A blessed sunday

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I had been thinking about self-denial for sometime now, thanks to Peter Kreeft's "Love is stronger than death". I went to chruch this Sunday and we were too few to have a youth meeting. Just Vasanth and I were avilable. Hence the hotel was closed, but I never allowed that to prevent me from having a good meal when I was hungry. This Sunday I was not just hungry for fellowship I was starved, famished and fainting. I did not want to die, I wanted to live so I decided to peep into NLAG, it had been two years since I had been to NLAG. I was too late for Power house.

At NLAG I found something going on under the banner of 'NLAG YOUTH', I never knew that NLAG had a youth, nevertheless I entered because that was what I was looking for. A lady was preaching again on Self denial. As I was sitting there all of the scattered thoughts I had had about self-denial began to make sense. I was sitting there in comeplete awe. After the message took the oppertunity to clarify a doubt in her message.

At our service at St.Georges I was reading the hymn book (something I always do when the anouncements begin) to search for some words of 'age old wisdom'. There I found the words "Love triumphs over loss". It is a misinterpretation to think that it is a philosophical statement. It is a 'highly' existential one. When I read it I couldn't understand how it could existentially happen, through the rest of the service I was pre-occupied with that but still was at loss about it.

When I was listening to the message at NLAG youth all of a sudden somehow, thoughts gelled together, it wasn't about what the lady was preaching. It was what Peter Kreeft said and God speaking and I understood it. I was having revelation after revelation. It was too good. At the end of the day I was glad the hotel was closed :) God is good.

I ended my week as usual at the Tiruvanmiur beach except that my usual friend was out of town so i took Peter Kreeft with me and a miniature book reading light. He was speaking and I was listening. I was still reading Peter Kreeft at Ascendas eating KFC burger and there was another revelation from Peter Kreeft that what God expects from us is our silence not our ramblings in the name of prayer. That He is the subject not the object of our prayers.

On the whole it was a blessed day. God is brilliant, if the category of brilliance can be applied to Him.

How is it possible???

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Over the past weekend I had a 'bit' of free time, so I decided to indulge in the frivolous pleasure of watching all three parts of Lord of the Rings which takes about 10 hours.

There are so many things that are stricking about Lord of the Rings. Something that was profoundly striking about that movie is the valour exhibited by the race of men. The race of men is potrayed as fickle minded and is predisposed to evil but at the same time they are strong and have a sense of honour and valour.

In the movie, a relatively small number of men are arrayed againts a much larger and 'physically' stronger orch force of the dark Lord of Sauron. On the eve of the battle the men with the King of Rohnan ask them if there was any chance for them win the battle.

The king of Rohnan minces no words when he replies 'No we will not win... but we will fight nevertheless'. Contrary to what we would expect, the men around him aren't afraid, they are inspired. How? Or perhaps why?

We cannot understand it, but deep within we know that we wouldn't be doing anything different if we were there. Why is it that even if we dont understand why they do it, we strongly feel deep within that we would do the same?

How is it possible for these men to charge gallantly into a sure death? Knowing well that they will end up feeling the blood warmed cold metal of the soward piercing their breast.

Is it folly? Or is it pride? Or is it valour? Or is it honor? Or is it love? Or is it all of it?

The same triat is found in the movie 300 as well. Here too men go to war knowing well that they will not win. They fight valiantly and feel honoured and happy to be in there fighting their way to a sure death.

Why does the modern mind have difficulty understanding this?

I think it is probably because of humankind's unanimous 'post-modern' agreement that the purpose of life is the 'pursuit of happiness/pleasure'. Where as the 'pre-modern' mind thought that the pursuit of life was the quest for the Truth, Truth (hebrew Emeth) meaning that they are to be happy in what they are 'supposed' to be. Their purpose of life was in fulfilling thier purpose of life, not in perusing pleasure.

