Fasting Convinces …

Ash Wednesday Reflection on Jonah 3: 1-10

It was a day of fasting at the city of Nineveh. After the miraculous save of Jonah through the belly of a fish, Jonah finally arrived in the city of his destination, Nineveh to proclaim the prophecy of God. At prophet Jonah’s call, the entire city from the king to the citizens to the animals joined the fast and put on sackcloth seeking repentance from God for their wicked deeds. The cry of Jonah, “Forty days more, and Nineveh shall be overthrown” put the city to test and gathered the political attention, for His Highness the King of Nineveh took the lead and made it a public policy in calling for a fast with his royal proclamation. The call for the fast included turning away from the evil ways and from the violence that is in their hands, besides putting on the sackcloth and ashes. The call for fast on that day put God in a fix to change God’s plan for the sake of the life for that city. From the clashes of conflicts, the city went into fasting and ashes, and out of ashes, the city came out into a splash of liberation and life. 

1. Fasting Challenged the Polis (5 V)

As Jonah proclaimed the prophecy of God, the people of Nineveh believed God, and sought God’s help through a very democratic, political and spiritual way of fasting. This idea of fasting emerged from among the people of the city. The fast they proclaimed was communitarian and for the need of their city. Their fast was not for a selfish need or for an individuals need or for an exhibition of their piety. Their fast was a political necessity, for it challenged the whole of the city. As the fast was proclaimed, everyone in the city without any objections or reservations or concessions observed their fast by putting on their sackcloth and ashes. Great and small in the city, man and women in the city, child and adult in the city, the sinning and the sinned-against in the city, powerful and powerless in the city, irrespective of their lines of divisions and identities, the city came out to the open for a fast in support of their city. When the whole city got together to fast, both the sinned and the sinned against joining the fast meant repentance with regard to the sinned and an indication from the sinned-against that time is ripe for reconciliation. This fasting, which included everyone and in which no one was excluded, displayed the true spirit of fasting. It was this fast that challenged the city.

2. Fasting Challenged the Polity (6-9 Vs)

With the impending peril at hand, when a fast was proclaimed by the city, the royal power at the city, who represents the polity, furthered the fast. The fast for the city was a mandate that emerged from the people and for the people, and therefore His Royal Highness was challenged to endorse it and made it a public policy for the good of the city. The king with all his power consciousness could have easily downplayed and rejected the idea of fasting, for as kings they only know to feast and they cared least if the city would go into a doom. The king was challenged by this fasting, and therefore at the peoples call for fast, he had to rise from his royal throne, had to remove his royal robes and had to cover him with sackcloth and had to sit in ashes. The spirituality of this fast was such, that it demanded the powerful to give up their power costumes, attires, attitudes and masks, and calls for a wholesome solidarity with the powerless and weak symbolized through ashes, the waste product that comes after the consumption of energy. The fast for the city challenged the king to issue a public decree calling everyone in the city to restrain from food and feed and be in solidarity for the cause by putting on the sackcloth and ashes. The royal public decree calls everyone in the city to turn their evil practices, practices of discrimination and oppression and to turn away from violence that was in their hands. The king also felt, such a fasting that comes from the community may also challenge God.

3. Fasting Challenged the Prophecy (10V)

The king, who was challenged by the communitarian fasting, felt that even the prophecy from God could be challenged of such fasting by people attempted for a change in the city, and may change God’s plans for the sake of promoting life. As was foreseen, the fasting challenged the polity and eventually challenged the prophecy of God according to the writer of this book. The prophecy from prophet Jonah that ‘forty days from now, Nineveh shall be overthrown’ was challenged because the fasting was for the sake of community and not for an individual need. The prophecy was challenged for the barriers of power, for the powerful gave up their power and joined the common, and the community encouraged each other along with the creation to save their city. The prophecy was challenged that the residue ashes became the common binding and bonding symbol in the city, which reveals their deepest concern for righteousness. The prophecy was challenged for both the oppressors in the city and the oppressed in the city joined together to fast, where the oppressor sought repentance from God and the oppressed and oppressed could see justice being enforced in the land. This fasting challenged the prophecy of God, for it was political in nature, for the fast focused on ‘save the city’. This fasting was for the common good of the people and the community in the city, and it has shown the city’s belief in God and in their spiritual quest for God’s intervention. On all these counts, this fasting by the city of Nineveh challenged the prophecy of God and challenged God, for according to the understanding of the writer of the book of Jonah, the city did not perish as was willed by God earlier.

