The Eternal Message of Christmas: Love Beyond Borders, From the Sanatana God

 

Warmest Christmas greetings and heartfelt wishes to you all on this holy eve. Today marks a Thursday steeped in reflections from years of pastoral experience and social service, but as we stand on the threshold of Christmas, let's pivot to the timeless joy of this season. Everyone knows Christmas celebrates the birth of Jesus Christ. Yet views differ on why He came to earth. Some say God's Son descended from heaven solely to free humanity from sin, ensuring our ticket to paradise. That's not wrong, but it often stops there—self focused salvation, with little thought for others. On the flip side, many cite Jesus' command: "Love one another." They love, yes, but confine it to their own kind. Did Jesus preach such bounded love? Absolutely not. He challenged the status quo: "You have heard that it was said, 'Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.' But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you" (Mt 5:43-44). Every faith echoes calls to destroy the wicked and protect the righteous. Jesus, however, left a message of forgiveness. He urged transforming evil through love and mercy—not vengeance. He didn't just speak it; He lived it. Nailed to the cross by His tormentors, He prayed, "Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing" (Luke 23:34). Thus, Jesus loves not only believers but non-believers and even enemies. He calls us to mirror that boundless love. This is religion's true essence: not a weapon of division, but a bridge to unity. Whatever faith we follow, let's transcend its boundaries, loving all and fostering peace, love, and harmony in society. In our divided nation today, this unity is our greatest need. I trust you'll agree. Once more: Merry Christmas filled with love and joy, plus warm New Year wishes ahead. Now, let's delve into Christmas' eternal message.

The Prophetic Light in a Chaotic World

Our world teeters in unrest—violence, hatred, and self-righteous clashes everywhere. People spill blood to prove whose faith or ideology reigns supreme. In this spiritual decay and moral darkness, we turn to Isaiah's prophecy from 2,700 years ago: "For to us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government will be on his shoulders. And he will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace" (Isaiah 9:6). "Everlasting God" (Sanatan Creator), according to Pastor Emmanuel Singh, isn't mere title—it's God's core identity, transcending time. We often limit "Sanatan" to cultures or rituals, but it means eternal, without beginning or end. The Bible attributes this solely to God: - Psalm 90:2: "Before the mountains were born or you brought forth the whole world, from everlasting to everlasting you are God." - Revelation 1:8: "I am the Alpha and the Omega... who is, and who was, and who is to come, the Almighty." - Revelation 22:13: "I am the Alpha and the Omega, the First and the Last, the Beginning and the End." Sanatan isn't a human invention with a founding date—it's God Himself, the "Great I AM" above past, present, and future. On Christmas, we worship this Eternal God Almighty. And Micah 5:2 foretold: "But you, Bethlehem... out of you will come... one who will be ruler over Israel, whose origins are from of old, from ancient times" (echoing John 1:1, Ephesians 1:4).

The Infinite Becomes Finite: Incarnation's Marvel Christmas' greatest wonder?

The Mighty God, Everlasting Father, became a vulnerable Son. Imagine: the Creator of stars humbles Himself into a virgin's womb, cradled in Bethlehem's manger amid animals. This isn't ordinary—it's the eternal Word made flesh. John 1:1,14 captures it: "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God... The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us." Why did the Infinite enter time's limits? Why did the Creator take created form? One word: *love*. God didn't dispatch rules from afar. He descended to rescue sin-stained humanity personally.

Bridging the Divide Through Presence

Love demands closeness, not distant commands. Laws might enforce obedience through fear, but only presence melts hardened hearts. Sin built an impassable gulf between God and us—no book or decree could span it. So God became the bridge: Immanuel, "God with us." He didn't rule from a throne; He served in our dust.

The Immortal Tastes Death

God is spirit, immortal, without blood. Yet Scripture demands blood for sin's atonement. No human could pay humanity's debt; no pure spirit could die. Solution? The Eternal took flesh—to die in our place. Bethlehem's manger led to Calvary's cross, where His blood f lowed for us. Immortal became mortal, paving our path to eternity.

A Sympathetic Sanatan Saviour

Distant gods hear cries as reports; this God shares our pain. He hungered, thirsted, wept, endured rejection. When you suffer loss or injustice, know your God isn't a cold judge— He's a compassionate friend who walked weakness to victory (Hebrews 4:15).

