PEACE-LENT 2023 - Peace is integrity

Monday, First week in Lent - February 27, 2023

The WORD in LENT: Leviticus 19: 1-2, 11-18; Matthew 25: 31-46

Two terms that dominate the Word today are - judgement and neighbour! In Christ-ian terminology, my judgement depends on how I deal with my neighbour. Whether I look at them in terms of assets and liabilities, in view of my profit or loss, from the point of view of gain or burden! When I do that, all my resultant actions and way of life will be so selfish, ungodly and absolutely unChristian! 

Peace is a question of integrity - where there is integrity there is true peace; where integrity lacks peace fails, or at the most it exists but is fake! It remains precarious. The more selfish I am the more fragile my internal peace gets. The more selfish a society grows the more challenged its peace is. The more selfish humanity becomes the more frail its peace becomes. The solution is integrity.

Integrity - personal and collective - ensures the absence of gap between what a person or a society is and what they wish to appear as. When a person tries to appear as he or she is within, the person may draw criticism but will certainly work on oneself and become a holistic person. When a society remains what it really is, without making appearances or fabrications about its identity, but ready to be challenged constantly and grow out of these experiences, the society becomes foundational to a holistic humanity. 

A person who is good from within, inspite of all the weaknesses and imperfections that may show up now and then, is an integral person and there is peace within him or her. A society that is just and virtuous in its very fabric, inspite of all the untoward and occasional failures, is a true seed of the Reign when it holds on to its integrity. Yes, integrity alone can pave way to peace, be it personally or socially, because peace is integrity. 

PEACE IS A CHOICE

PEACE-LENT 2023: First Sunday of Lent 

February 26, 2023: Genesis 2:7-9: 3:1-7; Romans 5:12-19; Matthew 4:1-11

Why did God make the tree, if God wanted them never to eat of it?

Why should that fruit be there first of all, if God knew it would not help them, instead it would ruin them? 

Would not life have been more peaceful without this unfortunate event of the fall - and who created the opportunity for it, if not God?

These top the list of FAQs that arise from today's Word. And this lent we have chosen to look at this reality from the point of view of peace! Reflecting in the light of the questions above and similar others, what stands out in the Word today is the fact that peace is fundamentally a choice! Just yesterday lived through the day that marked one year of war in Ukraine - a folly of a war in the 21st century! Of course, it is not that this is the only war that is on... there are so many war situations and war-like situations all over the world, threatening the local and universal peace! Every individual societies, families and persons are not spared of this lack of peace. Against this background, the Word establishes today three facts:

Fact 1: God chose to gift us with the capacity to choose; yes, Choice is a gift! If we get to see, it is this capacity to choose that is the fundamental element of human dignity. It is freedom and autonomy that define a human person. When they are missing there is a breach of human rights, loss of human dignity and a crisis of very humanity. This is what is happening in many a place today where this freedom and autonomy is not given, or controlled or hunted out. Think about all the discussion on freedom of expression, threat to the whistle blowers, and the stifling of truth that is happening all around the world! 

God made us human persons; that involves primarily our capacity to choose! When every thing is prefixed and there is nothing to be done about it, where does the personal capacity of individuals come in? Would it not be merely luck and destiny that is at play? Though at times it may look like it is so, the fact is that we are given with the great gift of choosing, to make of ourselves what we are! When we become aware of it and responsible about it, we are laying the foundation for peace - be it personal or universal! 

Fact 2: We choose God because God chose us! God has made a choice to love us and has given us a sign of that love in Christ, in Christ who chose God absolutely! In choosing God, Christ chose to obey. In choosing to obey, Christ chose peace, oneness, serenity... he chose SHALOM! For God so loved the world that God gave the only Son that the world may have life: that is the source of our peace, the unfailing source of our eternal peace! 

God created us in a paradise and invites us to that paradise; what we make of our life in between these two is our choice! Can we make this a peaceful journey towards a peaceful eternity? That depends on whether we wish to choose God or not; that rests on whether we are ready to choose peace or not! Choosing peace is choosing God, and that is what Jesus has exemplified in his life! 

