August 2008
GENERAL INTENTIONS
RESPECT FOR CREATION  That the human family may learn to respect God’s plan for the world and become ever more aware that Creation is God’s great gift.
 
MISSION INTENTIONS

CALL TO HOLINESS          That the answer of the entire people of God to the common calling to holiness and mission may be promoted and fostered by means of careful discernment of charisms and constant commitment to spiritual and cultural formation
 
September 2008
GENERAL INTENTIONS

REFUGEES
That Christians may defend and protect refugees.

 
MISSION INTENTIONS

CHRISTIAN FAMILIES
That every Christian family may be a small evangelizing community which is responsive to the needs of others.

 
October 2008
GENERAL INTENTIONS

SYNOD OF BISHOPS
That the Synod of Bishops may help all those engaged in the service of the Word of God to transmit the truth of faith courageously in communion with the entire Church.

 
MISSION INTENTIONS

PARTICIPATION IN THE CHURCH'S UNIVERSAL MISSION
That in this month dedicated to the missions, every Christian community may feel the need to participate in the universal mission with prayer, sacrifice, and concrete help.

 
November 2008
GENERAL INTENTIONS

LOVE OF GOD AND NEIGHBOUR
That the testimony of love offered by the saints may fortify Christians in their devotion to God and neighbor, imitating Christ who came to serve and not to be served.
 
MISSION INTENTIONS
CHURCH IN ASIA
That the Christian communities of Asia, contemplating the face of Christ, may find the most suitable ways to announce Him, in full faithfulness to the Gospel.
 
December 2008
GENERAL INTENTIONS

CULTURE OF LIFE
That, faced with the growing expansion of the culture of violence and death, the Church may courageously promote the culture of life through all her apostolic and missionary activities.

MISSION INTENTIONS

FRATERNAL WITNESS
That, especially in mission countries, Christians may show through gestures of kindness that the Child born in Bethlehem is the Hope of the world.

 
 

Prayer - A Raising of one's mind and heart to God...by Sr.Luciana Zonta

Prayer is a matter of fundatmental importance in the life of a Christian, both communal or public prayer, as well as personal prayer. A Christian who fails to grow into a personal relationship with God lacks the motivation for being a believer. God remains a stranger in whom he/she cannot put trust in.

 

Just imagine: a life without human relationships, without communication, what would it be like, for any of us? Can we envision someone cut off from meaningful connections, from interpersonal contacts?  It would mean unbearable silence and isolation.

Family life can give us an idea of what I am trying to convey to you about prayer.

The more closeness, understanding, affection there is among the members of the family, the more need there is to exchange words, gestures, expressions of benevolence and love.

Vice versa, where relationships are not nourished, there is coldness, unsatisfactory communication, little or no exchange of words. Consequently, often it happens that one runs away from such a situation and looks for satisfying relationships elsewhere, outside the family and, within the family, the members live like strangers to one another.

Likewise, the same thing can happen in our prayer life. We can truly say that if we don’t know God we cannot love him. And if we don’t learn to love him, we will not feel the need to dialogue with him. Therefore, it is crucial that we engage often in a trusting and loving conversation with our God in moments of personal prayer and thus grow to know him better and to love him more.

1. WHAT IS PRAYER?

Prayer is a search, it is a hunger, a thirst for God, and, even if we are not completely aware of it, prayer is often a response to him who first speaks to us and moves us interiorly, in the depth of ourselves. The call of Samuel is a good example of what I am trying to say. So, it follows that prayer has to involve listening. In the Vatican II Document Dei Verbum 25 we find: … we speak to him when we pray; we listen to him when we read the Scriptures.

A classical definition of what we intend by the word prayer is: “Prayer is a raising up of one’s mind and heart to God.” (St. Therese of Lisieux)

Yes, the center of prayer is the human heart, because the heart stands for the whole being. In fact, when someone says “with all my heart” that person means “with all my being”.

Praying is not so much a matter of saying words, reciting formulas. It is also this, but it is more a pouring out of our heart, our sentiments and feelings, asking questions, listening attentively to someone whom we love, whose friendship we cherish, but also to someone whom we sometimes fear…In other words, authentic, true prayer is an affectionate sharing of ourselves with God. Indeed, the heart of prayer is desire for God, a yearning to know him and to be known by him.

In this regard let us look at the psalms, particularly ps 63: O God, you are my God, I pine for you; my heart thirsts, my body longs for you, as a land parched, dreary and waterless … or ps 42: As a deer yearns for running streams, so I yearn for you, my God… or ps 103: Bless the Lord, my soul, all my being bless his holy name … he forgives all your offences, cures all your diseases… The Lord is kind and full of forgiveness, slow to anger and rich in faithful love…

 

The psalms are a school of prayer; through them we learn to engage our affectivity, as well as all our senses to communicate with God.

