The Choice, the choice that matters

THE WORD AND THE SAINT

January 17, 2024: Remembering St. Anthony the Abbot
1 Samuel 17: 32-33,37,40-51; Mark 3:1-6

If there is one thing that all religions and philosophies agree upon, it is this: that there is a constant conflict between the good and the evil in the world! And we, we are part of this story whether we like it or not. 

From the eyes of faith, we can say, we are constantly posed with two options at any point of time: to choose something 'Godly" or to choose something 'ungodly'! Be it in our words, or our actions, or our attitudes... we become what we choose! If we choose our ego, our self-image, our selfish cravings, our prejudices or our selfish goals - we are lost forever. The giant sized philistine or the self righteous pharisees - this what they chose! Young David instead chose God: I come in the name of the Lord of hosts!

Jesus chose God too, the loving God who cares for God's children. When St. Paul acclaims, 'I can do all things in Him who strengthens me!' (Phil 4:13), it was not pride but an outlook on life, an outlook that always chose whatever was Godly. "Finally beloved, whatever is true, whatever is honourable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is pleasing, whatever is commendable,...think about these things" says Paul (Phil 4:8).

We celebrate St. Anthony the Abbot today, who inherited a huge property early in life, as his parents died, leaving him with his younger sister. But for Anthony what mattered was not the wealth, but the Word of the Lord. He sold everything and gave it to the poor and chose to become a hermit, living a life of austerity and holiness. A choice that was tremendous! 

Only these choices can prove the claim, that 'God is our rock, our fortress, our stronghold, our deliverer, our shield in whom we take refuge'.

God of history is with us!

WORD 2day: Tuesday, Second week in Ordinary time 

January 16, 2024: 1 Samuel 16: 1-13; Mark 2: 23-28

God's choice of David is a typical indication of a fact that is repeatedly accentuated in the Old Testament - that God is the Lord of history! 

When the people of Israel were adamant of having a king of their own, they soon learnt how mistaken they were, with their experience of Saul. But God knew how to write straight through those crooked lines, and God alone knew. He chose a little shepherd boy and raised him to be God's beloved king and in his lineage brought the Saviour into the world. 

God broke conventions, the way the world saw things, the way the world judged things, the way the world prioritised values. God proved that, God is always beyond all laws and conventions, and that God was the real Lord of the world and its history!

Jesus, the Son of God, had to do the same to prove to those around him that there was something new happening in history... that God has visited them! Being prisoners of our own conventions and petty rules and regulations, and our prejudiced ideas and prefixed thinking, let us not miss the Lord who is present with us, every day and every moment, sharing every ordinary moment of our life - because, God, the Lord of history, is with us!

True Love and Authentic Relationships

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

January 15, 2024: 1 Samuel 15: 16-23; Mark 2: 18-22

The Word today presents to us a few binaries... obedience - sacrifice; new wine - old wine; new wine skin - old skin. The message that is offered is clear: we have choices to make and each of those choices has its own consequences! 

New wine is not better than the old wine (ofcourse, those who are familiar with wine will know it better) but the new wine is "new" and it needs a new skin that can hold it. If not, the nature of the new wine will pierce through the skin and spill out... wasting itself and tearing the skin.

Christ's teaching invites us to a new outlook on the world, on relationships, on God, on faith, on our daily life and commitment - an outlook that is integral, holistic and complete. That which makes it complete is LOVE - love for God and love for one's brothers and sisters!

Ritualism and Legalism are decisively transcended by an understanding of our Christian life in terms of love and relationship! It is not in keeping thousand and one laws that we are truly regarded "Christian"; it is not in the numerous practices of rigour and asceticism that we become true Christians... but it is in Love. When I love, I am from God, for God is love! When there is no love in me, I am far from God and I am far from being a Christian.

Hence, what really matters is not who is more ascetic or who is more observant with religious rules, but who is truly loving, loving from the depth of one's being! What really matters is love and relationship, true love and authentic relationships!

The History of the People of God - 6. The Lord in Search

WORD 2day: Saturday, First week in Ordinary time

January 13, 2024 - 1 Samuel 9:1-4,17-19,10:1; Mark 2:13-17

The Word presents to us today two persons - one, who went in search of the donkeys and the other, who went in search of the sinners... both for the sake of their fathers' wish! Though the comparison is strange, the fact is that both are kings... one, the first king of Israel and the latter, the eternal King of heaven and earth.

We may consider ourselves worthless and as dumb as donkeys, but the truth is that the Lord is in search of us. Many a times we speak of a humanity that is in search of God, but how much more true it is to think of the Lord who is in search of each of us. That is the experience of the people of God, the people whom the Lord has chosen as His own and made the children of God. The call for us here, is to open ourselves up to the Lord; invite the King into our hearts; and the King shall reign forever in our lives and through us, reach out to many more who are lost and are searching for themselves!

