Capax dei

We know a missing element in our hearts, may be formed in different ways although our lives. This emptiness is a yearning for grace, one way or the other shapes the very uniqueness of a person. This Capax Dei is a spiritual longing in our being.

In Mary, the capacity for God blossomed into the most beautiful flower. She received in her the Son of God. She is also the living testament, that the capacity for God prepares generations to form grace structures to fill us with grace. About her conception, our faith defines, Mary, from the moment of conception, by a singular grace and privilege of Almighty God, and in view of the merits of Jesus Christ, Savior of the human race, preserved free from all stain of original sin. If we see it as a divine magic of one moment we have less reason to rejoice. Of course, what happened in Mary is a divine grace, but it also signifies a completion of that inherent receptivity, perhaps as a culmination of grace-structures formed through many generations, culminating in Mary utterly open to the Divine.  These generations, persons showed their truthfulness and openness to receive grace to fill their yearning, being healed of wounds that sins would originate in them and breed.

Mary has a face, a blueprint for humanity’s ongoing transformation. Her "fullness of grace" is not a static, unreachable ideal, but an active invitation. Mary’s Capax Dei radiates a boundless compassion that shows the Divine love she so perfectly contained. Each generation, holds the potential to build upon this sacred lineage, to cultivate anew this capacity for God. It is in acts of empathy, in selfless giving, in the fearless embrace of the marginalised, that the ‘Capax Dei’ of a generation truly expands. Her birth, then, is a constant spring of hope, reminding us that the human spirit, imbued with its sacred capacity, can continuously transform itself, mirroring her grace, extending her charity, and thereby becoming, in every living moment, a fresh epiphany of God’s presence on Earth.

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Blessedness

Being poor and hungry, suffering and mourning were not signs of divine blessing, but signs of a curse according to many beliefs. Even now many prefer to believe so. But to these, Jesus attaches the blessedness of God’s kingdom. There is a freedom to trust because he taught about God to be our Father. The Gospel sets people to feed, console, stand for justice, and ensure resources for the feeble. The hungry being satisfied, those who weep being consoled and so on, are the signs of liberation the Gospel brings. These are the marks of Christ humanity can bear on their lives; the beauty or the glory revealed in us with Christ’s Glory. The blessedness is a gift and a responsibility which reflects the opening words of Gospel announcement “… he has sent me to proclaim good news to the poor, liberty to captives, to open the eyes of the blind…”  These acts of grace make a renewal in us in the image of the creator. See around, see within - he is everything and he is in everything. There are no differences, domination and divisions, no one is higher or lower, outsider or one’s own, nothing is strange or hostile … only Christ. The things of above, for Jesus, were not super-transcendental high ideals, instead they were breaking one’s separating boundaries and extending oneself to others in love in the freedom of the gospel.  Live the beatitudes in the freedom of the gospel, see the beauty of Christ being revealed in us, and in the church.

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Beyond Vengeance: Embracing Life for All

When prophets called for repentance, a self-critique for renewal, they condemned those on the other side who were apparently strangers or enemies. Jonah is a symbol of all those attitudes, and the time they held this approach. If they pleased Yahweh, they could expect Yahweh to do what they liked.  Jonah, though he spoke of the nature of Yahweh as full of love, compassion and slow to anger, he does not expect Yahweh to act according to his nature. Jonah represented the general approach of the people. Gradually, in some sectors, the understanding took a renewed outlook, taking a universal vision; God's goodness and compassion extend to all people. Jesus revealed God as Father of all, and we are all God's children. The righteousness of God is inclusive of all, seeing the good of all. It is natural that we may desire to win. Divine righteousness means the winning of everyone, and the life of all. Seeking vengeance and destruction is not about divine justice, but about self-righteousness. Every other person, other nation, or other race may be destroyed in establishing justice; that may be our expectation of justice. Ultimately, that which would remain is a 'me' who is justified. That is actually a hell. In our evaluations, viewpoints, and even in prayers, revenge-seeking attitudes may be present. Unless our perspectives, choices and observances are moulded by the nature of divine righteousness, which desires good and life for all, we have not known the heart of Christ. 

