WILFRED GREGORY MORAS

Coadjutor Bishop for the diocese of Jhansi.

Wilfred Gregory Moras from St Roque’s Parish Neerude Mangalore.  He opted to study for the Missions and was ordained for the diocese of Lucknow.  He was elected as the coadjutor Bishop of Jhansi 11. 05. 2024,  And was ordained on 06. 08. 2024, the Archbishop of Agra Raphy Manjaly, in the presence of His Eminence Leopoldo Girelli the Apostolic Nuncio to India and Nepal. 

Co-consecrators to the Ordination ceremony was Most Rev. Peter Parapullil (Bishop of Jhansi) and Most Rev. Gerald John Mathias (Bishop of Jhansi).  The Presentation of the candidate was done by Rev. Father Tarcius Britto the Vicar Genral of the Diocese of Jhansi.  And the Apostolic letter was announce to the public by the Rev. Fr. Arulraj of the Diocese of Jhansi. 

A great crowd of priests from the diocese as well as various dioceses across the states added to the ceremony.  The family members as well as numerous friends of Bishop Elect came to witness the Holy event.  Nearly ten thousand people watched the event online.  

The ordination ceremony took place in Christ the King College ground.  The well decorated stage held the Altar. The ceremony took place in the presence of nearly three thousand people from all walks of life.  However, over a ten thousand has witness the ceremony online which was aired by the media team.  A well organized Choir uplifted the mood of the faithful to prayer.

A meticulously planned Liturgical service spread an ambience of devotion.  Adding to the faith expression of the Liturgy, Biblically well nit and a vibrant homily by Most Rev. Ignatius D’Souza took the entire liturgy ahead including the ceremony of ordination to a level above ordinary.  The ceremony of the ordination was extensively expressed the devotion. 

The Liturgy concluded to open a very short felicitation in honor of the newly ordained Bishop Wilfred Gregory Moras, who addressed the audience with a statement in Hindi saying: “Ishwar ka sevak Bishop Wilfred ka pehla abhivadan sweekary ho – Jai Yesu.”  (Please accept the first greetings from the servant of God Bishop Wilfred – Jai Yesu.) 

A sumptuous meal after the program awaited all at different location as well as counters.  It was a well appreciated and accepted event.  The rest is to unfold gradually to fulfillment.  Our prayers and participation is the only ingredient that can accomplish the aimed. 

Bishop Wilfred expressed as he concluded with a sweet smile: “Maati ka putla hu me, apse juda ni hu, prem daya aur karuna dikhana Kyo ki me bhi insane hu, khuda ni hu.” (… I am also a human being and not God! )  However, our hope and prayer is that You will definitely lead the flock to God!  May God Be Praised !

-TheBee

Pope Francis clears
path for canonization of
Blessed Carlo Acutis

Pope Francis recognizes a miracle attributed to Blessed Carlo Acutis and another to Blessed Giuseppe Allamano, and approves the canonization of 11 martyrs in Syria.  For young Catholics, the most interesting is surely the recognition of a miracle attributed to Blessed Carlo Acutis.

The young layman was born on May 3, 1991, in London, England, and died on October 12, 2006, in Monza, Italy, succumbing to leukemia at the age of 15.  Pope Francis beatified the millenial in 2020 in Assisi, where Blessed Carlo had made multiple pilgrimages and where his mortal remains rest. 

Miracle attributed to Blessed Carlo Acutis recognized on Thursday is related to a woman from Costa Rica.  On July 8, 2022, Liliana prayed at Blessed Carlo’s tomb in Assisi, leaving a letter describing her plea. Six days earlier, on July 2, her daughter Valeria had fallen from her bicycle in Florence, where she was attending university.  She had suffered severe head trauma, and required craniotomy surgery and the removal of the right occipital bone to reduce pressure on her brain, with what her doctors said was a very low chance of survival.  Liliana’s secretary began praying immediately to Blessed Carlo Acutis, and on July 8, Liliana made her pilgrimage to his tomb in Assisi.  That same day, the hospital informed her that Valeria had begun to breath spontaneously. The next day, she began to move and partially regain her speech.  On July 18, a CAT scan proved that her hemorrhage had disappeared, and on August 11, Valeria was moved to rehabilitation therapy. She made quick progress, and on September 2, Valeria and Liliana made another pilgrimage to Assisi to thank Blessed Carlo for his intercession. 

In the decree released on Thursday, Pope Francis announced he will convene a Consistory of Cardinals to deliberate the canonization of Blessed Carlo Acutis, as well as Blessed Giuseppe Allamano, Marie-Léonie Paradis, and Elena Guerra. 

The decrees also recognized a miracle attributed to Blessed Giuseppe Allamano (1851-1926), an Italian-born priest who founded the Consolata Missionaries.  The miracle regarded the healing of an indigenous man in Cape Verde named Sorino Yanomami, who was attacked by a jaguar on February 7, 1996, in the Amazonian forest.  Even though his brain was left partially exposed, Sorino survived the ordeal thanks to surgery in Boa Vista and the intercession of Blessed Allamano after several members of his congregation prayed a novena for Sorino. 

Pope Francis also recognized a miracle attributed to the intercession of Venerable Giovanni Merlini (1795-1873), an Italian-born priest of the Missionaries of the Most Precious Blood.  The Pope recognized the martyrdom of a Polish priest—Servant of God Stanislav Kostka Streich (1902-1938)—and a Hungarian-born laywoman—Servant of God Mária Magdolna Bódi (1921-1945)—both of whom were killed in hatred of the faith by communists.

The decrees also recognized the heroic virtues of the Servants of God Guglielmo Gattiani (Italian Capuchin priest, 1914-1999), Ismaele Molinero Novillo (Spanish layman, 1917-1938), and Ismaele Molinero Novillo (Italian layman, 1911-1974).  The Pope approved the “favorable votes of the Ordinary Session of the Cardinals and Bishops for the canonization of Blessed Emanuele Ruiz and 7 Companions, of the Order of Friars Minor, and Francesco, Abdel Mooti, and Raffaele Massabki, Lay Faithful, killed in hatred of the Faith in Damascus (Syria) between July 9 and 10, 1860.”

–Courtesy: Devin Watkins, Vatican News.

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Co-adjutor
Bishop Elect 
Rev. Wilfred Moras

(from the Diocese of Lucknow)

Name: Rev. Wilfred Moras.
DOB: 13. 02. 1969.
Father’s Name: David Moras.
Mother’s Name: Florine Moras.
Place of Birth: Neerude (Mangalore).
Home Parish: St Roque’s, Neerude.

Minor Seminary: 1987 – 1989, St Paul’s Seminary, Dilkkusha.
Major Seminary: St. Joseph’s Regional Seminary, Allahabad.

Appointments:
1997 -1999: Professor in St. Paul’s Minor Sminary.
1999 – 2002: Secretary to the Bishop.
2002 – 2003: Vice Principal at St. Anne’s, Palia. 
2003 – 2006: Licentiate in Missiology in Rome. 
2007 – 2008: Principal and Warden at St Francis School and Hostel at Nigohan. 
2008 – 2013: Principal at St Anthony’s College, Barabanki.
2009 – 2013: Visiting Professor at St. Joseph’s Regional Seminary, Allahabad. 
2013 – 2016: Doctorate in Missiology, Rome. 
2017 – 2021: Director of Regional Pastoral Centre Nav Sadhana. 
2021 – : Rector of St. Joseph’s Regional Seminary, Allahabad.

11th May 2024: 3. 30 P.M.:  Announcement as the Co-adjutor Bishop Elect for the Diocese of Jhansi.  

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The Consecration is scheduled for 6th August 2024 in CKC Ground, Jhansi., at 3 30 pm.
Details will be announced in a short time. 

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The Voice of St Jude_July-August 2024 (Click here to read)

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Obituary to Fr. Alex Mascarenhas

The precious God’s gift of life given to Fr. Alex Mascarenhas on his earthly pilgrimage was lived by him as a gift to others. He was born at Kelmbet, Mangalore, St. John Bosco Church Parish, on 20th August 1942. He is the sixth child of the 9 children to the pious and devout parents and exemplary Christians Mr. Gaspar Mascarenhas and Mrs. Eliana Mascarenhas. His own brother Fr. Ignatius Mascarenhas is also a priest of Mysore diocese.  On behalf of the bishop and the entire catholic community of the diocese of Jhansi I would like to render hearty condolences to the relatives of Fr. Alex who have come from Mumbai.

As a devout, dedicated, energetic, committed and enthusiastic priest, Fr. Alex rendered his relentless and committed service to the church as the anointed one, set apart for God’s work. By his exemplary life, he has inspired and guided many, to come back to God, transforming their lives and helping them to surrender their wills to the Divine Will.

Academic Accomplishments:

He had his primary education at Kelmbet; Higher primary education at Shirua after which he took 7 years break from his studies and helped his parents in family business as he belonged to very big family. Then he resumed his high school studies.

Seminary formation and priestly ordination:

From 1965 – 1968               Willingly and joyfully responding to the call of God, he joined Minor Seminary and received Formation at St. Pauls’ Seminary, Lucknow.

From 1969 – 1971              Philosophical Studies at St. Joseph’s Regional Seminary, Allahabad.

From 1971 – 1974              Theological studies at St. Joseph’s Regional Seminary, Allahabad.

He was ordained a priest, with his brother Fr. Ignatius Mascarenhas on 11.12.1974, at St. John Bosco Church at Kelmbet, Belmen, Mangalore and offered his first thanksgiving Holy Mass on the following day in the same church. After his ordination in the early 1980s he obtained his Master’sDegree and completed B Ed.

Pastoral Ministry:

1975              His first appointment as assistant priest at Pagdipur Mission.

1977              He was appointed procurator of St. Jude’s Shrine, and during this period he built St, Jude’s Convent in the Shrine campus.

1982              He was appointed as principal of Holy Cross School at Datia.

1988              Appointed parish priest at Sacred Heart Mission at Parichha

1989              The Chairman of the Biard of Bishops appointed him as Minister on the staff of St. Joseph’s Regional Seminary, Allahabad.

1992              Appointed Principal of St. Mary’s School, Banda.

1994              Appointed parish priest of St. Xavier’s Church at Kailar, BHEL and principal of St. Xavier’s School.

2004              He was made Mission incharge at Orai, he was also asked to start new mission stations at Kalpi and Jalaun; at the same time Director of Social Work to begin Self-help groups in about 25 villages around Orai.

2006              He was given the responsibility of Diocesan Director of Education; incharge of diocesan properties and construction of buildings. He also held the post of Chancellor of the diocese of Jhansi

2008              He was appointed as the Rector and Procurator of St. Jude’s Shrine. It is he who initiated and accomplished the Perpetual adoration chapel and the stations of the cross.

2014              He began to serve the people of God as parish priest at Sacred Heart Church, 52 Cantt, Jhansi

2017              After his retirement he came to Vianney Bhavan for rest and spending his life actively and fruitfully he breathed his last yesterday, Monday, 1^st April 2024 at 10.20 pm and went for his eternal reward, at the age of 82.

Fr. Alex has been ill since few months and received medical treatment at St. Jude’s Hospital as well as at Holy Family Hospital in Delhi. A few days back as he was admitted in St. Jude’s hospital he said in an emotional outburst, “I think it’s time for me to go to heaven”. Perhaps he was aware of something and he was preparing himself to meet the Lord.

Fr. Alex was a man of profound thinking, responsible leader, compassionate pastor and successful educationist. He was a kind and generous person who has helped many people and families in their difficulties. He has always been a cheerful and humorous person. He accomplished all his responsibilities with utmost care, great enthusiasm and with humility and love for God. He has been obedient to the bishops and cherished brotherhood and companionship with all of us priests. According to Fr. Freddy Mendonca, Fr. Alex’s companion from childhood he is a good mathematician who scored 100% in his school days. He is very precise in his calculations and decisions. He also rendered summer pastoral ministry in the diocese of New York and Muscat.

Dear Fr. Alex, we will miss you very much all our life. All that we can do now is to pray to God for you. May God grant you eternal light, peace and joy in paradise. Good bye and rest in peace, we will see you in heaven.

Now on behalf of the bishop, priests, religious and all present here I would like to thank Fr. Benny, Fr. Freddy Mendonca, and Fr. Prakash Ladella for their companionship, care and support given to Fr. Alex. I would like to thank Sr. Benedicta and Sr. Flora of DSH at Vianney Bavan for their relentless service in taking good care of Fr. Alex. I would like to extend my heartfelt thanks to the sisters, doctors, nurses and medical assistants of St. Jude’s hospital as well as Holy Family Hospital, Delhi, for all the medical aid provided to Fr. Alex. I would like to thank Mrs. Neelam and Mr. Aloysius for their love and care shown to Fr. Alex. I thank all of you, who have come to participate in the last celebration of the Eucharist with Fr. Alex and join in his last journey of his earthly life. Let us, in this Holy Mass pray to God for the departed soul of our dear father Alex that he may enjoy eternal light and bliss.

