Worthy Treasure

Sometimes I feel guilty on how I had been neglecting one of the greatest treasures lying uncared in my cupboard – The Holy Bible! As a Catholic, I have a tendency to take it for granted, and seldom turn to it for the much needed counsel, especially when I am frantically looking for a solution to problems which are hard to find. All I ever needed to do was open its pages and follow what I find therein. Familiarity breeds contempt, and that seems to fit perfectly to the way I had been handling the Word of God. I have heard stories of how people who had turned over a new leaf because of the life-giving words, but what have I done about it?

Every time now I turn the pages and read the words reverently, I know the words seem to have been addressed to me. Lovely life stories of virtuous and wicked narrated to me by a loving Father or Grand Mother to teach me the great cherished values; principles and precepts which can show me light in the midst of darkness, words of caution and admonition, when I let the reigns of life free without any control. The Holy Bible is capable of doing in my life a lot more than I can imagine or hope for.

Centuries of wisdom squeezed out and presented to me in a platter, and it is for me to take it or refuse it. If I have a deadly malady and know for sure a remedy, and when I am offered, could I refuse it? Mere knowledge of a remedy is not going to cure me from the malady, I need to accept the remedy and swallow the pill, which may be sweet or sour or bitter. The Word of God is not sweet all through; sometimes I know it is sure to probe deep into my soul, and many a secret thought may come out as a result, but that is part of the process of purification.

I am beginning to take seriously the role and function the Holy Bible plays in my life. I have begun to carry it when I am out, so that I would not need to fear anything, I could be sure that no evil would befall me. I am confident that “He” is there always at my side, and I have nothing to fear. I may never be able to sling biblical verses one after another, or give an exegesis of paragraphs lucidly and intelligently, but I know it is sure to touch my heart and affect me at sometime or other.

This is no magic book for me, where I would get what I am looking for, and relegate it to the cupboards after my work is done; I would like to take the Holy Bible as my talisman, which is there always with me, whether I am healthy or sick, whether it is sunny or raining, whether I am happy or sad. I can hear the words of the loving Father beckoning me, anytime I open its pages. What greater treasure could I desire then?

Burying worries

One of the most painful challenges we face in life is tackling nagging worries and anxieties. It is next to impossible to overcome them altogether, unless we have full control over them, and it is an art to take full control of what makes us worried and anxious. One might think it is easier said than done, because there is hardly any soul on earth who does not go through anxious moments and come in contact with worries. No doubt, when they are not checked in time, they could lead to depression, and that could turn out to be fatal if it becomes chronic. I am no psychologist or psychiatrist to analyse the different reasons responsible for excessive worries and anxieties, but I would like to look at them from psycho-spiritual point of view. I might sound a bit too spiritual when I begin to discuss what Jesus has to say about worries and anxieties, but the point is Jesus had a remedy for this malady which haunts several men and women of our age.

Let us turn to the Holy Bible to see what Jesus says about these unfriendly allies to human beings. “Do not worry about your life, what you will eat [or drink], or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food and the body more than clothing? Look at the birds in the sky; they do not sow or reap, they gather nothing into barns, yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are not you more important than they?” (Mt 6:25-26) … “Do not worry about tomorrow; tomorrow will take care of itself. Sufficient for a day is its own evil” (Mt 6:34). Jesus is addressing the problem squarely, and is it not heartening to realize that two thousand years ago, Jesus had known what our generation may be going through in an acute way! And what he tells us may not sound too profound, but if we give a serious thought to his words, we will realize that he has a serious point to make.

Jesus no doubt is making this part of the discourse in the context of dependence on God, or a superior being, if one feels the word God too intimidating. It does not require of me to tell that every human person is limited, and we have no other option than to depend on others to fulfill most of our needs and wants. Fortunately, the society we live in fulfill these needs, and there are certain other needs which we draw from our inner self. There are a few wants where we cannot look up to human persons; for instance a child who is too frightened of darkness may cling on to its mother, but when we grow into adulthood, we have to device certain mechanism to handle fear by ourselves, and in this case, we may believe and call upon God to stand close by, so that we would not experience fright. Similarly there are areas which are beyond the reach of human persons, and they are the ones where we need to look up to God for assistance.

