Heart Speaks unto Heart

“A sacrifice to be real, must cost, must hurt and must empty ourselves. The fruit of silence is prayer, the fruit of prayer is faith, the fruit of faith is love, and fruit of love is service and fruit of service peace.” These words of Blessed Mother Teresa are true in the lives of many saints in the Catholic Church. Saints are not dropped from above but they were born, bread and nurtured here amongst the people. As we celebrate ‘All Saints’, let us thank God for the saints of God who have helped the Church with their unceasing love and service. Having said that, we also witness people in our lives that live a saintly life, a life full of service and love for others. As a priest, I am given a mission to be at the Service of the people of the parish, especially to care for the pastoral needs of the faithful. What is your mission?

“All Souls Feast” is celebrated in the Church on the 2 November. The theological basis for the feast is the doctrine that the souls which, on departing from the body, are not perfectly cleansed from venial sins, or have not fully atoned for past transgressions are debarred from the Beatific Vision and that the faithful on earth can help them by prayers, almsgiving and especially by the Sacrifice of the Mass. It is our duty to pray for the dead but most importantly, we also need to pray for ourselves in order to be cleansed by the Lord. Every often world pose us with challenge and temptations come hence, we might slide into iniquity. Cleansing must be done here and now. What do I like to be cleansed from?

Priesthood: A sweeter and a lighter yoke

This week, we the Clergy of the Diocese of Georgetown will be attending our annual Clergy Conference with the theme, ‘…and God saw that it was good.” As I ask your prayers for all the priests in the Diocese who are serving God’s Church in different corners of Guyana, I also request you to know other priests of the diocese. It has been a blessed time for me last three months in the parish.

Priesthood is not easy and not difficult but challenging. After vesting the newly ordained priest at the Ordination, Bishop goes on to say these words, “Take the yoke of the Lord, for His yoke is sweet and His burden light.” This is true in the life a priest, sometimes it is a heavy yoke, meaning to say, challenges in life a robust and enchanting, if one is not rooted in Christ, can easily fall into the trap of the enchanter. It is a yoke given by the Lord, so it has to be sweet and light. Through prayer and Lord’s assistance, a priest can make the yoke lighter and sweeter.

St. John Vianney in his catechism on the Priesthood says, “If I were to meet a priest and an angel, I should salute the priest before I saluted the angel. The latter is the friend of God; but the priest holds His place. St. Teresa kissed the ground where a priest had passed. When you see a priest, you should say, "There is he who made me a child of God, and opened Heaven to me by holy Baptism; he who purified me after I had sinned; who gives nourishment to my soul. " At the sight of a church tower, you may say, "What is there in that place?" "The Body of Our Lord. " "Why is He there?" "Because a priest has been there, and has said holy Mass. "

Ordaining me to the diaconate Archbishop of Southwark Peter Smith said, “you are ordained priest to yourself and the people of God, hence you have dual role.” I had to shed lot of my own inclinations, ideas, opinions, interests, family, friends, hobbies, manner of life, and so on for the sake of the flock that God has entrusted me with. I would like to end with words of Blessed Mother Teresa, “A sacrifice to be real, must be real, must hurt and must empty oneself.”

My heart: a cradle for the Infant Jesus

Wright brothers, Orville and Wilbur had finally succeeded in getting their homemade airplane airborne on December 17, 1903. Ecstatic over their success, they sent a telegram from Kitty Hawk, NC to their sister in Dayton, Ohio saying, "First sustained flight today. Fifty-nine seconds. Hope to be home for Christmas."

Well, it seems sister was so thrilled by their success that she immediately took the telegram to the editor of the local Dayton, OH newspaper. The following morning edition found the Wright brothers' name splashed across the front page. The headline that day read, "Popular Local Bicycle Merchants Home for the Holidays." Quite obviously, the newspaper editor had missed the important point of the historic telegram.

Christmas is here yet again. As the name suggests its Christmas, it is about Christ and not about anything else. “God becoming man, or Maranatha” is the event that we celebrate with joy and jubilation. We have been preparing for Christmas both externally namely, cleaning the house, preparing Christmas culinary designs and internally namely, novena, confession, reading scripture, prayer and so on, which is a good thing to do and duly rewarding. But most important question one must ask is, why did I prepare? Or more specifically, for whom did I do all this?