 Visible Revelation of the Invisible

We crave tangible refuge from abstract voids. The unseen God became visible in Jesus: "No one has ever seen God, but the one and only Son... has made him known" (John 1:18). Jesus embracing sinners shows God's mercy; touching lepers reveals His touchable holiness.

Humility's Revolution: From Manger to Service

In our power-hungry world of religious one-upmanship, Bethlehem flips the script. The "King of kings" (Revelation 19:16) claimed no palace. He came to serve, not be served: "The Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many" (Matthew 20:28). At the Last Supper, God incarnate wrapped a towel around His waist and washed feet: "Now that I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also should wash one another’s feet" (John 13:14). True eternity teaches no hatred, only humble service. If God stooped so low, why do we strut in pride?

Our Eternal Identity: Chosen Before Creation

Christians aren't a 2,000-year startup. Our roots predate time in God's plan: Ephesians 1:4-5: "For he chose us in him before the creation of the world... In love he predestined us for adoption to sonship through Jesus Christ." 2 Timothy 1:9: "[He] saved us... not because of anything we have done but because of his own purpose and grace. This grace was given us in Christ Jesus before the beginning of time." We're no accident—part of the Eternal Father's timeless design. Our identity transcends race, nation, or creed; it's rooted in Christ's everlasting love.

Surrender at the Eternal Father's Feet

Christmas isn't just lights and cake—it's homecoming to the Sanatan God the Creator. The Wonderful Counselor untangles life's knots; the Prince of Peace calms our chaos. Gaze at that manger child. Forget pride and divisions. Dedicate your life anew to the God who was, is, and is to come—our Lord Jesus Christ.

Prayer: Eternal Father, You are the Beginning and the End. You took human form to banish our sin's darkness. Fill our hearts with Your humility this Christmas. Empower us to carry Your timeless love into this violent world. Amen.

What does Christmas' call to universal love mean for you this year? Share in the comments—let's build unity together.

HAVE REASONS FOR A FAITH THAT HEALS THE WORLD

 

A Christian should “give reason to anyone who asks to account for the hope that is in you” (1 Pt 3:15), but we are often not given practical guidance on how to prepare. S/he should combine historical wisdom, practical skills, strategies, spiritual insights and practical principles inspired by Jesus, to explain to another the faith with charity and clarity; be ready to dialogue, evangelize and respond to questions about the Catholic faith in any given opportunity.

The book, The Everlasting Man, a compelling defense of Christianity, (apologetics) by G.K. Chesterton changed the young atheist C.S. Lewis, on the path toward Christianity. In fact, he was convinced that Jesus compels his disciples to make a choice: either you are with Jesus, or against him. There is no third way. This historical, mythological, philosophical, and theological story written in an obscure literary style, on humanity and religion looks quite paradoxical and disorienting, writes Ron Rolheiser. Yet, it is a classical literary genius, apt even today. It can become life story of a Christian of 21^st Century, applicable to modern life. To understand this paradox is already a step close to becoming a true Christian. 

 Jesus’ life principle was one of healing humanity and the world at large, bringing in the original order set by God, which a part of the humankind has disfigured and desecrated. This is a spiritual adventure for all of us, who are destined to heal. Like the cripple who, being healed by the apostles, began “jumping and praising God” (Acts 3:1–9). This is the hope produced by a spirituality of healing. That’s why Jesus came. In Jesus the healer, divinity and humanity meet, wherein his whole body, mind and spirit become a “conduit of God’s energy”, meant to set right a world gone wrong.  Jesus manifests the healing love of God, whose ultimate intention is establishing His totally healed Kingdom. We all can be ‘conduits’ of God’s healing energy.

God reaches out to the sinner (destroyer of the Kingdom), the sufferer, the marginalized. Jesus, following the Father’s will, seeks out the sinners with love and humility. He just wants to know if we want to be well again; if we really want to heal others. But there is always opposition to this healing process in the world. Often the healing work is condemned. There is the resistance to God’s creative work, to deny that it is not needed. The leaders of the world are confounded with diverse decisions. Many lawmakers of the state ignore ethics, natural laws, morality and conscience. Why do the governances want their way? Why don’t they seek together the common good? It is because God’s ways threaten their stay in power. They expose their strategies of oppression and exclusion to boost their egos.

