This week is about how you and your partner can have a financial plan and budget your lives together.
Check out more at the "To Heaven" Tab here on the site - The Symbol - All is Love
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🙏🏽”Prayer in action is love, love in action is service.” - St. Theresa of Calcutta ... One of the criticisms of the church is always about our action in the world. Although we have so many social institutions that help the homeless, feed the poor, etc. sometimes in the humanity of the people in the church we may not always have been the most loving or charitable.
Even for myself working inside the church there are so many times I have felt discouraged and wanted to turn away, but in my own prayer I hear God say the words “That’s why you are here. To make the difference.” And I am reminded of the truth that has been revealed to me in his word and in the sacraments and know I must endure. Ghandi once said “Jesus. I love Jesus the Christ. It is Christians I have a problem with because they do not live out fully the teachings of their Christ.”... In the reality we are all sinners and will all at times fall short, but one of the signs to the world is our daily living, if we are an example “by our love”(John 13:35) then we can start to see the work of God all around. I want people to see how much I pray, not by me posting pictures or talking about it but by the work I do, the way I am with my family, and how they see me in day to day living... ✝️🕊🌎 - The Symbol - All is Love ✝️ 📖🕊”Grace perfects nature...” - St. Thomas Aquinas
As most know, I didn’t grow up in church.... Most people at least have the story of a praying Grandma, and although my Grandmother was very much a teacher of love for me, God or prayer, or anything like that was not a part of her when I was growing up. It was actually not until recent years when she asked me what a rosary was because she said she always thought people saying words so fast sounded funny to her. 🙏 📷 - Yeah that’s a snapshot of how I grew up. Guided by good hearted people who because of circumstances like social status didn’t have the resources of knowledge so many others had.... People who worked hard and genuinely cared about others, but also suffered from the effects of original sin that all of us do and without a direction of faith many times got caught up. There weren’t any priests, or religious brothers; nuns, or ministers who stepped into my world. Over time my exposure to it as I look back all entailed me ‘going to them’.... 📖Social teaching. Moral teaching. Spirituality. Things like marriage, or theology of the body was taught to us by the shows and movies we watched along with the music we listened to. Thank God for grace - the free gift that breathes life into the lungs of dirt and makes it Golden. I’ve never been removed from my nature or nurture, but time and time again I am grateful for a God who doesn’t make me seek after him but instead out of love continuously comes after me to perfect me in him. I just pray you keep working on me to make me into a visible sign of your invisible grace here on earth. 🌎 ✝️ - The Symbol - All is Love Got to work on this and some other video projects for my sister Alexandra. Proud of her for taking this step and putting out her first book. Check this out.
"Songs of Freedom" is a poetry book by Alexandra Henry. In this video learn about the person behind the book, and the inspiration for it as well. Purchase on Amazon at: https://www.amazon.com/Songs-Freedom-Alexandra-Henry/dp/1793483639 - The Symbol - All is Love The prayer🙏 ... “Father bring us back home, instill in us the word which is our backbone; we’re just children that act grown.”.... 🤔💭 Simple thought. I never heard or seen scripture verses growing up.... We didn’t pray before meals or before bed. Church was a “good deed” to check off the list for certain occasions and times of the year. And even with that it wasn’t something as a full family, just with mom... I learned Jesus died at 33 because of a Nas song; I learned what abortion was in another song; and the first scripture verses I ever heard were because of Lauren Hill and DMX. - I had memorized prayers like the Our Father and Hail Mary, but they didn’t have meaning for me in my younger years.
Due to all of this, the first prayers I memorized and prayer along with in conviction were those of DMX on each of his albums.... This is not to make up for the songs of violence, sex, and robbery on those same albums but somehow in the midst of these things that were ugly God met me. Years have gone by and I have learned so much more about the nature and character of our creator, developing a relationship with him that is committed and has some battle wounds to show for it. As I sit back in these recent times reflecting on my journey I am grateful to you for your hand in every step. Lord thank you that even though I’m not yet where I’m going, I am not where I used to be. Amen. ✝️🌇🌃🗽🕊🙌🏽 - The Symbol - All is Love 🤔💭It was 7th grade... My music teacher got some recording keyboards and tape recorders. I stopped going to lunch. Every day I would go in and experiment making beats, recording tapes that at the time I thought was going to land me a deal and I would not have to go to school anymore.