When one thinks of life as a pursuit of pleasure, such heroism is not possible, such heroism would look foolish. When on thinks of life as the fulfilling of a greater purpose, all hardships and toils will be pleasurable.

When suffering has a meaning/purpose, life is beautiful J. A life without suffering is death as in the Brave New World. Hats off to Aldous Huxley who had the guts to write the dystopian truth in the Brave New World.

Women in Corporate careers

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I have always admired women who aspire to sit along side men in boardrooms making billion dollar decisions. But yesterday I was reading the penultimate chapter of Jack Welsh's 'Winning' about Work-Life balance that the caused me to reconsider my admiration for such inspired fairer sex.

Jack Welsh says that in 1960-70s no one talked of work-life balance because back then the corporate world was male bastion, women took care of the family. In 1980s women began to make inroads and when women worked it there wasn't anyone to take care of family and so work-life balance became an issue to be reckoned with.

In the book, he writes about something the no. 2 HR of GE a lady by name Susan said. She said that when she went on business visits across the world leaving her seven year old daughter at home that she would go all the way crying. Probably because her daughter was crying and she couldn't give what her daughter wanted (which is herself) because her want for corporate glory was higher than her want for her daughter not to cry.

Jack then talks of an event in a question forum in which a woman asked him about a solution to the problem of women having to make a lot of sacrifices by remaining unmarried, not having children, not enjoying life because they had to make it to the top in the corporate ladder. Jack says that he stumbled for an answer and so Maxine a top-notch most sought after Australian News broadcaster decided that she would answer that.

Her answer which caused an eerie silence when something like this. “For women the problem is their biology. They cannot keep up with the pace of a full fledged corporate life and family life. They have to take a decision. I did want to have kids. But I took a decision that I needed to pursue my career at an early age when the time was right and I did it. I still want to have kids, but then my career is important to me. A woman's career has to do with the decision that she takes. You cannot have it both ways.”

Some of you may disagree with her, but I appreciate her candor. She looked at the ugly truth and faced it head-on, her way. But what cannot be denied is that she lost her feminity, the quintessence of feminity, the honor of motherhood.

It is better for such women not to have kids at all for it is injustice to beget a kid and deny it the love of a mother. A kid that is denied the love of its mother will never be able to comprehend true love. Without the comprehension of true love life is a meaningless tale full of noise and fury signifying nothing.

My mother was a career woman, but I know the sacrifices that my mother did to make time to love me and my sister the reason why I am able to cherish and love life in spite of all the toil and fruitlessness that entails life is because of the experience of love that my mother cherished in me and thereby helped me cherish in life. Its all about love. 'Amor vincit omnia' - Love conquers all. Love conquers the wish to be at the top.

In that respect I admire Sudha Moorthy the wife of Narayan Moorthy. She was 'extermely' intelligent, 'highly' talented woman who always achieved substantially higher than what an above average man could achieve. Before her marriage, she was in the corporate world of the Tatas. She was a great achiever in a male dominated engineering field and she had access to the top brass at such a young age. She was a budding star.

She married Moorthy and decided to keep home and hearth. She took care of children while Narayan Moorthy was creating a revolution in lives of millions of people. After her children were grown enough, she sat in Infosys board. She now manages the charitable trusts that Narayan Moorthy had created, but all of it was after her children were on their own feet. She indeed is the luckiest of women I would say because she took the right decision. She had the joy of raising children, the thrill of sitting in boardrooms, the contentment in being a beneficiary in lives of thousands.

God gave man a curse that he would toil to feed his family and woman a curse that she would feel the pain of nurturing her family. I was thinking of all this yesterday and then I wondered if the curse that God gave to man and woman post fall was actually a real curse or a guideline to get through this fallen world disguised as a curse.

Ps: What I have written here may be slightly skewed, perhaps there is a woman somewhere who has been able to make it to the top in the corporate world and spend time with her family as well.

