Rev. Fr. Lasantha Abrew, a Jesuit from Sri Lanka shown in the attached picture, is engaged in work with refugees in the Kakuma Camp in Kenya. He shared this reflection of Advent with me. Though his wealth of experience could contain many volumes, I made it very brief for the bulletin. ‐‐ Fr. Dinesh

The grace‐filled season of Advent links two great mysteries of our faith. First, it harnesses the mystery of Incarnation; God visiting His people through Jesus in human form took place in history and will again in the Lord’s second coming. His first visitation was unnoticeable and happened in an insignificant way, recognized by a few marginalized ones. But the second coming of Jesus will happen gloriously, to complete His mission and hand over the Kingdom to His Father.

Jesus came with a mission from His Father: to proclaim the Good News which announced that God is our Father, we are God’s own children, and we are brothers and sisters. That is the meaning of “Kingdom of God.” All the miracles, parables, and teachings of Jesus contained this message: God is our ABBA Father. Jesus lived and was killed for this message but after His glorious resurrection, He entrusted His mission, given by His Father, to His beloved disciples. The disciples continued preaching the Good News and missioned us, through our Baptismal consecration, to continue the message.

Therefore, Jesus’ second coming in glory is to judge whether we, as His disciples, proclaimed and lived the Good News. In other words, did we complete the mission of Jesus, building the Kingdom of God? If we have been faithful to our calling and completed the Kingdom experience living as brothers and sisters, Jesus will hand over the new Heaven and Earth to His Father saying, “I began and my disciples have completed.”

Therefore, the season of Advent challenges us to question our own quality of Christian life and look forward for His Second Coming. Are we living and proclaiming Jesus’ message of Good News to answer Him on that day?

I am working with the refugees in Kakuma Camp in Northern Kenya, about 250,000 refugees from 21 nations. The whole problem of the refugee issue is exclusion. They are excluded by their own in violence. They have to run away in fear to the camps. In the camp, our main message is that although they are products of exclusion, we can build communities of inclusion. It is built on faith that God is our Father, we are God’s own children, and we are brothers and sisters even though we are of different nations, races, linguistic groups, and tribes.

I wish you a grace‐filled season of Advent!

I met a person in my country of Sri Lanka, where access to professional psychiatric and mental healthcare is limited. The person suffered from Major Depressive Disorder which was, in previous times, called Clinical Depression. Sad feelings and an inability to do basic things like getting out of bed or finding enjoyment in his usual passions had been the defining characteristics of depression for him. But, amazingly, he now says, “My faith has given me the hope I need to go on in my life. When I say Catholicism and the love of Christ have saved my life, it is not mere hyperbole.” I want to share the spiritual things that have helped him deal with his depression so that, perhaps, they may help you as well.

Realize that you are not alone

The Catholic Church has dealt with mental illness for quite some time. Long before our modern system for addressing mental health, the hospital at Geel, Belgium, was established under the patronage of St. Dymphna, the Patron Saint of those suffering from mental illnesses. In the 7th century, the good Nuns in Geel introduced a system to take care of the mentally ill, and some of those patients found healing through treatment and prayer.

Holy persons such as Venerable Francis Mary Paul Libermann and St. Mother Teresa of Calcutta admitted to suffering with bouts of depression. While they would be struck to the heart with grief, they still found comfort in their faith. Ven. Francis Libermann, who suffered greatly in his life, wrote, “I never cross a bridge without the thought of throwing myself over the parapet, to put an end to these afflictions. But the sight of my Jesus sustains me and gives me patience.”

The person who shared with me his dealing with depression mentioned the above examples to show that “You have intercessors in heaven and on Earth who know that the mind has many mountains and cliffs. [...] Loneliness can be the worst part of depression. Knowing that I am indeed among friends in my suffering has been enough for me to keep going and to find hope.”

Meditate on Christ and ask His Saints for Help

“I find great comfort in the Incarnation. We, as Catholics, believe in a God whose love for us is so powerful that He took on our lowly nature in order to redeem it. Christ did not become human just to teach us some new lessons; He shows us a whole new way to be human and, ultimately, how to share in His Divinity.”

My countryman continued, “In my darkest moments, when I truly was giving in to despair, I found that saying Jesus’ prayer and meditating on the Nativity of our Lord was enough to let me go on another day to pursue help. [...] Prayer is very hard when you are depressed. God seems silent, and I wonder where He is and what He is doing. All the same, I do pray, and peace eventually comes. Mother Teresa’s dark night of the soul lasted several years, but she endured. You can find strength in the same faith."

“I do believe that offering up your sufferings for the conversion of the world and the souls in purgatory can do great things. You’re turning your mind to charity, and doing so will teach your heart to love people in the midst of grief. [...] Finally, let’s pray to the Virgin Mary, the Mother of God, Our Lady of Sorrows. Ask her to help you and all who are plagued by grief and depression.”

