THE WORD AND THE FEAST

The Cross Talk: Feast of the Exaltation of the Cross

14th September, 2015

Num 21: 4-9; Phil 2: 6-11; Jn 3:13-17

Celebrating the feast of the Exaltation of the Cross, our focus is on that symbol of God's love for humanity, the Tree of our Salvation. Exalting the Cross today, we are called to hearken to the voice of the Cross. If the Cross would speak to us, we would hear these three words:

1. Look Up: Look up to the Cross and be saved. It is in and through the Cross that we have been saved. Cross is not a symbol of suffering nor a sign of curse. By choosing the Cross as his weapon and throne, Christ who has conquered the world has won God's salvation for us. In all our difficulties we are called to look up and draw hope from this Cross.

2. Be Lifted Up: When we look up, we are given the light. Those who look up to Him shall never be ashamed, promises the Word. We are invited to be lifted up by the Lord...just like the Saviour who was lifted up! The love of the Lord will lift us up, inspite of the burdens we bear and the clutches that tend to pull us down. Let us surrender, so that we can be lifted up; let us humble ourselves before the Lord that we could be lifted up by the Lord.

3. Lift Up: Once lifted up, the Son of Man would draw everyone to Himself. And once we are lifted up by the Son, we should in turn lift everyone else up to the Lord. Our life has been punctuated with so many blessings and marvels from the Lord and today, we look up, we gaze at the One who is lifted up, and be lifted up ourselves. Our life in Lord should lift up the rest of the humankind with us to the Lord that everyone may look up to Him and be saved.

The ACT of FAITH

13th September, 2015: 24th Sunday in Ordinary Time

Is 50: 5-9A; Jas 2: 14-18; Mk 8: 27-35

Faith has to be lived, it has to be manifested, be seen and shown; if it does not, it can be interpreted as dead and good for nothing. The ACT is one perspective that the Word offers today, to live and manifest a living Faith.

Faith has to be manifested through Actions of love

Faith that is devoid of love is not Christian and that love when not shown in action is not real. Love is not treating people according your whims and fancies, it is approaching every person with a respect and reverence that he or she is an image of the living God.True love translates itself into commitment, a commitment for the well being of the other.

Faith has to be witnessed to in Choices for life

The world and its culture today is prone to death. Difficulties are highlighted, despair is amplified, destruction is perpetrated and death is felt in the air. It is nauseating for a true believer, because we are persons who have chosen life, life in all its abundance. We can never choose to be gloomy and sad, pessimistic and given up! We choose God, we choose life!

Faith should be based on the Thoughts of God

Human thinking and worldly calculations will never make us persons of faith. it is only God's perspective of all that is and all that happens, that can fill us with faith. Jesus had only the thoughts of God and he rebukes Peter for being contrary to that. Sufferings, Crosses, Sacrifices are nothing new when we take up to the mind of God. Within the perspective of God everything has its place and meaning. It is that realisation, that makes our faith come alive. 

WORD 2day : 12th September, 2015

Evidence of the inexhaustible patience

Saturday, 23rd week in Ordinary Time
1 Tim 1: 15-17; Lk 6: 43-49

Paul calls himself the evidence of God's inexhaustible patience. Aren't we all such evidences... taking into consideration the endless opportunities we are offered to bear the right fruits at the right season.

Just a couple of days ago, some one asked me why is it that people are so bad and they don't allow me to be as good as I wish to be! I believe today's Word answers that question... I am responsible for the fruits that are expected of me... there will surely be scores of others who will disturb,  distract, discourage and disorient me but I cannot lose the direction that I am given with. I cannot blame it on others or the situation when I fail to bear the fruits that I should. However we have a God who is inexhaustible in patience. It is beautiful to remember here those wise words of the saint of the gutters... God expects from us not success but faithfulness. Let us resolve to be good,  to bear only good fruits,  to never give up on the call we have received. May the inexhaustible patience of God fill us with  necessary endurance to make this journey possible.

