What everyone longs for...

WORD 2day: Thursday, 16th week in Ordinary time

July 23, 2026: Jeremiah 2: 1-3, 7-8, 12-13; Matthew 13: 10-17

There is one thing that everyone longs for ultimately in life and beyond... peace and serenity! Every time God calls us to Godself, we are promised comfort, peace, tranquility, peace and well being. These are the lofty gifts that the Lord has in store for us. These we receive not by looking but seeing, not by hearing but listening, not by desiring for riches and luxuries but for the presence of God. When we abandon God, we find ourselves abandoned; not because God has abandoned but because we have abandoned God and moved away from God.

Look at the double mistake that the Lord points out through Jeremiah: one, forgetting the source fountain and secondly creating little cisterns thinking that you will store water for ever, but even those cisterns are leaking and so weak! What a powerful imagery to understand the kind of priority crisis we have in the world today! Yes we are constantly abandoning God, to our own detriment.

There are subtle ways of abandoning God - hearing but not understanding, looking but not perceiving, seeing but not taking to heart the presence and the majesty of God. We are after "useless idols" as Jeremiah says in the first reading. What everyone longs for, what the whole world is yearning for, is right near us for our taking. But we are too busy making our living, establishing our names and defining our own glories.

All that we need to do is open our eyes and see, open our ears and listen, open our hearts and perceive: we have so easily available what everyone longs for, right at our doorstep - the peace and joy that the Lord alone can give!

A Passionate love for the Lord

THE WORD AND THE SAINT

July 22, 2026: Song of Songs 3: 1-4; John 20: 1-2, 11-18

Celebrating Mary of Magdala, one who loved the Lord passionately

Mary Magdalene is one character in the life of Jesus, that many are very curious about. The conspiracy theorists and apocryphal experts find in themselves a great interest to study this person more and more and come up with details that are there and even those that are not there! However they all begin with one question, which the Gospel today answers.

That Question is this: Why is it that the Lord appeared to her first and not to the other apostles?

The Gospel answers it in such simple terms: because she was there!

As we read in the Gospel today, she was there at the tomb early morning. Then, she ran to the apostles and brought them; the apostles saw, they believed and they left... but she was there, she stood on, she stayed at the tomb and kept weeping (cf v.11). She was there, and she got to see her Master.

She was like that widow about whom Jesus spoke of once in his parables (Lk 18) - persistent and insistent, not giving up! She wanted by all means to know what happened to her Master! She could not settle with the answer, 'we do not know'! She persisted in her heart and mind and soul. She stayed on because she just could not go! She was so passionately in love with her Master.

The key is right there: if we are passionately in love with the Lord, we will see the glory of the Lord right in front of our eyes. A passionate love for the Lord seeks the Lord with a yearning so strong that cannot take 'no' for an answer. By all means, the soul, the heart, the person wants to get in touch with the Lord. That is what is to be answered first when i say, I want to encounter the Lord - how passionate am I about it? How passionately am I in love with the Lord? 

My passionate love for the Lord will be seen in my daily life style: nothing else will matter more to me. Every person around me will resemble my Lord to me, every cry of the suffering will come to me as my Master reaching out to me, every heart that bleeds will bring my Master alive suffering right before my eyes - how can I remain indifferent then? Yes, the key is, a passionate love for the Lord!

Mercy and Faithfulness

WORD 2day: Tuesday, 16th week in Ordinary time

July 21, 2026: Micah 7: 14-15,18-20; Matthew 12: 46-50

The most concrete expression of God's faithfulness is God's mercy which is so boundless and plentiful. At times people insist on the 'anger' of the Lord and question where it has disappeared when things untoward happen or persons inhuman affect others or the society at large. Are we really right to attribute human emotions to God: the Old Testament people did it, when theology had not really developed as much as we have it today; when the revelations were yet to come to their fullness, which happened concretely in Christ our Lord!

