Dear People of God,
Readings of the Day: 1 Jn 4:19-5:4; Gospel: Lk. 4:14-22
It is 08th January 2015. The first reading is bluntly pointing out a need for a correlation between faith and praxis. “If you say, I love God, while you hate your brother/sister, you are a liar.” The manifesto of our Christian faith is to be seen in our action. The way we love others is the way we believe God but not the other way around. We cannot say that loving God is the priority for my life while neglecting our brothers and sisters. In fact, it would be a sheer compromising of our faith when we find it hard to connect our faith in God and love in our brethren. It is indeed challenging for ourselves to connect faith and love. Yet that is what we are expected to practice as a Catholic. In the Gospel, Jesus reads his manifesto from the Prophet Isaiah, “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me. He has anointed me to bring the good news to the poor; to proclaim liberty to captives and new sight to the blind; to free the oppressed and to announce the Lord’s year of mercy.” Yes, indeed, the Spirit of God is on us to bring good news to everyone and announce the mercy of the Lord. What is our manifesto as a Catholic? We are invited to revisit and renew our personal manifesto based on our faith and praxis with the guidance of the Holy Spirit during this year of Consecrated life. May God bless you.