Feeding and Tending

Message from Fr. Jose Koluthara, C.M.I.

Risen Lord,  help us make our love for you real by feeding and tending others. Amen.

My Dear Brothers and Sisters,

Feed my lambs. Tend my sheep. Feed my sheep. With this triple imperative, the risen Jesus opened the way for Peter to come out of his despair and experience redemption. He who had vehemently denied his discipleship (Jn. 18:17, 25-27), as well as any association with Jesus, was given the opportunity to renew his love for Jesus. Jesus’ words to Peter not only helped to assuage his guilt, but they also set the agenda for the rest of his life - and ours. “Feed my lambs” would become the agenda of the post resurrection church.

Feeding Jesus’ sheep would challenge Peter to abandon his ancestors’ centuries–old practice of remaining separate from non-Jews and to accept all people as belonging to the one flock of Christ. That would challenge Peter, as is illustrated in today’s Gospel (Jn. 21:1-19), to welcome all into one boat (bark of Peter) and the one net of salvation. Feeding and pasturing Jesus’ sheep also meant that Peter and others would work so that John’s vision of the Lord, as shared in today’s second reading (Rev. 5:11-14) would eventually be realized and that the voices of every creature would unite to render praise and honour and glory to Jesus and to God forever.

Feeding Jesus’ sheep would soon find Peter exercising a healing ministry in the same manner of Jesus. For healing, teaching, and preaching in Jesus’ name, i.e., for feeding the hungers of Jesus’ sheep, Peter and the other disciples would incur the wrath and the hostility of the authorities, first of Jerusalem and then of Rome. Their bravery and boldness in the face of such personal danger is evidenced in today’s first reading (Acts 5:27-32).

While contemporary believers can readily appreciate the challenge of Peter’s agenda, what are the ramifications of that agenda for us today? For the answer to that question, Henri Nouwen says, first we have to ask ourselves Jesus’ question: “Do you love me?” Perhaps another way of asking that question would be, “How do you love my least ones?” Jesus equated loving him with feeding and tending his sheep. Therefore let us, as church, be renewed in our resolve to make our love for Jesus real by feeding and tending others.

AM I BEING CALLED? How am I being called to feed the lambs of Jesus? Could it be as an ordained or consecrated person? If God is calling you, contact Fr. Hansoo Park 416-968-0997 Email vocations@vocations.ca or visit www.vocationstoronto.ca

Easter Experience

Message from Fr. Jose Koluthara, C.M.I.

Risen Lord,  transform us radically from within and make us ministers of your forgiveness. Amen.

My Dear Brothers and Sisters,

Easter, the central feast of the year, is unique in many respects. It is the only feast that lasts for 50 days in the church calendar. St. Athansius called the seven weeks from Easter to Pentecost “the great Sunday”. The first inclination of the church’s instinct to extend this feast comes in the way we celebrate the Octave of Easter, the first 8 days of the 50. The celebration of Mass on each of those days takes place almost as if we were still on Easter Sunday itself.

What did the Easter experience mean for those earliest Christians and what it continues to mean for us, here and now? Jesus lives; fear not! The early Christians experienced and appropriated the freedom from fear achieved by Jesus-risen. This fact is admirably illustrated in the radical transformation that overcame them. The frightened became fearless preachers of good news and ministers of God’s forgiveness for sinners. What made the difference in their lives? Jesus, who died and rose to life and who in that saving act, conquered the power of fear. Unfortunately, however, fear continues to be the great human leveller. Everybody is fearful of something: fear of failure, fear of hurting or being hurt, fear of loss, fear of not knowing love, fear of pain, fear that what I believe in and hope in may not be so. But the message and the truth of Easter is “Fear not!”. These are empowering words. Freedom from fear is the achievement of the resurrection and the experience into which each of us has been welcomed by the victorious Christ.

Jesus is risen, explained the late, great Karl Rahner and the world with him. Because of this everything is different and we are too. Death is no longer a final stopping place but a passage to life that does not end. Because Jesus lives, death should no longer strike fear into our hearts. “There is nothing to fear”, says the risen Jesus in today’s 2nd reading from Revelation (1:9-13, 17-19). Aware that fear and peace cannot commingle in the human heart, “Peace”, says the Risen Jesus in today’s Gospel.