Jesus’ passion, death, and resurrection will continue to heal the world and restore its humanity to sanity, free those under bondage of sin, enlighten those still in darkness, and heal the ‘sick’ and hungry humanity. God will not stop the healing mission, because his love is unchangeable. God will comfort his people and show mercy to them for He is gracious, faithful, holy, just, and near to those who call upon him.

“To set right a disjointed universe, God broke open his own heart in love” writes Bishop Barron. God worked through many prophets, to gather the scattered children of the dysfunctional world into a divine life. Humanity is God’s centre of love. God’s power breaks open to include both the happy and the hopeless. The human quest for God is reversed, as God himself as the ‘hound of heaven’ goes out in search of the ‘sick’ for a wholistic healing. The essence of Christianity is, therefore, a self-emptying divine love, wherein we partake in the essential healing mission of the Trinitarian God.

In the actual world, on the contrary, we see a “scapegoat mechanism” (René Girard) worked out by the powerful of the world, who have the insatiable human need for scapegoats, in order to justify their misdeeds. According to Bishop Barron, God’s power acts in opposition to that energy of scapegoating:  God directs the energy of scapegoating violence back on the self-powered leaders, exposing the dangerous consequences of scapegoating over the unstable order of the society.

God sets a new order: a transformed world, through the divine and creative healing touch, perfecting the human nature, conformed to the original natural plan. This new order – Kingdom of God– is breaking out in the world; divided people are coming back together, and God is going to reign. Human race must live now as members of this new kingdom. People themselves will engage the enemies of the world, to deal directly with those powers opposed to God’s creative mission, confronting the “political oppressors, religious charlatans, and self-absorbed Pharisees.” And the Universal Truth will set the enslaved people free, and heal them from the worldy ‘diseases’ and its many extended symptoms. The ill-motivated people will be called to come out of their stubborn self. God wants the good, and only good of humanity. We all ought to be healed of all our ego. We all ought to opt for ‘Theo-drama’ and not ego-drama, following God’s will in our life. Consequently, we shall worship God in spirit and truth in a healed world. Ultimately, a healed humanity will realize that no devotion (worship) is more pleasing to God than that which is directed to the poor needy (St. Leo the Great). A healing faith helped by reason, like a hidden force, can bring about transformation in the world, beyond what our eyes perceive, because “faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen” (Heb 11:1).

 

 

 

Love Your Neighbour: A Christian Unity Octave Ecumenical Reflection

 

The theme ‘You shall love the Lord your God… and your neighbour as yourself’ (Lk 10:27) of the Christian Unity Octave (2024), initiated by the Catholic and Protestant Churches, the World Council of Churches and other ecumenical bodies, and collaborated generously in drafting the prayers and reflections, reflects on the familiar story of the Good Samaritan, and all are encouraged to ‘Go and do likewise’. The ecumenical bodies of Churches through this moment, try to collaborate in making unity happen. The Gospel theme connects between love of God and love of neighbour beyond boundaries – in giving of self in service of the other. Jesus, throughout his ministry had only one Mission: to gather the ‘scattered tribes’— the rich and  the poor, the sinners and the saints,  the outcasts and the marginalized in charity, mercy, justice, and unity. All are welcome  to establish the unity of all God’s people, created in His image of loving the mankind. This presents, the coming together of heaven and earth — the coming of the Kingdom of God of unity, justice and peace; the coming together of divinity and humanity in Jesus, the Unifier and the Unified— yet distinct, in the plural-Trinity. Yet, how many divisions we find among the followers of Christ! Christian Unity Octave, is aimed at promoting unity, not just within the Churches, but among all peoples. This event, was influenced by French Catholic priest and theologian Paul Couturier (1881-1953), and based on Jesus’ prayer to God die Father: "That they may he one!" (John 17:21). Jesus asked for this not only for his followers, but for all humanity.

 What must we do to achieve such unity? This crucial question we all need to answer, if we are to find meaning of our life on earth and for eternity. Every person wants a life of fullness ( Jn 10:10), for “The glory of God is a human being fully alive” (St. Ireneus). The existential realities of life, with divisions and disunity, often distance us from the quest for the One God.

