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Have you watched the movie Tuesday with Morrie, or read the bestselling book on which it is based? In it, a retired professor—Professor Morris Schwartz, “Morrie” to his friends—who knows he is going to die meets with a former student to talk about issues that matter—love, family, forgiveness, life, death, … One of the first things Morrie tells the young Mitch is: “When you know how to die, you know how to live.” “Are you going to talk about dying?” Mitch asks him. Morrie: “No! About living!”

Mitch would later write of these encounters as his professor’s last class. In it, he learnt surprising and precious lessons: “I am lucky,” Morrie says one day. “Lucky?” “Ya, I get time to say my goodbyes. Many people do not get that time.”

Another day, Morrie mentions one of his great regrets—having kept anger in his heart, and not having forgiven a friend. “What a waste!” he exclaimed. “Mitch, forgive everybody everything!”

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Fr Joe Mannath SDB

This young woman was transformed by the way her sister faced death from cancer.

Not everyone is born a saint. We are not perfect. We desire fame, money and everything that can make us successful in the eyes of the world. We don’t desire death. We programme our mind in such a way that we shut out whatever we fear or don’t want to face or accept. And, when nothing ill-fated happens or when luck is on our side, we try to prolong our happiness and shun all pain, especially the possibility of having to face death. Only a few get the chance or the opportunity to face the reality of death. This comes in the form of sickness, accident and other unfortunate events which have a lasting impact on our lives.

If our life goes too smoothly, we carry on as if we will never die. We would never let the thought of death show its ugly head.  However, when we encounter a life-changing experience, it teaches us to face the reality of death.

That was what happened to me and my family….

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Elena Kharkongor

My name is Jonali. I was born on a cold February morning in Shillong a month and a half ahead of time. Sadly, my twin brother did not survive. However, I made it through the winter in the warm and loving arms of my parents. Growing up, I was a very quiet and shy girl who liked to observe my surroundings. I loved books and found refuge in them. My sister has been an avid reader and I guess I got into the habit of reading just by being with her. My mom is a stay at home mom by choice and we would lovingly tease and call her ‘The Kitchen Lecturer’ – someone who screams from the kitchen. My dad is the best dad ever (and I am dead serious). He is persistent, creative and such a positive influence in my life. We grew up poor, but we also grew up happy. My mom and dad always inspired me to do more, achieve more and taught me to never give up.

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Jonali Patgiri

It was a hostel meant for poor students managed by a religious congregation.  Mr Andrew, the hostel warden, came with a list of complaints against Arun, one of the newly admitted boys and suggested to the director that Arun be sent away for the good of all the others.  The superior told the warden, “Mr Andrew, this is a hostel meant for poor boys.  Arun is from a poor family and he has no mother.  His father is a drunkard.  If we send him away now, he may end up as a social misfit.  Let us be patient with him.  After all, this hostel is meant for such boys.”

The superior of that hostel had a clear understanding of the mission of that hostel.  Here, by “mission,” we are not referring to missionary work, or the act of preaching the Gospel.  By mission we mean “the task one is entrusted with,” “the assignment/apostolate given to an individual or community.”

In the last article we spoke about “vision.”  We described “vision” as the ideal that we want to reach.  Vision is the ultimate goal to be realized in the future.  Vision is future-oriented.

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Fr Jose Kuttianimattathil SDB

We, at MAGNET, invited open feedback about religious from lay women and men, in these words:

“Thousands of schools and colleges—from top-rated institutions in cities to those catering to the poorest in the villages—are run by religious. So, too, hospitals and health centres of all types. And centres for street children, homes for the destitute aged, leprosaria, orphanages, media houses, retreat houses, shelters for the homeless, legal aid centres, …

As a lay person, you will probably be familiar with one or a few activities of religious. We would like to know your impressions of Catholic religious (women and men) and your expectations from them. “

Here is a frank and well-thought out feedback from a professional familiar with members of religious orders.

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Conrad Saldanha

Essential Services Maintenance Act (ESMA) of 1968 is a law with special reference to this lockdown period

Imposition of ESMA:

“The Covid-19 outbreak has breathed life into antiquated laws,” says The Economic Times of 21 March 2020.  In April 2020, the Uttar Pradesh Government decided to put on hold the increase of the Dearness Allowance (DA) for its sixteen lakh employees which was due from January 1, 2020.  The government decided not to pay DA instalments which will be due from July 1, 2020 and January 1, 2021.  Further, it imposed ‘The Essential Services Maintenance Act, 1968’ (ESMA) and prohibited strikes in workplace for the next six months.  Similarly, the Andhra Pradesh Government imposed ESMA on health and medical services for a period of six months from April 2020.  The Madhya Pradesh Government invoked it on 3 April 2020 across the state as a measure to prevent any strike by essential services delivery system, including the medical and health services.  Therefore, it is high time we learnt the provisions of ESMA, especially during this pandemic period.

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Fr Ravi Sagar SJ

Moments before sending this to the Magnet, I happened to see two or three news items in ‘Matters India’, a news service run by a veteran journalist and a dear friend, Jose Kavi. They speak about the arrest of a veteran Jesuit social activist, who has spent much of his life working for the rights of tribal people in north India. We will come back to him later. This article is about someone else.

