Feb 2014 newsletter

© St. Mary’s Malankara Catholic Church, Toronto

MONTHLY EVENTS

FEBRUARY 2014 Newsletter Volume 5 Issue 8

Feb 2

Sunday School

Examination (2:00

pm)

Feb 9

Exarchate Bible

Quiz

TBD

Ladies prayer

meeting at John &

Jincy’s residence

(6:30 pm)

Contact Information Fr. John Kuriakose

Tel: (416) 485-7781

[email protected]

Malankara Catholic Church St. Mary’s Mission Toronto

St. Eugene’s Chapel◊13 Regina Avenue◊Toronto, Ontario◊M6A 1R2 [email protected]

www.stmarysmalankaracatholicchurchtoronto.ca

Sunday Liturgy

3:00 PM Adoration of

the Blessed Sacrament

3:30 PM Song Practice

4.00 PM Namaskaram &

Confession

4.30 PM Holy Mass

INSIDE THE ISSUE

SHOWCASE:

Knowing Yourself to Know God

2-3

SAINT OF THE MONTH:

St. Aldegundis

4

Kids Korner 5-6

We see in the lives of all, a drastic change when they have a

real encounter with Jesus. It sprouts into them the understanding of

being the children of God. While some abandon their whole life situation

to fully experience Christ, others too change their ways of living to make

Christ the highest priority in their lives. Take a look at the “Saint of the

month” article which shows a great example of St. Aldegundis who took

such a decision in her life.

Pope Francis, these days, has been reminding us that we are

not living a Christian life just because we are baptised. We must

encounter the Lord and seek it in our daily chores. Have a read through

the article titled “Knowing Yourself to Know God” to learn how we can

start to understand God through our own bodies, desires and

relationships. As the dawn of lent approaches, we ought to take few

moments in reflection, to find out our God’s presence in our lives. May

the Moonnu nombu starting on the 10th of February be a prelude to our

journey ahead.

Like these great examples of the saints before us who lived a

normal life, who lived a life for Christ, truly encourage us this month to

think beyond ourselves and move us to greater goodness.

- The Editorial Team

Table of Editors Editors ------------------- Jonathan Mani, Sebin Alexander

Layout-------------------- Lynn Babu

Chief Editor------------- Amit Mathews

Advisor------------------- Rev. Fr. John Kuriakose

Got Feedback? Please address to Amit Mathews (Chief Editor) at

[email protected]

Letters will be published in the next issue of the bulletin

mailto:[email protected]


Malankara Catholic Church

Knowing Yourself to Know God

The importance of knowing oneself has been the mantra of successful people and true artists in the modern time, and has been expressed throughout the past. In human communities that prize both conformation and individualism, this is a strange concept, and one that has difficulty being reconciled.

In comes the Catholic Church, who in Her infinite wisdom by the grace of Christ, never falls into one camp or the other, but always rises above with the right answer. Prizing both the unrepeatable uniqueness of the individual within the service of the community we are given, the Church defines what a vocation is. It is our call to holiness in the avenue best suited to our individuality and the community to which we are sent, whether parish, cloister, religious, or family community.

But the only way we can truly discover our unique vocation is through closer and closer relationship with Christ. Living out our vocations, unique to each of us, brings us closer to Christ, but Christ is who gives us the ability to live out our vocations.

What we can eventually deduct from this is that truly knowing ourselves in increasing fullness leads us to God, and knowing God in growing fullness helps us to understand ourselves. Searching for truth within leads us to the ultimate truth, and the ultimate truth leads us to interior understanding.

The question of which one comes first is very much a chicken and egg kind of question. Although he may have been gravely flawed in many of his teachings, John Calvin puts it eloquently in his Institutes of the Christian Religion when he says, “Nearly all wisdom we possess, that is to say, true and sound wisdom, consists in two parts: the knowledge of God and of ourselves… which one precedes and brings forth the other is not easy to discern.”

The Theology of the Body takes it one step further; having made us in His own image and likeness, we can start to understand God through our own bodies, desires and relationships, because they ultimately come from Him.

The sinner’s natural question then becomes, how much of my desires are from God? What about when I want is not what is good for me or others? What if the vocation God wants for me isn’t the vocation I desire? Isn’t fasting and self-denial a Catholic practice that goes against this idea?

The easiest way to answer this is to start with a block quote from the Catholic writer C. S. Lewis from his book, The Weight of Glory.

“The New Testament has lots to say about self-denial, but not about self-denial as an end in itself. We are told to deny ourselves and to take up our crosses in order that we may follow Christ; and nearly every description of what we shall ultimately find if we do so contains an appeal to desire. … Indeed, if we consider the unblushing promises of reward and the staggering nature of the rewards promised in the Gospels, it would seem that Our Lord finds our desires, not too strong, but too weak. We are half-hearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased.”

God created our desires to be passionate and burning and amazingly good. Lewis writes that we easily settle for less than what we truly want, that instead of being rebellious and hardcore by sinning, we are the unimaginative and boring when we choose sin. He believes we settle for sin because we don’t understand what it is that we desire.

(Continued on page 3)


Let’s take a little spiritual history lesson. When Adam and Eve were created, they were created with perfect desires, and were perfectly happy. In the beginning, there was harmony in the relationships of creation – between man and God, man and nature, man and others, and man and himself. When they ate the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge, they fell from Grace. The Fall disrupted all of these relationships, including the relationship between man and himself.

