Let's get our basics right!

WORD 2day: Thursday, 5th week in Easter time

May 19, 2022: Acts 15: 7-21; John 15: 9-11

The apostles, in the first reading, so clearly mirror the mind of Jesus who said, "my yoke is easy, my burden is light" (Mt 11:30). They decide that anything more than what is really necessary is an unwanted burden. Jesus dared to summarise the whole of the law into just one dense, profound and challenging word: LOVE.

The commandments served but one purpose: Remaining in the love of the Lord. That was the only concern that Jesus had. Jews or Gentiles, circumscised or uncircumsised, it did not matter to Jesus and the apostles learnt it well from their Master. St. Paul would say categorically in 1 Cor 7:19 - "circumcision is nothing and uncircumcision is nothing; Keeping God's command is what counts."

And Jesus had already clarified what that commandment was - the new commandment that I give you, love one another as I have loved you - in terms of serving each other, in terms of washing the feet of the other, in terms of doing unto the other what one wishes to be done to him or her. 

This is the mindset with which Jesus says: "the law and the prophets hang on these two commandments" (Mat 22:40) - the Love of God and the love of the neighbour. What other summary can we give for a Christian life, other than this? 

Let us beware of complicating issues: our faith is simple, easy and light, if only we get our basics right: L O V E.

The Model of the Synodal Church

WORD 2day: Wednesday, 5th week in Easter time

May 18, 2022: Acts 15: 1-6; John 15: 1-8

We are speaking so much these days about "synodality"... with the ongoing preparations towards the Synod on synodality! With Vatican Council II, the ecumenical council that has revolutionised the Church, this theme has gradually taken the forefront of the discussions within the Church! Today we have the account of the first ever ecumenical council held: the Council of Jerusalem! It stands as a wonderful Christian model of handling crisis and confusion. Getting together in brotherly dialogue and faithful communion - that is the model of the synodal Church for us.

The Community of faith gives us a splendid possibility of remaining united as branches to the one Vine, Jesus. Today, when crisis and confusion arise, how many human methodologies we follow to handle them: writing anonymous letters, spreading calumny about others, raising unchristian slogans and following uncharitable actions. Is it truly a 'Christ'ian way of approaching a problem? What are we aiming at? Establishing our ego? Gaining our political mileage? 

Division within the Church is the worst scandal we can give to the world. It is a definitive lack of the synodal spirit of getting together, listening to each other and deciding for the good of every faithful and for the entire faith community. It is not about who is right or who is wrong, it is not about who is more important and who less... it is about what is God's will and what will unite us as One Community of the people of God.

Let us be united with the one Vine, nourish ourselves from that vine, be filled with the sap from that vine and give fruits worthy of that vine. Or else, we will have to be pruned and charred!

Revealing the Risen Lord in the Spirit

WORD 2day: Monday, 5th week in Easter time

May 16, 2022: Acts 14: 5-18; John 14: 21-26

Jesus seems to be winding up his earthly phase with his disciples and he bids them farewell as if to say they have to take his place thereafter. And orientatively, this whole week we will listen to this series of sayings from Jesus. He had assured them, that their faith in God and their faith in him, will stand them in good stead...they will do all that he did and even more! (cf. Jn 14:12) Today he promises an added facilitator: the Holy Spirit. All these promises were not mere words... they worked.

The People saw in the apostles great prowess... they healed the paralytics and gave life to the dead. The people found it so overwhelming that they thought that the gods had descended on them. If we really believed in the Lord and beheld his risen presence with us truly, people would see great things in and through us. 

The world needs people of God today; the world longs to see the real majesty of God revealed in ordinary things and we ought to be the instruments in the hands of God. This is not to be interpreted in an immature sense of creating sensational happenings or feigning miraculous events or fictitiously concocting revelationary phenomena...that is not what is expected of us. 

All that we need to do is, dispose ourselves into the hands of God, allow the Spirit of the Lord to take hold of us and reveal through us,  the merciful, loving and powerful presence of the Lord today. That is what we are called to do: to be in the hands of God, in the service of the Spirit, that the Risen Lord may be seen, witnessed and believed by all who encounter us.

The Peace that comes from the Lord

WORD 2day: Tuesday, 5th week in Easter time 

May 17, 2022: Acts 14: 19-28; John 14: 27-31a

"It is necessary for us to undergo many hardships to enter the Kingdom of God," say Sts. Paul and Barnaba (Acts 14:22). Elsewhere in the Acts (see 5:41) we read, "they rejoiced that they were considered worthy to suffer dishonour for the sake of the name" of Jesus, after having received severe flogging. As soon as they were released from prison or from investigation, they were found back again preaching with a greater zeal.