It was amazing to learn that a person who was just forty-eight years old could touch the lives of so many thousands of people. When Trepan Singh Chauhan passed away on 13 August 2020, every newspaper and media organization in the State of Uttarakhand carried the news. Hundreds of people poured out their grief on social media.

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Fr M A Joe Antony SJ

We are currently living through perhaps the worst crisis the global community has faced in the last one hundred years since the Spanish flu of 1918. COVID-19 has disrupted life on a massive scale.

Recently, in a talk to faculty and students, Fr Stephen Mavely, Vice Chancellor of Assam Don Bosco University, made a comment which later became the central point of his address at the University Convocation. He described this as time of “churning.” He presented the following characteristics of this churning: a challenging time, a disconcerting time, a revealing time, a disturbing time, an unsettling time. The talk inspired me to reflect further on this “churning.” I characterize this time with three phrases: a time of unsettling disruption, a transformative time and a time for community and compassion.

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FR JOSE PARAPPULLY SDB

Introduction:

Fratelli Tutti, Pope Francis’ third Encyclical Letter on the theme of Fraternity and Social Friendship, was published on October 4, 2020 (feast of Saint Francis of Assisi). The title is an expression of this saint, who used these words to “address his brothers and sisters and proposed to them a way of life marked by the flavour of the Gospel.”

The Holy Father describes it as a “Social Encyclical,” since it draws inspiration from the Document on Human Fraternity that he had signed with the Grand Imam of Al Azhar, Egypt, during his Apostolic Trip to the United Arab Emirates on February 3, 2019.

The encyclical addresses not only Catholics but all humanity, so that brotherhood and social friendship prevail and help the human family to live in a more dignified way, to build a world where rights are respected, every person is worthily welcomed, everyone can enjoy the same rights and have the same duties and where we can work together to promote social cohesion. These are all objectives that bring us closer to each other, as a human family, for the concrete good of all.

In the background of the Encyclical is the COVID-19 pandemic which, the Pope reveals, “unexpectedly erupted, exposing our false securities” as he was writing this letter. The letter is also marked by a sadness and even indignation at the scores of people who have died during the pandemic for want of better distribution of health care resources.

“If only this may prove not to be just another tragedy of history from which we learned nothing,” the pontiff writes. “If only we might rediscover once for all that we need one another,” he continues. “God willing, after all this, we will think no longer in terms of ‘them’ and ‘those,’ but only ‘us’.”

The encyclical is quite long: Over more than 43,000 words in 287 numbered paragraphs; 288 footnotes. It consists of a general introduction and eight chapters. Here is a short summary, chapter by chapter.

1. Dark clouds over closed world

The first chapter reflects on the many distortions of the contemporary era. “Globalized society makes us neighbours, but it does not make us brothers and sisters.” The dark clouds over a closed world are observed in the despair and discouragement that are widespread in society, in the polarization that impedes dialogue and living together, persons are easily sacrificed and discarded; there is inequality of rights and new forms of slavery and moral deterioration and the weakening of spiritual values.

Great words, such as democracy, liberty, justice and unity are being manipulated. In the face of these challenges, Fratelli Tutti insists that “the road we must travel is that of closeness; it is the culture of encounter” that can bring people together. Despite these ‘dark clouds’ the Pope invites us to be hopeful. Hope can look beyond personal inconvenience and opens us up to grand ideals that make life more beautiful and worthwhile.

2. A Stranger on the road

The second chapter is a detailed reflection on the Gospel story of the Good Samaritan—a true example in building fraternity and social friendship. The text explains an unhealthy society as one that turns its back on suffering and is “illiterate” in caring for the frail and vulnerable. In the face of so much pain and suffering, our only path is to imitate the Good Samaritan—to become neighbours to others, overcoming prejudices, personal interests, historic and cultural barriers. Love shatters chains and breaks walls. “We were made for love,” the Pope writes. Further, Fratelli Tutti summons us to be actively involved in rehabilitating our wounded societies and reminds us that we all are co-responsible in creating a society that is able to include, integrate, and lift those who have fallen or are suffering.  We are exhorted to recognize Christ in the face of every excluded person.

Hence the question, “Will you pass by on the other side, or will you stop to help those wounded on the roadside?”

3. Envisaging and engendering an open world

In this chapter, the Pope calls for an alternative way of thinking. We can rise to the

challenge of envisaging a new humanity. We can aspire to a world that provides land, housing and work for all. This is the true path of peace, built on love, not fear. We are  exhorted to go outside the self to find a fuller existence in another and tend toward “universal fulfilment.” Promoting the good means promoting values that advance integral Human development by thinking and acting in terms of community, by combating the structural causes of poverty and inequality, by requiring the state to be present and active and to invest in assistance to the vulnerable, by ensuring that no one is excluded, by establishing a real and lasting peace based on a global ethic of solidarity and service. Love can create or build open societies that integrate everyone. A love capable of transcending borders is the basis of “social friendship.”