Fasting in the book of Jonah is the recognition of the fact that 

• God is concerned about unrighteousness as disastrous for creation. 
• God’s concern of impending danger as proclaimed by the prophet can bring people and powers together for common good, which directs the mission as lobbying. 
• The righteous could feel excluded in this process of reconciliation like Jonah, and such people need to include themselves in God’s act of reconciling all.

As churches, we are called to prophecy, reconcile and heal our situations of wickedness and bring in transformation to our localities and societies. The polis, the polity and the prophecy were thoroughly challenged by the fasting of the people in Nineveh that brought in a change within and around them. Out of clashes they went into ashes, and out of ashes they came out splashing life and change.

Implications for Today 

• In the season of Lent, is our fasting political and for a communitarian purpose? 
• In the context of the Campaign for climate justice, should not our fasting in this season sensitize our congregations and communities to be akin with the flora and fauna, address indiscriminate mining and save our splendid earth?
• In the context of the growing violence, oppression and discrimination done in the name of caste, gender, religion and region, should not our fasting in this season conscientize our communities to become peacemakers and bring in justice and liberation?

The Injustice of the Justice: Is the Wages of Sin Death?

On the Verdict of Supreme Court on Dara Singh’s Life Imprisonment

 A Plea on the eve of India's Republic 2011

On the 21^st January 2011, exactly twelve years after the Graham Staines and his two young boys Philip (10yrs) and Timothy (6yrs) were burnt alive in their Jeep by the ilk of Dara Singh and the other fundamentalists, the Supreme Court of India upheld the verdict of the Orissa High Court and granted life sentence instead of the death sentence granted by the lower court of law to Dara Singh. As they declared the judgement, Justice P.Sathasivam and Justice B.S. Chauhan, the honourable bench of jurists further commented that

“In the case on hand, though Graham Staines and his two minor sons were burnt to death while they were sleeping inside a station wagon at Manoharpur, the intention was to teach a lesson to Graham Staines about his religious activities, namely, converting poor tribals to Christianity… It is undisputed that there is no justification for interfering in someone’s belief by way of use of force, provocation, conversion, and incitement or upon a flawed premise that one religion is better than the other. It strikes at the very root of the orderly society, which the founding fathers of our Constitution dreamt of”.[1]

Forgiveness to what extent? Church leaders across the denominations welcomed the judgement of life sentence to the cruel killer Dara Singh, for they have all said that their theological persuasions teach them to forgive and not to kill anyone, for they believe that in the course of time, the guilty can turn good as there is power in the ideal of forgiveness. All the more some Churches have even gone to the extent of relating this curtailing of death penalty to opposing abortion in their theology, for they all affirm life and not killing or death of life.

My initial impulses on hearing about the judgement of the Supreme Court, is what a grave injustice the highest courts of law in the country have done for they have pitied with the guilty killer and cut down the punishment from death to life imprisonment. How can the Supreme Court spare a fundamentalist who is bloodthirsty and is all out to kill anyone on false prejudices? Death penalty for such crimes should have been pronounced by the highest court of law in India.

