Encounter that touches

WORD 2day: Monday, 14th week in Ordinary time 

July 5, 2021: Genesis 28:10-22; Matthew 9: 18-26

Encounter with God - the Word presents three of them today: Jacob's encounter with God, the ailing lady and the little child encountering Jesus. There are two messages that stand out in the entirety of today's events. 

Firstly, any encounter with God rejuvenates. Jacob was given a new vision of life; the lady with the haemorrhage was given a new life; and the little child was given back her life! One cannot remain the same after having encountered God. 

The second message, which is carried specially by the Gospel account, is about the special encounter through TOUCH - It is interesting to note the two accounts of Luke which seem to point to a fact: whether you touch God or God touches you, the fruits are the same! The lady, sad and suffering touched Jesus, and Jesus touched the little child dead and gone... the effect was the same - a new lease of life. 

Touching God or God touching us, they are the same - for they both are fundamentally an encounter and "Faith is born of an encounter with the living God who calls us and reveals his love" (Lumen Fidei, 4). 

May be another important feature can be underlined too - that God met Jacob on a ground  and while he slept; Jesus encountered the diseased lady on a road and amidst a jostling crowd; Jesus touched the little girl in a room and while she lay dead! It does not matter where we are, or what we are up to, the living God can encounter us anywhere and anytime, provided we are ready and willing to accept and behold the encounter. 

Behold I stand knocking at the door, says the Lord! May Lord Jesus touch us so that we may be healed by that encounter that touches our entire being. 

CALL AND CONTRADICTIONS

Living our call to the full

July 4, 2021: 14th Sunday in Ordinary time
Ezekiel 2:2-5; 2 Corinthians 12: 7-10; Mark 6: 1-6

Based on the Word this Sunday, here are some contradictions that you could ponder on…

1. You are sent by God to a particular space and time: till the end of your time you will not realise it to the full and not as long as you are in the space where you live!
    How many of us wonder what we are really upto and how many even lament that we are not making any meaning at all where we are! It is simply the strength of faith that can help us understand that we are in a particular situation, because God willed us to be there!

2. You are sent to live amidst a people, the people with whomever you find yourself in reality, but they will never look at it that way and you will wish to have been elsewhere all your life!
    At times it takes a whole life time to prove oneself; ironically some end their life, all the time trying to prove themselves, and never succeeding in any way. It takes a really strong self esteem to stand firm even at certain drastic experiences of rejection we face in life. That sort of a self esteem, comes from our sense of being connected to our real source, that is God, from whom we draw our dignity.

3. You are called to be a prophet - though it means living a life of a prophet, it is decided only in the way you die. It is, literally or symbolically, a call to die for a cause!
    This is another irony…to live for a cause is actually to die for it. That is, we find that the cause we are dedicating ourselves to, is so meaningful and life-giving that we are ready to give up anything for that. The Reign of God has to one such cause, or “the cause” for which a disciple of Christ has to live for, or die for?

4. You are sent, as people of God, amidst a people who would not easily accept you; if they accept you easily, may be, they are not the ones for whom you are specifically sent!
    Is it not our usual experience: that we seek to be with those with whom we feel at home, by whom we feel accepted, with whom we feel comfortable and appreciated. Apart from this, there is a kind of divisive sense of belonging, that differentiates between ‘we’ and ‘they’, ‘our’ and ‘their’… a sectarian mentality that has deep roots even within a church!

5. You are sent - that does not mean you are special... just look around and you would see scores of persons much better than you, however that does not excuse you from following your call.
    A sincere person is certain to have this feeling – that one is not really worthy of the call that he or she has received. For example, to be called ‘christian’ or to be called ‘people of God’ or ‘persons of God’…do we merit it? No. But that fact notwithstanding, we are called to live, strive to live the call that we have received, the chosen-ness that we enshrine.

