Category Archives: Belief

Why We Pray

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By Cynthia Aralu

Hi everyone! Pray the Rosary.

As a little girl, I did not like praying. My mom noticed this and would say so to me. I felt evil for not liking to pray and for other reasons I could not reconcile in my mind; not because of anything she said to me. My mom may have her imperfections just as I do, but no one loves like my mom. She loves you where you are and prays for you to be better, all the while encouraging you to join her. I am not always that patient nor do I have her social skills; I’m still learning this. It was the thoughts that I had that condemned me.

I never once picked up the rosary to pray of my own accord in the past, unless instructed to or called to do so. I remember timing the rosary one time when we prayed together at home. I was surprised it took us 15 minutes to complete the rosary and the litany, because it always felt so long to me. Prayer at home consisted of the rosary, songs of praise and worship and then petitions. I preferred when we ended up only doing praise, worship and petitions because it felt shorter.

I did not go to the chapel at my secondary school either for daily mass, unless forced to do so, which hardly ever happened since I was alone. I was surprised when I found out my sister prayed the rosary alone. To me, goodness came so easily to her, that she has helped people come to the Catholic Faith through only living out her life and sharing testimony. My brothers recited the mass in Latin easily, and I’m talking about on the car ride home or at home, not only in church, and because I can be a bit competitive, I learnt to say the “Our Father” in Latin and tried to master the creed and the gloria. With time, I could say long stretches, almost becoming excellent at singing the creed and the gloria in Latin at every First Sunday mass of the month at St. Dominic Catholic Church, Yaba. If it weren’t for my siblings around me, I would never have risen to even the small level that I did while at home in Nigeria.

I walked away from my faith during the early-second quarter of 2020. I sinned gravely and then started to question my faith. I found holes in it and started to doubt the existence of God. The moment I thought God did not exist, it felt to me as though a film had come down my eyes and I could see things clearly. That is the only way I can explain it, but I was blinder than a bat. Towards the end of 2020, I started getting answers when I wasn’t looking for it, but my heart was so sluggish to repent. Some sense was slapped back into me when I did a devotional with my sister as she suggested. We had studied a verse in the New Testament, which referred to another verse in the Old Testament. I was curious about what it meant so I read Isaiah 45 (I think this was the verse but it could have been different), and I realized the error in my thinking, and I repented internally to the extent that I could back then.

I believed in God but I did not believe in the Catholic Church. I had seen grave sin as a kid, that and other reasons, and I judged instead of loved. I did not attend other denominations either. As a child, I had concluded from what I’d seen that they followed their pastors and not Jesus, so, there was never a sway to be a member, even though I attended a vigil service alone and had felt the presence of God at a Pentecostal church. I do not recall the name of the church. Perhaps, it was the Redeem Christian Church of God. I don’t know any other like that. I just wanted to worship God at a cross-over service so, this visit had been very much without a thought.

Towards the end of 2022, I started watching a lot of videos. I became convicted of the authority of the Catholic Church handed down from Jesus and I gained a deeper consciousness of the Holy Eucharist as the Body of Christ. I felt immense gratitude to be able to attend mass and receive communion. I was also applying for jobs back then and kept getting rejections even after interviewing. My sister relayed to me her past experience of getting a job rejection on her way home, and how she prayed the rosary and it helped her get past it. She encouraged me to do the same. I recalled as well a time in the past when I had difficulty finding a job in London and I went to the place of prayer to Our Lady at St. Joseph’s Catholic Church, New Malden. I prayed for her help and wept some more in the church pews to God. I got a job after. Bolstered with confidence from my memory and my sister’s testimony, I began praying the rosary. I realized that it wasn’t hard to pray so I prayed it when I felt really sad and later on prayed it daily. Afterwards, I got the idea to write it down and maybe publish it.

While I was in the US for Christmas/New Years’, I was really troubled about the job search, so I had gone to sleep. Just as I was waking up, I saw a woman standing at a doorway, shining with so much brilliance, with golden light around what I think was the frame of a doorway. She was so beautiful, and I think she was smiling at me with arms stretched out. I woke up and wondered, “Who is that?”. I told my sister who had walked into the room what I had seen. I kept saying how the woman was so beautiful. Although I cannot even draw her or describe her features because my memory was already fading after seeing her, one thing that stuck with me was that her beauty was astounding. If I had not written it down, I wonder what I would be able to remember now. Anyway, I had an inkling that I might have seen the Blessed Virgin, but I could not voice this to my sister. Soon after that I got a call for a Job interview in Canada. I cut my trip short and went back to Canada, and I got the job in a matter of a little over a week after the interview.

Later on when I heard people describe Mary from her apparitions or visits, one thing they all said was how she was so beautiful and I remembered what I’d seen.

I have also smelt a nice-smelling fragrance while praying the rosary. I thought I was imagining it until I saw a video of someone describing the same. I also wondered if it could be an air freshener. I took my thought to my mom, and she told me she has experienced the same, so I thought that maybe it was real and maybe we experienced the same thing. I also thought if it was the air freshener, it would have been a consistent smell in prayer and outside of prayer but of course, I pray that I experience it again to give confirmation to my experience.

I started the 33 day preparation of consecration to Jesus through Mary in March, 2023. An intention we were asked to make to the Holy Spirit for a certain duration of the 33 days was to increase our trust in Mary. I had a dream during that time. I lay on a bed and felt a hand under me. I knelt up on the bed in panic. I was holding a rosary, so I placed it over the edge of the bed and a hand reached out from under the bed and grabbed on to the rosary, dragging it with me. My intention had been to scare it away with the rosary I was holding and I was shocked it did not work. So, I said “Mother, please burn this evil away.” or something to that effect. The instant I uttered that, the evil was gone. The moment I woke up, I was filled with a deeper trust for Mary beyond the rosary beads. This is not to say that a blessed rosary will not be effective in an exorcism. I needed to trust her and that is what happened.

