The Joy of the Reign: a Choice against the Ego

THE WORD IN ADVENT

Third Monday in Advent - December 15, 2025

Numbers 24: 2-7,15-17a; Matthew 21: 23-27

Balaam praises the Lord for what he sees, while not all really see what he saw! That is being a prophet... prophets are those who are gifted to see beyond. They are able to see something that we do not see, because they choose to see. They choose to see what the Lord wants them to see, not merely what they are able to or what they wish to see! A star from Jacob and sceptre from Israel... is the sign from the Spirit of what the Lord was doing for God's people. 

The joy of the Reign to which we are called this week, comes not from just situations that change or settings that favour - but from a definitive choice; a personal choice to accept and acknowledge the Divine, as we were instructed by the Word on Sunday. Most of the times the block to the joy that God wishes to grant us is - we ourselves, our selves, our self! 

We see that explicated in the Gospel today - the scribes and the pharisees come asking Jesus about his authority. They are not worried about the rightness or wrongness of his works, the rationality of his behaviour, the truth or not in his teachings... they are worried about his authority. They were feeling threatened, their authority at stake. They saw Jesus overturning the so-called order that they had created in their own authority... in fact that overturning order was the recognition of the order of God, the authority of God. 

To choose God over one's own Ego; to choose what God wills and not one's own wish; to obey God's command and not one's own whims and fancies; to choose the Divine plan in spite of the difficulties involved and inconveniences foreseen... that is choosing the joy of the Reign. It is ascribed as the joy of the Reign, because it has to be differentiated from the popular understanding of joy which is doing what I like and the way I like. The joy of the Reign, instead, is a choice against the God... the choice for God's ruling.  

REJOICE AND BE THE REIGN

Accept, Acknowledge and Announce

Gaudete Sunday - December 14, 2025

Isaiah 35: 1-6a, 10; James 5: 7-10; Matthew 11: 2-11

We reach the third Sunday of Advent, and we know the special significance of it. While the first Sunday invited us to 'stay awake for the Reign,' and the second Sunday called us to 'dare to behold the Reign,' the third Sunday deepens the call, and bids us to "Rejoice and Be the Reign"! It is a necessary growth process to shift from looking for the Reign out there, to Being the Reign, or growing to be the Reign. It takes a mighty commitment, but before that it requires that we joyfully accept the Reign and acknowledge its presence; thus our life shall become a joyful proclamation of the Reign that we behold and that we are!

To Accept the Reign is to see the signs and attribute them to the Lord's doing. It requires optimisn and hope to look at what is around and accept it as our context... while we see what dominates is a negativity, lamentation, blame game, self centredness and dissipation. The Lord declares - happy is the one who is not scandalised to accept me as the Lord and Saviour - that is where the Reign begins. To look around and pick up from the numerous possibilities, the possibility that is inspired by faith, that is, those which are inspired by presence of God and our rapport with God. 

To Acknowledge the Reign is to accept that the Reign has come, and to see the Reign already at work. The Reign is not a finished reality that would come into our world! That would be a faulty idea, when it comes to the mind of Jesus - the Reign is amidst you; the Reign is you. That is what Jesus would say. Get up, pick up your mat and walk; your faith has made you whole; go, show yourself to the priests... these were his statements, where he underlines the 'already and not yet' that his revelation stood for. The Reign is already here, and that which is not yet fully here, because I need to grow into it. The call and the challenge is therefore to become the Reign, to be the Reign. But how do we do it?

By our transforming love for the other... making the voiceless speak, making the weak strong, making the faint hearted pick up courage, making the insensitive feel the other, making the indifferent warm up their hearts... in short, by filling this world with the joy of love, the amoris laetitia! Filling this world with joy, would require that I possess that joy and that is why the prophet today cries out: rejoice! Paul in his letter to the Philipians would resound it: again I say, rejoice! Rejoice always, without ceasing because the Lord is with us and he come once again to be with us. We are people of the Reign and the Reign cannot be made present here on earth, except through us. When we are filled with that joy and we grow to be the Reign, we become the proclamations of the Reign.

To Announce the Reign - that was the mission of Christ, and that is the mission that Christ has left us too. To announce is not merely by words, we know. It is the announcement through the very persons we are, our ideals, our priorities, our values, our life, our choices, our entire being. Hence the call to BE the Reign... of course, it is a process, a process of growth, a process of self-transformation, a process of bulding up humanity, a process of spreading love and the joy of loving! The world stands in need of this love today, in need of genuine love that centres on the other, the others, the Other - that is the key to understand the Reign! 

