The New people

WORD 2day: Monday, 2nd week in Ordinary time

January 18, 2021: Hebrew 5:1-10; Mark 2: 18-22

When the Lord announces in the book of revelation, 'Behold I make all things new,'... we know well that it's not merely about some "things" to be made again or re-created; it's primarily about a new mentality, a new perspective that God wants to instil and inspire in us. The source and the spring of this new perspective is Christ himself. He is at the same time the priest and the sacrifice; the prophet and the Lord of the prophets!

In fact with a new way of relating with us, with the unique way of sharing our very nature, Christ makes us a new people! And that is what the Lord wants to see in us: our new selves, free from the shackles of the past and the prejudices of the ages, to relate with each other anew and to live with each other without any conditions or preconceived notions.

Being new persons is not being strange, but being recreated in the Spirit, being imbued with the newness of the Gospel and being inspiring and to some extent being even scandalous. Some truly Christian attitudes are scandalous - forgetting the evil done to oneself, forgiving the harm intended, loving the one who hurt you, doing good in spite of the evil done against you, helping someone whom you hardly know or from whom you can expect no return, standing by the weak and the helpless despire the inconveniences and discomfort that is cause to oneself - these are scandalous, aren't they? 

We are called to conform to the Spirit of Christ, not conform to the practice and system around. That is the crux of being New people today!

COME, SEE AND BE

Inspiration, Invitation and Institution 

January 17, 2021: 2nd Sunday in Ordinary time 

Samuel 3: 3b-10,19 ; 1 Corinthians 6: 13c-15a, 17-20 ; John 1: 35-42

Our life is a call and more specifically our Christian life is a demanding call. Having reflected last week on the Call of Jesus, last week with his Baptism, this week the Word speaks to us of our call from Jesus! It involves an inspiration, an invitation and an institution! 

The first reading, from the life of Samuel highlights the inspiration we have received. Inspiration is from within. It requires that we are attentive in order that we do not miss it. A friend of mine recently resigned his job and opted another underpaid job. When asked why, he said that he felt that the former job was keeping him away from the Church, eating away his Sundays and a great portion of even the other days. I asked him how he did come to decide on such a thing. And he said, 'I just felt it'. It is significant to note that he had very recently become a Catholic, in spite of strong resistance from the rest of his family.

Inspiration is the intervention of Spirit into our concrete lives, making us discern the will of God and work out our salvation. There are directions that come our way, as to what to do and what to choose, and if only we are attentive to the signs and events, we would know exactly what choices to make! At times we care so less about what God wants of us, that we decide on something wrong and reap the fruits of it - complaining that the Lord is too hard with us! How great a gift inspiration is!

The Gospel extends the invitation to come and see. The fact that we are inspired is undeniable, for every one of us is guided and led by the Spirit who resides within us (as the Second reading reminds us). But the crucial element is for us to 'see'... to take note of... to understand what we are inspired about. The invitation is to behold the message from the Lord, to make our contact with the Lord an experience and not just an appointment.

There is a standing invitation from the Lord to belong to the Lord, in body and soul, in spirit and mind, in time and space! The invitation is at the same time a challenge, challenging us to belong to the Lord. That invitation and challenge has been age old - Hear O Israel, love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your might and with all your strength. That love is indeed a challenge to belong to the Lord and to the Lord alone.

The call to be a Christian is not a call of an individual, it is a call to be a communion of persons, to be an institution. It is a call to form One Body with the Lord - united with the brothers and sisters in love, instituted into a sign of hope to everyone around who is looking out for something to hold on to in life. The world today may appear so critical about Christians, but it is only an expression of the expectations they have of us: that as one family of hope-filled people, one institution of Christ filled persons, we radiate the joy that the humanity stands in need of.

Let us be attentive to the inspiration within, heed to the invitation from above and belong to the institution that we are called to become - the Church, the people of God, the believing Community, brothers and sisters in love!

Divine Solidarity that makes us complete

WORD 2day: Saturday, 1st week in Ordinary time

January 16, 2021: Hebrew 4:12-16; Mark 2: 13-17

The Word became human and lived amidst us, sharing every bit of our reality, everything except sin. The same Word lives with us and within us today, enlightening us, sustaining us and making us complete. 

