St. Joseph is an example of faith in the action of God in one's life in unexpected ways. And Joseph was a righteous man, and when he found Mary with child, he did what a good, upright, moral man should do, he wanted to put her away. And then he has his dreams, and he sees things differently, and he has faith in God. It must have been a difficult choice, not easy, to find a wife, not even your wife, but when it was espoused to you, be with child, and have faith in a dream. And yet he had that faith, and the dream came true. And he seemed to be an example of this way that God acts in our lives, always in unexpected ways. We expect him to act in predictable ways, in a natural, moral, and righteous way. And that is not the way God acts normally, he does act sometimes through a moral situation,

[01:03]

but often in a very unexpected situation. And faith is really that being open to God in the unpredictable, surprising events of life. And many are not prepared for that. They have a prearranged idea of God, that he should behave in a certain way, and many people are very angry because he doesn't do so, he doesn't follow the laws they should. And God is this unpredictable mystery which comes into our lives and changes them, and we have to be ready to change. And as I say, it must have been a great shock that Joseph was against all his natural instincts and understanding, the idea of the law, and yet it came into his life like that, and changed it totally. And so also, as I say, we have this image of God as to what he should do. Many people are very angry because God doesn't behave as they think he ought to do. Many reject him for that reason.

[02:05]

But if one has faith, one learns to discern how God is present in the most unexpected ways, the most unpredictable events, and then if one is open to that, then this great change in one's life takes place. God is this mystery. It's not predictable, it's not something we can manage and control, or that we can properly understand. It's something beyond our understanding, beyond our control. And very few people are really to risk that. Joseph took a risk in a sense, and that risk was justified. And so we also have to take a risk in our lives to open ourselves to the unpredictable and allow it to enter in and to change us. I think the greatest danger is this. We all tend to be dominated by our natural reason and the scientific evidence and so on. And when it's within that, then we feel happy. We know it's a predictable world and we can manage it.

[03:08]

But the real world is not like that. As you know, science has completely broken down this predictable world. It was all supposed to be beautifully arranged mechanically. The whole system was perfect, like a watch or a clock. Everything was organized beautifully by God. And then we found that it's just not arranged like that at all. It's unpredictable. There's an element of indeterminacy. In the atom itself, the very basic structure of the universe is not predictable. That's the whole breakthrough of quantum physics, the discovery that in the atom there is an unpredictable element which you cannot predict. And so the universe is not this beautifully organized rational system which will suppose that there is order, there is reason in the universe, but there's always something beyond it, something indeterminate, unpredictable. And that is where God breaks in, not through the organized order of nature, but through the unpredictable. And so we all have to be open to this other element, this element of mystery in our lives.

[04:15]

And we're all so governed by science and reason, we want everything to be properly organized, scientifically arranged. And it's the same with medicine, with health. We want our health to be, our bodies to be properly organized, to be healthy and all that they should be. And when things begin to go wrong and the unpredictable comes, we get disturbed and we rush off to a doctor to get everything put right again. But in reality, God is working through all these irrational events in our lives and through the disturbances in our nature. When we get sick and so on, nine times out of ten, or God judges like that, God is intervening in our lives when we get ill. And illness is just as necessary as health in our lives, and it's often more necessary when things begin to go wrong that we begin to realize the deeper meaning in our lives. So we have to be open to this unpredictable mystery of God and allow it to work.

[05:17]

And that is faith. And St. Joseph had that gift of faith that enabled him to accept Mary and to allow this great mystery to come into human life, to the human world. So we ask his prayers in intercession that we may be open to this mystery of faith, to the unpredictable action of God in our lives. As mentioned in the letter to the Romans, this history of the rejection of Jesus by Israel. Jesus came as the Messiah, fulfilled the promises, prophecies of Israel, and he was rejected because he didn't conform to their expectations. They expected the king to rule over Israel, to conquer his enemies, at least to be a success in this world. And Jesus didn't come as a success in this world, and what was worse perhaps, he came as a friend of the publicans and sinners, people who were rejected by the ordinary devout people.

[06:19]

Jesus became their friend. And so he contradicted their expectations in almost every point. And that surely is the problem of God. I think if God behaved himself as people wished him to do, they would all believe in him. But God does not come to people's expectations. We were reflecting yesterday this unpredictability of God. God is the divine mystery, and we expect him to conform to our ideas, God to be good and just and holy. And we see so much injustice and evil around us, and we ask, why does God permit all this? Everywhere, I think. We see it day by day, the rich turn over the poor and the strong over the weak, and violence takes its toll on people every day. And people say, where is God? In the Jewish concentration camps, the Nazi concentration camps, many Jews saw their children