“And He appointed twelve (whom He also named Apostles) to be with Him...” (Mk 3:14)

I personally feel ‐‐ and it’s the real need of the time ‐‐ that there should be more vocations to the Priesthood and consecrated life. As Jesus rightly puts it: “The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few.” (Mt 9:37) So, the clear invitation is extended to you, dear “youth” in our Parish, to give it a thought today.

Let me give you a few tips for discerning whether you’re actually called by Our Lord the High Priest for this great vocation. I also call them “steps” of vocational discernment. These steps, however, should not be taken as final and finished but rather for reflective purposes.

• Step 1: Have the right understanding of happiness.

• Step 2: Know that He has created you for a specific Mission.

• Step 3: Accept His love and His choice for you.

• Step 4: Make yourself available to listen to the Lord. Prayer is how we primarily listen to the voice of the Lord, especially through Holy Mass, Eucharistic adoration, praying with the Word of God or Rosary, personal meditation, etc. Be alert to the obstacles to hearing His voice: Sin and the noise of the world?

• Step 5: Cooperate with Him in clearing away obstacles to free you to say, “yes.” Be alert to what keeps you from giving yourself over in love to Him: Past hurts or fear?

• Step 6: Give yourself entirely to Christ in Love; be holy! Strive to give yourself fully to Jesus in love which is called a “personal relationship” with Him.

• Step 7: Begin to distinguish the “four voices” of discernment: 1. The voice of the Lord; 2. Our own voice; 3. The voice of the world; 4. The voice of the devil.

• Step 8: Make the choice. Choice brings the discernment to an end and with that comes a new found freedom to begin living with clarity and hope. There is no other way to serve the Lord than by stepping out in courage and proper discernment and by making a definitive choice for your life.

In 2016, I had the privilege of visiting the tomb of St. John Mary Vianney, Curé d’Ars and patron Saint of Parish Priests. As I was kneeling before the tomb, my mind began to race and my heart began to swell. In that moment, I remembered all the parish priests who have impacted my life: those men who, through their words of encouragement and example of holiness, helped me consider that God was calling me to follow their example throughout my life. They helped me know that I was loved by a God who had a plan for my life even before I was born.

With grateful tears in my eyes, I thought about how incredible it would be to go to confession in the same church where St. John Vianney used to sit and hear confessions for 12‐15 hours per day. So, I made my confession there with many intense emotions.

As I prayed my penance afterward, I knelt before Vianney’s tomb once more and considered what it must have been like for the thousands of penitents who visited this humble parish priest to receive the Sacrament of Reconciliation. What words of healing and encouragement did he share? How did God speak to His children through the voice of this spiritual Father? In my mind I heard him say, “Speak freely, for the Lord hears you.” I felt reassured that, in the words of St. John Paul II, “We are not the sum of our weaknesses and failures; we are the sum of the Father’s love for us.”

The prospect of providing that kind of wisdom and mercy to those who need it most gave me great joy and consolation. Even today, when I sit to hear confessions, I close my eyes a moment and picture St. John Vianney in my mind and ask his intercession for me, to have his zeal and enthusiasm to show God’s mercy and compassion to the penitents. They come for the Sacrament and I pray they depart as free, relieved, and renewed children of God.

Oh, St. John Mary Vianney, pray for me to imitate your example
as the model of Confessors and pray for our people of God
to understand the healing and consoling power of this great Sacrament!

We come now, on Palm Sunday, to the beginning of Holy Week. It is perhaps a strange Palm Sunday, a strange Holy Week. We may be covering our faces due to the still-haunting Pandemic and also harboring distant fears caused by a war between Russia and Ukraine. Who knows how these will affect our countries, too, in the near future? God only knows.

We could make our usual outward and visible journeys, gestures, exchanges, and gatherings that have always embodied the inner meaning of this week like the procession of Palm Crosses or the choral singing of Hosanna. These things echo the events of the first Palm Sunday but, this time, with a difference.

The inner journey is more necessary than ever, and in the following sonnet that I extracted from "Sounding the Seasons," by Malcolm Guite, the poet has explored the truth that what was happening “out there” and “back then” as Christ entered Jerusalem is also happening “in here” and “right now.” There is a Jerusalem of the heart. Our inner life also has its temple and palaces, its places of corruption, its gardens of rest, and its seat of judgment.

Let's walk with Christ on both an outer and an inner journey that leads to the Cross and beyond.

A poetic reflection…

I am ever so near you, hovering over your shoulder, reading every thought.
People think that thoughts are fleeting and worthless, but yours are precious to Me.
I smile when you think lovingly of Me.
My spirit who lives within you, helps you to think My thoughts.
As your thinking goes, so goes your entire being.
Let Me be your positive Focus.
When you look to Me knowing Me as God with you, you experience Joy.
This is according to My ancient design when I first crafted man.
Modern man seeks his positive focus elsewhere: in sports, sensations, acquiring new possessions.
Advertising capitalizes on the longing of people, for a positive focus in their lives.
I planted that longing in human souls, knowing that only I could fully satisfy it.
Delight yourself in Me, let Me become the desire of your heart!