One attribute that can be logically justified is that of God's unlimited mercy, because we have come to know God as Love... God is Love, God is Mercy, God is Goodness and therefore to say, God abounds in Mercy, could be logically sustained. And the Gospel today clarifies, on our part the concrete way of living our mercy is being faithful to the biddings of the Lord.

Being faithful to the biddings of the Lord would consist of being attentive to everything around me, being truly concerned about everyone around me and being open to the promptings of the Spirit within me. These days when there is so much of killing and destruction all around, and endless uncertainties everywhere... we are called to remain attentive to the Lord speaking through the other, the Lord challenging in and through the other to remain merciful... that would be the most crucial bidding of the Lord today: to be merciful.

Mercy is not about doing some charitable acts here and there, and now and then. But it is becoming like God, growing in our godliness and being signs of God's faithfulness to those who are in need of it. It begins right from home - with your spouse, with your children, with your parents, with your neighbours, with your need strangers... with your brother and your sister! Be ye merciful as your Lord God is merciful!

Want miracles? Here is a project of life...

WORD 2day: Monday, 16th week in Ordinary time

July 20, 2026: Micah 6: 1-4, 6-8; Matthew 12: 38-42

"To act justly, love tenderly and walk humbly with your God" - Micah presents a project of life in these precise words (Mic 6:8). It is a project that he gives to the people to walk in the Lord's ways and not to weary the Lord with their unfaithfulness and stubbornness. How different are we from the people whom Micah addresses today in the first reading? Aren't we just like the pharisees and the others who were incessantly asking for signs from the Lord?

Crying statues, bleeding icons, moving crosses... aren't they all time hits of the so-called religious minded people? And today, in the context of the present war crisis... aren't we asking continuously the Lord to do something, while it has been always the mean human intentions and excessive exploitation of the vulnerable that has led the whole humanity to varied crises thus far! Are we looking for miracles?

Of course, for us miracles are a daily feature, because our God is an awesome God. But looking for some strange phenomenon, exciting events and glamorous happenings, is not the "Christ"ian outlook of a miracle. For Christ, the miracle is in the hope that we can give each other; miracle is in the love that we share for every one around us; miracle is the everyday faith in the Lord and the resultant serenity amidst all the din that we find ourselves in. Don't we have the call to be agents and sources of peace and justice wherever we are?

Let's resolve to do the right, love goodness and walk humbly with the Lord and we will see miracles all around us, on a daily basis!

Choice... the choice of God!

WORD 2day: Saturday, 15th week in Ordinary time

July 18, 2026: Micah 2: 1-5; Matthew 12: 14-21

Jesus was living dangerously. But he chose to do so, for the sake of the Reign of God. He stuck his neck out for the poor, for the oppressed, the marginalised, the ostracised, the exploited, the forgotten in the society. He believed that the Reign of God belonged precisely to them. His life was a hope to the least, the last and the lost.

In this choice Jesus was making present the God of the Old Testament who sided the oppressed, who stood by the just in their struggles and who kept watch over the persons who strove to live according to God's will. The first reading points out the choice of God, the choice for the poor and the suffering. This predilection on God's part distinguished Jesus and the choices he made. His choice was, the choice of God.

There were apparent and real dangers, and Jesus knew it well. Nothing could stop him from proclaiming the Reign of God for he knew he had come precisely for that, to establish the Reign of the God of Truth, the God of the suffering, the Lord of the least, the protector of the lost, the hope of the last.

If we look at the world today - the poor are the last to be thought of, if at all they are considered. The weaker sections are totally forgotten when it comes to economic development and national identities. A nation can execute decisions that would affect entire life of people, in hours' time and nothing is thought about what the homeless and helpless will do! They are almost non entities. What can we do for that, we may ask. If we remain silent we become equally culpable and our choices do not truly reveal our identity as people of God or people of the Reign.

Our identity has to be our Choices... may they be forever in keeping with the choices of God!