• Moral Victory for Fundamentalist Forces: Burning alive three people, which includes two children deserves a death penalty. Although one cannot bring back the lives of the three that were burnt by penalizing the murderer with death penalty, penalizing with a death penalty would have been a learning lesson for others not to indulge in heinous activities such as this. Now the fundamentalist forces think this verdict as a moral victory to them, for they think can take law into their hands and execute it at their leisure, for they know that it is their own colour of people that are there in the judiciary and legislature and a mere penalty would be imposed for such crimes of hate. 
• The Wages of sin is Death: Pronouncing death penalty is not a ‘tooth for tooth’ theology, for the perspective of Christian theology is grounded on forgiveness virtues. However, God does not take sides with those that commit crimes of death and simply leave them scot-free. For I think God, in whom we affirm and believe is a God who exercises justice, which I mean is to take them into task those that involve in injustice. By Christ’s victory over death, Christ has chained all the forces of evil and injustice to death in his grave and proclaimed new-life over against it. So I believe, people who are involved in acts of injustice are prone to death, be it pronounced in the court of law or in any other form. Christian theology surrounds around life and life affirming channels, subsequently meaning to reject and crucify all the forces of death. God is going to pronounce the judgement, where righteous will be blessed and the unjust will be punished. The wages of sin is indeed death, and no better act can be called a sin than the killing of three innocent people on the pretext of forceful conversions.
• No one can take law into their own hands: Assuming that there were forceful conversions (the Wadhwa Commission has clearly indicated that no incidence of forceful conversion took place in this particular incidence), the honourable jurists callous comments that ‘to teach lesson to Graham Staines’ was something unwarranted of a learned jury. To teach a lesson, if every one starts killing the others I think Indian society will be left with none except the killers, on the contrary Indian ethos are built on the values of tolerance and non-violence. Hope the Jury would take back their comments on this judgement. 
• Are the Dalit & Tribal Communities in India prone to forceful conversions? This verdict is against the Dalit & Tribal sentiments in India. For the jury has assumed that these communities do not have any brains in choosing their spirituality, and therefore are taking on them these external religions forcefully and for want of meeting some temporary needs. For the jury has projected Dara Singh as the messiah of Tribal communities from preventing them from the religious conversions, which is very unfortunate.

In the light of this discussion, I think the court of law needs to make a review on their verdict of upholding life sentence to Dara Singh instead of death penalty, if at the fabric of secularism is to be upheld. Staines and his two sons are the martyrs of secularism in India, and it’s high time that the unjust forces of fundamentalism and communalism need to be buried. Let no other Dara Singh spiral and arise in this our country of ours.

---

[1] http://www.deccanchronicle.com/dc-comment/conversion-factor-022 as used by Fr. Dominic Emmanuel in his opinion piece.

Anthem for the National Ecumenical Conference on Justice for Dalits 2010

We are the church, you are the One we search

We ‘re on the march, for you are our life’s approach

We bear the Cross and overcome our sins reproach 

We ‘re in your reign living the values in perch

Caste or Christ, make a choice now
one gives death and other lets live
to cast out caste, come let us vow
the spirit of our calling lets re-live

Divisions, discriminations and oppressions

Dominations, admonitions and suppressions

O Caste, how cruel are your descriptions

Found within and around our inscriptions

Let justice roll down like a river

cleansing away injustices forever

Let righteousness flow down to revere

cleaving up the divisions sever

Come out to celebrate inclusivity

Come back to life burying exclusivity

Cull out to fight darkness in all sincerity

Call out a fast for it’s a gain to liberty

NCCI- Commission on Dalits        

           

The Unheard Voices of Youth: Challenges to the Church Today

Our Year, Our Voice & Our Choice

On the 12^th August 2010, the United Nations launched International Year of Youth, calling the attention of the worldwide youth to raise their voices in all freedom and courage, and also calling the attention of global citizens to rise to the occasion of listening to the voices of the youth, whose voices have been either unheard, or neglected thus far. Approximately about 1.7 billion in the world are young people, and the world has more young people now than ever before. This directs to a phenomenal change in the demography of the world, and necessitates for the upsurge of the voices of youth be it in governance, community building or any other facet of life. The theme for this year proposed by UN is “Dialogue and Mutual Understanding” and the slogan for this year is “Our Year Our Voice”. Thanks to the efforts of NCCI-Commission on Youth for highlighting this year and for joining with other youth movements in raising our voices for a just world.