Our inner quest for unity brings us closer to God and to each other, by strengthening the Christian unity, through collaboration with Christians of all Churches. This can be a difficult task. It requires solid commitment to dialogue and discernment, ever open to the Spirit for the sake of serving God, and God alone, fulfilling Christ’s prayer– that all be one.  Jesus showed equal love to all, including the enemies. Being on the path of Christian unity, through loving one’s neighbour means not being selective, but being attentive to their needs, despite of diverse traditions.

Loving one’s neighbour “as yourself” presumes self-acceptance just as we are, and self-respect, acceptance of one’s own Church or community, with all its assets and failures. It is of natural instinct to love someone of the kin, of own faith, those sharing the social status, outlook and values. We prefer people and places of familiarity. Yet, the obligation is to love all, regardless of caste, colour, culture and creed. To be a ‘neighbour’ within a reality of distrust and uncertainly, is to open our hearts with love towards all,  especially those who are in need.

 Christians of diverse denominations need to go beyond convention, overcome “ecclesial and culturally conditioned short-sightedness” and see how the life and witness of other Christian faith-fellows reveal God’s love to others. It is only through widening our vision that we will be drawn to others in union with Christ. The story of the Good Samaritan teaches us that we learn more from those who are different from us, than those who think alike. Every situation serves as an opportunity to help the needy ‘other’. How do we, then, respond to our ‘neighbours’, within the Christian fold? How do we heal Christ’s ‘broken’ and ‘crumbling’ Church, manifested in superiority, insecurity, distrust and division?  Do the diverse prayerful and sacramental rituals of reconciliation, healing and blessings, build up the Church or do they persist in divisions that distance us further from God,  and wound the Body of Christ (Church). A Christian union that builds up the broken Church,  also enhances a national unity in diversity.

 The crave for social unity through solidarity requires  the recognition of others as brothers and sisters. However, when faced with insecurity, suspicion and distrust of our neighbours, hospitality and ecumenical dialogue become the starting steps towards unity, in contexts of religious and cultural pluralism. Christians, therefore, are challenged to find Christ within their Christian communities, by loving one another. Moving  beyond the confessional traditions overcoming hostility and hate, and by practicing ecumenical hospitality, we become ‘neighbour’ to each other –‘the one who shows mercy.’

 Neighbours are discovered in the most unexpected people and in unexpected situations. For example,  in today’s society that is so much polarized  by politics which set majoritarian religion against the minorities and by inter-communal conflict, Christians are challenged to cross the walls of separation and build unity. Following the Lord’s command –“Go and do likewise”, we are called to act mercifully, and genuinely love our neighbours – to be “other Christs.” We accept, recognize and respect, and not reject those who are different. We bring down the peace of God on all people of goodwill.  Christ calls all of us to enter in close relationships with members of other church traditions, and bear witness together to God’s love. We are called to be ambassadors for Christ (2 Cor 5:20), being reconciled to God and to one another. Working together for Christian unity through mutual trust, by  opening up ecclesial wounds, will only help rebuild the single Body of Christ.

 To some conservative factions of the various Church denominations, who consider the Catholic Pope Francis to be  a dangerously progressive, in his epiphany homily this year on the issue of  ideological splits in Church, asked the faithful to abandon “ecclesiastical ideologies”, and focus on poor, not 'theory'. He warned against “basking in some elegant religious theory” instead of finding “God who comes down to visit us”, especially in the poor. The Church needs to ensure that "our faith will not be reduced to an assemblage of religious devotions or mere outward appearance.” Instead, we open up more to each other, resolve conflict, and strengthens our bonds of unity. In fact, the same Francis and the Archbishop of Canterbury jointly have commissioned bishops for a unified mission. A special summit, took place during the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity, that brought together over 50 Anglican and Catholic bishops representing 27 countries. Additionally, some recent publications related to ecumenical movements, evoke the spirit of Pope Francis in charting a new course, exploring the “desire for Christian unity” with a global reach.[1]