-Fr. Tarcius Britto (V.G., Diocese of Jhansi) 

The Voice of St Jude_March-April 2024 (Click here to read)

Voice of St Jude March to April 2024

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Jan – Feb 2024

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What is Ordinary Jubilee 2025?

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A jubilee is a special holy year of grace and pilgrimage in the Catholic Church. It typically takes place once every 25 years, though the pope can call for extraordinary jubilee years more often, such as in the case of the 2016 Year of Mercy or the 2013 Year of Faith.

A central part of any jubilee are the Holy Doors. These doors, found at St. Peter’s Basilica and Rome’s other major basilicas, are sealed from the inside and only opened during a jubilee year. In 2016, Catholic dioceses also had their own Holy Doors.

The opening of the Holy Door symbolizes the offering of an “extraordinary path” toward salvation for Catholics during a jubilee. Pilgrims who walk through a Holy Door can receive a plenary indulgence under the usual conditions. 

Jubilees have biblical roots, as the Mosaic era established jubilee years to be held every 50 years for the freeing of slaves and forgiveness of debts as manifestations of God’s mercy. The practice was reestablished by Pope Boniface VIII in 1300.

Jubilees are planned years in advance, with the 2025 Year of Hope being no exception. The theme was announced in January 2022.

Sometime early next year the pope will publish the official bull declaring the Jubilee and establishing the date for the opening of the Holy Door, which will likely be in December 2024.

(Source: Catholic News Agency)

The Jubilee Prayer

Father in heaven, may the faith you have given us in your son, Jesus Christ, our brother, and the flame of charity enkindled in our hearts by the Holy Spirit, reawaken in us the blessed hope for the coming of your Kingdom.

May your grace transform us into tireless cultivators of the seeds of the Gospel. May those seeds transform from within both humanity and the whole cosmos in the sure expectation of a new heaven and a new earth, when, with the powers of Evil vanquished, your glory will shine eternally.

May the grace of the Jubilee reawaken in us, Pilgrims of Hope, a yearning for the treasures of heaven. 

May that same grace spread the joy and peace of our Redeemer throughout the earth. 

To you our God, eternally blessed, be glory and praise for ever. Amen

(Pope Francis)

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Mother Eliswa

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The Diocese of Jhansi unveiled the official Logo

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The Diocese of Jhansi unveiled the official Logo of the upcoming Jubilee Year.

The Jubilee is due to be held in 2025 on the theme ‘Pilgrims of Hope’ and reflects on some of the Holy Year’s early initiatives and plans.  In the Diocese of Jhansi on the Christ the King Feast, prior to the solemn procession of Christ the King, the unveiling of the logo took place by the Bishop Peter Parapullil. 

The Revealing of the Logo took place at Deborah Castellano Lubov

The official Logo of the upcoming Jubilee due to be held in 2025 has been unveiled in the Diocese of Jhansi as well.  It was primarily unveiled for the universal Church in the month of June, at at a press conference held on Tuesday in the Sala Regia of the Vatican’s Apostolic Palace, the Vatican revealed the official Logo for the upcoming Jubilee year.

The then-Pontifical Council for the New Evangelization, now contained within the new Dicastery for Evangelization, was entrusted with coordinating the Holy See’s preparations for the Holy Year 2025 with the motto: “Pilgrims of Hope.”

The former Council’s President, Archbishop Rino Fisichella, revealed the logo and reminded that as preparations begin within the Church for the Holy Year, their Dicastery launched a competition, open to all, for the Logo’s creation.

A total of 294 entries were received from 213 cities and 48 different countries, he said, noting participants ranged in age from 6 to 83.

“In fact, many hand-drawn designs were received from children from all over the world, and it was really moving to go through these drawings which were the fruit of imagination and simple faith.”

During the judging, the works were identified only by a number so that the author remained anonymous.

On June 11th, Archbishop Fisichella submitted the three final projects to Pope Francis to select the one that struck him the most.  

“After looking at the projects several times and expressing his preference, the project of Giacomo Travisani was chosen,” Archbishop Fisichella said.

Giacomo Travisani, present this evening, reflected on what motivated his submission. He said how he had imagined all people moving forward together, able to push ahead “thanks to the wind of Hope that is the Cross of Christ and Christ himself. “

Winning Logo

The Logo shows four stylized figures to indicate all of humanity from the four corners of the earth. They each embrace one another, indicating the solidarity and brotherhood that must unite peoples. The first figure is clinging to the Cross. The underlying waves are choppy to indicate that the pilgrimage of life is not always on calm waters.

Because often personal circumstances and world events call for a greater sense of hope, a description of the Logo says, the lower part of the Cross is elongated turning into an anchor, which dominates the movement of the waves.

Anchors often have been used as metaphors for hope. 

The image shows how the pilgrim’s journey is not individual, but rather communal, with the signs of a growing dynamism that moves more and more toward the Cross. 

“The Cross is not static,” Fisichella suggested, “but dynamic, bending toward and meeting humanity as if not to leave it alone, but rather offering the certainty of its presence and the reassurance of hope.”

The Jubilee 2025 Motto, Peregrinantes in Spem is also clearly visible in the color green.

Urgency to live Jubilee in light of hope

Archbishop Fisichella reflected on Jubilees and why the upcoming one is significant.

“Every Holy Year in the history of the Church,” he said, “has taken on its full meaning when it is placed within the historical context that humanity is experiencing at that time and particularly when it is able to read the signs of anxiety and unrest combined with people’s perceived expectations.

“The vulnerability experienced in recent years, together with the fear of the violence of wars,” he continued, “only makes the human condition more paradoxical: on the one hand, to feel the overwhelming power of technology which determines their days; on the other hand, to feel uncertain and confused about their future.”

“This has given rise to the urgency to live the upcoming Jubilee in the light of hope.”

In this context, Archbishop Fisichella reminded, “Pilgrims of Hope” was chosen for the Jubilee’s theme.

“It expresses the need to make sense of the present so that it can be preparatory for a real thrust into the future in order to embrace and respond to the various challenges that arise from time to time.”

Jubilees’ importance to life of the Church

In a recent letter addressed to Archbishop Fisichella, Pope Francis noted that “the Jubilee has always been an event of great spiritual, ecclesial, and social significance in the life of the Church.”

He recalled that ever since the year 1300, which marked the first Holy Year, “God’s holy and faithful people has experienced this celebration as a special gift of grace, characterized by the forgiveness of sins and in particular by the indulgence, which is a full expression of the mercy of God.”

In the Church, a Jubilee, or Holy Year, is a great religious event.

A Jubilee is “ordinary” if it falls after the customary 25-year period, and “extraordinary” when it is proclaimed by for some outstanding event.

The last ordinary Jubilee took place in the year 2000 during the pontificate of Pope St. John Paul I.  In 2015, Pope Francis proclaimed an Extraordinary Holy Year of Mercy.

What to expect soon

After the summer, Archbishop Fisichella noted, the official Jubilee website and related app will be available.

“Both will be tools to help pilgrims participate fully in the proposed events, facilitating the spiritual and cultural experience of the city of Rome. In fact, in addition to the important Pilgrim’s Charter, the Jubilee portal will contain news, historical notes, practical information, services and multimedia tools, in ten languages available to the pilgrim and easily accessible for people with disabilities.”

The Dicastery is already envisioning major events, and highlighted that special attention will be given to the following categories: “Families, Children, Youth, Movements and Associations, Elderly, Grandparents, Disabled, Sports, Sick and Health Care, Universities, World of Work, Choirs and Choruses, Confraternities, Priests, Consecrated Persons, Eastern Catholics, Catechists, the Poor, Prisoners, and many others…” A calendar will be ready by the end of the year so as to allow adequate organizational time for pilgrims and related agencies.

-Courtesy: Vatican News

Winds of  Change

The document released at the conclusion of the first stage of the ‘Synod on Synodality’ on October 29 in the Vatican, sets the tone for the final stage of the Synod to be held in October 2024.  

Approved by the conclave, the report enumerates many areas for the Church to move forward.  

In a major declaration, the report places ‘the poor at the centre of the Church’ and states that ‘learning from them (the poor) is something the Church needs to do more and more.’  

Giving a new dimension, it cautions against viewing the poor as ‘objects of Church’s charity works; they are one with the Church as everyone else.  

Read the cover story, WINDS OF CHANGE…

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Click on the image
 to read…

VATICAN CITY –
The Summary Report from the Synod on Synodality has been issued…

NO woman ordinations–but discussion may continue on deaconate and presented again next year.

NO mention of special “blessings” for those in irregular unions, including homosexuals.

Strong focus on Eastern Churches and Ecumenism 

Attached is a working English Translation (AI) of the entire document, for reference and review.

Click on the image below to read the Summary 

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The Feast of St Jude 2023

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The first Shrine in India in honor of St Jude Thaddeus is situated at Jhansi.  The root of the origin of St Jude goes back over five decades from now.  When he late Bishop F. X. Fenech a man of great faith made a promise to St Jude that if he helped him, he would build a Shrine in Jhansi in his honor.  And his prayers were answered, more than that the devotion to St Jude began to spread like wild fire at an area which was comparatively less populated. 

Thus began a loud celebration on the 28^th of October, which is the feast day of St Simon and St Jude.  As time advanced and surrounding progressed, the devotion and celebration also increased.  Initially the devotees gathered for three days.  As time advanced Novena to St Jude got great prominence.  The reason for this is simple, the spiritual experience and the response to their prayers even in the extreme situations was not the story of a few but so many people.  And the devotion that began half a century ago is still on with the same vigor an enthusiasm. 

This year the Novena began with the Blessing and Hoisting of the Flag of St Jude at the Shrine front by the Bishop Peter Parapullil.  Every day from novena day one that began on the 19^th October to ninth day that is on 27^th October, numerous devotees gather for the devotion.  Every day witness Solemn Eucharistic celebration and Novena to St Jude as well as the Blessing with the relic of St Jude.  Eucharistic celebrations were in English in the Morning at 6 30 am;  at 8 00 am in Marathi and at 4 30 pm in Hindi.

All three celebrations did witness a packed church as always.  However the Triduum days many more pilgrims arrived which made the celebration much more vibrant.  This year the Preacher was Rajesh IMS, who inspired all with his reflections that was well tuned to the present family problems and confusions.

Main celebrant on the feast day main Mass was Most Rev. Louis Mascarenhas (Bishop of Prayagraj). He was flanked by over a hundred priest who include the diocesan Priests as well as guest priests who came in from Gwalior, Agra, Delhi, Bhopal …

The solemn celebration was very prayerful with a wonderful Choir.  The packed church witnessed the active participation and assistance from the diocesan youth in various levels.

Triduum days witnessed cultural events after the evening Eucharistic celebrations by various parishes and institutions. 

On the feast day evening hours witnessed a solemn procession and Healing services as well as Eucharistic adoration. The spiritual program came to a conclusion with the words of gratitude by the Bishop Peter Parapullil.

-TheBee

May His Soul Rest in Peace

Obituary to
Fr. Norbert Mascarenhas

By Fr. Tarcius Britto (V.G.)

(15. 10. 2023, at Cathedral, Jhansi)

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Fr. Norbert Mascarenhas, lovingly called Noby by many, was born at Niddodi, Mangalore, Little Flower Church Parish, on 6th June 1954. He is the second of the four children to the pious and devout parents and exemplary Christians Mr. Marcel Baptist Mascarenhas and Mrs. Celestine Sequeira. He is survived by 2 brothers and one sister. His younger brother Fr. Alex Mascarenhas is a Jesuit priest working in Dhanbad, Jharkhand.  Fr. Norbert has 4 nephews and 3 nieces. His niece Emiliana, who is living in Dubai told me yesterday that he is also the grandfather of 11 grandchildren in the family. She regretted in tears saying that she had promised him, she would visit him soon but his sudden demise made it impossible.

As a young, energetic, committed and enthusiastic priest, Fr. Norbert has inspired and guided many, to hear the voice of God, and surrender their wills to the Divine Will. And so, Fr. Norbert is the vocation promoter of Fr. Ronald Tellis, Fr. Stephen Vaz, Fr. Denis Mascarenhas of our diocese and many others.

Academic accomplishments:

1970           Completed SSLC from Mysore Secondary Education Board, Karnataka

1973           Completed intermediate from Madyamic Shiksha Parishad, Allahabad

1976           Completed Hindi Literature from Hindi Sahitya Sammelan, Allhabad

1977           Completed UG degree, Bachelor of Arts from Bundhelkhand Degree College, Jhansi

1978           Completed Studies on Islam from Henry Martin Institute of Islamic Studies, Hyderabad.

1984           Completed B.Ed from Bundhelkhand University, Jhansi

1986           completed PG degree, Master of Arts in History, from Bundhelkhand University, Jhansi.

Seminary Formation:

From 1970 – 1973       Minor Seminary Formation at St. Pauls’ Seminary, Lucknow

From 1974 – 1976       Philosophical Studies at St. Joseph’s Regional Seminary, Allahabad.

From 1976 -1977         Regency at the Bishop’s House, Jhansi

From 1978 – 1981       Theological studies at St. Joseph’s Regional Seminary, Allahabad.