The youth speak the facts as truth without any adulterations to their voice, for they believe in the strength of truth. They are bold in calling, ‘a spade a spade’; for they don’t mince their words nor doctor their speeches according to their conveniences. Unfortunately, these voices are regarded as cacophonous, worthless and sometimes called immature, and are not heed to.

The Context
The recent suicides of young Dalit men and women due to the unbearable torture of discrimination on the basis of caste continue to be a reality of our times. Institutions of higher learning are not an exception, for such incidences have been happening unabatedly. Mr. Senthil Kumar, a research scholar in Physics at Hyderabad Central University committed suicide and Mr. Bal Mukundh, a final year student of MBBS in All India Institute of Medical Sciences committed suicide, due to caste discriminations highlight the plights of young people today. These young peoples’ voices were unheard, their cries for justice were unheard and their tryst for destiny had to come to an end abruptly. These young men’s road to death started with the day they joined their institutions, for the institutions of higher learning have become fertile crescents for caste perpetrations. The voices of the dominant continue to amplitude their power by suppressing the cries of the oppressed communities. They bring in the argument, as those that have ‘merit’ will be rewarded, and lets do away with the reservation systems. And students, who enter these educational institutions through reservations and quotas, undergo a hell lot of discrimination and humiliations. Where is the space for the voices of our young Dalits to speak out and articulate? Where is the space for dialogue and mutual understanding in situations like that of this? Is the society open enough to listen to the cries of the Dalit communities? Questions concerning this go on and on, but the fact of the matter is, in this year of our youth, are the voices of Dalit youth heard or muted?

Time has now come to listen to the voices of the youth from across our Churches and societies, and more certainly the voices of our Dalit young people, whose voices have been marginalized, for being Dalit and for being young. Jesus Christ as a young man, voiced out against the injustices done in his days, and has given space for those voices that were marginalized in the society to be heard. As a Church, we need to confess that not enough space was given to the voices of young people, for always their voice was sidelined under the guise that these voices are from inexperienced and so on.

Jesus' Silence
In Matthew 15: 21-28, we see a Canaanite woman, who cried to Jesus for healing her daughter who was demon possessed. Here is a voice of a woman, a Canaanite, and more over who had a daughter who was demon possessed. I assume that this woman would have been a young woman, who took all the courage to voice out the need of her daughter. At that very instant verse 23 says, ‘Jesus did not answer her a word’. Did Jesus become deaf at that point to listen to the voice of that woman? Was Jesus closed in making a conversation with a woman, who was from a different community? Was Jesus worried that his Jewish male identity would be maligned if he spoke to a woman in need? Was there not a space at Jesus for the voices that are in deep distress and pain? Jesus’ silence and his reluctance to answer to her voice probably would have pained that woman at that moment. Now enters the disciples, to add fuel to the fire and not just asked or requested Jesus, but were begging Jesus ‘to send her away, for she is crying after us.’(23b)

Disciples Grievance
The cry of that distressed woman was jarring to the ears of the disciples, was a disturbance to their following Jesus and the disciples were even prejudiced, thinking that the woman was crying after them. This act of the disciples is yet again to suppress the voice of that depressed woman. At the behest of the disciples, Jesus gives a political answer with some shades of theology and philosophy, telling that his jurisdiction is within the house of Israel and was destined for the lost sheep within that fold. By this answer, probably Jesus thought that this woman would leave that vicinity, for his intellectual propositions cannot be challenged. The woman did not give up, until her voice was heard, and in all desperation, probably in a louder tone, she knelt and asked Jesus to help her. Jesus now took the occasion to interpret his theological answer from a day-to-day affair and said how just it is to take the bread from the child and throw it to the dogs? Jesus probably again would have thought, with this kind of analogy, this woman would shut up and leave. 

Woman's Resilience
All the more the woman was more challenged and replied in all boldness to the analogy with yet another analogy, that ‘even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from the masters table.’ That day she made it a point to make her voice be heard at any cost with any kind of theology. Her strong voice for healing, her cry for justice and her tongues for liberation challenged a person like Jesus and brought in a change in him. No doubt the disciple would have been dumb at the response of Jesus when he said, ‘ O woman, great is your faith! Be it done for you as you desire.’ The woman’s voice was finally heard.

