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Do I want a meaningful new year, or just grow older?

“Happy New Year!” We wish each other. Or other occasions, we say things like, “Happy Birthday!” or “We wish you a happy married life,” or “All the best in your new job!”

Others’ wishes will not make our day or our new year happy or productive or meaningful, just as someone wishing me an enjoyable picnic cannot guarantee my safety or nice weather.

A new day, a new year, or any stretch of time is simply capital—to be used well or badly, to be wasted or invested, as we choose.

What will I do with this new lease of life?

I can learn from how spent my past year.

I can learn from what makes me happy as I look back, and from my regrets.

Striking Findings

Here are findings we can learn from:

• A famous study done by Harvard University on what makes people happy as they grow older gave this one very clear finding: What makes us happy (and also keeps us healthy) as we grow older is CLOSE RELATIONSHIPS.
• Another finding, made by Australian nurse Bronnie Ware through her work with the dying, concerned the COMMONEST REGRETS PEOPLE FELT AS THEY FACED DEATH. The first one was: I wish I had lived by what I believed in, rather than trying to please people. Other regrets included: Focussing on work and neglecting relationships, not staying in touch with friends, not having laughed enough, and not having been a good human being.
• An Indian research paper, trying to see how fulfilled women religious are, found that what made the largest number of them happy as they looked back was: HAVING WORKED FOR THE POOR.
• A Sister, who is also a therapist, learnt that she passed from depression to joy through a simple change in attitude: WHATEVER THE SETTING, I CAN BRING MORE LOVE INTO IT. This change, she says, has kept her happy.
• Fr Patrick, a priest-formator, complained for years that “superiors do not understand me and my plans.” He moved from grumbling to enthusiasm when he realized: “The real issue is not that superiors do not understand my plans, but that I do not try to understand God’s plans for me. Once I made this shift, I have been happy.” WHOSE PLANS AM I TRYING TO FOLLOW—MINE, OR GOD’S?

An Alphabet Soup

Based on such life-changing discoveries, I am serving you an “alphabet soup” for the new year—with eight ingredients that can help us grow up in the new year—and always.

A: AWARENESS. Awareness is probably the biggest help for growth. We easily walk through life unaware.  We do not see or hear. We can be lost in a fantasy world of our own. Am I aware of what is happening in me—what makes me deeply happy or unhappy, what my heart is looking for? Am I aware how my behaviour affects others? Have I got in touch with my potential and my limitations? When asked, “Are you a God, a saint, etc.,” the Buddha replied, “No.” “What are you, then?” His beautiful reply: “I am awake!” May you and I be fully awake! May we not sleep-walk through life (as most people do).

B: BEAUTY. Ideas may move us. Things can attract us. People influence us. It is beauty that “seduces” our mind and heart, and makes us glow. We can find beauty in nature, in people, in words, in music, in silence. The beauty of a song or of child’s smile, the beauty of a bird or of a tree in bloom, the beauty of literature or of a peaceful countenance can move us to tears and make us better. There is much beauty around us—and in us, provided we are open to seeing it. We must leave the world a more beautiful place than we found it.

C: CELEBRATION. Celebrate life! There is much to celebrate—every day. We call a Mass a celebration, for in it we celebrate God’s love and Christ’s real Presence with us. We need not wait for special occasions to celebrate life. We can start the day looking forward to meeting God, doing good, sharing love, and end the day looking back and thanking. We can truly celebrate every single day. What are we waiting for?

D: DEATH. In his simple and brilliant Commencement Address at Stanford University, Steve Jobs told the young students: “Death is one of the best inventions of life.” It sweeps away the old, brings in the new. Unlike animals we are aware of our mortality. Our time on this earth is limited. This day, this hour, this moment is precious, because it will end soon. The art of wise living is to set priorities for our limited life and pursue them while we have two priceless gifts—health and time. Faith is not an invitation to fantasize about life after death; it is a warm and urgent call to do something beautiful with the time before death.

E: ENERGY. What energizes you? What makes you want to get up in the morning? What brings out the best in you? Are you able to enjoy the simple pleasures of life—a glass of water, a simple chat, a small prayer, a walk, a look at nature? Do you feel nourished and energized as you do these very ordinary things? The most energizing pursuits in life are love and faith. When we love someone deeply, we do not feel tired caring for that person. When we believe deeply (in God, in an ideal, in a dream, …) we get really charged to pursue what we strongly believe in.

F: FEELINGS. Feelings matter. Listen to what you really feel. Understand how others feel. Feelings are facts. In fact, most people are led more by their feelings than by the beautiful theories they claim to follow. Thus, likes and dislikes, attraction and revulsion, fear and jealousy, anger and depression, explain most human actions. Virtues are not the denial or suppression of feelings, but their wise and adequate expression. Just as a tamed dog is very useful, a tamed emotion is virtue—very useful for life and a good source of positive energy. “Negative” emotions (e.g., jealousy or irrational fear) can sap our energy, kill our happiness and damage relationships. Do you take time to understand how you feel and why, and to understand the feelings behind others’ reactions?

G: GROWTH. Growing older is automatic; growing up is not. All of us are one day older than yesterday, and one year older than twelve months ago. The real issue is: Am I growing up? Just as someone else cannot make me taller by pulling me from both ends, but can help me by feeding me correctly, others can help my growth—through example, encouragement, guidance, challenge, corrections, loving support. But no one else can make me grow up. As a young priest, doing much good in his parish, told me, “Already in the seminary I was convinced that you, staff members, cannot form us; we form ourselves.” External events can be hard or pleasant, but they do not make us mature or childish; our responses do. Good and bad example is part of everyone’s experience. What I choose to follow makes me the person I am. As the saying goes, “the same sun that melts butter hardens mud.”