Fr. Norbert was ordained a priest on 25^th March 1981 at St. Anthony’s Cathedral, Jhansi and offered his First Thanksgiving Holy Mass at St. Jude’s Shrine on 26^th March 1981.

Pastoral Ministry:

1981           His first appointment, asst. priest at Don Bosco Boys Home, Lalitpur

1983           He was appointed assistant to Fr. Augustin at Christ the King College, Jhansi

1984           Appointed Incharge of St. Mary’s Mission, Naibasti, Mauranipur, and did all pioneering works staying in a Darmashala.

1989           He was appointed as Diocesan Director of Catholic Enquiry Center, Jhansi

1990           He was the Priest incharge of St. Mary’s School, Banda

1993           He was appointed priest-inchage of CKC Primary Section, which is now become CKC Academy.

1994           Priest incharge of Holy Cross Mission and the Principal of Holy Cross School, Datia, he worked hard for the development of the Mission and the school.

2001           (15^th July) Appointed as Co-director of Education Society and co-pastor with Fr. Denis D’Souza at St. John’s Church, Premnagar.

2001           (18^th December) Priest incharge of Indergarh Mission and Manager of Kolbe Vidya Mandir.

2003           Appointed as Principal of St. Anthony’s Cathedral College, Jhansi

On 26^th March 2006 Fr. Norbert celebrated his Sacerdotal Silver Jubilee at St. Anthony’s cathedral, Jhansi

2009           Appointed Principal of St. Mary’s Inter College, Masih Ganj, Sipri

2016           Appointed as parish priest of Our lady of perpetual Help church, Sipri

In the year 2022 Fr. Norbert moved to Vianney Bhavan and yesterday, Saturday, 14.10.2023, at 6.45 pm he breathed his last and went for his eternal reward.

Fr. Norbert was a man of profound thinking, eloquent orator, compassionate pastor and successful educationist. He was a kind and generous person who has helped many people and families in their difficulties. He has always been a cheerful and humorous person. He accomplished all his responsibilities with utmost care, great enthusiasm and meticulously and to the satisfaction of all. He has been obedient to the bishops and cherished brotherhood and companionship with all of us priests.

Dear Fr. Norbert, we will miss you very much all our life. All that we can do now is to pray to God for you. May God grant you eternal light, peace and joy in paradise. Good bye and rest in peace.

Now on behalf of the bishop, priests, religious and all present here I would like to thank Fr. Benny, Fr. Freddy Mendonca, Fr. Alex Mascarenhas and Fr. Prakash Ladella for their companionship, care and support given to Fr. Norbert. I would like to thank Sr. Benedicta and Sr. Flora of DSH at Vianney Bavan for their relentless service in taking good care of Fr. Norbert. I would like to extend my heartfelt thanks to the sisters, doctors, nurses and medical assistants of St. Jude’s hospital for all the medical aid provided to Fr. Norbert. I would like to thank Mrs. Neelam and Mrs. Veronica Aloysius for their sisterly care shown to Fr. Norbert. I would like to thank Mr. Albert who was with Fr. Norbert for the past few months helping him in various ways. I thank all of you, who have come to participate in the last celebration of the Eucharist with Fr. Norbert and join in his last journey of his earthly life. Let us, in this Holy Mass pray to God for the departed soul of our dear father Norbert. 

-Fr. Tarcius Britto (VG).

The Voice of St Jude _ September 2023

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NEW PRIESTS

For the Diocese of Jhansi _ 2023

From the Church at Thumba to the South Pole of the Moon… 

In the 1960s, when India’s aerospace programme was just taking off, a beach just outside Thiruvananthapuram served as the lab for several experiments in aeronautics. Scientists, including Dr APJ Abdul Kalam, converted a church near the beach into their office.  Why because, it is located in Thumba, Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala, which is near the southern tip of mainland India, very close to earth’s magnetic equator. 

As APJ Abdul Kalam mentioned in his autobiography Wings of Fire, “The site selected at Thumba lay between the railway line and the sea coast, covering a distance of about two and a half km and measuring about 600 acres. Within this area, stood a large church, whose site had to be acquired.”  Vikram Sarabhai met with the bishop, Reverend Peter Bernard Pereira, who readily agreed to give the church over for space research. The fishermen and their families were promised jobs in the premises and they also moved out. That church housed the first unit of the Thumba Equatorial Rocket Launch Station (TERLS), which was later named the Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre. Kalam wrote: “The St. Mary Magdalene church housed the first office of the Thumba Space Centre. The prayer room was my first laboratory; the bishop’s room was my design and drawing office.” 

This church had an interesting history. Like many other ancient churches in this part of the world, this one too could trace its roots back the sixteenth century when St Francis Xavier came to Kerala. Legend has it that he built the first structure – a prayer hall with mud walls and a roof made of coconut frond thatch. This structure apparently lasted nearly a hundred years until the Jesuits replaced it with a church dedicated to St Bartholomew. 

Its high-raftered roof was a sanctuary to swarms of pigeons. The altar in front of the statue of Mary Magdalene was left untouched as we had promised the fisher folk that this sacred area would be preserved as it was. And many of the early rockets, including the very first Nike-Apache, were assembled in front of the altar. The central portion of the church became a bustling office space. Later, assemblies took place in the newly built rocket assembly hall. Once that move occurred, the various wings of the church were used to provide temporary accommodation to the scientists and the support staff.  

And so, the church building came in handy once more! The main assembly wing of the church was partitioned into cubicles. The newly arrived scientists sat in these makeshift offices and went to work on the preliminary planning and recruitment of staff. We had the basic facilities in place now, but we all had to live with the flocks of pigeons and their offspring!

Visitors, especially other scientists coming from abroad, were often taken aback by this strange sight. Many of them made appreciative noises about the innovative spirit of Indians and lauded our passion for and determination to enter the space age despite the hurdles. But for us, these were not hurdles – we were doing exciting things and over the years the church had become our home and the pigeons our family.  As the years rolled by and more structures came up, the church building served as a general-purpose covered space that could be used as a stop-gap area. Finally, this iconic building was converted into a modern space museum with audiovisual presentations and models. Today, it attracts hordes of school children and many visitors who love the special conducted tours of the museum. 

The room in the small bishop’s house, which became Kalam’s office, had nondescript, basic office furniture: a table and a chair – it was here that Kalam plotted the route of India’s space science. That room is kept the way he had left it. When he became the president of India, he was taken to the room and showed that nothing had been changed. He sat on that chair, once again, as cameras kept clicking.  The photograph is now kept on the table with some plastic flowers. For VSSC’s scientists, this is sanctum sanctorum. 

India’s first rocket launch took place here on November 21, 1963. “It was a sounding rocket, called Nike-Apache, made at NASA. “The rocket was assembled in the church building,” wrote Kalam. That was the time when the assembled rocket was shifted from the church building to the launch pad by truck. Later, the payload for the Rohini launch was famously transported on a bicycle.  That rolling which began on a bicycle, now has reached as a rolling of a rower on the moon’s surface as we witness today. 

Courtesy: Conde Nast Traveller, February 2017, Extract from A Personal History by R. Aravamudan, Gita Aravamudan (Harper Collins India).,  Charmy Harikrishnan, Jul 2015,

–TheBee

VOSJ_August 2023

Voice of St Jude August 2023

MESSAGE OF HIS HOLINESS POPE FRANCIS
FOR LENT 2023

Lenten Penance and the Synodal Journey

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Dear brothers and sisters!
The Gospels of Matthew, Mark and Luke all recount the episode of the Transfiguration of Jesus.  There we see the Lord’s response to the failure of his disciples to understand him. Shortly before, there had been a real clash between the Master and Simon Peter, who, after professing his faith in Jesus as the Christ, the Son of God, rejected his prediction of the passion and the cross. Jesus had firmly rebuked him: “Get behind me, Satan! You are a scandal to me, because you do not think according to God, but according to men!” (Mt 16:23). Following this, “six days later, Jesus took with him Peter, James and John his brother and led them away to a high mountain” (Mt 17:1).

The Gospel of the Transfiguration is proclaimed every year on the Second Sunday of Lent. During this liturgical season, the Lord takes us with him to a place apart.  While our ordinary commitments compel us to remain in our usual places and our often repetitive and sometimes boring routines, during Lent we are invited to ascend “a high mountain” in the company of Jesus and to live a particular experience of spiritual discipline – ascesis – as God’s holy people.

Lenten penance is a commitment, sustained by grace, to overcoming our lack of faith and our resistance to following Jesus on the way of the cross. This is precisely what Peter and the other disciples needed to do. To deepen our knowledge of the Master, to fully understand and embrace the mystery of his salvation, accomplished in total self-giving inspired by love, we must allow ourselves to be taken aside by him and to detach ourselves from mediocrity and vanity. We need
to set out on the journey, an uphill path that, like a mountain trek, requires effort, sacrifice and concentration. These requisites are also important for the synodal journey to which, as a Church, we are committed to making. We can benefit greatly from reflecting on the relationship between Lenten penance and the synodal experience. 

In his “retreat” on Mount Tabor, Jesus takes with him three disciples, chosen to be witnesses of a unique event. He wants that experience of grace to be shared, not solitary, just as our whole life of faith is an experience that is shared. For it is in togetherness that we follow Jesus. Together too, as a pilgrim Church in time, we experience the liturgical year and Lent within it, walking alongside those whom the Lord has placed among us as fellow travellers. Like the ascent of Jesus and the
disciples to Mount Tabor, we can say that our Lenten journey is “synodal”, since we make it together along the same path, as disciples of the one Master. For we know that Jesus is himself the Way, and therefore, both in the liturgical journey and in the journey of the Synod, the Church does nothing other than enter ever more deeply and fully into the mystery of Christ the Saviour.   

And so we come to its culmination. The Gospel relates that Jesus “was transfigured before them; his face shone like the sun and his clothes became white as light” (Mt 17:2).This is the “summit”, the goal of the journey. At the end of their ascent, as they stand on the mountain heights with Jesus, the three disciples are given the grace of seeing him in his glory, resplendent in supernatural light. That light did not come from without, but radiated from the Lord himself. The divine beauty of this vision was incomparably greater than all the efforts the disciples had made in the ascent of Tabor. During any strenuous mountain trek, we must keep our eyes firmly fixed on the path; yet the panorama that opens up at the end amazes us and rewards us by its grandeur. So too, the synodal process may often seem arduous, and at times we may become discouraged. Yet what awaits us at the end is undoubtedly something wondrous and amazing, which will help us
to understand better God’s will and our mission in the service of his kingdom.

The disciples’ experience on Mount Tabor was further enriched when, alongside the transfigured Jesus, Moses and Elijah appeared, signifying respectively the Law and the Prophets (cf. Mt 17:3). The newness of Christ is at the same time the fulfilment of the ancient covenant and promises; it is inseparable from God’s history with his people and discloses its deeper meaning. In a similar way, the synodal journey is rooted in the Church’s tradition and at the same time open to newness. Tradition is a source of inspiration for seeking new paths and for avoiding the opposed temptations of immobility and improvised experimentation.

The Lenten journey of penance and the journey of the Synod alike have as their goal a transfiguration, both personal and ecclesial. A transformation that, in both cases, has its model in the Transfiguration of Jesus and is achieved by the grace of his paschal mystery. So that this transfiguration may become a reality in us this year, I would like to propose two “paths” to follow in order to ascend the mountain together with Jesus and, with him, to attain the goal.

The first path has to do with the command that God the Father addresses to the disciples on  Mount Tabor as they contemplate Jesus transfigured. The voice from the cloud says: “Listen to
him” (Mt 17:5). The first proposal, then, is very clear: we need to listen to Jesus. Lent is a time of grace to the extent that we listen to him as he speaks to us. And how does he speak to us? First, in the word of God, which the Church offers us in the liturgy. May that word not fall on deaf ears; if we cannot always attend Mass, let us study its daily biblical readings, even with the help of the internet. In addition to the Scriptures, the Lord speaks to us through our brothers and sisters, especially in the faces and the stories of those who are in need. Let me say something else, which is quite important for the synodal process: listening to Christ often takes place in listening to our brothers and sisters in the Church. Such mutual listening in some phases is the primary goal, but it remains always indispensable in the method and style of a synodal Church. 

On hearing the Father’s voice, the disciples “fell prostrate and were very much afraid. But Jesus came and touched them, saying, ‘Rise, and do not be afraid.’ And when the disciples raised their eyes, they saw no one else but Jesus alone” (Mt 17:6-8). Here is the second proposal for this Lent: do not take refuge in a religiosity made up of extraordinary events and dramatic experiences, out of fear of facing reality and its daily struggles, its hardships and contradictions. The light that Jesus shows the disciples is an anticipation of Easter glory, and that must be the goal of our own journey, as we follow “him alone”. Lent leads to Easter: the “retreat” is not an end in itself, but a means of preparing us to experience the Lord’s passion and cross with faith, hope and love, and thus to arrive at the resurrection. Also on the synodal journey, when God gives us the grace of  certain powerful experiences of communion, we should not imagine that we have arrived – for there too, the Lord repeats to us: “Rise, and do not be afraid”. Let us go down, then, to the plain,
and may the grace we have experienced strengthen us to be “artisans of synodality” in the ordinary life of our communities.