WORD 2day : 11th September, 2015

The Real Me
Friday,  23rd week in Ordinary Time
1 Tim 1: 1-2, 12-14; Lk 6: 39-42

Humility is an essential part of holiness. Holiness never leads one to pride and anything that makes one proud is a bit short of true holiness. While realising the areas in which one has to grow and taking steps towards that growth is an important part of maturing in one's life,  mutual corrections are very Christian ways of growing up. Humility is not an artificial debasement of oneself in any way. It is knowing my real self accepting it and being at home with it; at home with knowing my imperfections and continuously working on it. St Paul was mindful of his real self all the time. He never thought of hiding his dark past and was never bloating over the glorious state of his present relationship with Christ. In fact his relationship with Christ made him more aware of his real self. In Christ I get to know my real me,  not just my past but also my call;  not merely the splinters and planks in my eyes but even the blessings and splendour given unto me. That is the real me!

WORD 2day: 10th September, 2015

Put on love; put on Christ
Thursday,  23rd week in Ordinary Time
Col 3: 12-17;  Lk 6: 27-38

If we do not say that the words are from the letter to the Colossians,  one can easily misjudge those as some paraphrasing of a part from the Gospel and as words of Christ himself. Paul had so intensely taken in the spirit of Christ that his insistence of putting on Christ comes from his person much stronger than from his words. Love is presented as the crux of Christ's message. When Paul said elsewhere too,  to put on Christ he practically meant put on love. Love, understood not as childish sentiment of attachment and dependence, but a Christlike selfgiving. Love is the sweetest of all teachings of Christ and it is the most difficult of all too, for it comes inbuilt with forgiveness;  forbearance, kindness,  gentleness,  Integrity and sacrifice. Isn't that difficult enough?  The fact however is,  if we believe being a Christian is to put on Christ, it can never happen except by putting on love!

WORD 2day : 9th September, 2015

Christ : All and in all
Wednesday,  23rd week in Ordinary Time
Col 3: 1-11; Lk 6: 20-26

Confusing criteria,  disarrayed priorities,  Godless morality,  inhuman ethics and heartless secularisation of the world... this is the context in which we are called to live and profess our faith in Christ. The Word today establishes, that in this context,  we cannot put up with compromises and half baked convictions. We need to make a clear and impeccable difference in and through our lives. The world stands in need of Spirit filled Evangelisers, calls out Pope Francis. And the way is to live as if Christ is all for me and Christ is in all who stand with me towards making this world more and more liveable. Am I ready?

THE WORD AND THE FEAST

Destined, Chosen and Shared glory with

8th September, 2015

Rom 8: 28-30;Mt 1:18-23

The Birthday of our Blessed Mother brings home to us the message of being chosen from all eternity - as St. Paul affirms in Eph 1:4 - God has chosen you before the foundation of the world. God chose Mary from eternity and prepared her to be the worthy dwelling place for God's Son. That is why the Angel greeted her with those significant words: 'Hail! Full of Grace!' She, who was so full of Grace and who bore the fullness of Grace within her, becomes for us the bearer of grace. She was destined and chosen and God deigned to share with her God's glory.  

Her role as the destined and chosen one, reminds each of us our status as chosen children destined to share in the glory of the Lord. When she was born, the climax of God's salvation plan was born. Her greatness lies in the fact that she cooperated with God and it was that trait which led her to the glory that she shares with the Lord today. Everyone of us is called to that same glory and we are faced with the same demand: that we cooperate with the Lord in the eternal plan, where we have a specific and irreplaceable role to play.

The scourge of the world today remains the fact that it has lost the sense of the eternal. All that matters is the here and the now, the immediate and the instant differences that people look for. This is the tendency that leads to evaluating a  person in terms of usefulness, looking at everything from the point of view of gain or loss and judging everything with the criterion of utility.  Gender bias and gender issues that are prevalent today are because of such immature approaches to life. Celebrating the Girl Child day today, is another fitting moment to appraise the type of attitudes we sport towards humanity, whether they are holistic or not, helpful or not, balanced or not, in short - truly Christ-like or not.

Let this feast of our Blessed Mother bring health to our mind and body, to our spirit and soul, that we may be fully alive, sharing and spreading the glory of God - that is what we are chosen for and that is what we are destined for! Praised be the Lord. Ave Maria!

WORD 2day : 7th September, 2015

Good: all the time!
Monday,  2 3rd week in Ordinary Time
Col 1: 24 - 2:3;  Lk 6: 6-11

Jesus' life holds out to us a challenge that consists of a simple,  uncomplicated criterion but highly demanding. The criterion is: be good.

