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Allow me to use two quotes from my book, A Radical Love. They are words I heard from two knowledgeable and sincere “outsiders.”

One of the senior-most doctors at CMC Hospital, Vellore: “We would like to learn from Catholic priests and religious your dedication.” This experienced medical professional had come across extremely dedicated Catholic priests and religious.

An educated and very friendly Hindu lady, talking to Catholic friends: “I have come to know a number of Catholic priests and sisters rather well. I am not impressed by most. Before being members of special groups, you are human beings, like the rest of us, with all our weaknesses. If you have found ways of overcoming the human weaknesses we all face—greed, jealousy, anger, egoism—then, you have something to teach us. Otherwise, why should anyone come to you to learn?”

Joining a special group—a religious order, or the IAS, or an elite unit in the army, or a gym—is for a simple reason: to do more competently and more professionally what everyone is called to.

Speaking as an “insider” to other insiders, we will know our strengths and weaknesses even more clearly. We will be familiar with the saints, heroes, mediocrities and unsavoury characters among us.

All professional groups have heroes, mediocrities and utterly disappointing members. All groups officially claiming higher motivation and commitment to service have done inspiring, relevant, courageous service—and also disappointed.

When we discuss urgent priorities—whether in a family or one religious house or a whole religious order—opinions differ. That is why we have house assemblies, provincial chapters, general chapters, etc.—to listen to one another and to those for whom we work, to pray and discern God’s plans, and to choose the best options, rather than go for what is merely easy or the whim of a few.

Having met many religious of all ages and positions, and after listening to a good number in the intimacy of spiritual direction (where people reveal their deepest experiences and most painful problems, which do not come out in community discussions and WhatsApp messages), I see the following as our topmost priorities. I do not claim that this is the best list possible. It is more than likely that equally well-informed and sincere religious may tick off priorities differently.

Fr Joe Mannath SDB

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Around 2003 Johnnie Walker produced a short video to promote their whisky. It showed a school of fish moving in the same direction. The fish took a human form, and while swimming close to the surface, they started jumping out of the water. It was then that one of them, coming closer to shore, put his feet on the seabed, stood erect out of the sea and started walking. The caption of the video then read, “Take the first step. Keep walking.”

Tuesday, December 2, 2014

I had just inserted the key in the office door when I heard the phone ringing. It was 8.30 am. Since Monday was my day off, on Tuesdays I am usually welcomed with a lot of small papers pushed underneath the door by the inmates. I thought it was too early for the phone; so I did not answer it. While I was collecting all these bits of papers and skimming through the various requests, the phone rang again. This time I answered.

“Carmel, you’re the one that I want.” I recognized Deputy White’s voice. “Can you come to my booth as soon as possible, please?”

I left the papers on the desk, made sure that the door was locked behind me and walked down the hallway. That morning, Deputy White was working in the school dorm called “5550.” I knocked on the door and he buzzed me in the deputies’ booth—a small dark elevated room with a panel full of buttons which controlled everything which happened in the dormitory from opening and closing doors to putting on and off the lights. The whole room was surrounded by a thick dark glass window, thus, the deputies had a 270º view ranging from the open bathroom and showers, to the sleeping bunks and the recreation area where the TV was.  The deputies always kept the lights of their booth off so that the inmates could not see through the windows.

Bro Carmel Duca MC

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It was a usual Sunday morning. As I was getting ready to leave for Baghar, a slum in Howrah, where I have been spending the Sundays for the past several years, a phone call came from the coordinator of the projects there, asking me not to come as a tragedy had struck the place during the night before. Taken aback, I asked her for details. She told me that two young boys had got drowned in the pond in the middle of the slum while the  immersion of an idol was taking  place,  and that the whole community was in mourning. I expressed my shock at this tragic news and I told her that I would be coming shortly.

Pall of Gloom

Baghar is the garbage dumping ground of the Howrah Municipal Corporation. Every day. hundreds of trucks carrying waste materials collected from the corporation area dump them here. Several mountains of garbage dot the place. Some three hundred families, mostly migrants from Bihar, live around this dumping ground, eking out an  existence by collecting recyclable materials from  the garbage and selling them. The whole place reeks with slime and dirt and unbearable stench, and smoke envelopes the region. People live in highly unhygienic conditions under plastic sheets and in dilapidated huts. Children suffer from malnutrition and from sicknesses associated with unhygienic living conditions.

Eight years ago, the Don Bosco Development Society, the social work wing of the Salesians of Don Bosco in Kolkata, launched a programme in Baghar with a view to weaning  away the children and youth from collecting waste materials and putting them on to the path of  education and skill training.  A number of projects were launched—nutrition programme for babies, health camps, medical help, educational support, computer classes, drinking water supply, making of community toilets, low cost housing and educational tours. Over a period of time, these projects began to bear fruit. They made tangible changes in the slum, especially in the increased admission in schools and decreased school dropouts.

Fr Mathew George SDB

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St Joseph Cafasso, considered a model priest, lived in the city of Turin, Italy, in the 19^th century. He was given the nickname “the Priest of the Gallows” for his pastoral care of criminals, especially those condemned to death. He stood by their side as they were lead to the execution.

