THE WORD AND THE FEAST

The Name above every name : JESUS

Celebrating the Name of Jesus: 3rd January, 2017

Phil 2: 1-11; Lk 2: 21-24

There was a moment when Peter looked at a lame man who begged at the temple gate, 'In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, stand up and walk" (Acts 3:6,16) - that was the first moment of realisation as to how powerful a name we have been gifted with! Jesus - the most beautiful and powerful name on earth and heaven, name above every other name, a name that would bring peace and solace to the disturbed and fear and trembling to the evil minded (Acts 4:17). 

Celebrating the name of Jesus can bring us three messages to remember:

1. Jesus is the name that revealed God to us (Jn 1:18)

2. Jesus is the name given to the entire love of God shared with humanity

3. Jesus is the name in which we have received the power to call God Abba Father!

WORD 2day: 2nd January, 2017

Live in Christ, live in truth

Monday after Christmas Octave

1 Jn 2:22-28; Jn 1: 19-28

John warns people against confusing what is truth and what is false! He says, if we have to know for sure that we are in truth, then we have to live in Christ. We need not wait to be told, because our anointing, our being in Christ, will itself reveal the truth to us. It did, to John the Baptist. When he had an ample opportunity to enjoy a bit of glory and adulation among the people who would have accepted him to be the Christ, he made it point blank that he was not the messiah! John knew the truth and stood for it. 

Knowing the truth, believing in it and living on it are the signs of living in Christ. We have just begun a new year and we might be fresh with a lot of resolutions yet - why not think of this living in Christ and living in truth!

PROMISING 2017

What is the Lord promising in 2017?

Celebrating the Mother of God in the New Year

Num 6: 22-27; Gal 4: 4-7; Lk 2:16-21

We celebrate a triple feast today: the birth of a brand new year, Mary - Mother of God and the World day of Peace! On this auspicious day, we have something that the Lord promises us - again a triple promise: Blessing, Grace and Peace, as we listened to in the first reading. 

BLESSING: The Lord promises first of all, Blessings. How do we understand blessing? The antonym is a curse, that is wishing the destruction of someone. Blessing therefore is wishing that something good happens to the other. The Lord wishes that we receive, experience all that is good. Sometimes we may think that the Lord fails to send anything good our way. Blessings abound when waiting is long. Let me share with you a forward that I enjoyed recently on a social network. There was a dog and an elephant which got pregnant together. In 60 days the dog delivered some ten puppies! It got pregnant again and delivered another 10 in 60 days...then again...and after half a dozen such cycles, the dog happened to meet the elephant. The elephant was still go around with the first baby in gestation. The dog laughed at the elephant and asked, "did you check if you are really pregnant? I have already given birth to some sixty kids. Look at you!" The elephant with a solemn smile said, "when I deliver my kid, he would draw everyone's attention. When he crosses the road, everyone will stop in awe. When he stops and turns around humans would run for their life." The longer the wait, the greater the blessing! The Lord has great things in store for us. Let us never get impatient and frustrated. Even amidst the toughest darkness, we need to keep our eyes fixed on the Lord and wait on the Lord with faith! The Lord promises blessing and they will surely come our way!

GRACE: The second promise is Grace. What greater witness than the Mother of God, Mary who was called 'full of grace'. Understanding grace is another task we have today. What is grace? -Is grace a thing? an intention answered? a healing?...No. This is the misunderstanding we have when we speak of more graces and less graces, as if we count or weigh graces on scales. Grace is fundamentally the presence of God with us, the relationship that God establishes with us, the way that God enters our ordinary lives! That is why Mary was full of Grace: she bore the Son of God, the second person of the Trinity, the Word made flesh, God made human in her womb. Mother of God, is what God made her! Theotokos - the bearer of God. In the fullness of time, God sent God's only son, born of a woman, declares St. Paul in the second reading. Why should God send God's Son? It is the way that God fulfilled God's own desire of being with God's people. I will be with you. I will never leave you; I will never forsake you nor forget you, my people! Wasn't that the promise that the Lord had given always?