[07:24]

being massacred before their eyes, and they said, where is God? And that is what everybody asks, where is this God who is supposed to be just and good and who allows all this to happen? And that surely confronts us with this mystery of God. You see, God is not somebody we can understand and put within our comprehension. If he would, he would be merely a human being, he would merely be somebody limited, because our human understanding is limited. And God always goes beyond our expectations, and contrary to our expectations, and it's facing the mystery that is really the secret of prayer and meditation and spiritual life. When we pray, we have to go beyond words, and then beyond all these thoughts, these images, these structures, which we take to be religion, and which are religion to some extent. But in prayer you have to go beyond all these limited human understandings, and open yourself

[08:28]

to the divine darkness. It's a great understanding of the Father, that God is this divine darkness beyond the light of this world, and on the light of human understanding, there is the hidden mystery. And we have to face the mystery, and allow that mystery to penetrate our lives. And then we begin to see a meaning behind all this. As long as we remain in the sphere of reason, morality, religion in the ordinary sense, we're never satisfied. We always find there's something wrong. And only when we go beyond all these limits do we discover the hidden mystery, which ultimately is a mystery of love. And love is not something you can predict, something you can control. Love is something beyond all this. So I think we all have to face this mystery in our lives, that we all have this image of God, this concept, this theological understanding, and yet, as every theologian admits, God is

[09:30]

beyond. I think it's very interesting that Karl Rahner, the greatest theologian of this century, the last speech he gave, I think, before he died a few years ago, was saying how we tend to talk so much about God, so we knew what we were talking about, and we didn't realize sufficiently that every word we say about God has to be, I would say, denied, but has to be collected. It's never adequate. It's always a pointer towards something beyond. And he realized deeply this mystery of God, and I think that's what we all have to realize. It's very disconcerting at times, you see, that God does not act as we expect. Somebody's dying, or your child is dying, and you pray with every reason to ask that God should save the child, and then the child dies. You think, where is God? What is he doing? And people complain of the absence of God. Many, many people feel that God is absent.

[10:30]

Just when you expect him to be present, he's dead silent. Nothing happens. And that is the mystery we face. But if we can go through that, then we discover there is a hidden presence, there is a divine love in the midst of it all, but it's a hidden mystery which we only discover when we go beyond ourselves, beyond our natural human comprehension. So we ask for this grace to be able to go beyond, to discern the mystery of God in our lives, and in the world around us. The pain is very challenging, this whole concept of the gratuitous love of God, especially to pay the laws of reason and morality. And it's a great problem, in a sense, because we all grow up with this sense of moral reason, do what is right, keep the commandments, not kill, not steal, not commit adultery, keep the law, and we become good Christians when we keep the law.

[11:32]

And yet, the gospel goes altogether beyond the law. And not only beyond it, but in some sense even against it. And it's a great challenge with the gospel that Jesus rejects the scribes and Pharisees, the righteous people who are trying with all good conscience to keep the law, and then all these publicans and sinners who are living against the law. And he doesn't depend on the religious people, he depends on this sinner, this young man who goes off and wastes his living, and then comes back. It's true the young man repents, but the Father doesn't wait for his repentance really. He embraces him immediately. He doesn't say, you must do a penance for so long, show your sincerity. He simply receives him back in this gratuitous love. And we all have to reflect on that. It's a great problem in a sense, you see.

[12:34]

The law, as St. Paul says, is good and just and holy, and we have to try to keep the law. And yet, the law doesn't fulfill us in any way, and the law is a great danger, because when you keep the law and you feel you're doing right, you begin to have confidence in yourself, and that is a great danger, you see. The more you see you're a good Christian, a good Catholic, doing all that you should, you begin to be compassionate, to be satisfied with yourself. And that is the great sin of all sinners, you see, this self-compassion, this self-centeredness, this self-love, it's the root of all evil. And so the righteous person fulfilling the law may be very far from God, while the unrighteous person who's not fulfilled the law but is aware of it and able to surrender to God, becomes, it's nearer to God than that Jesus showed in the parable of the Pharisee and the publican. The Pharisee was a good man, and I give tithes of all that I have, I fast, rice, and wheat,

[13:37]

he keeps all the law, but he's very pleased with himself, he thinks he's much better than this publican, and the publican says, Lord, have mercy on me, a sinner. So, it's illustrated again and again that very religious people can be very far from God, and very irreligious people can be very close to God. It doesn't mean that we have to become irreligious, but there's obviously a paradox in it, and we have to try to keep the law. But we do it out of love for God. What is the difference? You keep the law because you want to be righteous in yourself, you want to feel that you're a good person, or you keep the law because you feel God and his love is calling you in that way. And when we keep the law in response to the love of God, it's something which brings us nearer to God. But when we keep it out of a sense of our own righteousness, which is very easy, it's easy to slip from one to the other, and then again to congratulate ourselves on the fact that

[14:41]

we're religious, we're keeping the law, and then we destroy all the value of what we're doing. When our action is in response to love, then we realize, and it's quite gratuitous, and God rewards us not because we are good, but because we respond to his love. It's something totally beyond the law. And Christianity, the gospel, is a religion of love. It's not a religion of the law. That's why St. Paul, all this long, Epistle to the Romans, he's working on that all the time. If it's not through fulfillment of the law that you're saved, it's when you recognize the gratuitous love of God that you're saved, not by your own virtue and goodness, but by your love. And love is a great mystery. To go beyond God's reason and surrender to love. That is the secret of the gospel, and we all have to try to learn it in that way. There are different aspects of this gospel which one can reflect on, and I can reflect

