Be Aware

Journey to Holiness: See the truth, even if it hurts

March 18, 2019: Monday, Second week of Lent

Daniel 9: 4-10; Luke 6: 36-38

Truth is what is. It never changes according to one's convenience or inconvenience. Much of the virtues that are at stake these days can be traced back to one tendency as a source: the unwillingness to see the truth. It is not certainly an inability, but an unwillingness and in that, it is a choice, a deliberate choice for the evil.

There is a crime racket that is shaking our State (Tamilnadu) these days...and a couple of days back the mother of one of the accused (although the case of him being the accused is so evident, even from his own admission of it), spoke to the media defending her son, and maligning the name and the character of a victim. This is so typical of the world today. According to these sorts of persons, there is nothing called 'truth', what exists is only what pleases them and what does not! Can this be our lifestyle?

We need to see the truth even if it hurts. If I find myself at fault, I should be courageous enough to admit it. If I find another at fault I should be prophetic enough to point it out and Christian enough to forgive him or her. If I find it impossible to forgive another, can I ever hope to be forgiven by the Lord? How can there be two measures, one which I use and the other which I wish to be used for me by God. The measure is the same and that is truth... hence let us learn to see the truth, however tough it might be!

Holiness tip for Today: Be aware of your need for forgiveness; forgive the other!

Holiness: GROWING INTO HEAVEN

Milestone: THE MOUNTAIN

March 17, 2019: Second Sunday in Lent
Genesis 15: 5-12; Philippians 3:17 - 4:1; Luke 9: 28-36

We find ourselves at the second milestone on our journey to holiness; the second Sunday of Lent and the milestone is the Mountain! After the desert experience, the dry, the empty and the lonely experience, we are led to the mountain experience, an experience of elation, ecstasy and exuberance. We are given this experience to remain focused on the ultimate joy that is in store for us and thus never to lose hope or give up.

Mountain is an experience of joy, excitement, freshness, sunlight, and thrill. On our journey to holiness, these experiences are given as foretastes of the heaven that we are promised with. And we grow through these experiences into heaven. Mountain Experiences are foretastes of heaven, experiences closer in nature to heaven, a preparation towards heaven.

Holding on to the Lord's Covenant: We go up the mountain, holding on to the Covenant that the Lord has made with us, an unfailing security that sustains us in the uphill journey. The Covenant offers us a secure foundation on which to build our entire journey to heaven, the mountain taking us closer to heaven. The first reading today offers us the example of Abraham who founded his life on the promises of the Lord and was ready to give up everything that he had, towards ascending that holy mountain of the Lord. His confidence in the Lord and on the covenant, was rewarded though much late yet in a manner concrete and tangible. 

Keep Climbing in your Commitment: If Covenant is the gift from God, commitment is the response required from us, a way to ascend towards heaven, crossing remarkable milestones. The second reading instructs us how to keep climbing in our commitment towards being transfigured into the image of Christ himself. We know a journey uphill is always tough and demanding, but the fact is that we are being led up by someone who has come from the top and so has a first had experience of not only what it means to be up there but also what it takes to get there. Because, Christ who is from heaven has the experience of having lived through the same life that we have and having reached that heavens, promising us that the same is possible with us.

Be Transformed towards Communion: Heaven is communion, communion with the Father, the Son and the Spirit and we grow into that communion. We are drawn towards it in our daily life, through the mountain experiences of joy and esctasy - but we are not to get stuck there! Like Peter and the other disciples wanted, we might think of laying our tents there. That is not our call; our call is to be continuously transformed into the image and likeness of God, into being children of the Covenant, ever faithful in our climbing, deepening our commitment to be transfigured, that finally we get ourselves transfigured into Christ. 

The Lenten journey is likened to this journey of holiness, growing through the mountain experiences into heaven. Let us resolve to never give up on this journey - neither due to discouragement nor due to presumptuous disillusionment that we have reached heaven much before actually doing so. 

As we find ourselves with the Transfigured Lord on the mountain today, let us keep in mind that we have not reached the destiny as yet. The Lord reminds us this: that it is not enough to see the Lord transfigured and be taken up by that; but it is our call to be transfigured ourselves into the Lord's image and thus grow into the heaven that is promised to us. 

Be Christ

Journey to Holiness: Love genuinely, without measure

March 16, 2019: Saturday, First week of Lent

Deuteronomy 26: 16-19; Matthew 5: 43-48

The Perfection that Christ expects from us is being like him, that is, being love! The love that we speak of is genuine love, a love that is seen even in odd times, specially in odd moments, in spite of odd times! It is not merely being kings and queens of good times! The key question here is: How enduring is your love? 