Something greater is around

WORD 2day: Friday, 15th week in Ordinary time 

July 17, 2026 - Isaiah 38: 1-6, 21-22, 7-8; Matthew 12: 1-8

God deigns to do strange things for the love of the one who trusts in God! The first reading is one such episode. There are so many others, like the burning bush (Exo 3), the water from the rock (Exo 17), the sign of the fleece (Judg 6:36ff), and many more. These are merely to show that there is nothing or no one greater than the Lord and anything is possible with God!

When it comes to showing mercy to those who trusted, the Lord is lavish, prodigal and unreasonably generous, because God's love is unconditional and everlasting. That was a difficult message for Jesus to communicate to the law abiding, traditional and painfully legalistic Jews. Even today the Lord tries to impress upon us the same message, the message of how loving the Lord is, how unconditional God's love is and how far from judging the love of God is.

No rule can be too big and no custom too important, than the love that the Lord has for you and me and the longing that Lord has for our total well being. When we have a tendency to be legalistic, when we find ourselves prone to judge, when tasks at hand draw our utmost attention, or the situations of stress or crisis try to overpower us, let us realise: something greater is around us, something greater envelopes us, something greater sustains us - and it is, God's love, the love which became man and gave his life for our salvation.

Come, now come!

WORD 2day: Thursday, 15th week in Ordinary time

July 16, 2026: Isaiah 26: 7-9, 12, 16-19; Matthew 11: 28-30

The yearning of a Godless soul, the struggle of a people who have gone far away from God is intensely presented in the first reading today. The world today is treading that path indeed... trying its best to define life sans God; trying to convince everyone around that it is possible to live without having anything to do with anything sacred! Worse still, the trend today advocates creating our own gods and creating gods of ourselves!

We have been thinking for long that we have solutions for every problem and even for those that we do not have the solutions, we could create shortcuts that can keep the pain and the struggle away for the time being. Hardly do we care to remember in history, how some things have put the entire humanity into crisis of varied kinds - the experience of the pandemic, the wars that afflict, the economic meltdowns etc.

The Word today presents to us the situation and the Lord's response - yes, you have gone far away from me, and caused so many grievous situations for yourself. But do not panic; do not fret; I have all this time been beside you just waiting for you to freely choose to come to me. Now, Come!

The Lord invites us today to the true consolation, the real solution, the authentic peace that can give meaning to our daily life and all its strife. He does not promise an absence of yoke, nor does he lure us with a negation of burden...he promises a yoke that fits us perfectly and a burden that proves really bearable: because we live it in the Lord's company. 'Come to me' says the Lord, because all the struggle is since you have moved away from me.

Come to me...and learn of me...and you will find meaning, peace, consolation and serenity!

All things belong to God...even you and me!

WORD 2day: Wednesday, 15th week in Ordinary time

July 15, 2026: Isaiah 10: 5-7, 13b-16; Matthew 11: 25-27

All things have been handed over to me by my Father, says Jesus today in the Gospel. 

'God as the author of history', has been a concept so strongly evinced by the narratives of the Old Testament. Even the super powers like Assyria and Babylonia were considered to be commissioned by the Lord to make certain twists and turns happen in history. This is the background against which Isaiah chides Assyria saying, they think they are the masters of their own destiny and the authors of their success. They fail to understand that there is someone far beyond and above them, who "sits in the heavens and laughs"(Ps 2:4) at the folly of the proud.

This is an ongoing reality even today. Humanity as a whole, the scientific community at times, the political and economic super powers many a time, fall prey to this folly and create and cause atrocities that we have seen all through history. But the saddest part of it is the fact that the worst affected section of the society would be the poor, the innocent and the weak. How many inhuman justfications we have ready, to rationalise such follies.

