Jesus' School of Servant-Leadership

THE WORD AND THE SAINT

July 25, 2022: Celebrating St. James, the Apostle.
2 Corinthians 4: 7-15; Matthew 20: 20-28

Feast of any Apostle reminds us of the wonderful words that St. Paul utters today: "we hold this treasure in earthen vessels". Every apostle has his own weakness, nevertheless the gift that they are and that they possess, surpasses everything as God's power and might are revealed in it.

Feast of St. James (with the Gospel that we are given to reflect today) reminds us of this more strongly and adds another specific teaching, a teaching from Jesus' School of Servant- Leadership. In Matthew's and Mark's versions of the Gospel, we find every time that Jesus foretells his passion, he follows it up with the discourse on servant leadership (as we see in Mt 16:24ff; 18:1ff; 20:20ff). James and John, just like the other apostles, took time to realise that the only thing we can inherit from Jesus is his identity as Suffering Servant!

Eventually they wanted to bear the crown that Jesus mentioned and that is what they did. James led the community of Jerusalem... humble and service minded as the Master himself; and his blood shed like the Master's (Acts 12:2). Let us praise the Lord for the apostle St. James and be prepared to witness to the Lord till our last breath!

PRAYER IS RELATIONSHIP

July 24, 2022: 17th Sunday in Ordinary time

Prayer... A Christian Prayer... An authentic Christian Prayer... A Christ-like prayer is fundamentally one's Relationship with God. Out of the numerous attributes to God that were proper to the historical experience of the people of Israel, which was his own experience - Jesus picked that of 'Father'. That was the most scandalous of all, for the Jews. When Jesus called God, Abba, Father (Mk 14:36) as we see in Gospels, he was demonstrating an intimate relationship that existed, not only between him and the One who sent him, but also between everyone who believes in him and God...as John says, to all who believed in him, he gave the right to become the children of God (Jn 1:12). Radically for Jesus, faith was a process of acknowledging a God who reveals Godself as a father, a mother, one who created us, one who cares for us! Consequently, Prayer for him was a relationship that one shares with God; a relationship that is built on a personal sharing - on DIALOGUE.

Prayer is a Dialogue... a dialogue where there is a sharing of minds and oneness of heart. Abraham, today is presented in the reading as dialoguing with God... he does not only speak his mind but listens to God and gets to know God's mind. A beautiful picture of a person in conversation with God - trying to raise his preoccupations, with the limited knowledge that he has, but with the concern he has for the life of the others. And an amazing depiction of God who knows very well that there will not be even 10 righteous people as Abraham claims, but listens patiently to his pleas, allows him to talk and permits him to share his concerns. At times when we begin to furnish a list to God and ask that to be granted on order; or when we make programmes and suggest God to follow; or when we find problems with God's designs and suggest improvements - we need to remind ourselves of this dimension of prayer - prayer as a dialogue! It consists not only in speaking but also in listening, waiting for and accepting God's will. Prayer is a dialogue, a dialogue that is initiated by the overwhelming RECOGNITION OF GOD'S GOODNESS.

The overwhelming recognition of God's goodness and majesty is what initiates the process of dialogue! The Psalm beautifully presents the human heart opening itself up to God, in praise and thanksgiving! A true Christian prayer begins there! St. Paul formulates this so well in his letter instructing, "do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God" (Phil 4:6). When we recognise the loving presence, the helping hand, the protecting wings, the sheltering solace of God on a daily basis, we cannot help singing the praise of God inspite of the endless needs and preoccupations we can possibly have in life! That recognition of God's goodness and majesty and our readiness to acknowledge and submit to it, bestows on us the greatest of all gifts, the TOTAL ACCEPTANCE BY GOD.

Prayer is the relationship that is born out of the realisation that God accepts me totally, unconditionally, inspite of all my iniquities. The second reading today affirms that God has forgiven me, buried all my sins and nailed them to the Cross on which my saviour Jesus died for me! And with the same Jesus, God has raised me to the status of God's child, in my baptism! God loves me so much that God accepts me with all my limitations, with all my childishness, with all my idiosyncrasies. Comparing this relationship to friendship in the parable that Jesus narrates today, he subtly communicates a point that we can be sometimes foolish, simplistic and thoughtless in the things that we ask from God or in the way we ask for them. Still, we need not hesitate, we can go right on and do it, because God accepts us as we are. It is that affirmation that gives us the right to stand in the presence of the Lord and be ourselves, as Abraham dared to be!

