Wednesday, December 30, 2015
Monday, December 28, 2015
Thursday, December 24, 2015
A Christmas story, in a Sal forest
JD communalism
combat 24 December 2015
A Christmas story,
in a Sal forest
John Dayal
Let me tell you a
Christmas story about a little baby boy. In fact two little boys.
They were born in a
forest, watched perhaps from the shadows by birds and animals, and this virgin Sal forest in the
hills of Kandhamal in central Orissa has everything from deer and foxes to
tigers and all the way up to elephants. Could be a scene straight out of a cinema
reinterpretation of the Nativity in the Gospels of the New Testament.
The four Gospels of
Mathew, mark, Luke and John document the life and times of Emmanuel, God with
us, but more universally known as Jesus the Christ. Jesus, as every child has
been told, was born in a Manger, the wooden or earthen tub in which fodder is
kept for cows in the shed, or gowshala, in the town of Bethlehem where his
parents had to stop suddenly because of Mother’s labour pains. Mary and her betrothed
Joseph were on their way to Jerusalem, their ancestral town, to register
themselves in a government census ordered by Cesar, the Emperor of what was
then known of Western civilisation. But for these orders, Jesus could well have
been born in the gown of Nazareth, some distance away, where Joseph worked as a
skilled carpenter.
Circumstances
ordered by government and nature has made Bethlehem famous in history. Jesus
was born there one winter, fixed rather arbitrarily by later kings and their
astronomers as the night of 24th December of the Gregorian calendar.
All very complicated. There are no reindeers in Bethlehem, it never really
snows in December, but there are all sorts of trees, even sheep and shepherds,
even now. Alas, too many soldiers, policemen, the occasional battle tank, and
all too much barbered wire in the rolling countryside.
The Kandhamal
forests are now well known in the Christian history of India, which began in
Kerala a few years after the crucifixion of Jesus in Jerusalem. It too sees
lots of policemen and their military vehicles, hunting not for animals but for
political extremists who too are armed. They kill each other all too often.
Other people also
kill, and burn houses, and hunt for men, women and children, even on Christmas
Eve.
This is what
happened on the eve of Christmas 2007 when targetted violence broke out. I was
there within a few days to record and report, but this is not the time to speak
of the violence. One can always Google the details, though the judicial
commission headed by Justice Panigrahi appointed to investigate the violence is
still a long way finalising its report. Ironically, Justice Naidu, who filled
in for Justice Mahapatra who was asked to probe the large scale targetted
violence against Christians in August 2008 but who died before he could write his document, filed his
report this week. This happens.
Just story is just
of the two children who share a birthday with Jesus the Christ.
Close to
the tip of the Kandhamal district is the village of Ulipadar, a part of
Bamnigaon, inconsequential and insignificant as most villages in backward
Orissa are. In this village lived two women who had come here on their
marriage. One was 26-year-old Muktimeri
Parichha. Both were heavily pregnant, and were expecting a safe delivery at home
or a small dispensary and clinic some kilometres away, which is run by Catholic
nuns.
But the violent mob
reached them before the labour pains had started. The village folk ran into the
forests to save their lives, these two pregnant young women among them, helped
by others who half carried them up the hills. Back in the village, the mob
pillaged and burnt the houses.
The two babies were
born soon thereafter. The mad rush for dear life had perhaps triggered the
labour. Later they told me there was no cloth to wipe the babies clean. The
mother’s dhotis were torn in half, one half for the woman, the other half to
swaddle the newborn. Quite out of the Gospels, where the Magi and the kings of
the east were to find the Baby swaddled in clothes. On a second visit later, I saw the babies,
healthy and smiling. Both had been given names, which could roughly mean
beloved of Jesus, or bhaktas of Jesus, to use a word now very popular. The
Children are growing well, I am happy to report. Justice for the victims of the
violence is another thing altogether.
Christmas in India
means many things, and like language, micro culture and folk art, changes every
hundred kilometres or so. And it is a heady, ever changing mixture of the
local, vernacular folklore and food and dress habits and imports of the last
thousand years, from the west and the east.
There was Christmas
in India before the Portuguese came and brought in the new songs of the Birth
and the Joy and Hope of the salvation it promised. The Jingle Bells and carols
came later, with the Dutch, the French and British, the generic term used as a
coverall for soldiers and civilians from England, Scotland, Wales and north
Ireland. There is also a dash in the hot pot from Switzerland, Spain, Italy,
Armenia, and a huge dollop from countries of the Mid East and the Far East,
from Palestine, Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, a hint of Egypt, and just a trace of
China.