[15:47]

simply on this mystery of water. It says to this woman, Everyone who drinks of this water will thirst again. Whoever drinks of the water that I shall give him will never thirst. The water that I shall give him will become, in him, a spring of water, welling up to eternal life. And we all need to reflect on this mystery of water. We tend to think of water, like other things, as a material element that satisfies physical thirst. And we think there's no more to it. But water is much more than that, just as all the elements are. We've got this philosophy of life by which we always separate body and soul, mind and matter, and water belongs to the body, to the matter. And in reality, body and soul are not separate, and mind and matter are not separate, and everything partakes of the spirit of God.

[16:48]

The spirit of God is present in the whole creation, and everything is sacred. The water is sacred. The water of the garden is sacred water. God is present in it. And in the Vedas, it's interesting to read, a very deep sense they have of the sacredness of the water. It says, for instance, In the waters, O Lord, is your seat. In the waters, O Lord, is your womb. God comes forth from the waters. Glory to the waters. The waters are a resting place for all the gods. May the waters, the mothers, purify us. The waters are the mothers, you see. The mother gives life. The waters give life. Hail to you, unfathomable, all-purifying waters. These are the aspects of water. From the beginning, God creates this water to be a source of life, to give life to the

[17:50]

whole creation, and it gives life to humanity. And none of us can live without water. Every human being would die without water every day. And it's a source of life to us all. But that life we live, it's not separated. We don't have simply a physical life that water supports, and then another life, quite separate, which we get from reading the scriptures and so on. The human being is a whole. Body, soul, and spirit. And water quenches our thirst physically. It also responds to a deeper thirst. We're not satisfied ever with the early material quenching of the thirst. Thus we're not satisfied with material bread. The Bible says man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God. Bread also is a food of life. And in the Eucharist, Jesus took bread, you see, and he took wine, and he revealed the

[18:51]

deep meaning of that bread. But that bread doesn't merely respond to your physical requirements, or even your psychological needs. That bread communicates the spirit of God to you. God himself is present in that bread. And there's a way in which God is present in all bread, in all water, in all life. And we all live in this sacramental universe, a universe in which God is revealing himself. God is present in the whole creation, revealing himself in the whole creation, and communicating himself to us in the whole creation. And Jesus reveals this mystery of water. It is not merely to quench the thirst, but it's to quench this thirst for God, this thirst for life, not of this world, but of life beyond. And it's all one. There's no one separate, physical and spiritual. God himself is present in matter, in the physical world, in our own bodies, in our own life. And God is communicating this life to us in so many different ways.

[19:55]

And when we take ordinary water, we should realize that it's a gift of God, that God comes to us in that water, comes to us in that bread. And then when we share in the Eucharist, God comes to us in that bread, in that wine, in a very special way, no doubt. He comes in the fullness of his self-revelation in Jesus. But it's only a fullness from, if it starts already from the bread itself, you see, and God is communicating himself in the bread, then the fullness of the meaning of bread and wine comes when they're associated with the body and blood of Christ, when we realize Christ himself is present in the bread, in the wine. That is, he's present, by the way, in the water also. He takes the water of baptism, and the water of baptism becomes a sacrament of eternal love. And it's a cleansing. The water quenches thirst, but the water also cleanses and purifies. So it cleanses physically, but it also cleanses spiritually. So we live in this sacramental universe to discover this deep meaning.

[20:59]

And the sacraments of the church are not very intended to be separated from the sacrament of the universe. You see, sometimes we tend to think Jesus is present in that bread and that wine, but he's not present outside it to go to the church. Jesus is present there to leave the church, and Jesus is no longer there. But of course, that's absurd. He's everywhere. He's present in a special way in the bread and the wine. He's been consecrated because he's alive and he has a unique meaning. But he's also present in bread and wine everywhere. He's present in water everywhere and in the earth everywhere. So we have to realize the presence of God and that water springing up to eternal life. This is the presence of God in the heart. God is present in the heart of every person. And as we become aware more that we're not merely physical beings or spiritual beings, we become aware of that presence. And then that water springs to spring up to eternal life. It's a beautiful phrase, you see.