Let us treasure this great relationship we have with God, yearn to be in God's presence and live in God's presence as authentically as possible, as innocent and dependent as children, as grateful and obedient as sons and daughters, as rightful and loving as Jesus himself was towards God, whom he revealed to us our Our Father and Mother!

In love with the Lord!

THE WORD AND THE SAINT

July 22, 2022: Remembering St. Mary of Magdala

Micah 7: 14-15, 18-20; John 20: 1-2, 11-18

Mary of Magdala, is one character in the life of Jesus, that many are very curious about. The conspiracy theorists and apocryphal experts find in themselves a great interest to study this person more and more and find details that are there and even those that are not there! However they all begin with one question, which the Gospel today answers.

They ask, why is it that the Lord appeared to her first and not to the apostles? The Gospel answers it so simply: because she was there! As we read in the Gospel today, she was there at the tomb early morning. Then, she ran to the apostles and brought them; the apostles saw, they believe and they left, but she was there, she stayed at the tomb and kept weeping (cf v.11). She was there and she got to see her Master. She was like that widow about whom Jesus spoke of once (Lk 18), persistent and insistent! She wanted by all means to know what happened to her Master! She stayed on because she just could not go! She was so passionately in love with her Master.

The key is here: if we are passionately in love with the Lord, we will see the glory of the Lord right in front of our eyes.

What everyone longs for!!!

WORD 2day: Thursday, 16th week in Ordinary time

July 21, 2022 - Jeremiah 2: 1-3, 7-8, 12-13; Matthew 13: 10-17

There is one thing that everyone longs for ultimately in life and beyond... peace and serenity! Every time God calls us to Godself, we are promised comfort, peace, tranquility, peace and well being. These are the lofty gifts that the Lord has in store for us. These we receive not by looking but seeing, not by hearing but listening, not by desiring for riches and luxuries but for the presence of God. When we abandon God, we find ourselves abandoned, not because God has abandoned but because we have abandoned God and moved away from God.

There are subtle ways of abandoning God - hearing but not understanding, looking but not perceiving, seeing but not taking to heart the presence and the majesty of God. We are after "useless idols" as Jeremiah says in the first reading. What everyone longs for, what the whole world is yearning for, is right near us for our taking. But we are too busy making our living, establishing our names and defining our own glories.

All that we need to do is open our eyes and see, open our ears and listen, open our hearts and perceive: we have so easily available what everyone longs for, right at our doorstep - the peace and joy that the Lord alone can give!

The Word that lives

WORD 2day: Wednesday, 16th week in Ordinary time
July 20, 2022: Jeremiah 1: 1-4, 10; Matthew 13: 1-9

"See, I put my word into your mouth and I set you over the nations!" It is the word of the Lord that is put into the mouth of a prophet that makes him or her the light to the nations, a reference point to the people. The Word comes to us daily, the Word lives in us, the Word which was made flesh in the person of Christ, dwells in us as the indwelling Spirit and enlightens every bit of our life. The question is, do we realise it?

If we do realise it, we would be like the good soil that gives a hundred, a sixty and thirty fold. Because we hardly realise it, the Word is pecked away by so many other attentions that we have, or it is scorched by the difficulties we have or choked by numerous other concerns that we have.

The Word alone can show us those tendencies that are to be rooted out and to be torn down, or those that are to be destroyed and be demolished within me. The Word alone will enable me to build and to plant, to grow within me the values of the Reign and thus establish around me the Reign of God.

Want to see signs? Here is a project of life!

WORD 2day: Monday, 16th week in Ordinary time 

July 18, 2022: Micah 6: 1-4, 6-8; Matthew 12: 38-42

"Only to do the right and to love goodness and to walk humbly with your God" - Micah presents a project of life in these precise words (Mic 6:8). It is a project that he gives to the people to walk in the Lord's ways and not to weary the Lord with their unfaithfulness and stubbornness. How different are we from the people whom Micah addresses today in the first reading? Aren't we just like the pharisees and the others who were incessantly asking for signs from the Lord?