On my way home from Harlem back to the Bronx with my younger sister each day, we would stop at the bodega first for a quarter water and some chips and then jump on the 6 train for about a 30 minute ride. Standing over my younger sister I had these tape cassettes that I would play on my Walkman from what we had created at lunch and as I got home I would blast these bootleg Cd’s I bought from one of the guys on the street. For a few months my biggest rotations were The Eminem Show, and Get Rich or Die Trying. 💿 On one end, my very introspective and self reflective art continued to be fed, and on the other this entrepreneurial ambition began to form. My identity as a man began to form in these pre teenage years, and this idea of the hustle - or being self-sufficient; the goal of not working for someone else but being able to provide by building your own brand was implanted. At the same time walking through the streets of Harlem and the Bronx I started to become aware of the social inequalities and the conditions in which we minorities lived in.... Somewhere in my subconscious the idea started to form that those who held the money didn’t care about us and the only way to change our conditions was to compete with them in the marketplace. Years later coming to my faith, I thought I had to put these things aside as I would be told things like “this is being worldly” or it is “being attached to possessions”... Poverty was seen as an ideal, and to have less as a form of humility. After being purified and finding it in its truest form learning poverty from a spiritual perspective is not having less or more, it is about proper care of the things God has given to is. In all of my experiences, I know this was all for a reason - “I gotta make it to heaven, I’m going through hell.” 🕊✝️🗽🌇 - The Symbol - All is Love 🗣J.Cole ... “No role models and I’m here right now.” 🤔💭
I was 17 years old... Already recording and performing for a few years/selling mixtapes I signed up for this international competition my school was taking part in. After the first round performance, conversations began amongst some adults who wanted to get me in contact with some of the major labels, and by the second round for the city... even more. I remember sitting in the first major meeting with Violator management. After waiting in the lobby, I saw L.L. Cool J leave the building coming out of an album listening party. When I was called in to the meeting room to dialogue and play a few of the tracks I had compiled in a Demo I remember the side talks around the room. They eventually arrived at, “He’s good; but he’s too conscious for the market.” This proceeded from place to place, even as I met with independents such as one owned by Floyd Mayweather a year later.... This was before I even fully came to my faith. Fast forward a few years. I’m speaking and performing - this time at a big event in Staten Island. We were on the drive back, and a missionary here from Korea riding with us started a conversation about childhood influences and “role models”. The others in the car along with myself speaking from the perspective of minority Americans all expressed that due to family issues, school, the abuses which caused mistrust in church, society, etc our main influences and teachers were the rappers. Most of us didn’t have Fathers in the home, attended public schools, and were affected by things that left us finding our only hope in these “celebrities that looked like us.”... I’m grateful to the Cole’s and Kendrick’s, and others who although are not directly religious or anything like that but in this current market that dictates poison to our communities serve as a voice of truth and hope in that space. Whether they know it or not - they are many times a voice of God in a dark space. 🌎 💡🗽🌇🌃 #SainthoodInTheCity #hiphop #jcole #faith #rolemodels #encultured @allislovemedia #ministry #nyc #hope #eucharisticworldview -The Symbol - All is Love This was shared on my Instagram stories and on my Facebook LIVE but yesterday it was brought to my attention, that a fake page was made on social media and on GoFundMe trying to raise $1,000 in my name. They stole pictures from this website, and even shared my actual youtube videos. THE ACCOUNT WAS NOT MADE BY ME. I only once did a GoFundMe campaign and that was years ago in order to help with a project I was working on with the World Youth Parliament to go to Berlin, Germany and participate in the conference. Above are screenshots from my cellphone of the pages that were made.
I wanted to document this here on this blog to let all of you know, if you ever get an email, or Private Message, etc. of someone saying it is me and they are asking for money then it is a LIE. The only place that I have taken donations(almost never; and even less through internet especially) is through the "DONATE" page here on this website. - The Symbol - All is Love Week Ten of Marriage Mondays.