PEACE: The third promise is Peace. Celebrating as a Church the 50th World Day of Peace, Pope Francis gives us the following theme: Non-Violence: a style of politics for peace. Non Violence is a time tested weapon of global well being. Meeting violence with violence would mean accelerating the destruction of the world and humanity. Just two days ago there was a tensed moment when the US expelled the Russian diplomats alleging that they interfered in the Presidential Elections. The Russian Foreign Ministry wanted to expel the US diplomats in a tit for tat reaction. But wisdom prevailed when the Russian President Putin declared against it. He did not stop with that he invited the American Children in Russia for a Christmas Celebration too! Not a move to extol him and all his policies, but this responsible act of this world leader is a clear sign of non violence, a proactive pursuit of good will. The Holy Father expresses concern over a quasi world war being fought in piecemeal, all over the world today. He says over 50 nations are involved in some form of war! The Prince of Peace is with us - the Son of God who has come into the world, pleading us to love, embrace and grow together towards fullness of life - only peace can do that. The Lord alone can give us that peace!

Blessing, Grace and Peace - that is what the Lord is promising in 2017. Let us claim that promise for ourselves, for our families and for the entire world. 

The Lord BLESS you and keep you;

The Lord make his face shine upon you and be GRACIOUS to you;

The Lord lift his countenance upon you and give you PEACE!

Amen.

WORD 2day: 31st December, 2016

To be Christ amidst Antichrists - the Last days?!

The last day of the year

1 Jn: 2:18-21; Jn 1: 1-18

Do you get a feeling of tearing the last leaf of the calendar, or turning the last date on your diary or opening the last page of a novel...that is very dramatic! But the truth is, life goes on! It is good to end something and start something anew. That should begin from our mindset. 

Today as we look back at 2016, we find so many events and happenings that in a way disturb our minds - the political roller coasters, the economic manipulations, the legal tragedies, the social calamities, the religious inhumanities...all of them pose a big question in our minds : is the end near? Yes, the end is here, for the year; but yet another will be born anew. And nothing will change if our mindsets don't. 

John speaks of the antichrists who have already come - there is no doubt about it. It is no useful task for us to start investigating who is the antichrist that has come. What matters is to believe and to make it true that the Word has become flesh and has come to dwell amidst us. In and through us, the Word has to live on, even amidst the antichrists who are possibly all around us. That is the call: each of us, to be Christ amidst the antichrists in the society. It means a challenge, a personal, social, communitarian, ecclesial challenge for us to make Christ present here and now. That alone will amount to the mindset of the last days, not fear nor recklessness. With discernment and determination let us resolve to be Christs amidst the antichrists today.

THE WORD AND THE FEAST

Family - School of life and love

Celebrating the Holy Family, as a family

Sir 3:2-6,12-14; Mt 2:13-15,19-23

The Holy Family is usually celebrated on the Sunday that falls within the Christmas Octave. This year, since Christmas itself fell on a Sunday, and because the next Sunday would be the Solemnity of the Mother of God, we remember the Holy Family today! That said, let us dwell on the strenna for 2017 from the Rector Major of the Salesians of Don Bosco. There has been a great insistence on the importance of the family from the moment Pope Francis decided to convene two synods, one extraordinary and the other ordinary and his encyclical Amoris Laetetia. Keeping with this spirit, the Rector Major proposes: We are a Family - every home a school of life and love.

Our life is one long learning; the first school is home and the first teachers are parents. Everything that happens is a learning experience, provided we take time and assistance needed to make sense of the events in the right perspective. Life and Love are connected - life begins out of love and only a life that is filled with love makes sense to the person and to the world. Family is the first place and the constant place where this meaning making can happen. Love is born in a family and it is nurtured right there. That is why we can confidently say, family is the first place where a person encounters God; if he or she fails to encounter God there, it is tough to do it elsewhere, be it a church or a basilica! Holy Family today inspires us with the right model - the birth of love into the Holy Family is a symbolic mystery for us to understand, what our families should become.

Finally let us raise a pertinent question: what really makes the Holy Family, holy? Apart from Sanctity and Simplicity, there are three other S's that we can notice, admire and follow from this Family of Nazareth: Spirit-filled personal lives, Selfless relationships, and Silence. These three qualities are essential for any family to grow in its holiness. May the Holy Family assist us and fill our families with love.

WORD 2day - 29th December, 2016

Light and darkness, Love and hatred!

5th day in Christmas Octave

1 Jn 2: 3-11; Lk 2: 22-35

Christmas is not over yet, we are still in the Octave! There is a gradual revelation of the Son who has come into the world - Simeon today identifies the Light that has come into the world: a light of revelation for the gentiles and glory for Israel (Lk 2:32). The light, which makes us see the right facts, the light which helps us understand the real meaning of our life, the light that Christ is, the light that Christ brought into the world - that is LOVE: whoever claims to be in light but hates his brother or sister, is still in darkness (1 Jn 2:9)...they have still not seen the light, the true light, the Christ, the Son!