[22:01]

It says, the water that I will give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life. We all have to discover that hidden spring. You see, it's in everybody. But most people, it's sealed everywhere. They've not discovered it at all. They think that water is frustration and physical thirst. And then when that spring is open, you discover God is present in the midst of you, of God, and in your life. And that eternal life is dwelling within us, welling up within us. And we're all trying to live that eternal life now, not simply in the future. Eternal life is present to us in our hunger for bread, in our thirst for water. It's a hunger for eternal life, for the bread of life, for the water of life. And we're all living, as I say, in a sacramental universe where God is coming to us in everything, in every body, and in every event. And once we realize the indwelling presence of the Spirit of God within,

[23:02]

then we see that presence everywhere. And we receive the Spirit of God in everything. We have to ask for that to be true. It's faith, of course, to be true. It's that God is dwelling in the heart, in the midst of us all, as a spring of life. Not only for this world, but for eternal life. He's offering us day by day. And especially, of course, in the Eucharist. God comes in that bread and that vine in a unique way, but still it's the real presence we see of God, which is everywhere, and comes to us in a special way in the bread and wine of the Eucharist. We experience the indwelling presence there, and realize it. So now let's go into history, by the grace of the Holy Gospel. This issue of forgiveness is one of the great messages of the Gospel, and it always remains extremely difficult. Jesus speaks with tremendous emphasis and almost exaggeration.

[24:05]

Peter comes up and says, how often shall I forgive my brother? To seven times. He was being very generous. Seven is a number of fullness. He was feeling that he'd very done all he could. And Jesus said, not seven, but seventy times seven. He exaggerates it and shows there's no limit. And then he tells this parable, and there's a great contrast between the first man, owes ten thousand talents, and that's a very large sum, about ten lakhs, let us say, rupees. And the other one owes a hundred denarii, that would be about a hundred rupees. And so again he exaggerates. So one man is given this immense debt, and he can't forgive the other. It's a very small debt, a hundred rupees. And that is a problem. Forgiveness is extremely difficult. I think everybody experiences, when you're wounded in your ego, yourself,

[25:09]

it's very, very difficult to forgive the person. You can say you forgive him, you can try to forget about it, you can do all that you like, but the wound remains. You still feel this anger, this resentment, and it won't go. And it remains true that as long as you remain on this ego level, the ordinary human level, it's almost impossible to forgive. You can forget about it after a time, you can do something about it, but the true forgiveness is almost impossible, totally. On the other hand, if you can go beyond your ego, if you get beyond the self and make that inner surrender, then this forgiveness comes. It's a gift of God, you see. It's not something you can do. You cannot forgive of yourself. You can only forgive if you receive forgiveness. It's grace from God. Something comes into your life which is a healing power. Genuine forgiveness is a healing.

[26:14]

It isn't simply that you forget about it, or that you ignore it, or that you suppress it, but a healing power comes and changes you. The whole wound is healed. And then forgiveness becomes easy, becomes impossible to resist it. And so that's what Jesus is asking then for, this inner surrender. When we make that surrender of ourself, something comes into our lives which changes us. And what before was impossible becomes simply easy, because we don't do it ourselves. Something comes into us which forgives in us, and it's a gift, it's a grace. I think we all have to ask for this grace of forgiveness. And realize that we cannot forgive of ourselves. Many people are really troubled by it. They want to forgive, and they try to forgive, and they ask for grace to forgive, and so on. But still the thing remains. And yet if the surrender can be made, and forgiveness received,

[27:16]

then we can forgive others, and this change will take place. We all have to ask for the gift of grace of forgiveness in our own lives, and we can forgive others. We have this Feast of the Annunciation in the middle of Lent, and it has a rather deep significance for this child who's destined for death and resurrection. The method of the Hebrews tells us, body it has thou prepared for me, I come to do thy will, O God, and Jesus comes into this world, into this body which I have prepared for you in my womb, and he comes to do the will of God, and he lives out his whole life in disobedience to the will of the Father, to the moment of death that he takes his life on the cross and surrenders it totally to the Father. And I think it shows us

[28:19]

this deep meaning of the crucifixion in the Hebrew, at the birth of the Annunciation and the crucifixion, is that Jesus comes into the world through the will of God. Each one of us is called to that will. We don't want to think too much of the accidents of the cross. We think of suffering and pain and humiliation and the violence that surrounds it all. But in a sense, all those are accidental. We're not all going to be crucified in that way or suffer in that way. But behind all that is the essence of the sacrifice. I've surrendered his will to the will of the Father. So it was due, and I had no father. Not my will, but thy will be done was the essence of the sacrifice. But obviously some people do suffer greatly. Some people suffer sometimes dying of cancer and great pain and agony. And others suffer from some crippling disease or from some accident which incapacitates them.

[29:22]

And some people are tortured in prison and suffer for years in a concentration camp. So in all, there are innumerable sufferings. But that's not for everybody, obviously. The majority don't suffer in that way. I mean, everybody has a body prepared for us to do the will of God. And that is the call of each person. And when we fulfill ourselves, when we fulfill the will of God in our lives, of course that will is not easy to find because our own will obscures it. We come into the world with the will of our own, our own desires, our own ambitions, and our own fears and anxieties. And that egoism, that self-love, obscures the will of God. And so it's always a breaking through this self-love, this self-will, and allowing the will of God to reveal itself. And that is the real cost in life,

[30:23]

this breaking through one's own ego, one's own self, and dying for that self. It's a real death, a crucifixion. And Mary herself, she lived in that way. As far as we know, she had no great sufferings to endure in her own person. She lived a humble, simple life in Nazareth. And yet she was called to make the total surrender of herself to God. And day by day, she must have lived in that surrender, allowing the Holy Spirit to enter her life, to transform it. Not by any great work, of course, but doing her daily household work, caring for children, relating to other neighbors, and doing the ordinary way of life. And yet that was life of perfect sanctity. It's very important that we should see the following of Christ, and the cross can be a life of simple, humble service day by day.

