Dear friends,
Hope you are all well and have a good time with the steady weather this past week. Though there had been fears of some scary weather, we were able to escape such a thing. Hope we continue to have a good time ahead.
I thank all people who came for my installation mass and prayed for me. That was really encouraging for me. I thank in a special way the PCCW for their wonderful arrangements for the refreshments after the Mass. Your presence made me feel so good and special. Thanks a lot for your love and support. I look forward to your continued sentiments of love and support throughout my stay and ministry here.
I also thank Fr. Eric Berns, our Dean to have accepted to come over here and install me as the Pastor. I look forward to working with all the priests of the Deanery with Fr. Eric’s leadership.
I remember something my teacher told us in the class a long ago. That was about the scissors and the needle. She told us, “You boys should be like the needle not like the scissors”. We were, at least I was, bewildered when the teacher said this, because I thought in my mind that both of these things were as dangerous as the other. And I even asked the teacher, “Why teacher are you saying this, because both of these are capable enough equally to hurt us? Then why can we be like the needle not like the scissors?”  The teacher thus explained: The scissors cut the things and separate them. For example, when we use the scissors to cut a piece of cloth, it serves as the agent of separation and division. But when we use the needle to stich a torn piece of cloth, it serves as the agent of bond and union. That is why you need to be like the needle, not like the scissors”. Then I understood what the teacher meant.
We Christians are called to be the agents of unity and peace. That is what is our vocation as Christians. We need to carry out the mission of union and peace by following the example of Christ Himself. He came to unite the separated humanity to God the Father Himself. It is because of that we have become again the privileged children of God. That unity is to be established among us all. Despite all our differences and disagreements, we need to remain as one, one in Christ Jesus our Savior. Our mission is based on the love, love as portrayed and practiced by Christ.
We see this unity was very well practiced by the early Christians. In the book of Acts, we see this more explicitly (2:42-47). By being so they had set an example to us that the community life of Christians is not a difficult job but a doable one. So, keeping their example in our mind let us live a life of union, the union of the Trinity.
God bless.
Yours sincerely in Christ Jesus,
Fr. A. Antony.
 

Dear friends,
I hope you are all doing well. We have been having oscillating weather with warmer and colder weather. We need to pray for conducive weather so that the farmers have a good growth of crops and a good yield.
 Once there was a couple who were really a good husband and wife. They were such a good couple that there was no secret between them. They really loved each other so well and they had a good time for sixty years. The wife had asked her husband for a favor which the husband obliged to offer her. The favor was that the husband should not ask her anything about a particular box that she wanted to be secret. The husband respected her sentiments and never asked her anything about it. Their life went on for so long as sixty years.
 It so happened that the wife was on her deathbed and she was about to die. She called her husband and asked him to bring the box about which she wanted him not to ask anything from the beginning. The husband brought the box and set it before her. She asked him to open the box. He opened it and to his surprise, he saw a bundle of money which was around $200,000.00 and two woolen toys. The husband asked his wife what that was. She said, “I made these woolen toys. When I married you, my grandmother told me to do this. That is, whenever I got angry with you, I should not argue with you. Instead I should go and pick some wool and make the toys like this. These are the toys I made.”
 The husband was so happy that there were only two toys, which meant he made his wife upset only two times. But he was curious about the money and asked her, “What about the money? How did you earn them?” The wife solemnly said, “Oh, that money! That is the amount I made by selling the toys that I made.”
 This story may be comical, but it teaches us a lesson. If a family needs to be happy and content, there should be some kind of sacrifice and self-denial on the part of husband and wife and also the children. If the members of the family are not ready to make any sacrifice for each other, the family will be a hell filled with hatred, quarrels and fights. This sense of sacrifice will be possible only if there is true love in the family. Let us love each other wholeheartedly and make a good family.
 God bless.
 Yours sincerely,
Fr. A. Antony
 

 