After his ordination, he went to Turin to attend one of the post-graduate courses at the Convitto Ecclesiastico (a resident institute for priests). He was then asked to teach there, and proved to be a brilliant lecturer.  He aimed at making the young priests not only learned but saintly men and efficient ministers of the Gospel.

Fr Cafasso spent long hours in the confessional. His fame for learning and sanctity attracted great numbers of penitents there. Besides teaching, he found time for other forms of apostolate, the chief of which were teaching catechism to poor children, visiting the sick and the various prisons of the city.

Visiting the Prisoners

The prisons during Fr Cafasso’s time were gloomy places infested with vermin. The prisoners were free to communicate with each other and the worst of them had the greatest influence in the prison. It was among these outcasts of society that Fr Cafasso spent most of his free time. He visited each prison at least once a week, and some of them once a day. He returned home each night bringing with him the vermin of the prison, which he jokingly called “living silver and moving riches.”

Fr Leon Cruz SDB

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An extraordinary man’s remarkable life came to an end the day after Christmas last year. It generated an outpouring of sorrow and tributes from all over the world. The people of South Africa, who lovingly called him ‘the Arch,’ felt devastated.  Thanks to a rare blend of qualities and gifts—a sharp intellect, a refreshing sense of humour, an infectious laughter, a ready wit, boundless compassion and courage in the face of threats—Archbishop Desmond Tutu was a much-admired and much-loved figure for decades.

Desmond Mpilo Tutu was born in a poor Methodist family on 7 October 1931 in Transvaal, South Africa. Later they shifted to the Anglican Church. He grew up watching the horrible implications of the cruel, racist apartheid system in South Africa that gave all the political power to the minority whites and discriminated against the blacks, who were the majority. In a system that rigidly segregated the citizens on the basis of their skin colour, the blacks had no right to vote.

After his high school, Tutu dreamed of becoming a doctor and managed to get admission in a medical college, but his parents could not afford the expensive fees. He courted Nomalizo Leah, a friend of his sister. Leah happened to be a Catholic and Tutu agreed to a Catholic wedding ceremony, after having their marriage registered. They both became teachers, but when the racist government, in a blatant attempt to promote inequality, passed the Bantu Education Act, which deliberately lowered the standards of education for black South Africans, they quit teaching. Tutu took to learning theology and was ordained an Anglican priest in 1961. Next year he went to England to earn a master’s degree in theology and returned to South Africa in 1967.

Not Revenge, but Reconciliation

Tutu spent some time in East Jerusalem, learning Arabic and Greek. He taught theology in South Africa for five years and then went again to England to be the vice-director of the Theological Education Fund of the World Council of Churches. When he returned to South Africa in 1975, he was appointed the Dean of St. Mary’s Cathedral in Johannesburg, then the Bishop of Lesotho in 1976 and the Bishop of Johannesburg in 1985. The very next year he became the first black person to hold the highest position in the South African Anglican Church—the Archbishop of Cape Town. He was named the president of the All Africa Conference of Churches in 1987—a position he held until 1997.

Fr M A Joe Antony SJ

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“Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, before you were born, I set you apart; … I appointed you as a prophet to the nations.” These words from the book of Jeremiah (1:5) are apt for my life and vocation.

I am the second child in the family. I have an older brother and a younger sister. Ours is a lower middleclass family in a remote village in Mangalore. Our house is surrounded by thick forest, full of greenery. Very beautiful place. We have a close-knit bond with our parish. My parents, very pious people, instilled in us love for God and our neighbours and the Kingdom values from our childhood. They provided us with an Old Testament story book and the Lives of the Saints. When we were small, mother used to read those books for us and we children and daddy sat near her and listened to her attentively. When we went to our maternal grandparents’ house, we heard moral and chivalrous stories. What joy it was to listen to them!

God called Abram when he was seventy-five year old, but He called me before I was formed in my mother’s womb. At the age of four my litany was: “I am going to become a Sister,” even though I could not even pronounce that word (sister). In any problem, big or small, mother used to ask me to pray. Believe it or not, my Beloved Jesus responded to me—most of the time immediately and sometimes a little later.

On my fourth birthday, my parents presented me with a pair of earrings. Even though in those days our financial condition was not so good, they gave me joy. I was so delighted with the new thing I ran hither and thither. In the evening my mother saw that one of my earrings was lost. She swept the whole house and even the yard. At last, my mother called out my pet name and asked me to pray. I earnestly asked Jesus to help me to find the ring.  i went out to the yard and I saw something shining near the well (which is in the yard). I called out to my mother, who came out immediately and was overjoyed to see the ring in my hand. So many people had passed that way and stamped upon it (as many of our neighbour come to fetch water from our well), but nobody had seen it or taken it. I thanked the Lord immediately.

Sr Lavina Anitha of the Holy Trinity AC

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“The one who follows the crowd will usually go no further than the crowd. The one who walks alone is likely to find oneself in places no one has ever been before,” stated Albert Einstein.