Fact 3: Choosing peace is choosing God! God invites us to take up our call to choose peace, but that choice is a challenge. It is a challenge because it involves choosing God - choosing to abide by God's Word and not by the popular fads of the world; choosing to remain calm at difficulties and not trying and testing God and God's capacity; choosing to be humble and loving instruments in the hands of God and not trying to play God to the world! This is what we see happening in the event of temptation of Jesus, presented in the Gospel today. 

Jesus chose God, and thus he chose peace! The devil had to leave him and the Angels were around to comfort him. That is peace: keeping the devil far away and allowing the angels of the Lord to teach our way. The world does just the opposite today - it keeps anything that is angelic far away, claiming it is too childish and naive; but dares to play with the  wiles of the devil so oblivious that it will eventually lead to their damnation, a total loss of peace! The challenge of peace therefore is to make a choice to be authentic come what may, to forego of our ego and put the Other and the others much before me and mine.

Peace is a choice. Realising the gift of choice that we have received from God and choosing God above all, we choose peace! May this season of Lent, the Peace-Lent that we are journeying through, grant us and the whole world, true and lasting peace!

PEACE-LENT 2023 - Peace is Justice

Saturday after Ash Wednesday -  February 25, 2023

The WORD in LENT: Isaiah 58: 9-14; Luke 5: 27-32

Peace can never be inaction; it is never silence. Peace cannot be conformism; it is never playing by the book. Peace is Justice - we are called to be breach-menders, restorer of ruined houses, rebuilders of ruins - that requires that we act, that we change first from within and then all around us. Justice alone can guarantee true peace and justice has to begin from our interior change. 

The kind of change that we are called to effect is a change that is all-encompassing. It would not consist in accusing myself as a sinner and escaping my responsibility for the other, nor can it tolerate calling the other a sinner or judging the other out of bounds of salvation. Who are we to, when God wants to embrace everyone - however unworthy we are!

Peace consists in that act of justice  - removing the yoke from the shoulders of the oppressed, doing away with our clenched fist in authentic forgiveness and generous reaching out, not giving into wicked thoughts or resulting words! Peace consists of a relationship of compassion and justice, making the other matter invariable of our judgements regarding what they are or who they are! 

We cannot tink of peace, where there is no justice because peace is justice!

PEACE-LENT 2023: Peace is Compassion!

Friday after Ash Wednesday - February 24, 2023

The WORD in LENT: Isaiah 58: 1-9; Matthew 9: 14-15

Satyagraha! Peace marches! Marathon for peace! Fasting for peace! How do these really function? Have you ever given a thought to it? What does it matter if you and I fast or go for a march or take up some campaign for world peace? How does it work, that one in one end of the world is fasting or going on a march for peace in another end of the world? Does it work at all?

Fasting during the lent - how does it affect the Community of faith? Is it only the money that is saved that matters, that we can give it to someone in need? What does it really do to me and to the rest around me, when I fast? And why should we fast at all? These are some questions that arise, everytime we celebrate this all important season of lent. 

Fasting is a sign of compassion. It is a sign of utmost participation in the sufferings of others - be those sufferings caused by external reasons or internal. Fasting for the sake of itself, may help oneself in self-control and self-discipline, but that is not the principal motive of fasting! This is what Jesus brings out in his critical presentation of fasting, not to say about the prophetic voice of Isaiah.

Fasting will have done its real contribution to humanity - to persons and the community at large - only when it inspires compassion in the heart of persons. This compassion is feeling for the needy other, the suffering other, the weeping other, the languishing other... it is this compassion that will render our fast a real Christian act. This compassion alone can lead to peace - in our hearts, in our society, in the whole of humanity. 

There can be no peace until I begin to think of and to worry about the other and their needs: because peace is fundamentally, compassion!

PEACE-LENT 2023: Peace is a Choice!

Thursday after Ash Wednesday - February 23, 2023

The WORD in LENT: Deuteronomy 30: 15-20; Luke 9: 22-25

Very often we complain and lament on things that go wrong in our lives, blaming it on someone or something! Without uncompassionately brushing aside the pain that is involved in the experience of trouble or loss or difficulty, if we seek to find the real cause, the root cause, the ultimate cause... we shall find there, a choice! 

When situations of conflicts arise, when persons around create a crisis or events of life rake up problems... what matters is not actually what happens, but what we choose! We make choices that, may not be immediately, but eventually take us to where we find ourselves at the end. If everything is a choice, just so or more so, peace is a choice!