Jesus becomes the epitome of love, not because he loved us when we were waiting to love him in return; but because he loved us even when we cared the least for his love; as St. Paul observes, he died for us even while we were sinners! 

At time how calculative and how selective we become in sharing our love - is that truly Christ like? Loving genuinely, that is, without measure and without conditions; that is the call that we have today.

Holiness tip for today: Love, without calculating or measuring the cost!

Be Good

Journey to Holiness: Not just doing some good but be good!

March 15, 2019: Friday, First week of Lent

Ezekiel 18: 21-28; Matthew 5: 20-26

Doing some good now and then is not good enough, the Word challenges us to BE good, and be good consistently. 

Once having been good, does not count! Being persistent in your goodness is the challenge.

Rationalisation and Justification will not excuse you, if you cease to be good. Never tiring in doing good is the sign expected from you.

Making a show of your goodness by way of legalities and fulfillment of requirements amounts to nothing, the Lord can see through your paraphernalia and judge you by your internal self. Are you essentially good?

What you do to manifest your goodness does not matter, whether that goodness truly exists within matters much. 

Your external image of being good means nothing because the Lord knows your thoughts that pass judgments on others, your words that kill persons, your wishes that rob people of their respect and dignity. Being Good means being good at the core of your being, every bit of you being good! Yes, it is tough, but we have no choice if we want to call ourselves children of God, the totality of Goodness.

Holiness tip for today: Be good, don't be satisfied with doing some good!

Be Prayer

Journey to Holiness: Pray, with your life

March 14, 2019: Thursday, First week of Lent

Esther 4:17; Matthew 7:7-12

Be Prayer - it may sound a bit odd, but that is what matters more than saying prayers! Both, the example of Esther that is offered and the teaching of Christ on asking, seeking and knocking, reiterate that specific dimension of prayer. At times we are busy saying prayers that we do not realize our call to 'be prayer'! 

Being Prayer has two meanings: 

One, being the one who prays..."pray-er"! Bringing one's whole self into prayer that it becomes a self offering to the Lord with heart, soul, body and mind! 

Secondly, being prayer means being what we pray. If we pray for peace, we become the agents of peace; if we pray for the needy, we become the consolation of those in need; if we pray for the Church, we grow to be responsible members of the Church, and so on. 

Esther, in her act of praying was getting ready to offer herself totally despite risks, for the sake of God's people. Jesus concludes his teachings on prayer with the golden rule: do unto others what you wish be done unto you! The key is here: let us mean what we pray, and be daring enough to take up the challenge that our prayer poses to ourselves. Praying is not an easy job; it is demanding!

Holiness tip for today: Pray, with your life not merely with your words!

Be Open

Journey to Holiness: Listen to the Word all around you

March 13, 2019: Wednesday, First Week of Lent

Jonah 3: 1-10; Luke 11:29-32 

Wickedness of the generation that Jesus refers to in the Word today, is the tendency to justify, rationalise or counteract the call to conversion. It is a common experience that we see, within ourselves or around us, the numerous reasons given for justifying a wrong doing even after we know clearly that it is wrong. It is also possible to see persons who rationalise a wrong doing in the name of circumstances, consequences and customs. There are others who make sure they sideline or eliminate those people who raise pertinent questions, disturbing questions or upsetting queries. These are various ways in which people react, when they are put in the dock sometime or the other. 

The challenge today is offered by the people of Nineveh, as Jesus refers to! They paid attention to the message when it came, they listened and they acted upon it. If only we are to truly listen to all the messages we receive and genuinely act upon at least a half of them, we would never be called "wicked" by Jesus! The need is to be open: to be open to receive the Word, the call from the Lord towards conversion, from anywhere and from anyone. 

That call to integrity, to authentic christian living, to radical witness to the Gospel way of life, is all around us. We are called to witness to the gospel with our very lives - are we ready?

Holiness tip for today: Listen, the Lord is speaking, through everything and everyone around.

Be God's

Journey to Holiness: Believe and belong to the Lord.

March 12, 2019: Tuesday, 1st Week of of Lent
Isaiah 55:  10-11; Matthew 6: 7-15

Yesterday we were invited to reflect on 'being Godly' and today we are reminded of our fundamental nature of belonging to God: we are God's own... God's sons and daughters. 

God's Word, God's presence with us is so effective that everything can be transformed by it: but there is hitch. That is the personal freedom that God has given us, as the core element of our fundamental dignity! God will never take that for granted. Anything that God wishes to do for us: it depends on our personal choice; the use of our freedom! We need to choose it, positively and personally. 

