The Voice, the Bread and the Messenger!

WORD 2day: Friday, 3rd week in Easter time

April 23, 2021: Acts 9: 1-20; John 6: 52-59

The Word today presents to us the three fundamental ways in which the Lord continues to reveal Godself to us! We encounter a hard headed crowd that opposes Jesus and a stone hearted man being melted by the grace of God... the stubborness of humanity and the power of Divine Grace - what a lovely play of life and meaning in these! Let us unravel the three splendid elements of God's self manifestation amidst this play that continues even today!

In the first reading we see, that the Voice from heaven touched him; the man sent by heaven healed him; the Bread from heaven strengthened him. What an example of the Word, the Sacraments and the Community of faith working together for God's Reign! Yes, these are the three elements we are presented with.

The Word...the daily and unceasing revelation of God! It is never dead or outdated, but alive, cutting into the finest of existent realities and making it glow with meaning. When we miss it, we miss the lamp for our feet, the way for our life, and the very ground for our being.

The Sacraments...specially that of Eucharist, an undeserved gift offered to us, to be strengthened from whatever weariness or worries we find ourselves in. Today specially when we are so stricken by infirmities and fear, how blessed we would be to find our strength and solace in the Sacrament, God's living presence amidst us.

The Community...our own brothers and sisters, who are given to us to be loved. It is not that we expect someone to be sent to us, as Ananias was sent to Saul, but we need to become the Ananias to those in need, those blinded in their hearts and spirits, those unable to see the light of joy and serenity! Let us be the persons of God, the people of God to take hope and peace, joy and serenity to them!

Can we today behold the goodness of the Voice and the Bread, that we shall become Messengers of God's love to all, especially those who are burdened and weak!

The Meal, the Memorial and the Mandate

THE WORD IN THE HOLY WEEK

Another Passion Week amidst the Pandemic - the Maundy Thursday

April 1, 2021: Exodus 12:1-8,11-14; 1 Corinthians 11: 23-26; John 13: 1-15

This Thursday is central to the Paschal Mystery, for varied reasons: firstly, because today we see happening things that are a foreshadow or a foretaste of what is to come - the body and blood to be given on the Cross is already pre-announced, the passage from death to eternal life that is to be accomplished on the resurrection of Christ is already explained in the passover meal, the very essence of Christ's life, death and resurrection is summarised in the call to serve each other; secondly, because it is the beginning of the climax of God's salvation plan, the climax which began in the incarnational event and reaches its peak in the resurrection event. The Thursday gives us three important messages to ruminate on - 

The Meal and the Eucharistic Community. The Lord renders us the Eucharistic Community by giving us a meal to nourish us individually and as a community. The meal, as explained in the book of Exodus, already contains so many Eucharistic elements - the community factor, the salvific factor, the festive factor, and so on! This day makes us Eucharistic Community and that is why so much importance to the Eucharistic Lord - with the meal and the adoration and the vigil.

The Memorial and the Ministers of the Lord. The Lord sets up this gathering of the people of God as a memorial of the covenant, specially the everlasting covenant made in the blood of Christ. And to facilitate memory, he creates his own ministers, so close to his heart and leaves them as living memories of his covenant. This is the challenging call that the Lord has given to every person called to ministerial priesthood...that they remain the living memorials of the presence of the Lord amidst God's people. 

The Mandate and the People of God. The people of God are created in the name of God and the defining identity that is given, is the command of love! Love - it was that made us and it was love that saved us and love is the call that makes us trully people of God. "By this they will know that you are my disciples, by the love that you have for each other." The mandate, from where derives the word Maundy Thursday, is not merely a command to do, but a task that defines our very existence as people of God. 

May this day remind us, that we are everyday called to be people of the mandate, the mandate of love!

SACRAMENT OF THE SELF-GIVING GOD

The Solemnity of the Body and Blood of Christ

June 14, 2020: Deuteronomy 8: 2-3, 14b-16a; 1 Corinthians 10: 16-17; John 6: 51-58

It is a beautiful day to think of the most loving mystery of our faith: the Lord becoming our nourishment! God feeds his people and moreover, God feeds the people with God’s own self! What a mystery and how loving to think of it!