Prayer comes easily to me now because I pray from a place of love and it has since the end of 2022. I do not stop to think about the time it takes to complete prayer anymore or read the bible or even if saying one word is just as efficient as saying plenty words. I had those arguments with my mom in the past. I think now that it wasn’t because I was evil that I did not like prayer, but because I did not love with a big heart. Because whether or not I said one word, I never sat in silence in His presence waiting for God to speak to me, while those who said plenty did not care about spending a long time in the presence of God, even if their prayer was full of words.

My mom has since told me the time in her life where she had the most encounter with God and received prophetic messages from God was when she attended daily mass, received communion and prayed the rosary. Back then, she did not do the amount of prayer she does now. I have also learnt that her mom, my grandmother, spoke in tongues, which I found surprising since the perception I got growing up from other Catholics is that it is not something believed in the Catholic Church, but my grandmother was very Catholic and a member of the Charismatic renewal. I think my grandmother must have been praying for me too in heaven.

So, even if more prayers are added to an already established prayer, and I happen to be present with the people praying, I will join in in joy. If they sing it, I will sing along with joy. This is because I know the prayer must have been put together by people with deep devotion and love, and prayer really should be about love and not a to-do-list or a comparison of what is more efficient over the other. If the heart is there and it pleases God, i.e., not against God’s commandments, that is most important.

If you would like to learn how to pray the rosary as taught by mom and her parents, see link here: How to pray the rosary

Thank you for reading today’s post. Remember to like this post and share it with your friends if you enjoyed it. Follow me on my blog, Katmira’s blog or my podcast, Amara’s Musings, to receive notifications whenever I have a new post. You can also subscribe below to get an email notification whenever a new post is out. This is particularly helpful if you don’t have a WordPress account.

Pray the Rosary. Let it be, until we meet again or “Ka ọ dị” as it is said in Igbo.

A song you can listen to!

Seeing Without Perceiving

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By Cynthia Aralu

Hello everyone! Pray the Rosary.

These days, my Instagram feed is mostly about Bible verses or the things of Christ. Even though I cannot dispute it is a good thing to have my feed full of the things of God, I fear I have lost a lot of my initial motivation; the desire to only see the things of God. Without intending to, I have tamed the algorithm of my feed by liking bible verses, prayers and the things of God, because I do indeed like them. They are good after all. As a result of this, even though I engage in scrolling, it cannot be mindless but it is somewhat driven by a distractedness. Yesterday night, just before bed, I engaged in this same distracted scrolling, and I would like each reel as I scrolled. I stumbled across verses about the significance of Christ’s suffering and death and a verse caused me to pause. It could be that the verse from Isaiah which I had intently listened to in church hours earlier, had helped to bring it all together in my mind as I scrolled, such that I reached enlightenment on reading the verse from St. Peter which said that “He himself bore our sins in His body on the tree, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness. By His wounds you have been healed”

I could not help but wonder, “Could it be that our sins were literally his wounds?”

For some reason, I had been trying so hard to understand it beyond what was stated when it was as plain as day. Am I the last in coming to know this?

There is no humour in the suffering and death of Jesus. There is so much gravity to sin that I have missed for most of my life. Was it purposeful because I could not bear it?

It is as plain as Isaiah said, that “As many were astonished at him his appearance was so marred, beyond human semblance, and his form beyond that of the sons of men—so shall he startle many nations; kings shall shut their mouths because of him; for that which has not been told them they shall see, and that which they have not heard they shall understand”.

That is just how gnarly sin is, and rightly so, we all should be astonished by sin and its effect. Every wound Jesus took on, that which was visible and invisible to the human eyes, I inflicted and yet He chose it willingly so that I may have life through His suffering. It is the redemptive power of suffering when it is offered up to God, united to Jesus, of which I now have a share in, and only quite recently did I grasp this, without even fully realizing what I was doing, until I wrote about it.

I woke up this morning and I pondered even more about all of this which I have mentioned. I remembered the passage from scripture that said, “they will see without perceiving, hear but without understanding.”. I could not help but wonder, “What else have I missed?”. I was so full of gratitude to God, so I thanked Jesus for His offering of Himself and I thanked God the Father and the Holy Spirit for enlightening me.

Thank you for reading today’s post. Remember to like this post and share it with your friends if you enjoyed it. Follow me on my blog, Katmira’s blog or my podcast, Amara’s Musings, to receive notifications whenever I have a new post. You can also subscribe below to get an email notification whenever a new post is out. This is particularly helpful if you don’t have a WordPress account.

Pray the Rosary. Let it be, until we meet again or “Ka ọ dị” as it is said in Igbo.

A lovely song to listen to!

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The Accused

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By Cynthia Aralu

Out of the depths I cry to Thee, O Lord!
Lord, hear my voice!
Let Thy ears be attentive
to the voice of my supplications!

I wait for the Lord, my soul waits,
and in His word I hope;
my soul waits for the Lord
more than watchmen for the morning,
more than watchmen for the morning.

O Israel, hope in the Lord!
For with the Lord there is steadfast love,
and with Him is plenteous redemption.

Psalm 130: 1, 5-7

Hi everyone! Pray the Rosary.

Have you ever been in a situation where a person who had given you some information which you shared to someone else, was now lying to that someone else about the content of the information they had given to you? Then, you were made to look like a liar and also incompetent, because the person who they were lying to has known them longer or better, and because of human nature, was more inclined to take their side. Have you ever been in the position to disprove this person with a screenshot and a well-formed argument?

This happened to me quite recently; actually the interval between Monday and Tuesday.

When the person who had been lied to looked at me and presented to me the information he had received from the lady, I mentioned that I was pretty sure that I had been told something different by the lady and he had given me a weird look, so, I had followed up with, “It is probably just a misunderstanding.” to which he nodded in agreement.

To be honest, I have been in a similar situation multiple times in the past before, when I lived in London. It is such a terrible position to be in. I recall the first time it happened. I was thrown under the bus by a coordinator for a mistake he made. I was at the virtual meeting, the first of that kind for me and He’d lied. I had frozen then and my heart raced uncontrollably. I did not know how to protect myself. I am glad that I did not do so at that meeting. It would have been a useless argument, and I would have been labelled “troublesome”. He was a coordinator, and I was only an assistant. When I left that meeting, my mind had run in all directions, and then settled on an idea to prove that there was no way I could have possibly known about the existence of the task, to even have been aware to perform it. I got indisputable proof that I had not been trained on the SOP and so, I could not have been aware of it, let alone, done it.