Dear brothers and sisters, may the Holy Spirit inspire and sustain us this Lent in our ascent with Jesus, so that we may experience his divine splendour and thus, confirmed in faith, persevere in our journey together with him, glory of his people and light of the nations.  Rome, Saint John Lateran, 25 January, Feast of the Conversion of Saint Paul.  

– POPE FRANCIS

[Courtesy –   Dicastero per la Comunicazione – Libreria Editrice Vaticana]

Pope to artists: Beauty is work of the Holy Spirit

edited from Joseph Tulloch

In an address to members of an Italian cinema organisation, Pope Francis reflects on the importance of beauty, which, he said, is often “left to one side” in theological discussion.

Pope Francis on Monday welcomed to the Vatican members of the Ente dello Spettacolo Foundation, a Catholic organization which promotes cinema in Italy.  Setting aside his prepared remarks, the Holy Father spoke off-the-cuff to participants about the significance of beauty, and its relationship with harmony, which he identified as “the work of the Holy Spirit.”

The Pope began by expressing his appreciation for the work of those in the film industry, which he called “the work of beauty.”  

Despite its importance, the Pope said, beauty is not always given sufficient attention within the Church. “It’s always been left to one side, or at least in the corner”, he explained. “Theology books talk a lot about the verum, truth; they speak a lot about bonum [the good], but not so much about beauty.”  “It almost seems like discussing beauty isn’t relevant to theological and pastoral reflection,” he said, before adding, in a reference to a famous line from Dostoyesky, that it is “beauty that will save us.”

Beauty, the Pope continued, “is harmony, the work of the Holy Spirit.”  “When we see the work of the Holy Spirit, which is harmonising differences,” he said, “then we understand what beauty is. Beauty is the work of the Holy Spirit that harmonises everything – contraries, opposites, everything.”

He gave the example of the morning of Pentecost: “There’s that big fuss, everyone’s talking, nobody knows what’s going on, a great disorder … It’s the Spirit that harmonises all of this.”  

Cinema, the Pope concluded, aims at harmony, and the greatest works of cinema are those which manage to convey “harmony, both in joy and in pain, human harmony.”

The importance of cinema:  Pope Francis ended his address by thanking those present, and reflecting on the importance of the film industry.

“Thank you for your work,” he said. “It’s evangelical work. Poetic work too, because cinema is poetry; giving life is poetic. I thank you for your journey: keep going, keep going, in the footsteps of the greats. Keep going.” 

-Courtesy: Vatican News.

5 Decades long Saga at St Jude’s Shrine: DIL BAHADUR…

Dil Bahadur was born in the year 1952 at Palpa Town in Thansen, Nepal. He was the third child among three brothers and a sister they are – Dan, Dalli, Dil, Bir & Lok. His Parents Chandra Bahadur and Mannkumari held good fortune: Indeed a wealthy family that held vast land and a three storied building at Palpa. 

However Dil Bahadur travelled off from Thansen leaving all those fortunes. In the year 1966, at the age of 14 he reached Jhansi. Initially for about three months Dil and one of his companion stayed with their acquaintance Shyamlalsingh Lama at Cantonment, Jhansi. After about three months he found a place at St Jude’s Shrine Campus as a watchman. That was the beginning of a long saga that tell a loyal story of a man of royal character; Dil served at the Shrine of St Jude’s for five decades. 

Bahadur was a familiar person for all the pilgrims who came to the Shrine of St Jude. At Jhansi many people know him to be someone who never went back to his home. But a few people remember him to have gone home once. But those who are close to him would remember his home visit two time in the past five decades. Once for a couple of months and a second time when he heard about the death of his mother. Apart from this for few months he was absent for few months; in the recent past Dil was away in the hospital for more than a month due to his leg injury.  That would make Dil Bahadur absent from Shrine campus ‘only four time in five decades’. Indeed heart of Dil is well planted at Shrine. 

Though he arrived as a small boy, he grew in strength and courage in the Shrine campus. He grew up in his knowledge in technical fields like electrical works and plumbing. Any of the faults could be easily rectified soon no matter at a switch board on the ground floor or the bulbs on the fifteen feet long cross on the top of the dome of the Shrine of St Jude. Those who have climbed atop of the dome would know, how scary a feeling it is to be there to withstand the sight of height and the wind that strike too hard. But that was only an adventurous job for Dil Bahadur. 

No intruders would easily dare to plunge in the campus. There were occasions when some thieves who tried to break in and Dil was injured by them. Still Bahadur’s heart faced no tremor; indeed he is Bahadur not only in name but also in character. His name is Dil, indeed he was full of heart for those in need. Lot of money he has given out to those in need, especially to his co-workers. 

Bahadur was physically weak past few years. On the 5th February evening hours, he became ill. Sixth morning health condition was again down, due to giddiness he had a fall as well. But Bahadur would never want to go to hospital. By 4 O’clock evening he was found to be extremely sick, unable to get up himself. So Fathers and his close acquaintance decided to take him even if he never wanted to hospital. However he had to be carried to the vehicle to take him to the hospital. There it was found that his sugar level had shot up to five hundred. Up to 8 O’ Clock Bahadur was responding to all who visited him in the hospital, and even said good bye; that was 6th night. After 9 O’clock at night he slipped in to coma; he was slowly sinking. At early in the morning at 4.30 am on the 7th February Dil Bahadur breathed his last in the hospital at the age of 66, nearly after 52 years in St Jude’s Shrine campus. 

Morning hours His body was brought to Shrine campus. At 11 O’clock his last journey began; carrying through the Shrine of St Jude; pausing in front of the miraculous statue of St Jude; the journey continued to the place of his final rites according to the customs and traditions of his home town; final rites were administered by Dil Bahadur’s one and only dear friend from Nepal Shyamsingh Lama. 

Indeed Dil Bahadur is no more a voice that resounds in the campus. But the sweet memories of him would munch our minds. I see it as a great privilege to serve him past three years; to feed him; to spent time with him; to talk with him with very-very limited words. But few are the moments when Dil used to unfold himself in words that speaks antic tales from his life in St Jude’s Shrine, and those stories would have a difference like ‘pearls among pebbles…’

-TheBee

Presentation of the Lord

By Fr Merlin Rengith Ambrose,  is Professor of Canon Law and Executive Secretary of the Commission for Canon Law in CCBI.

Published in the The New Leader, February 1-15, 2023

Presentation of the Lord

On February 2, we observe the Feast of the Presentation of the Lord, honouring Jesus Christ’s presentation in the Temple when he was a young child. The Presentation of Jesus in the Temple is an early episode in the life of Jesus Christ. This feast is celebrated by many churches forty days after Christmas on Candlemas since the blessing and procession of candles is included in today’s liturgy or the Feast of the Presentation of Jesus. Before the revision of the General Roman Calendar, this marked the end of the Christmas season. This is another “epiphany” celebration insofar as the Christ Child is revealed as the Messiah through the Canticle and words of Simeon and the testimony of Anna, the prophetess. Christ is the light of the nations, hence the blessing and procession of candles on this day. During the procession to the church, the Nunc Dimittis is sung, replicating the words that Simeon proclaimed. In Roman Catholic and Orthodox churches, the procession into the church for Mass commemorates Christ’s entrance into the temple. Until 1969, the ancient feast of the Presentation of Our Lord, which is of Oriental origin, was known in the West as the feast of the Purification of Our Lady, and closed the Christmas season, forty days after the Lord’s birth.

The episode of the presentation of the Lord Jesus is described in chapter 2 of the Gospel of Luke in the New Testament. Within the account, Luke’s narration of the Presentation in the Temple combines the purification rite with the Jewish ceremony of the redemption of the firstborn (Luke 2:23–24) in obedience to the Torah (Leviticus 12, Exodus 13:12–15, etc.). Luke explicitly says that Joseph and Mary take the option provided for poor people (those who could not afford a lamb; Leviticus 12:8), sacrificing “a pair of turtledoves, or two young pigeons.” Leviticus 12:1–4 indicates that this event should take place forty days after birth for a male child, hence the Presentation is celebrated forty days after Christmas. In the Roman Catholic Church, the Presentation of Jesus in the Temple is the fourth Joyful Mystery of the Rosary.

The event of presentation is found only in the Gospel of Luke and Luke is massively interested in the temple. In fact, his gospel begins in the Temple, remember the story of Zacharia and angel, and ends in the temple, the disciples after the resurrection going to the temple and praising God constantly. And there are a lot of temple references in the Gospel of Luke. Well … Why was temple so important for ancient Israel? The temple was practically the dwelling of the Lord. It was the place of encounter par excellence. It was the meeting place of God and human beings. In temple the divinity and humanity embrace. Human race was brought back on line with God. Whenever someone offered a sacrifice in temple, he was turning his life, his mind, his will back to God. He was becoming reconciled with God.

But the sins of the nations had compromised the integrity of the temple. In fact, things got bad according to the prophet Ezekiel that the Lord’s glory left his temple. Especially the exposition of Ezekiel 8-11 in which Ezekiel describes the departure of God’s glory from the first Temple (“Solomon’s” Temple) as a prelude to the final destruction of the Temple and the city of Jerusalem in 586 BC. Therefore, one of the most disturbing and very frightening lines in the whole Bible, that is the Yahweh’s Shekinah (glory of Yaweh, the presence of the Lord, His dwelling) got up from the temple and left.

Therefore, one of the deepest aspirations of Israel was to re-establish the temple as the place of right praise so that glory of the Lord might fully return. We can see this longing in the prophets and Psalms.

Obviously, in the first reading today, taken from the book prophet Malàchi (Mal. 3:1-4), we read, “thus says the Lord… suddenly the lord whom you seek will come to the temple.” To the temple will come the Lord whom you seek. To the temple will come back his dwelling, his presence, Shekinah, the Yaweh’s Glory. In the light of this, therefore, when Joseph and Mary bring Jesus to the temple, the prophecy of Malachi and many other prophets is fulfilled, i.e., the Glory of the Lord, Shekinah returns to his favourite dwelling.

This is precisely what the holy man Simeon sees. He sees the coming of the Messiah in the Temple; he sees the coming of God’s presence, His dwelling; his Shekinah whom the people were seeking. Simeon knew all old prophecies; Holy spirit had given him the revelation that he would not die until he lays his eyes on the saviour. That is precisely why, when he takes child Jesus in his arms, he says “now master, let me go for my eyes have seen your salvation.” And this is the famous nunc dimittis prayer which we recite every day in the Compline, the night prayer of the Catholic Church.

Well… God returns to the temple in the human form as someone who is going to make sacrifice. Sacrifice, what for? For the reconciliation of the fallen humanity with God; to bring back to God the sinful humanity. He did that … He indeed that… This little baby Jesus, both human and divine, having come of age at the climax of his life, would enter this same temple again and declare his body as the new temple and three days after on the cross he would perform the final sacrifice, final offering; the final presentation on the Cross, offering himself to the Father. Therefore, today’s presentation is the first presentation and that final sacrifice or final presentation will take place on that day.

The presentation of Jesus in temple, forty days after Christmas, is perfected on the Cross and is represented every time that the mass is celebrated. The presentation of the Lord Jesus is the beginning of our salvation! 

Courtesy – Fr Merlin Rengith Ambrose.

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MESSAGE OF HIS HOLINESS POPE FRANCIS FOR THE 57th WORLD DAY OF SOCIAL COMMUNICATIONS

Speaking with the heart “The truth in love” (Eph 4:15)

Dear Brothers and Sisters,

After having reflected in past years on the verbs “to go and see” and “to listen” as conditions for good communication, with this Message for the LVII World Day of Social Communications, I would like to focus on “speaking with the heart”. It is the heart that spurred us to go, to see and to listen, and it is the heart that moves us towards an open and welcoming way of communicating. Once we have practised listening, which demands waiting and patience, as well as foregoing the assertion of our point of view in a prejudicial way, we can enter into the dynamic of dialogue and sharing, which is precisely that of communicating in a cordial way. After listening to the other with a pure heart, we will also be able to speak following the truth in love (cf. Eph 4:15). We should not be afraid of proclaiming the truth, even if it is at times uncomfortable, but of doing so without charity, without heart. Because “the Christian’s programme” — as Benedict XVI wrote — “is ‘a heart which sees’”. [1] A heart that reveals the truth of our being with its beat and that, for this reason, should be listened to. This leads those who listen to attune themselves to the same wave length, to the point of being able to hear within their heart also the heartbeat of the other. Then the miracle of encounter can take place, which makes us look at one another with compassion, welcoming our mutual frailties with respect rather than judging by hearsay and sowing discord and division.