One of the most beautiful and meaningful tabernacles that I have seen, I picture it so well in my mind, has a metal carving of a pelican mother, pecking her breast to tear her flesh open and feed her young ones with her own blood dripping from her body. Such a beautiful image to refer to Sacrament contained in that sanctum sanctorum. It is from the famous Christian legend that made the early Christians adapt that symbol for Christ himself.

Jesus' act of giving his body and blood to the believer is in keeping with the identity of the God whom the people of Israel always believed in and experienced. The God of their faith was signified in that act and that is why, when he declared, 'I am the bread from heaven, and those who eat of me shall not die', the people were shocked; some were enraged, many others deserted him! It was indeed a hard teaching for them. But it was a fact: Jesus did give himself, his body and his blood for the everlasting life of the whole world (cf. Jn 6:51). In this act of giving his body and blood, Jesus reveals to us three profound dimensions of God.

The first is, God as a parent: God as Father and Mother, is a fabulous revelation that Jesus has made of God. It was not entirely a new dimension; the people of Israel did experience it in an intense manner. Moses reminds them of that in the first reading... he reminds them of how God walked them through the desert and provided them with the food and drink that they needed. The provident God was actually a father, a mother, a loving parent, though the people preferred to look at him only as an awesome God and an almighty God. Jesus introduced God as "Abba", "Father", a loving parent, a lover par excellence. In giving his body and blood as food, Jesus highlights this element of God, the element of nourishment of the children, the element of feeding and the element of fending for the needs of the children.

Every time we come to the Eucharist, shouldn’t we imagine it as a child coming to the Mother asking for food! Just imagine that scene and the love that is involved in the mother giving the food and the trust with which the child asks for it. That is Eucharist. In this particular time that we find ourselves unable to approach the Lord in this Sacrament, is it not this longing that we need to nurture and treasure within us? Sad it would be if some find nothing lacking, during this experience! Loving it would be, if we long for it and every time we make a spiritual communion express our willingness to stay with the Lord and stay with the Eucharistic love always!

The second dimension is, God as a friend: There is no love greater than a person laying down one's life for one's friend (Jn 15:13). Jesus taught this model and lived it to the letter. As he shared that last supper with his friends he made it very clear to them, that it was a prefigurement of what has to happen on the Cross very shortly. The bread to become his body and the wine to become his blood... we do it in memory of him right until today, in memory of that friend-God who came down to live among us, be like us and give of himself to us.

Every time we break the bread, we are challenged to be friends of God, to imitate his sacrifice, to burn with the same love for our brothers and sisters. The second reading elaborates this. Every time we raise that cup, we are reminded of that last drop of blood that came from his side, reminded us that we are called to live not merely for ourselves, but for others, for those who are in need of love and meaning in life. It is easy to ask the Lord who is my friend…as that person asked Jesus, “who is my neighbour”…but Jesus would never answer that. Jesus would only tell me, to whom I need to be a friend, that is, to whom I need to reach out, to whom I need to give, to whom I need to extend my loving arms! What an eucharistic message that is…to constantly reach out in love!

The third dimension is, God as part of us: The most difficult-to-digest dimension is this: God as part of us, God as dwelling in us! If you eat of this body, you will remain in me and I in you, says Jesus. God wants to remain in us, to dwell in us, to form part of us! God becoming part of us!?! Isn't that kind of scandalous? But that is the truth. What a difference it will make if only we realise and believe in that truth! We will come to you and make our home with you (cf Jn14:23), abide in me as I abide in you (Jn 15:4), you will abide in me and I will abide in you (cf. Jn 6:56)... we find these repeated teachings where Jesus reveals a unique dimension of a God who wishes, longs and seeks to abide, not just with us, but IN us. If we truly understand its implications and effects, we would have attained the eternal life that Jesus promises.

