A Human's Struggle to stay Human

Lent in the Syrian Orthodox church commenced with the biblical passage – The Wedding at Cana - wherein which the water in the six stone jars was transformed to wine by Jesus the Christ. The six stone jars represent the six weeks of lent. The Church fathers with great theological anticipation set the almanac with this pericope at the forefront of Lent explicitly urging the faith community to transform our six weeks of ordinariness (water) to extraordinariness (wine).   The Church has reached the mid of lent today. On the one hand it is indeed a great joy because our three jars are full at the same time we ought not to forget that our three more jars remain empty.   Mid-lent should engulf us with a commingling of feelings so that we could draw impetus from them to carry on this transformative and explorative journey forward with great enthusiasm. Enthusiasm is not an abstract emotion rather it is a derivative of the Greek word ‘enthusiasmos’ which means ‘to be possess...

Imperfections are just perfect. Our imperfections are our uniqueness. We are what we are because of our perfect imperfections. Yet we live in a world where there is absolutely no space for imperfections. For instance check out the alternative expressions used for people with disability – ‘differently abled’, ‘special children’ etc. Nancy Eiesland was a professor at the Candler School of Theology at Emory University. She was born with a congenital bone defect, underwent numerous operations in her youth and experienced considerable pain as well as disability. Nancy in her book ‘The Disabled God’ opines; Euphemisms for persons with disabilities have abounded in recent years, including ‘differently abled’……These people maintain that Euphemisms deny the fact that disabilities do exist and reinforce the idea that disabilities must be camouflaged to make them acceptable for public. This tendency to sanitize certain ‘imperfect’ concepts through euphemisms itself gives the clarion ...

A man visited a Sufi Guru. On entering the Guru’s room the visitor felt uncomfortable as there was no chair for him to sit. Visitor: You could have a chair at least. Guru: Where is your chair? Visitor: My Chair? I am journeying Guru: So am I. We are all journeying. “Life is a journey and not a destination” are the words of Ralph Waldo Emerson. The beauty of this journey is that it has no destination. The problem of having a destination while journeying is we get fixated on it and ‘the moments’ lose their significance whereas to journey without destination is to enjoy the vitality of each moment.  Live in the moment  is what I would urge my readers to adhere to this lent. We may either look back, brood on our past and lose our spontaneity in life - to put it in biblical rhetoric, become a pillar of salt (Gen 19: 26) or we could be anxious about future and make life chaotic. In both the cases we are compromising the joy of this journey. How conveniently we ...

Woman right from the Garden of Eden was non-conformist. She never believed in blind obedience rather she preferred to encounter absurdities and uncertainties having the audacity to pay for it no matter however severe it was. Her  willingness to deal with contingencies is what makes her ‘faithful’. She explicates radical and subversive versions of faith; after all to have faith is to exhibit the nerve to be non-conformists. No wonder God chose a woman’s womb to incarnate. The Bible is impregnated with such non-conformist women viz. Eve, Tamar, Esther, Vasthi, Mary Magdalene, Shiprah and Puah, Ruth, Deborah, Mother Mary, Hagar, Hannah and many more. The gospel portion set apart for today according to the Syrian Orthodox almanac deals with yet another non-conformist woman i.e. Canaanite/Syrophoenician woman (St. Matthew 15: 21-31). This is a familiar passage to all of us. Moreover men never forget especially those passages where women are humiliated – irrespectively by God ...

Life should be an ardent search for reasons to love and embrace rather than hate and exclusion. Jesus spent his entire life relishing with the people whom the world naively called ‘sinners’. We are so reluctant to love others that we desperately search for reasons to keep them at bay. ‘Sinner’ is one such word used to legitimize our discrimination; as if we know what exactly sin is. Swami Vivekananda once remarked My Vedanta doesn’t recognize the definition of ‘Sin’. A Hindu does not brand any of you as a sinner. You are all sons and daughters of the Great God. According to Vedanta calling someone sinner is the greatest sin. No Christian has to become a Hindu nor has a Buddhist to convert to Christianity. Reach God choosing your own path – this is the message of Vedanta. Mahatma Gandhi also opined, “To call people sinner is to undermine their humanity.” India is too good in qualifying someone a sinner and Caste System is its chief paradigm. Indian soil gave birth ...

Why this obsession with skin colour? Would you believe if I were to say that India is a racist country? Look at the commercial advertisements, review the excessive sale of cosmetics for fairness in India, observe the casting of actors in movies (especially the complexion of heroes and villains), take a look at the matrimonial ads; in these we would see the tentacles of the ugliest form of racism protruding. It often wonders me how racial we are even while naming the ‘beauty’ products – ‘Fair & Lovely’. This gives the message that only that which is fair is lovely. Who decides the yardsticks of fairness and beauty in this country? Is beauty ascribed to skin colour? Casteism is invariably present in this nation and now racism is also at its rise. Shame on anyone who tries to define beauty on the premise of skin colour. Women are the most vulnerable victims to the pervasive racism in this country. Mudra Mukesh an academician, lecturer and researcher disturbingly writes; ...

Who decides my mode of Fast? My religion, Church, Society or me? Isn’t the core of these rituals or any ritual for that matter, to make humans recover the fragrance of humanity? Then why aren’t we respecting the autonomy of humans? This Lenten season I urge my readers to foster their own eccentricities no matter however foolish it may seem to be. Choose your mode of fasting by asking just one question to you and you alone. “Does this help me make a better me?” This reminiscence me Castaneda’s beautiful thought; Any path is only a path and there is no affront to oneself or to others, in dropping it if that is what your heart tells you. Look at every path closely and deliberately. Try it as many times as you think it necessary. Then ask yourself and yourself alone, one question. Does this path have a heart? If it does, the path is good; if it doesn’t, it is of no use.   I have friends who have resorted to various kinds of fast viz, Carbon Fast, Cyber Fast and so on...