That was God’s saving grace. I emailed this proof to the second-in-charge of the unit and explained my side of things. My point was acknowledged and accommodated, but I always felt weird to work there after that, and around that coordinator. I didn’t have the option to leave. If I had been back in Nigeria, I would not have stayed. I became so guarded after that incident. A similar situation repeated itself but this time around, I spoke up for myself with email receipts, and the other person got angry. It felt so messy to me, and I was uncomfortable. To be fair, God vindicated me so swiftly from these situations and others, but it all felt turbulent to me, and it made me distrustful; this and other things in life.

So, when this similar situation repeated itself this Monday, I did not want to cause any friction, so I had automatically said, “It is probably just a misunderstanding.” It was her word against mine and I started to wonder if I had heard her wrong on the call that day. After work, as I walked to the bus stop, I felt tired and sad, and I told myself not to cry. For me, it went beyond the lie. She had been so rude to me on the call while I tried to stay professional and levelheaded. It felt as though this situation kept repeating itself in my life, but I also recognized, as I stood at the bus stop waiting for a bus, that the day before, I had knelt before the Blessed Sacrament, and told Jesus that I really want to know how He felt when He suffered during His passion. My mind knows that it must have been great suffering, but in truth, I feel I am lacking the empathy to fully grasp the depth of His suffering. I thought the best way to cure my lack would be to feel as He felt.

“Not a lot of people experience this.” I told myself, coming close to resenting it.

“It is a privilege to go through this.” I recognized, when I considered the rarity of my experiences, still feeling tired and sad.

A word from scripture stood at the forefront of my mind, “He was a man of sorrows, well-acquainted with grief.”

So, I wondered, “Did Jesus cry? Did He hurt every time he was accused or rejected or mistreated?”

My emotions were heavy so I offered them up to God.

When I got home, I pulled out my laptop. It occurred to me to check my laptop for a Teams conversation from a different day when the lady seemed to be suggesting the same thing I had surmised from her call that day. I found it, took a screenshot of it and saved it. Then, I started to formulate an argument in my mind that I was going to present the next day.

I woke up Tuesday morning and I prayed to God to vindicate me. On my way to work, I recognized that I wanted to do things my own way because I did not want to ask God what I should do, and I was trying to hide from this knowledge. But you really cannot hide from God. So, I asked God what I should do. I felt the heaviness lift off my chest. I decided to listen to an episode from Bible in a Year (BIY) because I wanted to hear from God. Psalm 130 was read in this episode. It spoke to me, and I knew what to do. I decided I was going to be still and wait on God. I laughed when I realized that I did not even want to fight for myself. Whatever fight I had been mustering was only a symptom of conditioning. Truth is, I want to be fought for by God Who loves me so much. I want to bask in the sweetness of His love, and I want to laugh and rejoice in the recognition that I am loved so.

My Spotify was on shuffle, so it suggested another episode from BIY a while later. This episode had Psalm 120, which thoroughly fit my situation; a prayer for deliverance from slanderers. I knew God’s hand was in it.

His vindication may not even come through this situation. It might be through something else that leads to her conversion. I am fine with it. I know that He is protecting and leading me. What can mere mortals do to me?

Later on, that day, I heard a bible passage differently for the first time. “Come to Me all you who are labor and heavy-laden and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me. For I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will have rest for your souls. For My yoke is easy and My burden is light.”. In the past, I had focused on the part where Jesus said to cast my burdens on Him. Yesterday, I was able to focus more on the part where He said to learn from Him “to be gentle and lowly in heart”.

I can’t say I fully understand what it means to be “gentle and lowly in heart” but I do know that I crave peace more than anything and yet, I seem to want to fight first.

Thank you for reading today’s post. Remember to like this post and share it with your friends if you enjoyed it. Follow me on my blog, Katmira’s blog or my podcast, Amara’s Musings, to receive notifications whenever I have a new post. You can also subscribe below to get an email notification whenever a new post is out. This is particularly helpful if you don’t have a WordPress account.

Pray the Rosary. Let it be, until we meet again or “Ka ọ dị” as it is said in Igbo.

A lovely song! Have a listen!

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Good

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By Cynthia Aralu

Hi everyone! Pray the Rosary.

Moments ago, I opened my Spotify and I got a creepy looking pop up on my screen: “Song Psychic. What areas of your life do you need answers to: Love, career, etc.”. I don’t recall all of the options. I should have taken a screen shot but I cancelled it as fast as I could and said, “God forbid”, as I imagined someone else going along with this and then possibly being suggested music in the genre of their sadness. On the one hand, this new addition to Spotify could be completely harmless algorithm, on the other hand, too many sinister things go on in this world without people being aware and one must be vigilant. Who knows what goes on behind the build of that new attraction. I must admit, in the past, I would have clicked on this without thinking too much about it. It is not like I believed in the predictions. It only seemed fun to me in the past. The thing is you open yourself up to harmful spirits when you dabble in new age practices. Thank God if you leave unscathed physically but what of your soul’s health.

I was going to write about something else entirely different while I listened to music on Spotify, but I guess this is the thing to write about.

Many people do not realize the danger they expose themselves to when they dabble in New Age Practices. It is portrayed as something good in the media and there is often no physical repercussion so people cannot perceive the gravity behind their actions. Sometimes, it can even affect mental health and it is labelled as a psychological disorder. This is not to say all mental illness is spiritual. There are some that aren’t and there are some that are. I know this because I remember once feeling depressed and I did not want to move from where I sat, I could not, and I felt like I was suffocating in the heaviness in my soul. I made a small, quiet and unsure prayer to God, “Father help me”. The darkness dissipated and the heaviness left me as soon I uttered those words. This was a period I did not believe in God. I was desperate to be saved. Now, I know The Holy Spirit must have been helping me to pray. This experience made me believe God must be real. I even spoke to a colleague about it because I was dazed about the experience. She seemed upset that I was telling her about it. Around that time, I had been consuming so much Tarot Card readings on YouTube and I told her about it and that was okay. My awareness of the realness of God did not even snap me back to re-orient my life completely to God. It just made me consider just how real He is.

