Bible
Study: Colossians1:21-23.
/ Luke 6:1-5.
Today’s
first reading gives us a short summary of Paul’s spiritual theology. At times,
when we look at the life of Paul and consider his past life as one who was once
a great persecutor of Christians and a murderer, we begin to wonder, how he
managed to go on to become one of the greatest Apostles of all time.
Today’s
first reading carries the secret, it contains what I think Paul kept saying to
himself: Die to the Past because by his death Christ has made you holy and
blameless so therefore stand firm in the faith, be stable and steadfast, let
nothing trouble you, never give up hope.
We all
need to adopt this attitude as well. There is a saying that when you keep
looking back too much, you end up going that way eventually. Again, like in
car, the mirrors that enable you to see behind are so small in comparison to
the wide windscreen in front of you that enables you to see what is in front.
As Paul
says, “You were once strangers, you were once hostile in mind, and you were
once masters of evil” but no more. I mean no more. Your repentance has made you
into a new creature, therefore, do not be like Lot’s wife; do not look back. The
more you keep thinking about and relishing those old memories of your sinful
past, the more you expose yourself to greater temptations and if you go back,
your later life would be worse than the former.
Being new
creatures, Jesus wants us to live simply and sincerely, doing things not
because we seek to attract attention to ourselves, nor because we just want to
follow traditions, but because we have a sound conscience. A conscience that
understand the law and the spirit behind it as well. This was the kind of
conscience behind the action of Jesus and his disciples in today’s Gospel
passage.
Today, we
remember a great woman, a woman who was already called a saint even before her
death, a woman who was made a blessed just within six years of her death, a
woman of our times, a woman who was not only acknowledged as a hero before God
but before men as well; a winner of a Nobel Peace Prize. We are talking about
none other but MOTHER TERESA OF CALCUTTA. She died on the 5th of
September, 1997 at the age of 87.
In 1946,
while riding a train to Darjeeling, to make a retreat, Sister Teresa heard what
she later explained as “a call within a call. The message was clear. I was to
leave the convent and help the poor while living among them.” She also heard a
call to give up her life with the Sisters of Loreto and, instead, to “follow
Christ into the slums to serve him among the poorest of the poor.”
After
receiving permission to leave Loreto, she took a nursing course for several
months. She went to Calcutta, where she lived in the slums and opened a school
for poor children. Dressed in a white sari and sandals (the ordinary dress of
an Indian woman) she soon began getting to know her neighbours—especially the
poor and sick—and getting to know their needs through visits.
The work
was exhausting, but she was not alone for long. Volunteers who came to join her
in the work, some of them former students, became the core of the Missionaries
of Charity. Others helped by donating food, clothing, supplies, the use of
buildings. In 1952 the city of Calcutta gave Mother Teresa a former hostel,
which became a home for the dying and the destitute. As the order expanded,
services were also offered to orphans, abandoned children, alcoholics, the
aging, and street people.
For the
next four decades Mother Teresa worked tirelessly on behalf of the poor. Her
love knew no bounds. Nor did her energy, as she crisscrossed the globe pleading
for support and inviting others to see the face of Jesus in the poorest of the
poor.
According to Saint Pope John Paul II, at the mass of the beatification
in 2003, Mother Teresa was “one of the most relevant personalities of our age”
and “an icon of the Good Samaritan.” Her life, he said, was “a bold
proclamation of the gospel.”
Let us
pray:
Let Jesus,
help me to die every moment to my past and live in such a manner that my life
itself like that of Mother Teresa may so touch and inspire millions to serve
you. Amen.
Good morning.
Be Happy. Live Positive. Have Faith. It is well with you. Happy Weekend.
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