Crying statues, bleeding icons, moving crosses... aren't they a craze these days! Should they be? Ofcourse, for us miracles are a daily feature, because our God is an awesome God. But looking for some strange phenomenon and glamorous happenings, is not the "Christ"ian outlook of a miracle. For Christ the miracle is in the hope that we can give each other; miracle is in the love that we share for every one around us; miracle is the everyday faith in the Lord and the resultant serenity amidst all the din.

Let's resolve to do the right, love goodness and walk humbly with the Lord and we will see miracles all around us, on a daily basis!

GOD VISITS US

The capacity to receive, listen and to suffer

July 17, 2022: 16th Sunday in Ordinary time

Genesis 18: 1-10; Colossians 1: 24-28; Luke 10: 38-42

Behold! I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with that person, and they with me. Rev. 3:20 summarises the liturgy of the Word today! The Lord visits us; everyday, in various ways, in ways ordinary or wondrous, the Lord visits us. What is our response and what should it be - that is the question we are invited to reflect on.

The first reading pictures God visiting Abraham. It is interesting to read the first three verses and a great lesson awaits us there. The first two verses say, that the Lord appeared and Abraham lifted his eyes and saw three men! Not in glorious light or in flaming clouds, but in three simple men, that the Lord visited Abraham. Reading further the second and the third verse together, gives us another detail, Abraham saw three men and he addressed them, "My Lord, do not pass by." Though Abraham saw the men, he was able to behold the presence of the Lord. The Message for today is established right there! 

Our God visits us... on a daily basis.. in one way or the other, in ways ordinary or in ways wondrous, the Lord visits us. Through extraordinary signs of awe-inspiring events or heart-breaking happenings; through a person whom we come across on a dreary daily routine, an extra smile or an overshadowing grief on the person's face; through a habitual joy that brightens the day or a repeated bad news on a newsprint; the Lord visits us! 'I fear the Lord passing by', said St. Augustine, in simple words expressing the grief of not being ready to behold the visit of the Lord, due to the hustle of the day or the ordinariness of the experience.

The Word today points to us the special capacity needed for someone not to allow the Lord to pass by...

The Capacity to Receive: 

Hospitality is not in things; it is a matter of the heart! It is not the fact that some one can afford, that makes him or her hospitable to other. It is the heart, the love that is there in the heart, the warmth that fills that heart, that makes a person go out of one's way to extend hospitality to another person. In the ancient Israel, a stranger to the land was treated as a guest of honour, and a guest became a messenger from God! In the ancient Indian culture too, we have the age old saying, 'Athithi devo bhava' (meaning -the Guest is God) and the great Tamil Classic, Tirukkural dedicates a whole chapter of 10 couplets on Hospitality, that is receiving guests and treating them with love and honour. The Capacity to receive the Lord, is seen in one's capacity to observe everything in life with a sense of gratitude and wonder, one's capacity to encounter a person every time with a new perspective and without judgments and prejudices. It is the capacity to see God in everything that is around and every person who is around. Abraham was able to encounter God in the three men that he saw; St. Paul was able to encounter Jesus in the light that threw him down from the horse and listen to his voice, calling out to him!

The Capacity to Listen: 

Encountering God, is basically listening to God! Every visit brings us a message. Every encounter has something to tell us for our daily life. It is a special gift to listen to the Lord, to discern what God wants of us, to hear the Lord's voice telling us 'do this' or 'be this' or 'become someone' or 'denounce something'. The Lord speaks in every encounter, through every person, through every event... we are expected to act, to respond and carry out the task entrusted to us. But the point of departure is always the feet of the Lord! To sit at the feet of the Master and drink in every bit of wisdom and knowledge, that when it is time for me to go forth, I am prepared to be God's presence to the others, that when they encounter me, they can feel the presence of the Lord!

The Capacity to Suffer: 

Encountering God is a challenge to make a choice, a fundamental choice for the Lord or otherwise! St. Paul made that choice, a 'U' Turn for the Lord - and the ultimate choice is to choose to suffer for the Lord. The Lord prepares us - Abraham was prepared to wait endlessly for the promises to be fulfilled; Martha was prepared to run about doing things for the love she had for Jesus, Mary was prepared to sit at the feet of the Lord mindless of the criticisms hurled at her, and St. Paul was prepared to say, "I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake!" When God visits us, it is a dangerous event, a risky experience - because after that nothing can remain what it was before. There will be a drastic change and we have to be prepared for that.