As pilgrims of hope, reccognizant that as pilgrims our hope is the Reign, we are invited to accept and acknowledge the Reign, becoming the Reign ourselves and announcing it to the world with joy and with love!

The Zeal for the Reign

THE WORD IN ADVENT

Second Saturday in Advent - December 13, 2025

Ecclesiasticus 48: 1-4,9-12; Matthew 17: 10-13

Prophet Elijah rose like a fire, like the flaring torch... introduces the first reading today, opening a discussion on Elijah and John the Baptist in particular and on prophets in general. 

The fire of Elijah was the fire that could save us from the wrath of the fire of God according to the Ecclesiasticus... the message is: Elijah is harsh with us, so that we could save ourselves from something that could more harsh - the anger of God on injustice and inhumanities. That is the reflection to be made. Of course there is a big question here at bay, whether we should speak of the wrath of God...but let us rest it, for not losing our focus. The focus is the fire of Elijah that is for our salvation, for our wholeness, for our ultimate destiny - for the Reign. 

The fire of John the Baptist which is compared to that of Elijah is the last minute preparation for the coming of the Saviour... the moment of truth, as it were. An advent message in its core, the call is the prepare ourselves to meet the Saviour any time...and that meeting if it has to be the experience of the Reign, we need to be fired with the zeal of Elijah or John, they who burnt for the Reign. 

Be it they or prophets in general, they were all for God and God's message. They counted nothing more important than carry out the task given to them, announcing the message entrusted to them, inaugurating what we reflect today as the Reign of God here on earth. That is the call of Jesus - towards which John wants to prepare the humanity. 

Hence the concluding reflection for this week - to dare to behold the Reign is to be fired with the zeal for the Reign...if we are not fired by it, how impossible it is for us to behold the Reign, understand it, interpret it and decipher it where it is already making its inroads. Just as even the disciples who did not recognise the Elijah in John, we may fail to recognise the Reign in Jesus, or the world may find it hard to recognise the Reign in our lives... the key is this - that we be fired with the zeal for the Reign! 

Reign willed by God

THE WORD IN ADVENT

Second Friday in Advent - December 12, 2025

Isaiah 48: 17-19; Matthew 11: 16-19

Daring to behold the Reign is all about protagonism on behalf of the Reign, that is taking responsibility for it and making it present wherever we are. However, such a task runs into a danger when someone, in the name of protagonism, makes it a personal project, according to his or her own whims and fancies!

Just imagine some great political leaders today who in the name of making their country or society great, have recourse to policies that are highly personal and arbitrary - wanting to promote one's own causes, interests and popularity; much worse, to the detriment of the others and to the destabilisation of a wholesome future. Can this be justified? That is exactly what Jesus explains with that parable of the children playing in the market place - who are worried about nothing more than what they wish and desire, for themselves and from others. 

As psychology would have it, one of the marks of maturity in a person is the capacity to distance oneself from one's own subjective feelings and finding the space for the other. Spirituality would add to the other, an Other! For us in Christian parlance, it is opening ourselves to the Will of God... Reign in fact is the Will of God being done - on earth as in heaven. Is that not what Jesus taught us?

The Lord speaks to us through Isaiah today, assuring us that it is not all together impossible to know what God wants of us - because, the Lord himself teaches us, the Lord himself leads us in that way, the Lord shows us by so many different ways and means what we need to do and what we need to choose, to do the will of God. Reign of God is the will of God executed with readiness and joy... indeed, it is fullness of our lives, the radical living of what God wants of us and that fullness is truly the Reign that God has willed for all, and for each of us. 

The Rule of the Reign

THE WORD IN ADVENT

Second Thursday in Advent - December 11, 2025

Isaiah 41: 13-20; Matthew 11: 11-15

Daring to behold the Reign is, almost always, interpreted in terms of power and capability to transform. Indeed it is, but the power and the capacity here comes from a very strange source - from our simplicity and the recognizance of it... that is the real rule of the Reign. 

Jacob the worm, Israel the dust... they are not phrases that demean the dignity or identity of those who belong to the Lord, but a reminded or who we really are in comparison to the might and majesty of the Lord. It is precisely this might and power that renders us powerful and capable in the presence of the Lord. 

Jesus described this in terms of John the Baptist, who seemed powerful and tremendous in the sight of the people. Even he is null in front of the simplicity of the Reign, says Jesus, declaring the fact that the real strength of the Reign comes from the One and only Strong: the Lord of the Reign. 

