എന്ടെ വല്ല്യമ്മയും ചാച്ചനും

ഒരു ജൂവിഷ് പഴംചൊല്ല് ഇപ്രകാരം പറയുന്നു: “മറവി നമ്മെ തടവുകാരാക്കുന്നു, പക്ഷേ ഓര്‍മ നമ്മുടെ രക്ഷയുടെ രഹസ്യമാകുന്നു.” എന്ടെ വല്ല്യമ്മയും ചാച്ചനും ഇപ്പോള്‍ ഒരു ഓര്‍മ്മയായി മറിയിരിക്കുന്നു. ചാച്ചന്‍ മേയ് 20, 2011നില്‍ ഞാങ്ങളോടു വിട പറഞ്ഞു. അമ്മ കഴിഞ്ഞ തിങ്കളാഴ്ച, നവംബര്‍ 4നും. ഓര്‍മ്മയാണ് നമ്മെ പലപ്പോഴും പരിപോക്ഷിപ്പിക്കുന്നത്. വൃത്തരായ മാതാപിതാക്കള്‍ അവരുടെ ഓര്‍മ്മയിലെ കെട്ടുതാഴുകളും അതില്‍നിന്നും പഠിച്ച ജീവിത പാടങ്ങളും നമ്മുടെ മുമ്പേ ഓരോന്നായി വിവാരിക്കുമ്പോള്‍ ഒരുപക്ഷേ നമ്മള്‍ അത് കാര്യമായി കണക്കാക്കാരില്ല. ഇപ്പോള്‍ അവര്‍ നമ്മളെ വിട്ട് പിരിഞ്ഞപ്പോള്‍ അവര്‍ നമ്മുടെ ജീവിതത്തില്‍ ചെയ്തു തന്ന ഓരോ കാര്യങ്ങളും മനസ്സിലൂടെ കവിഞ്ഞൊഴുകുന്നു. മക്കള്‍ തങ്ങളെ ജനനം നല്കിയ മാതാപിതാക്കളെ നന്ഹീപൂര്‍വം അനുസ്മരിക്കുന്നു. ചിലര്‍ തന്‍റെ മാതാപിതാക്കല്‍ക്ക് ജീവിച്ചിരുന്നപ്പോള്‍ വേണ്ടത്ര പരിചരണം കൊടുക്കുവാന്‍ കഴിയാത്തതില്‍ വ്യസനം കൊള്ളുന്നു. പക്ഷേ മരണം ഇതൊന്നും കണക്കിലെടുക്കുന്നില്ല, കാരണം “death is a mighty leveler.” 

 എന്‍റെ ഓര്‍മ്മകള്‍: 

ചാച്ചന്‍ എപ്പോഴൊക്കെ പേരകിടാങ്ങളെ കാണാന്‍ വീട്ടില്‍ വന്നിട്ടുണ്ടോ, അപ്പോഴൊക്കെ ഒരു പൊതിയായിട്ടാണ് സാതാരണ വരാര്‍. അല്പം കുടിച്ചിട്ടുണ്ടെങ്കിലും, ചാച്ചന്‍റെ സ്നേഹമാധുര്യം ഞാന്‍ അനുഭവിച്ചറിഞ്ഞു. പിന്നെ ഞാന്‍ സെമിനാരിയില്‍ നിന്നും ലീവ് കിട്ടുമ്പോള്‍, എപ്പോഴും കാണാന്‍ ചെന്നിരുന്നു. കുറെ കാര്യങ്ങള്‍ എന്നോടു പറഞ്ഞിട്ടുണ്ട്, കെല്‍കുവാന്‍ രസമുള്ള കാര്യങ്ങളും, അനുഭവിച്ച വൈഷമ്മ്യങ്ങളും. I loved to hear your stories. Now I will miss you. ഇപ്പോള്‍ എനിയ്ക്ക് ഒരുറപ്പു തോന്നുന്നു. കാരണം, ചാച്ചന്‍ ഞങ്ങളുടെ ഒരു പ്രാര്‍ഥന സഹായിയായി മാറിയിരിക്കുന്നു.