The Word recalls to us - the Lord scatters the proud hearted and raises the lowly (cf Lk 1:51); God reveals things to mere children and sends the haughty empty! All things are God's and from God everything draws its life and its sense. If I approach life with this sense, my worries find a way out, my concerns cringe to my feet and bearing my burdens become a child's play!

What a saving wisdom it would be to recognise that all things belong to God, yes... even you and me, and all that we dream... everything belongs to God, and in God we live, move and have our being!

Right faith and Right living

WORD 2day: Tuesday, 15th week in Ordinary time

July 14, 2026 - Isaiah 7: 1-9; Matthew 11: 20-24

Unless your faith is firm, you shall not be firm. What is that which differentiates, sets apart a Christian in this world - it is not the name or the external signs or the identification by belonging to a group or the other; instead, it is a matter of faith, an internal disposition towards the Lord who has called you and commissioned you.

Right faith has to create right living; right belief and right action are after all essentially dependent in so many of the religious traditions, as we know of. The Integrity that Jesus demands of us is basically one of right belief and right living. It is not enough to have theoretical correctness in what we believe, the essential factor is that this theoretical knowledge translates itself into a practical living.

Sometimes circumstances and situations can force us to take decisions or make choices that are not proper to the life that we have been called to. It is not so strange to commit such a mistake. But it is not only strange, even highly unbecoming of a child of God when he or she has received all possible warnings and all possible signs of God's directions but still makes a choice that is not worthy of a child of God. Worse still, if the person justifies that choice. And worst of all, nothing can help the one who decides to remain with that choice in spite of all this.

Faith which is not translated into right living and a living that is not guided by right faith, are totally alien to a true child of God. Even if the simplest of signs is given, a child of God will acknowledge it, make sense of it, hold on to the light that the Lord provides and and shape his or her life according to God's will. Where do I stand in this regard?

The Challenge of Orthopraxis

WORD 2day: Monday, 15th week in Ordinary time

July 13, 2026: Isaiah 1: 10-17; Matthew 10: 34 - 11:1

What Hosea has been speaking to us the last week, Isaiah speaks this week... they both underline the importance of Orthopraxis! 

How do we understand that term, Orthopraxis? True Christian life does not consist only of worship and of adoration, it consists of truth, justice and charity. In short, it consists of love which is the concrete translation of worship and adoration into action. The action that blends well with love for God and love for one's brothers and sisters balanced with care, is called the Orthopraxis! 

It may sound simple but it is tough in two senses:

Firstly, I may feel out of place when I begin to take this 'orthopraxis' seriously, because the rest of the crowd seems to be busy doing what they believe to be 'normal' or 'ordinary'...and I shall be left alone seen 'out of the ordinary' or in plain terms, 'a stranger'. Even those who are with me, those who surround me at close quarters may not totally approve of what I live by.

Secondly, it shall certainly be tough because orthopraxis demands that I mean what I pray... that whatever I do on a daily basis does not go against anything what I say in my so called 'prayer'; that what I do by way of 'prayer' may find its continuation in the rest of the things that I do during the day; that there exists no gap between what I pray, what I say and the way I conduct my daily life.

In fact, my ways show the truth that is hidden in my prayer, and my prayers manifest the hidden truth about my daily priorities in life. Where your heart is, there your treasure might be! Not in pleasure or in riches but in the holy will of God needs to be our true joy. It has to be in our steadfast life unto the law of the Lord, our unceasing dedication to True Love, that is, to God.

Let us try to recognise our way to the Lord, laid out so neatly... there may surround thorns and thistles but the way is right... let our prayer and our works orient us onward. Let our prayer transform our daily life and may our daily life inspire our prayer!

It is the Master who sends...

WORD 2day: Saturday, 14th week in Ordinary time

July 11, 2026: Isaiah 6: 1-8; Matthew 10: 24-33

It is the Lord who sends; it is the Master who calls; it is the Teacher who commissions! It is not because I am worthy to be sent, or qualified to be called or skilled to be commissioned... but it is because it is the Lord who calls! As St. Paul says it in such simple terms: "those whom he called, he justified" (cf. Rom 8:29). However unworthy I am, when the Lord has appointed me for a mission, he makes sure that mission goes on through me.