Jesus warns us that every tree is known by its fruit (cf. Lk 6:44): “The good man out of the good treasure of his heart produces good, and the evil man out of his evil treasure produces evil; for out of the abundance of the heart his mouth speaks” (v. 45). This is why, in order to communicate truth with charity, it is necessary to purify one’s heart. Only by listening and speaking with a pure heart can we see beyond appearances and overcome the vague din which, also in the field of information, does not help us discern in the complicated world in which we live. The call to speak with the heart radically challenges the times in which we are living, which are so inclined towards indifference and indignation, at times even on the basis of disinformation which falsifies and exploits the truth.

Communicating cordially

Communicating in a cordial manner means that those who read or listen to us are led to welcome our participation in the joys, fears, hopes and suffering of the women and men of our time. Those who speak in this way love the other because they care and protect their freedom without violating it. We can see this style in the mysterious wayfarer who dialogues with the disciples headed to Emmaus, after the tragedy that took place at Golgotha. The Risen Jesus speaks to them with the heart, accompanying the journey of their suffering with respect, proposing himself and not imposing himself, lovingly opening their minds to understand the profound meaning of what had happened. Indeed, they can joyfully exclaim that their hearts burned within them as he spoke to them on the road and explained the Scriptures to them (cf. Lk 24:32).

In a historical period marked by polarizations and contrasts — to which unfortunately not even the ecclesial community is immune — the commitment to communicating “with open heart and arms” does not pertain exclusively to those in the field of communications; it is everyone’s responsibility. We are all called to seek and to speak the truth and to do so with charity. We Christians in particular are continually urged to keep our tongue from evil (cf. Ps 34:13), because as Scripture teaches us, with the same tongue we can bless the Lord and curse men and women who were made in the likeness of God (cf. Jas 3:9). No evil word should come from our mouths, but rather “only such as is good for edifying, as fits the occasion, that it may impart grace to those who hear” (Eph 4:29).

Sometimes friendly conversations can open a breach even in the most hardened of hearts. We also have evidence of this in literature. I am thinking of that memorable page in Chapter XXI of The Betrothed in which Lucia speaks with the heart to the Innominato [the Unnamed] until he, disarmed and afflicted by a healthy inner crisis, gives in to the gentle strength of love. We experience this in society, where kindness is not only a question of “etiquette” but a genuine antidote to cruelty, which unfortunately can poison hearts and make relationships toxic. We need it in the field of media, so that communication does not foment acrimony that exasperates, creates rage and leads to clashes, but helps people peacefully reflect and interpret with a critical yet always respectful spirit, the reality in which they live.

Communicating heart to heart: “In order to speak well, it is enough to love well”

One of the brightest and still fascinating examples of “speaking with the heart” is offered by Saint Francis de Sales, a Doctor of the Church, whom I wrote about in the Apostolic Letter, Totum Amoris Est, 400 years after his death. In addition to this important anniversary, I would like to mention another anniversary that takes place in 2023: the centenary of his proclamation as patron of Catholic journalists by Pius XI with the Encyclical, Rerum Omnium Perturbationem. A brilliant intellectual, fruitful writer and profound theologian, Francis de Sales was Bishop of Geneva at the beginning of the XVII century during difficult years marked by heated disputes with Calvinists. His meek attitude, humanity and willingness to dialogue patiently with everyone, especially with those who disagreed with him, made him an extraordinary witness of God’s merciful love. One could say about him: “A pleasant voice multiplies friends, and a gracious tongue multiplies courtesies” ( Sir 6:5). After all, one of his most famous statements, “heart speaks to heart”, inspired generations of faithful, among them Saint John Henry Newman, who chose it as his motto, Cor ad cor loquitur. One of his convictions was, “In order to speak well, it is enough to love well”. It shows that for him communication should never be reduced to something artificial, to a marketing strategy, as we might say nowadays, but is rather a reflection of the soul, the visible surface of a nucleus of love that is invisible to the eye. For Saint Francis de Sales, precisely “in the heart and through the heart, there comes about a subtle, intense and unifying process in which we come to know God”. [2] By “loving well”, Saint Francis succeeded in communicating with Martin, the deaf-mute, becoming his friend. This is why he is also known as the protector of people with impairments in communicating.

It is from this “criterion of love” that, through his writings and witness of life, the saintly Bishop of Geneva reminds us that “we are what we communicate”. This goes against the grain today, at a time when — as we experience especially on social media — communication is often exploited so that the world may see us as we would like to be and not as we are. Saint Francis de Sales disseminated many copies of his writings among the Geneva community. This “journalistic” intuition earned him a reputation that quickly went beyond the confines of his diocese and still endures to this day. His writings, Saint Paul VI observed, provide for a “highly enjoyable, instructive and moving” reading. [3] If we look today at the field of communications, are these not precisely the characteristics that an article, a report, a television or radio programme or a social media post should include? May people who work in communications feel inspired by this saint of tenderness, seeking and telling the truth with courage and freedom and rejecting the temptation to use sensational and combative expressions.

Speaking with the heart in the synodal process

As I have emphasised, “In the Church, too, there is a great need to listen to and to hear one another. It is the most precious and life-giving gift we can offer each other”. [4] Listening without prejudice, attentively and openly, gives rise to speaking according to God’s style, nurtured by closeness, compassion and tenderness. We have a pressing need in the Church for communication that kindles hearts, that is balm on wounds and that shines light on the journey of our brothers and sisters. I dream of an ecclesial communication that knows how to let itself be guided by the Holy Spirit, gentle and at the same time, prophetic, that knows how to find new ways and means for the wonderful proclamation it is called to deliver in the third millennium. A communication which puts the relationship with God and one’s neighbour, especially the neediest, at the centre and which knows how to light the fire of faith rather than preserve the ashes of a self-referential identity. A form of communication founded on humility in listening and parrhesia in speaking, which never separates truth from charity.

Disarming souls by promoting a language of peace

“A soft tongue will break a bone”, says the book of Proverbs (25:15). Today more than ever, speaking with the heart is essential to foster a culture of peace in places where there is war; to open paths that allow for dialogue and reconciliation in places where hatred and enmity rage. In the dramatic context of the global conflict we are experiencing, it is urgent to maintain a form of communication that is not hostile. It is necessary to overcome the tendency to “discredit and insult opponents from the outset [rather] than to open a respectful dialogue”. [5] We need communicators who are open to dialogue, engaged in promoting integral disarmament and committed to undoing the belligerent psychosis that nests in our hearts, as Saint John XXIII prophetically urged in the Encyclical Pacem In Terris: “True peace can only be built in mutual trust” (No. 113). A trust which has no need of sheltered or closed communicators but bold and creative ones who are ready to take risks to find common ground on which to meet. As was the case sixty years ago, we are now also living in a dark hour in which humanity fears an escalation of war that must be stopped as soon as possible, also at the level of communication. It is terrifying to hear how easily words calling for the destruction of people and territories are spoken. Words, unfortunately, that often turn into warlike actions of heinous violence. This is why all belligerent rhetoric must be rejected, as well as every form of propaganda that manipulates the truth, disfiguring it for ideological ends. Instead, what must be promoted is a form of communication that helps create the conditions to resolve controversies between peoples.

As Christians, we know that the destiny of peace is decided by conversion of hearts, since the virus of war comes from within the human heart. [6] From the heart come the right words to dispel the shadows of a closed and divided world and to build a civilization which is better than the one we have received. Each of us is asked to engage in this effort, but it is one that especially appeals to the sense of responsibility of those working in the field of communications so that they may carry out their profession as a mission.

May the Lord Jesus, the pure Word poured out from the heart of the Father, help us to make our communication clear, open and heartfelt.

May the Lord Jesus, the Word made flesh, help us listen to the beating of hearts, to rediscover ourselves as brothers and sisters, and to disarm the hostility that divides.

May the Lord Jesus, the Word of truth and love, help us speak the truth in charity, so that we may feel like protectors of one another.

Rome, Saint John Lateran, 24 January 2023, Memorial of Saint Francis de Sales.

-FRANCISCUS

[1] Encyclical Letter Deus Caritas Est (25 December 2005), 31.

[2] Apostolic Letter Totum Amoris Est (28 December 2022).

[3] Cf. Apostolic Epistle Sabaudiae Gemma, on the IV Centennial of the Birth of Saint Francis de Sales, Doctor of the Church (29 January 1967).

[4] Message for the LVI World Day of Social Communications (24 January 2022).

[5] Encyclical Letter Fratelli Tutti (3 October 2020), 201.

[6] Cf. Message for the 56th World Day of Peace (1 January 2023).

-[Courtesy: Vatican.va]

Tribute to His Lordship Most Rev. Peter Parapullil 

on his 

Decennial Anniversary of Episcopal Ordination (2013-2023) 

Hailing from the famed Ernakulam South, travelled far to unknown region in North, chose the city of Virangana as his mission, Father Peter adhered himself to Christ’s Vision.  

Once in Jhansi, he was ablaze with fire, walked with Jesus with burning desire, The poor, the lonely, the unlved there were All he found were God’s children everywhere.

Jesus gave his own heart, a place marvelous to dwell, shepherd His flock, to guide and tend them well, The pastures were dry, the plains of Bundelkhand, the Spirit moved all along, making it lushy green land. 

The 6th of January 2013, was a day to consider, the mantle fell on him when all were in wonder, With the Shepherd’s staff to care and feed, the lost and strayed, to search and lead. 

Coupled with dedication and toil, many a hurdle he brought to foil, retained a clear-vision and willing spirit, none to self, but render Him all the credit. 

Adoration Chapel is “the power house” he dreamt, where young and old find healing, freely rent, the new mission stations were his heart’s longing, available for every function he’ll be there praying.  

The people of Jhansi are safe and sound and secure, so far as the shelter of St Jude the Apostle endure, Bishop Peter has 10 years gracefully completed, as the Spirit has won and devil defeated. 

Ordained to succeed the glorious Apostles, ever on move, turning all stones and thistles, to kindle the light to those in darkness. 

May Jesus walk with you for ever and ever, in sunshine and rain and in cloudy weather, and may Peter, the chief of Apostles for ever inspire and guide you for all ages…

– CRI Members Jhansi , 08.01.2023.

“Be Born Again”

A Christmas Story 

from

Sr. Poonam C.J.

Jesus answered and said unto him, “Verily, verily, I say unto thee, except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.”    (John 3:3)Jesus, the great master, in a decisive tone of authority and certainty, tells this with a pun and the grown-up man, Nicodemus asks in dilemma, “how can I be born again?” Quoting Jesus’ words, I wish to say that it’s not the children but the grown-ups who need to be born again regaining their childlike simplicity, innocence, spontaneity, affection, trust, optimism and purity of motives and desires. At this time of Advent when we already hear the Christmas bells ringing in our hearts, we need to really ask ourselves, do we need to be born again because we have lost our initial grace, purity and nature with which God sent us into the world.

Jesus, the great Messiah chose to be born as a feeble child. It’s the wisdom of our God of paradox although it may seem “folly in man’s eye”, that in simplicity, helplessness and feebleness the mightiest plan came to shape.  What I wish to say is that we need to get back to our original self-i.e.to childlikeness “asa child is the mightiest power in the universe because child is charmingly alive every moment. A child is neither troubled by the wounds of the past nor weighed by the anxieties of future. A child is the creator of the present moment and lives truly in it” (“Courage to be Myself” by Carlos G. Valles)On the contrary we find our society worried to tame children into the likeness of others so called ‘civilized people’. We have seen mothers and fathers stressed too much for a tiny child’s studies as if at the age of four their child was giving class ten board exams.

Let’s truly introspect what beauty God has sent us with.  “Alas,” in the name of civilization and maturity we have lost it. It’s the need of the hour to be born again as a child at this Christmas season. Over the years the heaviest luggage that we carry on our shoulders is our fear to prove oneself before others what we are not. All of us like to show ourselves as intelligent, capable, full of potential, mature, strong, and great managers and we are scared to make mistakes. We are scared to show ourselves as weak and fragile and we neither cry nor break down hiding our vulnerability all the time to show our strength. If we manage to waken the child in us and give him a place in our grown-up life, we shall find a new freshness and liveliness in our heart and shall be able to communicate it to all those around us, which will be the best contribution we can make to the welfare of society today.

Child has the power to be optimistic amidst turmoil and storm. Child lives life to the full by being in his original self. Child is the embodiment of innocence, tenderness and affection. It is in child’s nature to trust and be betrayed, to be vulnerable, to get hurt and forget it, to fight and reconcile the next moment and to do all the funny things as per the promptings of his heart. Once the children in my class demanded not to teach them rather tell them about my life. I paused to their plea and obliged to their questions. A child asked,” What is the name of your mother?’ I answered in all seriousness, “Miss Venus.” Another child asked, “Tell us your father’s name.” Before I could answer, a naughty child spoke loudly, “Jupiter, What else.” The whole class laughed including me. I became an innocent child in their presence and they enjoyed it very much. Another incident that made me a child again where I won each one of their hearts by identifying myself with them. The principal of the school in all his seriousness announced in the school assembly to check children’s nails to teach them hygiene. SpontaneouslyI checked mine and found that I too had forgotten to cut them which brought a smile on my face. It was noticed by one of my students. Having reached the class, maintaining a level of sobriety, I ordered the monitor of the class to note down the names of all those who had long nails. Within five minutes he brought the diary to me in which eleven names were written and the eleventh one was Sr. Poonam C.J. I burst into laughter. If I would have behaved like an adult, being nasty and arrogant, scolding them for their act, I would have lost the beauty of the present moment which I was gifted by them.  A child knows the art of laughing at oneself and makes others laugh at themselves.