As the psalmist instructs us, the Lord knows me through and through, knows when I sit and when I stand, even before a word is on my mouth, the Lord knows what I am about to say and knows even the thoughts in my heart. 

These knowings are not for judging me or conditioning me, they are not means of labeling or categorising me...they are means of Divine Solidarity that makes me Whole. God the only Complete Being, chooses to complete my being, in spite of my unworthiness and imperfections. 

This Divine Solidarity is a grace and a vocation. Grace, because we know we are loved forever without conditions or limits. That is our Identity - people loved by God. It is a Vocation, because we are called to imitate the same solidarity in Empathy - not judging and gossiping, calumniating and scandalising, but feeling one with the weak and healing those with hurts. We are called to empathise, build up solidarity among us because, one of the fundamental expressions of true love is solidarity. 

Faith is a Verb

WORD 2day: Friday, 1st week in Ordinary time

January 15, 2021: Hebrew 4: 1-5,11; Mark 2:1-12

Faith is not merely accepting a set of truths in theory and professing to believe it. Faith takes the most concrete form of expression in one's personal life and in the life of a community and brings the entire reality, personal, communitarian, social, economic and political, together affecting the whole being of a person and a community. In fact, faith is not merely a quality or a feeling, it is a verb.

When we say faith is a verb, it means faith is an action word. It takes a doer, an action done and the one towards whom the action is aimed. The classical definition of faith too upholds this vision : faith as the personal response to a self revealing God, involves me, God, and my response, the response being a concrete expression in action.

The Word today presents is with persons who had faith in Christ and moved by it they did something that was incredible...they broke all barriers that kept them away from Christ. Their faith was expressed in most concrete way possible. They decided to take that crippled man to Christ, they had a problem, they over came that problem and did what they decided to do - because they had faith in Christ. Nothing could stop them.

We would do well to reflect :

How concrete is my faith in Christ?

How determined am I to stay close to Christ?

What are those things that hinder me from getting near to Christ?

What am I prepared to DO, because I believe? 

Ready and Willing

WORD 2day: Thursday, 1st week in Ordinary time

January 14, 2021: Hebrews 3: 7-14; Mark 1: 40-45

If you wish, you could make me well, prays the man with leprosy! What does God wish for us? God wills that we live to the full, that we live every day and every moment to the utmost, regardless of the situation that we find ourselves in. For I know the plans I have for you, plans for your welfare and not for your ruin, says the Lord through Jeremiah (29:11). When it comes to giving us life, and fullness of life, God is ever ready and always willing. The question is, are we?

Are we ready and willing, to listen to the Lord and live up to the status that the Lord had given us: to be coheirs with Christ. Just as the man says to the Lord in the Gospel passage today, the Lord says to each of us - if you wish, you could be coheirs with me to the Reign! Again the question is, are we ready and willing?

To be ready is to be prepared to act, to respond and to face a situation. It consists of being aware of what we could possibly be encountering, to be equipped to face that situation and to make the preliminary effort to live life to the full even in a changing scenario.

To be willing is even more fundamental...it is to make up one's mind to accept a situation, with all its exigencies. It involves trust and hope; trust that the Lord will always be in favour of our life to the full, and hope that nothing that happens is hidden from the omnipotent and beloved presence of God. Isn't that a disposition that we need to grow in?

The Lord wishes that we be well, be blessed and live our lives to the full... Are we ready and Willing? 

The Lord with us

WORD 2day: Wednesday, 1st week in Ordinary time

January 13, 2021: Hebrew 2: 14-18; Mark 1: 29-39

The Lord be with you, is a daily greeting we have! The Lord being with us, in Christ-ian terms, means that the Lord is for us, the Lord is in our favour, the Lord cares for us - in short, the Lord is with us. The Lord with us - Emmanuel, is not merely a presence that is spatial, but a presence that is total - in every way. 