Let me now explain the same concept from the perspective of the twentieth century ‘existentialist philosophy’. Here in this category we may recall the contributions of Jean Paul Sartre, Nietche, Tolstoy, Dostoevsky, and others. Confronted with human tragedies and predicaments, these men and women tried to find amicable ways of handling them, but not resting their faith on religious believes, but on reason and logic. Sartre might tell those who are excessively worried that they might find relief from them, only when they dare to take a leap into the unknown, and they put it figuratively as jumping into the everlasting deep hole. Is it too frightening? They are just repeating what Jesus has told the people, though here the terminology is somewhat philosophical, but the idea remains the same. Unless we are ready to let things go out of our control, we might still be tied to them.

Let me present an image for dependence on the superior power, or on God; to let things go out of our hands might sound too frightening, but it is only when we do it, can we find life bearable and meaningful. One may find safe and secure when his boat is fastened to the shore, and to let the rope go and let the boat move forward is too frightening, and anything could happen when the boat is in the middle of the river, but if one does not want to take the risk of letting things go, one might be stuck to where one was. To reach the other shore, we have to let the rope go free, and allow the boat to face the currents of the river and find its own pace and route to reach the other shore. Those who are worried too much are seeing the risks and dangers involved rather than the possibility of reaching the other shore by letting the rope go free. We shall come back to the topic again, to explain the art of letting things go.

Harnessing psychic energy

I believe every human person has a tiny bit of Godliness in him/her; I like the Greek notion of the human beings as ‘demi-god’ (tiny god), because that says that we have the qualities of God. This necessarily implies that to a certain extent we have the power that God has and exercises. The common sensical attributes of God as omniscient (all-knowing), omnipotent (all-capable), and omnipresent (present everywhere) can also be attributed to the human beings, though only in a limited way. It is my belief that the power that we inherit as “children of God” is ever-present and available in ourselves, and very seldom do we recognize it and tap it. If only we recognize the power that lies deep within ourselves, then the medical practitioners may become unemployed.

What do I mean by this? We have immense power and potentiality deep within us that there is no disease or infirmity that we cannot heal by ourselves. The psychic power (later in a different blog, I will come to talk about another power, the cosmic power) unfortunately, is a mine of precious resources, which lies unexplored, untapped. Now why do we not realize and recognize this psychic power deep within ourselves? One of the reasons which comes to my mind is that it requires certain disciplining of the mind-body-spirit, in order to recognize the depth, width and height of this mine. There had been individuals even in our own times who do wonderful works of healing and reconciling persons, using this psychic power. Over the next couple of blogs, I would like to explore ways of tapping the rich healing power that it is capable of.

It may be necessary that I define what I mean by psychic power! It is a power that every human person is endowed with, by the very fact one is a human person. We might find several justifications for the power we have been given, if we fall back on the creation narratives of the conventional religions or the creation myths of different tribes. As believers, we can easily understand that God created us in his own image and likeness, and after creating breathed his own spirit into us. Is it not a wonderful thing for God to do? He is sharing not only his image and likeness, but he is also sharing his life spirit; in other words, he is sharing with us his power and qualities with us. If we fall back on the Bible, there is no question that God shared his very self with us.

We often come across weak and fragile human persons at a spur of a moment achieving impossible and unimaginable works; for instance, it is said that if a baby is about to be run over a moving vehicle, and if the mother of the child were to notice it, she would be able to push the speeding vehicle and save the child. Now where does she get the strength to do this impossible feat? Of course this is the psychic power. Sometimes we wonder how certain persons, so simple and may even be just illiterate, can do some impossible wonders, and they may not be able to explain how they were able to do by themselves, but everyone would know that this is not possible under normal circumstances. These are the illustrations for the use of psychic power.

Now what can we do with this psychic power? There is nothing which we cannot do with the psychic power that we each one of us have; this is like the power which is convertible into any form we may want. You want to build self-confidence, the psychic power can help you; you want to find a suitable job for you or your partner, this can help; or you dream of a home for yourself and your family, but find it hard to find the means, then the psychic power can show you the way to attain your goal. It would be wrong to imagine that using the psychic power we can achieve material benefits instantly. We could look at it as a prescription for the diseases we suffer from. Just looking at the prescription is not going to cure the disease, we will have to purchase the medicine and take them, and that can bring healing. But that requires a special preparation of the body-mind-spirit.