Dear friends,
Hope you had a good week and hope you will have a good one ahead. My prayers go with you for a better week. 
Once upon a time there was a man walking along the way and a beggar met him and asked for some help. The man said that he would help him. He said, "I am willing to help you, but I am not going to give you any money. But I will make you partner in my business." The beggar was very elated. He asked the man, "Oh, you are going to make me your business partner! How much would be my share of the profit and what is the business?" The man said, "I will give you all my land and you cultivate and do the farming. When the harvest time comes just give me 10% of the profit and you take the 90% of the profit."   The beggar was even more surprised and overjoyed. He could not believe his ears. He thought that he was dreaming. Anywise the beggar accepted the deal and thanked the man. So they parted, agreeing on the deal.
The beggar started working hard and earned profit. As agreed he went to the man with whom he was the partner and gave him the share of the profit which was the 10%. This he kept doing loyally and he was very happy about the way it was going. 
The years passed by and the beggar slowly forgot the partner little by little. And also he thought, 'I am working, and he is not working and why should I give him any share at all? I am not going to give him anymore shares.' Thinking so he stopped giving the share to the other partner in the business, who was actually the owner of the whole business. When the owner approached the partner, who was originally the beggar, the beggar said what he thought earlier and refused to give the share.
This is very true of us most of the times, too. The business partner in our life is God. He has invested a lot of things in us. He gave us a body, gave us life, gave us parents and what not. All He wants is to be faithful to him. But what happens a lot of times is that we become disloyal to him. We betray His love and affection and we become obsessed with the worldly wealth and pleasures. We do not want to spare time for Him to be with Him and we do not want to keep His words. We go astray because of our selfishness and our indifference towards Him. Keeping our trust in the short-lived joy of worldly materials, we are ready to forgo the eternal joy. Like these, in many ways we break His covenant with us. But the reality is that in spite of these all, God still loves us and comes behind us with the hope that we will one day come back to Him renewing the covenant.
Let us keep this in our mind and try to come back to Him.
God bless.
Yours sincerely in Christ,
 
Fr. A. Antony
 

Dear Friends,
I hope you are all fine.  I am happy to have come to these parishes.  I am excited to meet with you all so that we can grow together.  I was told that these parishes are strong Catholic parishes with deep faith.  I am happy to know that.  I hope that your faith gets stronger and stronger and you become good and living witnesses of the Lord.
There was a very strong Catholic person who was going to church for a long time. He had been going but in vain.  He did not find that the Holy Mass  helped him in any way.  He came to a point when he was bored of Mass so much that he sent a letter to the editor of a renowned newspaper.  His letter read something like this. "Dear sir, I am a Catholic person.  I would like to tell you that the mass and the preaching  are no good.  I have been going to church for all my life.  I have listened to thousands of homilies and received thousands of communions.  But none of these have helped me.  I feel I have wasted a good part of my life.  The priests’  preaching is a waste of time.  Their preaching has not done anything to me at all.  I don't know why all these people are so dumb." 
The letter created a stir among people.  There was much hue and cry about this man and his letter.  He was almost hated by all.  To the end of all, another person wrote a letter to the same editor of the same newspaper.  That letter read like this: “Dear sir, I am a Catholic and I am married.  We have been married for more than thirty five years.  My wife has been cooking for all these years.  She has cooked various kinds of meals.  But till now I do not know the recipe for any food or meal.  I know that the food has nourished me, and given strength and flexibility to my body.  If I had not eaten those meals prepared by my wife, I would be physically dead today.  Similarly so, if I had not been going to church for all these days of my life, I would be spiritually dead.  So the nourishment of my body depends on my wife's food and my spiritual nourishment depends on going to church."  Thus the stir came to an end.
This is sometimes true in our life. We try to find rational reasons for attending the mass.  But we need to realize that the mass and the other sacraments do not need our rationale for being effective.  They have their effect despite our acceptance or non-acceptance.  So the better way to approach these is to take part in these things without trying to rationalize them.  They will sure have an effect in our lives.
May God bless you all.

Sincerely, Fr. A.Antony