The Word explains today the ways in which the Lord is with us. The Lord is with us emotionally - for the Lord knows what we feel, what we are going through and what we make of what happens to us. The Lord is with us spiritually - for the Lord inspires our spirits to make choices, set priorities and walk in righteousness. The Lord is with is concretely - for the Lord experiences with us all that we experience during the day and all through the day. 

In the daily routine of Jesus that is presented in the Gospel today, we are given with a picture of what his life was like, giving us a hint that there should be enough space for the other, for the needy and for God in our daily lives. Jesus shows us by example as to how to live a life, where the Lord shall be with us!

The Lord is with us, in every way! Let us never fret or despair, even in the worst of scenarios, for God knows what we are going through, because Jesus has gone through that himself!

Jesus our brother

WORD 2day: Tuesday, 1st week in Ordinary time 

January 12, 2021: Hebrew 2:5-12; Mark 1:21-28

Who do people say that I am, was a famous question that Jesus asked his disciples. Who do you say that I am, was another dimension that he was interested in. Today we have another similar question that is answered in the Word: who are we to Jesus, or how does Jesus look at us or what does Jesus consider us to be?

The letter to the Hebrews repeatedly insists on the human condition that God deigned to assume in the person of Jesus Christ. It is the most salvific of all aspects within the mystery of incarnation. In the very taking of the "human" form the Lord made salvation a universal offer to us... If we conform to the image that the Lord left as a model for us, we shall be in a position to experience that salvation to the full.

Jesus in sharing our nature, becoming one with us in everything except sin, and reconciling us to God our father and mother, makes us on par with himself in relation to the one loving God... We are all, not only brothers and sisters in Jesus Christ, but brothers and sisters of Jesus Christ. It is a privilege and a challenge at one and the same time.

It is a privilege to be called a brother or sister of Christ, because it makes present the fact that we are all created in the most awesome image and likeness of God. It is a challenge because to be a brother or a sister of Jesus is a tough call :the one who hears the words of my father in heaven and puts it into practice, is my brother and my sister!

We are exhorted in the beginning of this Ordinary season of the liturgical year to get consciously deeper into the task of resembling Christ, for in it we grow in the image and likeness of God. It is difficult but not impossible, because we have a strong support and inspiration in Jesus our brother. 

The Reign Call

WORD 2day: Monday, 1st week in Ordinary time

January 11, 2021: Hebrew 1:1-6; Mark 1: 14-20

We have come to the end of the Christmas season and Ordinary Time begins; we have finished celebrating the events around Jesus' birth and we begin to remember the life and ministry of the Lord. Rightly the readings today highlight the revelation made in and through Jesus of Nazareth, the Son of God, as the Word made flesh, and as the climax of all precendent prophecies and preparations! 

And Jesus begins, by proclaiming the Reign for which he stood all his life, even unto death! His message, his life and his mision was all summarised in that one reality: the Reign of God. The Reign of God is the single term explanation of all that Jesus taught, in words and actions. It is not only about Jesus, but even all that the prophets and the law spoke of till Jesus... ushering in that moment when Jesus would inaugurate the definitive phase of the beginning of the Reign. Yes, the Reign has begun...but ofcourse, not yet completely established.

The Reign will never be completely established until the last person on earth who rebels against truth, justice, love and peace converts himself or herself to the love and mercy of God. It begins with each of us, just leaving our nets, our boats and our attachments, to follow Jesus - follow the values of Jesus, the teachings of Jesus and the very life style of  Jesus. This is the Reign Call that is given to each of the Christians of all times.

The Lord calls us today, to make our own, the dream and the vision of the Reign of God; to be in our own way messengers of the Reign. Are we prepared to leave the nets and boats, and follow the Reign Call?

UNWRAPPING JESUS

The Love, the Covenant and the Beloved

January 10, 2021: Solemnity of the Baptism of the Lord

Isaiah 55: 1-11; 1 John 5: 1-9; Mark 1: 7-11

Christmas season draws to its close with the Baptism of the Lord, because the manifestation is made as clear as possible at this point when the voice from heaven thunders, "this is my beloved Son!" The moment definitively seals the greatest of the gifts that God has ever given humanity: God's only Son...Jesus the Christ, the Word made flesh! The gift that came down to us on that Christmas night, in the lowliness of the manger, has been gradually unwrapped these days, with manifestations - first to the shepherds, then to the wise men and slowly but strongly to Mary and Joseph, as they beheld that Son of God, in their humble hands.