I was captured by a tiny photo of a dog’s puppy and a child. Both were on four legs and the child told the puppy that he does not want to grow up as his parents will send him to school and he will miss all the fun of life.  “We have lost our mischief in the lowest recesses of our personality, afraid of being called childish in a world of adults. We have mastered the dulling of our senses and the deadening of our lives. Today’s world needs a child’s laughter to survive.” (“Courage to be myself” by Carlos Gonzalez Valles) Over the years we lose our originality due to training, scolding, teaching, threatening, coaxing and seducing and are formed tactfully into another text book to be read by all. We are born with uniqueness and can not live like text books which are often copied from one another.

Our original self longs to get back to its pristine innocence, humility, openness, simplicity and beauty. How long will we keep running from this call of our heart? At this life’s journey we may find some true and genuine agents who challenge us, break us and help us to re-discover our original self. They can be small children or even liberated adults who have come out victorious from life’s furnace.  These are those liberated souls who have tasted the nectar of freedom, spontaneity, mischief, humility, and can be original at any cost.  Ultimately let’s learn from Jesus the Messiah to be born as a child and live a meaningful and prophetic life no matter what prize it may cost us.

– Sr Poonam CJ, Principal at Nirmala Convent School, Jhansi.

On the Occasion of Christ the King Feast,

Jhansi. 20.11.2022

Dear Friends, brothers and sisters in Christ Jesus,

Once in a conversation with a bishop someone asked that in your Catholic faith the bread and wine change into the body and blood of Jesus.  This is beyond my grasp, may be its impossible, how is it possible?  In reply the bishop reflects a bit and answers.  When we were born we were small, as we get our nutrition and other necessities we gradually grow up physically and become big.  However, the food that we consumed has transformed into flesh and blood.  And you also physically continue to grow.  Similarly why not a bread and wine in the hands of God get transformed ? 

The questions did not end there.  How can your Lord Jesus in a small piece of bread can contain wholly – completely – fully ?  The bishop reflected and replied,  There is a landscape in front of you and you see many things.  But that seeing is through two small eyes.  If through the small eyes if you can see all these, then why not God contain in a small piece of bread?  Above all he is God so anything is possible for Him. 

There came a third question.  In the whole of the universe how can the Lord Jesus be present in small pieces.  The bishop replied, a mirror if you throw on to the ground, it breaks up into many pieces.  Even then in it we can see the same reflection even in a small piece or a big one.  The reflection can be seen fully in the same manner.  In the same way Jesus is present in all the pieces of bread that is transformed into the body and blood of Jesus. 

Dear friends in Jesus Christ,  let us understand about the Holy Eucharist through the Catholic teachings and Vatican council-II.  Lumen Gentium No: 11 and Catechism of the Catholic Church 1324 speaks about Eucharist.  It says that Eucharist is the Source and summit of Christian life.  All the means of our life should be used for the Lord.  Jesus is present in the Eucharist.  And it should be our effort to reach that Jesus in the Eucharist. 

What is the meaning of Eucharist as the source and summit?  First of all the impact of Eucharist is in all Christian, just like the light rays emanate from the sun which affects all of us.  Similarly the Strength from Eucharist affects us.  Secondly, Eucharist is the highest sacrament from which we receive all strength and grace.  Holy Eucharist is the source of all grace in our day to day life.  Basically Holy Eucharist is Jesus Himself.  Rest of the sacraments are the acts of Jesus, but Eucharist is Himself who is the source of grace.  For the sake our salvation he sacrificed Himself on the cross.  This grace works in our Christian life.  Thirdly, the Universal sacrifice of the church is greater because the Lord Jesus because Christ is wedded to the church.  Ephesians 5:21-32 says about this relation between church and Jesus, and the members of this church becomes the temple of Jesus body and blood.  Thus the whole church also becomes the source of all graces.  Fourthly,  Holy Eucharist is the source of Eucharist because it leads us to repentance.  Prior to the reception of the Eucharist we examine our conscience and clenses oneself through the sacrament of repentance.  So that we become ready to accept the Lord. 

Apart from all these, the Eucharist reminds us of the sacrifice that Jesus did for us.  Through the reflection of these we become repentant and clean oneself to live a better and good life.  Holy Eucharist leads us to hope, faith and love. 

When we submit ourselves with intelligence and willingness, Holy Eucharist strengthens us and increases our faith.  Hoy Eucharist is the source of desire.  Desire is such a quality that keeps us alive in our strive towards eternal life and one day we arrive at that Kingdom. 

The command of God is Love of God and Love for our Neighbor.  When we say that we love God but have hatred and anger towards others and have quarrelsome attitude to other, then our claim of love of God is false.  Love for God and Love of Neighbor goes hand in hand.  God loved humanity so much that He sacrificed Himself for us.  And we are able to be present as God’s Children. 

Let us strive to be in the life of the Trinity – Father, Son and Holy Spirit. 

Holy Eucharist is the summit of Christina life.  St Augustine says that the wholeness of life is Holy Eucharist.  The sacrifice of Christ for our sins, therefore the Eucharist is the summit of Christian spiritual life. 

Let us pray to God as well as examine with what manner and disposition we approach the Eucharist? or how we prepare ourselves.  With anger, greed, hatred… with all these sins when we come before the Lord we become unworthy.  The Word we hear that when we go to receive Jesus and on the way we realize we have committed a sin, then leave everything and go back to reconcile with the one, then come and to receive Eucharist.  

My dear brothers and sisters,  many times we receive the Eucharist in an unworthy manner.  Let us pray to God that in our reception of the Eucharist we may prepare ourselves.  Let us truly repent ourselves.  So that we may receive Christ in full manner and receive grace.  Thus our Christian living is Holy and witness Christ in our life.  Amen 

– Fr Frnaky Matthias, Principal at CKC, Jhansi

Fr. Sahayanathan

on the occasion of Christ the King Feast,

Jhansi_20.11.2022

Today the universal Church is celebrating Christ the King of kings; King of the universe.  We celebrate it in a very special way; by way of participating, accepting and receiving the Eucharistic Jesus who is Christ the King of kings.  He gave us the broken body as food and we are filled with this bread of life.  We adore that Christ who is the King of the universe. 

Dear sisters, brothers and children,  Gabriel Marsell, a French Philosopher speaks bout love.  When we say that ‘I love you’, if it is true then He/she sacrifice own very life.  In this universe people keep speaking same, but no one was so to sacrifice own life.  Only one, that is Jesus the Christ, by whose sacrifice we are all saved.  Marcell says that people may say that I love you and will not sacrifice or die for the one whom they say that I love.  Jesus on the other hand said and did so. 

At Vatican city front, there is a pillar which is also a sign.  On it there is a writing which says like this, Christ conquers, Christ Reigns, Christ Commands.  That pillar is not an original structure of the place.  It was brought from a sun temple in Egypt.  This was a sign of cruel kingship.  The pillar says, if any one who don’t obey the king’s order will have death, at times life may end at a hungry animal in the circus camp of Nero, which is also the kings and his high officials’ recreation and entertainment.  It is said that St Peter was martyred upside down at this place. 

However, slowly Christ’s sacrifice for humanity and its strength and love got recognition among kings.  That is why as the time passed the symbol of sun on this pillar was replaced by a cross.  And the words were placed below the cross as ‘Christ conquers, Christ Reigns, Christ Commands’.  The command of Christ is this that ‘love one another as I have loved you…’

How Jesus Christ became a King?  The answer is ‘He fought against evil and sin and fought a battle of truth.  He conquered the world that was cursed with sin.  And how he reigns?  He never reigns with power and might and fist; But with care for the lost, sheep and protecting them his love.  So He is the King of love.  And he teaches us the means of love. 

Pope Pious II established this feast seeing the violence and war between the nations.  Against all these calamities to humanity the Pope raises the voice saiying that let us stop these violence, he exhorted through his encyclical.  In the kingdom of Christ the King of kings there is peace!  Let us accept Him as our King.  The King of the Universe.  King of kings is Christ.  Let us stop war and crime;  Let us promote happiness and joy.  Let us not spoil the peace and untiy.  Let us work in justice and peace.  The Pope had this aim when he established this feast. 

We have heard about Thomas Moore, who was with the King Henry, he was a capable and competent servant.  And he was holding a high rank.  But when the king gets deviated from the moral way of living and abandoning his own wife and marries to another and brings immoral image, Thomas Moore takes a stern objection and he goes away from the palace.  The king was angry.  But Thomas Moore was ready to die for the God whom he serves the highest.  Pollycorp of Smirna was told by the king to stop proclaiming Jesus so that I may set you free.  But Pollycorp replied eighty six years I have stood by Jesus or not, Jesus stood by me.  And against that Lord I will never go against.  He added I am not afraid of this body which will go into ashes in an hour, but I am afraid of the fire of hell that never extinguish.  I am not ready to reject the King of kings Christ Jesus. 

When Jesus was asked by Pilot ‘Are you the King?’ Jesus replies: ‘My kingdom is not of this world.  My kingdom is the kingdom of peace.  Kingdom of peace.’  For the faithful of Christ it is the greatest achievement to acquire a life of truth.  When we proclaim Jesus as the king we must be ready even to quit our life and work.  That is the specialty of the Kingdom of the King of kings. 

Let Jesus who is seated at the right hand of the Father may reign in our hearts, families, society, nation.  Let his carry his love, justice, and truth.  Let us live for the King who is the King of Kings. Amen.

– Fr Sahayanathan, Principal at CKC Academy, Jhansi.

His Excellency Most Rev. Leopoldo Girelli, (Apostolic Nuncio to India and Nepal)

During the Festal Eucharistic celebration at St Judes’ Shrine Jhansi on 28^th October 2022

On 28^th October during Festal Mass, St Jude’s Shrine Jhansi

Your Lordship Rt. Rev. Peter Parapullil Bishop of Jhansi, Rev. Fr. Valerian D’Souza Asst Procurator St Jude’s Shrine, Rev Fr. Christudas Parish Priest of St Jude shrine, Rev. Fathers, Sisters, Brothers and lay people in our Lord Jesus Christ.

I am truly pleased to celebrate Holy Mass for you in this well known Shrine of St Jude.  Dedicated to St Jude Thaddeus one of the Apostles of our Lord Jesus Christ.  The foundation of this Shrine was laid on 29^th October 1956 by Rt Rev. Fenech the first Bishop of Jhansi.  Then ten years later on 27^th October 1966 this Shrine was blessed by the then Apostolic Nuncio to India His Excellency Most Rev James Knox.

I was gladly informed that the thousand of pilgrims that flock to the Shrine of St Jude irrespective of religion, caste or creed, showing the devotion to the patron saint of the desperate cases and lost causes.  Dear Brothers and sisters, the first reading taken from the letter of St Jude, urges the people to keep their faith by cultivating a personal relationship with God through prayer.  The purpose of the letter is to defend the apostolic faith, hence the false teachings.  And cautions the Christians against leading very minimal Christian life.  It also encourages them in the love of God and depend on his mercy, as it is the sure way to eternal life.  The Second reading taken from St Paul to the Ephesians presents the Church as structures build upon the stone of Apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus being the corner stone.  In this regard St Paul clearly states that the Christian life is a life of faith.  And that are saved by God’s amazing grace. 

As a pontifical document  lumen fidei instructs us that faith in Christ brings us salvation, because in him our life becomes radically  open to the love that precedes us the love that  transforms us from within, acting in us, through us. 

Dear Brothers and sisters,  the Gospel reading taken from the evangelis St Juke narrates to us the call of twelve apostles, which marked the beginning of Jesus’ ministry.  After the Baptism, He received from John the Baptist in the waters of Jordan river.  Jesus resolutely call them the Apostles.  And they immediately followed him.  Subsequently aware to become fishers of men and became primary teachers of Gospel message of Jesus.  According to the Gospel account of Mark and Mathew, a place of the call of Mathew the first apostles is the Sea of Galilee.  Before making a crucial election of the apostles Jesus withdrew to the mountain to pray.  Even before other times before significant moments of His ministry Jesus departs to gardens or mountains  to pray, showing us that he stands as communion with the God and man.  Really a mediator between humanity and God. 

Through out in the Gospel of Luke Jesus describes as one who prays.  Two parables on prayer.  Jesus also teaches His disciples the prayers.  And urges them to pray always.  The calling of Apostles is a prayer event.  Having a deep theological significance.  One cannot make oneself a disciple.  As Pope Benedict VII remarks, discipleship is born from prayer of the Son, of Jesus Christ, and his dialogue with the Father, Jesus always makes a closer contact with God the Father.  His chosen Apostles are given a dual responsibility.  First, to be with Him, with Jesus.  And then to be send out by Him.  To preach authority in the name of Jesus.  They must be with Him in order to know him.  In order to attain intimate acquaintance with Him.  The Twelve must be with Jesus to be as to able to recognize His oneness, His unity with the Father.  The man became witnesses to His mystery.  One might say that they have to pass from outward to inward communion with Jesus.  In being with Jesus they see Jesus and in seeing Jesus they see God. 