Another time, it was like a deep sadness, and I thought it good practice to remind myself of happy memories, to bring back my happiness. I could not remember even one happy memory. One thing that stood out to me though was Christ’s resurrection. It holds so much weight and power in meaning and being. I thought, “Christ is risen”, and I was restored. So, I said it continuously on my walk to work.

I have done a lot of foolish things in my life. I am just now starting to see sin as foolishness because it is not worth the cost when you do the math. There is the eternal consequence of course but I have never been the type to peer too deeply at the future. I just mean it is such an inconvenience to choose evil. My conscience condemns me. I know God sees me. And then I feel really bad about falling short. When I feel bad, I will apologise to God and then head to the confessional. I am thankful to God for the gift of confession but feeling horrible is not something I would want to walk into knowingly. I know the feeling is there for a good reason though. My anticipation of it serves as a deterrent when I consider what action to take. So, I end up thinking I might as well do good and have peace and joy in God.

I will not always want to do good. Sometimes, I will want evil, even knowing that it is not good for me, and the only reason that can bring me to choose the good will be because of God. I will do good through Christ Who strengthens me. If I were perfect, I would always want the good, but I know my imperfection and my limitation, in that, I can do no good apart from God.

Oh, I landed right into what I wanted to write about. “Doing Good because of God”. That is funny.

I was told recently that when I said, “I will do it because of God”, I say that to make myself feel good. Perhaps I do feel good when I say it, but it is also my reality when it is hard to choose good. I don’t believe it to be any less virtuous because I don’t believe I could do it if not because of God, even though I know it to be good, even though I feel good even after doing it. So, I cannot say I do good because of good’s sake or because I want it. I do it for love of God and I will do it well with God’s help. It does not mean it is a burden either. It brings me happiness when I do it, because it pleases God, and it is for my own good. What can I say, I am a complicated human being.

Thank you for reading today’s post. Remember to like this post and share it with your friends if you enjoyed it. Follow me on my blog, Katmira’s blog or my podcast, Amara’s Musings, to receive notifications whenever I have a new post. You can also subscribe below to get an email notification whenever a new post is out. This is particularly helpful if you don’t have a WordPress account.

Pray the Rosary. Let it be, until we meet again or “Ka ọ dị” as it is said in Igbo.

Have a listen! It sounds playful.

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One of Us

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By Cynthia Aralu

Hello everyone! Pray the Rosary.

When you hear the scripture and people speak about Jesus and say, “He was one of us”, do you ever wonder what that really means?

The bible said He suffered and was tempted in every way, yet without sinning, and as such is able to sympathize with our weakness. This, He did all in the service of God, so that He may atone for our sins, through His sacrifice of Himself. So, we should have no fear, but be confident to draw close to the throne of grace, and in doing so, we will find mercy and the grace which will help us in our time of need.

I suppose when I have thought of Jesus, even after hearing that He was just like us in every way apart from sin, I have hated any depiction of Him that to my mind was less dignified. I have heard it said that on the cross He felt abandoned when He said, “Father, Father, why have You forsaken me?”. I think maybe to my mind, I interpreted that to mean that He believed He was abandoned, or perhaps I have heard it said as much. My memory is all jumbled up. Either way, I know Jesus is God, so I could not accept that He did not know that The Father was with Him. It was an imperfection that I just could not allow myself to believe. I suppose a part of me felt He found temptation easier, because He is God. I am not proud of that thought.

Today, I think I see things a little different and have another understanding of that moment when He said that. Partly because I have felt this before, but not even close to the degree to which He did, and also partly because, I heard someone say today, “He felt abandoned” and it finally clicked; “He felt”. So, this is only a feeling or emotion; the same emotion that people, including myself, have allowed to distort their grasp of the truth and then have fallen into sin. I say “only an emotion” not to belittle the strength of His emotions, but only to delve into the immensity of His emotions and to say, “what excellent will power, that he was able to hold on to the truth when He felt immense darkness, rejection and abandonment”. And that is only partly His emotional pain, not to talk of His physical suffering as He hung on the cross.

Perhaps it makes sense to me now because I know it is possible to feel an emotion which is at war with the truth of a situation which I am aware of 100%. It is the complexity of the Human situation and Jesus fully went through the human experience.

I believe while He felt abandoned, He knew His Father to be present and when He said that prayer from Psalm 22, “My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me”, in one way, He was uniting Himself to our suffering, our pain and our despair.

He was one of us.

I am sure this prayer also meant other things. Reading the Psalm will give you an idea, considering the suffering He went through, but I suppose, that other meaning, although equally important, is not the focus of what I am writing.

Following the prayer I mentioned above, He said another prayer just before He died, “Father, into Thy Hands, I commend My Spirit”, which spoke of trust in His Father to take care of Him and preserve Him. And God did preserve Him. He was raised from the dead by the Spirit of God and is now seated at the right hand of The Father, interceding for us. And the same Spirit of God which raised Him from the dead, dwells in all baptized Christians.

It would seem to me that He started off and lived His human life entrusting Himself to God and entrusting Himself to others. He entrusted Himself to the care of Mary and Joseph. He entrusted Himself to the 12 He chose, even knowing that Judas would betray Him. Man, He trusted. I do not know if I could trust people like that but maybe it is a call to entrust oneself to others. I do not know. I am only trying to see people through His Eyes, which are unjaded. I wonder if this would lead to more trust.

I am not a theologian, I might not be accurate in my understanding. In fact, I believe that there is so much that I do not know. I am only seeking understanding and contemplating God. If the answers never come, I am fine with it. There is a knowledge that leads to pride and destruction anyway. But, if you want to hear from people who have studied Theology, Ascension Presents has a couple of them.

Thank you for reading today’s post. Remember to like this post and share it with your friends if you enjoyed it. Follow me on my blog, Katmira’s blog or my podcast, Amara’s Musings, to receive notifications whenever I have a new post. You can also subscribe below to get an email notification whenever a new post is out. This is particularly helpful if you don’t have a WordPress account.

