ON TELE/JLAG
Many years ago, on Televisa, your father had a very interesting program that I watched, but I remember that they covered his face, what was this due to?
R. Don Jesús, the reason why you couldn’t see my father’s face was because it wasn’t him, he was an actor. My dad wanted to project a sense of mystery and keep some of his privacy. I seem to remember that the actor was someone with the last name Armendáriz or Arozamena, I think.
SELF-HELP/BERTIZ
What can you recommend as a good self-help process to help me with my anxiety attacks and that does not require the services of a professional?
A. How about trying the practice of self-compassion?
Anxiety sometimes presents as excessive worry that one is not good enough or has negative traits. These thoughts, when played in a loop, can be demoralizing and can make day-to-day activities miserable. One way to combat this negative self-talk is to practice self-compassion. While it may seem strange at first, trying to view your current situation the way you would if a good friend were going through it can be a start. Give yourself the kind of comfort you would give a friend, instead of the harsh criticism you often give yourself.
Another exercise in self-compassion is to find and focus on a photograph of yourself from childhood. Instead of directing your thoughts towards your adult self, direct them to that child. Recognize that your adult self deserves the same kind of reassurance that a child deserves, as you continue to learn, too, even if it’s different things.
MARIA
Don’t you think that Mary is not mentioned much in the Bible, since she is more important. How many times is she named she?
R. Don Rafael, you are right, the Virgin Mary appears mentioned at a wedding where Jesus turns water into wine; he tries to see her son while he is teaching, and she is there at her crucifixion. In fact, Mary is mentioned more often in the Qur’an than in the New Testament.
I share another curious fact. Mary was an accidental virgin and the Gospel of Matthew is the only one that tells us that Mary was pregnant before she and Joseph had sex. It was said that she was “with a child of the Holy Spirit.” As proof of this, Matthew cited an Old Testament prophecy that states: “A virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and his name will be Emmanuel.”
Matthew was using the Greek version of the Old Testament. In the Greek Old Testament, the original Hebrew word “almah” had been translated as “parthenos”, from there into the Latin Bible as “virgo” and into English as “virgin”.
While “almah” means only “young woman”, the Greek word “parthenos” physically means “an untouched virgin”. In short, Mary was said to be a virgin due to a translation accident when “young” became “virgin”.
THE BONES
What has more bones, the hand or the foot?
A. The human hand contains twenty-seven bones compared to twenty-six in the foot. The extra bone in the hand, the pisiform, is a carpal and an example of a sesamoid bone.
More than half of the bones in your body are in your hands and feet. There are 27 in each hand and 26 in each foot, and the way they are arranged is remarkably similar. If you bend your fingers, you can see that each one contains three bones, except for your thumbs, which only have two.