Every time we get down to pray, be it in the family or as a community or personally, we need to picture to ourselves this God, God who is part of us. We are not trying to cry out to a God who is far away; we are not complaining to a God who does not know what is happening in our life; we are not trying to convince a God who does not understand what I am going through… we are getting in touch with that God who dwells within us, who is part of us, who is suffering with us, who is feeling the same loneliness as we do, who is much more close to us than we can ever imagine! Every prayer should remind us of the Eucharistic Union that we celebrate with the Lord, the Eucharistic Union that we are called to live every moment of our life, because God is PART of us.

As we celebrate and thank God for this greatest gift of all, today, let us strive to experience God as our Father, our Mother, our Friend, and above all... Our God as abiding within us. Thus shall we be transformed more and more into Him.

LOVE SERVES IN EVERY WAY

Holy Week 2020 - MAUNDY THURSDAY

April 9: Exodus 12:1-8,11-14; 1 Corinthian 11:23-26; Jn 13:1-15

Love is basically a willingness to submit oneself to a way of life that wishes the good of the other. Knowing the needs of the other, without having heard from him or her is a sign of love. Committing myself for the good of the other, without ever thinking of what I would gain, is an attitude of love. Being ready to lay down one's life for the good of the other is the ultimate act of love. There can be no love better that one being ready to lay down one's life for the other and it all begins in being at the service of, the other and the good of the other. The world has grown so callous to 'the other', all that matters to one is oneself and one's own - where is love here? and where would service be here at all!

Maundy Thursday is the day on which the Lord gave us the famous mandate, the mandate of love: love one another as I have loved you; love in action - wash each other's feet; love to be identified as belonging to Christ. The day is filled with so many things to thank the Lord for. 

First of all, the Eucharist instituted today is a loving service in action, by the Son of God who gives himself up for our good. Love serves by making itself the food for the other, by destroying oneself that the other may live!

Priesthood that is initiated today is a service, a ministry of bringing the Lord to the people. It is an offering of love that persons chosen and called make for the Lord, to the Lord's people, for the Lord's mission towards the Reign of God. 

Then comes the commandment of love - the spoken words of Jesus, that would be lived out in his action of serving the disciples, washing their feet and waiting on them at the table! A love in concrete action.

In every one of these, that which stands out is love. Love is our identity, love is our mission and love is our meaning. Love is seen in service, true and selfless service.

Life-giving Life

Solemnity of Corpus Christi - 29th May, 2016

Gen 14:18-20; 1 Cor 11: 23-26; Lk 9: 11-17

We celebrate today the Life-giving Life, the Life that came down to give us life, by giving one's own life! Corpus Christi reminds us of the great miracle of Orvieto. Jesus is the life giving Lord, the Lord who gives up one's own life 

Bread and Wine are  ancient symbols that were already present in the Jewish tradition and Lord Jesus uses that symbol in a manner totally amazing. Bread and wine stood for two important messages. One, it was the regular food of those days. Secondly, it represents the two major realities of life: bread that stands for the everyday experience and wine that reminds us of the special moments we shared.

Body and Blood, the two essentials of a being- that is what Jesus became for us. Jesus is the life, the life-giver and the fullness of Life. 

The life giving Lord chooses to give life in this world and prepare us for the eternal life. The Eucharist is a concrete manner in which the Lord is open to the multitude of persons and specially persons who have never experienced the things that we just spoke about. 

How hungry are you?

WORD 2day: 3rd Thursday of Easter

May 9, 2019: Acts 8:26-40; John 6:44-51

Christ proclaims himself to be the food,  the nourishment of our being. I am the bread. ..the flesh that I give is for eternal life. The Word is made flesh and it is there for our taking. But how intent are we on taking in the nourishment?

Today we see the Eunuch who encounters the Word through Philip. Though it was the Spirit who led Philip there and initiated the process,  it was the person's interest that propels the entire process of conversion and transformation. He invited Philip onto the carriage and he asked for the explanation and he demanded to be baptised. He was hungry for the Lord. He yearned for the nourishment. It was there and he claimed it for himself.

Anyone who eats of the bread that I give will never hunger and he who drinks of my blood will never thirst, says the Lord. The world is, and teaches us too to be, hungry for so many things in our lives - money, name, fame, power, possessions, prominence, ego, success, domination and manipulation! There is but just one thing we need to hunger for - the Lord, and only that will remove every other needless hunger! 