We may be weak or simple, but we are reminded that the right hand of God is stretched out to us and our help comes from the Lord. The first reading repeats that and similar phrases - I will help you, I will answer you, I will hold you, I will not abandon you... these are the assurances and the promises that make Simplicity, the rule of the Reign. 

The fact to be underlined here is - the simple shall be ruled by the Reign and the simple shall be the rulers of the Reign... they are the signs of the Majesty of the Lord among us, and Simplicty shall be the rule of the Reign. 

Strive for the Reign

THE WORD IN ADVENT

Second Wednesday in Advent - December 10, 2025

Isaiah 40: 25-31; Matthew 11: 28-30

Daring to behold the Reign is the task entrusted to us by the Word this week... but the Word today assures us that we are not alone in this run! We are strengthened to strive for the Reign, because the Lord who is with us refreshes us, rejuvenates us and strengthens us. 

Strength is the single most repeated word in the first reading today - within that short passage the term "strength" and its variants are so often sighted and everytime with an innegligible emphasis. However, it has at least two major points of view - one the source and the other the offer; one the giver and the other the gift!

First is the Strength of the Lord. The Strong One of Israel is the first focus - the Mighty one, the Holy One, the Creator, the Everlasting One, the Untiring One, the Most knowing One! The Lord is strong and invincible and we need no proofs to understand it; it is an inevitable experience, whether we like to recognise it or not, whether we interpret it in terms of God or not, whether we let our humility take its precedence or not! That everlasting all knowing One has everything prepared for us and is ready to accompany us in our daily strife... but are we prepared to receive the offer, ready to behold the gift?

Those who hope in the Lord renew their strength... for the Strong One offers to gift us with that strength. Espcially in our fatigue and failures, the Lord wishes to offer us the strength with which we can strive for the Reign, run and walk without getting drained, keep rejuvenating ourselves without getting consumed, arise from every single stumble and resume with the same energy, bear every burden with shoulders reinforced, and never feel over burdened or over worked, when it comes to striving for the Reign. 

Let us recognise at every turn of our life's journey, the Strenghtening hands, strengthening us to strive for the Reign. 

The Flock of the Reign

THE WORD IN ADVENT

Second Tuesday in Advent - December 09, 2025

Isaiah 40: 1-11; Matthew 18: 12-14 

One of the signs or consequences of daring to behold the Reign, is to grow into the flock of the Reign - challenges the Word today. We see three traits indicated:

The first is the capacity to console... it comes, as St. Paul would say elsewhere (2 Cor 1:4), from the consolation that we have received from God ourselves. The capacity to console those in strife is a special trait of the Reign - that we seek the suffering, the lowly, the weak at heart, the downtrodden - to seek the lost, the least and the last. 

The other trait is the capacity is to counter... it is not merely condoning everything merely because someone is suffering that amounts to the Reign. Daring to behold the Reign involves daring to call a spade a spade - to identify all that militates against the Reign and denounce them categorically. Because, with justice he will rule the world, he will judge the peoples with his truth - and his truth and justice can never permit any compromise. 

A third is the capacity to collect... or gather into the flock. No compromise does not mean lack of compassion. The categorical choice for truth and justice comes with a incomparable compassion - that is the inimitable style of the Good Shepherd, the most profound revelation of God the Father of Jesus Christ, and our own! A shepherd who goes after the sinners, denounces sin but never the sinner, rejects  compromises but never despises the weak. The Reign is all about gathering in the compassion of the Lord, the flock that depends on the Lord and the Lord's compassion.  

The Immaculate Conception

The WORD and the Feast

December 8, 2025: Genesis 3: 9-15, 20; Ephesians 1: 3-6, 11-12; Lk 1: 26-38

The Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception of Our Blessed Mother - the dogma of faith that Mary, from the moment that she was conceived in her mother's womb, was preserved without the stain of original sin. The celebration of today has 3 reminders for us:

Reminder 1: God's plan for each of us is eternal! God chose to preserve Mary even before she was born, from the moment of her passing from non existence to existence! How true when the Word says, 'You know me even before my bones were being formed in the womb of my mother.' God knows each of us and has a mysterious plan for us from eternity. Is it not true that God has chosen us before the foundations of the world, as St. Paul says.

Reminder 2: It was indeed a grace that Mary was spared from the stain of original sin, but she on her part remained faithful, sinless and wholly belonging to God all her life that she brought this grace of holiness, right upto the end of her life when she was found worthy of another grace - that of Assumption. We were freed from the bond of original sin too, at our baptism. Is it not our duty to bring this baptismal innocence right through to the end of our life that we can find ourselves in the company of saints and angels in union with God almighty!