Jesus by instructing His disciples who leave everything behind and to go and make disciples of all nations clearly revieals a sense of discipleship.  As Pope Francis elucidated, each Christian and every community must discern the path the Lord points out.  But all of us are asked to obey His call to go forth from our own comfort zone in order to reach all the peripheries in need of light of the Gospel. 

When Jesus Christ calls He does not look so much to the quality of the chosen.  But their faith in in Him through obedience to words.  Like Simon Peter said: “Master at your word are we let down in it.  Are we ready to sacrifice our comfort zones and re-orient our priorities, in order to align with God’s priority and plans for us? 

Dear Brothers and sisters, may the Lord grant you the light of faith.  And give you the grace to seek Him Generously with all your heart and follow him closely.   May St Jude your patron intercede for you and lead you to Jesus, the light of the world.  And may God bless each and every one of you.  Amen

His Excellency Most Rev. Leopoldo Girelli, (Apostolic Nuncio to India and Nepal)

Addressing the audience during the cultural evening on the 27^th October 2022 at Shrine front 

Namaste, very good evening to all of you. 

I am very impressed by your great devotion to St Jude.  I thank Your Bishop Peter Parapullil for inventing me to participate in your celebration the feast tomorrow.  I come as a pilgrim, as many of you coming here to celebrate to celebrate, to participate, to pray. As St Jude the great saint, powerful saint who is able to heal our sickness of our soul and not only the sickness of our body.  I would like to share my thought and impressions I have in my heart while coming to Jhansi.

As I come as a pilgrim to Shrine St Jude’s shrine.  But Jhansi as a city in the history of India itself is a shrine and memorial.  Who are reading and studying the history of India cannot but recognize in the great fervor of Jhansi ki Rani the figure of courage to fight for independence and freedom and peaceful co existence which are essential for building a nation a healthy nation.  And we are catholic, Catholic Church we are Catholic Church contributing to building history a good history of this beloved country India.  Through our education through ethical values, instilling values of the gospel, the values beatitudes, values of peace, values of love, forgiveness, reconciliation,  co-existence, harmony all these values are important  to create a people- population  – county that believe in progress, in its well being. Coming along the highway from Delhi, reaching the area of Uttar Pradesh where Jhansi is situated, I realized that that Jhansi is the junction for railways.  Going from Jammu to Kanyakumari – from Calcutta to Bombay.  And this center means something.  Because in life all are pilgrims.  We are on move.  Because the system has a beginning and end.  In this journey we need a center. We need something that keep us stable in life, in our values, in our principles.  Jhansi with this history with this beautiful Shrine of Shrine is a symbol of solid Values in our life.  And this values of justice, honesty, of solidarity and everything that can help us peaceful.  And coming along the highway, I realize and saw there are several villages.  In all these villages there are temple.  Which means you are religious people.  And being religious people means being peaceful people.  These days we are celebrating Diwali.  The festival of light.  And we join with joy the celebration of our Brothers and sisters Hindus, to express our living together respectfully; harmony is the build nation, to build a community. And Pope Francis is very much determined in promoting the brotherhood and fraternity among all the religious people.  So Let us really celebrate this festival of this sentiment of respect and love for each other.

Now allow me to address you with these words.

I am truly glad to be present with you this evening on the occasion of the religious cultural evening  in your spiritual preparation of the feast of St Jude.  In this religious and vas cultural setting, I offer you my greetings and friendship, respect and fraternal love,  I appreciate very much the Indian spirit of fraternal charity, hospitality, dedicated service, forgiveness, sacrifice and renunciation.  Pope Francis exhort us, our life should be like this, to worship, to pray, to journey, to pilgrim, to do penance.  Let us walk together, let us be united.  If we stay united we will discover the right path.  Let us ask God for the gift of peace.  Let us pray to him that He may make us his instruments of his peace in a world still torn by hatred, by division,  by selfishness and greed. May we become powerful instruments of God’s amazing light, and use our talents and gifts for his greater glory. 

I conclude by showing my appreciation for this lovely cultural program that you have prepared.  Depicting the powerful values of compassion, mercy, love and peace.  My wish for you in the award of St Jude, may mercy, peace and love be yours in abundance.  May God grand you with his light and give you the grace to seek him with all your heart.  And May God Bless every one of you.  Thank you. 

–Most Rev. Leopoldo Girelli (Apostolic Nuncio to India and Nepal), during the cultural evening on the 27^th October at Shrine front.

Fr Ronald Tellis

at St Jude’s Shrine on 24^th (sixth day of Novena to St Jude) on the theme Modern challenges to Family.

Before we reflect on today’s theme and the word of God I wish we all pose for a moment and see ‘what is happening to me and to my family and to my community life?.  What are the difficulties and challenges that my family faces? Are we going through a rough time? Are we struggling to be parents?  Are we bothered by our children?  Are we perturbed having our grandparents in our home?  If there is a problem, am I a contributing partner or factor?  Is the family where I live is challenged because of me?  Is it because of the wife or husband or children?  Or is my family is going in accordance with the scriptures as designed by God? 

My dear people of God, we all agree that we have problems in our own families.  We all agree that we are all partners and contributors for this trouble and struggle in our family.  Also the problems in our communities of religious and priesthood, I am a partner and significant member because of whom there is trouble in my community life or in my presbyterium. 

The first reading taken from the letter to the Ephesians, Paul underscores that marriage is a mystery.  It is not a contract.  It is not mere coming together to gratify our sexual needs or desired to produce children but a mystery.  What is the concept when we say that it is a mystery?  What is a mystery rather?  Mystery is a matter which by ourselves we cannot fathom, we need God’s assistance to unravel it or to understand it.  Significantly and consequently it comes down to the point that without God we cannot understand what marriage is.  God created all of us in his image and likeness.  And he created a partner.  That partner in the sacrament of marriage comes together to build a family.  And most beautiful of all Jesus was born in a family.  He did not come down just appearing here on earth.  He took the form of us, we human persons.  And He was born of a virgin-Mary, born in a family. 

God sanctified family life for having born his son amidst us in the form of a man.  Therefore, my dear brothers and sisters, family is the most beautiful unit for the church and for the world.  Hence, when the family is holy the society is holy.  When the society is holy the nation is holy. 

Let us see, what are the challenges we face to live our Christian family life.  There are many.  We can count ocean of them.  If you count one by one, there are innumerable.  But we are not going into discuss and deliberate all those.  But we will see what are the most significant of  them which pertain to our family life.  This challenges my dear brothers and sisters could be external or internal.  When we say internal problem is that struggle or challenges caused by me.  External means a societal factor.  It could be economical, political, social or any other.  But internal or external factors can challenge our family.  Should we not accept that in today’s families there is no family catechesis. 

The major problem we face I our families is lack of family catechesis.  Lack of faith formation.  What is our effort to learn what God has to tell us about family.  All that matters is that we go for a Sunday mass.  Good number of you are coming from Bombay, we know the mass cannot last for 50 minutes because the next shift is there.  And the priest is in a hurry to finish his homily.  It never last for 7-8 minutes.  If it goes more than that the people will say ‘the priest is too long’.  And we have no time.  After that you have to go for shopping.  The children have no time to attend catechetical classes.  With much difficulty we priest track them for first communion, and for confirmation it’s a herculean task to get them together, that’s about it.  And for marriage.  The worst of all our catechesis regarding marriage.  In our diocese we have two days of marriage preparation course.  More than two days is too much.  I don’t know in Bombay it is for three days?  Two full days of marriage preparation.  I was wondering, a priest undergoes 11-12 years of formation to be ordained as a priest.  And for married people two days of course is enough.  Do you think its serious enough?  That for marriage it is enough to learn two days, what is marriage is all about? 

Marriage is not so much different from as regards to the vocation concerned, vocation to priesthood, both are valuable.  One is not better than the other.  Some of us are called to married life, some others are called for Sacred Orders which we call priesthood and there are very many consecrated women.  Don’t you think my brothers and sisters, we take this sacrament of marriage very lightly?  That is the reason why there are so many divorces.  So many break down.  And some of the marriages I known, they have not even lasted a week!  Forget about 25-50-60 years… The reason is lack of preparation for this holy sacrament of marriage.  That is the reason why St Paul said: ‘Marriage is a mystery’.  And to unravel this mystery only God can assist us in our marriages. 

What are we doing with the time what God has given to us?  We all are busy.  Another challenge we face in our family life is that we are too busy.  We have no time.  Running one end to another, pillar to post to make a life most beautiful.  What is the beauty of life         we are running after?  Materialism is eating our life of family as cancer, materialism.  We run after acquire more and more.  The world today and the society tells us what counts is what we have, rather than who we are.  When we run after what we want to process, what we have, we will be never satisfied.  Materialism is a major challenge for our family life, if you can evaluate it.  We run so much to acquire money in any way and any means.  We want to be rich.  We want to show off before the society that we are someone  or somebody.  We would like to show it to externally.  Years back I had gone to one of the shrine for the feast one man appeared there, I could hardly see his body, except that he fully clad with gold.  It looks ridiculous to do such things. 

Do we have time for our family?  Do we have time for our children?  What are we really looking for?  Is there peace in our family?  So much of individualism.  Me and mine.  Lack of understanding between wife and husband.  So many quarrels on petty shows, within a challenge comes we wants to quit?  Lack of perseverance, another challenge in family life.  We can’t persevere.  We are intolerant.  Resistance is so little, that  we want to quit the game with easiest drop of a pen so to say.  So easily we can quit the game because it is difficult.  Commitment, lack of commitment.  Because we know, if I cant match with this man I have another one.  Cannot match with another one, I have another one.  And also feeling that I do not need anybody, I am self sufficient.  I make my life, I can live alone.  ‘God did not create us to live alone’.  God created us to live in a family. 

Another challenge I see in Christian family is so much addiction to internet.  We have heard hundreds of times but then when we speak about challenges its very pertinent that we speak.  How much time we spent on internet?  Our children are busy, there is no place, there is no time for a visitor coming to our house.  Children don’t like to move out of the house, they are happy in their own house.  We are texting and texting and we do not know what are we texting.   My dear brothers and sisters, we need to think seriously.  Is our internet to which we are connected is it helping us?  In what way internet is internet building our families?  Question yourself.  Is it building your family? Or is it ruining your family?  Also ask a question, what we watch on television?  Most of the serials we watch they are confused to hell, so to say.  One is married to two, one is married to one and busy with someone else… what we constantly watch is what our thinking pattern would be.   Remember this.  What we constantly watch and what we constantly see, tend to imitate.  If you watch a serial all the time where family discord is there gradually you tend to agree with it.  Is it not what we watch we agree with?  It is so! It is so in most of the times.   I am close by in the cathedral  church.  When I visit families I see good number of them had good jobs, in railways and things like that.  Another major challenge we face with Christian families is addiction to alcohol.  Drunkenness!  And may be in the context of Bombay drug addiction.  Drug addiction.  How do we tackle them.  Lack of seriousness to apply ourselves to family life will lead us to live our life as we want. 

I would recommend few things which would help us to build our families according to God’s plan.  According to God wants to live the family.  First of all we must make ourselves available for the family catechesis.  Let us send our children regular catechism  and to the church.  It is true that they resist, but can we just give it to that because they resist.  Family counseling rather than quit, because it is difficult.  What is easy my dear brothers and sisters?  Nothing easy in life.  If you have anything to value then it always cost our efforts our energy and sacrifice.  In one words so to say, marriage is a sacrifice.  Sacrificing our ego, is the first thing we do on the day of marriage. 

So I would like to leave your with few questions you need to ask yourselves.  First of all check, how is my family going on?  Is it going on the right path?  What are my children doing and how do I help them to live Christian family life?  Am I the cause for the constant fights in the family?  Am I a person who is so egoistic?  Am I a materialistic person who is worried about money-money-money?  Am I a person who is ready to sacrifice my own self for the sake of the family?  If you want to understand the mystery of the sacrament of marriage there is only one way.  Submit yourself to God.  If you want to know the mystery what God wants us to live, a married life and family, we need to go to God.  We need to read the scriptures which tell us in volumes that where there is love there is sacrifice.  Where there is sacrifice there is forgiveness.  And where there is forgiveness there is adjustments forbearing and perseverance. 

May our families be blessed my dear brothers and sisters.  Let us face the challenges of the families.  And ask God to help us that we may live our family life according to the plan God has designed for us. 

May God bless us all. 

Fr. Stephen Vaz

at St Jude’s Shrine on 22^nd (fourth day of Novena to St Jude) on the theme Parent and Child Relationship. 