If I wish peace in my mind, in my heart and in my life - I have to choose it. If I choose ego, if I choose success, if I choose prosperity, if I choose profit or my own material growth, I choose them! Yes, I choose them, and not peace! Choosing peace sometimes, or most of the times in fact, costs! I have to be ready to pay the cost. That is what Jesus means by "taking up my cross" - it is choosing to pay the cost, for the divine peace that we can find only in the Lord and in the salvation that the Lord has planned for us. 

We may think we are choosing life, or  that we are choosing prosperity... but in actuality we might be choosing death and disaster! We need to pay attention. What matters is not immediate gratification but the ultimate good. At times it might require sacrifices and mortifications. If we need peace, we need to choose it, because peace is a choice!

PEACE-LENT 2023: Peace is Reconciliation

Ash Wednesday - February 22, 2023

The WORD in LENT: Joel 2:12-18; 2Corinthians 5:20 - 6:2; Matthew 6:1-6, 16-18

Be reconciled to God - that is the crux of the message given to us at lent. We begin today this year's lenten journey... this year we shall celebrate the Peace-Lent. 

Peace is a yearning that everyone has today world over. In fact the whole creation is thirsting for this peace! The ecological crisis, the economic crises, the political unrests, the human right violations... every one of this experience is a reminder of the lack of peace, the lack of shalom! The message of reconciliation that is central to the season of lent, is a key towards peace.

The varied terms in which the Word expresses the message of the whole of lent: come back, turn to the Lord, order a fast, assemble and gather, be reconciled, pray, fast... all these terms refer to the peace journey that we are invited to make. The peace journey is all about reconciliation, returning to the fullness that we are gifted with! 

Peace is reconciliation, a getting back to the holistic relationship with myself, with others, with the Ultimate Other, my God who loves me without measure.

Growing Up to be a child!

WORD 2day: Tuesday, 7th week in Ordinary time

February 21, 2023: Sirach 2:1-11; Mark 9: 30-37

'Grow Up!' - people say, when they are upset with someone's attitudes found wanting, when someone behaves 'childish' and immature, as it is said. Grow up, yes... but, grow up to what, grow up to be what? Growing up would always means to go towards some state advanced or ahead...but here we have another perspective to reflect on.

The Word today invites us, to grow up... to grow up to be children. Cling on, trust, hold on, wait on the Lord... in short, grow up to be true children, true children of God! Is this rightly, 'growing up' - how do we understand?

Who can wait on the mercies of the elders but a child, for when we consider ourselves grown up we crave to be independent. Who can cling on to someone else and keep trusting in their goodness, hoping to be led in the right path? Who can abandon their cares into the hands of someone else and remain light and care-free, but a child! Who but a child can look up to others and understand that he or she is the least of all who are around and helpless of the lot?

Jesus invites us - grow up to be a child... let go of your ego, learn to depend on the goodness of the Lord, allow God to take hold of your hands and you will find the true peace, the peace of a child. And so, grow up constantly, to be a true child!                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                    

Faith and Wisdom - Gifts from God

WORD 2day: Monday, 7th week in Ordinary time

February 20, 2023: Ecclesiastes 1:1-10; Mark 9: 14-29

Knowledge can be obtained by effort and hardwork but wisdom comes from the Lord. We may read, listen, think and increase our knowledge, but putting various pieces of knowledge together to arrive at a decision is wisdom and that cannot be acquired by purely hardwork or merely human effort.

It is a gift from the Lord, because Wisdom as the first reading tells us today, belongs to God and whom God deigns to grant it, and the measure God wills to grant it.

Belief is born from what we learn and what we understand, while Faith is not merely our lonesome job. It is our personal response to a self revealing God. If so, it is the Lord who grants us this faith as a gift and helps us grow and mature in it too.

'Lord I believe, help my unbelief"... we come across that profound prayer today. It would do a great good to us to make this prayer a regular and daily prayer, everyday in the morning asking the Lord to help our unbelief and make us truly the Lord's faithful sons and daughters!

HOLINESS - THE IDENTITY OF THE PEOPLE OF GOD

From God, of God, and like God!