Ever since the Fall, our desires are twisted, which is why Jeremiah can say “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick, who can understand it?” (17:9)

Paul also expresses his frustration with this in Romans 7:15-24, but his understanding of Natural Law causes him to write of this struggle differently than most people think of it. He understands that His and every human being’s true desires point ultimately to God, but that we still choose to do evil. This is why he can write “For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate… For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing.”

While our naturally good desires are twisted, and therefore have trouble pointing to God, our broken relationships with others and ourselves also distort how we view God. The first five years of our life especially shapes how we understand the world and God. Nearly every child that grows up with a distant father they barely see, grows up to view God the same way. Children with abusive fathers can barely grasp the idea of God as Father. People who have

low self-worth, who believe when various people say that they are useless/ugly/dumb/annoying will have a hard time accepting that God loves them without them having to change. People who have expectation for themselves that are too high, and have a hard time being kind to themselves, often believe that God’s justice comes before His mercy.

The only way to permanently untwist these desires and reorder these relationships is to grow deeper in your relationship with Christ: know Him and love Him deeper. God is the creator of humanity, and He sees us as we actually are. We are the colour-blind ones with a faulty perception of ourselves and Him. Through Him, the reasons behind your actions, beliefs, desires, etc, come to clearer view, and you are given the grace to change the way you relate the way to yourself, others and God, and thereby understand Him and yourself more. Like St. Augustine we will say, “What I know of myself I know through your light shining in me.” It’s all a beautiful circle that you should really take part in.

I will end off with this last quote from Barry Long: “Knowing yourself means being able to separate the true from the false in yourself – love from emotion, joy from sentiment, will from desire.” You must be able to differentiate between who sin tells you that are, and who God knows that you are. You must be able to choose to love, even when you do not feel like loving. You must separate what sin tells you that you want, and with a strong act of will, choose what will truly fulfill eve the desires you cannot imagine – God.

- Nisha Thomas


Liturgy of the Month

Week Gospel Readings Epistles Old Testament Readings & Reader

Feb 02 Mk 6:1-6

A Prophet Without Honor

Acts 9:10-21

2 Cor 4:1-6

Gen 9:12-17, Ps 29:1-11,

Is 41:8-20

Lizy Alex

Feb 09 Mk 1:12-20

Jesus Announces the Good News

Jas 5:1-6

2 Thes 3:6-15

Gen 2:4-17, Deut 18:9-16,

Is 40:27-31

Aswathy

Mathew

Feb 16 Mt 24:45-51

The Faithful or the Unfaithful Slave

Acts. 20:25-38

Heb13:7-16

Deut 34:1-9, Sir 7:29-36,

Is 65:13-16

Manoj

Feb 23 Jn 5:19-29

The Authority of the Son

2 Pet 3:8-1

1Thess 4:13-18

Gen 49:29-33, Eccl 7:1-14,

Is 38:9-22

Joshua Joseph


St. Aldegundis

St. Aldegundis grew up in a wealthy and royal family. She was raised by both her parents, St. Walbert and St. Bertila in the Hainault region of Flanders. She was born around 639 and died in the year of 684. Her feast day is January 30. St. Aldegundis always had visions as a little girl. From these constant

images of Jesus, she decided to dedicate her life fully to God. However, her parents had something else planned for her life; a marriage with an English Prince. When she heard this, she ran away from home to go and follow Jesus. She witnessed a miracle on her journey across the Sambre River. She did not have a boat or ferry. Instead, she prayed that God would make a way for her. Suddenly, two angels appeared to her and told her to walk on the water. St. Aldegundis did as she was told and her shoes did not get wet. After crossing the river she built a small cabin in the forest. Aldegundis was ordained as a nun by the bishop of Maastricht and her cabin became a convent, part of the Benedictine monastery Maubeuge. She experienced many visions throughout her life which only increased her faith and complete trust in Jesus Christ. It was noted that one time, she defeated the Devil himself in a debate. Jesus used to work through her to heal others, and she never took credit for them. Her death was seen 9 years in advance through another saint. She died at the age of 45 due to breast cancer. Even with cancer, she was still able to dedicate her life fully to the Lord. She never let her sickness stop her from praising Him. Today, St. Aledgundis is seen as the patron saint of cancer and wounds. I only pray that all those suffering from cancer today; those who are going through chemotherapy are healed and offered a new life in Jesus Christ. St. Aldegundis, please pray for us!

-Isabel Mani

Saint of the Month


UNSCRAMBLEUNSCRAMBLE Unscramble the letters in orange

coloured boxes above to figure out

the clue below: A Character in the Bible (5 Letters):

1. “I can do everything through him

who gives me ______”.- Phil 4:13 (8 Letters)

2. Who came to Jesus at night to hear

his teaching? (9 letters)

3. When Joseph's brothers returned

home from Egypt the first time, who stayed behind as prisoner?

(6 Letters)

4. In what river was Moses hidden

among the bulrushes? (4 Letters)

Last Month’s Answers:

1. Eternal 2. Abraham 3. Sinai 4. Ahab

UNSCRAMBLE Answer:

Terah

BIBLE QUIZBIBLE QUIZBIBLE QUIZ

I am really proud and happy to read the latest edition of your parish bulletin. I see a joint effort of a few devoted members as well as the involvement of our youth as evidence from the contents, layout and presentation every month. May Almighty God continue to work wonders among Malankara Catholic Community in Canada in coming years.

Abraham Ponmelil St. Peter's Malankara Catholic Church Spring Valley, New York

Letters to the Chief Editor

Feb 2014 newsletter

Documents

Transcript of Feb 2014 newsletter