Brian Bartholomew Tan

Home/Brian Bartholomew Tan

About Brian Bartholomew Tan

This author has not yet filled in any details.
So far Brian Bartholomew Tan has created 346 blog entries.

Pottery Preparation: A Christian Parallel

As it is written in Isaiah the prophet: “Behold, I am sending my messenger ahead of you; he will prepare your way.  A voice of one crying out in the desert: ‘Prepare the way of the Lord, make straight his paths.’” - Mark 1: 2-3 There are more than 150 mentions of the the word, "Prepare" , kun in Hebrew, [...]

By |2021-03-18T07:43:11+08:00March 18th, 2021|Faith Formation|Comments Off on Pottery Preparation: A Christian Parallel

Reclaiming the Beauty and Mystery of God through Art

"God saw all that He had made, and it was very good." - Genesis 1:31 We live in a world of flux, a world of pathos and bathos, bathed in the fragmentation of a post-modern sociological consciousness, where humanity has been taught to question the existence of God, and of which humanity has been exiled and inevitably spiraled into a [...]

By |2021-03-10T06:27:03+08:00March 10th, 2021|Faith Formation|Comments Off on Reclaiming the Beauty and Mystery of God through Art

Lent: A Season for a Sea Change

The term, "Sea Change" can be traced etymologically to its first use in 1610, when William Shakespeare wrote and produced the play, The Tempest: “Full fathom five thy father lies; Of his bones are coral made; Those are pearls that were his eyes: Nothing of him that doth fade/ But doth suffer a sea-change/ Into something rich and strange. Sea-nymphs [...]

By |2021-10-31T02:39:50+08:00March 4th, 2021|Faith Formation, Featured story|Comments Off on Lent: A Season for a Sea Change

Why Lent and Why We Celebrate It

What do we know about Lent, and why do we celebrate it in the first place? HISTORY Since the earliest times of the Church, there is evidence of some kind of Lenten preparation for Easter, but Lent only became more regularized after the legalization of Christianity in A.D. 313. The Council of Nicea (325), in its disciplinary canons, noted that [...]

By |2021-03-04T05:34:03+08:00March 3rd, 2021|Faith Formation|Comments Off on Why Lent and Why We Celebrate It

The Community in a Diapause Season

A diapause is an indefinite period of time of suspended development in insects, invertebrate, or mammalian embryos, during seasons of unfavourable environmental conditions. The term "diapause" was coined by a German entomologist in 1893 to describe such a period of temporary limbo during the embryonic development of insects. He observed that insects had two cycles of rotation in their egg [...]

By |2020-11-14T12:40:02+08:00November 6th, 2020|Faith Formation|Comments Off on The Community in a Diapause Season

St. John Paul II and Lessons for Community Building

The year 2020 marks the centenary (100th anniversary) of the birth of St. John Paul II. He was born Karol Józef Wojtyła on May 18, 1920, in Wadowice, Poland, and as a youth growing up in Nazi-occupied Poland, studied for the priesthood in secret, and was ordained a priest in 1946. He was no stranger to suffering and persecution. After [...]

By |2020-10-23T03:39:28+08:00October 23rd, 2020|Faith Formation|Comments Off on St. John Paul II and Lessons for Community Building

Liturgical Reflection for 30th Sunday in Ordinary Time -Year A (25 Oct 2020)

In today’s Gospel one of the Pharisees, “an expert of the law” ventured to test Jesus as to which was the most important law. The Jews were governed by the Mosaic Law which comprised the Ten Commandments and more than 600 auxiliary and additional rules for living. It was more in the Pharisees' interest to defeat Jesus rather than to [...]

By |2020-10-23T03:38:50+08:00October 23rd, 2020|Faith Formation, Liturgical Reflection|Comments Off on Liturgical Reflection for 30th Sunday in Ordinary Time -Year A (25 Oct 2020)

A Psalm for Our Community inspired by Psalms 80: 1-4-19

Give ear, O Shepherd of Israel, thou that leaded Joseph likes a flock. My God, lead Maria to make her mind , keep the job and changes, to a new department. Help her Lord as she had harder her heart. Many year she had not been to church, thou that dwells between  the cherubim, shine forth. Before Ephraim and Benjamin [...]

By |2020-10-23T03:38:25+08:00October 23rd, 2020|Faith Formation, Stories & Testmonies|Comments Off on A Psalm for Our Community inspired by Psalms 80: 1-4-19

Inspiration from Psalm 46, God is with us.

God is both refuge and strength for us, a help always ready in trouble; So we shall not fear though deadlines are too many, KPIs are impossible to meet, God’s love for us is a surety when we are obedient, thankful and have a contrite heart, Bad bosses come and go, a job lost opens the door to a better [...]

By |2020-10-23T03:37:03+08:00October 23rd, 2020|Faith Formation, Stories & Testmonies|Comments Off on Inspiration from Psalm 46, God is with us.

A Community of Support

I remember that a few years back, when I was still an undergraduate, I received the news that a teacher who had taught me at Junior College had passed on. I had briefly bumped into her at the university's library just a couple of months shortly prior and in our brief conversation, I understood that she was in the midst [...]

By |2020-10-16T03:46:16+08:00October 16th, 2020|Faith Formation|Comments Off on A Community of Support