5&2 Youth Blog

The Best Finnish Course

10/10/2018

After three long-distance trips during the summer, I am finally 100% here (in my heart!). Now that the winter is coming, I am also back. This time I want to write about the best Finnish course.

The Lord has blessed me to live in Finland for almost three years. I have made lots of friends here and met interesting people in my daily life. Nevertheless, like any other foreigner in Finland, I am no exception and I also struggle to learn Finnish. (Oh, I thought it was enough to learn svenska - Swedish!)

Having already taken Finnish Level One, this year I started with the jatkokurssi - continuation course. But, strangely enough, I do not feel the course is as challenging: many of the words I knew already and I also didn't find it that difficult to conjugate cases. What happened?! It's as if I had taken some extra courses already!

The prayer to St. Michael, which I have learnt by heart in Finnish.

Until yesterday, I did not know where I had learned the words I knew. But guess what?! A huge percentage of my Finnish vocabulary I have acquired in the Church! We were learning positioning words and furniture, for example oikealla puolella (which I read every Sunday in Creed: at the right [hand of the Father]). There are many more words, such as koska, siksi, jos, leipä, taivas, koti that I realized I had learned by reading the day's Gospel in Spanish while I was listening to it in Finnish, or through repeating prayers or songs.

Truthful Grace

10/4/2018

“Lord Jesus, I trust in You.”

During this Pascal Octave, I have started praying the Novena of Divine Mercy. God’s Mercy is infinite, the only condition we need to discover it is that we trust in Him.

Thanks be to God, I participated the Easter Vigil this year with Stella Maris People. We arrived on Saturday afternoon and had sharing moments in group and in family.

By the time of the Vesper, we had decided to do the readings in different languages and shared them among ourselves. This meant that the readings and psalms were in Greek, Hebrew, Italian, Spanish, Chinese, Finnish, Swedish, English and Tagalog. It gave us an amazing feeling of being the Universal Church and experiencing a new Pentecost!

After the Vigil, we shared some experiences, songs and pastries.

Christus Resurrexit! Christ is risen!

My ABC for Advent

20/12/2017

It's the third Sunday of Advent already, so in this post I will try to summarise my Advent reflections in the order of the alphabet.

A: Annunciation. Our Lady's period of Advent is actually longer than ours, since she knew that Jesus was coming since the Annunciation.
B: But. "Everything before the 'but' does not count." It happens to me all the time. (ノ_＜) I want to pray more, but I don't have time." "I want to participate in the morning Mass, but it's too early." Maybe it could be a New Year's Resolution, to stop all the buts?
C: Child. Many times we should be like children, waiting for the Child Jesus with our hearts full of purity.

Norcdic Youth Meeting in Vadstena - Alejandro's Experience

30/10/2017

I do not know how many of you heard about the Nordic Youth Meeting that took place in the city of Vadstena in Sweden (the town where our dear St Bridget founded her order's first convent) in September. This meeting was related with the World Youth Day, and it aimed to gather the youth from Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Finland and Iceland.

Sadly, I was the only one from Finland there, but it was evident that the presence of Finland was extremely desired in that meeting, since everyone there (seminarians, priest, laics, and even the Cardinal himself) were not only asking “What happens with the group from Finland?” but also said strongly that they really hope next time we will take part. (This means we need to shape up with our communication!)

Sceengrab from YouTube video of Cardinal Arborelius talk, which is available below.

Salt and Light of the World

28/7/2017

You are the salt of the earth. But if salt loses its taste, with what can it be seasoned? It is no longer good for anything but to be thrown out and trampled underfoot.

You are the light of the world. A city set on a mountain cannot be hidden.

Nor do they light a lamp and then put it under a bushel basket; it is set on a lampstand, where it gives light to all in the house.

Mt 5:14

Is there any way to hide a mountain under a cloth or an elephant into a fridge? Of course, there are cases, if the cloth or the fridge is big enough or the mountain or the elephant is small enough. But these situations would not have happened without conditions.

In my observation, in our modern days, we are trying to hide a mountain every day. Which mountain am I talking about? The Love of God.

