Primacy of God and the Quality of Faith

THE WORD AND THE FEAST

November 21, 2023: Remembering the Presentation of Mary in the Temple

2 Maccabees 6:18-31; Luke 19: 1-10

Zacchaeus' episode in the Gospel is an evergreen example of an encounter that transforms a person. As St. Paul would say, 'if anyone is in Christ, there is a new creation' (2Cor 5:17). When we allow the Lord to really encounter us, the Lord transforms the whole person. Nothing remains the same. Everything is new because we begin to see everything from the perspective of the Lord. 

As Pope Francis said in his first encyclical Lumen Fidei, faith is not just to see Jesus, it is to see with the eyes of Jesus (LF 18). When our faith is authentic, the whole perspective changes. What seems to be important, what seems to be necessary for someone may seem totally secondary to me, because I see as the Lord does, because I think as the Lord does, I love as the Lord does. 

Eleazar in the first reading demonstrates the same to us - 'such pretense is not worthy of our time of life' (2 Mac 6:24), he says, caring the least to preserve his life, because he did not want to lead the others astray from God. His priorities were different from that of the rulers who were persecuting them, the officials who were executing orders or the society that stood around them, because he was a man of faith!

Today we remember the event of Mary being presented in the Temple - why does the Church remember this event though it is not part of the Biblical account. There is a very important reason - highly spiritual and simply logical. Mary, as far as we see in the Gospels, seems to be totally resigned to God's will and absolutely obedient to God's voice. Where does this begin from - the answer is the memory we celebrate today. The parents offered her to the Lord, thus inculcating within her mind and heart, that she belonged to God and God alone. That was reflected all her life. 

Even for us the message is same today: the primacy of God in our life, defines the quality of our faith. How absolute is God's place in our daily lives?

To see the Reign

WORD 2day: Monday,  33rd week in Ordinary Time 

November 20, 2023: 1 Maccabees 1:10-15,41-43,54-57,62-64; Lk 18: 35-43

While it is important to stand for Interreligious dialogue and inculturation of faith, it is equally important to realise what is an integral process of dialogue and inculturation. If only 'all becoming one' is the objective, then today we should be comfortable with what is happening around... all, in every field, everyone is becoming one in their selfishness and self seeking tendencies! It is our call to become one, but which one? Not anyway one... but One in just one way! 

Becoming one as a humanity, bound by true and wholesome values, standing for real freedom, dignity and solidarity, that is our task. That is what the Reign is all about. At times it will look impossible and totally a dream, an utopia, a fable and a fairy tale. But in faith, it is not! We are going to hear of the end times beginning from now for the next two weeks - not about the end of the world or end of the times but it is the end of hopelessness and end of misery. Because we are convinced the Reign is at hand. 

That conviction requires an eye of faith; let us cry out for it and the Lord will grant us! Jesus Lord, have mercy on us, that we may see, that we may see the Reign!