As Church we have most times been reluctant to listen to the voices of youth and voices for healing, and all the more like Jesus and the disciples, our adults and elders in the Churches have every reason to let down the voices of youth. This woman, challenged Jesus, challenged the disciples and I believe even the Church today for we need a change from within, where we can move from speaking and being a noisy church to a church where we allow the voices of youth and those in distress speak out, where we can move from preaching mode to listening mode, and where our Churches become the platforms for the varied and diverse voices of youth to be heard and attended to. The silence of Jesus, the grievance of disciples was challenged by the resilience of this woman, who spoke in all courage to voice out for her daughter’s need. The voices of youth are always kept in a mute mode, and let us give them a voice. Wake up Church to voice out the voices of young people in this year. Wishing you all an eventful International Year of Youth. Our Year, Our Voice and lets make it our choice.

Churches’as Hills of Help: A Quest for Ortho-praxis

Reflection on “I lift up my eyes to the hills. From where does my help come?”

Psalm 121: 1

 

Introduction

The recent James Cameroon’s blockbuster movie Avatar takes along the viewers to the hanging mountains and dreamscape of flora and fauna of planet Pandora.  Famous theologian Kwok Pui-lan in her review of the film titled  “Avatar: A Subversive Reading of the Bible?” she writes “in Avatar, planet Pandora is not only a land of milk and honey, but also has a large reserve of a precious metal unobtanium. The avatar of Jake is sent as a messenger to ask the natives to relocate so that the humans can mine the unobtanium. Jake learns the native ways, falls in love with one of them, and becomes so identified with the natives such that he helps them to fight against the colonizers. The movie invites us to look at the world from the point of the indigenous people—to see the beauty of their interconnected way of life and learn about their culture.”

Britain’s Vedanta Resources, the multinational bauxite mining company, has pitched its tent in Orissa, one of the eastern states of India. In August last year, the Supreme Court of India allowed Vedanta Resources to mine bauxite in the Niyamgiri Hills of Orissa. The mined bauxite would feed the company’s proposed $800-million alumina refinery in Kalahandi district and an aluminium smelter project, costing Rs.70 billion, in Jharsuguda districts of Orissa. This project is going to damage the livelihood, their daily bread and environment of more than 8000 Dongria Khond adivasi people. The Na’vi in the film Avatar and the Dongria Khond adivasis in India share several common issues for justice and peace.

The above two situations sets our given text in our context to ponder and delve upon. Psalms 120-134, which are popularly called as ‘songs of ascent’, where used as hymns that were sung by pilgrims as they gathered to Jerusalem during the appointed feasts for the whole of their nations. As the pilgrims journeyed to the elevated Jerusalem, their eyes were continuously upon the hills, for the hills were their solace and destiny to which they were journeying. The pilgrims anticipated for help, calling on the accompaniment of the divine, which the psalmist records in the first verse of the Psalm, and the assurance from the divine was recorded in the succeeding verses.

Taking cognizance of the realities of our adivasi people, our indigenous brothers and sisters and their struggles for daily bread, their ongoing campaigns to affirm self-dignity and their fight for justice, allow me to reflect the given verse from the perspective of the marginalized communities. The Dongria Khond peoples daily prayer is ‘we look up to the hills, from where will our help come?’ In a context, where the hills are broken down for profit, and where the forests are cut down for selfishness, from where will our help come from? 

1. Hills Represent Strength

For the indigenous people in Niyamgiri, Orissa and for several others like them else where in the world, hills are the symbolic representations of their life systems. For generations they have lived on the hills and their livelihood, their sentiments, their religion, their culture, their beliefs, their civilisation and their value systems all are interwoven with the hills. Their strength is their relationship with the hills; their stronghold is in their association with the hills, the fauna and the flora there on.  Life for the Dongria Khond people is their hills in Niyamgiri, and they cannot expect life with out their hills. ‘We look up to the hills, from where will our help come?’ continues to be the echo that’s heard from that hill, and help shall certainly come from the God of the hills. ‘A mighty fortress is our God…’ is the hope against hope with which these our people live and God of justice who cares for the displaced and the indigenous people shall come in rescue of them. Hills do not represent power, rather they are part of God’s creation and their strength lies in being a help to the others, be it in causing rains, be it in protecting the forests and be it in giving a livelihood to the people and nature.