This week is about how you and your partner can continue to grow. This is a weekly series released here on Mondays at 6PM where we will share about relationships and marriage as we build with one another as a family from week to week. Please follow @Pinky2Heaven on Instagram, and for more information visit the "To Heaven" tab here on this site - The Symbol - All is Love Acoustic Worship version featuring Jesus Vargas, and Dafne Alejandro of The Symbol's Rap song "Last Words". (Video Filmed and Audio recorded in the Parish Hall of Santa Maria Church, Bronx, NY)
Inspired by Jesus Last Words found in Luke 23:46; "Father into your hands I commend my Spirit." Stream the original song "Last Words(Lift My Hands)" by The Symbol (@BeTheSymbol). Now available on all streaming platforms.(iTunes/Apple Music; Spotify; Tidal; Google Play; Pandora; Amazon; and more...) - The Symbol - All is Love Some of you that follow on social media may know that I was hired for this gang prevention program for teens in the Bronx as Assistant Program Director. The program offers time after-school with music lessons, tutors, art therapy, sports, media creation, cooking, etc. in order to help young people and their families have more resources and the space to engage in activities which could positively impact their lives. We also have had things like workshops for college, immigration/knowing your rights, etc.
The program was founded in remembrance of Lesandro "Junior" Guzman-Feliz when he was murdered outside of a Corner store bodega last summer in June of 2018. For more about this story, check: https://pix11.com/2018/12/21/judge-sets-date-for-first-murder-trial-in-bronx-bodega-killing-of-lesandro-junior-guzman-feliz/ Here is also a local news article about our program: http://bronx.news12.com/story/38534931/councilman-torres-announces-1m-in-anti-gang-funding Please pray for us, these young people, and the entire community as we work to impact the Bronx and change lives by offering alternatives in this space. - The Symbol - All is Love I feel like lately I have been on camera and stuff more than ever before which is good in one sense as it creates/documents some of the work, and provides a way of sharing information and the "good news" at work in my life but on the other side it is super exhausting.
What I have been enjoying more and more however is when this work is for aspiring writers, film makers, etc that are in school working on projects for this stuff. In the past months I have been interviewed a number of times from young adults I have met in different places as help for their school work. Here I am finding more of a place to dialogue and do more relational ministry because the projects for the most part haven't had to do directly with the faith, but instead with my life, art, and media work where I am able to slip in some of the ministry stuff and plant some seeds. This has also put me in a place of a reoccurring thought/conversation about how "good" the quality of someone's art is.... from its concept to execution. For music it has been not only musical production quality, but also the depth of the lyrics and song-writing, the thought behind it, the melodies, and rhythms used etc. For film it has been not only the camera quality, but also the creative twist/spin on angles; storyline; etc. What has been coming up with this however is that people should be attracted to your art because it is good - not because of where you are from, or who you are connected to/involved with etc. And what that means for us as a church is that of course we have great depth theologically/philosophically, etc. but also its creative approach in which it is represented should dialogue with the culture as well as challenge the culture with its quality. I have found myself many times approached by people within the church to collaborate on projects and I always have a hard time telling certain people that their quality isn't up to par - how I love their enthusiasm, and their fire to share our faith but also want to challenge them to grow in the quality of their creative expression. Especially living in a day like today where due to technology almost everyone has access to produce works and mass market it from the comfort of their home, we seem to have an even bigger responsibility to be better at our crafts. And I know this has been a challenge even for me due to a lack of financial resources to get better equipment, but I have to always even challenge myself to be better. I say all of this to say - we are all students.... We should all be growing; in our knowledge, and should push our standards forward so much as they stay in the realms of morality and good catholic social teaching. Let's challenge ourselves in the way we write; in the colors we use; in the depth of our art expressed, and let us never be afraid to enter into new territory to expand our creative expression plus it's reach. - The Symbol - All is Love For everyone in New Jersey, here is an event for you guys to come to. Join us at Kean University on March 27th at 7PM. - The Symbol
- All is Love |
The Symbol's MUSIC :These are my thoughts . . . My Beliefs . . . My Actions . . . Everything I do. This is the documentation of my quest towards creating more unity in the community by authentic #LOVE.
This blog was started at: DaLyricalMiracle.blogspot.com and continued at: allislovefeelx.tumblr.com But now, as I have matured in my understanding as "The Symbol" and no longer Brandon Feel-X Morel you can continue my journey with me here. FREE DOWNLOADs(click above images to get download link)
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