6. You are sent - therefore it doesn't matter if you don't love the task that you are entrusted with, it is your duty not your hobby; do it with your full heart and energy… even if it is, and especially if it is living your daily life in silence!
    It could be that, the task we are called to does not interest us, or some one else’s task seems more attractive or more engaging or more rewarding! But that cannot deviate me from the responsibility that is entrusted to me! I need to grow sufficiently strong in the faith perspective of my life, that I do things not because I like them, but because I have been commissioned to do them, nevertheless I do them to my maximum capacity.

7. You are sent - that does not mean you are strong, it makes you weak and vulnerable! But it is in that weakness and vulnerability that you would make the One who sent, better known to the rest!
        It is not merely an honour to be an apostle, that is, to be sent. It is more a challenge and a risk. It does not only make me special, it makes me also more responsible, more answerable, more culpable of the wrong personal choices I make. No one practically may know the deep buried motivations that guide my choices, but God knows it all and it is God who has sent me. Does that not make me really vulnerable? However, that is my special identity, isn’t it?

8. You are a prophet to the people which means you would be rejected by them, at least by the dominant and the majority - if you are easily accepted, you are no prophet!
       What prophet is he or she, who speaks only what everyone likes! Is it not more a pleasing than a prophesying? Like Jesus asked in connection to John the Baptist: what did you go to see in the desert – a man with an elegance and finesse? If you are cause of a controversy, it is perfectly alright, provided you did not create it deliberately for your own mileage and your own hidden agenda.

9. Popularity and Prophecy do not go together - mind you, if you seem too popular in a place, you are conforming to their ideals, and not to the one who sent you. So, don't strive to make yourself acceptable!
        Pleasing, popularity, conformity – these are terms diametrically opposed to a prophetic lifestyle. The only person we need to please, or conform to, is God! This is due to the fact that God is eternal, never changing and ever perfect. When we begin to please as many as we can, we begin to compromise and conform, losing truth and meaning of our very lives. It is a serious question to dwell on, beginning from our simple ordinary daily life, to national and international affairs.

10. The One who sent you, sent you to the rebels, not to the patriots! Hence if you are comfortable with those who are inside the flock, with those who are just around you, you are mistaken - you haven't started to live your call yet!
       This is again the choice of people whom we deliberately choose to be with! But here it directly refers to those whom one intends to serve! When I do something for someone, I wish to see my returns, my reward, my satisfaction…and if I choose to serve only those who are submissive and those who do not raise any critical questions with respect to the situation in which they live. The world today is desperately trying to redefine ‘partiotism’ and ‘loyalty’, as conformism and compromise! Can it be?

In conclusion, what is the Word challenging us to be, or to do? To think and act in terms of the call that we have received and to be ever conscious of it. It may present apparent contradictions deep-seated controversies, but making the call the foundation of our meaning in life, is the secret to grow into true disciples, apostles, and prophets of the Lord.

My Lord and My God!

THE WORD AND THE SAINT

July 3, 2021: Feast of St. Thomas, the Apostle

Ephesians 2: 19-22; John 20: 24-29

It is always a special grace given that a person is concretely offered a proof for his or her faith. Otherwise faith is a personal experience that is inspired within a person and expressed in daily life. Thomas, the Apostle occasions an event that became an unforgettable experience for even the rest of the apostles, and for the entire believing community. 

Apart from focusing on the fact that Thomas doubted and hesitated to go by others' experience, his awe and total acceptance of the Master is a great inspiration for us. That statement he makes, My Lord and My God, was a such a spiritually mature statement that could not have come merely on the spur of the moment. It is definitely a relationship that Thomas shared with Jesus, a conviction he grew in and a declaration that summarised his faith experience. 

Thomas excels in taking the belief in Jesus to the next level, as he addresses Jesus for the first time as "God"! Till then they called Jesus, Master, Rabbi, Teacher, and even Lord...but it is from the heart of St. Thomas that we hear for the first time within the Gospels, Jesus being addressed, God. That was the sign of the faith maturity that was coming into the community of believers. It is a maturation of their perosnal experience of the person of Jesus!

