In the BCBP we learned this Blessing-prayer, scripture based, which we have since used daily to pray for our children, their families and their loved ones, and also for those specific individuals who have asked for prayers and those who have been brought to our attention.

This video was taken at the grounds of the house of our daughter and son-in-law, Lauren and Josh Barkhurst, in Westerville, Ohio in August 15, 2016.

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Recently, one of our grandson, Anton, who was to travel to Mexico to help out in the restoration of their Honda plant that was flooded, was blest by us and his parents, prior to his two-weeks’ sojourn.

In my own larger family, it is common even for my siblings to ask for blessings before they go on trips, “for a blessing and for protection,” they would say.

And, in the interest of brevity, I usually write on my Facebook comments the single word “blessings,” whenever a friend(s) celebrate a milestone or happening.

Just what exactly is a “blessing?”

We Pilipinos practice it all the time in our “Mano po'”

Blessing is a “divine and life-giving action,” the source of which is the Father, and his blessing to humanity is both Word (Jesus) and Gift.

“From the beginning until the end of time, the whole of God’s work is a blessing.”

God blest all living beings: man and woman, Noah, and with Abraham God’s blessing entered human history which was moving towards death, and redirected it towards life, towards its source, God.

It was through Abraham, the “father of all believers,” who when he embraced the blessing, as we learn from scripture, that the history of our salvation was inaugurated.

So that, in the BCBP way, like in the Christian way, we practice blessing our children, our family, our loved ones, with the same blessing that our own Church blesses us daily and everywhere in its celebration of the mass, which in a Liturgical sense is actually “our participation, as People of God, in the work of the Father blessing his people (us)

So, “Mano po,” is not only the title of that Pilipino movie, but could be the greatest gift we could give to those we love. And we do not have to be rich to give it. We just have to be good.