Wednesday, March 6, 2013
Tuesday, March 5, 2013
Honest to God: Moving towards a more credible language Joseph Mattam S.J.
Honest to God
Moving towards a more credible language
Joseph Mattam S.J.
1. Introduction
Hitler’s Willing Executioners - Ordinary Germans and the Holocaust (D. J. Goldhagen, Vintage Books, 1997) is a challenging book. It narrates how ordinary Germans were willingly involved in the execution and near extermination of Jews in the 1930s and 40s. The Jews are considered God’s chosen people; the Bible, especially the OT, attests that God always protects His people. They are never left without his protection and providence, but the events from 1930 onwards did shatter the above conviction. God was significantly absent in these events. If we look back into our history of say, 500-600 years, we are left with further questions. We may mention just a few, out of the many hundreds, of such important events that have happened and are happening in history: millions of Africans were uprooted from their own country, were made slaves and treated in the most inhuman ways; the genocide of millions in America and Australia (it is claimed that more than 80 % of the local inhabitants have been murdered by the invaders from Europe - The Bible and Colonialism, a Moral Critique, by M. Prior, Sheffield, 1997); Colonialism by which most of the Asian and African nations lost their sovereignty and were impoverished, becoming mere source of enrichment for the colonizing Christian nations.
Moving towards a more credible language
Joseph Mattam S.J.
1. Introduction
Hitler’s Willing Executioners - Ordinary Germans and the Holocaust (D. J. Goldhagen, Vintage Books, 1997) is a challenging book. It narrates how ordinary Germans were willingly involved in the execution and near extermination of Jews in the 1930s and 40s. The Jews are considered God’s chosen people; the Bible, especially the OT, attests that God always protects His people. They are never left without his protection and providence, but the events from 1930 onwards did shatter the above conviction. God was significantly absent in these events. If we look back into our history of say, 500-600 years, we are left with further questions. We may mention just a few, out of the many hundreds, of such important events that have happened and are happening in history: millions of Africans were uprooted from their own country, were made slaves and treated in the most inhuman ways; the genocide of millions in America and Australia (it is claimed that more than 80 % of the local inhabitants have been murdered by the invaders from Europe - The Bible and Colonialism, a Moral Critique, by M. Prior, Sheffield, 1997); Colonialism by which most of the Asian and African nations lost their sovereignty and were impoverished, becoming mere source of enrichment for the colonizing Christian nations.
Sunday, March 3, 2013
Friday, March 1, 2013
Tuesday, February 19, 2013
Where there is knowledge
there is no know-er
Where there is know-er
there is no knowledge!
[ author : Shaukath in Mozhiyazham - മൊഴി യാഴം 50 - ഷൗകത്ത് ]
Here knowledge is enlghtenment.
Where the brain has used all its exercises
and not gained anything
there can be an awakening.
It just happens
The world of thoughts has become silent
this awakening takes place.
I and mine are no more.
Knowledge, know-er, and known disappear.
I am not different from other things, other people:
this awareness grows
This is a very very rare experience.
there is no know-er
Where there is know-er
there is no knowledge!
[ author : Shaukath in Mozhiyazham - മൊഴി യാഴം 50 - ഷൗകത്ത് ]
Here knowledge is enlghtenment.
Where the brain has used all its exercises
and not gained anything
there can be an awakening.
It just happens
The world of thoughts has become silent
this awakening takes place.
I and mine are no more.
Knowledge, know-er, and known disappear.
I am not different from other things, other people:
this awareness grows
This is a very very rare experience.
Monday, February 11, 2013
Pope Benedict XVI to step down.
Pope Benedict XVI has announced he will resign in two weeks.
Here is his full statement:
Dear Brothers,
I have convoked you to this Consistory, not only for the three
canonizations, but also to communicate to you a decision of great importance
for the life of the Church. After having repeatedly examined my conscience
before God, I have come to the certainty that my strengths, due to an advanced
age, are no longer suited to an adequate exercise of the Petrine ministry. I am
well aware that this ministry, due to its essential spiritual nature, must be
carried out not only with words and deeds, but no less with prayer and
suffering. However, in today’s world, subject to so many rapid changes and
shaken by questions of deep relevance for the life of faith, in order to govern
the bark of Saint Peter and proclaim the Gospel, both strength of mind and body
are necessary, strength which in the last few months, has deteriorated in me to
the extent that I have had to recognize my incapacity to adequately fulfill the
ministry entrusted to me. For this reason, and well aware of the seriousness of
this act, with full freedom I declare that I renounce the ministry of Bishop of
Rome, Successor of Saint Peter, entrusted to me by the Cardinals on 19 April
2005, in such a way, that as from 28 February 2013, at 20:00 hours, the See of
Rome, the See of Saint Peter, will be vacant and a Conclave to elect the new
Supreme Pontiff will have to be convoked by those whose competence it is.
Dear Brothers, I thank you most sincerely for all the love and
work with which you have supported me in my ministry and I ask pardon for all
my defects. And now, let us entrust the Holy Church to the care of Our Supreme
Pastor, Our Lord Jesus Christ, and implore his holy Mother Mary, so that she
may assist the Cardinal Fathers with her maternal solicitude, in electing a new
Supreme Pontiff. With regard to myself, I wish to also devotedly serve the Holy
Church of God in the future through a life dedicated to prayer.
From the Vatican, 10 February 2013
Sunday, January 27, 2013
Friday, January 18, 2013
Wednesday, January 16, 2013
Saturday, January 12, 2013
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