Light and darkness, Love and hatred...everything is around us today in every situation. What is our choice - to accept the light and to behold the Christ? or to abide by the world and remain in darkness? Light is love, hatred is darkness. Amidst the vast crowd that does not mind being in darkness for reasons known only to them, let our light shine - because we have beheld the Lord, because we have seen Love!

THE WORD AND THE FEAST

Innocents - Massacred even today!

Feast of the Holy Innocents

1 Jn 1:5 -2:2; Mt 2: 13-18

Innocents - those who are unaware of anything wrong, those who are unaware of the evil that surrounds them, those who are untouched by the sinfulness that threatens to swallow them. The feast today is a remembrance of millions of innocents who are sacrificed even today on the altars of selfishness, licentiousness, irresponsibility and insensitivity! The Church remains so strong with regard to abortions, because of the inviolable dignity that life possesses, right from its very beginning. The world is running swift into a dungeon of selfishness and cruelty, which does not even think of the others, leave alone wishing the good of the others. There are persons and systems which work together to exploit the innocent and the ignorant. As a people of God, we need to stand against such systems and uphold the inalienable rights of every child of God. Can we open our eyes to the innocents who are massacred even today!

THE WORD AND THE SAINT

Why Proclaim?

Celebrating St. John the Evangelist - 27th December, 2016

1 Jn 1:1-4; Jn 20: 1a,2-8

Evangelisation has been a commission given to us by the Lord himself - through the disciples and apostles that Jesus had and handed over to us in time. The world today is beset with a terrible problem of religious violence - killing, persecutions, attacks and wars in the name of God! Is evangelisation needed today? Is it so important to proclaim one's God at the cost of life, peace and harmony? Don't you get that question very often in your heart? If you do so, you are one step closer to understanding what evangelisation means.

John today so simply puts it: I write this, that your joy may be complete! He would put the same words into Jesus' mouth(eg. Jn 15:11): I say these things, that your joy may be complete. We are called to share our experience with the world, so that the joy of the world, the joy of each person around us, the joy of the entire humanity be complete. Why proclaim: that the joy that God truly wills be complete! But that requires that those who proclaim, possess that joy and then share it! Called to proclaim, do I possess that joy? Having experienced that joy, do I feel the urge to share it? My joy becomes complete when I share it.

THE WORD AND THE SAINT

Feast of St. Stephen,  the first Martyr

26th December, 2016Acts 6: 8-10,7:54-59; Mt 10:17-22
As I sat to reflect on this day's Word and the Saint...the last year's post captured my eyes after I read it, I decided I shall repost the same!

I was amused when I looked at this picture of St. Stephen when I was looking for something to post... amused because the picture spoke what came to me as a reflection of the readings today.

If anyone read the Gospel of today and complained that they did not understand what exactly it meant, they could be directed to the first reading and that would make an elaborate and concrete explanation with example, of what Jesus says in the Gospel. 

Holding the Book (the Word) and the Stones together, with such serenity in the face and an olive branch in the other hand... portrays Stephen to the detail. Accepting to be a disciple, to belong to the apostolic community and to proclaim Jesus through service (Stephen was a deacon), was a bold acceptance of the consequences that Jesus spoke of already. Stephen seems to have accepted that demand, along with a firm faith in the promise of the Lord : do not search for what to say or what to do...the Spirit will enlighten you as to that! Stephen, enlightened by the Spirit, does exactly what Jesus did on the Cross: prays for those who persecuted him! 

To celebrate the feast of St Stephen immediately after the Christmas day also brings out a sharp message: yesterday was the birth of Christ, today is the birth of Christians...first time some one died to belong to Christ forever.

HE IS BORN !!!

He is Born! Come let us Understand Him!

Christmas Vigil 2016

Is 62: 1-5; Acts 13: 16-17,21-25; Mt 1: 1-25

We are gathered here to celebrate a birthday, a birthday that initiated a new birth to the entire humanity, a birthday of a very special person! We are not here to celebrate the birth of a helpless infant or a chubby child who would be playing with a globe in its hands...It is not just a child who is born today!