The question is,  how hungry am I for the Lord,  for the life giving bread, for the ever living  Word?

WORD 2day: 13th April, 2016

Without Hunger or Thirst

Wednesday, 3rd week in Easter

Acts 8: 1-8; Jn 6: 35-40

Luke presents a very dramatic account today of two contrasting movements gaining ground: one, the persecutions against the new believers in Christ and the other, the community of believers growing stronger by the day both in quantity and quality. They were persecuted, they were killed, they were dragged to prison, they were flogged and stoned...but nothing disturbed them. How is this possible?

Jesus gives us the answer in the Gospel: because they have no hunger nor thirst. They do not hunger for anything other than the nourishment from the Lord. They do not thirst for anything other than doing what pleases the Lord. The model for us is Jesus himself who said 'my food is to do the will of the One who sent me'.

If we truly eat the body of Christ with ardent faith and absolute and conscious understanding, we would not hunger for anything more, nor thirst for anything else. Our needless yearnings and disproportionate cravings are because we have not understood the real treasures that we have in our faith, in our spiritual covenant with the Lord.

HOLY WEEK 2016 - The Maundy Thursday

THE TASK: SERVE

24th March

Maundy Thursday - the very name reminds of the mandate we have from the Lord and Master, a mandate that is so compelling because it was not given merely in words, but in and through a life that was lived! All the three events we remember today have the same message in different forms!

THE LORD'S SUPPER:

The First event is the Lord's Supper...not so much what they and how they did it, but what transpired in the mean time becomes the first mandate to us. It is the same with our families and communities too...not so much what we have at table and the variety of the spread that really matters, but what transpires around it. How many of us enjoy our table-time, in contrast to merely respecting time-table! The former concerns persons and the latter, programme. 

Jesus uses the encounter at the table, not merely here but with Zacchaeus, with the Simon the Pharisee, with the disciples to Emmaus and so on, for a spiritual encounter, an encounter that would transform the life of the other. How many of our table encounters have ended up as spiritual enrichments? Here again he uses this table-time to bring a strong lesson to the disciples: LOVE IS SERVICE!

THE EUCHARIST:

The second event is Jesus giving us his body and blood... an anticipation of what is about to happen on Calvary. Jesus anticipates the blessing of the sanctifying act, the salvific self-giving in inviting his disciples to eat his body and drink his blood. What gruesome agony he underwent on those following days - all for the love that the Father has for us; all for the love that Christ wanted to manifest to us. Jesus infact exemplifies the mandate that he gave just a while back. The lesson is so clear: LOVE IS SELF-GIVING!

THE PRIESTHOOD:

The third event is the institution of the Priesthood... as the ministry of making present this mandate given and exemplified. Priesthood is a gift to the Church, a gift that makes present the mercy of God to God's people. It is a ministry that perpetuates the self emptying of God. The Son of man who came to serve and to be served, continues to minister to his beloved flock. Priesthood becomes thus a standing reminder to serve and offers a splendid lesson: LOVE IS LIVING FOR THE OTHER. 

WORD 2day : 1st August, 2015

A Righteous Celebration

Saturday,  17th week in Ordinary Time
Leviticus 25:1,8-17; Mt 14: 1-12

Inspite of all the talk about recession and tough times,  celebrations do not seem to have reduced or stopped. Especially in the religious realm, celebrations find their importance and significance intact. At times they are exaggerated too to the extent of being detested.

Today the Word presents to us two modes of celebration: one, an exploitative celebration that is irresponsible, insensitive and a mere show of arrogance; the other,  a righteous celebration. Let none of you wrong the neighbour but fear the Lord your God,  instructs the first reading of today, which is all about jubilee among the people of God.

A celebration that is godly should not be at the cost of the other, but for the sake of the love for the other. Celebrations should reaffirm the meaning and joy of living. That is why everyday eucharist is a celebration, a reminder of the life that we are called to live in the Lord, in communion with our brothers and sisters. !

