THE WORD IN LENT -6

Love and be holy

First week of Lent, Monday: 23rd Feb, 2015. 

Lev 19: 1-2, 22-28; Mt 25: 27-31.

Already in the Old Testament with the call to be holy the Lord instructs the people on how to be holy. Notice the criteria presented,  that they are all about relationships and mutual responsibility among persons. Right enough in the Gospel we see Jesus letting us know the terms on which we will judged in the end of days. Again it is of relational nature.

It was unfortunate that at some point of time there had been developed a spirituality that claimed that one's holiness is a matter of private concern. Some times our lenten practices may fall in those lines;  let us beware. Pope Francis has been right in telling us to choose penance in such a way that it benefits the poor. However,  its not merely of the financial part that we are worried about, but mainly the part of the inter personal interaction.

Love,  and do what you like, said St. Augustine. Loving is the only way towards Christ like holiness.

CHOOSING GOD'S WAYS

1st Sunday of Lent: 22nd February, 2015

Gen 9: 8-15; 1 Pet 3: 18-22; Mk 1: 12-15

For the past three days we have been seeing about choices, essential at Lent. Today the readings sum up the list by inviting us to seek the ways of God as a whole! In the recent weeks we have been receiving videos and photos and reports of people being burnt, slain, beaten, and beheaded for the sake of their faith! Even yesterday I saw a clip from someone showing a brutal beating up of a group of men who were distributing pamphlets expressing their faith. What was in the pamphlet? How offensive was that?...to those questions I have no answer. But one thing I know, whatever was there on the pamphlet, the treatment meted out to them was not justified at all. And the way they bore it, was moving and challenging! God bless them for their sacrifices.

Accepting God's ways is not an easy task. When things go well, it is fine! Miracles and great favours are also God's ways. But when it comes to accepting suffering, accepting struggles from the hands of God...the challenge is enormous. It doubles, when we do not really know why we are going through what we are facing and what we are moving towards. We have three imageries for us to understand that anxiety, and still submit to the Lord.

1. Noah's Ark: That is the imagery of a work which seems meaningless and crazy: building an ark on the arid ground! There is a forewarning of something and Noah chooses to act on God's directions. Meaninglessness and Fruitlessness of his activity does not bother him! 

2. The Desert of Temptation: Jesus is driven by the Spirit into the desert, says the Gospel passage we read today. Desert, wilderness, impending temptations, frightening dangers...nothing stops Jesus from walking in God's ways. He knows for sure, that God has appointed God's angels to protect him and keep him from stumbling on the stone that is not within God's design. A perfect submission to the Lord.

3. The Passion of Christ: We are reflecting a lot these days, and preparing ourselves to behold in its gravity the passion that Lord Jesus went through for the sake of God's love for humanity. It seemed to Jesus, at times even to us, that it was an over-doing on God's part. Yes it was! Because, it is the very nature of God's love to over do. Everything is given to us in abundance. And the passion, seemed to lead Jesus into such an obscurity. But he did not resist submitting to that design and that is why we had that invincible light at the end of the tunnel, the single point of our hope: Resurrection.

The call is clear: to choose God's ways. In spite of the struggles that exist in it, we are called to lovingly submit to God's ways and that would be the only sure way to our salvation.