And yet, despite all these assurances and despite the fact that the imperative “Fear not!” and other similar admonitions against fear are repeated literally hundreds of times in the scriptures, we continue to allow fear to have the upper hand. Why? Could it be that we have yet to welcome Jesus-risen, the embodiment of forgiveness, into our lives?

WHAT WILL IT TAKE? Thomas believed because he saw Jesus. What will it take for you to respond to God's Call to priesthood or consecrated life? If God is calling you, contact Fr. Hansoo Park 416-968-0997 Email vocations@vocations.ca or visit www.vocationstoronto.ca

Easter People - Fearless People

Message from Fr. Jose Koluthara, C.M.I.

Risen Lord, help us live the Easter joy in our day-to-day life.  Amen.

My Dear Brothers and Sisters,

“We are an Easter People; Alleluia is our song.” This declaration was made almost 15 centuries ago by St. Augustine as an expression of Easter joy. But living our joy and enunciating our faith in Jesus’ resurrection in our day-to-day existence is a big challenge.

With regard to this daily challenge, Latin American theologian Jon Sobrino shares a personal memory in his book “Christ the Liberator”. About 30 years ago, Sobrino was present at a mass during which some of his fellow Jesuits were professing their religious vows. At the celebration, Ignacio Ellacuria (one of the Jesuits who were murdered for the faith in El Salvador, Nov. 16, 1989) spoke of the importance of following Jesus by living as already risen beings. Sobrino saw that he was accustomed to Ellacuria’s liking for historicizing the Christian faith.

Jesus resurrection in history means that we can continue to hope in a world grown dim with despair. In raising Jesus, God liberated an innocent, unveiled the injustices done against him and crowned his saving sacrificial death with victory and life. To live as risen beings in history is to share in all that God has done in Jesus and for Jesus.

Living as risen beings also means living free from fear. Fear must never again be the motive for anything we do or do not do. At various times and in variety of ways, we fear deprivation, boredom, loneliness, failure, suffering, but at the root of all these fears, insists David Knight, is the fear of death. Without our belief in resurrection death is the utter end of all; it is absolute loss. But through our baptism into the dying and rising of Jesus, death is absolute gain. Thereby we live as risen beings forever.

Marvellous was the transformation from fear to fearlessness in those who first experienced the power and reality of Jesus-risen. They learned to readjust their priorities, concentrating not on the passing things of earth but on the things that are above (Col. 3:1-4, 2nd reading). They could powerfully preach the good news of salvation (Acts 10:34, 36-43, 1st reading). Their experiences with the crucified Messiah and with the empty tomb (Jn. 20:1-9) will provide renewed impetus for our own continued growth in faith and our commitment to live as risen beings until Jesus comes again.

HERALD THE GOOD NEWS The Lord is risen, it is true! Through our baptism He calls us to proclaim new life to the world. Pray for those who herald the Good News as priests, brothers and sisters. If God is calling you, contact Fr. Hansoo Park 416-968-0997 Email vocations@vocations.ca or visit www.vocationstoronto.ca

BEYOND WEEPING

Message from Fr. Jose Koluthara, C.M.I.

Lord Jesus,  stay with me and help me reach out to those who walk the way of the cross. Amen.

My Dear Brothers and Sisters,

On this Palm Sunday, we begin the week called “Holy”. Our intent during this week is to remember the suffering and death of Jesus. Those sufferings were borne in fidelity to God and with total reliance on God’s help (Is. 50:4-7, 1st reading). Those sufferings were embraced with a humility that accepted not only the human condition but also the position of a slave and even a disgraceful death on the cross (Phil. 2:6-11, 2nd reading). Those sufferings were made all the more burdensome by the incomprehension of sleeping friends, by the denial of a chosen disciple, by the betrayal of another, by rejection of authorities and the mockery of the crowds (Lk 22:14 - 23:56, Gospel). Our interest in the sufferings of Jesus must never be primarily intellectual and speculative; they should always be practical. It should become a way of life for us. It should renew our sensitivity to the sufferings of others.