I do realise that I have been too allegorical here, but the message is simple and straight: to be forever open to the Lord, in a sense of daily conversion and repentance, ever growing into worthier children of God, better people of God. At times, we may not be understood by all, just as Jesus found himself misunderstood, misinterpreted and misjudged. Should that matter to us, as a chosen people of God. 

The challenge is to go ahead and remain with the Father's will. The King has searched us out and chosen us as His own - should we not believe in it? Let us never take off our minds, the Lord who is constantly in search of us. 

The History of the People of God - 5. Freedom in Submission

WORD 2day: Friday, First week in Ordinary time

January 12, 2024 -  1 Samuel 8: 4-7, 10-12; Mark 2: 1-12

It has been a hitoric human tendency to look for something or someone, to which or to whom, one can submit oneself. Whether by force or by choice, a form of legitimate dependence or extraordinary obsession, habit of blaming someone or positively seeking someone's counsel... persons constantly look to submit themselves to someone or something!

The point to be noted here is this: whatever be the form of submission, and whatever be its reason, it makes us dependent or subservient. The first reading reminds us of this human tendency, but before we judge the people of Israel of those historical times, let us understand how we ourselves fall into the same category! The only submission that gives us a sense of freedom and a sense of self-worth is the submission to God's authority - because God dwells in us and a submission to God, as God's children, is a reinforcement of our dignity, our self-worth and the sovereignty that God has placed within us, as human persons. This is what Jesus demonstrates in his encounter with the paralysed man.

Jesus reminds us that we are children of God and we have an inbuilt authority within us, the authority that is given by God. As long as we are true to our innermost self, we can enjoy that authority and it will be seen by people. The moment we begin to compromise, even a little, we become diffident of that authority and begin to look for it elsewhere. This is the state of sin that we experience.

Let us realise that God has the ultimate authority and has invested within us that authority as legitimate children of God, as people of God. Mindful of this, when we are truthful, righteous and selfless, submitting ourselves only to God and God's will, we experience the greatest of all freedom: the freedom of the children of God, the freedom in Submission as people of God.

The History of the People of God - 4. The Moments of Fall

WORD 2day: Thursday, First week in Ordinary time

January 11, 2024 - 1 Samuel 3:1-10; Mark 1: 29-39

An essential part of any people's history is their moments of fall and failure, their limitations and defeat; people of God are no exceptions to it. There is truly nothing wrong in a fall, an occasional failure as long as the person (or the community of persons) realises it as such; recognises the causes of it; and finds ways and means of growing out of it. This is the spirituality of the people of God. 

The danger is when a person is fallen and does not realise that he or she is fallen; when a society has so many flaws but does not recognise them as flaws but has grown so callous of it. That danger is more treacherous when it is a community of faith, and the community does it in the name of the Lord! It would be a folly of highest degree if a community does all that it wants and says to itself - we are a people of God and God will always be with us whatever we may do! It is true that the Lord will be with us - not as someone who justifies what we do and supports us in our sinfulness, but as someone who would convict us and correct us towards a more authentic living. This is what we see in the first reading today, an example of a fall and the lesson from it. 

What is the corrective? The Gospel presents us the right attitude, the corrective to the problem presented. It lies in the formula we hear: "if you wish to...". Surrendering our lives and life-choices to the Holy will of God, striving to discern the mind of God and resolving to live according to the promptings of the Lord - that alone can purify us, cleanse us, cure us, heal us, make us whole. 

The Lord is ever ready and willing to redeem us, because of God's love, but it depends on us to recognise our need to be helped, our need to be cured and turn to the Lord saying, "if you wish to, you can cure me!"

The History of the People of God - 3. Listening and Obeying Faith

WORD 2day: Wednesday, First week in Ordinary time

January 10, 2024 - 1 Samuel 3:1-10,19-20; Mark 1: 29-39

In the history of the people of God, one characteristic that sets the people apart as belonging to God is their capacity to listen to the Lord and obey the Lord's commands. That is what generates them, or regenerates them, raising them up to the status of the people of God, from a state that is common to all human persons. 

Today we come across in the Word, the popular episode which has given rise to the most typical phraseology in spiritual growth - "speak Lord, Thy servant is listening!" As we already pointed out, that attitude is outlined as the basic disposition of the people of God. Eli instructs the little boy Samuel in this act of self disposition to the promptings of the Lord - it comes across to us as a symbolic event that presents to us a people, who were learning to be, and growing up to own the identity of, the people of God. 