H: HAPPINESS. The sooner we learn that others cannot make us happy, the better. Others can help or hinder, be nice or nasty. Happiness and unhappiness is largely our own making. No one gets a perfect set of cards to play with; we play with the cards we are dealt. Why wait for happiness in some distant future? Why not be very happy today? Why waste time blaming and playing helpless or giving excuses, when we can change much by changing the way we look at things and respond to events?

Want a simple suggestion for making yourself happy just now? Think of ten good things you experienced today, and be grateful. Thank God in your heart. Thank the people who have been good to you. You will find yourself becoming happy. (Just feeling grateful is not enough. Experiments on happiness show that expressing gratitude matters for happiness.)

Do it!

In the new year, why not try this “alphabet soup”?
Decide to construct a happy and meaningful new year.

May you and I not merely grow older, but really grow up. Why else are life and health given to us?

Try this: Imagine the person you are now. Next, imagine the person you want to be by December 31, 2019. What do you see? What are the main differences?

It will help if you can draw pictures of your two images. Draw the second picture as vividly as you can. May it be a beautiful, life-giving picture.

MAKE IT COME TRUE.

YOU CAN.

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Fr Joe Mannath SDB

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I chanced upon a ‘little woman’ a few years ago when she was introduced to my family by her aunt (Mrs. Vennila) who was employed as a domestic helper in my house. “I am unable to come to work, since I have shifted my residence, and am finding it difficult to commute. This is my niece Malathi. She is willing to work in your house.”  We were taken aback, seeing a little girl who appeared to be about twelve or thirteen. We told Vennila that we could not employ her, since it is against the law to employ minors. We would be booked for child labour. Besides, this child should be in school!  “No Madam,” sprung a little voice, “I am twenty-two years old and have been working for the last eight years.” I could not believe my eyes and ears.  After much quizzing and clarification, we decided to employ her, wondering all the time how she would cope with the work, but wanting to help her and give her a safe place to work. Her only demand was a footstool to help her reach the kitchen sink tap!

All of a metre (about three feet and four inches) in height, Malathi hails from a hamlet in Tamilnadu’s Thiruvanamalai district. She was denied a normal childhood when her father expired. Circumstances forced her to quit school when her family migrated to Chennai in search of work. Her mother, the only breadwinner at that time, took to working at construction sites, while her brother, with his wayward life, became a drain on the family’s resources. To help her mother support the family, Malathi started working at fourteen.

Small in size, great in mind

What makes Malathi stand out in the crowd is her tiny physique, pleasant beautiful smile and child-like demeanor. A dwarf from childhood, she has never let her height (or the lack of it) get the better of her.  She has devised ways to make up for her short stature, and is quick to find a remedy when faced by challenges to her height. Whenever she needs to reach the switch of a light or a fan  (positioned about five feet above the ground), Malathi uses a wooden spoon or the handle of the broom! I am amazed at her dexterity in using implements larger or heavier than herself. Her ingenuity is awesome! She has never excused herself from completing a task due to her stature. Committed to her work, she will put several others to shame with her dedication and sincerity.  Tasks assigned to her are completed meticulously and thoroughly. She is like a mini whirlwind! Once she enters the house, she does not take even a few minutes off, except at meals time, unless commanded to do so. I have had several tirades with her when at times I step in to her domain to help with some of the chores. Such arguments have often ended with her declaring: “Amma, this is my job; you go and do yours!”

Never shying away from work, Malathi is eager to learn anything new, be it tightening a screw, handling the pliers or secateurs, pottering in the garden, using the microwave oven or making an omelette. She tries her best to hone her skills and add new ones too.  She refuses to take a day off work unless forced to and rarely asks for free time.

Other aspects of her character are extreme honesty and a wonderful memory! We introduce Malathi to everyone who steps into our home, be it a family member or a friend. She is like a security guard who will not allow anyone inside our home unless she is convinced of all their credentials.

A Smart Polyglot

Working in houses, Malathi has picked up several languages and today is a polyglot. She can speak Tamil, Hindi, Urdu and Telegu fluently, as well as a pretty good smattering of English.  Malayalam and Konkani are on the anvil! Her choice of clothes is not the traditional saree, but western ones! Sharp, respectful and quick-witted, she is well known in the locality. She continues to work and support her mother as well as her brother’s family, since he is struggling to pay off debts accumulated over the years.  Recently, with much cajoling, she has opened an account in the post office and pays into a recurring deposit scheme in view of her future. With such qualities I often wonder what position she would have held if she had had the opportunity to complete her education.

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Ordetta Mendoza

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What is my deepest experience? What has touched me and changed me radically? Have I found what responds to the deepest desires of my heart? Is this what I share with others? Or, am I living on the surface, and meeting others too on a superficial level, trying to give them what I think they like, rather than what they really need?

Father Alban, an enthusiastic young religious priest in Mumbai, told me of what a young man in Bangalore had told him that really went to his heart.

“Like other theology students, I used to go to some parish for weekend ministry. There we made friends with young people and their families. I would crack jokes and laugh with them, and I thought I was popular.

“A few years later, as a young priest, I visited one of these families. A young man in the family, who had been a boy when I used to visit them as a theology student, told me something simple that touched me deeply. He said, “Father, you were interesting. You cracked jokes. You discussed cricket scores. But you did not give us what we really needed. You did not give us Jesus.”

“This really hit me.

“I decided to be what I am supposed to be as a priest and religious: a person close to God who helps others to get close to God.

“This is what I am trying to be now. As you can see, I am very happy. My priorities are different now, and the Lord fills my life with joy.”