The call for us today, is to become aware of our personal experience with Jesus the Christ - we may have a hundred definitions of who Jesus was and is, from varied sources and documents. But what matters most is, that one experience, that one personal definition that you have for the person of Christ. That is why Jesus insisted with his apostles at times: "but who do YOU say that I am?"

May St. Thomas, the holy apostle of faith, inspire us to yearn for more and more personal experiences with the person of Christ, that we may more and more mature to exclaim from the depth of our own hearts: my Lord and my God!

Mercy, not Sacrifice

WORD 2day: Friday, 13th week in Ordinary time

July 2, 2021: Genesis 23:1-4,19, 24:1-8, 62-67; Matthew 9: 9-13.

 

Mercy not Sacrifice! Mercy and Sacrifice actually stood for two paradigms that were in confrontation as a result of Jesus' life and teaching. God and one's relationship to God was explained purely in terms of sacrifice, sacrifice which stood for fulfilment of the requirements based on regulations and customs. The challenge is alive even today - that we do not make our spirituality a sacrifice-based spirituality. Fulfilment of the precepts, keeping the commandments, making vows and carrying out the same, offering suffrages and being faithful to our prayers to be 'said' or 'done'. 

Mercy, instead is fundamentally a relationship. I remember our Scripture professor explaining the meaning of the hebrew word for mercy - rahamim (or rachamim) which comes from the root, rehem (or rechem) which means "womb". Biblically, as Jesus uses, mercy thus refers to a compassion one feels to a child in the womb or a bond very intimate that arouses a warm feeling towards the other! 

Far from, doing something to help the other or giving something to someone in need, Mercy is to feel one with the other, specially with someone who is really in need. That is why the statement of Jesus that follows, I have come not to call the righteous but the sinners - a feeling one with the needy! 

When we really feel one with somone in trouble, or difficulty, or temptation, or a struggle, much before branding that person a 'sinner' or a 'weakling' or a 'traitor' or an 'infidel', we would strive to stay close to him or her, find out what actually is going on and share moments of solidarity that would walk that person right out of that situation. That is what Jesus did and that is what he expects of you and me: mercy, and not sacrifice!

To rise and walk...by faith

WORD 2day: Thursday, 13th week in Ordinary time

July 1, 2021: Genesis 22: 1-19; Matthew 9: 1-8

Imagine the Gospel scene of today: what if the man had decided not to get up and walk, because he was not sure if he were able to. He would have been justified...because after so many years of his lying down there, inability to stretch his limb, it is justified even if he thinks, it would logically be impossible to just rise and walk, so instantaneously as Jesus wanted him to. That fact of being justified notwithstanding, who would have been the loser? The man himself, and without knowing what he would have lost or missed. 

Many a times, out thinking goes this way. In the name of being careful and thoughtful and observant and prudent, we don't leave any space for God. We have everything pre-thought-out, everything fixed in its place, every judgement made and every calculation done! At the end of it all...we are at a loss, how things dont go the way we want them to. At times we do not even know what it means to depend on God - we say we believe in God but in practice we do not ant to take any chances, as we say!

Today the Word challenges us to believe, that nothing is impossible for God. Nothing is too big for God, be it forgiving sins or curing the sick, proves Jesus. Rising and Walking was a decision that man took to trust in the Lord and hope in his command over absolutely everything on earth. When Jesus said 'rise, pick up and walk'...he did not argue or reason out or ask for scientific proof that it would happen. He just wished to do what Jesus said, he just wanted to give God, God's space! Lo and behold, there was a miracle!

Abraham was just beginning to cherish his life, but he was cherishing it to the extent that he was growing unmindful of the One who gave him that life. But he was given a chance to rise and walk, to prove his trust and hope in the Lord. And he just rose, and walked...walked right up to that peak of giving up all his dreams and plans, all his future hopes and human urges. He rose above them all, and walked with the eye of faith!