Jesus in the Gospel, brings to our attention an important and indispensable implication of this basic disposition that we reflected upon. Just listening is not enough; people of God obey! People of God are those who obey what the Lord wants of them. For Jesus this is was an absolute in life - he would indeed repeat often that only those who listen to the words of the Lord and put them into practice can be called the children of God and only they are eligible to enter the portals of the Reign. He did not only preach this, he lived it for the community to see. He prayed all night and in the morning set about living what he heard or listened from the Lord - "because that is why I came," he affirmed. 

Listening to the Lord and Obeying the voice of the Lord - is a fundamental experience and characteristic trait that makes us people of God. Are we on our way?

The History of the People of God - 2. From God's Hands

WORD 2day: Tuesday, First week in Ordinary time

January 9, 2024 - 1 Samuel 1:9-20; Mark 1: 21-28

In the "ordinary" history of the people of God, there is one remarkable experience that cannot be missed - the experience of the providence of God - a God who provides, not just some things that we need, but every element that will make our life meaningful. Today we see in the first reading Hannah praying for the grace of a child and she receives it. The lesson that is given for us, follows that moment: when Hannah recognises that moment of grace, she acknowledges that she received that child from God's hands -"Samuel, for I asked God for him!"

In the Gospel we find a group of people who were wondering at what Jesus was saying and doing, the meaningful and powerful words, and the unbelievable things he was doing. They were astonished at the authority that Jesus was manifesting - certainly they knew what Jesus knew, that the authority came from above. They were not ready to acknowledge that - those were from God's hands.

Jesus lived his life and call to the full and there were manifestations of the authority that God had invested in him... he imparts us a simple and clear teaching: when we live our lives to the full and go all out to do what God wants us to do, what we need, we shall receive at the right time, from God's hands. That was the experience of the people of Israel, and that shall always be the experience of the people of God. But we need to grow in that identity and experience, ready to recognise and acknowledge all that we receive, from God's hands. 

The History of the People of God - 1.Time of Need

WORD 2day: Monday, First week in Ordinary time

January 8, 2024 - 1 Samuel 1: 1-8; Mark 1: 14-20

After a long while, we return to Ordinary time of the year! And Ordinary time of the liturgical year can be of great value - as it has its own share of faith formation to offer us. It is important not to lose that programme of formation that the daily Word holds out to us. This week we begin to read from the first book of Samuel and the week would take us through the ordinary history of the people of God. We call it ordinary history because it happens ordinarily to every one; we call it history of the people of God, because this kind of an understanding is in the light of faith, in the light that God sheds on our life and its events. 

The history of the people of God begins with their time of need - the people feel they are in need, they are anguished, that they are helpless. The excellent example given to us is Hannah, the to-be mother of Samuel the great prophet. But here, she is an old mother and called sterile and taunted by her rivals. This is not merely the story of Hannah, but of the people of God who believe in God but live in slavery, while so many other nations around them lived in their power. It could be any of us, who is in need, who is in trouble, who is helpless as to where to turn to for solutions to one's problems. 

Where does the solution lie: in the promises of the Lord. The Lord comes with the eternal promises and that could be the only hope for the people of God. The time is at hand, the Reign of God is near - Jesus announces today! The Reign of God is the fullness of God's will. Our confusions and troubles, our needs and anxieties, can be turned to joy and fulfillment when the Lord steps in. When we admit that and allow that to happen, we become people of God and we begin the grand history as People of God. 

Water, Blood and Spirit

WORD 2day: Saturday before Epiphany 

January 6, 2024 - 1 John 5: 5-13; Mark 1: 6-11

The Liturgy today prepares us towards two beautiful events we are moving towards...the epiphany and specially, the Baptism of the Lord. The reflection begins with the sanctifying elements of Baptism. First, the waters of baptism that cleanse, as Jesus cleanses the person with leprosy in the Gospel. Secondly, the Blood of Jesus shed on the Cross once and for all, which saves us from eternal damnation and promises us eternal life. Thirdly, the Spirit of the Lord that is given to us, poured into our hearts as a seal of God's love for us, that which makes us children of God! 

We have these three veins of faith that connect us to the Father through Jesus - the waters of baptism that gives us new life in Christ, the Blood of Christ that bring eternal life in Christ and the Spirit who makes it possible for us to receive these gifts from the Lord - these are the guarantees of our relationship with Christ. 

Water stands for purity, blood stands for vitality and the Spirit stands for our relatedness in the Father through the Son. Water makes us children of God, Blood makes us witnesses of Christ and the Spirit makes us heirs to the Father.

The manifestation of Jesus at Epiphany, gets completed in the event of baptism we shall be celebrating the following day, reminding us of the baptism that we share in! We have the Son, always for us and with us, and so we have the eternal life that God promises in and through the Son. The Lord has made us His own, at baptism, in the cleansing water, in the saving blood and in the sanctifying Spirit and we joyfully belong to the Lord! Let us prepare ourselves joyfully towards these great celebrations of our faith.