[31:24]

The vast majority of people, that is how they live out their lives, how they bear the cross, how they become like Christ. She was also privileged, of course, to stand at the foot of the cross. But again, she was not actually suffering physically, she was simply accepting the mystery of death and resurrection, death and the life of her son. And through that total acceptance of it, she also becomes holy, she also dies with him, she also is raised with him. That is our calling, to stand at the foot of the cross. May not be suffering in any way, but to allow the cross, the crucifixion, the death and the resurrection to take place in our lives. And I say, by doing the will of God, when we surrender to that will, we die to our ego, to our selfish desires, to our lower self, and then we acknowledge Christ himself, the love of God, and give possession of him to us. So we also give possession of our baby, and we also may die with her,

[32:26]

live with her, die with Christ, live with Christ, and the whole church may manifest this mystery to the world. That is the mystery of the cross. But I say it is not primarily in the accidents of the crucifixion. And I think people could be put off by that. You see, if you think, how can I go through all that sort of agony? Well, we are not all called to do that. At least I am not. But we are all called to live that surrender of our lives, to aid our dead, to embrace the flesh and the living. In this, Carl Hegel is accused of casting out demons and ills around the prince of demons. And when we think of this whole world of demons and scripture, this reminds us of what I call the psychic world. The ancient people, we tend to live only in a physical world, a material world,

[33:27]

and then you have the spirit beyond. But the ancient people knew an intermediate world, a psychic world, be it the physical, the material, the spiritual, the whole world of the psychic powers, or what in India they call siddhis. And we have to be aware of those powers. It was very evident in the time of Christ. He says, By whom your sons crossed our heavens. And there were these powers in Israel and also all through the Roman Empire. People performed these miracles, these powers, healing, and so on. There were temples, where people went regularly to be healed. And these powers were there. And here in India, of course, these psychic powers are everywhere. Such as Sai Baba, of course, has these powers. Every day he manifests them, producing ashes and other evil special objects and so on. And it's very common in India. And they're neither good nor evil.

[34:30]

And they can be both good and evil. And that is a great problem with them. That's why they're always considered dangerous. You should never get involved with them. Because you have black magic, which is the use of these psychic powers for evil. And that's extremely common in India. I know myself many examples, especially in my Catholic family, where this magic takes place. People bury things in your garden or in your house and put a spell on you. And they can do incredible harm. They can even kill people by the use of this psychic power. It's a real power which you can develop and which can be used, whether it's good or evil. On the other hand, it can also be used for good. And there are many holy men who have these powers. And they help people. Such as Sai Baba has healed innumerable people. And he has healed people not only physically but spiritually. He does extraordinary good to people. There's no doubt. And so we have to not distinguish.

[35:30]

You see, the danger of these is that they can be both good or evil. And when we get involved with them, we can easily get subject to the evil parts. You get to find you have these powers. You see, many people today discover these powers foretelling the future or seeing into a person's character, knowing their past life and so on. And it can be very dangerous. You can manipulate people and you can learn to gain control over them. And so, as I say, one has to discern these powers and distinguish the psychic from the spiritual. And the spiritual is characterized by two things, by wisdom and charity. Or really, in a sense, by charity alone. Charity alone is God. It's the divine. And where that is present, then all these powers can be used without danger. But without charity, all these powers are dangerous. That's why St. Paul said, if I speak with the tongue of men

[36:31]

and of angels and I do all miracles, all is silly. That's not charity. It's worthless. So now there's the divine, which distinguishes all the good and the evil in all these powers. So Jesus himself had these powers, you see, he had these psychic powers of healing and multiplying bread and turning wine into water. All these are psychic powers, not necessarily good. They could be used by God, as he did, or they could be used by other forces. So we have to always keep that distinction. And here he's accused, you see, of simply having these psychic powers and passing out evil spirits, as the dons speak, by means of these siddhis, by these psychic powers. And he says to them, if Satan is divided

[37:32]

against himself, these powers are divided, they won't stand. And the psychic has no ultimate power to overcome and ultimately under the power of God. And then he says, by whom do your sons cast them out? You see, these powers are being used everywhere, and we must distinguish those which come from God, which are the work of God, and those which come from some other source, which can be either neutral or can be dynamic, can be evil. And they can be simply neutral. There are many people who have a healing power, they can heal people, and it can be simply good, yes, they come from God, and if Satan doesn't come from the devil, it is something neutral and valuable in and of itself. But it can also be used for the name of God, it can become the means of expressing the divine love of God's grace. And Jesus himself, of course, came to bring all these powers under the power of God with him,