He is more active than ever. But it is a dynamism flowing from a God-centred heart.

From Criminal to Caring Friend

Quite different is the case of a man called Aby, who used to belong to the criminal
“underworld” in an Indian city. He used to the dirty work for powerful people on payment: threaten people, beat them up, break their legs. One day, a priest asked him to go for a retreat. Aby went. He was so transformed by the experience that he not only gave up his criminal ways, but started devoting himself to picking up abandoned people from the streets and looking after them.

Oxford Research on Religious Experience

Alister Hardy was a marine biologist who decided to study religious experience scientifically. Instead of quoting religious texts, he started by collecting personal accounts of people who had what they considered religious experiences. His centre advertised in the secular press in the UK asking people to send in such accounts.

His team was surprised at the response. Thousands of people sent in such accounts. In an apparently secular country like Britain, so many people wrote of their religious experiences. The Alister Hardy Centre in Oxford went on to publish several volumes containing these accounts. One of them, called The Original Vision, is devoted to the religious experiences people had when they were children.

It may look as if people are mostly interested in money, fame, achievements and comfort. But more people have had touching religious experiences than we may think. The experiences published by the Hardy Centre are too many for me to quote here.

Cancer and Prayer

I have met cancer patients who were healed through prayer, and who now lead joyful, productive lives.

I have known others who look after terminally ill cancer patients because of their in Jesus.

The most joyful, the most inspiring, the most committed religious and priests (and lay persons) are persons filled with a spiritual vision. Celibacy, in particular, does not make sense if not chosen and lived out of a spiritual vision. Why on earth say No to two of life’s deepest experiences—spousal love and parenting? If celibacy comes down to just that, it would be a stupid and damaging choice. None of the works we do needs celibacy (or prayer or spiritual practices). Anyone with common sense and ready to work hard can do most of what we do externally.

But the heart of the matter, the secret of a person’s inner glow, the transparent goodness of persons free of power-games, manipulation and group-based loyalties—that secret lies beyond social analysis, psychological categories and human cleverness.

What Wealth Cannot Provide

Clare was such a person. She came from a wealthy Japanese family. Her father was one of the directors of the finance company, Mitsui. Her older sister was married to an IBM executive. Clare too had a boy friend, and they were planning to marry. Then she felt this “other call” and told her parents about it. She went to a convent to spend some time there and see what  religious life is. She told the Sisters about having a fiancé, and they told her that is beautiful. She found life in the convent very hard (materially), since she was used to luxury. So, she thanked the sisters and went back home. But, she told me, “For a week, I reflected. I found that I have much at home, but I do not need any of these things to be happy. Jesus Christ is enough for me.” She went back and joined the convent. Now, decades later, she says, “I have never lost the joy of my vocation.”

Mother Teresa told an interviewer: “I come from a happy family. I would not have left it to become a social worker.” She did fantastic service to the poorest, of course, but she di d not see herself as a social worker. For her, life was about meeting Jesus. She felt called to meet him and love him in the most unwanted of persons.

Ramakrishna’s Influence

The Ramakrishna Mission was founded by Swami Vivekananda, whose original name was Narendranath Datta. As a bright and sceptical young man, Narendranath went to see the village priest Ramakrishna. The holy man had been waiting for Narendranath. When asked, “How do you know there is a God?” Ramakrishna did not offer him any logical arguments. He told the young man, “Because I see Him more clearly than I see you.”

God-experience is more powerful than arguments and discussions.

What is your deepest religious experience? What keeps you going when you face hurdles or feel empty?

Who am I? What am I?

What is our identity as religious and priests? What is our heart’s deepest quest? What has touched us and filled us most meaningfully? What do we feel called to share with others? If what we share is only financial support, or academic knowledge (as in a school) or medical competence or political analysis, we need not be religious and priests to do this. Are we giving people what they have a right to expect from us—an joyful and inspiring life based on Jesus’ life and teachings, a way of seeing and treating people that is different from the world’s ways?

Religious experience, when genuine and deep, does not cut us off from people. It immerses us more deeply into the human journey. It shows us our weakness, vulnerability and the humanity we share with everyone. No wonder mystics are the most human of human beings and the most fully alive.

Want an example? Here is one.

Right in the shopping area…something very unusual

In the middle of a busy American city called Louisville in the state of Kentucky, there is an unusual plaque. It commemorates an experience Thomas Merton, the famous trappiest monk and writer had while walking through that busy street. Merton writes:

“In Louisville, at the corner of Fourth and Walnut, in the center of the shopping district, I was suddenly overwhelmed with the realization that I loved all these people, that they were mine and I theirs, that we could not be alien to one another even though we were total strangers. It was like waking from a dream of separateness, of spurious self-isolation in a special world. . . . This sense of liberation from an illusory difference was such a relief and such a joy to me that I almost laughed out loud. . . . I have the immense joy of being man, a member of a race in which God Himself became incarnate… I realize what we all are. And if only everybody could realize this! But it cannot be explained. There is no way of telling people that they are all walking around shining like the sun.
“Then it was as if I suddenly saw the secret beauty of their hearts, the depths of their hearts where neither sin nor desire nor self-knowledge can reach, the core of their reality, the person that each one is in God’s eyes. If only they could all see themselves as they really are. If only we could see each other that way all the time. There would be no more war, no more hatred, no more cruelty, no more greed. . . . But this cannot be seen, only believed and ‘understood’ by a peculiar gift.”

The mystical is not only the deepest of experiences. It makes us more fully human, and more deeply immersed in the human race. We see all that is human in a refreshingly new way. We have a new vision, a new energy. There is no more room for pettiness, divisions, hatred or gossip; for injustice, greed or back-stabbing. We see our oneness. We are in touch with the heart of reality.