And there is a whole other side to this which is the question as to why men shouldn’t give up their corporate dreams and keep home and hearth while allowing the women folks to dominate the board rooms. But that is topic for another essay.

I am to be dead

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The anthem that the choir sang on Sunday was so meaningful. I cannot forget the second stansa of the anthem. The words went something like this I may not be quoting it verbatim

Grow not in affections for the things of the world...
For you are already dead... and it is Christ living in you.

It was a blessed word at the right time. It was exactly what I was looking for to reslove a highly existential confusion I was going through. We all need is to die, for without death there can be no true love for God or man. It is simply not possible. But this unforunately runs contrary to our basic instinct which is self preservation and not self denial.

We can never be true Christians unless we are truly dead. In the movie 'Gladiator' Maximus Desmus Meridius (Russell Crowe) motivates his warriors just before battle 'Remember, what you are about to do will echo in eternity... fear not for you are an Almesian and you are already dead'. He wants his warriors to die an imaginary death so that they could be brave enough and allow the warm wet blood red metal of a soward to be thrust into their breast for the love of their country and fellow man.

Our Lord too talks of dieing but not this kind of physical death but the real metaphysical death of the true metaphysical self, the ego. Without the metaphysical death there can be no metaphysical rebirth, there can be no salvation. The kind of death that Christ talks of is harder than the kind of death the Maximus talks of, but that is the price for fllowing God and what we do will truly echo in eternity.

When our lives is so full of dreams, fury and passions, it is so difficult to imagine a death of self. But that is what Christ wants from us death to our selves, death to our dreams and our passions of life. After this death or this abandoment of our dreams and passions, there is a new creation a renewed self that isn't devoid of dreams and passion but has its dreams and passions renewed in Him who hung of the Cross to help find our renewed selves easily. So that we would live our lives to all its fullness by first dieing to self. He who looses his life shall gain it is the Truth of life.

Selective Proactiveness

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Proactiveness is a word that has become so popular in all organizations especially when it comes in the context of delivering results and career growth. We all want to be proactive about our careers, even before we leave a job we get ourselves good jobs elsewhere. Even before we complete our degrees we are already booked for a seat in a US university.

On Wednesday last week, I was riding down the Kotturpuram road at about 12:30 am after meeting some of my collge friends. There was a guy who wanted a lift I offered inspite of remember the warning my PM used to give saying never offer lifts after 10:00 pm.

The guy behind me was from some village near Salem. He was a poor guy but was so sincere. He had come to the High court in Chennai lost all his money there. He said that he did not have a penny on him and that he had to go to Salem. He was saying that people had told him that Chennai was a dangerous place and that he should try sleeping on the platforms here, so he wanted to go to Tambaram and sleep there. I dropped him near Ashok pillar to board some bus going out of chennai.

I was expecting him to ask some money from me, but I guess he was too dignified to ask for money, I waited for a moment when he did not make a case, I just kept moving. But then on my way conscience started to gnaw at me, was I being proactive, hell no. I was just being reactive, I wanted him to ask so that I would give. I did not try to be proactive and ask probe into his problems and help him there.

When we get a project in our company we ask a hundred questions, we become proactive rather than being reactive, but when it comes to charity and helping other we tend to be reactive rather than proactive. I cursed myslef for my selective proactiveness.

I couldn't accept my duplicity, I just couldn't drive on. Half way through I turned back to help out that guy. He wasn't where I had dropped him, I drove on and found him walking. I stopped him and he was shocked. I why he was walking he said he had no money, I gave him money to cover his immediate expenses. Before accepting it he told me that he had no idea how he would return it to me. I told him that I wasn't giving it to him, I was giving it to God.

He asked me why I was doing so much and I told him that in the Bible Christ wanted his followers to go two miles when asked to go one. Then he told me that he too believed in the Bible. He was telling me how people who were supposed to be followers of God were concieted and mean minded. I told him that he had to look at the Bible and God alone, not people. He concured, he had a New Testment with him. He appeared to be a fresh beliver who was being guided by some catholics.

