MOVING FORWARD UNDER THE GUIDANCE OF ST JOSEPH

I understand we have put a lot of effort and hard work to make Lenten observance and Easter Triduum a meaningful and significant one for our families and us. Immediately after that we have begun with our Novenas to St Joseph, the Worker. The organising committee have planned and coordinated well the novenas these past days. The feast day celebration with the procession will be 30^th April 2017 (Sunday) and we shall end the feast of St Joseph with thanksgiving Mass on Monday, May 1st. These past three weekends starting from the Easter Triduum celebrations, Divine Mercy Sunday and Novenas we have really worked hard to put our best foot forward in hopes that our community to experience and encounter with the Risen Christ.

During these past days I have noticed the church comers for the novena Masses are fewer than previous year. Many of you could not attend the nine-day novenas. Probably, you are too busy and exhausted with so many things. Some of you have taken on a lot of responsibilities and working hard for your companies, offices, schools and families. Some others have to make many sacrifices of time and effort for your families to raise your children with dignity, hope and basic values. Besides these we too are trying to attend as many social events as possible. Nevertheless, all those who came for the novenas have experienced inner healing, obtaining special graces, renewal, transformation and growing in virtues and holiness.

We have come to the end of Novenas and feast of St Joseph. We have been focusing on our four commitments mainly on Prayers, Word of God, Sacraments and New Evangelisation. All our preachers of the days have specified some kind of direction for us to seek out how the mission may be carried out and how to make them come to a realisation in our families and our parish community. They have offered the words of encouragement, support and challenged every parishioner to become more convinced in your daily commitment as Catholics and strengthen the call to be more faithful community.

Today our parish community has been greatly enriched and nourished by faith since our Easter celebrations and novenas. We need to work together to reflect a concern for one another in our parish. Today, we are challenged to bring God’s love, justice, and peace to our families, BECs and society at large. Not everyone can do everything, but our parish should be a sign of unity in pursuing a consistent concern for all who come to our parish. I believe that some of you just realised your potential to know one another better in our parish community and an opportunity to serve in our parish and those in need, to work for justice, and to pursue peace. Let us not put many other things on our shoulders that don’t belong to us. Be patient! We need to trust in Jesus and we still need Him in everything that we do. We still need the guidance of the Holy Spirit to give us strength and courage in all matters. Do pray to Jesus and he will cast your anxieties and troubles. Let’s make a steady progress in our faith.

We offer our gratitude and admiration to all those priests who celebrated our Novenas to St Joseph. As we look back at our celebrations do take a deep breath and take the challenge with new commitment towards strengthening our faith community. 

St Joseph, Pray For Us!

REJOICE IN THE SPIRIT OF EASTER

Easter has begun on 16 April and it will end with Pentecost Sunday on 4 June. These 50 days of the Easter season between Easter Sunday and Pentecost is a time to rejoice and a time to experience what it means when we say Christ is Risen. He is very much alive in us, among us and through us. In these seven weeks, we are also called to celebrate and ponder the birth of the Church (Acts 2) and gifts of the Holy Spirit and how we are to live as faithful disciples of the Risen Christ.

This sacred period of fifty days makes it the longest liturgical season in the liturgical year, longer than both Christmas and Lent. It is a time to celebrate new life in Christ. Coming to Church throughout this time is very important. The Risen Christ will change us and transform us always. We need not be afraid of change. He gives us hope and encouragement through faith. Eastertide reminds us even as we fail, that God will never fail us and His love is always new and never fails.

As we celebrate new life in Christ and the gift of peace in this season of Easter, let us remember the prayer of St. Francis of Assisi to be “instruments of Christ’s peace”. Peace of Christ grows when we live as reconcilers and in harmony with all of God’s creatures. I am very much inspired with his prayers, which goes: “Where there is hatred let us bring Your love. Where there is injury, let us bring Your pardon. Where there is doubt, let us bring faith. Where there is despair, let us bring Your hope. Where there is darkness, let us bring Your light. Where there is sadness, let us bring Your joy.” It is a very fitting prayer for peace after the celebration of Easter Sunday.

Now, we are in the midst of celebrating our Novena to St Joseph, the Worker that starts on 22nd April and will end on 1st May with our feast-day celebration. We, as “Easter People”, shall carry the joys of Easter with us in every aspect of our lives especially during our Novena and feast of our Patron Saint. I pray that during this nine-day novena period, every parishioner and pilgrim to our Parish may obtain special graces for all your petitions. May our celebrations during these days bolster the faith of the individual and our community as well. I hope this Easter season, our novena period and feast day celebration will bring new life, new strength and freshness in your faith.

