Blessed Trinity - Perfection of Love.

The Holy Trinity, whose feast we celebrate today, is outside the reach of time and beyond the grasp of human reasoning. It is a mystery of our faith. We can only fumble in the dark in search of glimmers of light. “Two is company, three is a crowd” is a popular expression. The gospel would have it otherwise. There, the figure three symbolises completeness and perfect symmetry, and re-appears at all the key moments of the Christ story.

            The life of Christ constantly reflected the Trinity. Three figures make up the nativity scene in Bethlehem — the Holy Family of Jesus, Mary and Joseph. Their first visitors - wise men, brought three gifts. Later, in the desert preparing to begin his public life, Jesus was tempted three times by the devil. A good story should have a beginning, middle and an end. Christ was a storyteller par excellence and three figures prominently in his parables. The Prodigal Son is about a father and his two sons; the Good Samaritan tells of the three passers-by, the priest, the Levite and the Samaritan; the sower sowed his seed in three kinds of soil, yielding three kinds of harvest.  The crucifixion scene has three figures, Christ between two thieves. Before his resurrection, he spent three days in the tomb.

            God is love. There are Three Persons in the Trinity, the Father the Son and the Holy Spirit. Together they represent the fullness of love. The Father loves the Son, the Son loves the Father. The Holy Spirit is their love for each other. We are made in the image of a triune God. God the Father, who created us, his Son who saved us, and the Holy Spirit who continues to guide us. Our lives should reflect the Trinity. We should be always creative like the Father, compassionate like his Son, and dispose our talents in the service of others like the Holy Spirit…

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A story is told of an activist who complained to God at the end of a long day: “God, you don’t care about us! Why do you allow all these: war, hunger, sickness to happen? Why are you not doing anything?” god looked at him with tenderness and love and said: “I did something, my son. I created you!”

Life has taught me that there are only two hard, incontrovertible facts; there is a God, and, I’m not Him.

Praying is something we do in our time, the answers come in God’s time.

Healthy Relationship...

As with the chopsticks, a relationship must be held neither too loose nor too tight but just right. There is no fixed rule as to who should be below or above. One is not enough to serve its purpose. You have to stay together for a purpose and for a mission. So do not chop each other but stick to each other because God has brought you together.

Our Roles - Lesson from John the Baptist.

            Conflict in any relationship arises from several factors. In work-related relationships in particular, role ambiguity occurs when someone is uncertain about what is expected of him/her. Relationship-related stress can actually be minimized, if not altogether avoided, if roles and competence are clearly defined. Having such would allow all parties in any relationship to know what to expect from each other.

            John the Baptist for his part had a clearly defined task. This entailed knowing fully well when and where his role begins and ends. One day upon seeing Jesus he testified about Jesus to the crowd, saying”…the reason why I came baptizing with water was that He might be made known to Israel” (Jn 1:23). Earlier in this same incident when asked of his identity John categorically stated that he is not the Messiah (Jn 1:15) and appropriated to himself the role of “a voice crying in the wilderness” (Jn 1:17) to herald the coming of the real redeemer of the world. Indeed when roles are clearly made conflicts of expectations and their resulting stress are fairly put at bay and prevented.

            Best wishes for the year 2017, full of JOY and Role completion.