2. Hills Replenishes Succor

The people will be forced to leave and will be displaced from their original inhabitations, they continuously look towards the hills, for they know out of the hills they see the sunshine and out of the hills their help will come from. The modern technology may blast the hill into pieces to dig out the mine, but the will of those on that hill is so strong, that no force on earth can disunite nor shatter them, for they affirm that their hills are their strength. Hills serve as healers for these our people; they give succor and comfort to the wounded and tired. The natural eco systems give them fresh air of healing, for there is interdependence of humans and creation, in its perfect balance. The LXX has the Greek work boetheia for ‘help’ in Ps 121: 1 and is used in Acts 27:17 as ‘supporting cables’, therefore the supporting help to hold together in all harmony comes from the hills, which is the belief and comfort to the people there. God of comfort, who succors God’s people through the presence of Holy Spirit, is the driving force for the people who are fighting against the mining industry.

3. Hills Reassures Solidarity

When the rights of the indigenous people are violated and violence against them is rampant, the hills unite people to stand for justice at any cost. The indigenous peoples’ lives are at risk, and they are in need of support and voice from across the globe for justice. Hills, which sees that the nature is in solidarity with the people there, and the people in solidarity with the nature for they both live in mutual harmony, establishes a strong bond of kith and kin among them. Therefore when one is in trouble the other comes in solidarity with the other. Thanks to all the social activists fighting for justice and thanks to the Church of England, who have withdrawn their investment support in this particular firm, for they are violating the human rights of the indigenous people in Orissa. God of justice, who has created the heavens and the earth, builds communities of peace and solidarity for the good of the creation. God holds together the creation and human who work hand in hand with each other. Solidarity comes from God, for God is the local inhabitant with the people on the hills, and we need to accompany the victims of injustice towards liberation and justice.

Conclusion

At a time, when huge structures of Churches are being built across the country competing with each other to build expensive structures, at a time when the orthodoxy of the Churches limits us to perform certain rituals within the four walls of the so called sanctuaries, at a time when Churches criticize among themselves on the basis of doctrines and dogmas, at a time, when we as Churches are struck with our orthodoxy, it is certainly a challenge to turn towards an ortho-praxis understanding of the Church. How practical are we as Churches? Does our existence as Churches have any meaning and relevance to the society in which we live? 

The Churches today needs to be like that of the hills, where the human beings, the flora and fauna and the entire creation live in mutual harmony with each other. The Church needs to give strength to those indigenous people for they look up to the hills of the Churches, which objectively needs to be the homes of justice. The Church is the place where succor and comfort is granted to those victims of human rights violations, and it is time that we as Church needs to rise up to the occasion of replenishing succor and tranquility to the communities around. When people look to the hills of the Churches, are we able to come in help to them? The Church is the place that reassures solidarity, for we need to journey with the marginalized and the oppressed towards their destined liberation. No matter what the identity of the people is, no matter what religious affirmations the people practice, if the struggle is for justice, Church needs to be in solidarity with them, even at the expense of their lives. People look up to the hills of the Churches for solidarity, from where will the help come?

These days, when the Lutheran World Federation in its General Assembly in July 2010 is discussing upon the theme, ‘give us today our daily bread’; if our Churches can be Bethlehems, the houses of breads, we can make our Churches more relevant for our times. As we join in the breaking of the bread, let us forget our orthodoxical Church traditions and affirmations and cling towards ortho-praxis, where we will be willing to be broken for the cause of our communities around, for only by being broken we can quench the hunger of many around. It is not the hill top Churches, that we are in need of, but the Churches, which serve, as hills of strength, succor and solidarity are the need of the hour. The will of the Churches should be the hills of help. Let us as Church wake up to see the grim realities around and lets commit ourselves to be in solidarity with the people of Dongria Khond in saving the hills of Niyamgiri in Orissa, and be a channel of liberation and justice. We may be distanced by space and time from Niyamgiri, but our sensitivity towards the indigenous people and their struggles needs to be taken into the cognizance of our Churches lives, for we need to garner support in favour of the people by expressing our total support to this cause of life and justice.