Let it be, until we meet again or “Ka ọ dị” as it is said in Igbo.

A lovely song to listen to!

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No Coincidence

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By Cynthia Aralu

Hi everyone. Pray the Rosary.

I started believing there were no coincidences even before understanding the reason I believed it, beyond something I heard on a TV show, coupled with my ability to connect dots where people didn’t. I did not grasp the depth of what I believed either, beyond the little that I did see.

Recently, however, I came across a passage of scripture about Angel Gabriel’s visit to Zachariah, and it dawned on me in a deeper way that there are no coincidences in life. Zachariah was going about his duty as a priest before God, and it fell to him “by lot” to enter the temple of the Lord and burn incense. And there, he was met by the angel who gave him the message from God that he would have a son and name his son, John.

What had the appearance of being random, was all within God’s providence and will.

I called that to mind when certain disappointing and hurtful things happened to me and offered the events and my emotions up to God. I felt a weight lift off my chest, as I submitted to God on separate occasions, even praising and thanking God in the most recent event. It is as John Jin Han sang in “Days of Youth”, “I know there is still so much growing that I have to do but I know in the end, I want to burn for God”. I am not so gracious in processing it all as it happens to me but I will leave it to Him to give me the grace to have more grace, then I will actually be able to act like my other name.

My other name is Amarachukwu. It is an “Igbo” name and it means “the grace of God”. I was given that name at birth because of an overflow of thanksgiving and gratitude my mom felt towards God at my safe, easy, least painful among my siblings (I gleaned from her words) and quick delivery. Upon giving birth to me, she had broken out in an “Igbo” song which featured my name. To give more context, while my mom had been pregnant with me, a soothsayer had told her that when she gave birth to me, there would be joy and crying. So, my mom’s joyous gratitude to God had flowed from her faith in God and her utter dependence on God to deliver her and hers from all evil, which is why she had decided to go into prayer rather than to accept the soothsayer’s suggestion of a fetish ritual to prevent the evil omen.

My mom told me my name means more than the grace of God but she couldn’t really describe it to me in English because as she explained, the English Language is limited in its expression of the meaning of my name. I think she described it as the goodness of God, the grace of God and the mercy of God all balled up in one name.

My naming was not a coincidence. Even the soothsayer’s prophecy was not a coincidence. Neither was my mom’s doubling down in prayer, a coincidence. Not even my birth or my life. All I know is that the devil has always been after us, even as a baby in my mother’s womb, and God has always been protecting us. If my mom had given in to that temptation, we would have been destroyed. Even the soothsayer recognized the spirit in my mom when the soothsayer turned to my dad and told him to ask my mom if she would agree, because as the soothsayer expressed, she could sense that my mom wouldn’t.

As I count my blessings in this life, as I look around at the evil and tragedy in the world, I suppose I think how sad it is to see so much sadness in this world. Yet, I know if you look closely, this world is fading away, and who’s to say the ones whom I learnt just passed away tragically are not the blessed ones.

I have always dreamt of a place full of order, a perfect place. It is my reason for leaving home. I know now that I was naive in my thinking. There is no perfect place. Yet, I do not regret my decision to leave. I came to realize recently that I have been longing for heaven all along. I have been longing for God. This longing hits me harder at certain periods and I get tired of being here. I can only pray for a happy death and hope in Christ my Saviour.

It is my hope that my life and death brings glory to God. Even my many sins and mistakes. How they weigh down heavy on me, as I am starting to recognize the gravity of them, after I have confessed them. How nonchalant I have lived without considering God. It is an all-permeating, fixed thought; of how much I have been loved even while being wholly undeserving, even now. I struggle to extend that grace to people; to be moved with compassion for people when they hurt me instead of taking offence. Just one of the things I am processing and praying about. I know one day even this struggle will be a thing of the past because I know that God is shaping me from one moment unto the next into the image of His Son, my Lord Jesus. I feel His guiding and instructive footprint in my mind and in my life, even as I am a mixture of resistance and willingness. I tell Him I am trying my best and ask for His help to be joyful in complying without that initial resistance. It is a funny scene but it is also rough.

Thank you for reading today’s post. Remember to like this post and share it with your friends if you enjoyed it. Follow me on my blog, Katmira’s blog or my podcast, Amara’s Musings, to receive notifications whenever I have a new post. You can also subscribe below to get an email notification whenever a new post is out. This is particularly helpful if you don’t have a WordPress account.

Pray the Rosary. Let it be, until we meet again or “Ka ọ dị” as it is said in Igbo.

A lovely song you can listen to!
Another lovely song you can listen to!

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The Forgiveness of Sins

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By Cynthia Aralu

Hello everyone! Pray the Rosary.

I suppose I will begin at what I do know.

Yesterday night and today, my mind has been full of the memory of a past dream I had about my dad, close to 3 years ago, in which at the end of it, I started to preach to the people present about the forgiveness of sins, after what I perceived to be my dad’s departure from the land of the living into the Kingdom of Heaven.

I have never done that preaching in real life and to be honest, I do not know how to. I was so full of boldness and conviction in that dream as I preached the forgiveness of sins. At the time I had that dream, I was coming back to a belief in God from a time when I believed in nothing. I had finished reading the book of Mark in order to understand Who Jesus is to me. I had tried to tame my distrust and work on a bible plan on YouVersion and I chose Mark because it is the shortest gospel. I did see things in a new light by the grace of God, to the extent that I could, but at the core, I was still weak in faith and morals, and I did what I wanted and found pleasing, not what God wanted.

The dream I mentioned earlier stuck with me, mostly because I had seen my deceased dad and he’d felt so real to me and somehow, I felt as though he had gone to heaven.

Today, in church, I heard St. Paul say that he does as he ought to do when he preaches the gospel, that it is of no boasting to him, and woe to him if he doesn’t, as it is a necessity that he does so, as he has been entrusted with a commission, and I thought that perhaps I ought to fulfil the dream I had in some way, right now, since I have never really outrightly spoken about the forgiveness of sins.

So, what is the forgiveness of sins, which I wholeheartedly believe and profess?