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Weapon for a Battlefield? Rosary as a Channel of Grace and Peace

The Holy Rosary is a prayer centred on the life of Jesus, life of Mary and the life of each of us. We meditate them through the Joyful, Sorrowful, Luminous and Glorious Mysteries. The repetition of the Hail Mary is a contemplative means to involve the grace announced to humanity in the person of Mary deeply into our personal lives, and to live the Gospel events. We invite Mary, the perfect disciple who pondered all these events in her heart, to help us see her Son's life with greater clarity and love. Mary's divine agency is to be understood within the aspect of fullness of grace. The healing, help, care, and victory that we ask of her are all within this grace. The imaginations on her victory should never be pictured or imagined as though in a war model, as though she was a war goddess. If pictured like that, we take away the nature of grace and divine action. Her power or agency is not a separate, inherent force, but the perfect channel for Christ's grace. Her "victory" is therefore the triumph of humility and obedient faith, not military might.

 God's favours are not for one nation, or people or religion, God's grace is given from his abundant goodness for the good of all. He grants victory, but not by destroying anyone, but by brining good for all. the figures like god fighting for his own people misrepresent the god images in the gospel, and instead we fill our beliefs with politicised images of god with vengeance, anger and siding with our interests. The same is true with the prayer of Rosary. Rosary is not a weaponised instrument, nor the prayer of rosary is a magical prayer. Rosary is a life story we are trying to retell and relive. There we hope for the graces that was once present in the life of those who were participants in the gospel story. We win by grace, not over anyone, but by a growth in grace for the good of all. The war models we have in our religious imaginations must give way for models of peace and dialogue.

In many new trends, under politicised emotionalism we are celebrating religion and its symbols. Are we glorifying god? Many are happy that there seems to be a revival and great witness. In such trends, we are risking grace for identity games. They are war-cry and celebrations without life and grace in it. If the crowd has no life, what will gather them after this momentum?

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sorrows of Mary

In devotions to the sorrows of mary, she has seven sorrows. If humanity's wounds are truly the wounds of Christ, Mary's sorrows also will be unresolved. From the view of redemption, Rachel weeping for her children at Ramah, the cry of mothers of babes in Bethlehem… were they not sorrows for Mary though jesus escaped the cruelty of Herod?  To understand and honour the sorrows of Mary, perhaps what we need is to accept and welcome her as our mother and listen to her what she would say. That is what Jesus said, "Here is your mother." Though we justify that what we do is to venerate, we have made her a superpowerful deity who is almighty, fighting war and bringing victory. From the view of devotion, we see the seven sorrows of Mary; often these sorrows are seen from the view of what we can get from her, even from her sorrows. She had the sorrow of uncertainty, separation, fear of loss, horrible sight of pain and death. Let us listen to what she has to say, what she suffered then in the time of Jesus, and her sorrows today in the time of ours. Give up the tendencies to put these into devotional coverage and moral condemnation without seeing a world in sorrows. We see miracles in her tears, fragrance, oil, apparitions even in her messages on sorrows. But do they call us for consoling those sorrows. Our devotional ways around her statues do not console her nor her children.  her sorrow isn't a historical event to be commemorated, but a living reality. Being the type of the church is not simply an imaginative ideal, the sorrow is alive. If the church truly embody the christ, every human sorrow alive in the wounds of christ is also a sorrow of Mary.  When we look at the world, we see mothers who fear for their children's safety, we see children in impoverishment, or children thrown into the world of unknowns. We see families torn apart by conflict, war, migration, and evacuations. Do we feel the pain? Can we as the church, feel the pain? The best way to console a mother is to care for her children. When we work for peace and justice, comfort the afflicted, feeding the hungry, and sheltering the homeless, we console the sorrows of Mary. Every act of mercy and love is a balm to her sorrowful heart. Instead of focusing on apparitions and signs, we are invited to see her tears in the real-world tears of suffering people and to act on that sight. We can see faith alive, God alive.

