacation June 15 - July 15
- Fr. Ed, the pastor, also speaks Spanish, is on vacation July 16 - August 12
- No budget has been set for youth group
- Between the different ethnic groups, there has been no collaborative projects, all separated (though there is no animosity whatsoever among them; they get along just fine)

History of youth-related activities/efforts in the past:
- Summer 2008, a seminarian tried to organize a youth day/youth retreat. Very few showed up.
- There have been some fundraisers for youth events, people tend to support those, but the profits were not particularly high.
- Someone has tried to have the parish's youth come to use the Church and School facilities for sports, games, but there were no commitment from the adults to help supervising, nor the participation from the youth themselves.


I have less than 2 months, with no budget, to make a youth event happen.

The show is now on.

Life Journey within one week

Not having recovered from the DHNS youth convention in Tampa, I found myself on the highway to Charlotte, NC with a friend to visit the dying mother of a Salesian priest friend of mine.

Staying over night at her son’s house, we stayed up late talking with the family. We talked about the feisty mother who has been so strong to hold on to life with her very frail health; we talked about the loving father who has been so hurt seeing his loved one dying; we talked about the hardship that every single member of the family endures taking care of their wife/mother/mother-in-law/grandmother. Those are what we talked about; but what I saw was the tremendous love everyone was pouring out for one another. The daughter-in-law amazed me with her gentleness and utmost care when I caught her several time wiping the mother’s face and combing her hair. The loving husband made my heart sink when I caught him sitting quietly next to her for hours. He just looked at her and she looked at him. Not one word. Only enduring love. They have been together and the have been through so many ups and downs of their lives. The oldest daughter was patiently taking to her mom though she knew it was only a one-way communication: whatever the mom said, everyone understood, but she did not comprehend whatever was going on and being said. The grown son made a comment while spoonfeeding his mother, “Human life moves through cycle: you start out as a baby and you come back to the baby stage at the end of your life. My mom is acting like a baby now.” He stopped to hold the juice bottle for her to drink. “The problem is,” he continued, “with babies everyone wants to take care of, but with old people, they are easy to be forgotten and abandoned.” We all nodded, not knowing what to think of it. I didn’t know what he meant; I only saw the love and care that he was pouring out for his mom in these last days. He’s a business man, father of two, carrying some sickness himself. Over the 20 hours I stayed at their house, if he was not busy feeding her, he was fixing her bed, bathing her, cleaning the house in between business phone calls that he still had to make. The two school-age boys hugged their grandmother when they got home from school then went off to do homework, then play. I guess they couldn’t understand much what it really means to have a family member’s life slowly passed away in front of them. But that doesn’t matter much because what they are also witnessing is greater than any force in life. They are witnessing the love everyone is giving each other. This love their whole family is giving to their grandmother is not based on the beautiful appearances, because their dying grandmother is obviously not beautiful; not on physical strength because she is at her most frail stage of health; not on excitement, because there are only slow and silent moments in the house; not on productivity because their grandmother is doing nothing but being fed, and their whole family spends all their time taking care of her.

Yes, they are experiencing the counter-cultured love. They are experiencing the true Christian love through family love. The seed of love is being implanted in them when the see what their parents, their aunt and their grandfather are doing.

Young people renew my enthusiasm for life. Old people remind me of the beauty of life. But people treating each other with Christian assures me of the love of God.

Daydream in class these days

Living a life on my own strength
Thought I could do well, and could go at length
But without you in just a heart beat
I came to term with who I truly need

It's not about me
But grace given for free
It's not about strength
But your mercy that never ends
It's not about success
But faith lived out at my best
It's not about righteousness
For who to you is just

It's not about me, it's not
But all about you, my God.

Stations of the Cross

I posted on this page the different versions of the Stations of the Cross that we used at my parish. The Lent 2007 is an adaptation, bilingual with slideshow and music accompaniment. The Lent 2008 is a shortened version, putting together by Class Vào Đời II, with a skit for each station. The third one was used by the Salesian January Leadership Retreat in 2007.

ABOVE ALL - TÌNH CAO SÂU

by Michael W. Smith

Verse 1
Above all powers, Above all kings
Above all nature, And all created things
Above all wisdom, And all the ways of man
You were here before the world began

Verse 2
Above all kingdoms, Above all thrones
Above all wonders the world has ever known
Above all wealth and treasures of the earth
There's no way to measure what You're worth

CHORUS
Crucified, laid behind the stone
You lived to die, rejected and alone
Like a rose trampled on the ground
You took the fall, and thought of me
Above all.







TÌNH CAO SÂU

Vượt quyền quý cao sang, quyền thần thế gian
Vượt ngàn kiếp sinh linh, trên hết muôn dân trần hoàng.
Ngài từ xưa đó đã có trước khi trời đất
Ôi, quyền năng Thiên Chúa có ai sánh bằng.

Một lời Chúa ban ra, thì liền có ngay
Mặt trời, ánh sao đêm, muôn thú cá chim từng bầy.
Người từ bụi đất, Chúa thổi hơi ban sự sống
Ôi, tình yêu Thiên Chúa, ôi sao tuyệt vời

Trên thập giá, Ngài chịu chết đau thương
Chịu chôn huyệt đá, trời đen khóc thê lương
Sống kiếp người đắng cay hay khổ đau
Chúa không e ngại, vì yêu đoàn con
Tình cao sâu.

SANCTUARY

Lord, prepare me
To be sanctuary
Pure and holy
Tried and true.

With thanksgiving
I'll be a living
Sanctuary
For you.





My translation:

Ước mong một đời
Làm nhan thánh Chúa Trời
Được trong trắng mãi
Được yêu chẳng phai.

Đếm ơn mọi ngày
Tình yêu Chúa thắp đầy
Nguyện xin hát khúc
Cám ơn Ngài.