Reminder 3: For Mary it was a remote preparation to behold the Son of God within her in God's own time. The feast occurs during Advent and that reminds us that we are in that place too... waiting and willing to prepare ourselves to behold the Son of God, who wishes to be born in our lives this Christmas. How well is our preparation going?

The Message is simple and clear: God has chosen me from eternity to belong to God. It is my faithful response to this call that will determine my status as God's son or daughter. When I listen to God's word and live by it, God dwells in me, God's word will be born in me, making me the dwelling place, the tabernacle, the temple of the Living God!

DARE TO BEHOLD THE REIGN

Dream, Discern, Determine...

Second Sunday in Advent - December 07, 2025

Isaiah 11: 1-10; Romans 15: 4-9; Matthew 3: 1-12

Repent, for the Reign of God is close at hand, in fact it is right in your midst; do you dare to behold the Reign? That is the question that the second Sunday of Advent raises to us. The Reign is the hope of the pilgrims… and as pilgrims we are called to develop within us the capacity to behold the Reign, the signs of the Reign, the seeds of the Reign and the possibilities of the Reign. At times, although it is right to say we await the Reign, it is more apt to say, we behold the Reign, because the Reign has been already inaugurated by our Lord, the incarnate Son, who came to live with us to make us understand that we are people of the Reign and the Reign is our hope… which is to be beheld in our day to day experiences. That, actually, is a dare… that we begin to dream, that we strive to discern and we remain determined about our hope.

 

Dare to Dream, tells us Isaiah today – the Reign is a dream! Just look at Isaiah’s words today… I personally had a very childish curiosity to see what would that scene be like, if what Isaiah explains becomes a prompt to create a AI image… just have a look at it if you wish to, on my blog: https://thots-n-lots.blogspot.com/2025/12/is-ai-ah-11.html ! It is a dream… but a dream of hope! That is what it is on the mountain of the Lord, says Isaiah and that is what our land would be, if we realise the Reign of God here and now. Is that possible? A big Yes and a sad No! A big “yes” because it is indeed possible when everyone loves the other… as St. Paul instructs the Romans, if everyone begins to respect and regard the other and remain united to the other in the Lord – it is indeed the Reign of God on earth. It would certainly be a “no”, if the forces of violence and hatred, deception and corruption, selfishness and wickedness, continue to take the world by force and rule over it.

 

The Dream requires us to Discern… “I have a dream” is a beautiful thing to say! But what kind of a dream? To be the most powerful on earth, to possess everything that I can set my eyes on, to have every one under my control and command…even these are dreams! There are those who have these dreams and they are already doing enough damage to the world. The dreams that we have, need to be discerned with the help of the Spirit, the Spirit of the Lord, the Spirit of justice and peace, the Spirit of righteousness and wisdom! We have a clear criterion given: ‘following the example of Christ Jesus.’ The criteria of discernment presented by John the Baptist is the same again – the baptism of the Spirit and fire, brought to us by the King, who invites us to his Reign, the Reign of truth and justice, righteousness and peace, true joy and eternal happiness. It is a choice – we need to make that choice because the time is near; the axe has already been laid at the roots… if we do not bear the right fruits we shall be felled. The discernment has to lead us to a clear choice and determination!

 

The Discernment leads to Determination… when apostle Paul refers to “he who helps us when we refuse to give up,” he is inviting us to have the spirit of the Prophets – like Isaiah and the Baptist through whom the Word speaks to us today! Determination for the Reign, prepares us for the worst – hard realities of life as symbolized by the austere life style of the Baptist, opposition and persecution as the death of John the Baptist exemplifies and rejection and isolations as most of the prophets, John the Baptist and Jesus himself experienced in their days. Determination overcomes any possible fear or pessimism, making one go to any extreme, even unto death, as we see in the example of the prophets. It requires real determination to behold the Reign, for it is an extreme challenge to live by the Spirit of the Reign. However, it is our very identity, our call, our vocation – to belong to Christ, to belong to the Reign.

We, as pilgrims are hope, are called to realise the hope as pilgrims – that the Reign is ours and the Reign is here amidst us. We become truly people of the Reign, when we dare to behold the Reign – with our dreams, discernment and determination. 

Is-AI-ah 11

If Isaiah was an AI : 

isAIah 11: 6-8 

The wolf lives with the lamb,

the panther lies down with the kid,

calf and lion feed together,

with a little boy to lead them.

The cow and the bear make friends,

their young lie down together.

The lion eats straw like the ox.

The infant plays over the cobra’s hole;

into the viper’s lair

the young child puts his hand.