The Language of the Holy Spirit

6/6/2017

Happy Pentecost!

I took part in the vigil at Stella Maris on Saturday, on the Eve of Pentecost Sunday, and the first reading drew my attention:

Then the LORD said: If now, while they are one people and all have the same language, they have started to do this, nothing they presume to do will be out of their reach. [GN 11:6]

It has been said that human communication is not very efficient, that listeners only get few per cent of the original message transmitted by the talker. But languages are also tools to proclaim and unite people.

The Daily Cross

11/3/2017

I have decided to follow Jesus
…
No turning back, no turning back
...
The cross before me, the world behind me
…

I am quoting from the lyrics of a song that we usually sing in Stella Maris during the youth weekends. I was inspired by today’s Gospel (Matt. 5:43-48): “Love your enemies, and pray for those who persecute you”.

Pope Francis invited us to pray for persecuted Christians recently, but I should really say that I also feel persecuted in my daily life in Finland (or Spain/Europe/everywhere!). We are not persecuted physically, but always, psychologically and spiritually. Did you understand what I mean?

I am so disheartened that there are women who are pondering abortion as a right and an opportunity; I am so disappointed that people are creating genders; I am so frustrated I defend the Truth, but people avoid accepting it.

Desert Life - Tea's Experience

16/1/2017

A desert? Not the first association that comes to mind when you hear the word Finland? However, for me my recent return to my home country felt like a move into one - the Biblical desert; a place where we are alone, stripped of the comforts and tempted by evils. Bit no need to get anxious, a happy ending follows! as always with the God of Israel who is love through and through and eagerly waits to give us that glass of life giving dehydration!

I returned to Finland after living 6 years abroad. During these years I met Jesus, gradually we became acquaintances and finally at Easter 2016 I joined the Church – His beautiful Body, perfected by the imperfection. During years 2015 and 2016 I spent several months at the Madonna House, a Catholic apostolate welcoming everyone to join their daily life for shorter or longer visits.

Easter Sunday dawning. We hiked up a hill to sing laudes, and to have some hot chocolate, paskha and kulich for the glory of the Resurrection!

My stay was a wonderful, life-changing experience. Worship of the living God naturally wells from the daily routine of prayer, work, leisure and shared meals lived out in obedience, poverty and chastity. Well, that is a whole another story. Now I concentrate on the shock that return to “the world” brought about in my life.

Young and Catholic in Finland - Alejandro's Experience

26/12/2016

Before coming to Finland I just knew that Catholics were a minority. To my surprise, this minority of Catholics in Finland was composed of many cultures and backgrounds, which was a beautiful reflection of the universality of the Catholic Church. During the summer of 2016 a youth festival took place in a Catholic center called Stella Maris. The idea of the festival came from a religious community guided by Father Gianni Sgreva CP, as the result of their continuous prayer for the youth of Finland.

The event was extremely especial, and it involved a significant amount of young people from different backgrounds and cultures. Youngsters from different parts of Finland were together in an environment that helped them to share their faith with new friends of similar age, talk about their experiences as Catholics in Finland, clear some of their doubts about the Church, and the most important reestablish their relationship with God or strengthen it. I am extremely thankful to God and all the people involved in this festival, since I never saw a Catholic event in Finland that would gather young people from all over the country. Moreover, this event was specially designed for youngsters, making the spiritual life easy for them.

Memories of 2016

17/12/2016

We have only 14 days more of 2016, and I usually get quite emotional during this season every year. There is no way to explain it with my words properly all my feelings, but I would like to share this with you all some memories from 2016, and Finland.

I moved Finland, at the beginning of the year just a few months after I became a Catholic officially. It was a big shock of changes for me, as I used to have a Catholic environment but not here.

However, I’m still grateful that Lord sent me here (yes He sent me here and I didn’t plan it, see the picture above about my reaction). I learnt and I shared a lot, the most important thing is that: Finland brought me closer to God.

Parish Life

What it feels like when God says: "I have a plan for you." Photo: @thebestchristianmemes

I want to share first my parish life in Turku: I feel home here!