 In the midst of many existing divisions among the followers of Christ, the effort towards Christian unity promotes ecumenical unity, as well as unity among all peoples, who seem to be in distress and pain. The prevalent practice is to claim an individual’s, group’s, or nation's distinct identity as different from others, by creating distance. It’s all about being oneself. Within this global ‘egotistic’ disorder and false nationalism with diverse identity-based communities, further fragmented by Hindutva political propositions,  the Christians face the challenge of identifying themselves as a single body of Christ, as mistrust is on the rise. It proves difficult to break the barrier of denominational identity in order to be recognised as 'Christians', building up a visible unity in Christ. Acknowledging each Church’s vulnerabilities, the varied voices and the prevailing cacophony, and by speaking with one voice under a common formula, the principle of unity is to be sought after, so that there be only one flock and one Shepherd – the Christ. Christian unity cannot be achieved through mere theoretical discussions. We need to seek new practical ways: to encounter one another, challenge each other, harmonize diversities, overcome conflicts and reconcile differences.

 In this context, the prayer moments during the Christian Unity Octave seeks the spiritual support of the ecumenical movement. A complete and universal Church unity is not just a goal, but a prophetic path for all Christian communities lead towards the common good of all, realized through a shared mission and witness. Through such ecumenical observances, prayer moments, dialogue and discussions, we can find concrete and creative paths to grow together in joint witness and mission. Jointly, as apostles of Christ, ecumenically we need to be ‘sent’ in reciprocal pairs, or through ecumenical groups, to be witnesses to Christian unity.

 It’s time for all the Churches and denominations jointly to move closer – a hard task though. All it needs is the will act now,  if we want to overcome the disunity in the Body of Christ. Through dialogue, personal friendships, learning from each other,  listening to the Gen-X youth, tapping their energy and enthusiasm, we can stir up the ‘ecumenical mantra’ against institutional inertia that is existing today. Let all denominations together make statements about political and social matters by resourcing all investigations and commissions through joint initiatives. And mostly, let the ecclesial authorities act in the light of the Gospel, through shared responsibility. Unity cannot be achieved through the personal authority of the supreme heads of the Churches alone. There is the need to explore ‘synodality’, within the ecumenical process, keeping guard against autocracy while being open to dissent, and to  exercise the freedom to be different. The need for pastoral care of the wounded and excluded through social charity  and through a leadership from below, would act as a catalyst to connect and build up that Christian unity – a hope for the future.

Finally, only an ecumenical opening to God’s love and love of neighbour, – the primary principle of pursuing peace and reconciliation – will help discover our shared identity. Such quest may be hindered by the eroded moral values and a commercialized spirituality, a lack of humaneness and of concern for the common good, probity and integrity. Therefore, faced with these realities, it is all the more imperative for all the Christian Churches to witness to God’s love as a single member of the Body of Christ. 

 Lord Jesus Christ, as we walk with You towards unity, let us not avert our gaze from the world, but keep it vigilant. Grant that, as we travel the paths of our life, we are able to stop and hold out our hand, to bind up the wounded and thus feel that You are present in them, You who live and reign forever and ever. Amen.

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[1] The ecumenical movement is understood as a twentieth-century movement of European origin with a global reach. The book, (L’unità dei cristiani. Storia di un desiderio. XIX-XXI secolo. I. Aurora ecumenicae), A History of the Desire for Christian Unity. Ecumenism in the Churches (19th–21st Century) is a multi-volume reference work on the history of ecumenism, "a reference work, a reconstruction of the arc of time in which the Christian churches transitioned from a position of hostility to one of dialogue, and from separation to forms of communion. Scholars across the continents and disciplines explore a history of individuals and groups, generations and assemblies, documents and programs, theologies and practices, all firmly placed within the framework of a desire for unity." An international research project its text brings together contributions from scholars of various disciplines and different Churches. It shows how Christians, during the 19^th  and 20^th centuries, participated in a process unprecedented in the history of the Church, towards the need for the unity not only of Christians, but of all people. This is the first of three-volume work project.  Cf. Alberto Melloni (Author), Luca Ferracci (ed), A History of the Desire for Christian Unity - Ecumenism in the Churches, 19th-21st Century, Dawn of ecumenism, Foundation for Religious Sciences,  Brill, Leiden, 2021.