As soon as we speak of being called and being commissioned, let us not think of those in the ministry - the priests or the religious or the lay ministers or those who have some special responsibility in the faith community! The 'called', the 'sent', the 'commissioned' referred to here, are not those but every Christian who is called, commissioned and sent by the very fact of one's baptism in the Lord!

Yes, we are called, commissioned and sent, each of us! And it is the Master who sends, the King who clothes us with his majesty and glory, adorns us with his identity and entrusts with his power. It is in the name of the Lord, that we go - not because we can go or we are competent to go - but because, the Lord, the King, the Master, wants us to!

On my part, the challenge is to be mindful of the fact that it is the Lord who has sent me and commissioned me and to be convinced that the Lord takes care of everything around me, provided I live my life faithful to the call. A thousand may fall at my side and ten thousand at my right hand, but nothing will come near me, for I have made God my refuge, prays the Psalmist (in Ps 91:7).

It is the Lord who has called me and it is Lord who has commissioned me, I am accountable to the Lord and to the Lord alone. In this world and to those around me, I have nothing to prove! All that I need to do is, stand in awe at the majesty of the Lord, believe in the Lord's sovereignty and submit myself in total faith into the hands of God, saying "Here am I Lord, send me!" When the Lord does send us, we will see the glory of God revealed in marvelous ways!

God with us - in thick and thin...

WORD 2day: Friday, 14th week in Ordinary time

July 10, 2026: Hosea 14: 2-10; Matthew 10: 16-23

this sign in Indian tradition is called the Abhaya Mudra,

the assurance of the unfailing and protective presence of the Divine

"Straight are the paths of the Lord" (Hos 14:10), declares prophet Hosea today. 

Straight, and therefore tough. Straight and therefore no compromises. Straight and therefore no confusions! Everyone knows the ways of the Lord; everyone knows what is acceptable to the Lord and what is not; it is made known by the Lord to every human person in their innermost self. No one can say, I was not aware that this is the right thing to do! Of course, every one knows it or at least has the possibility of getting to know it.

Further reflecting, the words of Jesus in the Gospel are quite frightening as we find Jesus trying to warn us against being good, against choosing the ways of the Lord and being God's disciples or apostles of the Word. He does not promise any prospects, instead persecution. He does not announce any offers, instead oppression. He says it very clearly that we will have to suffer for his sake, for the sake of the Word and for the sake of the Reign of God.

Each one knows what is good and what is right... and while choosing it, there is going to be problems and trials - unfortunately we know that too! Come to think of it: one knows saying the truth is the right thing, but doing it, he or she knows the consequences of being isolated; one knows being honest and sincere is the godly thing to choose, but he or she knows too, that it will only bring loss and lag, while the rest of the dishonest world seems to march ahead in victory and glory! So choosing God's ways seems to bring nothing desirable!

Now listen to Jesus who assures the consolation of the Lord, the consoling and affirming presence of the Lord with us, always and everywhere. Because what we have chosen is the way of the Lord, we are certain to find the Lord present with us all the way. The way might be filled with pitfalls and climbs and hurdles and thorns and thistles... but we are sure amidst all these, the Lord walks with us, the Lord speaks on our behalf and the Lord acts in and through us.

What a mighty consolation we have: in thick and thin, God is with us!

Love, because you are loved!

WORD 2day: Thursday, 14th week in Ordinary time

July 9, 2026: Hosea 11: 1-4,8-9; Matthew 10: 7-15

We are loved, loved by God, loved extremely and unconditionally. Like a child, without having to pay back, we are loved by God. Hosea who has been speaking to us for the past few days, brings out the compassion and love of God towards God's children in various terms, always contrasting it with our own infidelity and fickle mindedness. Today he brings out the love that God has for us in terms of a love that a father or a mother has towards a little, helpless child.