Deep religious experience flows into compassionate and courageous service. It does not cut us off or makes us blind and indifferent. But what we bring to people is not simply financial support or political acumen, or the latest theories, but the power of a transformed heart and a God-centred life.

May those who meet us find this to be true of us.

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Fr Joe Mannath SDB

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In the International Conference on climate change, called COP24, that met in Katawice, Poland, last month, one unusual speaker stood out—a fifteen-year-old high school student from Sweden. Her bold and direct challenge got the world’s attention. Her name is Greta Thunburg. She was already known as a student activist who protested in front of the Swedish Parliament demanding that Sweden honour the promises made on climate change. Then she started skipping school on Fridays, to move government to take responsible action on climate. At first she was alone. Later, many thousands in different countries joined her.

A group of them went to the Conference Site holding a banner that said, “12 years left.” This refers to the conclusion by experts that the world needs to cut emissions by 50 percent before 2030.—Editor.

At the Climate Change Conference last month, she told the audience made up of seasoned politicians and experts:

My name is Greta Thunberg. I am 15 years old. I am from Sweden.

I speak on behalf of Climate Justice Now.

Many people say that Sweden is just a small country and it doesn’t matter what we do.

But I’ve learned you are never too small to make a difference.

And if a few children can get headlines all over the world just by not going to school, then imagine what we could all do together if we really wanted to. But to do that, we have to speak clearly, no matter how uncomfortable that may be.

You only speak of green eternal economic growth because you are too scared of being unpopular. You only talk about moving forward with the same bad ideas that got us into this mess, even when the only sensible thing to do is pull the emergency brake.

You are not mature enough to tell it like is. Even that burden you leave to us children. But I don’t care about being popular. I care about climate justice and the living planet.

Our civilization is being sacrificed for the opportunity of a very small number of people to continue making enormous amounts of money.

Our biosphere is being sacrificed so that rich people in countries like mine can live in luxury. It is the sufferings of the many which pay for the luxuries of the few.

The year 2078, I will celebrate my 75th birthday. If I have children maybe they will spend that day with me. Maybe they will ask me about you. Maybe they will ask why you didn’t do anything while there still was time to act.

You say you love your children above all else, and yet you are stealing their future in front of their very eyes.

Until you start focusing on what needs to be done rather than what is politically possible, there is no hope. We cannot solve a crisis without treating it as a crisis.

We need to keep the fossil fuels in the ground, and we need to focus on equity. And if solutions within the system are so impossible to find, maybe we should change the system itself.

We have not come here to beg world leaders to care. You have ignored us in the past and you will ignore us again.

We have run out of excuses and we are running out of time.

We have come here to let you know that change is coming, whether you like it or not. The real power belongs to the people.

Thank you.

As Shannon Osaka wrote, “For all those following the climate crisis, Thunberg is both an inspiration and a warning: Sometimes we need a 15-year-old to tell us the truth. And the truth isn’t always pretty.”

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In the Name of Jesus: Reflections on Christian Leadership
Henri J M Nouwen

Nouwen presents a series of short reflections on “servant leadership” which he saw as the essence of Christian ministry. At that time of writing, he was working in a community of mentally challenged people in Toronto, Canada. He avoids an academic approach and bases his thoughts on his experience with the people with whom he was living at the time in the new community “trying carefully to discern which of (his) own experiences and insights could speak to priests and ministers who live in very different circumstances.” Nouwen took one of the inmates of the community to join him on the stage as he addressed the large gathering.

One temptation among the religious is to be “relevant.” Nouwen likens this to the experience of Jesus who was tempted to turn stones into bread, to satisfy hunger. According to him, “the Christian leader of the future is called upon to be completely irrelevant and to stand in this world with nothing but his own vulnerable self.” “Man does not live by bread alone.” Speaking on the question, “Do you love me? “ he observes, “The Christian leader of the future is the one who truly  knows the heart of God as it has become flesh—a heart of flesh—in Jesus.” There are two kinds of love that we experience—the love of God that is totally unconditional, and that of our fellow humans which is “conditional.” This second love is fraught with ambiguity and darkness as “only a broken reflection of the first love. Christian leaders are not simply to be well-informed people with opinions about the issues of today. “Their leadership must be rooted in the permanent intimate relationship with the incarnate word Jesus, and they need to find there the source for their words, advice, and guidance. To be fruitful in the future, it needs to move form the moral to the mystical.” Like Jesus, his ministers are also tempted to be spectacular, which is tantamount to putting the Lord to the test.

Nouwen sees confession and forgiveness as the concrete forms through which we the sinful love one another. We have to shun the temptation to be powerful. “Power offers an easy substitute for the hard task of love.” The Christian leader of the future “must choose to be radically poor.” And be led rather than lead.  Nouwen believes that the future Christian leadership needs a deep spiritual formation of the whole person, a “formation in the mind of Christ.”

Chicken Soup for the Soul: Living Catholic Faith: 101 Stories to offer Hope, Deepen Faith and Spread Love
Jack Canfield, Mark Victor Hansen & LeAnn Thieman.