You may have to suffer,  take on yourself burdens and brickbats,  be misunderstood and be rash judged. ..but never lose your nerves;  be good. At any given point if you are left with a question. ..what to do,  or what next,  or what is my reaction... it is simple: be good. Never lose your goodness for anything or anyone's sake. It is not enough to believe that God is good all the time. ..It is important that I be good all the time and never grow weary of doing good (cf 2 Thes 3: 13).

THE REIGN HERE AND NOW

6th September, 2015: 23rd Sunday in Ordinary Time 

Is 35: 4-7; Jas 2: 1-5; Mk 7: 31-37

The deaf hear and the dumb speak... that was not merely a statement of compliment to Jesus,  but it was an expression of a hopeful longing! A longing of generations that the Reign of God would be established wiping every tear off the eyes of humanity. When Jesus did these wonders among people,  they found in those wonders and signs the very symptoms of the imminent Reign of God,  as foretold by the prophets of old. They hoped it would come around atleast then. ...and Jesus did promise them that. I have come that I may proclaim the year of the Lord,  initiating the Reign on earth (cf. Lk 4: 18), declared Jesus. Anyway,  Jesus was not deceiving them or letting them down; he told them clearly,  the Reign of God is among you (Lk 17:21). If they wanted to make it present or make it a reality, they could have done it. They were not ready for it.  The challenge is the very same today... if we want it we can make it a reality today, here and now! But we are not ready;  we do not want to! 'Oh no... how we wish it became a reality today', we might say. But the Word challenges us today: Do you really want the Reign present here and now? Then...

1. Behold the Reign

If I truly wish that Reign is established here and now, I have to firstly believe that the Reign is amidst us. Through persons of good will, through initiatives of selfless promotion of well being of the downtrodden, through the numerous who are ready to lay their lives down for a cause that might not concern their good at all,  through the ascendancy that God has over the earth,  the humanity and history,  the Reign is in reality present right in our midst and all that I need to do is realise it. There are so many signs of it;  there are ample evidences of it. God is at work in reality, let us acknowledge it. In partnering with persons and agencies of good will, in recognising the presence of the Lord in the world through various simple signs,  in attributing to God every single inspiration to common good,  we behold the presence of the Region here amidst us. The first reading from Isaiah presents us these symptoms of the  reign.

2. Block not the Reign

There are certain attitudes and habits through which I become a block or an hindrance to the Reign. The mere fact that I too belong to the so called church and I too have received the Baptism doesn't guarantee that I will allow the Reign come alive here and now. Discriminations on the basis of any criterion - caste or colour or community or availability of resources - is an apparent block to the Reign, says James today.

3. Be Agents of the Reign

The ultimate call is to be positive agents of the Reign in the manner that each one is called to be. My words and attitudes, my thoughts and convictions, my deeds and dispositions have to be Reign friendly. They have to be life giving. They should offer the light to the blind, the voice to the dumb, the hearing to the deaf, the liberation to the suffering... I need to become the agent of the Reign of God here and now. How long am I going to blame the other, moan the times and wait without doing anything? The call is clear: to actively do my part in making present the Reign here and now. How ready am I for the sacrifices involved? How prepared am I to take upon myself the hardships that would come my way and the inconveniences i would have to put up with?

Happy are those who hunger and thirst for the Reign of God, for they shall be satisfied!

THE WORD AND THE SAINT

5th September, 2015: Remembering Blessed Mother Teresa

Continuing in faith: stable and steadfast
Col 1: 21-23; Lk 6: 1-5

Stand firm in Faith without drifting away,  instructs St Paul in the first reading today. Nothing but faith has to be the foundation of Christian life. Faith is the personal response that one gives to a self-revealing God. Experiences may vary,  outcomes may differ and success and failure may find equal probability in what we take up. ..but none of these should make me waver or drift away from the journey I have begun in the Lord.

We have a great example for that today in the person of Blessed Mother Teresa of Kolkata. A person who had every reason to be shaken and to drift away,  but she stood her ground stable and steadfast in faith! Nothing but what God wanted from her,  mattered to her. In her life choices,  major decisions and day to day living,  she based herself on the solid foundation of faith. Many accused her of many things, as we see in the Gospel today, but she remained firm,  continuing in faith, stable and steadfast!