In the Gospel Jesus gives a practical demonstration of what happens when we really understand and experience this love of God, so free, so unlimited and incredibly unconditional. When we receive the love from the Lord, we cannot hold it within us - because of two reasons: we receive it undeservedly and we receive it in such immense measures! That is why he sends his disciples far and wide, and asks us today, to go and to take the loving message of God to every nook and corner of the earth.

Experiencing God's love makes me by nature, loving. The more I experience God's love truly, the more loving I become. The corollary is revealing: the less loving I am, the less have I really experienced the love of God. Hence all those hypocrites who spread hatred in the name of God, are despicable beings that have really not experienced the true love of God. Isn't that a challenging perspective to think about?

If we really experience the love of God, drink deep from it, we cannot but give it because our cup overflows! We give because we are filed with it. We give because we are given. We love because we are loved!

The Lost children of God...

WORD 2day: Wednesday, 14th week in Ordinary time

July 8, 2026 - Hosea 10:1-3,7-8,12; Matthew 10:1-7

We see the Lord calling his apostles today and sending them to the lost house of Israel...go to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. It is not about some historically lost group of people that the Word is speaking to us - the reference is to the present situation, the present day when people are more and more drifting away from God, when the very children created by God are losing God, getting lost from God, getting themselves away from God. 

In the first reading today, Hosea gives us at least three ways in which persons today get themselves lost from God.

The first is the image of the "divided heart"...persons divided between the good and the evil, divided between the truth and the fake, divided between love and animosity, divided between giving and avarice.

The second is the image of the "straw drifting on the water" ...the aimless ways of life, the confusing value systems, increasing promiscuity and self-centred justification of everything that leads to relativism.

The third is the image of the "thorns and thistles on the altar"...the sacred of our life encroached by the tendencies of materialism, consumerism, objectification of persons, possessive sense of sentimentalism and many other thinking and practice which cloud the true spiritual sense of human call. 

Every person is a child of God... that is our true identity and fundamental calling, but often times today marred by the conflicting ideas and luring attractions. How are we going to remain children of God in our daily lives? How are we going to reach out to the "lost children of God"? 

The passion to be compassionate

WORD 2day: Tuesday, 14th week in Ordinary time

July 7, 2026: Hosea 8: 4-7, 11-13; Matthew 9: 32-38

The Word today presents to us two contrasting realities: the obstinate sinfulness of the people and the absolute compassion of the Lord. A contrast that fills the pages of the Salvation history, right from its beginning up until now, until our own days and our own lives!

In the first reading, Hosea points out how despicable the people were getting. The dwindling faith, the blatant compromises, deliberate choices for what is ungodly, absolutisation of human autonomy, justification of a lawless economy... wait! are these not the experiences that the society is grappling with even today?

Is there a way out of these? Surely no, as long as the idolising tendency of the human person does not disappear. Today we make idols out of money, possessions, our own ego, power and position, status and social image, sometimes so ironically, even of our own religiosity, forgetting the actual epicentre of true meaning of our existence! How many values, persons and principles we sacrifice in the bargain! As if that is not enough, the society is ever ready to demonise those who stand for justice and truth, those who speak up for God, those who stand for God's people. The so-called mainstream society ostracises those persons as anti-socials, conservatives and anti-progress individuals.

Jesus presents himself to us as a motivating role model, inspiring us to stand for God and for the values of the Reign, inspite of the world that threatens us. Jesus is absolutely compassionate even when he finds that the people were not ready to understand him totally, some of them in fact were calumniating against him. Nothing would perturb Jesus... and it was so because, it was his passion to make people feel the compassion of God. Yes, the theme we reflected on yesterday... being the compassion of God and being compassionate with suffering children of God. 

The challenge today is, whether we can be still compassionate, even though we find those around, not really worthy of it!

