Jesus Youth professional’s ministry brings you a Professional Conference Profess Messiah (Professing Messiah in Professional Life) from Sept 8th to 11th at Kochi, Kerala, India. The program especially targets working professionals (Doctors, Engineers, Lawyers, Management professionals, and Teachers of the Professional Colleges) and those who are passouts but waiting for a job.

The program includes Sharing of Life experiences, Live Discussions and thought Provoking input Sessions.

Date: Sept 8th 6:30PM – Sept 11th 2PM

Venue: Chavara Hall, Rajagiri College of Engineering & Technology, Kakkanad, Kochi, Kerala, India

Details & online registration: www.jyprofessionals.com

Email: jyprofessionals@gmail.com

“Rabbi, where are you staying?.. He said to them, come and see” – Jn 1:38. This was the beginning of a great Kingdom started by a youth who had neither any riches nor fame.

A carpenter boy who taught us the meaning of a simple word ‘Love’. Till today this kingdom of Love stands solid. Even when the world saw the rise and fall of many, he still remains the central figure in the pages of history. Before him is the era of unknown and with his death he marked a new beginning.

Jesus Christ, the everlasting youth our Savior. He is a Healer and a Teacher who Professionally Engineered the foundations of human Salvation. You my friend are chosen. You have received a divine call to ‘come and see’. So be there in Cochin in the second week of September!

Profess Messiah Conference Prayer:

Oh Heavenly Father, we thank and adore You for the love that You have shown us by sending Your only begotten son Jesus Christ. Sweet Jesus, our Saviour and Lord, we love You and kneel before You. Our dearest Holy Spirit, helper and comforter, we worship and adore You for continuing the act of salvation and guiding us in every step we take.

Lord, bless all of us working towards the success of Profess Messiah to put on Your armour and enable us to grow strong in You (Eph 6:10-11). Jesus, help us to be in prayer and entreaty in the Spirit on every possible occasion. Pour out Your Spirit that we may joyfully work in the vineyard of Profess Messiah. We pray that all the resources and participants of Profess Messiah grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ (2 Peter 3:18).

Lord Jesus Christ, help us to enjoy Your imperishable love through Profess Messiah. Amen.

St. Joseph, Mother Mary and Blessed Pope John Paul II, pray for Profess Messiah.

1 Our Father… 1 Hail Mary… 1 Glory be.

So we hope to see all you professionals for Jesus on Sept 8th, 2011 at Kochi, Kerala, India.

What is Taizé worship? Why do so many people (up to 7000 a week – primarily young people) go to Taizé to pray? Why is the Taizé prayer so attractive?

There is certainly a multitude of answers but perhaps a key response lies in the fact that, at the heart of the prayer, there is a monastic community. Taizé is a little village in the south of Burgundy, France. In this village, over 60 years ago, Brother Roger founded a community devoted to prayer and living a parable of reconciliation within the church and the human family. The Community is made up of brothers from all the continents and major denominations who gather together three times a day, seven days a week, throughout the year to pray (whether there are 7000 young people present or only twenty).

Taize Prayer

The Taizé prayer is not simply a prayer form or model that can be adapted or inserted into any context with the same results. There are, however, characteristics of the Taizé prayer that can be useful in understanding its dynamics. The distinguishing marks include repetition and silence and the insertion of these into the liturgy. Repetition is not a new phenomenon nor unique to Taizé. The use of repetitive prayers is a long attested reality in the history of Christian spirituality and liturgy (for example, in the Jesus Prayer and the Rosary).

What is unique to the prayer of Taizé is the adaptation of the repetitive form to simple musical lines and core biblical texts that can be sung by a whole assembly of various nationalities, languages, and denominations. The duration of repetitive songs (whether in canon form or ostinato) during prayer is not to be timed nor the number of repetitions calculated beforehand. The assembly is to immerse itself in the simple but profound harmonies and let itself be carried by this sung prayer.

Silence is perhaps the second most important aspect of this particular prayer practice. In the middle of the prayer is a long period of silence (rather than a sermon or meditation). Maintaining silence is not a technique or method enabling some special communication with God. It is simply holding oneself in a presence and letting Christ, through the Holy Spirit, pray in us. There are not many short silences in a Taizé prayer rather the prayer moves along according to a certain rhythm through song, psalm and reading leading up to a longer silence (around 10 minutes) which then culminates in intercessory prayer and more song.

