#brandon posts

[captainvatican]

mary did you know

that your baby boy

would one day flex on satan

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Oooh, Saturday Sun!

I met someone

Out on the West Coast

I gotta get back, I can’t let this go

I gotta say, writing this 31,000 feet in the air really brings my writing to new heights. But seriously, you really do end up reflecting on a lot while you’re sitting in a giant piece of metal that’s flying through the sky.

It’s easy to get caught up in the madness and insanity of our daily lives. We glorify busy and look down upon, or even straight up ignore, rest and leisure. But life is meant to be an adventure. And adventure doesn’t mean it’s always going to be easy. But we can be damn sure it’ll be worth it. Though the main purpose of my trip to California was to attend a conference to be formed as a better leader and disciple, it was nice to take a few days beforehand to rest and meet up with some friends and family. But even more than just resting, I went on an adventure.

You see, this adventure is like no other adventure. This is not your rock-climbing, mountain-hiking, road-tripping kind of adventure. I went on a new adventure, one which has terrified me like no other before.

What was that adventure?

I came home.

Even weirder, I came home for the first time. But my home wasn’t brick walls. It wasn’t a white picket fence. It wasn’t a nice one family building. It wasn’t something I could use. In fact, quite the opposite was true. My home was the recipient of my desire to serve. My home had a heartbeat. Home had a smile that could melt planets. Home had a laugh that was so contagious the Pentagon put it on a watch list. Home had hands so soft that dermatologists hate them. My home had a voice so sweet you’d have to get checked for diabetes right after hearing it.

I found myself before a person: an embodied soul.

Home was her. Home was a ravishing soul. Home was a person that I've known for over two years now, but a person I slowly (read: quickly, but am still learning to admit it) fell for.

In her I found my home, but she was also a vibrant adventure. She was this wild, untamable reality: an ocean I was, am, and will continue to be afraid to dive into - and yet I will try my best to brave the waters. Yet, she was a warm, safe refuge from the realities of this world: a quiet forest for me to dwell in and to find cool shade in the beauty of the raging summer heat.

For as long as I’ve sought to escape into the wilderness to find some far-off adventure, I’ve also sought the warm embrace of home. In her, I’ve found it all: a perfect combination of someone who provides to me the safety of home, yet calls me to step out into the brave world to pursue greatness.

To greatness she has called me, and to joy she has guided me.

You see, for as long as I could remember, I’ve struggled with learning to love myself - even after being freed from years of depression. I’ve always wanted to pour out this intense, unending love out for others. But more often than not, when I was presented with someone who cared, I would feel like I was not enough, or, too much.

I have been caught in this paradox that has had my mind, heart, body, and soul caught in a war that could only leave a trail of destruction and sin. It was the paradox of feeling like I was not enough, due to previous sins and wounds, or that I was way too much, due to this overwhelming desire to love.

Yet, in the midst of it all, I found myself before God. Praying once again, abandoning myself, rushing to seek Him, and orienting everything I did for His glory. I (hesitantly) reclaimed my identity as His beloved son, working hard to build up a healthier foundation for who I was, understanding it was rooted in Christ and nothing - and no one - else.

Over time, on this little adventure of life, I ended up finding someone walking alongside me. She became a close friend, a best friend, someone I desired to spend all my time with. To my surprise, she felt the same way. To an even greater surprise, she eventually told me how she felt.

That was over a year and a half ago. A year and a half from that very date, what we affectionally call “14 Day”, we found ourselves together for the first time. Long distance is insane. I had closed myself off to it after previous experiences, but she made her way past the walls of my heart. She didn’t come knocking them down, but she sat outside of it, speaking to me from the other side, slowly building the courage to knock on the doors of my heart.

And when she did, I opened freely. After all, love cannot be forced. It cannot be “filtered” into some beautiful and poetic experience. It is, don’t get me wrong, but love is war. It is fighting for each other and learning each other. It is a school where a soul is at stake.