The truth is that God so loved the world; He loves you and He loves me so very much, that He sent His only Begotten Son, Jesus, so that anyone who believes in Jesus will have eternal life and have it to the fullest. It is the wish of God that we all become His sons and daughters and it is His desire and His good pleasure to give us the Kingdom, every single one of us, the righteous or the sinner, the weak or the strong, the poor or the rich, the despised or the loved, the broken or the healing. He wants you. He wants me. But, we have all sinned and fallen short of the glory and the goodness of God. As such, Jesus made the way for us to be reconciled and bridged back to God, the Father, through the sacrifice of His Life, the sinless for the sinful; and Jesus, He has conquered sin, death and the troubles of the world. If we would but repent, put away our old, sinful ways that bring harm to our souls, and believe in Jesus and all that He has revealed, we will have eternity with Him, living as beloved sons and daughters of God. Be baptized, therefore, in the name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, as Jesus has commanded and walk in new life in Jesus, remembering always that He is with you always even to the end of age and through it all, and knowing as well, that once we have endured this life, we have a crown of glory waiting for us with God forever.

This is as best as I can tell of the forgiveness of sins in this post. If you would like to learn more, you can go on the YouTube page of Ascension Presents.

Thank you for reading today’s post. Remember to like this post and share it with your friends if you enjoyed it. Follow me on my blog, Katmira’s blog or my podcast, Amara’s Musings, to receive notifications whenever I have a new post. You can also subscribe below to get an email notification whenever a new post is out. This is particularly helpful if you don’t have a WordPress account.

Pray the Rosary. Let it be, until we meet again or “Ka ọ dị” as it is said in Igbo.

A beautiful song you could listen to!

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Thanking God this New Year

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By Cynthia Aralu

Preserve me, O God, for in Thee I take refuge.
I say to the Lord, “Thou art my Lord;
I have no good apart from Thee.”

The Lord is my chosen portion and my cup;
Thou holdest my lot.
The lines have fallen for me in pleasant places;
yea, I have a goodly heritage

I bless the Lord who gives me counsel;
in the night also my heart instructs me.
I keep the Lord always before me;
because He is at my right hand, I shall not be moved.

– Psalm 16:1-2, 5-8

Happy New Year Everyone! Pray the Rosary.

I hope everyone is keeping well this New Year. We are about halfway into the first month of year and I’ve got to say, I started off the New Year with good news. I took the PMP certification exam in the early hours of Jan 1st, right from the comfort of my home and I received word the next day that I passed. I am so thankful to God for his help in my success, which is His. It has been a long time coming. He put the goal in my mind years ago, although I did not know the path to take to get it or think that I would be eligible to take the exam, but He pushed me forward with a gentleness and His persevering Spirit. I applied around July last year for the exam and my application was approved. I was so overjoyed because prior to applying I had a fear that I hadn’t had the title of “Project Manager” for very long and perhaps that could affect my application but it did not matter.

I was deep into preparing for the exam when I discovered that I made a huge error in my application which had already been approved; there was an error in my work history which made it look like I had more years of experience in a particular job role than I actually had. I wrestled with myself about reporting this to PMI. And then I wrestled with God. I have a tendency of taking shortcuts as long as I get to my goal and no one gets hurt. It is still something I am fighting to overcome and in that moment, it was so hard. I told God that anyone I told about reporting this and withdrawing my application would think I am stupid, since I had already passed through the approval process and there was no way I would be audited after that approval. But, as I wrestled with God in my head, I heard a video playing from my phone say, “Have Faith”.

I felt a profound peace wash over me after I heard that, so, I messaged the customer service line of PMI and reported the error and told the rep to withdraw my application. I think this happened in October of last year. At that time, I was nearing the end of the study group session I was a part of, so when I withdrew my application and re-applied, I felt unsure of where I stood, even as I attended the study session that followed after. In the wait for the re-evaluation of my application, my studying slowed down somewhat and I took a bit of a break from the gruelling studying I was engaged in. I saw a movie at the cinema with a friend and really just slowed down. Thanks be to God, my second application was approved and I didn’t have to go through a stressful audit. The studying I did for this exam was incredibly stressful and I don’t remember an exam ever stressing me as much as this exam did.

To put things into context, and not to be boastful because my life really is a display of the goodness of God; I have not failed any course I have taken since the WASSCE at the end of secondary school. It was understandable I performed poorly since I had not studied and I did not trust in God. I got mostly Cs, which was not helpful to me if I wanted to get into Medicine, which I did want at the time, but since then, I have grown to be aware that I am somewhat capable if I work hard and ask God for His help, because I graduated with a Distinction, the highest grade achievable, in my MSc course in Pharmaceutical Sciences at Kingston University, despite my “poor memory” which I have struggled with a long time, and yet my MSc course did not stress me out quite like this exam did. It could be because this exam is not a part of the sciences, so it was a lot of learning of terms or concepts for the first time.

There were moments I wanted to stop studying but I deeply wanted God to help me and I wanted to approach Him knowing that I had given it my all. I knew He would help me like He always did. To be clear, I did not wait until it was time to take the exam before I started praying. I prayed before I applied; continuously as I prepared, for guidance while I studied, to absorb the information as I studied, to retain it, to be able to answer any question put forth in front of me at the exam, and to have an easier exam than the practice questions I went through. I prayed as well during the exam, as my belly started to hurt as I answered the first 60 questions which I thought were okay enough, and continued praying as the questions got annoyingly harder during the second 60 questions, and continued praying as the discomfort in my belly persisted during the last 60 questions which I thought were fair.

I did not fully sense God’s presence as I wrote the exam but I knew He had to be present because He is always with me, because He is faithful, not because of anything I do, but because of His Character. However, my senses were dull, so my prayer as I took this exam was desperate as time progressed. You see, sometimes, I am able to sense Him in the breeze that envelopes me, or in the movement in my mind that allows me to see things clearly which I once did not understand, once I ask for His help, or a warmth of my cheeks and a rush, or a warm, cozy feeling in my heart that makes me feel cocooned, or the repetition of a phrase everywhere He would like me to explore in the bible, or a peace that comes over me, and many more ways, because God cannot be contained and I am not able to know all of the ways in which He makes His presence known.