When and how do we exercise ourselves in listening? Well, again, we may be helped by thinking of the way we converse with one another, with a friend: We talk, exchange ideas, feelings, what is important to us; then, we listen, we wish to know how the other reacts to our sharing of ourselves. Do we behave in this way with the Lord, or are not there times when we start saying something to him and go on and on and on with our words and then turn off the conversation without giving a change to the other to talk to us? It can also happen the other way around: We listen silently all the time but there is little or no engagement, no exchange, no answers.

2. HOW DO WE LEARN TO PRAY?

There are many, many books on Christian spirituality, on prayer. They can make us more aware of what prayer is and tell us how to go about learning to pray. However, since prayer is a relationship with Someone, it is by growing in the relationship that we learn to pray, that is, by praying we learn how to pray. And since we see in the gospels how all of Jesus’ words and works had their source in deep and intimate prayer to the Father, we should take him as our model of prayer.

3. HOW DID JESUS PRAY?

Before beginning his public life, under the impulse of the Spirit, he retired in the desert to pray. How did he respond to the devil’s temptation? With the words of Scripture.

We are told that he often chose a solitary place to converse with the Father. Sometimes he spent the whole night in prayer, especially when he was faced with important decisions such as

  • the choice of the 12 apostles
  • facing his passion and death

Can we imagine in each of these situations what his prayer was like? What kind of feelings or significance do the words or gestures in the text carry? Good prayer goes beyond words to catch the spirit of the event or of the story being told.

A good way to pray is read a passage of Scripture, especially one that tell about a particular event, for example:

  • the Annunciation
  • the first miracle in Cana
  • the visit to Martha and Mary
  • the washing of his disciples’ feet

Recreate in one’s mind the situation and enter into the scene as one of the characters… and hear Jesus speaking to me or to another and participate in the dynamism of the event, in the conversation. Ask questions and listen for the answers.

When we pray this way it is good to record in a personal journal what happens. It is also helpful to share with someone (a spiritual guide) about our personal prayer so as to avoid deceiving ourselves.

In his dialogue with the Father, Jesus always uses expressions of thankfulness and gratitude, especially before performing a miracle, such as:

  • the multiplication of the loaves and fishes
  • the resurrection of Lazarus.
  • the breaking of bread with the disciples of Emmaus.

In so doing he witnesses his closeness and dependence on the Father as well as his appreciation for everything.

A well known prayer of Jesus is the one in the Garden of Getsemane before his passion—an anguished prayer that causes him to sweat blood, but a prayer that helps him to dispose himself to do the will of the Father. He prays also on the Cross as he is dying: “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” So, the author of the letter to the Hebrew 5:7 can rightly say that Jesus, “During his life on earth offered prayer and entreaty, aloud and in silent tears, to the one who had the power to save him from death, and because of his reverent attitude his prayer was heard”.

Jesus, not only gives us the example as a prayerful person, but he also tells us many things about prayer. He speaks about the necessity to pray continuously without getting tired or discouraged, to ask humbly and repeatedly what we need and to be confident that the Father will grant our requests. He cautions us, however, about temptations and boredom, so that we might learn to be watchful and persevering in prayer. Jesus’ entire life and being was a response to God’s love and so must our prayer be. He shows us that any event in our daily life may become an opportunity for talking it over with God.

Perhaps the greatest challenge of all, in considering personal prayer, is what we find in the gospel of Luke 21:36. “Stay awake, praying at all times”.

 

4. HOW CAN WE PRAY ALL THE TIME? HOW IS SUCH THING POSSIBLE?

Let us look at John’s gospel , chapter 4: 8-14

“The Samaritan woman said to him, ‘You are a Jew. How is it that you ask me, a Samaritan woman, for something to drink?’ Jesus replied to her: If you only knew what God is offering

and who it is that is saying to you, ‘give me something to drink,’ you would have been the one to ask, and he would have given you living water.

The water that I shall give him will become in him a spring of water, welling up to eternal life. (water signifies the Spirit)

See also Jn 7: 37-39

“On the last day, the great day of the festival, Jesus stood up and cried out:

‘Let anyone who is thirsty come to me!

Let anyone who believes in me come and drink!

As scripture says, ‘From his heart shall flow streams of living water.’

He was speaking of the Spirit which those who believed in him were to receiv”.

Indeed, in the person with a prayerful heart, the Holy Spirit is the living water “welling up to eternal life” as if from a wellspring. (Jn 4:14)

 

In Rm 8:26-27 St. Paul says: “Likewise, the Spirit helps us in our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we ought, but that very spirit intercedes with sighs too deep for words. And God who searches the heart, knows what is the mind of the Spirit because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God.”

We must learn to invoke the Spirit and ask him to prepare us to meet the Lord and invite him to pray with us and in us.

In answer to the apostles who asked him to teach them to pray, Jesus left them the beautiful prayer of the children of God: the Our Father.

The Our Father is the prayer of the Christian.

If we take time to pray, if we allowed the Holy Spirit to reveal to us the deeper meaning of the words of the Our Father we would discover that through this prayer we are led to express blessing, request, wish, desire, abandonment, forgiveness, promise, entreaty…

That is, this simple prayer, if prayed slowly, giving it time to sink in, to catch our attention and the sentiments of our heart, can be a prayer as deep and as vast as Jesus’ love. As St. Paul says: “We will know the utter fullness of God himself".