അമ്മ വീട്, ഞാന്‍ പഠിച്ച സ്കൂളിന്‍റെ തൊട്ടടുത്ത് ആയതിനാല്‍ പലപ്പോഴും ഉച്ചയൂണ്‍ എടുക്കാതെയായിരിക്കും സ്കൂളിലേക്കുള്ള പുറപ്പാട്. പക്ഷേ എപ്പോഴൊക്കെ ഞാന്‍ പുലിക്കുരുമ്പ വീട്ടിലേക്ക് ഓടി കയറിയോ, അപ്പോഴൊക്കെ നാവിന് സ്വാതുതകുന്ന ഭക്ഷണം എപ്പോഴും തയ്യാറായിരുന്നു. അമ്മ എപ്പോഴും മക്കളെ കരുതിയിരുന്നിരുന്നു. ചിലപ്പോള്‍ സ്കൂളിലെ പാജകം ചെയ്യുന്ന ചേച്ചി വരാതിരിക്കുമ്പോള്‍, അമ്മയെയാണ് പകരം പാജകം ചെയ്യുവാന്‍ വിളിക്കുന്നത്. എന്നാലും, സ്കൂള്‍ കഴിഞ്ഞ് വീട്ടിലേക്ക് മടങ്ങുംബോള്, എന്റെ ചോറ്റുപാത്രത്തില്‍ മിച്ചം വന്ന പയറുകറി തന്ന് അയക്കുമായിരുന്നു. സ്നേഹം പറഞ്ഞ് അറിയിച്ചില്ലെങ്കിലും, അമ്മയ്ക്ക് മക്കല്‍ക്കുവേണ്ടി ചെയ്തു തരുവാന്‍ പറ്റിയ ചെറിയ കാര്യങ്ങള്‍ സ്നേഹത്തോടെ ചെയ്തതിനാല്‍, ആ സ്നേഹം ഞാന്‍ തിരിച്ചറിഞ്ഞു.

ചാച്ചനും അമ്മയ്ക്കും ഒരുപാട് ഒരുപാട് നന്നി – എന്‍റെ അമ്മ മേരിയെ എനിക്കു സമ്മാനിച്ചതിന്. Thanks beyond expression. 

അമ്മയുടെ അവസാന നിമിഷങ്ങളില്‍ വേണ്ടത്ര പരിചരണം നല്കിയ വര്‍ക്കിച്ചനച്ചനും ലാലിയാന്‍റിക്കും, മക്കള്‍ വരുണിനും അരുണിനും നന്നി. ദൈവം നിങ്ങളെ അനുഗ്രഹിക്കട്ടെ.

The Temptation of Sight

What happened recently in my District Kannur, in north Kerala was the Eucharistic miracle. This happened in Christ the King parish, Vilakannur on the 15^th of November, 2013. My mother went and saw and told me that it is real. Many people thronged to see the unspeakable light spreading from the Eucharistic host and the face of Jesus imprinted on it. The diocesan (diocese of Tellicherry) investigating team is doing their part to verify it. 

The first thing that came to my mind was quite disturbing – how many would change their ways when God appears? Would the crowd who see the Lord merely end at sight rather than a strengthened belief in the real presence of Jesus and the resolve to live a qualitatively different life? It is sad that many end up like that. When something unbelievable happens, the temptation to have a direct look at that propels people to move. So they run to the place of the event, see it and there begins a series of questioning, interpretations and the practical implications of it. Now the temptation is the temptation of mere sight which does not lead to belief.

The first temptation in the Garden of Eden is about rejecting faith and trust in favour of knowledge, rejecting belief in favour of sight. This finds a parallel in the Emmaus Episode where the dejected disciples could not just understand why such thing would happen to Jesus. They thought of Jesus as an all powerful, a magician who could get off the difficulties on the wink of an eye. They were utopian in their thinking. But now Jesus joins them on the way. Jesus opens their eyes on the way. Jesus brings to them an authentic understanding of the human realities by explaining to them the prophets, the scriptures. The invitation of the Serpent in the Garden of Eden was to eat the forbidden tree to attain knowledge. Jesus now invites them to eat, not with the promise of knowledge, but with an assurance of solidarity. The disciples’ eyes are open with a new grasp of reality. They are given a glimpse of the risen lord- but it was a fleeting glimpse. Sight once more had to give way to belief.