After a little bit of chit chat about God, I said good bye and left happy that that Holy Ghost helped me make the right decision. It was the Holy Ghost who impelled me to turn my bike when I was dead tired and wanted to go home and sleep. May all glory be to God.

Careerism the curse of this age

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This saturday, I left office early at 7:00 pm as I was compeltely drained. I went out shopping when there wasn't any need to I spent about 1.2k in about an hour thanks to my credit card. As i was riding back home I realized that I had bought stuff which I simply didn't need.

It was so irratinoal and I wanted to know why I had done that. I was analysing the sequence of events and thoughts, I did not want to go home early as I wasn't is a mood to read books and sitting at my room without books with none to talk to on a weekend can be nerve racking. I wanted to go out and do something, the easiest thing to do is of course shopping.

This got me thinking about life or this rat race that we run in our corporate world. I realized that my problem was I did not want to go to an empty house I wanted to talk to someone on the weekend and I did not have my family with me. Producerism was the phenomena during the medival times industrial revolution, consumerism was the phenomena until now and now there is this complecation of careerism as well.

We leave our loved ones behind and go in search of our career and pursue it with great passion all over the world. Why because we want to achieve something in life? Perhaps so, but not quite. Do we pursue our career because we want money? Perhaps so but not quite. Do we persue our career because its an issue of prestige in society? Perhaps so, but no quite.

I think we pursue our career because we want our families to be happy. We want our loved ones to take joy in our accomplishments, we want our them to enjoy our money, we want to give them a sense of significance in the society. To get ourselves into good careers we go to colleges far away from our homes, we go to places far off to work and thereby estrange ourselves from our families. And then we slog, ask God for help and slog to get our careers right. We have no time for our family, we have no time for our friends all time we have is for our career improvement and at the end of the day all we have is money which we end up spending in shopping or eating in restraunts or movie theaters. So at the end of the day we dont have money either ;)

When all is done, all one realizes is that the goal of our career which is to love and support our family is not just unmet, but our career mitigates us from being loving towards our family. Our parents have spent so much of their energies growing us and in return we dont have time for them because we need to pursue our career. Its so bad.

Actually we are setting very bad role models to the next generation. They'll leave their parents much sooner. But that is how life goes.We need to learn to maintain the work-family balance. If we dont do that now, posterity will blame us just like we blame our ancestors for the evil of castism.

Some corporate big gun said this 'if you want to make the best investment go home early and throw ball to your son'. There is so much truth in this, but unfortunately we are so mistaken in our priorities that we build houses for our sons and daughter and earn wealth for them but have no time to play with them.

As we grow older we need to priorite work in such a way that we dont jeapordize our family life for the sake of career improvment. Most often we indiscriminately follow our passion which we envision as our career and forsake our family. There appears to be no middle ground, there is an either or. I am writing this mail at 10:30 in office during my weekend holiday (Sundays and Mondays are my weekend holidays).

As far as I know, I see only one solution to this debacle.

Dont follow your passion in life or career. Follow God's will alone. Your passion and God's will may or may not conincide, but God's will should have primacy. God's 'revealed' generic will in everyones life is to honour our parents and love our family.

As we go about living our rat race lets remember to get priorities right. God first, family next, career/passion after that, ambition should have no role at all. Ambition is the root of all evil.

When exactly does reality become obsolete?

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Below what transpired between me and a friend in Orkut. I just wanted to document is somewhere my blog came in handy :)


I think reality by its very nature ought to be absolute. Reality is the Truth. If reality isn't the Truth, it cannot be reality anymore. Truth is absolute, it does not need rational justification. Truth is. Reality is. Always is :)

I believe that rational percpetion of reality can be a myth as you rightly pointed out, if there is no revelation. Lets just assume a case wherein Truth has made an effort to reveal itself to man. If this revelation is assumed to be correct, then it can be assumed that ones perception of reality need not be myth but the Truth.