[38:34]

the divine power is present, and these cities are used as his instruments, and therefore he says if I, by the finger of God, cast out these demons, these psychic forces, then the kingdom of God has come upon you. He came to go beyond the physical world, and beyond the whole of that psychic world, the world of spirits and demons, and of angels. Angels also belong to the psychic world. The leopards are a part of the angels, leopards are a part of the demons, and it's always ambivalent, you see, you can never be sure of the psychic world, you can slip easily from the angel to demons, they are very close to one another. Only when you go beyond the psychic world to the spiritual, when you enter into the love of God, then only you can be set free. And Jesus came to set us free from all these powers, not only the demons, but also the angels. Then he is subject to the angels, which are psychic powers, again, you see, it's dangerous because you're not

[39:36]

free yet. You're still open to demonic forces as well. And Jesus set us free from all the powers of evil and the limited powers of good, the divine. And that is what he means by the coming of the kingdom of God. It's the transcendent power of God, power of wisdom and of love coming and transforming human nature, and overcoming all these forces, which he also, of course, calls his cosmic power. And he says Jesus overcame all these powers, angels and demons, and went beyond, took us to God himself, to the inner reality of love, of truth and love. It's the realm of divine and everything else must be seen as subordinate to that. So these distinctions are rather important because in the Church we tended to think everything is either from God or from the devil, and we've not discovered that whole psychic realm, which, as I say, can be both good or

[40:38]

evil. And that's why the tendency of missionaries would think Hinduism is all diabolical, you see. But they didn't distinguish. There are demonic forces in India, very powerful ones, and there are also divine forces. And you have to distinguish and see how these powers are being used. Perhaps if I just mention this Kumbh Mabhishekam that took place yesterday in Pritchi. There are supposed to be about ten lakhs of people arrived. What is it, you see, that draws people to the temple like that? And it is the presence of the psychic power. You see, the gods are psychic powers. And they can be both good and evil. They can be also very definitely good. And the Hindu sees in the temple the presence of that power, that divine power is present in the temple. And that's what draws people to them. It's amazing when you think of it, you see, lakhs of people

[41:38]

simply want to go to be present at that temple when they go for a visit. They concentrate it because they believe now it's divine power is present, you see, and it can be holy for good, but it can also be evil. It's not pure, you see. That is the danger of it. And so that is why, you see, people in India have this deep sense of the divine and the past, but they're also terribly exposed to evil. And that is why India is in a tragic state at the present time. Because, you see, you've got to go beyond the merely psychic to this divine power of love which transforms you. You see, you can have great devotion to a temple, and yet you can be very unjust in your dealings with your workers and other people. So side by side you can have great devotion and injustice and immorality. And only when you get beyond the psychic to God himself can you be set

[42:39]

free from these negative forces. So, as I say, we have to distinguish between something good and the thought of something evil. And only when we go beyond the good and the evil, in a sense, beyond all limitations to God himself are we set finally free. And Jesus came to set us free from all power, both physical and psychic, of love to God himself. I've often seen, in my life, Jesus in the Gospels, you can see his words and his actions, his external ministry. You can see very little of that inner life. It's the job reflecting deeply on the mystery of Jesus reveals this inner life, this consciousness of Christ. And we all need to reflect on it. And it's very special. Jesus says always, he doesn't come in his own name.

[43:40]

He comes as the revealed himself. He came to reveal the Father. His whole life is turned towards God, turned towards the Father. And he lives in that awareness of the presence of God in him, the presence of the Father. I think this is important because I say there's danger when we think of Jesus as God. We put him to the other side with God, not with ourselves. But Jesus always speaks as a man among men in relation to God, to his Father. God, totally present to him, revealing himself in him, but always referring back to the Father, never in his city of his own. It's very striking the way he puts it. If I bear witness to myself, my testimony is not true. He speaks simply of himself, his witness is not true. He always speaks in the name of the Father, everything comes from the Father.

[44:41]

And that is the Christian revelation. I say it's not simply Jesus is God, speaking in the name of God, which is common among Hindu sages. It's a different revelation. Jesus has always been witness to the Father and his presence within. And there's another who bears witness to me and I know that the testimony he gives to me is true. There's this consciousness of God constantly, totally present in him, and that is what bears witness. Then he says, you said to John, that John bore witness, John came and he bore witness to Christ, but that was only a human witness, so God was with him. He was a shining light and we were willing to rejoice for this night. The testimony which I have is greatly that of John, for the works which the Father has granted me to accomplish, these works which I'm doing bear witness to me that the Father has sent me. So the works of Jesus are a sign of this presence of God in him, and part of his