During the Easter Vigil, our parish community welcomed 10 new Catholics (6 from the Tamil-Speaking community and 4 from the English-Speaking community) through the Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults (RCIA). They have gone through a period of enquiry, searching and contemplating since June last year and also through a Lenten time of enlightenment and purification towards the Easter Sacraments of Baptism, Confirmation and Eucharist. They have just begun their life-long journey of a faith as Catholics. They have also come to the final period of the RCIA journey. It is called mystgogy, a Pentecost experience of mystery. It will last for 50 days until the Pentecost feast. It is a time for deepening your spiritual experiences in order to enter more fully in the life of the Church. Stand firm in your faith and be courageous!

            

LET US JOURNEY AS AN EASTER PEOPLE

During Lent and Holy Week we might have found it a little tough to see ourselves as truly changed persons. We might have tried our best to keep the season a fruitful and meaningful one. Probably we have failed repeatedly in our attempt to keep the Lenten observance. In all our failures, we need to remember that Jesus was a failure in the eyes of the world but He was a success in the eyes of God the Father. The important thing is not to give up in discouragement. God knows your heart and your contrition.

Lent and Holy Week journey have ended and no doubt we were constantly challenged and demanded during these period. All our experiences, practices, involvements, understandings and knowledge, which we have obtained during the Lent and Holy Week has brought us to celebrate Jesus in Easter today.

Today we celebrate Easter Sunday and the Easter season begins. It is a season where we celebrate our NEW lives once again. The Lord has risen in our midst. His resurrection marks the triumph of good over evil, sin and death. Because He is risen “the old life has gone, the new life has begun!” (2 Cor 5:17). We have come to a knowledge who Jesus is for us and what He has done in our lives. Easter is not a one-time celebration but we are reminded daily that through our faith in Jesus we experience the NEW every day. The Risen Lord makes our lives NEW by forgiving all the wickedness of our past.

Our whole journey of Lent has been pointing us towards the baptismal font. It is a very important part of the liturgy and this is the whole point of our Lenten journey. Here, at this part we do a renewal of our baptismal promises at Easter Vigil and Easter Sunday. It is the one time of the year we recall our baptism and Jesus gives a NEW hope once again in our lives. We as individuals and as a community give birth to the Church. It is what Lent and Holy Week was building up to our faith lives.

Every Sunday when we recite our community prayer there is one part that goes, “We are blessed here at the Church of St Joseph with many opportunities to serve and grow in our faith journey.” On Easter, we are given a NEW birth and NEW hope in faith. As individuals or as a community let’s take very opportunity to seek, to serve, to love, to obey, to grow and to trust in the Risen Lord. This will be our Easter celebration. As St Paul advises us to “celebrate the feast, not the old yeast, the yeast of malice and wickedness but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth,” (1 Cor 5:8). In this the importance of our Lenten observance comes to the forefront of our lives.

BE CHEERFUL! CHRIST HAS RISEN FOR YOU AND FOR YOUR LOVELY FAMILY. HAPPY EASTER! CELEBRATE WITH A LOT OF HAPPINESS AND THANKSGIVING.

PEACE BE WITH YOU!

The disciples sat in that upper room grumbling, praying, arguing, discussing, pondering, and recalling the words of Jesus. Jesus came to the disciples in the midst of their confusion and chaos of their lives and said, “Peace be with you.”

Jesus was alive, risen from the dead, and standing among them. They experienced joy, tears, happiness, excitement, and a burden of despair had been lifted from their hearts. Jesus gave them; a peace that relived their grief, a peace that calmed their fears, a peace that was filled with joy and the fulfillment of the resurrection promise. They were now at peace with themselves.

Eight days later He came and gave that peace to Thomas. Thomas could now be at peace as he exclaimed that Jesus was his "Lord and God." Peace with one’s self can only be achieved with one has peace with God through Jesus Christ.

We need to be like Thomas. We can have peace in our lives, an inner peace if we surrender our will to Christ. Certainly! Jesus says, “Peace be with you.”

THANK YOU JESUS!

Jesus was beaten. He was bruised and He was crucified on the cross.

The cross is an interesting thing. It was invented as a means of torture, execution and death sentence. It was designed to express a painful, disgraceful, shameful, death. It was a symbol of hopelessness and punishment.

Today the cross is a symbol of hope, forgiveness and new life.  Today, on this Good Friday, as we look at the cross we ask ourselves: Why we use a cross on our neck, at the doorway, etc.? And what was accomplished on the cross?

Look at Jesus who was rejected and condemned by his own people; betrayed and denied by his own disciples and friends; and led to the death of a criminal. No one can go through a greater suffering like Jesus.

Today, look at Jesus on the cross and say to Him, “Thank you Jesus, you did it for me. I will never forget it”.