And I believe that the revelation of Truth by Truth itself is the Bible. :) So if I were to use your analogy of life painted on some canvas and when I have the 'option' (God given freewill) to choose the canvas, I guess the safest option to me would be the word of God. I wouldn't place my bet on the ability of my rational perception to somehow transmogrify into reality ;)

The 'balance of reality VS perception' idea is good. How can one be sure that one has got the balance right?
Ans: sense of satisfaction in our daily works

Well so everything, the discernment of whether our balance is right or not, boils down to 'a sense of satisfaction and an ease of mind at the end of it all'. This just takes the question to another level, how would you know that that is all that is to life and that the 'degree' of sense of satisfaction which you feel enough is and that there aren't higher degrees of satisfaction and peace?

You know the story of a eagle hatched in a chicken nest right? There was an 'expressed' satisfaction but still there was somewhere deep within its heart a 'repressed' (Freud... ;) yearning as to why there couldn't be more to life.

Another thing about this satisfaction index or for that matter happiness index to judge if life is going in the right direction is that it makes life livable on a day to day basis but it does not answer the bigger quesions of life. like, What is life? Why live? Is there an ulterior purpose? Why be ethical?

If I am satisfied and happy robbing people, having the sadistic pleasure of infliction pain on people, why should I not continue with my life satisfied and happy as I am. What creates in me an obligation to others? For our day to day activities the answer to these importnat questions don't seem mandatory but there are times when these questions would gnaw at our hearts. At those times if we look UP seeking for an answer He'll give us one. :)

Life skills is good. But when one does not even know what life is all about, how can one be sure that one has got all life skills correct?

When you had to get skilled in Mainframes, someone at CTS came over and taught you that so that you'll get skilled right. A JAVA guy wouldn't be able to get you skilled in mainframes.

Now who tranied this trainer of Mainframes? Who trained his trainer you keep going back you'll reach a dead end with IBM. Obviously, because IBM invented the Mainframes (the Big Iron). If we have a doubt with Mainframes the first thing we do it refer to IBM online manual. This gives us a gurantee that we'll get our skillset right.

Likewise in life which is a lot more complex than Mainframes, if we need the surity that we have got our life skills right who else can we turn to other than the creator of life?Skill sets got from anywhere else wouldn't gurantee that it would be fool proof. If God is to life what IBM is to mainframes, then Bible is to living what IBM's mainframe manual is to application development.

Chruch pub deleted scraps

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Below is what I scrapped in one of my friend's scrap book when we were discussing about church pubs. She scraped me telling that she didn't want me scraping all my thinking and saying in her scrapbook. I never like deleting off what I scrap, because scraps like these are like works of art, or rahter works of thought so I did not want to delete it off completely hence i put an entry in my blog and deleted it off her scrapbook.

I dont agree with the historical basis given for this chruch pub being the 'early chruch', it is gross misintrepretation of what actually happended in the early chruch. I wish the writer had done some research and had had some sanity before coming out with some irrelevant comparisons. The justification for pub cannot come from the model of early chruch.

I wish he had used someother justification rather than the early chruch because the early chruch was completly different. It was about matrydom, love, non-conformity. To my knowledge which is not much I agree, they were selfless people who did not conform to the norms who met in solemn services and prayed. Now, this is the point their acts of love was at homes, each of their homes were places where destitue could come and get as much help and love.

I am for this idea of chruch pub, provided it is undertaken with great caution. But it absurd to try to compare this with the early chruch or as the writer in the website says to consider this as a step towards the reincarnation of the original chruch. Its absolutely ridiculous, it appears to me that the guy has written that just to make the whole thing sound special. This is my subjective take.

My argument for chruch pub will have nothing to do with early church, it would have to do with the body of Christ. Differnet parts have different roles.