Today in our daily experiences we are called to rise and walk...to find Lord right beside us all through and remember for ever, "we walk by faith not by sight" (2 Cor 5:7)!

With open eyes...

WORD 2day: Wednesday, 13th week in Ordinary time

June 30, 2021: Genesis 21: 5, 8-20a; Matthew 8: 28-34

Hagar had almost given up. For her it was all over. She found no scope of living on and no chance of surviving that desertedness. All that while the well was just round the corner. She was so filled with self pity that she was not able to see the ample opportunity just there for hers to take. All that God did was open her eyes that she may see the well. 

However blinded she might have been, Hagar, finally does see unlike the people of Gerasene who never saw till the end, who it really was that had entered their village. Their self pity of having lost their swine in thousands blinded their eyes from perceiving the great and wonderful blessings that Jesus had in store for them. What a great miss it was, they asked Jesus to leave! 

Our problems and troubles, our suspicions and judgements, our prior experiences and disappointments, can easily blind us to the great things that surround us. Sometimes these may even block the blessings that we could receive in life. Not that miracles do not happen, but most of the times we are not in a position to see the miracles that abound all around us. We choose what is not necessary, what could be easily done away with, what does not really help us live our life to the full. And we reject the truth, the fact, the light, the way, the meaning, the sense of life!  

If only Hagar still failed to see what the Lord was showing her, she would have thrown her life away. If only the people of Gerasene saw who they were rejecting; if only they beheld the blessings that he brought; if only they lived their lives with open eyes...

Peter, Paul and Francis...

THE WORD AND THE FEAST

June 29, 2021: Solemnity of Sts. Peter and Paul
Acts 12: 1-11; 2 Tim 4: 6-8, 17-18; Mt 16: 13-19

The Feast of Sts. Peter and Paul, marks the day of their martyrdom...of course they were not martyred together; neither were they martyred in the same place or manner! But they were both martyred in Rome and Rome has these two principal apostles as its patron. There is one thing told of these two apostles in the readings today. They were called, and given a specific task. You shall be the rock... you shall be my instrument to take my name to the gentiles... these were the words with which the Lord invited them. And the Lord constantly protected them and rescued them, while they were on their part ready to give up anything, including their very lives, for the sake of the task entrusted to them.

However, why is this twinning...Peter and Paul? Because they were two solid pillars of reference in the early Christian Community. The Tradition of Papacy is a combination of both these apostles: Peter referring to the governance and the Paul referring to the doctrines! Both of these are equally important as roles of the Holy Father. This is the reason, this day is celebrated in many places as the "Pope's Day."

It is a day to celebrate the great God-given gift of Pope Francis! It has been 8 years! We are well aware of the numerous forces that are up in arms against the present Holy Father... from other domains of the world other than faith and religion, many from other denominations and some even from within the Catholic Church. But at a closer study and understanding it is easy for one to realise the amount of good that the present Holy Father is doing to the Church and to the world in the name of the Church.

Pope Francis seems a beautiful combination of Peter and Paul - making his mark in the governance of the Universal Church and having recourse to deep doctrines to make sense of the ordinary day to day experiences. Today, let us keep the Holy Father in our special prayers! God bless our Pope!

Our choices punish us, not God!

WORD 2day: Monday, 13th week in Ordinary time

June 28, 2021: Genesis 18: 16-33; Matthew 8: 18-22

The first reading today is a bit confusing! It presents a scene which looks as if God is waiting to destroy some cities and Abraham is trying to appease the wrath of God. Though apparently that is how it is narrated, the message communicated is quite different. Apart from an important learning from today's Word, there is an important unlearning that has to happen. 

Sodom and Gomorrah were cities filled with filth and sinfulness, wickedness and devilishness and on account of these, they were cities that were running themselves into destruction! It is like the ecological crisis and the nuclear risks that we have created for ourselves today! Anything goes wrong anywhere, it is going to affect a large section of humanity. One day or the other we are to reap its fruits! We already are facing the brunt of such foolishness, with the pandemic that is draining the life out of  us these days!