HE COMES TO STAY

Solemnity of Corpus Christi: 7th June, 2015

Exo 24:3-8; Heb 9: 11-15; Mk 14: 12-16, 22-26

The Feast of Corpus Christi reminds us of a drastic decision that God made in our favour! God loved us, God came amidst us and God came to stay with us! The solemnity that we celebrate today explicates this decision inspiring in us a similar attitude as we live our daily life.

That decision to stay with us is a Covenantal Presence... As St. Paul writes to Timothy, even if we are unfaithful, God is faithful forever. God has made a covenant with us through the very body and blood of God's Son, and that covenant is, to be with us forever!

The decision to stay with us is a desire for Corporal Union... Our Lord and Saviour becomes one with us, unites in our bodily existence too, enabling us to say, It is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me. It is a decision to be in us forever!

The decision to stay with us is  Concrete Commitment that the Lord take on our behalf; that we may be saved, sanctified and brought back to God. It is a call that Christ gives us to offer ourselves entirely to God, in every thing we are and everything we do. This is my body; this is my blood which shall be shed for you, says the Lord. It is a concrete commitment the Lord makes to be forever for us! 

MEAL, MEMORY AND MANDATE

MAUNDY THURSDAY: 2nd April, 2015

We have some 3s to remember today...

     - Supper, Sacrifice and Service

     - Priesthood, Eucharist and Identity

     - Meal, Memory and Mandate

Supper that Jesus shared with the disciples as a sign of his love for them; the Sacrifice that was prefigured in the bread and the wine shared at table; and the Service for which Jesus gave his lived example!

Priesthood that Jesus personified and shared with his apostles; Eucharist that Jesus himself was, the symbol of self giving love; and the mark of Identity that Jesus offered - the love with which the world will identify us as Christ's disciples!

Meal, that shows the relationship that the disciples shared with Jesus; Memory, that Jesus wants to leave behind in his own body and blood; and the Mandate to love each other as Jesus loves us, with a love that is so unconditional, so unlimited and so selfless!

The last three that we can go home with today:

- thanksgiving in our hearts for all the bountiful gifts that the Lord keeps giving, specially through our priests; 

- determination in our will to remember the Lord in our daily struggles that call for sacrifices; and finally 

- a resolve in our minds to love everyone and keep no stock of the hurts and negative experiences we have received from others for no fault of ours. 

WORD 2day: 11th September, 2014

The Crux of Christianity

1 Cor 8: 1B-7, 11-13; Lk 6: 27-38

The readings today have a practical summary for Christian living; it offers for our consideration and reflection the crux of christianity: LOVE, love in all its concrete sense. In fact in the context of the letter to the Corinthians, St. Paul is slowly building up towards the presentation of the all important hymn of love. 

Christian life has to be defined by love: love understood as sensitivity towards the weak and vulnerable; love understood as the compassion towards the needy and suffering; love understood as a non judgmental acceptance of the other; love understood as giving without counting; love understood as going an extra mile; love understood as forgiveness and love understood as relationship shared in the One God, the One Father and Mother of all. At times it might look very simplistic to propose love as the solution for all problems in life, but giving a serious thought to it, everything boils down to that. Love is the only answer to all the problems in life, in the world and in the whole of existence. True love (only what is true is love), true love alone can set the world back to its perfect mode of happiness and meaning. 

Anything else can  find only pseudo remedies and temporary face-lifts. It is love and love alone that can offer true salvation to humankind, because truly, the crux of Christianity is nothing other than, true love!

WORD 2day: 27th August, 2014

The Lord be with you: Remembering Saint Monica

2 Thess 3: 6-10, 16-18; Mt 23: 27-32

The loftiest wish one can make for another is, that the Lord be with him or her! But a Christian hears it almost all the time that he or she is out there to pray, specially in union  with the other brothers and sisters. Today St. Paul makes the same wish and prays that we may be blessed with peace. That peace and serenity will come only with the presence of the Lord and that is the meaning of the wish, 'Lord be with you!'