Chruch has to cater to the needs around it. If a chruch is in a slum it has to have a social program attached with it, if the chruch is near a college it has to have an entertainment center, if it is in a hippee area it has to have a pub. All chruches must have a counselling center.
Different kinds of chruches reach out to different kinds of people depending on the environment it is in. Period.

The early chruch had its own challenges and it did well. Why? Not because it had a big stragegy, but becaue it had people who were willing to put themselves in the line of fire.

A good pastor's role I believe is to encourage people to put themselves in the line of fire for God's sake.
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I went to St.George's one Sunday for the youth fellowship, but there was none. I was disgrunted and below is what I wrote

My week was tiring, I never had enough time to eat or sleep, I was going all cylinders full blast during the week. And I needed to unwind, I need to feel my heart lift up over my brain, I wanted to feel my state buds come back to life. I wanted to go to a restranut with my close friend and have a hearty meal and a lively chat. I was looking forward to it all week. I picked up my friend and was riding crazy to reach the restraunt have dinner and to feel life in all its fullness.

My week was hopeless, I never had enough time to enjoy the presence of God, I was slogging like hell at work, I was a zombie. I needed to feel my heart, I needed the fellowship of those who loved Him. I was craving for it with all my heart. I wanted to feel the love, I wanted my heart to really start beating again, I wanted to feel it alive again, to revel in the joy of collective worship of the likeminded. I was looking forward to it all week. I woke up late on Sunday and hurried to chruch hoping to attend the youth meeting after chruch and to feel life in all it fullness.

When my friend and I reached the restaurant, we found it closed. There was a moment of disappointment, a moment of irritation that our plans had to be changed. Nevertheless restraunt was not important, fellowship was. So we drove off to another restranut with equally good ambience which would serve us. And I could slowly feel my heart come back to life.

After church I was running around outside hoping to find a few to fellowship with. No there was none, I was distraught, the unsatisfied craving for fellowship was gnawing at my soul, my heart was beating not with life but with disappointment. As I was driving back in melancholy, I was wondering why I this had to be different from what happened with the restraunt, if I my most essential needs are not satisfied here, wouldn't it be foolish not to try to get it satisfied elsewhere?

Blood Diamond - Who is responsible

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I saw the movie 'Blood Diamond' on Monday in 6 Degrees at Satyam, the seats were so damn comfortable thanks to the new COO at Satyam and the bunch of frivolous Chennaites who are willing pay unrealistically high prices for a tad bit more of comfort and titillation. A recurrence of a French revolution in India will leave all of this class of people guillotined, but then our capitalist ‘driven’ society would come to their own rescue either by wooing the revolutionists to join their ranks or by undermining their power using money.

My cousin and I were sitting in the plush seats munching our hot-dogs watching the atrocities of drugged brainwashed kids handling AK47 gunning down whole villages, a sliver screen depiction of what is actually taking place a few thousand miles form us.

I was reminded of Hegel's statement that history is a 'slaughter bench'. We have developed a selective amnesia by allowing ourselves to be seduced by the comforts we live in so that we can easily forget the dark side of life where the innocent and the marginalized are treated like scum - beaten, butchered, raped and tortured.

As I was riding my bike home along the empty roads of Chennai, as I'd been to the 10 o'clock show, the question that kept recurring to me again and again was 'who is responsible for all this?' Or in other words how am I responsible for these unfortunate people who are victimized for no mistake of theirs. I could say ‘No I could do nothing about it, I cannot be responsible for it. I am not my brother’s keeper’. After all that happens almost half the globe across, there is no obligation that I ought to be responsible for the oppressed ones there.

But I am responsible for what happens in Houston (my client head office is in Houston, Texas) which is the twice as much distant. If I can be responsible for what happens in America by what rationale can I justify that I am not responsible for what happens in Africa, we say we live in a global village but we really don’t act like we live in one except when it provides an opportunity for us to go to US or to Europe.

