God reveals: the Christ within us

WORD 2day: Saturday after the Christmas Octave

January 4, 2025 -  1 John 3: 7-10; John 1: 35-42

What the Word wishes to communicate today, proceeds from where it left yesterday, in fact, in continuity with the themes of revelation we have been discussing in the past two days. First we said, the revelation is about Jesus as Christ, and yesterday we reflected on how this Christ is the spotless Lamb of God. Today the Word tells us, we are like Christ too - children of God, as Christ was the Son of God. 

When Christ, in Jesus became just like us, he revealed to us that in the core of our beings we are just like him! We are begotten children of God. Let no one deceive us to believe anything on the contrary, warns St. John today in the first reading. Yesterday, when the Word said, Christ is spotless and we are called to be so: that is sinless, we might have had an instant question, "is it possible at all?" And Christ wishes to respond to us today - Yes, it is possible.

How is it possible? Because we are Christs too - the Gospel says, Christ means anointed and each of us has been anointed, right when God chose us to be children of God by the anointment of the Chrism, at our baptism. Jesus the Christ tells us today, that it is not only true that he became one among us, but it is equally true that he has made us ones like him, sons and daughters of God, begotten of God! The challenge is that we recognise it, get convinced of it and begin to live it in our daily life, because all the ends have seen the salvation of the Lord and we are the chosen instruments to experience and announce that salvation.

When John pointed out to the Lamb, there were persons who were ready to take a readical decision to follow Christ, to go where Christ is, to stay with Christ and become like him! That is our call too - to become like Christ, that is to distinguish ourselves as children of God, living a holy life and loving our brothers and sisters. We are saved by Jesus the Christ, but we shall experience that salvation only as long as we make a choice to, go out there and live like him!

God reveals: Christ, the Spotless Lamb

WORD 2day: Friday after the Christmas Octave

January 3, 2025 - 1 John 2:29 - 3:6; John 1: 29-34

Jesus is revealed today as the Spotless Lamb that takes away our sins. In this, God is revealed as the Righteous One and Sinless One. Anyone who lives in God does not sin, and anyone who sins has never seen or known God - says John in the first reading today. This is a direct and categorical declaration on God and those who belong to God. Hence when John declares Jesus as the lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world, we are given with not only a revelation of who Jesus is, but that of who God wants us to be - people who are chosen to belong to God, to be God's children.

To all who received him, he gave power to become children of God - yes, that is a special ability, a particular preparation, a deliberate choice - to become children of God. That is the role that the Lamb took upon itself to accomplish: to make us children of God. Two indispensable ways to move towards that goal: renounce sin and acknowledge God. That reminds us of the baptismal promise that we reconfirmed at our Confirmation ceremony: do you renounce satan and all his works and empty promises? And we said, I do. 

Renouncing sin is renouncing the evil one - for sin comes from the evil one, those who are in God shall not go by sin. While converting oneself from sin and changing one's life, are essential elements of becoming God's own children, we cannot forget that these begin with the simple Step zero, of renouncing sin - calling it by name and judging it in face. This is the biggest of the crises of our times: the loss of sense of sin - the lost of the capacity to identify sin and call it as sin.

Acknowledging God becomes phony, if it is not preceded by a denouncement of the Satan and all the ways of the Satan... the dangerous trend that we see in the world today is allowing the two to co-exist. That is an absolute debilitation of truth, of faith and of anything that is transcendent. Jesus' person, his birth and his life choices, his death and the purpose attached to it, is a deliberate acknowledgement of God and a reminder of what such a life would be.

May the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world, help us to take on with courage and hope the world of sin!

God Reveals: Jesus is Christ

WORD 2day: Thursday after Christmas Octave

January 2, 2025 - 1 John 2:22-28; John 1:19-28

We have just ended the Christmas Octave. Let us centre today's reflection on a question: what was the purpose of Incarnation, the mystery that we celebrated for over a week! The focal purpose of the incarnation was, or is, revelation! The self revelation of God to us human persons that we could understand who God is, what God's relationship with us is and how much we matter to God. In the following three days the Word shall be preparing us towards the great commemoration of the epiphany, the manifestation, the revelation in the Son of God, that we will be celebrating shortly. 

Today the revelation that is underscored for our comprehension is that Jesus is Christ. And we know that it is the grace of the Spirit that anyone can declare, "Jesus is Lord" (cf. 1 Corinthians 12:3). There could three modes of negating this fact of revelation. The first is a naivete  in our understanding. This can happen to even the good willed, because good will alone would not suffice for right knowledge. There are thousands in fact who hold Jesus to be a great, kind, wise and gifted person, a great hero in history - but that would amount to mere incomplete understanding, although in itself it isn't wrong. 

The second is a rejection, where although one knows who Christ is, prefers to give that identity to some one else, or something else. At times this could be because one has not had the possibility of knowing to the full or one is stubborn not to see what is being revealed. Whatever be the reason, there is a lack here which could make the person(s) distant from the Truth, the ultimate, liberating Truth.

The third is a more dangerous and preposterous attitude of imagining onself as the Christ, that is Messiah or the Saviour. Whoever it be, whether as persons or as communities or as even churches, if we consider ourselves as those who are the saviours of the world, we are replacing the Lord, with ourselves. This psuedo consciousness is the greatest danger that is affecting humanity today, against which we are warned. Let us ask the Lord for the grace to encounter Jesus and acknowledge him as the Christ. 