We are here to celebrate the birthday of the One of whom Isaiah spoke: for unto us a child is born, a son has been given to us...he is named Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace (Is 9:6) 

If it were a mere child, why should the King be so alarmed? Why should the world fear? Why should the world wonder what is in store? The Kings are in fright because the one who is born is a Prince, the Prince of Peace! It was 1914, this very same day, the Christmas eve, it was a friday, the morning was noisy with bombshells and bullet rounds but the evening came and there was a total silence. The darkness thickened as the silence deepened, with Germans on one side and the British and French on the other. But something strange was happening...something was breaking through that darkness - a small lit candle appeared on the German horizon...what a foolish thing to do in the war front - betraying your location making oneself vulnerable to the guns of the enemy! As the British rose to an alert yet another strange thing happened breaking the silence of the night - a solemn orchestra began a lovely hymn : Stille Nacht, Heil'ge Nacht... It took just a few seconds for that beautiful sound to reach the opposite camp! The British were wonder struck and the guns went down while the voices rose singing the same hymn - the beautiful carol Silent Night, Holy Night. Very soon the French began in their language Douce Nuite, Sainte Nuit...One carol followed the other and more candles appeared. The Germans walked over the fence and the British and the French did the same and soon they were in the No Man's Land shaking their hands, embracing each other, exchanging gifts - strange gifts like their buttons and cigars, pipes and lighters - there was an unofficial, unauthorised and unarranged ceasefire! Not a shot was fired all night...In one of the zones the ceasefire continued for the next one week! The whole battalion had to be reassigned another region inorder that the war be continued in that place. This is called the Great Christmas Truce in history. The next year in many zones on the border they tried to observe this truce and it was not as successful as in 1914. In 1916 there was a strict and deliberate prohibition for the truce! It's 100 years since then...the world is afraid of this prince of peace! If he can bring peace to the warring factions - can he not bring peace to your hearts, to your families, to your relationships...make peace, allow the prince of peace to be born!

If it were a mere child, why were the shepherds notified and why is it that they were given such a prominence in the story? Because the One who is born is a shepherd, true shepherd who is born to die, born to lay down his life for his sheep, the Divine Shepherd! Why should God  be born to die! Why? God could have made one of his prophets die for us - why should he die himself? A friend asked another this question and the argument went long...the friend was not convinced. They went their way. The other friend one day invited the former to an outing and asked him to bring his beloved little son along. The outing consisted of a boating on a lake and in the middle of the water, the friend pushed his comrade's son into the water. Shocked and angry the friend jumped into the water got his son brought him to safety and was about to charge on his friend...he stopped him and asked him, why did you jump? You could have asked me to save your son, or the boatman to save or called for a security personnel...while the man shouted back - because he is my son and I love him more than anything in this world! He concluded - that's the same with God. For God so loved the world that God gave God's only son. For God so loved the world that God decided to come into the world in and through God's son. That is the Shepherd we have -who is not worried about making laws that are merciless and insensitive, who is not worried about establishing his own ego and prove to the world that he is capable of things that no one can imagine, who is not power mongering or money minded... he is a shepherd who is love and compassion, who decides to be born to die. Every one is born to live, there was only one who was born to die and that was God's only son! In his death he brought us life!

If it were a mere child who is born today, why should the world fear this child? Why should everyone look at this Child and the philosophy that this child brings into this world, as a threat? Because the One who is born is a wonderful counselor. If only we heed to His counsel! The world has a counsel, an advice - make sure you get your share and a little more if can be, never less than that. Make sure you get and get, and keep getting without anyone cheating you! Doesn't matter what you do, make sure you succeed, you gain, you stand to win! The Child born today has a different counsel. Have you heard of these two brothers - one was married and had two kids, the other remained single. They had a common farm, their inheritance. And they worked together on the farm producing every year grains in abundance. They shared equally the produce. One night the married brother thought on his bed, 'it is not fair that we share halves. He is single and he needs a future that is secure. After all, I have my family to stand by me if anything happens in case!' So, from that day he would get up in the middle of the night take a sack of grain from his barn and quietly slip it into his brother's barn. The single brother thought to himself one day, 'it is not fair that my brother and I share the produce equally. After all I am single while he has three more people to fend for." And he began to transfer quietly a sack every night into his brother's barn from his own. Both of them on their own, were wondering why after all these nights of transferring sacks of grains there has been no difference...until one mid night they bumped into each other, each one with a sack on his shoulder walking towards the other's barn. They dropped those sacks, embraced each other and cried in love. That is Christmas giving! Can we bump into each other with sacks of what we want to give the other? What a place this world would be if we were to take this counsel seriously: Give! Christmas is giving...that is the Christmas advice - give and give and give. That is the most fundamental form of love.

The One who is born is the Prince of Peace, the Divine Shepherd, the Wonderful Counselor - are you ready to accept that birth? Then, Merry Christmas to you!