O Lord, You have searched me, and You know me. You know when I sit and when I rise; You perceive my thoughts from afar. (Ps 139:1-2)

Behold, the virgin shall be with child and bear a son, and they shall name him Emmanuel, which means “God is with us.” (Mt 1:23)

Find your delight in the LORD who will give you your heart’s desire. (Ps 37:4)

The story of the baptism of Jesus can be found in three of the four Gospels: Matthew, Mark, and Luke. (Mt: 3:13-17, Mk 1:9-11, Lk: 3:21-22). The Gospel of John talks abut the Baptism in Chapter 1 but does not give any details to the actual event.

Jesus came to John for baptism, but John did not want to baptize the Lord. He felt unworthy and already knew that Jesus was the One the world had been looking forward to since the first promise of a Redeemer back in Genesis 3:15. Yet, Jesus asked John to baptize Him, and John obeyed.

Following the act of baptism, the Holy Spirit descended on Jesus. Luke’s passage says that the Holy Spirit came down in a bodily form. Because of those words and because each of the three passages say that the Spirit descended “like a dove,” we know that the people present saw something special that day. I think it is important to read the wording carefully here. These verses do not say that the Holy Spirit took on the body of a dove. Let’s not fall into the trap of worshipping the creature more than the Creator (Romans 1:22-25). The Holy Spirit may very well have taken on the shape of a dove, but the text does not say this and certainly does not encourage us to worship doves.

Following the baptism of Jesus and the descent of the Holy Spirit, a voice from heaven was heard: the voice of God the Father. God said, “This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.” (Mk 1:11). God spoke directly to the people and to Jesus, pronouncing Him as Christ. God approved of His life, ministry, and sacrifice.

Jesus is an example for us in many ways. There are some things that He did that we obviously cannot do -- such as die on behalf of another for the purpose of forgiving their sins. However, we can follow the Lord in His example of baptism. Our baptism is used to identify us with Christ and announces to others we accept and follow the Lord. Baptism is an important step for a new believer.

Jesus did not start His public ministry until after this event, and the passage in Luke says that He was about 30 years old when it happened. God used this time to publicly announce Jesus’ ministry. Immediately, Jesus was then led into the desert by the Holy Spirit to fast and pray. At the conclusion of 40 days of fasting, Satan came to tempt the Lord. When the Lord began His public ministry, He also immediately became a practical example for us in devotion to God and resistance to the temptations of the devil.

“You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you, so that you might go and bear fruit, fruit that will last.” (John 15:16)

Even now, I am still amazed and bewildered as to why God made me a priest. If not for His grace and compassion, I, being an unworthy person, would not have been chosen for such a holy and adorable task.

A priest is chosen among ordinary, feeble men. Therefore, a priest must be viewed firstly as a “human being” who is frail and fragile, prone to fall. He is a man made of flesh and blood. He’s a man who has every emotion and feeling which any other male human being possesses. Therefore, a priest should always maintain a rapport with his humanness. He should be rooted in it lest he starts thinking of himself as superhuman, which would be a myth for certain. He should eat and drink, laugh and cry, feel tired and perhaps need appreciation.

While being in that human realm, he should aspire to Holiness; he should gradually touch the Divine! Because he has not been called by a human source but rather a Divine Source. He is placed between human and Divine simultaneously. Therein lies the sublimity of his vocation. Therefore, a priest should be revered not because of his human qualifications but for the Divine seal with which our Lord has stamped his heart and soul. Here, I am reminded of a beautiful statement which St. John Mary Vianney made, “If I were to meet a priest and an angel, I should salute the priest before I saluted the angel. The latter is the friend of God, but the priest holds His place.”

With my personal experience of priesthood for 13 years, I see how the Devil tries to attack me in numerous ways. Because the evil one knows if he can tempt a priest, he can grab many souls for hell since a priest is entrusted with a group of people of whom he should take care. In the lives of his parishioners, from their birth to death, a priest is there representing Christ. So, his role here is immeasurable. Leading and directing people toward God is not a trivial matter. People, in return, should always say at least a small prayer for their priests rather than destructively criticizing them.

Today, there’s a big drop in priestly vocations. Many young people are mesmerized by the lures of the flesh and the world. Therefore, all Christians should pray fervently for vocations.

A priest finds his contentment not from this world but from above. Therefore, he’s sent to please not human beings but the Author of the Priesthood, our Lord Jesus Christ. “He is in the world but not of the world.” (John 17:16)

It is of great importance that all priests view their priesthood as a sublime gift from God. Despite their frailties, they should journey toward the New Jerusalem not alone but accompanied by the people with whom they’ve been entrusted, always with joyful hearts even amid the enormous sacrifices they must make along the way.