Every woman who walks with God has a story to tell us: Sarah will tell us, “Nothing is too hard for God.” Hagar will tell us, “Even in the wilderness, God is there.” Rahab will tell us, “God can use anything.” Hannah will tell us, “My God answers prayers.” Ruth will tell us, “It’s not over until God says so.” Esther will tell us, “God can turn a nobody into somebody.” Elizabeth will tell you, “You will give birth to greatness.” Our Blessed Mother will tell us, “It shall be done according to God’s word.” The woman with the issue of blood will tell us, “When all fails, God never fails.” Mary and Martha will tell us, “Dead things can live again.” Yes, these are the women through whom God made history.

A Call to Action

Year after year, humble, blessed, confident, courageous, intelligent, and determined women from all over the universe make big and great ‘success’ in various fields. They make the world proud with their sterling record of achievements. Every year on the 8th of March, International Women’s Day is celebrated across the globe. It’s a day to recognize female achievement and a call to action encouraging everyone to stand up for women’s rights and gender equality. The day is also used to recognize women who made significant contributions to the advancement of their gender.

Sr Lini Sheeja MSC

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Is it possible to wholly trust God with your future when your past is marred with pain?

I was not fortunate enough to be born in a Catholic family. I come from a staunch Hindu home. All through my life I kept searching for God.

Seeking and Finding

In Jeremiah 29:13, the Lord says, “If you search for me, you will find me, if you seek me with all your heart.” It was only when I reached first year of college, I casually went to the famous St Michael’s Church in Mumbai to attend a Novena to Our Lady of Perpetual Succour. At the end of that Novena, I had tears streaming down my face. It was as if I had met Mother Mary in person. As the prayer goes, “Lead us to Jesus, your loving Son.” it was Mary who led me closer and closer to her Son Jesus.

I was the only child of my parents. Usually when I say, “only child,” people assume I must have been very pampered. In my case, it was just the opposite. My childhood was filled with loneliness, depression and sadness. My parents were constantly busy making ends meet. I never experienced their love. My dad was a very strict man. Just one look from him was enough to bring tears to my eyes. I was so afraid of him. So, for nine long years it remained a secret between my Jesus and me.

In the year 1998, I went for my first retreat to Divine Retreat Centre in Kerala. Though still a Hindu at this retreat, I received the Baptism in the Holy Spirit. I was blessed with the gift of praying in tongues and also received the Spirit of boldness to face the world outside. I was no longer afraid of what my parents would do, but couldn’t imagine another day without Jesus.

Irma Raymond

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My Enemies & Blessings

One fine evening, as I was praying the psalm, “When evil men advance against me to devour my flesh, when my enemies and my foes attack me, they will stumble and fall” (Psalm 22: 12)”, I was struck by a question, “Who are my enemies?  I could not get any name or person’s face as my enemies.  I was surprised to hear the following as answer from within:  my fear, anxiety, worry, inferior feeling, hopelessness, guilt, anger, etc., are my enemies.  Against these negative feelings I was waging war, not knowing that I had only to surrender to the Lord in faith.

The greatest blessing in Religious Life is that I get ample opportunities to grow in self-awareness, self-knowledge and self-esteem.  A good number of persons—preachers, teachers and other enlightened persons—I came across, to whom I could open myself, my inner self, get help and be transformed.  Good books helped me, too. I have always experienced tremendous faith in the invisible, intuitive presence of God in my life.

In 2003, on January 26. Sunday (Republic Day), I was in one of the Communities in Eluru, Andhra Pradesh.  The young Sisters had gone to the villages for teaching Catechism and for Mass.  I had decided to visit a home for the mentally challenged children, run by the Missionaries of Charity (Mother Theresa’s Sisters), located in Vangaya Gudem in Eluru, just one and a half kilometre away from our convent.  My Superior had given me sixty Rupees for the auto fare. I decided to use that money to buy sweets for the children, and go there on foot. I had no companion to go with me.  Although it was daytime, walking alone in an unknown place scared me.  At that time, I could not speak or write the local language (Telugu).  Fear enveloped me.

Sr Nambi Kithari SAP

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What is a Budget?

Budget is nothing but making a plan to spend our money. It is drawing up a spending plan for the resources we have.  It allows us to determine in advance our future goal and the way to get there. In case we do not have sufficient money, it helps us to prioritize and spend on the more important items and avoid or postpone the others, so that we can have the money required for the envisaged financial goal. When we are faced with too     many items to spend on with our limited resources, then we need to separate the items based on what is basic and what is discretionary, and then prioritize among the basic needs. It helps us to focus on the things that we need and prioritize our spending accordingly. This will enable us to save money for our greater goals and in the light of it to spend only on our actual needs and not on all our wants. Thus, it is a blueprint of our financial planning. It is a roadmap or plan to achieve specific goals by managing our priorities and planning the use of money accordingly.

The starting point of a Budget

Making a budget always begins with the resources available to us. It is nothing but what we can count as our income. When we say ‘income,’ we mean what we can be sure of–regular salary, rental income, interest income, etc. Thus, the starting point for any budget is our actual income.

Two kinds of Budgets

Budgets can be of two types: (a) activity budget, and (b) goal-oriented budget.

Fr Alex Gnanapragasam SJ

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