Jack Canfield and Mark Victor Hansen are joint creators of the Chicken Soup for the Soul series, which includes about forty international best sellers. This volume, focused on the Catholic faith, contains 101 real life stories covering various aspects of Catholic life and spirituality. The stories contain a variety of experiences—amusing, sad, heartwarming, miraculous—and include rediscovery and return to lost faith and so on. Some are about how people encounter the love of God in various real life situations in life, like a teacher encouraging a poor immigrant student in her class or a son honouring his mother at a school event. There is also an incident that recalls a youth’s encounter with Pope St John Paul in Rome during the 15^th annual World Youth Day. There are also reports of miraculous experiences and healings, of the experience of conversions, of finding meaning in suffering, and the power of the sacraments, forgiveness and reconciliation. There are also nostalgic and humorous recollections by some whose convent school life experiences might bring an amused smile of recognition to those who have been through it. Each one is inspiring in its own different way, reflecting the experience of Catholic faith lived in the modern world by ordinary people. These testimonies can make us also recognize similar experiences in our own lives and help us with a deeper understanding of what it means to live the Catholic way today.

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Dr Gigy Joseph

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All or Nothing: Sr Clare Crockett
(A documentary, 2017, 85 Minutes. Available on YouTube.)

Sr. Clare Theresa Crockett died in an earthquake on 16 April 2016 at age 33 while working as a missionary among the poor in a remote village in Ecuador. She was a most unlikely candidate to join a convent, something she herself, as a young girl, could not think of. Born and brought up in a happy, nominally Catholic family in Londonderry, one of the most violent towns in Northern Ireland, Clare loved music, trained in theater and dreamed of a career in Hollywood for which she was eminently suited. Her ebullient spirit earned her the nickname “Live wire.” She used to declare that she wanted to be famous. She did act in a movie.

But at age seventeen, the feisty girl had a change of heart that stunned everyone. She decided to be a nun. Her family begged her to give up the idea. But Clare was the kind of person who would have “all or nothing.” “Neither success, nor fame, nor human love could fill me. I knew that only by doing what God wanted me could I be truly happy.”  She did everything in her life with a complete devotion and enthusiasm. Giving up the comforts of a normal secular Irish family was not easy. But she took to the rigours of her convent life with the same enthusiasm, joviality and infectious humour which made her popular among her fellow nuns, colleagues and the children she taught. Some time before the fatal earthquake she said that she would also die young like the Lord whom she loved deeply. And it came true when she and three postulants whom he was teaching music were crushed to death in the earthquake.

The film was made mostly out of photos and candid video footages of Clare, from her early childhood onwards and interviews with people who knew her closely. The movie radiates the infectious joyfulness of one who gave her life in loving sacrifice to Christ.

 The Young Messiah
Director:  Cyrus Nowraste. Cast: Sean Bean, David Bradley, Lee Boardman, Jonathan Bailey, David Burke. (2016, 111 minutes)

 Based on Anne Rice’s novel, Christ the Lord: Out of Egypt, the film presents a fictional life of boy Jesus during his Egyptian exile and return to Nazareth on the death of Herod. The episodes are entirely unbiblical but its presentation is consistent with the Gospel view of Christ. It opens with Jesus in Alexandria. While playing with his friends, Jesus is attacked by a bully named Eleazer. But Lucifer trips Eleazer over, causing his death, for which Jesus is blamed. People turn against Jesus. Mary saves her son from the crowd. His cousins, who had seen him bring life to a dead bird before, ask him to do the same to Eleazer. Jesus sneaks into Eleazer’s house and brings him back to life. However, the resurrected boy only attacks him ungratefully. The boy’s parents want the Holy Family to leave the town. Joseph announces his intention to leave for the homeland. They are bound for Nazareth, accompanied by uncle Cleophas, who gets extremely sick. Jesus heals him. This miracle becomes widely known. Herod’s successor sends a Roman Centurion to find and kill Jesus because he believes that the boy will be a threat to his throne. Both Lucifer and the soldiers are now after Jesus to kill him. Joseph and family hide in a cave to escape the hunters. But Jesus steals out of the cave and travels to Jerusalem with the help of some pilgrims. In the Temple, he meets a blind Rabbi, from whom he comes to know his past history. He grows in awareness of his mission. He heals the Rabbi. The news of this healing spreads like wildfire. It leads the Centurion to Jesus. But he is unable to lay hands on Christ, because he is in the centre of a large crowd eagerly listening to his words. The Centurion is awed by the meeting. He returns to tell the king that he has found Jesus and killed him. Thus Jesus is spared and he returns to Nazareth with his parents to a normal life. The movie presents a suspenseful story line and presents young Jesus beginning to show signs of the Messiah in the making.

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Dr Gigy Joseph

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A copy of MAGNET weighs about seventy grams. When we send copies in bulk, the post office checks the weight of the parcel. The meaning of grams or kilograms or pounds or inches is not a matter of opinion. We all know the meaning of a “kilo of sugar” or “three metres of cloth.”

Weights and measures serve a purpose. They are the norm for judging whether a shop sold me the right amount of sugar or the right length of material.

The norm of goodness and holiness, of fidelity and right living, for us, Christians, is Jesus. Holiness is imitation of Christ. A saint is someone who is Christ-like.

Jesus is exemplar, norm, model, Lord, brother, friend.

We do not join a religious order to follow Francis or Ignatius, Teresa or Don Bosco, but to follow Jesus. If being a Franciscan or Carmelite helps me to become more like Jesus, being a part of that group makes sense; if not, I should quit and seek my goal elsewhere.

Who is Jesus? What did he teach? What did he do?

No other religion is so centred around one person as Christianity is. It is crucial for us to clarify how we see Jesus, understand his teachings and try to imitate him.

Here is my attempt to summarize what he did and said.