Had the British missionaries not considered themselves responsible for what Indians were then, I wouldn't be as blessed in Christ as I am now. Someone somewhere unrelated considered himself responsible. Had Ida Scudder not taken it upon herself to build a hospital in Vellore, South India would still be 25 years behind the world in medicine.

Our Lord Himself took responsibility for our sins and He took it upon Himself to pay its penalty. He took responsibility to see to it that we wouldn't have to pay our due debt. Aren't we supposed to imitate Him? But here I live in a cozy comfortable world praying, reading Bible, going to church, being a part of youth, reading philosophic books, pumping iron, playing with my dogs, riding my bike like a crazy maniac (at times) and enjoying my life. I don’t even act like I am responsible for my own self, let alone the brothers in the Dark Continent.

Why travel half the world across? There are so many homeless people in Chennai. There are so many people who are oppressed by financial backwardness and by class differences. Our pastor was speaking about last week in youth. They are people who are sidelined and neglected, I walk by them every day. I think I am actually walking over them choosing to look other side or thinking of some philosophic problem to be solved. The last time I thought of them was I think about two months back, I just ’thought’ about them. I did NOT do anything about it.
We need to remember that on the day of reckoning, it is not the number of hours you spent in worship sessions or youth meetings that count, even the miracles you have done in His name don’t count, much less all the lie we tell in His name in church, much less whether or not you speak in tongues or prophesy.

What counts is when a person was hungry, did I feed him? When he was naked, did I clothe him? When he was in prison, did I visit him? When none talked to him, did I talk to him? When everyone looked the other way, did I look into his ‘dry’ eyes and talk to him? When none was willing to touch him, did I let him know the ‘warmth’ of the human touch?

The irony of the whole thing is that in spite of knowing all this I am still doing nothing.

Ps: The good thing about this movie is that there isn’t even a single obscene scene in the movie which is quite commendable for any commercial movie these days which are liberal with nudity in the name of art and freedom of expression. In nudity whether done in the name of art or not the sacred is desecrated. A film which stands apart from the rest ought to be commended. The media is causing us to loose our inhibitions little by little if we aren’t conscious of it there we come a day when there isn’t a category called sin any more. Even now we see it in a lot of postmodern Christians.

I lied in Chruch yesterday.

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Yesterday (actually day before yesterday as its 00:30 hrs now) in Church during Ash Wednesday service I lied like anything when I was saying the ‘Litany of Humility’ which is there below.

The words in italics are response of the congregation. There were a few places where I was telling the truth, but there were points which I had qualms respondinging but I responded nevertheless.

Things like not being loved, approved, consulted, I lied. I have always wanted to be love, approved and consulted. Things like being suspected, wronged. I have always wanted to be on the right, never be betrayed. And the last para was almost all lies.

I wish I could meet Rafael Cardinal Merry del Val the guy who wrote this, but I guess this guy has been dead for more than a centaury now.

Gosh!!! Hope someday I wouldn’t have to lie like this. Humility is a virtue that is almost non-existent now-a-days. If anyone thinks he is humble, it just that he is proud enough to consider himself humble. As Christians, we ought to make a consious effort to nurture it.


Litany of Humility:

O Jesus, meek and humble of heart,
hear me.

From the desire of being esteemed,
deliver me, Jesus.
From the desire of being loved,
deliver me, Jesus.
From the desire of being extolled,
deliver me, Jesus.
From the desire of being honored,
deliver me, Jesus.
From the desire of being praised,
deliver me, Jesus.
From the desire of being preferred to others,
deliver me, Jesus.
From the desire of being consulted,
deliver me, Jesus.
From the desire of being approved,
deliver me, Jesus.


From the fear of being humiliated,
deliver me, Jesus.
From the fear of being despised,
deliver me, Jesus.
From the fear of suffering rebukes,
deliver me, Jesus.
From the fear of being calumniated,
deliver me, Jesus.
From the fear of being forgotten,
deliver me, Jesus.
From the fear of being ridiculed,
deliver me, Jesus.
From the fear of being wronged,
deliver me, Jesus.
From the fear of being suspected,
deliver me, Jesus.