It is crucial during this time we focus on God becoming Man, the mystery of the incarnation. God took initiative in the history of human salvation by sending His Only Begotten Son to be our redeemer. Let us make this as the key of all our preparations during Christmas because Christ must be our focus and not ourselves. In other words, it is to welcome Christ in our midst as Prophet Zephaniah says the King is in your midst and as John the Baptist says, He is mightier than I am. The king and mightier is in our midst, namely, in our lives, in our families and in our Church community. Let us keep Christ in the center of all our celebrations because it is Christmas, birth of our Lord. Let us sing happy birthday, sing lullaby, sing carols and most importantly let us make our hearts a cradle for the infant Jesus to laydown and rest.

I would like to wish everyone peace and joy of Christmas to you and your families both in Guyana and overseas. May this Christmas be a time of grace and blessings. I am grateful to God for each of you in this parish. May you always be surrounded by Christ’s joy and peace.

Who am I to judge?

“Who’s side are you leaning on? Leaning on the Lord’s side”, is the familiar action song in Guyana. We need someone to lean on, especially when we cannot keep our head erect. Who is that someone in our lives?

As we begin the Jubilee Year of Mercy, whom do I want to give myself to lean on? The official song for the Year of Mercy, which is composed by Fr. Eugenio Costa SJ, sings as a praise song by lyricizing the Merciful like the Father. It also sings about the Holy Trinity, who with wisdom created, saved and sustained the universe with a boundless mercy. This way mercy is an attribute of God, in other words mercy is an intrinsic quality to the nature of God. The experience of God’s people in the Scriptures is that God’s mercy cannot be exhausted. Hence, it is part of the basic disposition of God’s love towards people and it directs His actions ultimately in ways that benefit his people.

God’s mercy is displayed in the Ministry of Christ. God’s Mercy is shown to the people who are need of it through Christ. Christ is the Mercy personified. He simply worked out the mercy of God at the human level. This is clearly seen in His acts of healing and this way God was sympathetic with the people plight.

“Blessed are the merciful for they shall be shown mercy” (Mat 5:7). The more we are merciful, the more we receive mercy. As Pope Francis said as he opened the Holy Doors of Mercy, “We have to put mercy before judgement, and in every case God’s judgement will always be in the light of His Mercy.” “They know not what they are doing? Father forgive them” were the words of Jesus as he was surrendering His spirit, an ultimate paradigm of mercy and not judgement.

It is easy to judge someone else and say he/she is this and that, but it takes courage and liberty to show mercy to someone who is already been pained and hurt. We might also have experiences of being judged, labelled or victimised, let us not lose heart because our God is merciful and never let you down. When we lean on to Christ, we will hear those gentle words, “son/daughter you will be with me in paradise.”

Don't waste living someone else's life!

Dear young people, you are the present and the future face of the Church. Let your enthusiasm prevail all your life, even if burden of life is heavy. Let no one influence your creativity, both in the Church and elsewhere. You follow your conscience because your conscience will never let you down. Negativities of this world can shrink your dreams, hence, be around positive people or make friends with positive people and your life will be positive, because positive people help your dream come true. Don’t be shy or fearful to ask questions? It is by asking questions one becomes doubt-free and consequently, one can help others who ask same questions.

The Apple founder Steve Jobs encouraged the young people at the Stanford University with the following words, “Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life. Don't be trapped by dogma — which is living with the results of other people's thinking. Don't let the noise of others' opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.”

If you have a dream follow it, if you don’t have a dream, dream because dreams will help your destiny; your destiny will keep you focussed and eventually, you will reach the summits, which you never imagined. Failures in life must make us stronger and must help us to orient our vision towards success. If one dwells in failures, there will be no time to think about success. Don’t live someone else’s life; life of your parents, boyfriend, girlfriend, husband, wife, children, Church community, etc. rather live your own dream. If you are following someone else’s life, most certainly you will be someone else not yourself. Sometimes, we have to take in the pinch of salt, because you are the master of yourself. God has created you in His image and likeness, therefore, God wants your to uphold that image and likeness of Himself.