4. A heart open to the whole world

The fourth chapter is dedicated to the theme of migration. The Pope makes a passionate invitation to all societies to welcome, protect, support and integrate the migrants whose life is “at stake,” fleeing from war, persecution, natural catastrophes, unscrupulous trafficking, ripped from their communities of origin. Our urgent mission in this is:

• Welcoming, protecting and integrating migrants and others on the margins;
• Becoming aware that either we are all saved together, or no one is saved;
• Forging a global juridical, political and economic order;
• Doing something good without expecting any personal gain or reward;
• Opening our minds and hearts to understand others different from us.

What is needed above all is global governance, an international collaboration for migration which implements long-term planning, going beyond single emergencies, on behalf of the supportive development of all peoples based on the principle of gratuitousness. In this way, countries will be able to think as “human family.” We can be open to our neighbours within a family nation by opening our minds and hearts to those who are different. In the universal communion, each human group discovers its beauty.

5. A better kind of politics

The fifth chapter presents one of the most valuable forms of charity because it is placed at the service of the common good. Besides promoting the common good,  a better kind of politics does not seek merely to gain votes. It serves as a channel for personal growth, promotes an economy that favours productive diversity and business creativity and is capable of a new, integral and interdisciplinary dialogue. A better politics is also one that protects work, an “essential dimension of social life”, and seeks to ensure everyone the opportunity to develop their own abilities. In this perspective, Fratelli Tutti calls for a social and political order whose passion is social charity. Social charity makes us effectively seek the good of all people, recognising all human beings as brothers and sisters, with no one excluded.

Pope Francis imagines societies that are more caring, focused on helping those in need and less swayed by market capitalism.

6. Dialogue and friendship in society

To dialogue means to approach, to speak, to listen and to look at; these lead to knowing and understanding one another and to finding common ground that favours friendship and love. From here emerges the concept of the “art of encounter” with everyone, even with the world’s peripheries and with original peoples, because “each of us can learn something from others, no one is useless, and no one is expendable.” The encyclical calls upon us to build a pluralistic society where dialogue finds a way. Such a society respects the dignity of others in all circumstances, it integrates differences—guaranteeing a genuine and lasting peace; and it recognizes other people’s rights to be themselves, maintaining an atmosphere of friendliness.

Three attitudes or actions that do not favour dialogue:

• Any aggression we may manifest, for example, on social networks;;
• Monologues that do not listen to others;
• The quick and humiliating discrediting of others.

True dialogue, indeed, is what allows one to respect the point of view of others. A kind person, writes Pope Francis, creates a healthy co-existence and opens paths in places whereas exasperation burns bridges.

7. Paths of renewed encounter

The value and promotion of peace is reflected on in the seventh chapter, “Paths of renewed encounter,” in which the Pope underlines that peace is connected to truth, justice and mercy. Everyone must feel “at home.” Peace-building is, therefore, “an open-ended endeavour, a never-ending task” and we have to take this path:

• In reconciliation;
• In common projects that do not deny each person’s individuality;
• In recognising, protecting and restoring the dignity of all persons;
• In option for the poor, the dispossessed and the discarded;
• In understanding and appreciating the meaning of forgiveness.

Given the present alarming scenario in the world, where COVID-19 has taken its toll and nations are engaging in different forms of war, the encyclical emphasizes the urgency of saying “Never again war!” and abolishing the death penalty. The pope says that nuclear, chemical and biological weapons, and new technological combat systems “have granted war an uncontrollable destructive power over great numbers of innocent civilians.” Hence war is a failure of politics and of humanity, a shameful capitulation, a stinging defeat before the forces of evil. How great a global fund to eliminate hunger could have been established with the money invested in weapons!

8. Religions at the service of fraternity in our world

In the eighth and final chapter, the Pontiff focuses on “Religions at the service of fraternity in our world.” He emphasizes that only with the awareness that we are all children of God can we live in peace with one another. The different religions contribute significantly to building fraternity. Seeking God helps us recognize one another as travelling companions, truly brothers and sisters, while the denial of religious freedom and freedom of conscience leaves humanity impoverished. The church is a home with open doors because she is a mother; she builds bridges, she breaks down walls, she sows seeds of reconciliation.

The encyclical reflects, in particular, on the role of the church: she does not “restrict her mission to the private sphere,” it states. While not engaging in politics, she does not, however, renounce the political dimension of life itself, attention to the common good, and concern for integral human development, according to evangelical principals.

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SR THERESA PHAWA FMA

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Here are the salient points of the new Foreign Contribution (Regulation) Act 2020, passed by the Ministry of Law and Justice, Government of India, on 28 September 2020. It amends the previous Act of 2010.

1. General Guidelines

According to the FCRA laws 2010 and Rules 2011, the FCRA registration certificate has to be renewed once every five years. The renewal application should be made six months before the expiry of the existing registration. The FCRA registration certificate will lapse if the renewal is not done in time. This means that after the period of validity of the certificate the association will not be able to receive foreign contributions.

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Fr Trevor D’Souza FCA