1. Incarnation: This unusual word means: He chose to become one of us. Didn’t want to keep a distance from us. Human beings matter much to God.
2. Abba: Jesus’ life focus was Someone he referred to as Abba (a term children used to refer to their father). More than union, they had a relationships of oneness. He spoke to this Abba even in the midst of excruciating pain when he felt totally abandoned.
3. Power: This oneness with Abba gave him unmatched power. This power is very different from that of the movie hero who beats up the villain. Jesus used his divine power only to do good. Of the thirty-seven miracles recorded in the Gospels, most are healings. Others are caring gestures, like turning water into wine or calming the stormy sea. He never used his power to put down anyone, or to crush an enemy. This is a sharp contrast between the Gospels and the mythologies of major religions.
4. Prayer: He spent nights in prayer. Why on earth did God’s Son have to do it?
5. Temptations: Stranger still, he was tempted in the ways that all humans are—by power, pleasure and possessions.
6. Compassion, not condemnation: Look at the incident of the woman caught in adultery, or Jesus’ dealing with Peter after the betrayal, or his stories about the lost sheep, or the prodigal son or the lost coin. God reaches out to the lost with greater concern.
7. Company of the Least: He mostly mixed with ordinary folk, and the unwanted and the despised. He did not cultivate the circle of VIPs, nor seek privileges.
8. Kind and tough: He was kind to the weak and tough with the powerful. He would touch the blind, the sick, the leprosy patient. He challenged the hypocrisy and cruel indifference of those on top.
9. People more than ritual: For him, evidently, people mattered more than the temple or the Sabbath—something that upset the orthodox a great deal. He moved, as Scripture scholars tell us, from an ethic of cult to an ethic of relationships. We will one day be judged on how we treated the needy and shared our gifts, not on how “religious” we were.
10. Love as core commandment: In fact, practically the only commandment was not a commandment, but an appeal from the heart of God: Learn to love! He gave this as the surest sign of discipleship. (Four centuries later, Augustine would summarize Christian ethics as “love and do whatever you wish.”
11. Love without boundaries: We are to love as He did—without boundaries, without walls, without excluding anyone. Everyone matters for God, not just those of my place, or religion, or caste or tribe.
12. Love as service of the least: Not limited to prayers and sweet words, but expressed in concrete good deeds, especially for the weakest.
13. Love that forgives: One of the harshest statements in the Gospels is the condemnation of the servant who, after being forgiven a huge debt, does not forgive his fellow servant a tiny debt. His own example from the Cross is without parallel.
14. Authority as service: The night before he died, he did something shocking, something that only slaves did in his culture—washing the feet of men who called him teacher and lord. Wouldn’t you be shocked if the bishop were to turn up at your house and start sweeping the rooms and washing the toilets?
15. Experienced weakness and need: He experienced fatigue, hunger, loneliness, fear, tears, extreme physical pain.
16. Accepted help: The hospitality of good friends. The help of Simon of Cyrene on the way to Calvary. (God sends us help, but we have no right to insist that it should come from those from whom we expected it.)
17. Childlike charm: Children didn’t find him boring, but were instead drawn to him. A kind and apparochable elder brother or uncle, not a solemn, distant preacher.
18. Died an apparent failure: Humiliated, tortured beyond measure, abandoned by his so-called friends and followers.
19. God’s tender face: He came among us showing us God’s tender face. He did not, in words or deeds, present a frightening or distant God, but an incredibly compassionate and tender God.
20. Victory from failure: By his wounds, I am healed. Out of his apparent failure, God wrote His poem of victory. Transformed by Him, Peter would heal the cripple and Paul would say, “I can do all things through Christ, who strengthens me.” Jesus’ transforming power has touched, healed and transformed countless men and women down the ages. This miracle continues. May you and I be open to the same transforming encounter.

This is the Master we follow. This is the model to imitate. If there were better ways of saving the world and helping people, God would have chosen that.

This is my attempt to summarize what Jesus brought us. How would you summarize Jesus’s life and teachings? How do you find his example and teachings—impractical, hard, magnetic, life-giving?

Questions for Reflection/Prayer:

1. Who is Jesus for me? What difference does He make in my Life? ………………………………………………………………………….. ………………………………………………………………………………………………………
2. Who is God for me? What is my favorite image of God? ………………………….. ……………………………………………………………………………………………………

Who am I for God? …………………………………………………

3. How would I summarize the essentials of Jesus’ teaching (in simple, non-technical language, for myself, or for a young person today)?

• ……………………………………………………………………………………
• ……………………………………………………………………………………
• ………………………………………………………………………………….
• …………………………………………………………………………………..
• …………………………………………………………………………………..

 4. Who are the most “Christ-like” persons I have known? Why do I call them Christ-like? In what ways were/are they like Jesus? …………………………………….. ………………………………………………………………………………………….. …………………………………………………………………………………………..

5. Over the years, do I find myself becoming more Christ-like or less so? …..

6. Why? ………………………………………………………………………………….. …………………………………………………………………………………………..

7. Is it my heart’s desire to become more like Jesus, or am I more interested in worldly success (power, money, possessions, fame, etc)? ………………………………… …………………………………………………………………………………………..

8. What is my definition of a meaningful (“successful”) life? …………………… …………………………………………………………………………………………..

9. What do I need to do to become more Christ-like? ………………………….…. ……………………………………………………………………………………………

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Joe Mannath SDB

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A few months ago, Vidyajyothi College, Delhi, asked me to address the Jesuit theology students on the use of the Internet and Social Media. After mentioning the fact that the world’s wealthiest corporations today deal in knowledge, or knowledge-related products (Alphabet or Google, Apple, Microsoft, Amazon), I shared with them my conviction that, while technology is easily available and is cheap or even free, and makes gigantic strides, our challenge is not to be afraid or defensive, but to create positive content. We need to learn to crowd out evil by making the good attractive. The means at our disposal today are powerful and easily accessible. How creative are we?