In the Gospel today, after giving his peace, the Lord instructs: 'do not let your hearts be troubled!', for the peace that he gives us is not the peace that the world gives: a peace of compromises and conveniences, a peace of inaction and suspicious silence! But the Peace that Christ gives us is the peace of the Reign, the peace that comes from justice and equality, peace that comes from true love and compassion. It is not contract of just war or war against terrorism; but a total cessation of war or corruption or injustice or any inhumanity! Jesus has given it to us as he promised! It is enshrined in the Word. True love for entire humanity and holy compassion for the least and the last.

Our call is to spread it, take it to every heart that longs, to every corner of the earth, specially those communities of persons where there is war and intolerance. In doing it, we will face troubles, floggings and stonings in words and ways, criticisms, threats and presecutions. The times are making that possible more and more... but let none of our hearts be troubled!

New faith, new community, new world!

FIFTH SUNDAY IN EASTER TIME

May 15, 2022

The Lord promises us new earth and new heaven... these are no empty words. And we know the Lord who created these originally is certainly capable of creating it anew, that is, rejuvenating it, revitalising it and reinvigorating it. The Word does not stop with  reporting the promise that the Lord makes, but lays out how this promise can be logically claimed! Yes, the new heaven and New earth will be experienced, when we renew ourselves in our faith individually and transform ourselves into a new community of the people of God.

New faith, new community, new world... And today a new Saint... 

Today is the canonisation of St. Devasahayam... Thanks to the grace of God for the opportunity to participate in the ceremony at St Peter's

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0E9L97OblIc&ab_channel=VaticanNews

To be loved; and to love

THE WORD AND THE SAINT

May 14, 2022: Feast of St. Mathias, apostle. 
Acts 1:15-17, 20-26; John 15: 9-17

Feast of any apostle is a reminder to each of us that we are called to be an apostle, sent in the name of the Lord. As my Father sent me, so I send you...said the Lord after his resurrection. Though the event of the election of Mathias is overshadowed by the sorrowful and unfortunate end of Judas, the feast has its usual charm of inviting us to an absolute commitment to the Lord.

Mathias is added to the list of the 12… the account presents us with three criteria to be worthily part of the band of ‘Apostles’. It will do us good to look at these three criteria, and correlate it to ourselves, whether we can be counted as being part of the group of apostles. 

The first of the criteria is, a personal, first-hand experience of Christ – not just what we read from authors or heard from preachers, not merely what someone shared or what someone else felt, but the impact of what I have experienced of Jesus, the personal encounter that I have had with Christ. 

The second criterion is being a witness to Christ before the world, specially in a world that runs madly after wealth, ease, power, social acceptance and public image! Doing that, would we be judged irrelevant and meaningless? Certainly, yes! 

The third is the Choice of the Spirit – you did not choose me, no I chose you declared Jesus. It is the Spirit who chooses, empowers and uses one as an instrument! Our responsibility is to REMAIN, to remain in the Spirit and bear abundant fruit!

The Word today adds a wonderful note to the reflection, as they seem to suggest the primary objective in being an apostle, or for that matter a disciple.iIn Jesus' own words...As my Father loves me, so I love you! The primary aim is to receive in all its fullness the abundant love of the Father, through Jesus our friend! And it is in receiving that love, our joy is made complete! 

Let us rejoice in being loved, and love each other in return!

To be God's begotten

WORD 2day: Friday, 4th week in Easter time

May 13, 2022: Acts 13: 26-33; John 14: 1-6

Let not your hearts be disturbed! That, according to Jesus, was the sign of Faith, faith in God and faith in God's only Son. Though we know that Jesus is the Incarnate Son of God, the real glory of his existence is seen in the fact of Jesus' obedience to the Father. 

As St. Paul would point out in his letter to the Philippians (chapter 2), it was because of his total obedience that Jesus was given the name above every name, that every knee shall bow and every tongue confess his Lordship. Even God almighty declares, "You are my beloved Son, today I have begotten you!" It refers to the eternal choice of the Lord to hold us close to God's heart and a response in correspondence to that choice. 