But this wish is at one and the same time, a blessing and a challenge. A blessing because it is in that moment of blessing that the Lord decides to intervene definitively in favour of the salvation of the entire humankind. It is a challenge because, the Lord being with us all the time, is a bit inconvenient. The Lord would be aware of everything we say or do, because the Lord is close at hand. Would I feel comfortable if the Lord knows all that I am involved in? Or would there be areas, where I would rather be by myself, without God?

In fact, it is this sense of God, the sense of God's presence all the time with me that amounts to a spirituality that is profound in its simplicity. Saint Monica is a great example in this regard. Her incessant prayers for her son and her spiritual endurance in waiting for the grace of God to bear fruit are lessons taught so powerfully. 

The Sacrament of the Self-Giving God

The Solemnity of the Body and Blood of Christ: 22nd June, 2014

Dt 8: 2-3, 14b-16a; 1 Cor 10: 16-17; Jn 6: 51-58

It is a beautiful day to think of the most loving mystery of our faith: the Lord becoming our nourishment! God feeds his people and moreover, God feeds his people with his own self! What a mystery and how loving! One of the most beautiful and meaningful tabernacles that I have seen, I picture it so well in my mind, has a metal carving of a pelican mother, pecking her breast to tear her flesh open and feed her young ones with her own blood dripping from her body. Such a beautiful image to refer to Sacrament contained in that sanctum sanctorum. It is from the famous Christian legend that made the early Christians adapt that symbol for Christ himself. (to read the legend click here) 

Jesus' act of giving his body and blood to the believer is in keeping with the identity of the God whom the people of Israel always believed in and experienced. The God of their faith was signified in that act and that is why, when he declared, 'I am the bread from heaven, and those who eat of me shall not die', the people were shocked; some were enraged, many others deserted him! It was indeed a hard teaching for them. But it was a fact: Jesus did give himself, his body and his blood for the everlasting life of the whole world (cf. Jn 6:51). In this act of giving his body and blood, Jesus reveals to us three profound dimensions of God.

God as a parent: God as Father and Mother, is a fabulous revelation that Jesus has made of God. It was not entirely a new dimension; the people of Israel did experience it in an intense manner. Moses reminds them of that in the first reading... he reminds them of how God walked them through the desert and provided them with the food and drink that they needed. The provident God was actually a father, a mother, a loving parent, though the people preferred to look at him only as an awesome God and an almighty God. Jesus introduced God as "Abba", "Father", a loving parent, a lover par excellence. In giving his body and blood as food, Jesus highlights this element of God, the element of nourishment of the children, the element of feeding and the element of fending for the needs of the children.

God as a friend: There is no love greater than a person laying down one's life for one's friend (Jn 15:13). Jesus taught this model and lived it to the letter. As he shared that last supper with his friends he made it very clear to them, that it was a prefigurement of what has to happen on the Cross very shortly. The bread to become his body and the wine to become his blood... we do it in memory of him right until today, in memory of that friend-God who came down to live among us, be like us and give of himself to us. Every time we break the bread, we are challenged to be friends of God, to imitate his sacrifice, to burn with the same love for  our brothers and sisters. The second reading elaborates this. Every time we raise that cup, we are reminded of that last drop of blood that came from his side, reminded us that we are called to live not merely for ourselves, but for others, for those who are in need of love and meaning in life.

God as part of us: The most difficult-to-digest dimension is this- God as part of us, God as dwelling in us! If you eat of this body, you will remain in me and I in you, says Jesus. God wants to remain in us, to dwell in us, to form part of us! God becoming part of us!?! Isn't that kind of scandalous? But that is the truth. What a difference it will make if only we realise and believe in that truth! We will come to you and make our home with you (cf Jn14:23), abide in me as I abide in you (Jn 15:4), you will abide in me and I will abide in you (cf. Jn 6:56)... we find these repeated teachings where Jesus reveals a unique dimension of a God who wishes, longs and seeks to abide, not just with us, but IN us. If we truly understand its implications and effects, we would have attained the eternal life that Jesus promises. 

As we approach this greatest gift of all, today, let us strive to experience God as our Father, our Mother, our Friend, and above all... Our God as abiding within us. And thus we shall be transformed more and more into Him.