The Wisdom of God in warning against these kind of craziness and pointing the right way is either rejected or belittled. The natural law and the divine law that is imprinted on our spirits, is the only guarantee towards a peaceful life. But we have ruined our prospects, disrespecting and discarding any law that comes from God! 

When Jesus discourages one from following him and chides the other for not following him, he knows exactly what is good for each of them. God has set laws and order, keeping in mind the needs, wants and requirements for peaceful living of the entire humanity. In human pride, irrational greed and ruthless selfishness, we have made a mess of the world entrusted to us. The warning is to all of us today, if we do not mend our ways and return to the ways of the Lord, we are leading ourselves and our world into destruction. As he did with Abraham, the Lord is negotiating with and through every good willed person even today!

Now coming to the learning and the unlearning: to learn the laws of the Lord inscribed on our hearts; to unlearn any misunderstanding that God punishes or God destroys! God does not punish, our own choices do!

WHO IS YOUR GOD?

A relevant question today!

June 27, 2021: 13th Sunday in Ordinary time

Wisdom 1:13-15,2:23-24; 2 Corinthians 8:7,9,13-15; Mark 5:21-43

Who is your God? This is a question the people of Israel were asked every now and then, by those who surrounded them. And the people would say: the one who brought us out of Egypt, the one who gave us bread in the desert, the one who gave us water from the rock, the one who saved us and the one who made us into a people. That was the experience of the people of God - an expeience of the God of alliance who promised them: You shall be my people and I shall be your God. But the problem began when people underwent some trials - they made wrong choices and were reaping the fruit; they lived by wrong priorities and it was getting back on them; they needlessly depended on the forces that they thought would save them but when it misfired they were submerged in troubles - they were trying to make sense of one question: but where is God during these moments? They thought and interpreted that - God had abandoned them, or that God refused to care for them, or worst of all, that God was punishing them! Was it really the right answer or the right way of looking at God?

No!, says Jesus emphatically in his thoughts, words and deeds. This was one of the life tasks of Jesus: to reintroduce God to humanity...to clear the wrong interpretations of  God, to make people look at God from God's perspective and not from human perspective, to make humanity really understand the Love of God and its boundless nature. Jesus had to struggle for it... when Jesus had to explain to the people that God has no favourites, and God's favourites are those who are renounced, negated and relegated to the peripheries of human existence. He had to tell people that God's nature is to forgive, all that they could manage was a maximum of seventy times seven; he had to insist every now and then, that God is a merciful father and mother, but all they could think was rewarding the good and punishing the evil! 

Today, after so much that God has done for us and after all that Jesus has done to reveal the true sense of God to us, do we really know God? Do we really understand who is our God? The experience of the pandemic and many other elements around it, even today, challenges us - do you really know who is your God? 

The pandemic has not ended...it is on and it continues to challenge us in many ways! One of the reflections, as inspired by the Word today, is to understand how compatible our image of God is, with the God that Jesus wishes us to see, experience and believe in.

God of life or death

The first reading speaks to us of the God of life... and we very often make of God, a god of death. Our God is a God of life - life, new life and endless life. We need to work out of the temptation to think of God as someone who has the noose in his hands, threatening us with death. There are two things that we need to understand here from Christian point of view: Death is not destruction! The end of our life here, is not the end of all! The Lord who gave us life, awaits us after life too! And death is not the obliteration of a person. Secondly, anything that appears to be a destruction or a ruin does not come from God, it comes from the evil one. An untimely death, a gruesome death, a painful death, an unexpected death - though the experience they give us is pain and sorrow, for the person who has that experience it is, another experience of his or her existence. It may be difficult to understand, but that is life. In the perspective of eternity, the fact is, whether we live or we die, we are with God. Even in the pain of separation from a person, this is what we need to believe and understand. Reflect on the first reading taking time with God. 