When the other disciples said to Thomas that they had seen the Lord, he doubted. He said, “Unless I see the mark of the nails in his hands and put my finger into the nailmarks and put my hand into his side, I will not believe” (Jn 20:25).

What is the actual connection between sight and belief? The object of belief/faith is concretized in a visible reality. The person of Jesus is beyond the visible dimensions of reality. He is the transcendent immanent at his incarnation. His divinity is hidden in his humanity. 

We often hear the phrase, “out of sight, out of mind.” This is a human reality that we want to hold on to permanence but the real fact is that change is the accompanying invader. Yet the eternal truth remains that we have been touched by grace, we have been seized by God, we have been bought at a price. But the constant temptation is to substitute belief for sight. Curiosity often ends at sight.

Jesus really knew our malady. This is the reason why he said to Thomas “Blessed are those who have not seen and have believed.” (Jn 20: 29).

May God lead us to belief. May He lead us all from doubt to certainty, from disbelief to belief, from a passing curiosity which ends at sight to a lasting presence which makes us captives of his love.

YOU ARE GOD'S FIELD!!

The 28^th World Youth Day held Rio de Janeiro 2013 was very special. The place where they were supposed to have the vigil at Guaratiba was named as campus fidei. Due to bad weather they had to shift the vigil to waterfront of Copacabana. Taking a cue from what happened; Pope Francis read the event in a different manner. He said, “Is the Lord not telling us, perhaps, that we ourselves are the true field of faith, the true Campus Fidei, and not some geographical location? Yes, it is true – each one of us, each one of you, me, everyone! To be missionary disciples means to know that we are the Field of Faith of God.” (Address of Pope Francis, Prayer Vigil with the Young People, Waterfront of Copacabana, Rio de Janeiro, Saturday, 27 July 2013).

This brings to my mind the Pauline image of the field. 1Cor 3:9, Paul uses the image of the ‘field’ to describe the Corinthian community. The Greek rendering of the word field is γεώργιον (georgion). It has the meaning of a cultivated land. In calling the Corinthians Paul underscores that the Corinthian community belongs to God. It is God’s possession.

How beautiful it is to belong to the Lord. If we are God’s field, building, St. Paul tells us that our body is the temple of the Spirit. He dwells in us. We carry in our body the death of Christ. Our existence, life is meaningful precisely because God works in us, through us and with us. He is Emmanuel – God with us. We have been bought at a price (the death of Christ). It is then our gift and responsibility to allow God to work in us without ignoring his voice as Pope Francis exhorted a group of journalists on 7^th October 2013.

I BELIEVE IN THE COMMUNION OF SAINTS: Bl. John Paul II soon to be a Saint

“Be imitators of me, as I am of Christ” (I Cor 11:1)

"Dear young people of every language and culture, a high and exhilarating task await you: that of becoming men and women capable of solidarity, peace and love of life, with respect for everyone. Become craftsmen of a new humanity, where brothers and sisters — members all of the same family — are able at last to live in peace." (From the message for young people for the celebration of the world day of peace, January 1, 2001)

Karol Wojtyla, a man who became Pope John Paul II, is my hero, a model of a lived faith. His friends called him Lolek. The official announcement of the canonisation of Bl. John Paul II together with Pope John XXIII on the 27^th April 2014 on the Divine Mercy Sunday, a feast instituted by him as the leader of the Catholic Church indeed is a good news. We can imitate him as he imitated Christ. We have seen him on T.V, heard him often and he is not a distant historical figure. He is still in our memory. To him we pay our homage. He was very close to the young people. It is enough to think of the World youth days he ushered in the life of the Church. Once when addressing the young people he said, “I am a young person aged 83.” What can we learn from this great saint of the Church? 

