LOVE-LENT 2017 - THE WORD IN LENT #23

Love: a journey from death to life

Wednesday, Fourth week in Lent - 29th March, 2017
Is 49:8-15; Jn 5:17-30

The Word today speaks of a change that is radical, a movement, a journey from death to life - all occasioned by love! God's love reaches out to everything that is dying and leads it to life. Jesus, the Son of God does the same as he promises: anyone who listens to my words, believes in the one who sent me, has eternal life;... he has passed from death to life. 

Look at the world today - is it filled with life or death? There is so much of wealth in circulation but those who have it are anxious about protecting it and those who are deprived are anguishing in need - neither of them are happy! There is so much of technological advancement - more than enhancing life, technology has come to destroy, manipulate and dehumanise life. There is so many possibilities of knowledge - no one really knows what is truth, everything happens underground and there is a constant conspiracy against peace and harmony, happiness and well being. There is a culture of death that surrounds us and threatens us. Are we going to give in?

We need to stand up and face situation. We to rise up to the occasion. We need to prove ourselves to be people of Life...people who can bring back life into this world, because we have the one who can give us life, eternal life, life in all its abundance. Love of Christ urges us to take up that journey from death to life, and take this entire world along. 

LOVE-LENT 2017 - THE WORD IN LENT #22

Love is a life-giving stream

Tuesday, Fourth week in Lent - 28th March, 2017
Ezek 47: 1-9,12; Jn 5: 1-3,5-16

In the name of love at times we tend to possess each other; mutually stifling existence. Two imageries that I have always been fascinated about love: one is about a butterfly behind which you frenetically go to hold it in your hands but you fail as it always flies away from you. A while later you sit letting it be by itself, it comes gently and sits on your shoulder. That is true love. Secondly, a fledgling that you wish to hold in your palms, if you hold it too tight the poor creature will be suffocated to death. You hold your palm fully open it will just fly away from you. The key is how balanced your holding is. 

The Word today gives us another imagery, love as a life giving stream: life giving because true love enhances life, renders life wholesome and meaningful; stream because love flows on, it cannot afford to stagnate. It is this flowing that makes it life giving and the life giving quality requires that the stream keeps flowing to reach out to more and more. God's love is true and it is truly a life giving stream! 

How life giving and how flowing is your love? Let your love be genuine and let your love be flowing... neither possessive nor devoid of life. 

LOVE-LENT 2017 - THE WORD IN LENT #21

To Love is to Forget

Monday, Fourth week in Lent - 27th March, 2017
Is 65: 17-21; Jn 4: 43-54

We go a lot by our memories; we make judgements on the basis of our past experiences; we decide someone is good or bad basing ourselves on memories! 

To love actually would mean to forget the past, specially the negative past, and live the moment to the full, open to the reality every moment of our life. People are unique each one with his or her individuality and experience. When we start judging others, we become too busy to love them. In judging we make people objects; we begin to use them to prove our point, instead of being open to what they are and what they can become. 

God is ever ready not only to forgive but even to forget. That is the spirit of true love, that forgets the other's shortcomings and starts anew everytime. The new earth and new heaven is a gift from this love that is so forgetful of the past, so unassuming in its acceptance, challenging us to the same. 

TO LOVE IS TO BE LIGHTED

LOVE-LENT 2017 - THE SUNDAY SCHOOL

Sunday 4: 26th March, 2017

1 Sam 16:1, 6,7, 10-13; Eph 5: 8-14; Jn 9:1-41

"We are children of the Light", the readings remind us today and invite us to live in the light! To awake from the slumber of the darkness, to avoid the works of the people of darkness and to acknowledge being anointed to announce the good news to the world - that is the call to be children of the light. We have the light within us, the Light of the world is with us, we are lighted to shine, we are lighted to shine as testimonies to the Light that longs to lead everyone to fullness of life.

We are called to SEE. Blindness is not merely of the physical eye... blindness of the heart to perceive the something that is so apparent is the worst of all blindness. Physical blindness is a handicap, but Spiritual blindness sometimes is a choice, a choice against something obvious! Not to see the goodness of the other, not to see the good the other has done to you, not to see the great things that God has done for us, these are the blindnesses out of which the Lord calls us today. The darkness within us can surround us so much that we may find so comfortable within it. That was the problem of the pharisees and the scribes: they were so cosy in their own world but Jesus disturbed them! He called them to light, he called them to awake. The Word today, calls us to AWAKE and see the Light, shining on us!