God of prosperity or poverty

The second reading points to us the folly of looking at God as someone who gives is prosperity! This is all due to the craze of the humankind which has prioritised prosperity and idolised the sense of having! Why is it that having in plenty and having in abundance is better than, having what you need and being happy with just the minimum! It looks like a thought out of the world, a thought that does not work! How easily we accept a statement like: you believe in God and you will have every thing you need in life; you submit yourself to God and you will have all the blessings that you think of...what a fallacy it is! St. Paul reminds us today: we believe in a God who made of Godself so poor, a God of total self-giving. God so loved the humanity that God gave everything including God's only son for our salvation; the Son so loved us that he gave us everything, including his own body and blood; the Spirit so loves us that the Spirit has deigned to make us the dwelling place! God became poor that we may feel enriched, blessed, filled with graces. So what should be our mentality? To seek to receive as much as we can? Or to give of ourselves as much as we can? That will decide whether we hold on to a god of arrogant prosperity or the God of loving poverty!

God of healing or punishment

The Gospel speaks to us of the consoling God of healing...specially in these days when everywhere the talk is about disease and death, the God of healing is a great consolation indeed. It is so disheartening to hear some, although they call themselves persons of God, or prophets, or preachers, or evangelists or whatever title they wish to give...but speaking words like: this pandemic is a wrath of God, a punishment from God and so on! How I wish these were dumb, for God's sake! Jesus connects us to the God who is Love. Love does not wish the pain of others, love wishes nothing but good. At times there are things which come as a consequence of our actions, a collective damage that we create for ourselves, the effect of the greed of some which affects even the others and the innocent...but can we attribute that to God? Punishing God was an interpretation that the people of Israel often had recourse to, to explain their sad and unfortunate predicament...but Jesus trashed it...Jesus overthrew it...Jesus has challenged us to grow over it. Whether we touch God as the woman with hemorrhage did today, of God touches us as Jesus did to the girl on the death bed...the result is healing, wholenses, life! God is a healing God. God gives wholeness! God gives life. God gives health! God gives meaning! God gives purpose! God gives eternal life!

Who is my God? God of life! God who embraced poverty out of love for me! God who gives me healing! Can we rest with that question today: who is your God?

When the Lord enters...

WORD 2day: Saturday, 12th week in Ordinary time

June 26, 2021: Genesis 18: 1-15; Matthew 8: 5-17

The Word today has the leitmotif of the Lord who enters homes and when the Lord does that, there is something marvellous happening. 

The Lord enters Abraham's house, and the childless Sarah bears a child. The Lord enters Peter's home and Peter's mother in law rises up from her fever. The Lord's presence makes things come anew. There is a third episode here which brings the same theme to the next plane: a mere Word from the Lord can make things beautiful.

The Word, is the living presence of the Lord... it represents the entirety of the Lord to us, for two reasons: Incarnation and the Mystery of the Trinity. 

Incarnation, is the Word becoming flesh and coming to live among us. That initiated a new relationship between us and God. A God who was of course loved and respectfully acknowledged all through the Old Testament, was still a powerful Other who was out there setting everything up for our wellbeing. But with the Incarnation, God becomes One among us, someOne who can empathise with us! That is the Word.

The role of the Word in the mystery of the Trinity is something beautiful and sweet...because, it is through the Word that we know God. Word is not merely about words spoken or written, but it is all about Communication. The Communication of God, is what makes us truly children of God... no one has known or seen God, but the Word introduces God to us and the Word is the Spirit at work...what a great gift we have in the Word of God. 

If we allow the Word of the Lord to enter our homes, everything will be renewed testifies the Centurion in the Gospel. Allowing the Lord to enter our homes is a marvellous thing to do; but it involves a great risk too. Things will not be the same anymore. We will have to be ready to forgo of a few things because, when the Lord enters everything is renewed! Are we ready for the renewal?