 

 

Future Hope OR Now

  

We need to balance our Easter hope with the section of a society opposed to God.  We belong to the world, and to the creator of the world. We are not out of it. Neither God is. Either we chose to live in the world, where we belong as long as we live, or in a world of dreams and future hope, forgetting the present.

 As Christians we are Easter people of joy and hope, while believing in a God who is Lord of earth and heaven, who in Jesus has defeated sin and death. All that is true. But we cannot look for a "cheap grace" interpretation of Christianity, where, as we hear in the film ‘3-Idiots, “All is well”. Neither must we succumb to hoping that “all will be well." Remember the fierce ‘war’ continues, be it physical (as in Israel now, Religious, communal) and spiritual. Well, we can live for ‘cheap grace’ for momentary satisfaction with the belief of hope in life after. For example, we can draw peace for time being through personal adoration before the Sacrament of Eucharist exposed for oneself, for a subjective satisfaction.

 Humans are much deep, capable of loving others with God’s love, as one lives on this earth. God is love. It means, God gifts himself to the other through self-emptying. To have this God is to be what God is - to love with full of hope and joy. In short, God is ‘to love’ in action (a verb, not a noun) right now. In this sense, the joy of obeying the commandment in the present: “love one another as I love you." The laws, rituals, traditions, commands, dogmas, doctrines and devotions, are meant to make us more adept at loving here and now. They are meant to awaken hope-filled love in our present lives.

 To love with God’s love, one needs to “remain” in his love. God’s love as a grace is ever poured on our nature, but remaining in that love depends on our action to love. God’s love dwells in our hearts, bodies, and minds in the measure that we give it away. When we enter into a hope-filled stream of grace, then the divine love “remains” in us. Therefore, hoping now itself, is to cooperate with God’s loving grace. Thus we participate in the love that God is. Hoping right now in our life is a play, between conditional and unconditional love. That’s how we can grow in the hope of loving.

 The loving hope is lived with the spirit of Truth, in words and deeds. It is a witness to God’s concrete love for the world here and now. We testify to this love, by loving hopefully, in the midst of the struggles, suffering and dying of people. Through sharing in their sufferings we are able to participate in the hope-filled life of God. Living with hope-filled spirit in the present, prompts us to speak the truth. With this hope-filled spirit of Truth, we share the love of the Father with humanity. To sum up, a hope-filled love incarnates God in the existing world.

BEAUTY WILL SAVE THE WORLD

Beauty will save the world. This is a bold statement and yet beauty as love will change our culture of death, of values and of life itself. What beauty is going to save the world? Here we speak of beauty as the light and splendour residing at the heart of man and woman. When it is seen it draws the beholder to itself. The beauty that will save the world is the love of someone showered on a suffering and dying person. It is the beauty transformed into infinite compassion out of love. It can transport the beholder to mystical heights. Beauty seen as love and truth are transcendental because they spill over to encompass every level of being. I was inspired by Cardinal Carlo M. Martini’s pastoral letter, 1999-2000, to write on the saving attribute of beauty. Recently I had been to a country village on the hills with sloping fields, evergreen fields and flowers that have bloomed with a gardener’s hand in it. It was beautiful. In my room I enjoy music, painting and literature. I cannot express to what extent such aesthetic experiences ennobled me. I can only say that I enjoy them all.

This theme of beauty is not something new in our culture and in the eastern spirituality. It is so much present in its splendor in our worship and art. With Urs von Balthasar we can say that God is not only Being, Truth, Goodness, but also the Supreme Beauty. The mystics and the artists know it better. The loss of admiration and appraisal of beauty with the coming of mechanical portrayal of figures and sceneries have impoverished our art. How is it so that thousands flock daily to the numerous temples beautifully carved, that stand as magnificent witness to splendor and beauty? One can think of the Taj Mahal. The while marvel, the carved stones and the structure! Beauty crowns the creation with what is good and true and witnesses to their mutual rapport.

Today the disinterested beauty has been trampled over feet by the modern world of affairs and business bringing it to a sad end. The earth is groaning! The ‘ecological immorality’ has tarnished its beauty. Beauty can never be ostracized and separated from the truth and the goodness. They are two sisters. One who considers beauty to be a thing of the past can never pray, can never love. The world illumined from God becomes only an illusion, dreams, romanticism. But when the dream dissolves it turns into ‘immagine’ that calls for desire to know and admire. Certain modern cultural practices have already began to reduce this aesthetic sense but it is only a culture that is in despair in its isolation.