Good morning,

I am sure most of you have watched the movie ‘Three idiots’?  Yes you have.  You remember to seen where Aamir Khan after having wing drinking party gets into his girlfriends room there upper room, where he meets the sister of his girl friend, who is pregnant with a child  and speaks to the child.  And he says: “Are bhai tum to andhar hi rah.  Bahar ni nikalna yaha to bada sarkas he.  Tumhara dada – virus, chabuk uthayega aur bathayega ‘Ingineer’ ban.  Yaha badi daud he.  Lekin tum chinta mat kar.  Apne dil pe hat rakh aur batha ‘Aall iiz vell!’”.  And the child kicks.  And the mother says: “Laat maara”.  And again he says: ‘Aall iiz vell!  “Laat maara. 

Communication of the child even in the womb of the mother is a sign for all of us that parenting is the complex undertaking which entails even from the pregnancy, through the child birth, through the infancy, to the teenage, to young adult, even in adulthood. 

Every father and mother knows the difficulties, the joys, the sorrows that come from parenting.  Most of you would agree that a child is part of your heart walking around you, outside you.  And when you feel that the child is part of your heart and you are trying to bring the child up.  It is an undertake rich with emotion, joys and sorrows.  Therefore parenthood is an endless series of small events, periodic conflicts.  Sudden crisis.  And all these calls for a response. 

If you see today’s gospel, all these parenting aspects are entailed in this Gospel.  There is a crisis that the child was lost after three days of walking back they understand that the child is not among us, the crisis.  There is a parental response that they get up and go back to the temple where they came from because they want to look for the child.  Anguish, anxiety, there is communication.  Where were you?  We were looking for you for three days!  And there is a child’s response: Do you not know I must be in my father’s house?  All these intricacies of this Gospel entail the parenting complexity. 

The crisis!  Proverb 22:6 says Train up your child the way he should go even when it is old he will not depart from it.  No mother, no father wakes up in the morning to make the child’s life miserable.  No mother wakes up and says that today I will nag, I will trouble, I will yell and I will bite; no mother says that.  Rather every morning the mother would say: “Today is going to be a peaceful day, there no arguing, there is no trouble, there is no despair.  But with all the wishful thinking the contrary happens.  And when this happens the call for the parent to respond, a call from principal’s office; ‘come into the office your child has made something’. A call from the neighbor: ‘your child has broken the window’. Sometimes the call from the police: ‘your child is fighting on the road.  What is the response of that crisis in us?  Most of the times response to this crisis is threat that if you do it again I will make sure that you are beaten up black and blue.  The threat always calls for the invitation to the misbehaviors.  Child does not hear if you do this again; he hears only do this again; and child does it again. 

Bribe! If you behave I will get you a bicycle at the end of the year.  If you get so many marks I will give you this.  If you behave in the house I will take you to the movie.  Bribe!  Promise!  Promise me that you will behave in future fine.   Present misbehavior is substituted by the future good behavior which doesn’t exist. 

Sacrasm!  Are you deaf, cant you hear me?  Why don’t you listen?  Sarcasm.  Discipline, the hard discipline, the cane discipline.  Beat up the child, the only thing that we know that we need to slap cross the face.  And that’s all what we know.  The physicians have a room.  In latin they say’premum non notere’, do not do the damage.  As we read in the second reading today: ‘Fathers do not provoke your children, rather bring them up in discipline and instruction of the Lord’.  What is the response of parents at these problems, all these illegitimate    response that’s spoke off?  Rather, it entails one thing, teaching the responsibility.  Transmitting the values rather than making them to comply to the rule that I have made as an authoritarian.  Remember, responsibility cannot be imposed.  It can go out from within fed from the values that is given in the family and in the community.  The value system that I woke every day the children don’t want to listen but want to see.  The value that I evoke as a parent in the house set the tone of my own family.  Therefore the value system that I inculcate in my own life and the boundaries that I set determines where the child should go. 

Instruct your children  in the spirit of the Lord, even in the old age would not grow out of it.  The value system, the daily prayer that we speak about.  The Spiritual aspect in our own life, our own spirituality, our own composure in the times of crisis, the reactions that we in fact share with our own children.  The communication. 

AS the father and mother of Jesus said: ‘where were you?  We were looking for you for three days!’  The communication.  Again in Latin would say: ‘Verba potenses’ or ‘verba valent’.  The words have the power.  The famous psychologist Powel says: ‘the words are like knives, unlike the surgeon who makes the incision at the exact place.  We try at random make incisions everywhere until it hits in one place.  Leaving the open wounds of the child in the heart.  That is what is called provoking the children into anger, anxiety and their own self defunctness. 

The communication that we are entailed with is of understanding.  It is not reacting to the child, rather it is feeling with the child to a particular behavior.  Rather reacting to the innermost being of the child that matters the most.  Finally the justification: did you not know that I was in  my father’s house?  Justification is a communication that in seeing the world in child’s eyes. 

There was a little boy Antie.  Who came to the father and said: ‘Dad, what is the statistics of the abandoned children in the city?’ Dad was a lawyer, and he gave all the statistics possible and he was so glad that his child is interested in social issues and social values.  The child goes again: ‘Dad, what is the number of one children in the city?’  The child kept asking the question until the father understood that he is not interested in social values or social justice.  He is afraid that he would be abandoned one day because he had seen a series in the TV that the children are abandoned by their parents.  He is frightened inside. 

Are we ready to see the world in children’s eyes?  Jesus says: ‘Let the little children come to me, to them belongs the kingdom of God’.  They have their own of course.  Their own understanding.  No question of a child is without a particular purpose.  It has a purpose.  Only we don’t have the time to react.  We don’t have the time to explain.  How do I justify every question of my child in my house matters a lot.  Children are like wet cement.  You scratch over it, the scratches will last till the cement last.  If you dig over it, a dog walks over it, it will be seen for ever.  But if you polish it, it shines through out.  Are we ready to make our own children as polished cement or a scratched or stepped on?  Or destroyed cement?  We will leave the marks for life. 

What is the goal of parenting?  The goal of the parenting is growing the child in the spirit of the Lord, in compassion, commitment and care.  It’s our words which can brutalize or it’s our words that can civilize.  It’s our words that can injure.  It’s our words which can heal.  The power of words that we take around all the time,  perhaps call for us to understand before we speak to our own children.  We are called today in communion with our children, as parent in the spirit of the Lord.  In the spirituality that is taught to us.  In the spirit of the words that is given to us.  In the spirit of strength that is given to us.  We are called to bring up our children in the religion and spirituality  that is embedded in their hearts. 

It is the parents who set the tone at home.  Children absorb everything that the parents say every day.  They value the values system that the parents have, because the best hero for the child is his/her dad and mom!  There you go!  What value system do I set myself matters what is reflected in the child each day.  The parenting goes through the pregnancy, they understand there in the womb of the mother whether the parents are happy or the mother is taken care, whether she is giving me life, whether she is cared for? The child understands.  The bond that is established after the child birth when the child holds the finger, and not let go.  Every silly question that the child ask during the infancy: ‘Dad what is this? Why is this…  Do I have the time to answer?  The angry teenager, The defined teenager I meet everyday, what is my reaction to that one?  Do I yell?  Do I scratch my head all the time?  Do I pull my hair down?  Perhaps it is the time for us to understand, to be a parent value based, spiritually based, praying to the Lord, setting values in my own community, setting values in my own family, setting values to myself.  The relationship of child parent goes not because the child is bad but because the value system is wrong. 

Let us pray, it is the time to learn.  Let us pray each day that our families be blessed.  Let us pray that our families be given strength.  Father and mother – togetherness, caring, compassion, love, commitment… all these values be embedded in my own family.  Let us pray each day that the depth of prayer in my family will reflect in the character of my child even in his/her old age would not deter from it. 

In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. 

Fr. Valerian D’Souza

(Procurator at St Jude’s Shrine Jhansi)

25. 10. 2022

Dear Pilgrims, lovers of St Jude,  From today (25 -27^th October) Triduum days have commenced. 

We have with us Fr. John Roshan Pereira as our Triduum Preacher, to lead us and guide us with the Word of God. 

Eucharistic Celebrations would follow the same time table as 6. 30 am in English, 4. 30 pm Rosary followed by Mass in Hindi.

All the three days an hour long healing services would be held at 11. 00 am to 12. 00 pm at the Shrine of St Jude.  

On all the three days various cultural events would entertain the pilgrims at the evening hours after the Hindi Mass and veneration of Relic.

On the 28^th (Feast Day)

Mass in Marathi followed by veneration of the Relic of St Jude – 5. 30 a.m.; 

Mass in English followed by veneration of the Relic of St Jude at 6. 45 a.m.; 

Main Mass in English by His Eminence Most. Rev. Dr. Leopoldo Girelli – the Apostolic Nuncio to India followed by veneration of the Relic of St Jude would be held at 9. 00 a.m.

Mass in English followed by veneration of the Relic of St Jude at 12 p.m.;

Mass in Hindi at  4. 00 p.m. Followed by Solemn procession with the Relic of St Jude; Blessing of the sick; followed by Benediction of the Most Blessed Sacrament.

Through the intercession of St Jude, may the Blessing of the Almighty God be upon all of You and Your dear ones.

God Bless

Rt. Rev. Peter Parapullil

(Bishop of Jhansi)

At the Inaugural Mass at St Jude’s Shrine 

19. 10. 2022

19. 10. 2022

My dear Pilgrims,

Today, on the first day of Novena, we hoisted the flag denoting the commencement of the Novena.  A beautiful theme is given to us today to reflect on that God created the family.  The fundamental doctrine of the Catholic Church is as God revealing Himself as a Trinitarian-God. We start all our prayers all in the name of the God. In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.  In God there is a family, three persons coming together. And how Jesus is teaching us that I am in the father and the father is in me.  And the spirit flows from us in the union of the Father     in the union of the father and of the Son the spirit Proceeds.  The unity of the three persons as one.  All of us sitting and participating in this mass and those who are watching alive. We all are created in the image of God.  We are all persons and not things.  When we are treated like things we feel bad.  Because things are used and thrown in the dustbin.  But people are respected accepted and dignified.  We are true persons. 

If a person is very selfish and ego centered, very much isolated, that person dies very fast.  There is no growth in that person.  We say, our father of the nation Mahatma Gandhi is Mahatma because he gave up everything for the freedom of the nation.   To give us freedom fraternity and equality.  He gave up everything.  Jesus is person par excellence. Who hanged himself for us.  Now we know what is the meaning of the person.  God the Father loved us so much that He gave us his only begotten son.  And Jesus loved us so much that He died on the cross for us, for the salvation of God. And the Holy Spirit sanctified us.   To give us enthusiasm to everyone of us.   Makes us members of His mystical body of Christ.  Constantly giving totally to us human beings.  God created in his own image and likeness.  We are the image of God when we are charitable when we give ourselves to others.  When we love everyone, we become His image. 

My dear brothers and sisters in Jesus Christ, let us learn to give ourselves totally for others.  Jesus became a person par-excellence because of total giving.  Even the last drop of blood he shed for other. Let us learn to give to others, to the family, to the society whom we meet in our life.  The community would become beautiful.  Because of the love for others.  When we give our love to others and totally give ourselves to others so that God may live in us and we become in the image and likeness of God. 

Today’s theme helps us to reflect and to give ourselves to others like Jesus who emptied himself fully.  Let us learn to  give ourselves totally for others and being loving always we will have life.  More we empty ourselves, God will fill our emptiness and fill us with His Spirit, It is then we become in the image and likeness of God. 

God Bless.

Fr. Valerian D’Souza

(Procurator at St Jude’s Shrine Jhansi.

17. 10. 2022

Dated: 17. 10. 2022

Prayerful greetings to You all the the devotees of St Jude Thaddeus.  

The Preparation for the Novena to St Jude and the feast thereafter is at hand.  I invite all the devotees and friends of St Jude to the altar of St Jude at Jhansi. 

Like previous years the Novena days will begin on the 19th;  at 6. 00 am Rosary followed by the flag hoisting, Eucharistic celebration and the Novena (all in English) by the Bishop of Jhansi Rt. Rev. Peter parapullil.  There after the 6. 30 Eucharistic celebration and the Novena will take place all Nine days of Novena.

All the Novena days in the evening 4. 30 pm Rosary, Solemn High Mass, Novena and Veneration of St Jude’s relic would take place in Hindi.  

Services in Marathi: all the Novena days at 8. 00 a.m.  (On Sunday 8. 30 a.m.) Marathi Mass and Novena by Fr. Ashley Banga and Fr. Villas Correia.  

All Novena days at 11. 00 a.m.,  Charismatic Healing prayer service would be conducted inShrine by Fr. Sadanand and Team.  

On the 27th October 4. 30 pm Solemn Eucharistic Celebration will be presided over by Rt. Rev. Joseph Kaithathara.  

Feast day Chief Celebrant would be His Eminence Most. Rev. Dr. Leopldo Girelli – Apostolic Nuncio to India. 

On the 25th, 26th and 27th after evening Mass Various Cultural events at Shrine front would entertain the Pilgrims and all the people present.  

Further information and updates would happen well in time.  

God Bless !