That others may be loved more than I,
Jesus, grant me the grace to desire it.
That others may be esteemed more than I,
Jesus, grant me the grace to desire it.
That in the opinion of the world,
others may increase, and I may decrease,
Jesus, grant me the grace to desire it.
That others may be chosen and I set aside,
Jesus, grant me the grace to desire it.
That others may be praised and I unnoticed,
Jesus, grant me the grace to desire it.
That others may be preferred to me in everything,
Jesus, grant me the grace to desire it.
That others may become holier than I,
provided that I may become as holy as I should.
Jesus, grant me the grace to desire it.


- Rafael Cardinal Merry del Val

Loving my first Love, my Lord

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I wrote this in one of the communities 'Agape love' in Orkut where people were posting about how they loved God.


I told my Lord...

You loved me by giving me my tasty timely daily bread
I gorged it up without a thought of thanking you

You gave me a sound nights sleep inspite of all problems I was facing during the day
I woke up next morning and with a quick word of prayer which I can't remember was back to tackling my problems

I asked your help to solve my problems You helped me out
I thought my problem solving skills were getting better by the day and I got more proud

You listened to me anytime I wanted to talk to you
But I was busy with work, reading a book, watching a movie when you wanted to chat with me

For me you gave up your last breath on the Cross
I used the liberty of your grace and streched it to its limits by my sins

Lord, do I love you? I am not sure, I think I am doing a very bad job loving you
I am not even put up a pretension of loving you

But Lord, I am doing my bad best
I'm sorry I've been too selfish to love you

My Lord, my first and best love replied...

Don't feel sorry my son, Love means not ever having to say sorry
I dont demand you love, I did not love you expecting you'll reciprocate

I just love you. Period.

Determinism and Design

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The problem of determinsm can be sorted out of one understands the difference between determinism and design. God did not determine man to be in the way he is, He designed man. Of course, design limits man. For example, God has designed man is such a way that man learns from nature, fellow man and circumstances. God has designed man to learn from these, but the decision that man takes based on what he has learnt by virtue of the desing, is completely under the control of his freewill. God does not intervene there.

Contented Christianity

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In Screwtype letters Lewis says contented worldliness is the devils greatest weapon against Christianity. I think contented Christianity is what the devil has learned to use so adebtly now.

Mass worship service has come in handy to him as it has become the 'soma' of Huxley's Brave New World ('soma' is a differnt word for opium), to the contemporary Christian world where they use worship services to 'pep-up' their 'dead' spirits. The solution to giving life to dead spirits is by dieing to self and picking up the cross and following his footsteps, not in saying 'Halleluia' and rising up ones hands or jumping up and down as in a drill or a yoga class.

Worship services are the means to a greater end in Christianity but the devil has sold people the delusion that worship service is an end in itslef, they are deluded into finding selfish contentment in worship services whereas worship service ought to strengthen and encourage people to greater self-denial and much love for God.

Just as Einstien said 'we have perfected the means but are in total loss about the goals'.

A God with personality

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If God is, He cannot be anyone other than the One who created the universe and life. God ought to have been creative, to assume creativity witout personality is unreasonable.

Yes, God can live in each of us, but not as a force as in pantheism but as a person. A personal God is not meant for synergy as in pantheism but for fellowship. Fellowship is conditional. The condition is not self awarness as in pantheism but love.

Idealism and realism

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Idealism is more akin to Platonic thinking where a person talks of what nature thought to be and realism is more akin to Aristotelian thinking where a person talks of what nature is felt and seen to be.

Reality is about what truth is. Idealism and realism both could have a claim to reality. Of course, here I see idealism analogous to rationality and realism analogous to empiricity.