At times we get so busy with all that we involve - things, persons, activities, dreams, plans and projects - that we forget to whom we belong. Imagine in a football game, if a player in the midfield were playing so vigorously that he forgot for whom he or she is playing...  funny, isn't it? That is what happens with us, so regularly and so unwittingly. Most of our problems in life crop up from this situation... our frustrations, our competitions, our anxiety to prove ourselves, our arrogance, our pride, our self conceit, they come from the fact that we are not mindful of the fact that we are all God's. 

God's word, God's plan, God's design, God's reign - these are the overriding principles that should govern our lives if we are convinced that we are God's.

Holiness tip for today: Belong to God, in all that you are and in all that you do.

Be Godly

Journey to Holiness: Give Unconditionally

March 11, 2019: Monday, 1st Week of Lent

Leviticus 19: 1-2,11-18; Matthew 25:31-46

Be Holy, for I am Holy, invites the Lord today. We are called not only to be God's people, but also to be Godly people.  It is not only about doing good, but doing it as God does! That is where the key is. The Word today gives us clearly what to do (the Gospel), what not to do (first reading), what not to fail in doing (Gospel) and what to abstain from (first reading). All of them put together... the call is to become like God; to be Godly.

Observe the quality that is underlined in the Word - it is about giving and not to worry about getting it back; it is about doing good and not being worried about receiving good in return; it is about loving and not insistent about being loved in return... the prayer of St. Francis strikes a lovely chord here: Grant that I may not seek so much to be understood as to understand, to be loved as to love, to be forgiven as to forgive! 

I cannot have conditions, for the good that I do: how much; to whom; under what circumstances; why they and why now... these analyses will make our giving conditional. The Lord instead gives and gives, never counting the cost nor the consequences. Can I grow to be as unconditional as that - that is being Godly.

Holiness tip for today: Give, without laying conditions for it!

Holiness: GROWING THROUGH TESTS

Milestone: The Desert

March 10, 2019: 1st Sunday of Lent
Deuteronomy 26: 4-10; Romans 10: 8-13; Luke 4: 1-13

In our journey to holiness, an essential milestone is the desert and they never lack! Every person goes through these times in quite a succession! Lent is proposed to be a workshop to train us for these testing times that might come our way, all through our life and to grow through them! Today the Word gives us three lessons on confront these testing times:

1. Our Disposition: Be Prepared to Wander

The First reading invites us to understand our history! Every one who has reached some significant point with the Lord in his or her life experience, has passed definitely passed through a phase of wandering. It is an essential spiritual experience to get closer to oneself, to each other and to the One who leads us.

2. Our Approach: Never Cease to Ponder

Yes, the One who leads us into the wilderness knows what is in store! We would miss it all if we do not keep pondering on the way. Pondering is such a powerful exercise that it can make sense of everything that happens, in its own time of course. When we cease to ponder we run the risk of wandering without purpose; the point is wandering with a specific purpose, in a specific direction...which the Lord alone knows.

3. Our Attitude: Be ready to Surrender

That specific purpose, that specific direction will be revealed in time, just in time! Hence the challenge is to surrender and not to fret. Surrendering would first involve the humility of saying to myself: I am not in control of everything. Secondly it would mean lifting my eyes to accept that God is in-charge. And thirdly it is a serene acceptance of God's will with utmost cooperation on our part, not rushing through or forcing things. 

It may be tough to find times so testing, but only when we are tested, we could be sealed OK.

Be Brilliant

Journey to Holiness: Conform not to the world but to the Lord

March 9, 2019: Saturday after Ash Wednesday

Isaiah 58: 9-14; Luke 5: 27-32

Let your light Shine, bids Jesus. This 'shining' or being brilliant, is not to project our own selves but to show the way to the rest of the world. It is not about hogging the limelight, but leading the world by example. 

While the world would look at a person as a tax collector, a sinner, a trespasser, a male or a female, some one important or less important, the Lord would see every one as a son or a daughter, someone so lovable and someone belonging to the Lord!

When I begin to see everyone as God's beloved, I begin to see the point in reaching out to each and every one of them, in the way each one needs. The world's categories such as, useful or not, worthy or not, feasible or not, do not mean anything in the categories of the Lord. The more we conform to the Lord the more we get to realise the folly of the order that the world has created for itself, not addressing each one by their utility. When we refrain from this utilitarian logic... the Lord, the Lord's perspective and the Lord's will become the priorities, and they are the essential prerequisites to Shine! 

Holiness tip for today: Shine; let the Lord shine through you.