I did not get my result immediately after the exam, like I expected to, and I allowed that to put me in a bad mood for the remainder of the day. I even started to regret taking the exam on that day because of how tired and sleep-deprived I was, how unsure I was about how I did on the exam, and my foul mood on the first day of the year. At the end of the day, I realized the reason my mood was off. I did not start the day praying. When I was planning to take this exam, I did not factor in setting aside an hour of the day to pray in the morning like I normally do. I woke up, did a quick prayer as I got ready for the exam and got on with it.

I am working on staying joyful throughout this year, despite what my eyes see, since I am short sighted in the physical and in many ways in the spirit. I am praying for discernment this year, of God’s will, God’s voice and God’s wise counsel. I am also praying for the grace and the strength of will to always do His will, so that I may be wise in all that I do, and also that I and my family may always abide in His house forever.

I am working on building intimacy with God this year, being mindful of my actions and acting indeed like I believe God to be the Lord of my life, so that I can glorify God by the way I live my life.

I am also working on bringing to the forefront of my mind, to serve as a guide on how I perceive and move through this world, that everything in the world belongs to me, so that I do not try to rush to grab it all for myself and I can be patient in letting others have it. Let me try to explain what I mean and I hope this makes sense. I came to this realization early one morning, on my way to work last year, when I pondered on one of the temptations of Jesus, which on and off would come to my mind, and I would think it strange, confusing and not very smart of the devil to tempt Jesus with the whole world when it all belongs to Jesus, but then it dawned on me, “Does it not all belong to me too, since I am an Heir of God and co-heir with Jesus?” It allowed me to be able to give more to the people around me when I remembered, because there is no reason I should be fighting or grasping for things or getting mad or sad over things that are ultimately mine. To operate from a mindset of abundance that comes from being who I am, a daughter of God, rather than from a viewpoint of scarcity that comes from the brokenness and scarcity I have encountered all my life. Of course, I am still working on remembering and applying this.

I hope to be thankful all year to God for all of His mercies, His kindness, His love, His grace, His revelations, His presence, His nearness, His movements, His provisions, His goodness and for Him, which He has already poured out into me and around me, trusting that He will continue to do so the rest of this year and the rest of my life, because He is faithful.

God bless you all in the New Year!

Thank you for reading today’s post. Remember to like this post and share it with your friends if you enjoyed it. Follow me on my blog, Katmira’s blog or my podcast, Amara’s Musings, to receive notifications whenever I have a new post. You can also subscribe below to get an email notification whenever a new post is out. This is particularly helpful if you don’t have a WordPress account.

Pray the Rosary. Let it be, until we meet again or “Ka ọ dị” as it is said in Igbo.

A beautiful song you could listen to!

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My End Of the Year Post

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By Cynthia Aralu

Hello everyone! Pray the Rosary.

It has been a while and to not run the risk of sounding like a broken record, how about I do not apologize for being away.

I have done an end of the year evaluation since 2020, I believe. So, I felt it customary to continue it this year.

This year has gone by pretty quick, that when I try to look back on the events of the year, it feels almost like yesterday that the year began, and yet quite deliciously contrary, the density of my memories lie squarely on my mind, like a thickly condensed flashback which I have a good grasp of in its intricateness.

I prayed a lot this year, more than I have ever done in my entire life, without my mother prompting me to “Come, let us pray”. I actually pursued God this year. How incredibly! I remember when the days to my time in London was starting to run out, just before I was to travel to Canada, I had mentioned to a colleague of mine, that if I arrived in Canada, with my mom around, I would feel obligated to attend mass out of a deference to her and to keep the peace, in her heart and in the house. But, I did wish that I felt a desire to go to mass, not just out of obligation to her. And how it would make everything easier. Fast forward to actually coming here and having an encounter with God which just filled my heart with a fire, a longing and a desire for God, that I went to confession last year, for the first time in 4 years, and strove after God from that time on. God is great! He hears the desires of my heart! He hears the words I speak! He knows me through and through, more than I can ever know myself and loves me completely. I am comfortable telling Him to help me because I am helpless most times, and He really does reach out and set me aright, even when I do not use those specific words.

I am here right now, completely imperfect, yet my mind reminds me that my God once told me that He salivates in the way I love. That made me happy at first, then shook me, because I know me. So, He must see so much good in me, and there is hope for me. I really just want to please Him, that I feel disappointed when I cannot do some things I wish I could do. I am praying always that God is patient with me because of my weaknesses, as I navigate all of this and I can finally drop all of the weight which I hate, but I always take great comfort and hide in His love. It is the safest I will ever be ever. So, I will cast my arms around Him, although I cannot contain His presence, and He will fill me always with His goodness.

For anyone wanting to gain a better understanding of the faith, you can check out Ascension Presents on YouTube for short videos. I hope God ignites that passion in your heart for Him too.

To everyone reading this, thank you for finding my blog, thank you for staying. I pray that God blooms the seed planted already in your hearts and you rejoice always in the Lord, so that your joy may be complete!

Thank you for reading today’s post. Remember to like this post and share it with your friends if you enjoyed it. Follow me on my blog, Katmira’s blog or my podcast, Amara’s Musings, to receive notifications whenever I have a new post. You can also subscribe below to get an email notification whenever a new post is out. This is particularly helpful if you don’t have a WordPress account.

Pray the Rosary. Let it be, until we meet again or “Ka ọ dị” as it is said in Igbo.

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The Right Time

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By Cynthia Aralu

Hi everyone! Pray the Rosary.

I think I have been away for over 6 months (correction: 4 months) and I really owe everyone an apology, including myself because this is really atrocious, haha..

On a serious note, I really tried to block out the thoughts of my blog and my podcast, and push off writing and creating posts because of the effort it takes to make the voice recordings. To be honest, I do not enjoy hearing back the sound of my voice. That is why these voice recordings are kind of weird to me. But, I actually enjoy the entire creating process, so, I don’t know what to say.

I hope everyone is doing okay. It’s been half a year, so, I bet a lot of things have happened in that time for you and for me too. If you care to, you can share in the comment section below.