Beauty involves two moments: to behold the beauty one has to be enraptured and to do so one has to perceive. One gets caught up in wonder at the form as the eyes grasps its splendour. In a world where moral ugliness screams from the headlines of reason and utility, getting raptured by beauty can make us more human. The love and the beauty of the creation converge to the supreme reality- God. In our daily love given and taken what really links one to another is the selfless love that is beautiful.

Beauty as Love              

It is always risky to start a joint venture of beauty and love because they are essential to living in harmony. We have lot of proofs in the advertising world and the mass media. How the film and theatre today equate love with sex and romance! Beauty and love are interrelated. You cannot have one without the other. Both are reciprocal. Dostoyevsky in his novel, The Brothers Karamazov writes, “Love is such a priceless treasure that you can redeem the whole world by it.” In The Idiot he writes, “Beauty is power. It will save the world.” The object we love is always wonderful and we overlook their defects because first and foremost they are beautiful. Mother Teresa, the bent woman, may not have been beautiful physically but she was beautiful from the inside. She has the “Christed beauty of her face” ever shone for many to be enraptured. Beauty, therefore, has everything to do with what starts in the heart and shines out.

Love and beauty are distinct though inseparable. Beauty and love are expressed in concrete form. They make things and persons lovely and lovable. They are sensual and enfleshed. Beauty emerges when love is generous and gives of itself. They together invite the beholder and bring about pleasure, delight, joy, union, ecstasy and transformation. This sense of beauty matures through being trained by the mind and will. It demands a deliberate choice to see the beauty which cannot function without the sense, however spiritual it is. To internalize this beauty as love, then it to participate in God’s life and become his artefice. What then we to do? Find beauty in what is seen, heard, smelled, tasted and touched. Chose the beautiful in the arts, in sports and in entertainment. Discern the beautiful in one’s own life. Invent all you have for this beauty-full-ness and say, “Late have I loved thee, O Beauty, ever ancient, ever new.” Let the searching for the beauty be our common quest.

 Beauty and Contemplation

Introducing this theme into the third millenium that is marked by a culture of technology highly sofisticated and rationalized, has the risk of being reduced to a mere ambiguous erotic and consumeristic outlet: the beauty of the top model, of the Miss Universe etc. Today the world especially in the West is tired of the rational dryness. The Easter spirituality is sensible to beauty and less so to the production-fever. Beauty joins with contemplation - the word that makes people sick, stressed and is empty of significance. It is not the seductive beauty that we are speaking about, that distances from the very objective for which our hearts remain restless. Instead something that is old and something new.

Is Beauty anarchic and away from the Real?

Is this theme far from today’s preoccupation and tension? I don’t think so. Even to this day the question of beauty strongly stimulates the mind and heart of people: which beauty is going to save the world?  It is not enough to denounce and condemn the evil of the world. Neither is it enough to speak of justice, duties and of common good in a world that is un-enchanted by beauty. It needs to speak with a heart filled with compassionate love, with that charity that offers with joy and enforces enthusiasm. It calls for radiating that beauty which is true and just in life, because only this beauty that enraptures truly the hearts and directs them to God. But how can the humble beauty of the crucified who is risen, bring about liberation to a human race that is so cynical, crude and corrupt?

In the present history of India where so much of misrule, threats, lies, lynching and corruptions are going on, killing innocent men and women who dedicate their lives for the common welfare of all, can we think of beauty as the path to salvation? In the fatigue and tired mood even the promoters of beauty do not find reason for conviction and enthusiasm to hope for beauty, goodness and truth. In discouragement that prompts all to direct themselves to a fatal destiny daily in midst of various forms of brutality, with incapacity to read the designs of the time-mongers, is it worth to invest in something that is of higher value?

True beauty is denied where there is no more joy, where the heart seems to be arrested due to the lack of enthusiasm. At this juncture we are pulled literally to the enrapturing beauty that invites us to go out of ourselves, to forget ourselves and taste the beauty of the gift of God in creation. The light of salvation will certainly attract many to The Beauty that will save the world.