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Peace is about life,

 if there is a price for peace,

is it peace?

submission is never a price for peace,

its a failed peace.

peace is about life,

life of all,

do you desire that peace?

you ask us to submit,

thus, you have unchallenged rest, trade,

you call it peace.

we submit to your unchallenged power

permit your will,

and you grant us peace.

is that peace.

peace is about life,

life of all,

do you desire that peace?

of course that peace has a price,

of respect, commitment, and effort,

seeing the good of all.

you mediators, do you see that,

that we deserve to live?

our future,

see it is all emptiness,

see around

devastated smoky place,

ashes not soil,

covered in toxins,

will there be life and smiles?

peace is about life,

life of all,

do you desire that peace?

we bear the mark of war,

wounds, hands and legs cut off

burned skin,

future will ask of these marks,

do you have life beyond of these marks for them.

if you celebrate conflicts,

they will mark them with our scars.

there will be no life.

peace is about life,

life of all,

do you desire that peace?

peace is about life,

life of all,

life in abundance,

life in its entirety,

do you desire that peace?

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A Walk with God

Faith is a matter of how we live our lives with God and how we experience god's life in our daily realities. It involves a deeper understanding of God's ways and being ready to walk in that path, because we trust in the goodness of God. 

Faith is deepened when we can really experience that God is in our life. Often, our faith remains as an abstract thought. It is important that we can freely raise our hearts to God. It may be our joys, sadness, beauty, or ugliness or whatever, but that personal touch is important in the path of faith, because our roots must know the touch of grace. Our deeper longing can find the touch of grace if we are ready to take what we ask from God, even into our bodies and emotions, and truly experience it.

Life of grace is not an individual affair. We know our faith and grow in faith being within the body of Christ. This body can be our family, community, friendship, classroom, a company, a governing body or the entire human family or even the entire creation. We grow, help, and complete each other in faith. 

Faith is not sensationalism, where we are led into a magic world of blessings and divine experiences. Faith is a life lived in the strength gathered in grace. Jesus does not ask us to live in a heavenly realm. True faith places us properly on the ground where we are called to walk with Christ. Walking with Christ gives us the maturity in faith. We find the accompaniment, strength and comfort of Christ. He interprets and guides our lives. 

Faith is not a definition or ideology. Often these days, we are misled by ideologies. They use the sentimentality of faith and Christian belonging, and promote inhuman, unchristian, and divisive attitudes. We cannot have the experience of faith there; we cannot grow in Christ. It is actually a test of faith, whether we choose Christ or politicised beliefs. So, along with the request to increase our faith, we also need to ask for the grace to understand true faith in Christ and for the grace to stand by that faith.

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Be present to the scars

Have we come home? Or are we still in the rush of the day - in the road, in the office, still waiting for an interview, or just lost after a few tough words with our loved ones? We are in a churning disk to be thrown out any time to unknown directions. Even amidst the offers of success and prosperity, we are pushed into yet another competition, at times exhausted. 

Let this evening take us to a newer capacity to form a consolation in our struggles. A life that is messed up, lost, or unachieved; a life that turned against our dreams - all these bear the touch of our tears and sighs. We are what they have shaped us. Let us come home, this evening. Being tender to ourselves, our feelings, sinking moments - let us be simply present to them. In our minds, let's allow all those who have shaped our present, for both good and bad, to be present with us. Perhaps in the dim light we can see the scar of tears that they too bore on their lives. They have come through great tribulations. Rarely anyone can claim an absolute success, but an evening grace offers an image of Christ being formed in us. We do bear the scars of our falls, but can we be a healer? Can we be a quiet, anointing light - a steady radiance that shines from within our brokenness.

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we were all wanderers

 we were all wanderers 

settled in a land 

in gratitude we told 'god gave this land.'

we forgot the journey, 

forgot the fear we knew; 

our privilege became the holy right.

we were all wanderers 

there are only early settlers

once we got power 

we chased others away 

"it is our land," we said.

it is evil, it is crime, it is sin 

to kill, to chase,

 we are killing the smile of the world.

we are killing the smile of the world. 

and in our hearts' own ground, 

the gratitude is dead,

the gratitude is dead. .

We called ourselves holy 

and sanctified the crime.

justified inhumanity.

our conscience is dead,

because we served not God,

but selfishness, power, and arrogance

we served nationalism, not god.

 we are killing the smile of the world.

we are killing the smile of the world. 

we are killing the smile of the world. 

and in our hearts' own ground, 

the gratitude is dead,

the gratitude is dead. . 

we were all wanderers.

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