February 19, 2023: 7th Sunday in Ordinary time
Leveticus 19:1-2,17-18; 1 Corinthians 3: 16-23; Matthew 5: 38-48

What makes one a Christian? Take a pause and answer this question within your hearts!

Is it Baptism? Yes, ofcourse, but only if it were received with a personal choice and every promise given at the proper moment is lived to the full everyday of one's life.

Is it being enrolled in a parish? Yes, but only if the belonging to the parish makes one feel one with the Universal Body of Christ, the Church.

Is it some sort of symbols that you sport, like a cross or a rosary or a scapular? Yes, but that identification would be just temporary, and would last only till my first word, or first act!

That which makes Baptism efficacious, our belonging to a parish meaningful, and makes us truly Christians is our realisation of our identity as people of God - a realisation that has to be manifested in our personal holiness and in our holiness as a community of believers.

Holiness is not a super-human quality. It is definitely not alien to being human. Because it can be seen at our very origin. God made us in God's own image and likeness says Genesis (1:27). So, holiness is our original nature, not sinfulness; Holiness is the core of our being, not sinfulness. Sin and Sinfulness have come to mar and obstruct our original nature. This is why to the chosen people, God says through Moses, "Be holy, because I the Lord your God am Holy." Because I am holy you can be holy too. Yes, dear brothers and sisters, we ought to be holy because we are FROM GOD.

Holiness is our choice, a choice made not once for all, but at every moment, at every circumstance, at every crisis. It is a choice made for God, because we realise and gratefully acknowlege choice that God has made for us. You did not choose me, I chose you, says the Lord (Jn 15:16). It is the Lord who had chosen us. It is not that we loved God but it is God who loved us first, reminds us St. John (1 Jn 4:9,19). God has chosen us and God has loved us abundantly! And our response is Holiness, because we belong to God, we are OF GOD.

Holiness is not an act, it is an attitude; it is not a set of actions but a habit; it is not merely an appearance but an internal becoming! Holiness is a daily effort to become more and more like God. It is returning to the image and likeness of God, the image in which we were formed, filled with love, by God. Holiness is certanly not an imaginary ideal proposed - it is a challenge that is life-long, however concrete. Right before our eyes we have the Lord as our model... in our words, thoughts, acts and choices of daily life, we are called to become LIKE GOD.

Our Blessed Mother and the Saints are our examples and Jesus is our Way. St. John traces that course for us when he says, 'we will be like him because we will see him as he is" (1Jn 3:2). We are called not to be merely good people but God's people. Every word and act of our's has to reflect God's presence to those around us.

We are People of God and our very identity is Holiness. If we miss out on holiness we lose everything. We are from God, We are of God and We are called to become like God - because we are the people of God, because we are the temple where God chooses to dwell, because we are the presence of God that the world so badly needs today!

We are the People of God - that is a mighty big mission that we have been entrusted with, a mission that flows from our very identity -that we become the presence of God! The ultimate challenge is that, in and through our daily life, we grow in our holiness, because that is our identity as people of God. 

Tranfiguration - a daily call

WORD 2day: Saturday, 6th week in Ordinary time

February 18, 2023: Hebrews 11:1-7; Mark 9: 2-13

Faith is a call to be transfigured daily - amidst the troubles we have, amidst the things that occupy our minds on a daily basis, that moment when we raise our eyes and our hearts to the Lord offering ourselves up in total surrender becomes a moment of transfiguration, when we are able to feel a presence that is so real and so sustaining! 

If we are lost in the worries and concerns, digging deep into our sorrows, we are not to be considered bad people, but just that we are unfortunate! We become persons without that supernatural eye that the Lord graces us with, in faith. In faith, we learn to see what exists beyond, beyond our struggles, weaknesses and difficulties. 

If we possess Faith... we possess an ever present light, an unending light, an ever new light, for life. That light illumines the every corner that is dark and unexplored in our lives, driving out fear from our hearts.

If we possess Faith... we have a host of people with us who have gone before us and who stand by us today, we are never alone. In that communion, in those relationships we are granted a wisdom beyond measure, clearing off all confusions from our minds. 

If we possess Faith, we possess the Lord, who would communicate with us, constantly and clearly, by voice and by words, by affirmations and appreciation, doing away with any doubt in our spirits. 

Liberated from fears, confusions and doubts, with faith, we shall be transfigured every day!