May God grant us God’s strength, succor and solidarity as we pledge to make our Churches the hills of help for people around who are fighting for their daily bread. Amen.

Voice of God Affirms Human Dignity to All

Our Year, Our Voice - International Youth Day

12th August 2010

Matthew 4: 1- 4

Key verse: “If you are the Son of God, command these stones to become loaves of bread.” But Jesus answered, “It is written, one does not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.” 3-4 V

The tempters direction to the hungry young Jesus, who was in fast for forty days and forty nights, is a challenge for Jesus.  Jesus who turned water into wine, with all his powers at this point would have easily turned the stones into loaves of bread to satisfy his deep physical hunger. In Jesus as human, his divinity was put to test, but Jesus though is divine affirmed his human dignity and countered back at the tempter accordingly.  For the tempter, the physical hunger was not important; rather a miracle to turn stones into loaves of bread was of high regard.

In our times today, to the hungry, to the weak and to those in poverty, most times the tempters of today the rich and the powerful show forth stones like situations and asks the poor to work on those stones until they are made as bread. The tempters of today crib and complain, because the poor are lazy they are not willing to turn stones into bread, because they are technically not sound enough they are unable to turn stones into bread, because they are not meritorious and always fight for reservations they are unable to turn stones into bread. Such complains go against the human worth and dignity of these our friends. On the contrary the tempters enjoy life and privileges at the expense of the vulnerable poor and hungry people. Those people who toil day and night are paid meager wages, but the huge bulk of profits go into the hands of the rich, for they have capital and power. The tempters of today are hard task masters, for they do not want any stone unturned in making profit for themselves, even though it costs human dignity to those poor workers.

Jesus, therefore affirms his self-dignity and counters the tempter by not performing any miracle, rather quotes the Scripture, the voice, where he says that it is not bread alone that will quench the hunger, but the voice of God, which is the word of justice, equality and dignity that keeps life going. Word of God shows right direction to earn bread through right means and right modes. Word of God counters the rich who make profit by easy means and by exploiting the weak and the poor. Word from the mouth of God, which is in hunger when lots of people go with hungry mouths, affirms human dignity and provides means and methods in addressing hunger. Word of God is life giving and hunger satisfying.

Prayer: God, who has sent the Word to become flesh in order to know the hungry, help us to be prudent in affirming dignity in all people and help us to voice against all tempters, who exploit the weak and the poor of our times today. Amen.

Our Mother Earth Bleeds…

(An offering on the eve of the 35th anniversary of coining the term 'global warming'. It was on 8th August 1975, Wally Broecker for the first time used this term in a scientific journal. )


Bombs on civilians were thrown in Hiroshama,

Making many innocent fight against comma,

Tombs have resulted for those in trauma,

For death spread around its stinking aroma.

Let there be peace in land filled with violence,

Make our faith to take cognizance

Of conflicts around, using our lives lens,

Seeking forgiveness for our deep silence.

Temperatures of our earth are rising,

Apertures covering the earth are widening,

Creatures on the earth are vanishing,

Raptures within the earth are deafening,

Departures from the earth are increasing,

Signature the earth to save her from shrinking.

Our life giving earth’s womb is soon turning to be a tomb

 Plumb and do not succumb to it. Save our earth

Our mother earth bleeds because of our greeds,

she ‘ll be pleased if we can take care of her seeds/needs

Is peace and justice still a reality?

Oh sure, only when we give up our cruelty,

Fighting together justly with out any partiality,

Affirming equality and sharing in commonality.

Peace is not only absence of war,

It is not when people are afar,

It is when we are one at this hour,

When self is gone, peace remains forever.