[45:43]

work is the works in him. As I say, this is important because Jesus sets himself before us as a model, you see. We also can do works in the name of God and entirely the works which God does in us. And it's the message we cannot attribute anything to ourselves. Whatever we do comes from God, comes from the Father. And Jesus shows himself as a model that everything he does, everything he says, comes from God. It's the word of God, it's the work of God in him. And that's why he's with us all the time, you see. In any world it is not with us. And then he says, the Father who sent his own witness to me, his voice you've never heard, his form you've never seen, you do not have his word abiding in you, you do not think it can be a sin. You don't have his word abiding in you when you recognize God in Jesus, when you also recognize God in yourself, you see. It's only when we begin to discern

[46:44]

the presence of God within that we're able to recognize that presence of Jesus to go together. And that's why he accuses the Jews, if you search the scriptures because you think in them you have eternal life, and it's the faith of God which is to move that you refuse to come to me. You see, the word of God is in the Bible, in the scriptures, but unless you have the word of God in you, you don't recognize it in the scripture. You can read the Bible end to end and know everything about it, history and so on, and never perceive the word of God because they haven't that word in themselves, they haven't that light of faith. And when that word is present in us, then we recognize that presence of God in the scriptures, that's why he says those who spoke of me, the Old Testament speaks of him. You search the scriptures so you think that they have eternal life, but I know that you have not the love

[47:46]

of God within you. I've come in my Father's name, you do not receive me, but the love that comes in His own name, you will receive it. If they recognized the presence of God in Moses, in the Lord, in the prophets, then they would have recognized it in Him. Because they failed to see it there, they failed to see it in Him. How can you be if you receive glory from one another? Do not seek the glory that comes from the only God. Jesus is always pointing to the only God, the one God, the Father of all. And that is the Christian revelation, Jesus revealing the Father. And I think, you know, I'm always afraid of this devotion to Jesus. Some people have this devotion to Jesus. Not that it's very good, but unless it is related to the Father, it's not very bad. Jesus is always a revelation of the Father. And we come through Him to the Father. And we may be implicit, of course, we may always be explicit, but unless we pray

[48:46]

to Jesus, prayer to Jesus in the Father, related to the Father, it's not a fully Christian worship. You can't separate Jesus ever from the Father. If only the revelation of the Father, the word of the Father, the image of the Father, the Son of the Father, always revealing the Father, but not the Father. And that is the Christian revelation. It's always a revelation of the Trinity. It's in the Spirit that we know Jesus is the Son, and we have to work because the Spirit is in us, we're able to recognize Him as the Son and to know the Father. So that is our Christian revelation. Do not think that I should accuse you to the Father. It is Moses who accuses you. If you have this rigid God in you, you recognize the Father, Jesus, and you receive salvation. But if you don't have the Spirit, you don't recognize the Father. If you believe Moses, you would believe me, for he wrote of me.

[49:47]

He obviously didn't write of Jesus in a very medical sense at all. He wrote from the Word of God, which was present to Moses, also revealing itself to him. And that Word is present in Jesus. That Word is revealed in Jesus. That Word is His life, His death, His resurrection from misery. Jesus is the revelation of God. It's the Word of God. It's expression of God in the world. So this is a wonderful mystery which we celebrate always. We always have to return to it again and again deeply in the Eucharist. We hear these words of Jesus, and we celebrate His action, we celebrate His death and His resurrection, and the signs of bread and wine. Jesus becomes present in His being as the Word of the Father, revealing the Father, communicating the Father's life. The question is raised where did Jesus come from? And

[50:48]

the Jews think they know where He came from. He came from Nazareth. And it says how in the beginning His brothers went up to the feast. His brethren had gone up to the feast. And He didn't go up with them, perhaps. He didn't want simply to be associated with them because people would think He's one of them. And He went up privately. And then they raise this question, is He really the Christ? And they say that when the Christ comes, no one would know where He comes from. And that was a tradition among the Jews. So when the Messiah came, nobody would know where He came from. It would be a sudden intervention of God in the world. And they knew Jesus was coming from Nazareth. And then Jesus says, You know where I come from. Yes, you think you know where I come from. But He doesn't really seem to come from Nazareth. He comes from Nazareth. But He also comes from God.

[51:50]

And they haven't recognized that. He says, You know me and you know where I come from. It's possible that should really be a question. Do you really know me and do you know where I come from? And then He says, I've not come of my own. He who sent me is true. And Him you do not know. I know Him, but I come from Him. Jesus comes from God. And there's always these two aspects of Jesus. He comes from Nazareth, a man born of Mary. And also He comes from God. And there's a deep sense in which we can say that everybody, we're all born into this world, the human mother and father. But we're also born of God. And there's a tradition in India, when a sannyasi, anybody asks him where he comes from, he's not supposed to say, because he doesn't just come from this world. I don't know, so Abhishek Dhananda,

[52:52]

when people ask him where he came from, he used to remain silent and point up there. And there's a deep truth in that, you see. We all come from God. God conceives us. Before the beginning of the world He conceives each one of us. And He calls us into being in this world. And Jesus, above all, of course, is born of God. He is one with the Father who lived eternally. And then He comes into this world and He's sent by God. And we all have to try to recognize this other dimension in life, you see. We all think everybody just comes from here or there, comes from India or Europe or wherever it may be and that's all there is to it. But every human being has its history of God in him. God is revealing Himself in every human being. And that's why we attach this extreme value to the human person. It's not merely a creative thing. There is something in every human being which is uncreative. There is a spirit of