Today is the culmination of the unwrapping...Jesus the gift of God is unwrapped so magnificently in the Liturgy today. We are called to behold that gift, so that the warning that John gives in his Gospel: he came unto his own and his own did not recognise him, may not happen in our case.

We are called to behold Jesus, the LOVE OF GOD. Jesus is the love of God personified. God's love takes flesh and pitches the tent amidst us... in the person of Jesus! Wherever Jesus went there was healing, life, happiness, forgiveness, in short he was the presence of God, the presence of love, love which lived among people. That is what we are called to perceive, as perceived John in the second reading today! To perceive Love living amidst us, manifest today by the very voice of God. Perceiving the presence we are called to transform ourselves into presences of love...for the same voice cries out to us today, in the suffering world, in the marginalised persons and in the exploited brothers and sisters!

We are called to behold Jesus, the COVENANT OF GOD. Isaiah proclaims those beautiful words, : I have given you as a covenant to the people, a light to the nations. A covenant is more than a contract; a covenant is more than an agreement. It is something that is etched into the lives of those who are involved. It is taking responsibility for each other, that is why the Church defines marriage as a covenant! Jesus is the sign of the responsibility God took for his children; God did not spare even God's only Son, writes the Apostle. Perceiving Jesus as the covenant of God, we are called to take responsibility for our brothers and sisters, we are called to concern ourselves with the blind and the deaf of our society, the poor and the needy of our locality, the marginalised and the oppressed in our contexts.

We are called to behold Jesus, the BELOVED OF GOD. The voice declares it in all clarity, as wrote Isaiah of old. "This is my beloved, in whom i am well pleased!" In declaring God's love for Jesus, the voice today declares to each of us: you and I... we are the beloved of God...in whom God takes delight! In our Baptism, God made us God's own, and we belong to God and our God takes delight in us (Ps 149:4). 

In baptism we are made sons and daughters of God...that is brothers and sisters of Jesus, the greatest gift of God, Jesus the Love of God, the covenant of God and the beloved of God...and in Jesus our brother, we are called to be in our contexts, the presence of the love of God; in Jesus our covenant, we are called to be the signs of the covenant of God with the suffering humanity today; in Jesus the beloved of God, we are called to live our lives, every day and every moment pleasing to the Lord, who longs to declare, regarding each of us, "This is my beloved son, my beloved daughter, in whom I am well pleased!"

The Best Man's Call

WORD 2day: Saturday before the Lord's Baptism

January 9, 2021: 1 John 5: 14-23; John 3: 22-30.

The stage is all set for the Baptism of the Lord. We have, in these days, reflected on all the passages around the event of baptism of Jesus! Only thing left is, to celebrate the great event of Baptism itself, which we will be doing tomorrow. 

Today we have the identity and role of John clarified: John calls himself the best man! What a beautiful imagery of a prophet and a minister... one who rejoices for his master! But not anyone would be chosen the best man for a bridegroom! It will be the best friend of the bridegroom who will have that privilege. And he will have the honour of staying the closest to the bridegroom all through the ceremonies of wedding! 

The call is to grow in our relationship with Christ, to an extent that we would be considered close to Christ. Everyday is an opportunity to grow in this relationship. It is a life journey, a journey we make accompanied by the Lord, a journey that is shared with the Lord who walks beside us. 

By this evening we would begin the celebrations of the Baptism of the Lord. This day, let us dwell on our baptism, and thank God for the grace given to us in our baptism. Our baptism was the beginning of our journey with the Lord. Have we been conscious of the presence of the Lord with us, on the way? What place, in our daily life, have we given the Lord who is constantly with us? And what about the promises we gave to the Lord, at our baptism, at the beginning of this journey together? 

Let us make amends in our breach of promises and lack of commitment to the Lord and renew our resolve to grow ever closer to Christ our Lord!