We are called to SEE LIKE GOD. As children of God we are called to see like God. The first reading presents to us an incident where the Lord gives us a practical lesson for our life. David, the least of all in the family of Jesse was chosen against all odds to be the ruler of Israel. There are other such occasions too that we find in the Bible: Joseph the sold slave, Gideon the weakling, Esther the orphan girl and so on. The message is clear: to see like God. As the Lord clarifies it (1 Sam 16:7), the Lord sees the heart and not the external appearances; the Lord sees the internal disposition and not the eternal display; the Lord sees the interior openness and not a stubborn self righteousness. To see like God would mean to avoid the works of the people of darkness, who try to close their eyes to any good that someone can do because of a prejudice they have at heart; who look for any lame excuse to judge and vilify others merely because they do not like the other; who look at others as threats and wait to see their ruin. Avoid the works of darkness and put on the armour of Light!

We are called to MAKE OTHERS SEE GOD. We are anointed people of God, chosen children of God. Peter reminds us in his letter, "You are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation. God's own people, in order that you may proclaim the mighty acts of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light" (1 Pet 1:9). By our baptism we have been anointed and by the sacrament of confirmation we are confirmed in the anointing - that we are to announce to the world the good news of the love of God. That we may see and see like God, we are given the Light of the Lord. The Light shines within us with such splendour that it radiates to the world around us! We are commissioned to be testimonies of the Light that shines in the world. 

If we can say like that blind man in the Gospel - "One thing I know, I was blind and now I can see!" - we are testimonies to the Light that shines within us, the Light that can give meaning to the world. When we really see and see like God, the works of God will be made visible through us and that is what we are called to. Let us thank God for having given us God's light and let us be lighted to be testimonies of the the Light of the world.

LOVE-LENT 2017 - THE WORD IN LENT #20

To Love is to Reign

Friday, Third week in Lent - 24th March, 2017
Hos 14: 2-10; Mk 12: 28-34

We are children of the King; the King who reigns in love, the King who is rich in mercy, the King who is ready to lay down his life for his children out of love. 

To reign we need to belong to the King and to belong to the King we need to do what the King wants us to do. The first one is to love the King and the latter is to love the king's children, that is, our brothers and sisters. To love, the King and his people, is to reign! 

Here, to reign is not to dominate but to submit oneself to the others' well being; to reign is not to rule but to serve; to reign is not to have authority over the others but to grow responsible for the others. To reign is to do to the others what God has done to me - love without limit, love without conditions, love without measure. To love is to reign!

LOVE-LENT 2017 - THE WORD IN LENT #19

Stubbornness of Heart kills Love

Thursday, Third week in Lent - 23rd March, 2017
Jer 7:23-28; Lk 11:14-23

Love has to do entirely with the heart - yes love is the language of the heart and if the heart is found to be stubborn, there is hardly any room for love there in. 

There are people who claim to be in love but very soon after their wedding their married life becomes a tough experience, the reason is exactly this - the stubbornness of heart. Each one is fixed or fixated on those ideas or attitudes of their own, that the heart grows more and more stubborn. This stubborness will not let love grow; it will only make selfishness grow and thwart love at its core. 

Stubbornness of heart can arise due to three reasons: 1. My ego does not allow me to change my mind; 2. I don't want to lose the little and passing benefits that my old way of life gives; and 3. I am determined to go with what is against the truth and righteousness. 

Let us beware, stubbornness of heart kills love!

LOVE-LENT 2017 - THE WORD IN LENT #18

Law - a gift of Love

Wednesday, Third week in Lent - 22nd March, 2017
Deut 4:1,5-9; Mt 5: 17-19

Rules and Regulations are many times detested by people. At times we look for loopholes and bypass rules; we look out for ways and means to evade laws. But the Word today instructs us, the so-called laws or precepts or commandments from the Lord are not imposed on us in anyway! We are free to choose to subscribe to these on our own, while the world wishes to break free of any rule whatsoever and instigates people to think that freedom is to do anything one wishes! The truth is being free is to the capacity to choose the right thing to say or to do at the right moment. How do we know what is right? The Lord in true and profound love has thought out for us a way in anticipation and the precepts we have from the Lord is the way set out for us. 

In the name of freedom today, people tend to justify aberrations, promote promiscuity and sanctify selfishness. Jesus challenges us to pay heed to the commands from the Lord and choose to live by it, despite the hardships they cause. If the motive is to stay close to the Lord, the Lord will empower us to stay clear of any falls!  Love of the Lord is close to us and the laws are just an expression of it.

LOVE-LENT 2017 - THE WORD IN LENT #17

Love: Recalling goodness at the heart of the fire

Tuesday, Third week in Lent - 21st March, 2017
Dan 3:25, 34-43; Mt 18:212-35

Being good and recognising the goodness in others is a faculty related to true love. The three levels of this faculty is spoken of in the Word today. 

First level is being good ourselves: as God is good. God is good all the time, and we are called to imitate that eternal goodness. 

The second level is to readily recognise the goodness in others: just as we appeal to the mercy of the Lord knowing well how rarely we deserved it.  Our love for God and God's love for us should inspire us to look at each other with that goodness as a framework.