Born of southern
stock, I grew up in the extreme north, in Srinagar, Shimla and Dehradun, the
hills and foothills of the mighty Himalayas, before coming to Delhi. My wife
grew up in Travancore, in what is now Kerala.
We celebrate in a
complex, but lively mix or traditions that trace roots in the Syrian oriental
ritual tradition as well as in the more Anglicized way seen in films and
television shows. But we know that the Christians of the North eastern States,
the many tribes in their homes in the Hills of Nagaland, Manipur, Mizoram and
Meghalaya dip deep into their own culture and folk traditions, while accepting
the best of the music that the west has to offer. Some daring young one will
have an occasional choir number, which could reflect something they heard of
Bhangra pop. It is the joy that is important. And Gujarati Christmas will be
incomplete without Christmas Garba dance by the beautiful girls and women.
So it can be a mix
if plum pudding, and walnut cake, roast pork and fried beef as much as it can
be pilaf and biryani, kebabs and gujiyas, shakar paras and appams and stew,
often at the same feast – what with these cross cultural and cross
denominational marriages that the young so love and he occasions bishop
decries.
The midnight Mass
may not be entirely traditional, and is certainly more popular among the
Catholics, the High church protestant episcopalians and the Oriental or Syrian
Orthodox traditions, some more urban than rural – to do with issues if
illumination and transport, I presume. But there is always a Sunday morning
service for the laggards and those who go to bed early in the cold.
The wine, the mulled
beer, the eggnogs or the single malts are optional. Alcohol can be a strict
No-No is several denominations.
But Christmas is not
really to be celebrated in five star hotels or in the large dhabas that have
sprouted up in the last 30 years or so along highways and low ways. It is time
for family, and friends. And to marvel that a little baby could mean so much to
so many so many millennia later.
As a Prince of
peace.
Christmas is about
peace, and love.
And the hope that no
one has to be born in a forest to a young, very frightened woman fleeing for
her life, because the government failed her. Or to be a refugee in a tiny boat
far away from home.
And it not spelled
as X-Mas. It is Christmas.
Merry Christmas, my
friends
--
John Dayal
www.johndayaTuesday, December 22, 2015
Monday, December 21, 2015
The trigger in the heart - Why suicides among religious in the Church?
Final Cut
The trigger in the heart
John Dayal
I have a close relationship with the Church in India,
across denominations, regions, languages, ethnicities. And though I came back
to the church just about three decades ago, I have been blessed with unprecedented
access to all echelons of the Christian community in the country, from the four
Cardinals, the many Catholic and protestant Bishops, across religious and
diocesan clergy and women religious. I have met them in their homes, in
confidence, and in the public arena, travelled with them in deep forests and in
the midst of violence, seen them in their glory on their academic and medical
institutions, and admired their courage in the face of aggression and
temptation. It is therefore not difficult for me to stand for them, and write
and speak for them, when they are the victims of calumny and hostility,
manufactured allegations and malicious barbs. In fact, I often articulate my
love for the Nuns and priests, the evangelists and itinerant pastors, some of
who second generation who have never had the benefit of long years in
seminaries and Bible schools, and perhaps have not even been baptised in a manner that would be acceptable to most of
us, but who have an abiding Faith in Christ and a deep personally felt experience
of the salvation He assures.
If this makes me aware of their humanity and spirituality,
it also makes me privy to their human
nature, their anxieties, fears, weaknesses and often enough, their struggles
with personal devils that seek to tempt them, or possess them. I am
sure the Superiors and heads of congregations and dioceses, who were once
themselves once young, are equally aware of this, though I am not sure how much
are the men and women in the church reaching out to their spiritual siblings in
distress or in need of a receptive and generous ear. The formal Confessional
does not suffice.
I am therefore deeply distressed at a very personal, core
level when I hear of a Woman Religious, a Nun, committing suicide, or once in a
while, a clergyman or seminarian. I
brush aside insinuations of criminality, or allegations of murder. Police and
internal enquiries are the instruments
of justice in such cases, and murderers eventually are traced more often than
not. I will therefore not talk of the sordid
affairs in the archdiocese of Bangalore which is beset with linguistic and
ethnic rifts that echoes the violent fault lines in the Indian nation. There
can be no defence, and no air-brushing
of criminality, even though one priest’s
death, and the arrest of several of his brother-clergy in the crime, is a strong reason for a deep investigation
by Rome into what is happening in South India. The continuance of Caste in many
other dioceses deserves a similar forensic enquiry.
But a suicide is a
very different matter, in the secular everyday world, or in cloisters, convents
and clergy homes. An old friend once said:
“In a suicide, all of us are guilty”.