BEGINNING 2025 WITH HOPE

Mater Dei, Gaudium Spei & Pax Dei!

January 1, 2025: Solemnity of Mary, Mother of God

Numbers 6:22-27; Galatians 4: 4-7; Luke 2:16-21

It is a beautiful day, a blessed day and a bountiful day when the Lord deign to grant us a fresh new year, and specially a year of jubilee, to be lived with the joy of hope (Gaudium spei)! May this new year 2025, be filled with hope, that comes from the unceasing presence of God with us! In the gracious Will of God, we begin this year with our Blessed Mother, who is honoured today with the title, ‘Mother of God’! Before we come to focus on that central theme of the day – Mary, Mother of God, we have a few other scintillating points of attention from the Word today! In fact, we have, in all, five points of inspiration and instruction from the Lord, at the beginning of this year.

Focus no.1: Blessing

The Lord not only blesses with a new year, but packs it up with blessings too! How do we understand God’s blessing? Certainly, today we come to the feet of the Lord, with remorse and regret for the instances of negligence and experiences of failure in the past year, with anxiety of newer plans we have for the fresh year and with a sense of need for supernatural assistance to make this year a fruitful and joyful journey. The Lord knows our mind and hence we have the Word today, presenting to us the words of blessing – the protection from God, the light of guidance from God and the merciful gift of peace from the Lord. What stands out is the last verse from that passage we read from the book of Numbers which defines what a blessing truly should be: “calling down the name of the Lord on someone or something”! That goes well with the reminder from the Gospel – that today is the eighth day from the birth of our Saviour, who was given the name Jesus – the name above every other name, the name we are invited to call down upon each other today. We shall be celebrating a feast proper of this name in a couple of days, but the reminder today is the blessing we have in this name!

Focus no.2: Fullness of time

In the second reading today, St. Paul calls our attention to the fullness of time. The question is, who decides the fullness of time? Certainly not we! We cannot see beyond what has gone by and what is… eternity belongs to God and God alone can define the fullness of time. Fullness of time is not about future, it is not about some auspicious moment to be waited for, but the sense of walking in the fullness of the present, with our hands in the hands of the Lord. It refers to every moment of here and now in our life, every moment of God’s guiding presence that can fulfill within us and through us, the eternal design of God for ourselves and for our brothers and sisters through us.  

Focus no.3: Children in the Son

St. Paul reminds us that we have been made sons in the Son of God, daughters through the Spirit of the Son sent into our hearts, children in that Son who makes us heirs of the One who created us, called us, spoke to us through the ages and has been constantly relating to us, whether or not we are aware of it. It is not because we deserve it or we have merited it, but because of the covenant that God made with us – that we shall be his people and He shall be our God. It is yet another renewal of the covenant, as we conclude today the octave of Christmas and begin a fresh and new year. What needs to fill our hearts today is that courage and hope – it is in this connection that the jubilee theme we have been given with makes a profound sense: to be pilgrims of hope! That hope which does not delude us, comes from the simple and undeniable fact that we are children of God, children in the Son of God.

Focus no.4: Abba, Father

Children of God, that is what we are made by the Spirit who cries and makes us cry out: Abba Father. This is the guarantee of fullness, the assurance of peace and the joy of hope. When we call God, our Father, we are not only declaring ourselves as children of God, but also that every other child of God is our brother and sister – what else could be a more fitting foundation for peace? That is why giving us the message for the 58^th World day of Peace, Pope Francis invites us to reflect on the theme: forgive us our trespasses, grant us your peace! It is in mutual forgiveness and care that we can ensure peace for entire humanity. It is interesting to recall the three concrete lines of action that he proposes: the forgiveness of international debts; the abolition of capital punishment; and setting up a world fund to eradicate hunger and poverty. Those are simply directives to declare that, I am my brother’s keeper, because we are children of the One Father!

Focus no.5: Mary, Mother of God

The Solemnity that we celebrate today, and underlined in the Word today, invites us to thank God for introducing to us Mary, as the Mother of God – this has quite many implications for our faith in its wholeness. Two simple but concrete messages that we can take from this dogma are: we are not merely instruments in the hands of God, or at least God does not consider it that way. We have a specific role to play, with our identity and liberty and our capacity to choose God and God’s will. That is where Mary shines as a Mother, not merely because she gave birth to Jesus, but because she collaborated in the Salvation Plan of the Father. Secondly, Mary is not only mother of Jesus, but declared mother of God because she persevered till the end – from the annunciation at her home in Nazareth and the manger of Bethlehem to the Cross on Calvary and the Cenacle of Jerusalem… she remained faithful to the call that she received, that is why she becomes the mother of God, the God made flesh and God who saved us in His death and resurrection. Clearly, the message here is how ready we are to persevere in the midst of discouragements and dreariness… a pertinent thought for the beginning of the year.

May our Blessed Mother, the Mother of God, be with us all through this new year, and fill us with hope, that we may make this year truly a pilgrimage of hope, keeping our hope alive and instilling hope in every one we encounter. May God forgive us our trespasses and grant us his peace. May God shine His light upon us and walk with us all through this new year 2025.