The third level is to recognise the goodness of the other even at most trying moments of life: just as we see Azarias today praising God from the heart of the fire. It is not enough, the Lord challenges, that we recognise the goodness in others when we are experiencing moments of joy and tranquility. We should be able recognise that goodness even when we are at the heart of the fire, even when we are going through the rough patches in life. Recognising the goodness of the others should become our second nature and it will happen only when we grow deeper and deeper in our personal goodness.

TO LOVE IS TO THIRST

LOVE-LENT 2017 - THE SUNDAY SCHOOL

Sunday 3: 19th March, 2017

Exo 17:3-7; Rom 5:1-2,5-8; Jn 4:5-42

Life is beautiful, no doubt; but it never lacks its share of problems, difficulties, confusions, traps and temptations. The beauty lies precisely in the manner in which a person lives these moments more than the happier ones. Anyone claiming to be a person of faith, has to manifest a level of maturity that shows him or her capable of living with a constant thirst. The liturgy today invites us to reflect on this aspect of one's faith life - learning to live with thirst. 

Life has its own patches of dryness and no one's life is an exception to it. The dryness is more severe in some, when compared to the others. What matters is not actually how much more or how much less, but how a person handles with one's own share of dryness. Handling aridity in life is a faith-skill. We see the people of Israel in their driest patch of their history - the sojourn in the desert. They are brought forth from slavery across the Red Sea, with great and mighty signs and wonders. But once in the desert, they complain for every little thing lacking patience to the core. They long for the onions and garlic of Egypt, they long for the flesh and meat they once had in plenty, they fret that they are without a drop of water! It is easy to laugh at them or judge their impatience, but we will do well before that to think of ourselves and our lives. Issues in the family, the employment issues, the financial crisis, the relationship issues, sickness, misunderstanding... as soon as a problem begins in our lives don't we begin to complain too? The Lord teaches us - to TURN TO THE ROCK, when struggling to handle aridity in life. Dying without water, the people get water from the least expected source... in the dry parched desert and worse still, a dry boulder of a rock in that desert. If we turn to the Lord, our Rock... we will see solutions to our problems, clarity to our confusions, help in our difficulties, from the least expected quarters. Let us turn to the Rock.

The second reading instructs us how to comport ourselves while feeling the thirst. When in the thick of a problem or in the eye of the storm, where do we fix our gaze? On the problem: that will only magnify the problem. On ourselves: that will only make us more and more depressed in self pity. Instead the reading invites us to fix our gaze on Christ, on the Lord who, even while we were undeserving sinners, was ready to lay down his life for us. Such is the love of God for us and should we fret when we are in a crisis? We are invited to RETURN TO THE SPRING, to the saving grace that loves without measure, the love that has been "poured" into our hearts from that Spring. 

In the Gospel, Jesus speaks of a thirst with which we should all live! It is not the thirst for a material good, a thirst for a interim peace, a thirst for a breath of relief but a Thirst for eternal life, a Thirst for perennial peace, a Thirst for fullness of life - a life-giving Thirst. He offers to give us the living water, the spring "gushing up to eternal life" (Jn 4:14). "All who are thirsty, come to me and drink" he declared elsewhere (Jn 7:37). We are called to live with that thirst, constantly longing for God. Like that deer that yearns for running streams, like the parched land that longs for rain, our soul should thirst for God, teaches the psalm (42). Let us thirst for God, let us thirst for a deeper and deeper relationship with God. let us thirst for the Spirit, let us thirst for the fruits of the Spirit, let us thirst for a life that is united with God, let us thirst for a life that is filled with God. Let nothing disturb us...let nothing separate us from God...hardships or distress or persecution or famine or perils or sword, not even death; let nothing separate us from God. Let these days of lent help us RELEARN TO LIVE IN GOD. 

LOVE-LENT 2017 - THE WORD IN LENT #16

Love: To dare to belong

Saturday, Second week in Lent - 18th March, 2017
Mic 7:14-15,18-20; Lk 15: 1-3,11-32

To say the Lord loves me is to trust in the goodness of the Lord. To say I love the Lord is to dare to belong to the Lord. The former is many times easier than the latter. 

In the first reading today, Micah speaks to God with a right of a child who belonged to the Lord, though he acknowledges his own shortcomings. In the parable that Jesus narrates we have the younger son who fell short of perfection but soon realised that he belonged to his father. They both dare to declare to the Lord that they loved the Lord. 

That was very daring of them, which the elder son dared not do. He did not feel that sense of belonging to the father, though he lived all the time with the father. What a lesson to learn, that it  is not to be taken for granted that I dare to belong to the Lord, just because I am most of the time around him. Even if were to stray a bit away from the Lord occasionally, it is important to feel that strong sense of belonging to the Lord, only that will bring me back to him. To love the Lord is to dare to belong to the Lord.