This month’s cover stories are about one pervasive aspect of the Information revolution: Social Media.

A wake-up call comes to all of us from a fifteen-year-old Swedish girl called Greta, who challenged a world body discussing climate change. In strong and direct language, she asked the group to assure today’s children a healthy world to survive in. Meet Greta here. Do we have this teenager’s awareness and concern for our planet?

Technology is a tool. It does not make us good or bad. What makes us who we are and what energizes us to transform the world is our inner experience. Mysticism is a “passive” (received) experience, but mystics are among the most active life-changers. The world needs more than clever theories and shrewdly couched political ideologies.  People look for credible witnesses whose lives have been transformed and lit up. To change the world for the better, we need persons whose inner core has been touched and transformed by the Divine. Check out the true stories about this in another article.

I want to thank Sr Ranjana UMI, who was a member of our editorial board until last month, and who has asked to be relieved of this responsibility. Thank you, Ranjana! All the best in your current ministry!

In her place, we welcome Sr Esme da Cunha FDCC, who is known to our readers through her column, “Special Days.” Sr Esme was a member of their General Council, and is now superior of her community and in charge of much editing work. Welcome, Esme! Thank you for sharing your rich experience and your notable writing skills with us.

Enjoy MAGNET.

Thanks to those of you who write and tell us what you think of this magazine. I am honoured to report that we hardly get any negative feedback. Most comments are heart-warming and so very positive. Many read it from cover to cover and miss it if it arrives late. Thank you for your full-blooded support!

I am committed to keeping MAGNET as good as the best magazines of its kind anywhere in the world. May I ask you to make it known, especially about religious, clergy and educated lay persons.

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Fr Joe Mannath SDB
Editor

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27 January: International Holocaust Remembrance Day

The Day commemorates the tragedy of the Holocaust that occurred during the Second World War: the genocide that resulted in the death of an estimated 6 million Jewish people, 5 million Slavs, 3 million ethnic Poles, 200,000 Romani people, 250,000 mentally and physically disabled people, and 9,000 homosexual men by the Nazi regime and its collaborators.

Auschwitz concentration camp was a network of concentration and extermination camps built and operated by Nazi Germany in occupied Poland during World War II. It consisted of Auschwitz I (the original concentration camp), Auschwitz II–Birkenau (a combined concentration/extermination camp), Auschwitz III–at Monowitz (a labour camp to staff an IG Farben chemicals factory), and 45 satellite camps.

Auschwitz I was first constructed to hold Polish political prisoners, who began to arrive in May 1940. The first extermination of prisoners took place in September 1941. Auschwitz II–Birkenau went on to become a major site of the Nazis’ ‘Final Solution to the Jewish Question’ during the Holocaust. From early 1942 until late 1944, transport trains delivered Jews to the camp’s gas chambers from all over German-occupied Europe, where they were killed en masse with the cyanide-based poison Zyklon B, originally developed to be used as a pesticide. An estimated 1.3 million people were sent to the camp. Others deported to Auschwitz included 150,000 Poles, 23,000 Romani and Sinti, 15,000 Soviet prisoners of war, 400 Jehovah’s Witnesses, and tens of thousands of others of diverse nationalities, including an unknown number of homosexuals. Many of those not killed in the gas chambers died of starvation, forced labour, infectious diseases, individual executions, and medical experiments.

As Soviet troops approached Auschwitz in January 1945, most of its population was sent west on a death march. The prisoners remaining at the camp were liberated on 27 January 1945, a day now commemorated as International Holocaust Remembrance Day.

In the following decades, survivors such as Primo Levi, Viktor Frankl, and Elie Wiesel wrote memoirs of their experiences in Auschwitz, and the camp became a dominant symbol of the Holocaust. In 1947 Poland founded the Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum on the site of Auschwitz I and II, and in 1979 it was named a World Heritage Site by UNESCO.

Every member nation of the U.N. honours the memory of Holocaust victims. We must go beyond remembrance, and make sure that new generations know this history and apply the lessons of the Holocaust to today’s world.

It rejects any denial of the Holocaust as an event and condemns all manifestations of religious intolerance, incitement, harassment or violence against persons or communities based on ethnic origin or religious belief.

It is a day on which we must reassert our commitment to human rights and do our utmost so that all peoples may enjoy the protection and rights.

We also focus on the disabled community that was one of the many victim groups of the Nazi regime.

The day is celebrated with exhibitions on the Holocaust—films, photo-albums, autobiographies, diaries and memoirs of survivors to give people a first-hand experience of what it must have been like.   

There is a quote attributed to Stalin who ordered the death of several million citizens of the USSR: “One death is a tragedy; a million deaths is a statistic.” So true, isn’t it? When someone dear to us dies, it is a personal tragedy for us. But when we read about hundreds of people who die in a natural disaster or war, or thousands killed in battles or ethnic fights, this information is merely a number for us, right?

Another sad fact of human life: We do not learn from history. There are persons and groups that promote the kind of ethnic and religious hatred that the Nazis promoted. They do not seem to see that it is not only inhumanly cruel, but it is also self-destructive. Germany nearly destroyed itself through the madness and mayhem of the Nazi rule. Germans were so ashamed of this part of their history that they would not teach it in schools; they did not want their children to know what they had done during the Nazi rule. Germany also became the most hated country after the war. It took several decades for them to rise from ashes, with gigantic US aid and help from elsewhere. German also went out of its way, once it was financially strong again, to regain the good will of people elsewhere through foreign aid.

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Sr Esme Da Cunha FDCC

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Managing stress, just as causation of stress, is a philosophical issue. It relates to our priorities and worldviews.