He saw every experience of life in the light of faith in God. He could see the digitus dei finger of God directing him in all things. He suffered. Early in life he had to encounter the realities of war, sickness and death. He had to make sense of a tumultuous world, his own experience of having to find meaning in a stunning catalogue of personal losses: his mother died, his only brother died, his father died, his Jewish friends and families were uprooted and killed in the Holocaust-- all by the time he was 25. In 1981, an assassin shot John Paul twice in St. Peter's Square in Vatican City. Fortunately, he was able to recover from his injuries and later forgave his attacker. He suffered from Parkinson’s disease. The themes of suffering, the centrality of Christ and the belief in God's ongoing supernatural intervention in our lives were the bedrock of John Paul’s papacy.

He was an intellectual giant, a philosopher, a theologian but he was often moved by a piety associated with the uneducated masses and sought consolation in the extraordinary, in the supernatural.

He wrote extensively. He was a moral theologian, specialized in sexual ethics. Two of his works are of great importance to us: The Acting Person and Love and Responsibility.  Fr. Robert Barron when commenting on these two books, he offers us the following insights:

• He speaks of sex and marriage, not as a burden but as an invitation to fullness of life. From his two works we can unearth an important insight for life. 
• He says that every moral act accomplishes two essential things. On the one hand, every action produces its own immediate consequences. On the other hand every act in the longer run contributes to build one’s character. Everything I do everyday is either building up my character or undermining it. He warns us of the danger of a typical modern attitude especially among young people. This attitude echoes as they mouth this expression, “I do a lot of bad things but deep down I am a good person. And it’s ok.” It is a separation of what one does and what one is. There is something wrong in this modern dictum. You cannot engage in all sorts of manipulative, superficial, trivial and sexually abhorrent behavior without affecting your character. You cannot remain a simply good person when something is essentially wrong. Who we are and what we do are intimately connected. There cannot be any separation. His teachings through his writings became a fountain of living water which could quench the thirst of every seeker while leading him to Christ, the ultimate meaning.

He tells us how to seek God. In a homily given on the feast of Epiphany in his own home town, Krakow, on 6^th January 1976, he spoke of the ways to seek God. He speaks of the rationale behind seeking God quoting St. Augustine: “I would not be looking for you, if I had already found you.” Every man, before beginning to seek, has already found God in some way. If he had not found Him in an initial, fundamental sense, he would not be looking for him. Man seeks God. When he finds Him, like the three wise men, through faith, he seeks Him in faith: he wishes to approach Him, the One he has found, and finally to reach the eternal Bethlehem. And if he has not yet found Him through faith; he seeks faith, he seeks the truth and so he seeks God. He would say that “Youth is a time given by providence to every person and given to him as a responsibility.”

We are all on the path that has been walked by many great human beings before us. John Paul II walked before us setting us an example. During his first solemn Mass in Saint Peter's Square, Bl. John Paul II said these unforgettable words: "Do not be afraid! Open, open wide the doors to Christ!" Let us listen to him. Following his example, let us entrust ourselves to Mary, who walked the pilgrimage of faith, hope and love.  We find the motto of his papacy in the coat of arms with the words "Totus tuus", drawn from the well-known words of Saint Louis Marie Grignion de Montfort in which he found a guiding light for his life: "Totus tuus ego sum et omnia mea tua sunt. Accipio te in mea omnia. Praebe mihi cor tuum, Maria - I belong entirely to you, and all that I have is yours. I take you for my all. O Mary, give me your heart."

“His example of prayer continually impressed and edified me: he remained deeply united to God even amid the many demands of his ministry. Then too, there was his witness in suffering: the Lord gradually stripped him of everything, yet he remained ever a "rock", as Christ desired. His profound humility, grounded in close union with Christ, enabled him to continue to lead the Church and to give to the world a message which became all the more eloquent as his physical strength declined. In this way he lived out in an extraordinary way the vocation of every priest and bishop to become completely one with Jesus, whom he daily receives and offers in the Eucharist.” (From Pope Benedict XVI's homily at the beatification of Pope John Paul II on May 1, 2011)