India has perhaps over 125,000 women religious, and a quarter that of
male clergy. The non-Catholic church in the country may perhaps have more than
200,000 clergy of various levels of theological education, but as a deep a
commitment. The vocation regions, and reasons, have changed over the decades,
shifting from the west coast across sought and central India to now reach the
extreme north eastern districts of the country. Educational standards have
risen sharply. And for those interested in social action, working in India’s
developing society beset with economic, caste and gender inequity offers a tremendous and very satisfying challenge.
But, as in civil society across religions and economic
strata, there are recesses of the mind, and the soul, which remain in ferment,
sometimes in a state of torture. While in a family, a teenager or even an adult
with signs of distress will be taken to a hospital and assessed by a
psychologist or a psychiatrist, such care is possibly not available to those in
religious orders.
There is also, perhaps, a loosening of the bonds that once
knit religious communities together, a
natural process which aggravates with the passage of time, and the
advancing of age and the consequent accumulation of tensions of many kinds. Or
external triggers.
Whatever be the reasons, it is time for those in charge,
the Superiors and the Superiors General, to singly and collectively start
a process of deep examination and
assessment, taking help from experts in the secular world, to assess and
address this issue.
The torsions and pressures on the mind remain unseen, and
are more difficult to address that issues of moral turpitude which grab the
headlines, or the impact of persecution which unfortunately is such a reality
too in India.
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Thursday, December 17, 2015
4th week of advent 2015
Judges 13: 2-7, 24-25a
Lk 1: 5-25
Our Mission
Today
we are invited to reflect on the experience of these great men and
women mentioned in the first reading as well as in the gospel
In
the first reading from the book of Judges, Manoah and his wife were
barren and had no children. Similarly in the gospel of Luke, Zechariah
and Elizabeth were also barren and childless. Although, the two couples
were righteous in the eyes of God, observing all the commandments
blamelessly, being childless is considered a curse for the Jew at that
time even until now. However it turns into a blessing because the birth
of Samson and John the Baptist were part of God’s plan to save humanity.
Both Samson and Baptist had to share in the mission. This is what the
angel said to Mary “ Behold Elizabeth your relative, has also conceived a
son in her old age and this is the sixth month for her who is called
barren, for nothing is impossible for God”.( Luke 1: 36-37)
The
mission of Samson was to deliver the people of Israel from the power of
the Philistines (Judges 13:5). How about John the Baptist? God assigned
John the Baptist a mission to fulfill: turning many children of Israel
to their Lord and preparing a people fit for the Lord. (Luke: 1; 17)
Each
and every one of us also has our own mission in life as a Catholic. At
this moment let us reflect and sincerely ask ourselves what mission God
wants you and me to fulfill as we prepare for the coming of Jesus Christ.
I
believe that we will only discover our true mission when we take time
to come to the Holy Eucharist, listen to the Word of God and let His
Word and Body transform us. Then and only then, will we be able to love
and live out our mission in our daily life, in the family, and the work
place as well. How? By sharing with others what we have felt and
experienced in the holy Eucharist not only by words but first and
foremost by our life testimony of loving and giving. This is our
mission- to know Christ and to make Him known to others in our own way
and in our own places.
What is our mission in life?
The
day of the Christmas pageant finally arrived. Kaitlin was so excited
about her part. The parents were all there to watch the performance of
their children. At the edge of the stage, Kaitlin sat quietly and
confidently. Then the teacher began: “A long time ago, Mary and Joseph
had a baby and they named him Jesus”. She continued, and when Jesus was
born, a bright star appeared over the manger”. At that cue, Kaitlin got
up, picked up a large star, walked behind Mary and Joseph and held the
star up high for everyone to see. When the teacher told about the
shepherds coming to see the baby, the three young shepherds came
forward, and Kaitlin jiggled the star up and down excitedly to show
them. When the wise men responded to their cue, Kaitlin went forward a
little to lead the way. Her face was as brilliant as the original star
must have been. The play ended. On the way home Kaitlin said with great
satisfaction, “I had the main part.” You did? Her mother questioned,
wondering why she thought that. “Yes, she said, because I showed
everybody how to find Jesus”.
How
true! To show others how to find Jesus, to be the light of their
paths- that is the greatest role and mission we can play in life. Are we
true to our mission of showing others how to find Jesus?
Fr. Martin Kuzhivelil CMI
Wednesday, December 16, 2015
Tuesday, December 15, 2015
Monday, December 14, 2015
Saturday, December 12, 2015
Friday, December 11, 2015
Sunday, December 6, 2015
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