Managing stress is all about taking charge: taking charge of our thoughts, our emotions, our schedules, our environment, and the way we deal with situations and perceived threats.

Stress management involves changing the stressful situation when we can, changing our reaction when we can’t, taking care of ourselves, and making time for rest and relaxation.

The S-AMRT Approach
I am suggesting a 4-S approach to managing stress: Self-Awareness, Self-Management, Self-Renewal and Self-Transformation or the (S-AMRT) Approach.

1. Self-Awareness
We need to be aware of what is happening to us and in us.
• Become aware of our daily routine, especially in regard to work and the effect that routine is having on our life and relationships and discern if this routine is one that enhances our wellbeing or saps our energies unnecessarily.

• Become aware of the kind of situations and reactions that trigger negative emotions and distress.

• Become aware of changes in our reaction patterns: of incipient fatigue, headaches, insomnia, gastro-intestine problems, and other bodily troubles. Such awareness lets us know that something is wrong and that we need to do something to correct things, to have a change of course.

• When we attempt a change of course, we need to become aware of our successful and unsuccessful modes of coping with stress. We then get rid of the unsuccessful ones and put more effort and energy into the successful ones.

2. Self-Management
We need to learn to manage our lives better. This we do by bringing about some helpful changes in our attitudinal and behavioural patterns.

• Developing more flexible attitudes towards self and work is a good place to start.

• We need to learn to manage our energy; know how much of it to spend and where and when and how.

• Time-management is a great help here. We need to set priorities, and learn to delegate tasks. We need to discern which are the tasks that need our personal attention and time investment, and which can be done by others.

• Learning to ask for help is another stress-buster. Too often we try to manage things on our own, and get frustrated. Frustration triggers a stress response. A simple way to avoid this needless stress is to ask someone for help — for advice as well as hands-on help.

• We need to be realistic in our job expectations. We need to make our job expectations our own and not somebody else’s. Trying to be and do what someone else wants us to be or do is a sure-fire recipe for continued frustration and burnout.
• We also need to set realistic goals and standards of performance. Setting standards far above our capacity to achieve them will lead to frustration and to stress.

• Occasionally dilute ordinary work with tasks of a different kind. If am a counsellor or manager, for example, I can set aside sometime each week to teach or play with some poor children, volunteer at a local charity and so on.

3. Self-Renewal
There are many ways we can renew ourselves and feel energised.
• Increasing physical fitness and overall wellbeing through vigorous exercise makes us less vulnerable to the negative effects of stress. Proper diet too assists in this.

• It is important that we have time to rest and relax.

Relaxation deactivates the sympathetic nervous system involved in increased stress levels and activates the parasympathetic system that decreases blood pressure, slows down heart beat and breathing rate and facilitates healing for the mind and body. Techniques such as yoga, meditation, deep abdominal breathing, visualization of serene environments, or even simply sitting or lying restfully with eyes closed thinking of nothing in particular activate the body’s relaxation response.

• Creative and meaningful relationships serve as sources of energy mobilization and provide opportunities for healthy relaxation.

4. Self-Transformation
This is accomplished especially by cognitive restructuring and changing our self-concept, the way we see ourselves, our environment, and conduct ourselves.
• We can bring about self-transformation through cognitive restructuring, that is, changing our perceptions and thought patterns. Changing our perceptions and interpretations, for example, of threatening situations or obstacles we face can help us both to find relief from stress as well as prevent stress.

• According to psychologist Richard Lazarus, simply changing the way we see events—as outside our control or within our control—may be the biggest factor in staying on top of stress. Believing we have control over events in our life has great leverage in management of stress. According to Lazarus, control is tantamount to health and lack of control is source of distress and disease. Even when we can’t control an event or situation, we can control our reaction to it. We can change our perception about it, and how we think about it.

• It is not only our perceptions of reality that we can change. It is possible sometimes to change the reality, or the stressor itself. It is true the real world is not always what we would want it to be. However, there are situations where we can change the reality. For example, our stress may be coming from an overcrowded day. We can eliminate or at least reduce the stress by creating lighter work schedules. Prioritising and delegating are two important ways to reduce work stress.

• How we appraise events (stressors) is influenced by our self-concept, how we see ourselves. Building a positive sense of self, strengthening our belief in ourselves and our capacity to be in control and achieve desired results can reduce our vulnerability to stress.

• There is less chance of being stressed out when our everyday work and activities are consistent with what we value and which provide meaning, purpose and satisfaction. It is not hard work that leads to burnout, but meaninglessness in what we do. There has to be a fit between our interests and the work we do. It is important to engage in work that suits us best, work that we find meaningful and fulfilling.

Importantly, the environment in which we work has to be one that is conducive to a sense of satisfaction and fulfilment. If the environment is not such, then we have to do the transformative work to change it. If we cannot change it, we may have to move into another more conducive environment.

• Living ethically, making our private lives congruent with the values we espouse publicly, and pursuing goals consistent with those values, also reduces the stress that results from guilt and fear of exposure. Behaviour that is at cross-purposes with our values and ideals cannot help but increase our stress level.

• Learning to live in peace with those who inhabit our relational world is also important. There are many interpersonal conflicts (major stressors) that we can easily avoid with a little effort. “Such an approach” psychologist Hans Selye, a father-figure in stress research, observed, “not only insures peace of mind but also earns the goodwill, respect, and even love of our neighbours, the highest degree of security and the most noble status symbol to which the human being can aspire.”

For reflection.

• Which of the stress-busters described here are ones you have tried and found helpful?

• Which others would you like to make part of your stress-busting programme?

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Fr Jose Parappully SDB

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