[53:52]

God present in each. Most people have forgotten it and sin shuts us away from it. But we can always rediscover it, recover this knowledge that we come from God. Every single one of us comes from God. It's the eternal Spirit in us and is capable of awakening. And baptism is really this enlightenment, this awakening to where we come from. We're born of God. As Jesus says, unless man is born again of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God. We have to have this new birth where we rediscover what we really are if we come from God. And Jesus comes to bear witness to that. He comes from Nazareth. He's man, born of marriage, but he also comes from God. He comes to reveal God. God's present in us, God's present in the whole world. So it's not simple that Jesus comes from God and we simply come from the world, but Jesus reminds us that we also are born

[54:55]

of God and be born of God and we are neither a divine being. And as St. Paul says, he knew us in him before the foundation of the world. He loved us before the foundation of the world. And each one of us has this divine calling, this divine birth. And we all have to realize it. To realize where we come from, to realize what our real being is. And when we die, we depart from this world. Our body disintegrates. The present state of mind, it disappears. But the reality of each person is revealed. Yes, we discover who we are totally. We become our true being. We enter into our being in Christ, our being in God. And that's the real purpose of life. So we all need to realize who we are. If we are born of God and sons of God, Christ is revealed at his birth. The story of

[56:02]

the raiding of Nazareth, a very traumatic human story. This family which Jesus loved, Mary, Martha, and Abner and Lazarus. And Jesus has this human love for them. And when he comes there, he's deeply moved. There's one occasion in the gospel where Jesus is said to have wept. Jesus wept. So there's a tremendous human side to this. Then, of course, there's a great human drama. This man has been lying in the grave all this time. And Jesus apparently deliberately waits two days before he goes up. And the whole scene is one of intense drama. And finally he calls, Nazareth, come forth, and the dead man comes. And this is a great dramatic event. But we need to remind ourselves all the time that it is a sign. St. John's Gospel particularly always brings out these miracles

[57:03]

as signs. And we have to remind ourselves because the mere physical event is very impressive. And all of Jesus' miracles, turning water into wine, feeding people with bread, walking on the water, they're all marvelous things. And you can marvel at them in the wrong way. So there's something final about that. But obviously these things are not all that important. To turn water into wine has no final value. To walk on water has no final value. And also to restore somebody to life in this world has no final value if people didn't come to bring us all back to life after death. And so we have to remind ourselves of the deeper meaning of the story. And it comes out in the meeting we had with Ezekiel, when the prophet says, um, I will open your graves and raise you from your graves. I will put my spirit within you and you shall live.

[58:03]

And then again in the reading from St. Paul, he says, he who raised Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his spirit who dwells in you. So the promise is that our bodies shall be raised up not to this life, but life in the spirit, a life which Jesus now experiences himself. Jesus didn't return to this world. He appeared in this world. He was a disciple to confirm their faith. Then he passed beyond the resurrection of what came back into this world. The resurrection is passing through this world to the Father. Jesus goes to the Father. And it's the transformation of the body and the soul into the life of the spirit. And that is the meaning of resurrection. And that's what we're all called to. St. Paul says, he who raised Jesus from the dead will also raise your mortal body. And then when Martha says, I know that he

[59:05]

will rise again at the last day, he said, I am the resurrection and the life. And that I of Jesus is not just the human Jesus, but I is that divine power which lived in Jesus. And it's to that that he calls it. We go beyond the body, beyond the mind, open ourselves to a transcendent mystery of the spirit, which then can transform us. And I think it's a great lesson which we all need to learn. You see, many people feel that problems of this world are immense, suffering and death is around us all the time. And we try to alleviate the suffering of the free people, to prolong their lives as far as possible. Modern medicine does wonders in this way. But it's all a tale to the end of the death coming. And so, Jesus doesn't come into the world simply to relieve suffering or to prevent death taking place. He comes to impart a new life altogether. And I think

[60:07]

we often tend to forget that. You see, we're so concerned with the human needs, the human suffering, that when you cure a person of cancer or something, he's going to die again after that. It's something, and obviously we have to do what we can, but there's no good fixing our goal of relieving human suffering in that way. You see, I think there's a temptation. I mean, there's tremendous need of medicine, of care for people, of service of every kind, but it's not the end, you see. And it will always be seen as something beyond all this. And unless we have our eyes fixed on the beyond, then these other things begin to have a wrong meaning. It's not that really the end of things is to give people food and clothing and to give them medicine and to preserve their lives as long as possible. But that's not the end, you see. When you've done all that, you've really achieved very little. And what God really asks of us, and what Jesus comes into the world to give, is eternal

[61:08]

life beyond this world.

[61:10]

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