Particularly for me, I have grown a deeper understanding and love for my faith in these 6 months. I am Catholic, just in case nobody knows. My prayer life has been more regular than it has ever been before and I am happy about that. I pray for final perseverance.

I will say for the most part I feel clueless nowadays. I don’t understand a lot of things and I fear God is speaking to me but I do not understand His message because of my short-sightedness. I say this because a recent bible passage from “The Bible in a Year” podcast, mirrored my actions and prayers. It is quite uncanny because this has happened to me twice now, first at the start of the year when this same feeling was strong and again recently, this week actually. I really do not know how clueless I can be as to what God is trying to tell me. I am a bit frustrated with myself. Pray for me that I have clarity. I just paused to pray for it too. Weird how I don’t recall praying for it before now. but perhaps I did.

Maybe I know the answer but I do not want to believe it. haha. And that is quite sad when I think about it.

The answer I can see is that God has sent His angel to take care of it.

So, if that is the case, then I am thankful to God for answered prayers.

Sidebar: I wrote this around midnight. I don’t know how I’m gonna put this all together. But, I created this post around midnight and I was like I’ll go to bed, wake up, say my prayer, come back, record this, and then finish the entire process of creating this. So, while I was on instagram, when I woke up in the morning, I saw an instagram post about “Let God take care of it. Open up the Word and listen to what God is trying to tell you”. So, I decided to listen to today’s bible verses on the Bible in a year. And something stuck out to me: “If you will not believe surely you shall not be established.” And that put a serious fear within me. Because I obviously do not want to be the one who is stopping God’s blessings from getting to me. Because we can do that to ourselves without realizing. So, I said a prayer, “I believe. Lord, heal my unbelief.” And I do believe that there is nothing God cannot do. I think it is that I cannot imagine the strength of His love for me. That’s where the unbelief comes from. I just need to trust in His love for me. To trust in His provision and to just trust in God. I will be back to give a testimony once it is all fully revealed to me by God.

Anyway, I drove recently; this Tuesday to be precise. Not a lot though. I have a learner’s licence here in Canada, so, I have to actually practice driving. Before this week though, the last time I was behind the wheel was 6 years ago. It felt different on Tuesday. I did not have the crippling nerves like 6 years ago. It was almost nice. It could be because my new friend, who was calm throughout, was in the passenger seat and not my brother. I love my brother but I remember him yelling 6 years ago and that was not fun. My friend, on the other hand, was using his phone at some point and when I asked him if he was afraid, he told me he wasn’t and that was his reason for using his phone. I might also have almost enjoyed driving now because I am older and calmer when it comes to handling “new things”, haha, but just a little bit calmer. But maybe that “little” makes such a huge difference on my temperament. I honestly just want to get the learning phase over with so I can move on from it. My impatience is unreal but I am trying to reel it all in. Lastly, it is definitely because I have been praying for a better experience this time around.

During the drive, I mentioned to my friend that my dad is not alive and he was so shocked and sad for me. My dad died when I was 5. It has been such a long time, which I tried to explain to him. Then He asked if my mom ever remarried or if I had any male role models growing up and my answer was “No.” He was amazed by that. I know he meant well, but his questions made me consider how much I might have lacked not having my dad. I had claimed God as my Father a long time ago when I was in bed in London and the memory of my mom’s prayer from when I was a child came to my mind. “You are The Father to the fatherless, The Husband to the widow.” I had said the same to my friend too.

However, when I was alone, I could not help but feel deficient and some things made sense to me. So, I thought it might explain why I never learnt to ride a bike. Maybe I might have been forced to learn how to drive a car, if he’d lived. I don’t know. Perhaps if my dad didn’t die, I would have gotten more confident in my childhood. But also, I would have been so spoiled, like one of those spoilt rich kids, or maybe not, since my mom was so strict. I don’t know. I wondered how else my personality might have been affected. Am I overly independent as a result of his death? Do I contemplate a lot about dying because of his death? Am I unable to form tangible relationships with the opposite sex as a result? Do I distrust the tangibility of human connections just a little bit? haha..

It is pointless to imagine what might have been and yet my mind wondered briefly. My dad is a hero in my memory. I loved him easily and missed him without wondering what the emotion was. Secondary school was hard for me at one point, so, I had informed my mom, out of blue, one morning, just before we got into the car, on our way to the church where I would catch my school bus, that I was okay with her remarrying, all because I wanted a dad.

I am an adult now though and have lived a considerable portion of my life without my father. I suppose thinking these things about deficiencies stirred up some feelings of inadequacies in general about myself, one such being my inability to drive competently. I probably have to address those feelings with myself. I am not my driver status. lol. and I am working towards getting it changed, and that is all that matters.

I have been a late bloomer when it comes to getting over certain milestones in my life. One such being my confirmation in the Catholic Church. I kind of conveniently pushed off attending classes run by my secondary school because I did not understand why I should do it, and my mom did not come down too hard on me for not going. Maybe because she didn’t realize I was not attending though. lol. Because of that, I ended up getting confirmed later, along with my younger sister, at her own school’s program.

I think I was a bit embarrassed then too that I had not completed it when I was younger. However, looking back now, I think I did it at the right time. I was more receptive to the message that God loves me. I think it is the only thing I remember from those classes. I had received the message with so much shock and pleasure; it is so strange, because I don’t know why it had felt personal to me to read about it in a book the instructors made to teach us with. It was like hearing it for the first time; the idea of a personal relationship with God and I felt loved.

So, perhaps, that is how I ought to look at everything else in my life that I do not have or I have not done. Perhaps, it really isn’t the right time for me.

Thank you for reading or listening to today’s post. Remember to like this post and share it with your friends if you enjoyed it. Follow me on my blog, Katmira’s blog or my podcast, Amara’s Musings, to receive notifications whenever I have a new post. You can also subscribe below to get an email notification whenever a new post is out. This is particularly helpful if you don’t have a WordPress account.

Pray the Rosary. Let it be, until we meet again or “Ka ọ dị” as it is said in Igbo.

The Right Time by Cynthia Aralu (Audio Recording)
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