Jesus walked the way of the cross in Jerusalem “once and for all”. But the way of the cross continues to be walked by more than 150 million street children throughout the world (United Nations statistics, 2002). A good number of them are forced into the streets to eke out a meagre living for their families. School is out of question for these young labourers who invariably become victims of violence, sexual exploitation and abject neglect. Thousands of them live in sewers or under bridges.

According to the administrators of Human Rights Watch, Brazil’s street children are victimized by the nation’s Police force, which in one day alone, executed 27 children in a church in Rio. In Colombia, the HRW estimates that at least six innocent children die per day at the hands of law enforcement officials. As long as these situations persist, the way of the cross continues for Jesus’ least ones.

In today’s gospel we find women being moved to tears at the sight of Jesus carrying the cross. Jesus’ words to them continue to speak their challenge to us: “Do not weep for me. Weep for yourselves and your children”. Today, this gracious gift of Jesus, “once-for-all” sacrifice prompts us to move beyond mere weeping to devoted work for the relief and well-being of his least ones. Let us be their companions, care takers and defenders along the way.

Palm Sunday of the Lord's Passion - March 28, 2010 Blessed are they who come in the Name of the Lord! Am I being called to proclaim Jesus as a priest, deacon, religious brother or sister If God is calling you, contact Fr. Hansoo Park 416-968-0997 Email vocations@vocations.ca or visit www.vocationstoronto.ca

GOD OF ALL MERCIES

My Dear Brothers and Sisters:

A 31-year-old Nigerian Muslim woman named Amina Lawal was sentenced to death by stoning eight years ago, because she had been found guilty of adultery. Civil rights groups around the world were outraged at the sentence that Lawal should be buried up to her neck and then have stones hurled at her head until she was dead. Under pressure from these groups, the judge declared that Amina Lawal’s conviction was invalid because she was already pregnant when harsh Islamic Shariah law was implemented in her home province. When she heard the judge’s decision, Lawal told a reporter from CNN: “I am happy. God is great and he has made this happen”.

Almost two millennia ago, scribes and Pharisees brought before Jesus another woman caught in the act of adultery (Jn 8:1-11). They quoted the law and goaded him into offering his opinion on the matter. But rather than be pressured by their tactics, Jesus simply appealed to the consciences of the woman’s accusers. Were they without sin? If the exact letter of the law were to be imposed on them would they fare any better than the sinful woman? Should they not remember the mercies shown them by God and be grateful to be able to show similar mercy to a fellow sinner?

That day in the temple area, Jesus did not give a briefing on the law but a lesson on the manner in which God deals lovingly, gently, patiently and with forgiveness with those who sin. Whether the woman’s accusers took to heart the lesson that was offered them that day, we cannot know. One by one, they drifted off, John tells us, starting with the elders.

As the climax of Lent approaches, both of these women teach us that our encounters with the God of all mercies preclude our taking up stones or pointing accusatory fingers at one another. Rather our gaze should be turned inward so we can recognize, admit and repent of our sins. Then the God of all mercies calls us to drop our stones, look away from ourselves and our sin and recognize God’s gifts of freedom from slavery and sin (Is. 43:16-21, 1st reading) as well as the ultimate gift of knowing Jesus Christ and the power of his resurrection (Philippians 3:8-14, 2nd reading)

 

Lord Jesus, help us acknowledge our sinfulness instead of pointing a finger at other people and condemning them as sinners.    Amen.

 

LOOKING FOR FAME, FORTUNE? What am I racing after in my life? Fame? Fortune? A life in Jesus? What is the prize I seek at the finish-line? If God is calling you, contact Fr. Hansoo Park 416-968-0997 Email vocations@vocations.ca www.vocationstoronto.ca

THE FORGIVING FATHER

 

Lord Jesus, help me overcome anger, pent-up hostilities, negative feelings and negative attitudes. AMEN.

My Dear Brothers and Sisters,

Imagining ourselves to be on a journey, we should think of God waiting for us at our destination. God sees us “while we are still a long way off.” In case we may not see our God coming toward us, provisions are made for huge billboards to alert us to the divine presence and salvific event. One reads: “There will be rejoicing among the angels of God over one sinner who repents” (Lk 15:10). Another invites: “I will heal your defection; I will love you freely - come back to me”.(Hosea 4:5)

Deeply moved at the sight of us coming home in need of forgiveness, our God grabs us before we can speak our sins and embraces us with a love that forgives, affirms and reinstates the relationship that we have broken. This loving forgiveness is illustrated in a touching way in today’s gospel (Lk. 15:1-3, 11-32)in the parable of the prodigal come home.

