Authentic Faith and Right Relationships

WORD 2day: 11th November, 2017

Saturday, 31st week in Ordinary Time

Rom 16: 3-9,16,22-27; Lk 16: 9-15

Note those words used in the first reading today - friend, fellow workers, fellow prisoners, compatriots, brothers and sisters - it is all full of relationships! Faith without relationships is empty. In fact faith in itself is a relationship, a relationship with God that defines every other relationship in life. Yes, it is all about relationships, but the right ones.

Faith and Right Relationships are connected to each other. Faith creates right relationships and right relationships mark authentic faith. How do we understand right relationships - they are relationships that are centered on God. They are not relationships that turn out to be possessive, selfish, self centered, self seeking, materialistic and mundane. They are relationships that center on God, that promote true selfless love, that respect the mutual dignity and freedom and that edify each other towards the spiritual maturity. These are Right Relationships, nurtured by Authentic Faith. 

When Jesus speaks of choosing one master and letting go of the other, this is what he means. By "money" he means all that is mundane, all that is materialistic and all that is merely utilitarian. By "God" he meant, all that is spiritual, faith centered and truly Divine. Relationships, if they are right, will surely lead us to this Spiritual Edification!

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How long yet that they taste the Lord!

WORD 2day: 10th November, 2017

Friday, 31st week in Ordinary Time

Rom 15: 14-21; Lk 16: 1-8

A couple of days back, a few of us priests had gone for a programme out and were returning by bus! As always, we were enjoying each other's company with cheer and laughter. I noticed an old lady who was sitting by a window and staring at us. She was quite stern faced and gloomy and before I could notice it fully, her eyes caught mine and she asked, 'are you all priests'? (ofcourse, we were in civil clothes and not clerical). No sooner than I nodded in response to her question, she began to curse - you are all liars, the church is finished, it will no longer stand, you are all living in the name of god! Though it was bad that all who were around were looking at us with pity, I could only look with pity at that old lady, and her bitterness that was so vividly portrayed on her face! Certainly she has some experiential baggage that makes her resent so badly. This event instantly popped up in my mind as I sat with the Word today.

How long yet that the bitter people of the world turn around and taste the love of God? Just like the pagans that Paul speaks of and the steward in the Gospel who suddenly discovered his insecurity, the proud and the arrogant, the resentful and godless of today need to come back to the Lord. The role that you and I are called to play here is to be reminders, signs, pointers, of that love and meaning that God alone can offer. For that we need to first take in that love as much as we can and hold it out to the world. For as St Paul affirms, 'those who have never been told about him will see him, and those who have never heard about him will understand.'