The invitation is clear dear friends... to behold the Lord who visits us, to let the Lord speak to us and be prepared for an encounter with the Lord - on a daily basis. Doing this our daily life will become meaningful, challenging and TRULY CHRISTIAN.

Choice! the choice of God and for God!

WORD 2day: Saturday, 15th week in Ordinary time

July 16, 2022: Micah 2: 1-5; Matthew 12: 14-21 

Jesus was living dangerously. But he chose to, for the sake of the Reign of God. He stuck his neck out for the poor, for the oppressed, the marginalised, the ostracised, the exploited, the forgotten in the society. He believed that the Reign of God belonged to them. His life was a hope to the least, the last and the lost. 

In this choice, Jesus was making present the God of the Old Testament who sided the oppressed, who stood by the just in their struggles and who kept watch over the persons who strove to live according to God's will. The first reading points out the choice of God, the choice for the poor and the suffering. This predilection on God's part distinguished Jesus and the choices he made. His choice was, the choice of God. There apparent and real dangers, and Jesus knew it well.

If this is what choice of God is all about... choice for us, for our well being, specially when we do not deserve it even a bit, then how do we respond to it? By making a choice for God, a choice for the Reign. Jesus has left us a hard lesson for usin and through his life.

Nothing could stop him from proclaiming the Reign of God for he knew he had come precisely for that, to establish the Reign of the God of Truth, the God of the suffering, the Lord of the least, the protector of the lost, the hope of the last. Understanding the choice of God, we are impelled to make our choice... our choice for God.

Our identity has to be our Choices, may they be forever in keeping with the choices of God!

Something greater is around!

WORD 2day: Friday, 15th week in Ordinary time

July 15, 2022: Isaiah 38: 1-6, 21-22, 7-8; Matthew 12: 1-8

God deigns to do strange things for the love of the one who trusts in God! The first reading is one such episode. There are so many others, like the burning bush (Exo 3), the water from the rock (Exo 17), the sign of the fleece (Judg 6:36ff), and many more. These are merely to show that there is nothing or no one greater than the Lord and anything is possible with God!

When it comes to showing mercy to those who trusted, the Lord is lavish, prodigal and unreasonably generous, because God's love is unconditional and everlasting. That was a difficult message for Jesus to communicate to the law abiding, traditional and painfully legalistic Jews. Even today the Lord tries to impress upon us the same message, the message of how loving the Lord is, how unconditional God's love is and how far from judging the love of God is.

No rule can be too big and no custom too important, than the love that the Lord has for you and me and the longing that Lord has for our total well being. When we feel the tendency to be legalistic, when we find ourselves prone to judge, when tasks at hand draw our utmost attention, let us realise: something greater is around us, something greater envelopes us, something greater sustains us - and it is, God's love, the love which became man and gave his life for our salvation

Come to me all you who are away from me!

WORD 2day: Thursday, 15th week in Ordinary time

July 14, 2022: Isaiah 26: 7-9, 12, 16-19; Matthew 11: 28-30

The yearning of a Godless soul, the struggle of a people who have gone far away from God is intensely presented in the first reading today. The world today is treading that path indeed... trying its best to define life sans God; trying to convince everyone around that it is possible to live without having anything to do with anything called god! Worse still, the trend today advocates creating our own gods and creating gods of ourselves! 

We think we have solutions for every problem and even for those that we do not have the solutions, we create shortcuts that can keep the pain and the struggle away for the time being. Hardly do we realise that the problem persists and it keeps brewing under cover, only to explode one day beyond control. And at that point we would find no return!

The Lord invites us today to the true consolation, the real solution, the authentic peace that can give meaning to our daily life and all its strife. He does not promise an absence of yoke, nor does he lure us with a negation of burden...he promises a yoke that fits us perfectly and a burden that proves really bearable: because we live it in the Lord's company. 'Come to me' says the Lord, because all the struggle is since you have moved away from me. 

Come to me and learn of me; come to me and find meaning, come to me and  find peace, consolation and serenity! Come to me all you who are away from me!