She is home. She is an adventure. She is also, a way better lover than I am.

For years I’ve written letters to my future wife. It was born out of my fifth grade self’s pure desire to love someone. Eventually, I gave up. But she gave me the desire to write again. Now, when I wrote, I never desired anything in return. Yet this soul surprised me with a journal full of letters to me. Beautifully written and authentically vulnerable love letters.

This journal full of letters to me wrecked me. I cried reading it on the plane ride back home, even while being surrounded by my close friends and coworkers. In all of my years hoping for someone to love, I have struggled to understand that I deserve someone to love me as well. In her, I've not only found a heart that mirrors mine, but one the exceeds it. When I see her, I do not see too much, but see this captivating fountain of love, once that I desire to care for and to drink from.

Her love has been so healing, that when we first met at Disneyland, she disarmed me with just a smile. Her love guides me closer to God. It has helped me grow and become a better person. It has freed me from preconceptions or false ideas that I am “too much” or “not enough.” In her, I’ve found a brave soul that is not afraid to love me to the cross.

The photo I took of her praying melted me. It made me understand how much she does not love just in word, but also in action. Love is a verb to her, one she lives out so beautifully and wonderfully. And I’m not the only one who sees it. Her friends do, and now, my friends do too. It was awesome to have my closest friends (basically family) meet her too. And Jay, @fireflyclasstransport, you’ll get to meet her soon too. :) 

Seeing her interact with my friends, who love her too, was amazing. They’d tease me about her as we started to sneak off for some private time together. It’s a blessing to hear how much they like her and want her to move to be closer. In this way, my world becomes smaller and homey. My friends becoming friends with each other, and my beloved at the center of it all.

This is a long, convoluted way (my JPII is showing) of saying that I am head over heels for a girl.  She has wrecked me, loved me, and called me out in so many ways. She is the Astrid to my Hiccup. The Amy to my Jake. To Kairi to my Sora.

From sneaking off to watch Spider-Man, to random pizza dinners, to slow strolls through a castle, to singing our favorite worship songs at church, I am home and I have found my favorite adventure. And I cannot wait for the other ones to come after all this.

I love you, my Lena, @brideshead. I am totally yours.

[captainvatican]

Those close to me will know that, thanks be to God, I’ve been free from depression for a few years now. But anxiety still manages to clutch my heart and shake it, even on the best of days. It’s not as bad as it once was, but it can still leave me frozen in fear.

But we read in Scripture that there is no fear in love, and there shouldn’t be. For “perfect love casts out fear” (1 John 4:18). Love is pretty awesome that way.

Now, balancing a more intentional (and intense) life that consists of a social life, work, etc. is insane. I still don’t have the best hang of it all, but I do my best to push through. However, every now and then, a Goliath-sized fear or obstacle makes its way in. That’s how I felt earlier today. This anxiety leaves me doubting myself - it paralyzes with a fear so intense that any courage and faith I had can vanish like the wind. But in the midst of it all, I’ve found a foundation in Christ, and with it, the woman I love.

In my heart of hearts, I can see myself shaking with doubt and anxiety. But the thought of being able to provide, to love, and to serve her and the eventual fruit of our love brings me to my senses and wakes me up from this crippling slumber of fear. This loves empowers me to fight.

It’s just as G.K. Chesterton (who I'm growing to admire more and more these days) said: “The true soldier fights not because he hates what is in front of him, but because he loves what is behind him.”

I can be in the deepest darkness, grappling with my greatest doubts and fears, but when I think about those who I am aiming to love and protect, everything scatters and I'm found in the warm embrace that I’ve come to call “home.”

Love scatters the darkness. It brings the proud to the knees. It pierces the night and brings the warm touch of sunlight. It stares down Goliaths and slays it with, not with violence, but with the softness of love.

It is intentional. It is life-giving. It is a fountain. It is a two-way street.