To be the compassion of God

WORD 2day: Monday, 14th week in Ordinary time

July 6, 2026: Hosea 2:16, 17c-18, 21-22; Matthew 9: 18-26

We begin to listen to prophet Hosea from today... and Hosea brings out an intense dimension of God's love towards us. He offers the analogy of a spousal love to the relationship between God and God's people. A reminder to us, of the how compassionate God is towards us God's people. The central call is that we realise the Comapassion that God is.

Jesus brings out the same compassion in his own way, his heart goes out to the woman with the suffering and his tender love reaches out to the girl on the death bed. The readings present to us Jesus, as the compassion of God and in doing so has an underlying commission to us. As we are given to understand and acknowledge Jesus as the Compassion of God, we are called and challenged to be the compassion of God in our own way, wherever we are and in whatever we do.

In a culture that is widespread today where the very meaning and implication of love is misunderstood or insensitively neglected, when faithfulness and mutual commitment in family living is more and more under crisis, when possessions and positions mean much more than persons... the message is truly challenging. Today, let us be conscious of every moment when the Lord gives us an opportunity to be God's compassion to others in our own way, beginning from within our families. 

Though little, our compassionate deeds might go a long way in making the day blessed for us and for the others.

The Reign Perspective

WORD 2day: Saturday, 13th week in Ordinary time

July 4, 2026: Amos 9: 11-15; Matthew 9: 14-17

The times are dull and dreary, the situation is grim and gloomy, the future seems uncertain and bleak, people beginning to lose any hope about a more just and peaceful world... there are theories and conspiracies, all of them disturbing... these are the kind of feelings that fill our days today... these same are presented in the readings too! But a truly Christian hope is that, there is always a light at the end of the tunnel. The last word is always the Lord's.

Amos, who has been pronouncing such vehement warnings all this while, at a point comes out with a hopeful projection of the future. In fact, some scholars say, that this part of the text could be actually an interpellation into Amos' text. However, the readings today point to the fact that things can and will change for the better. There will be plenty, there will be justice flowing like river and righteousness like an overflowing stream, in short, there will be the Reign of God established for sure!

The call on our part is that, we should be prepared for it. We should be prepared to have a new mindset, a totally new perspective, an absolutely different value system! Cosmetic changes will not work...patchworks will not be sufficient...little additions here and there, simple deletions at places will not suffice... these adjustments will only make the situation worse, more confused and totally disoriented. What will help is only a radical transformation in Christ. It is what St. Paul would say, 'do not be conformed to this world, instead be transformed in Christ Jesus' (cf.;Rom 12:2); 'those who are in Christ are a new creation' (2 Cor 5:17). And for this we have put on the mind of the Christ (cf. Phil 2:5) and that is a radically new mindset, a totally new perspective, new thinking for the new times, new wine in new wine skins, an absolutely different value system: namely, the Reign perspective!

Communion - the core of being Church

An unfortunate development despite warning

Certainly we are aware of what is happening in the Universal Church these days with the Excommunication of 2 Ordaining bishops and 4 candidates involved in the attempted episcopal consecration of the society of St. Pius X (SSPX) 

See Vatican News

Reacting to this news, I read a comment which remarked - "another Reformation is needed in the Church." Unfortunately, the connotation of the term used "Reformation" sounds exact as the efforts understaken by the group involved amounts more to a "schism" than to an enhancement of the faith community. 

When the Faith community, with all the struggles and strifes, tries to make itself as close as possible to the "joys and the hopes, the griefs and the anxieties of the persons of this age," some forces deny all these inspiration and signs of the times, for what they call "orthodoxy" which infact is more rigidity and fixation. It is the Holy Spirit alone that can help us discern the right sense of bringing the Good News to the world of today!

Doubts or difficulties... till death, with the Lord!