Let us not be satisfied with the usual way of praying—prayer done quickly and with little time for reflection and pondering. The banquet of the Scripture is rich and tasty. We have to work up a good appetite and engage wholeheartedly in dialogue with God and thereby grow in the ability to pray an intimate, personal unique prayer of the children of God.

     

    PRAYING ON THE SCRIPTURES ALONE OR IN A GROUP
    WE INVITE THE LORD
    WE READ THE BIBLICAL PASSAGE
    WE PICK OUT WORDS OR SHORT PHRASES AND MEDITATE ON THEM
    WE LET GOD SPEAK TO US IN SILENCE
    WE SHARE WHAT WE HAVE HEARD IN OUR HEARTS
    WE DISCUSS/DECIDE ON A TASK OUR GROUP IS CALLED TO DO
    WE PRAY TOGETHER/CONCLUDE WITH A SONG
 

Time to Change Jobs?

by Basil D'Cunha

Changing jobs is never easy. Here are a few ways to find out if a change is really what you need and how to go about the search

Test 1  -Attitude

There is a strong urge to change Jobs –  especially when you don’t seem to be going anywhere in the current Organization.

Let’s see when is a good time to make a  change:

  1. Do You contribute ideas in your Job,?
  2. Do  you volunteer to do odd jobs, ?
  3. Do you readily accept to work Overtime ?
  4. Do you readily help a colleague if they  finds some thing difficult to do?
  5. Do you get along well with your colleagues?
  6. Are you a Team player?
  7. Are you punctual?
  8. Are you courteous to your Superiors/colleagues?

In other words, do  have the right  Attitude  at the work place?

If the answer to most questions is YES –and inspite of this you are looking for a change then you have a case. But if the answer is NO to most questions – then there is perhaps need to review areas you could make changes in your attitude, and then reconsider after  a year  or so. ?

 

Test 2 – Personal advancement

Does your CV do you proud? Have you made  “significant” changes in your CV  since you took up the current job?

  1. Have you looked at your CV recently?
  2. Are there any changes that would make you proud? In other words  - have you added to your “Qualifications”?
  3. Have you  gone for any  Special courses to improve your skills?
  4. Have you won any awards in your work place?
  5. Have your improved  on your Arabic speaking skills?
  6. Can  you  be called a ‘Multi-tasker’ ( ability to do several jobs)
  7. Have you got yourself a Driving license?

Again if your answers to most questions is YES –then there would be a case to switch jobs. But if the answers to  most are NO then you perhaps need to think again? It is perhaps time you first  “improve” your CV.

 

Test 3 – Research the  new Company

 

  1. Have you checked their Website?  Is the Company philosophy better than the current one ?
  2. Companies look very ‘rosy’ from the outside. Have you checked from an Inside source that the Company is what it claims to be?
  3. Are there good prospects for further Promotions? Have you checked whether your Visa change will be straightforward?
  4. Is your salary package going to improve  so you feel ‘ justified ‘ in  changing?What are prospects to learn a few more Skills? Do they have a Training program?
  5. Is the Company stable – doing consistently well?

 

If the answers to most of the questions are ‘YES” then  it appears there is justification to consider this Company . If the answers are “NO” then you perhaps need to look at other Options i.e. other companies ,countries etc

 

Test 4 - What is your personal circumstance?

It is never advisable to make changes when there are other changes taking place  in  personal life – ie. Getting married soon, or  wife is  having  a baby, or there is a baby but no maid  to help out.

  1. Are you recently married ?
  2. Is your wife on your Visa?
  3. Is   your wife  pregnant?
  4. Will  the distance between the Company and your Residence –  going to put  you under stress  OR  more expense?
  5. Will you have time to have a relaxing week-end or help in the household chores?
  6. Have you prayed about this and have you discerned that it is the Lord’s will? This is very important - So don't make hasty decisions - are you at peace with what you the new proscpects or is there some uneasiness when you think of it?

 

Again if answers to most of the questions are ‘positive’ then  perhaps  it is wiser  to  differ your decision till things settle down at home and your hotline with God is stronger?

 

Final Test :Why are you seeking a change?  What is the cause of the Frustration .

 

  1. Is it due rampant discrimination?
  2. Were you rightly in line for a promotion –but was denied it due to “in house politics”
  3. No change in salary inspite of promises made.
  4. No Ovettime paid or paid correctly inspite of  working extra hours?
  5. Do not get Annual Leave on time, or as per Law?
  6. Not adequate opportunity to learn ‘new’ skills.
  7. Though better qualified – lesser qualified people are given opportunities?

 

Again if your answers are ‘Yes’ to most of the questions – then you need to look for a change-but be careful – many companies in the region do not have strong track records –so  research the change thoroughly  lest you go from the frying pan to the fire.

 
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