Love gives us the strength and will to fight for what is behind us while recognizing that what is before us does not have the final say - Christ does. And, I’ve gotta say, I love who and what I’m fighting for.

My bride. My future kids. My family. My friends. The students I serve.

In it all, love propels us out of ourselves and forward.

Sometimes forward can be synonymous with “unknown.” But with the right openness, with the right will, and with the right people surrounding us, forward is no longer dark, scary territory - but an adventure that awaits.

[captainvatican]

Y’ALL. I’m melting.

This is by far one of the best covers I have ever seen.

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I live-tweeted my first (intentional) viewing of LOTR (The Fellowship of the Ring) last night and honestly?

That was a wild ride I vaguely recall.

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It is beyond me how:

my youth ministry room was packed this Sunday - especially new faces

which was led by a solid group of new and excited core members

all of which are just excited to get together and to be formed and have fun

out of which there is more of a desire from the core team for weekly young adult meetings so we can all grow together

especially since our parish really is becoming a hub for adult formation and a home for teens, college students, young adults, and especially young families

how my campus ministry is thriving for the first time in decades of it’s history

there’s no longer a gender gap in the group but an equal attendance by both men and women

how we have a solid new budget to update, renew, and expand our resources and center

which we’re also finalizing stuff so we can all go to seek in jan 2019

which ill also have to fly back for a single (1) day during seek for a best friend’s wedding

but the student ministry is expanding and forming not just catholic students but disciples

all thanks to a deeper investment on the part of the student leadership and their desire to work with me and the new campus minister

how i got a scholarship to attend the tob institute next month to begin my formal certification

how im finishing preparing for my latin midterm which will later on lead to some time in adoration at my student chapel, a mariology class, and a class on faith and reason

how im even in school in the first place thanks to the generosity of countless people in which I exhausted almost every network I have

how im so close to being done with my bachelor’s degree that I set aside just to work but in doing so abandoned my own dream of finishing school

how I even found the perfect balance to perfect a social life, time for family, time for myself and for private prayer and formation, exercise and kick-boxing, a school life, youth, young adult, and campus ministries, speaking engagements, staff meetings, leadership meetings, archdiocesan meetings, and new adventures

how I am so in love with Christ that even weekly confession is a thing simple because I really do want to be with Him in Heaven.

It was all because of grace.

And I need to be more grateful to the One my soul adores.

[captainvatican]

I cannot overemphasize how much peace there is in pursing adventures with Christ. Adventures with Him have lead to heart-pumping mountain climbing. It’s led to quiet, still evenings sitting on my chapel floor. It’s led to spontaneous worship in my office while I plan the next young adult event. It’s led to deep conversations at a bar with the most uncommon of friends. It’s led to midnight Walmart runs for no reason other than being high on life.

All of this, it has been so amazing and humbling. It’s led to me falling in love.

Not with a girl, not with some far-off concept, but with the Creator of love Himself. 

This love brings so much joy, friends. There is nothing like it.

As I’ve been saving old posts to eventually delete this blog (almost 10 years of posts does add up rip), I’ve realized how much everything has changed. I mean, my life is completely different than it was a few months ago. A year ago. Two. Four.

I won’t lie, in looking back at the past half-decade of my life, I felt a lot of hurt. There was this temptation to abandon the gift of resting in the present moment with the Lord in order to focus on anxiety, old depression, and forgotten emotions. After all, I had realized that I have lost so much.

In my heart, I felt a shock at something so real occurring. Not so much shock as a disarming gentleness.

With a gentle hand on my shoulder, my Father looked at me and reminded me: “Oh, beloved. How much you have gained and grown!”

He’s right. I would not trade the presence of Christ in my life for any fleeting emotion, experience, or friend.

In the end, He remains. And He’s all I want.

I invite you to accept the invitation our Lord has placed before you in your deepest core. He desires to know and love you.

Adventure awaits, friend.

[captainvatican]

I LIVE.