Faith, Obedience of Faith... these could be considered high sounding words, but for us on a daily basis, it is in simple words: doing the will of God. It may sound more simple said than lived! How do we do God's will? It is simple yet again.

Doing the will of God is taking our duties to heart despite the discouragements, putting our heart and soul in the well being of those around us in spite of the possible ingratitude, putting the Lord first and at the center of all that we are involved in ... these are some concrete ways of doing the will of the Father. 

When we begin to live on a daily basis, in these terms, certainly we shall hear it said of us - "You are my beloved child, today I have begotten you!"

The Message and the messengers

WORD 2day: Thursday, 4th week in Easter time

May 12, 2022: Acts 13:13-25; Jn 13:16-20

St. Paul makes a long list of messengers running right upto John the Baptist, and in the Gospel, Jesus speaks of sending his own apostles as messengers. Sending messengers was not merely a need to perpetrate one's own progeny or contribution; it is not the kind of branding that is so often spoken of in the corporate world today. It is not like opening branches everywhere to establish one's monopoly! That is not what evangelisation is all about - trying to play the number games and by some way of the other increasing our strength.

The core of our faith, is the Message. It has been so, it is so and it will always be so! The message was announced through ages through prophets and persons of God (cf. Heb 1:1). At a point in history, the Message became the Messenger... that was the crucial phase of history when the Message, the Sender, the Messenger (or the Medium) all came together in one sacred and mysterious union - in the person of Jesus Christ, the Incarnate Word.

What was till then being considered a task of a select few among the people, with the coming of Christ, was handed over to the entire people of God and every child of God. We are God's messengers and that calls us  primarily to live the message, and in and through that, to announce the Message to the World.

How conscious am I of the Message? Do I really connect myself to the Message? Do I love the Message as much as to live that message! In what stage am I, towards becoming that Message?

Carrying out orders

WORD 2day: Wednesday, 4th week in Easter time

May 11, 2022: Acts 12:24- 13:5a; John 12: 44-50

These days we are given with certain signs to identify the flock of the One, Divine Shepherd and today we have an instruction very clear:  to Receive and Carry out Orders. 

A life of faith is all about getting orders and carrying them out. We find in the first reading of the day that the Apostles got orders directly from the Holy Spirit, to set apart Barnabas and Paul for a particular task. Elsewhere too in the Acts we see similar accounts of getting orders for the regular running of the Church. In the Gospel, Jesus clarifies that he got his orders from his father and instructs us that we too need to follow suit. Receive orders and carry them out... that is the way you can belong to the fold of the One Pastor!

Two things can hinder us from Receiving Orders: One, not hearing: because we do not listen sufficiently. We are so busy with running our own show that we are thoughtless about the orders that direct us constantly! Even if they arrive, we are are so occupied with so many other things, that we are not in a position to pay attention.

The second reason is a more serious: pretending not to hear! This is a conscious despise of the orders  that are given us. The Lord, the Spirit of the Lord keeps inspiring within us or keeps supplying us with clear cut directions and orders to be on the right path. At times owing to the inconvenience it can cause, or the difficulty it will put us through, we pretend not to hear those orders and proceed with what we think best. And when things turn out for the worst, we begin to panic and blame everyone else, including God.

Can we train ourselves to receive orders and carry them out in our daily life?

To be called Christians...

WORD 2day: Tuesday, 4th week in Easter time

May 10, 2022: Acts 11:19-26; Jn 10:22-30

It was in Antioch that the disciples were first called Christians, evidences the first reading today. They needed a name, a different name to refer to the people of the new way of life! And looking for one, they narrowed down on something with a reference to the One who inspired this way of life: Christ himself.

It takes time to be called a Christian, to be identified with the name of the Nazarene who made a crucial difference in and through his life. Even today, it is the same. It takes time to be identified a Christian: our lifestyle, our attitudes, our priorities, our relationships and our loving ways should merit the name.

Just as Jesus says in the Gospel today, 'the Father and I are one', so should we be able to say: Christ and I are one. What a model we have in St.Paul who declared, "it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me!" (Gal 2:20) And the other apostles, like Peter, John, James, Philip and all others who were doing marvellous deeds like Jesus and in the name of Jesus. 

We have a name; our life has a mission... the name is Christ, and our mission is love! When we love, we shall be with Christ; when we grow to be love, we shall be Christs, alter christus! We will be called Christians, when we grow to be so; when we grow to be love. Until then, our title 'Christians' will remain just a title and not our name!