THE WORD AND THE SAINT

July 3, 2026: Celebrating St. Thomas the Apostle to India
Ephesians 2: 19-22; John 20: 24-29

The Feast of St. Thomas could leave us with three lessons to ponder...

1. We are One Church built on the Apostles.

The feasts of every apostle is a reminder of the essential unity that has to exist within the Church. As Paul so vehemently opposes (cf. I Cor 1:10-13), right from the earliest times division has always been a dreaded scandal within the Church. This reality notwithstanding, the divided body of Christ today drains the Church of its witnessing power and evangelical authority. A divided Church is the worst scandal that we can give the world, the Magisterium has repeatedly declared. Instead, a Church with persons of single heart and mind, brothers and sisters who live in harmony, is the highest form of testimony we can offer for the Reign of God.

2. The Church in India has a special responsibility.

The Church in India, boasting a direct handing over of faith by an apostle, has a special responsibility towards establishing the Reign of God on earth. It is unfair to claim privileges but refrain from the duties that come with it. Every person who has received the gift of faith in this country of ancient heritage and culture, has to stand firm in witness to the Gospel thus received challenging the society towards a holistic transformation, ushering in the Reign of God here and now - through justice, peace, equality and sincere compassion for every other.

3. Doubts don't matter as long as the Lord remains close to us.

Thomas is easily identified with the doubt that he raised about the Risen Lord. He was not only the one who wanted to touch the wounds that nails made and put his hand into the hole on Jesus' side, but he was also the one who said, "let us also go, that we may die with him" (Read Jn 11:16). His personal attachment to Jesus covered up for his obstinacy in not believing readily when the rest of the apostles reported Jesus' resurrection. In our lives too, when doubts assail, when clouds gather over our heads and we tend to be overwhelmed by them, the only thing that can sustain us is our personal relationship with Jesus! Doubts or difficulties, we decide to stay all our life, right till our death, with the Lord.

May St. Thomas show us, and especially the Christians in India, the most fitting way of living out the Gospel in the given context, so that we may be authentic ambassadors of the Reign of God, here and now.

Inspiring awe for God

WORD 2day: Thursday, 13th week in Ordinary time

July 2, 2026: Amos 7: 10-17; Matthew 9: 1-8

Persons of God inspire awe about God, despite the unfavourable circumstances that surround them. Look at the two personalities presented to us today: Amos and Jesus. Amos, opposed by Amaziah, the local priest and threatened by Jeroboam, the king in Israel, is warned not to prophesy! What does he do... he speaks, what the Lord wanted him to! Jesus, surrounded by the self-righteous indignant religious fanatics, is scrutinised for every word that he spoke and every move he took! What does he do... he speaks, what his Father wanted him to! And the result: the people were in awe!

First of all, they inspire awe - they leave people wondering and lost in admiration: not that the circumstances around them is all conducive for that, not merely by their competence of speech or performance of a show, but by their lives and their courage to stand for truth. That fills the people with a feeling of awe!

Secondly, the feeling of awe is not all about them! They do not claim it for themselves. Amos clarifies that he is no prophet and belongs to no prophetic band, but he is a simple shepherd and a tree-dresser, but picked up by God and sent on duty by God. Jesus clarifies too that he has the authority because he was the Son of Man, the One sent by God, that his authority came from the Father who sent him! They inspired awe, but not about themselves!

Thirdly and most importantly, they inspired awe about God! Be it Amos or any other prophet or Jesus, all that they did, inspired awe about God. It was not a self-proclamation, a self-coronation, a self-nomination as the messiah of the masses. It was all about God, the glory and mercy of God... that is why seeing their acts and listening to their words, "people praised God" for giving such power to men!

If we need to be truly sons and daughters of our Eternal Father and Mothers, brothers, sisters and disciples of Jesus our Master, men and women filled with the Spirit, in short, if we have to be truly 'persons of God', every word we speak, every move we take and every choice we make has to inspire awe in the people, about God and God's glory! Do they?