“A man had two sons”. So the parable begins, and, with that announcement, we are invited to determine which son we identify with most. Will we throw in our lot with the son who knew himself to be a sinner- who humbled himself, admitted his sin and came home to find the open arms of his forgiving father? Or will we stand in sympathy with the older son and allow the love that has been lavished on us to be overshadowed by anger and resentment?

Surely the Pharisees and the Scribes took offence at what they would have perceived as flagrant injustice. The tax collectors and sinners regarded it to be too good to be true. Jesus’ parable of forgiveness wounded the sense of fairness of the professional keepers and interpreters of the law. We can almost hear them murmuring, “Yes, let the prodigal return, but to bread and water, not fatted calf; in sack cloth, not a new robe; wearing ashes , not a new ring; in tears, not in merriment; kneeling, not dancing”. (Fred Craddock, “Luke” 1990) But this is precisely the point of Jesus’ parable. God’s grace and forgiveness are lavish, not limited, and these are offered to repentant sinners. We for our part, must follow the lead of the prodigal and “come to our senses”(v.17) and recognize our sinfulness. Then we will discover that our God is already running out to meet us to reinstate us as beloved sons and daughters.

 

GOD WELCOMES US… Like the forgiving father of Luke's Gospel, God welcomes us home in spite of our sinfulness, and calls us to a life of holiness. Where are you at home? Are you being called to a life as an ordained or a consecrated person? If God is calling you, contact Fr. Hansoo Park 416-968-0997 Email vocations@vocations.ca www.vocationstoronto.ca

PASSAGES AND PASSOVERS

 

Lord Jesus, who hears our cries, knows our struggles, strengthen us along our way. AMEN.

My Dear Brothers and Sisters,

On each of Lent’s Third Sundays, the selected scripture readings remind us that ours is a spirituality of un-rootedness. As we see in today’s first reading from Exodus(3:1-8, 13-15), ours has always been a people on the move, not just from one geographical place to another, but also from one state of growth to another.

In her book “Passages”, author Gail Sheehy calls these developmental stages “passages”, which all human beings experience as they move toward maturity. Among life’s major passages, Sheehy identifies (1) “pulling up roots”- leaving home and defining oneself apart form one’s parents; (2) “the trying twenties”- one’s first tentative stand as an adult when all things seem possible; (3) “the catch thirties” - in which life commitments are made, broken or renewed, (4) “the midlife crisis of the forties”- a dangerous part of the journey when maturing adults confront the loss of youth, the fading purposes of old roles, career changes, disruptions in sexual equilibrium and spiritual dilemmas; it can also be a time of great opportunity for self-discovery and renewal. In addition to these passages, there are so many others, as when we find friendship and pass from loneliness to companionship, or when we pass over from sickness to well-being, or when sorrow for sin moves us to repentance and allows us to pass over from guilt to forgiveness. Through all these passages and passovers, we learn to know ourselves and, even more importantly, we come to know God.

It could be said that passover is the name of our spirituality, a spirituality that began to grow when God said to Abraham, “Go!” and because he had faith in God, he did. Moses had first become aware of the presence of God in the phenomenon of the bush, burning but not consumed. By the strength of God’s presence, Moses led his people out of Egypt. Their passover from slavery to freedom became the pivotal event of Israel's history. But even that passover was marred by human frailty.

Paul, in today’s 2nd reading (1Cor. 10:1-6,10-12) warns his readers to learn from the experience of the Israelites so as not to repeat their mistakes. When the journey of life becomes burdensome, we have to remember Moses’ God, a God who hears our cries, knows our struggles and is ever present to strengthen us along our way.

 

PROCLAIM HIS NAME… The Lord is kind and merciful and calls us to proclaim His Name. Consider service in the priesthood or consecrated life. If God is calling you, contact Fr. Hansoo Park 416-968-0997 email vocations@vocations.ca www.vocationstoronto.ca