Taize Worship Video

Taize Music

Taize style music is very popular among college-age worshippers today. The hallmarks of Taize services are simplicity, peaceful spirituality, and music based upon the chant styles of the Taize monastery in France. Founded in the aftermath of the second World War by Brother Roger, who died in a prayer service in the midst of the community in August 2005, Taize is dedicated to peace and ecumenical action.

Taize music is both simple and sophisticated. Brother Roger, founder of Taize, seeks to add a prayerful element to music, and a musical element to prayer, believing firmly in the old dictum, ‘those who sing, pray twice’. The songs of Taize are designed to be sung by those who have difficulty carrying a tune, as well as those whose training and background in music extends to high levels.

Taize worship relies on psalms heavily, as well as periods of silence, Bible readings, and prayers.

The way Taize chants ‘work’ is that they are simple phrases and simple tunes that gradually reveal depth and sophistication by being repeated over and over. According to Brother Roger, all who follow this journey of the spirit remain alongside other people, adding their prayers and voices together. ‘They do not separate prayer and commitment.’

Want to know more? Goto Taize Official Website

Love does not know bounds, so is the case with hatred too.

Orissa has been in the news, often for wrong reasons. The list is long with some of them making our heads hang in shame. In fact there is no comparison to what was done to Graham Staines and his two sons at Manoharpur village in Keonjhar district on 23 January 1999. A maniac mob blocked the doors of their station wagon where they were sleeping, poured petrol all over, and shouted political slogans as the father and two sons were burned alive.

As if this was not enough, the same barbaric elements unleashed violence on the hapless tribal Christians in Kandhamal following the killing of Vishwa Hindu Parishad leader Swami Laxmanananda Saraswati and four of his aides on 23 August 2008. The marauders ran amok, violating the tribal women, looting their properties, torching their houses and killing all those who were too weak to resist. In all nearly 200 people lost their lives in the violence.

That is why Orissa does not surprise me anymore. Yet a recent incident has stirred me once again in spite of the obvious contempt I do have for the state. At a remote village in the state, the majority Hindu group refused to allow the burial of a three-year-old Dalit Christian girl who died following some health complications.

The girl living at Jinduguda village, 15 km away from Malkangiri, a district in the southern part of Orissa, fell sick and was taken to a nearby health centre on 27 October 2010. The doctor advised the parents to take the child to a nearby hospital. However the patient developed more complications and died while being treated there.

The helpless parents brought the body of the girl back to their village for burial. The Hindus, who form the majority at the village, refused to allow them to bury the girl at the village. There are only 15 Christian families living at the village.

The distraught parents took the body to Malkangiri to seek help for burial. Finally the matter was reported to the local police. The parents, with the dead body in their hands, waited for the police to find a way-out. When the body started to stink, some sane elements in the community managed to prevail over the obstinate ones at the village and gave a quiet burial for the girl.

If anyone thinks this is an isolated incident, they are badly mistaken. Bargaining over the dead has been a regular phenomenon wherever caste feelings run high. In fact there are churches where separate routes as well as divided cemeteries exist to bury their dead – one for the high castes and the other for the lower sections.

Even in Kerala, God’s own country, the reality is no different. The lower sections and also new converts have no say in the running of the Church. They are kept on the margins, being denied of even normal human dignity. Separate seating and separate cemetery dots the landscape of Kerala Church.

A recent incident in central Kerala makes one sit up wondering about the extent of rot that has set in. A Dalit in his late fifties, who had been ailing for quite some time, died without receiving the last sacraments. In fact, he had not been attending the church for many years in protest against the discriminatory practices within his own church. And the leadership in the church did not take kindly to his way of expressing anguish. They ostracised him along with his family, stubbornly refused to reach out even in their times of crisis. Even when he died, they refused to bury him in the cemetery. Finally with the intervention of some sensible elders, he was buried just outside the cemetery.

This is happening in spite of the fact Christ has come mainly to give a new identity to all those who live on the margins – the tax collectors, the fishermen, and even the prostitutes. It is time there arose a new theology of action that could cleanse the Church within and without.

Remember the words that Christ spoke while addressing the synagogue at the beginning of his public ministry. “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he appointed me to preach the Gospel to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives, and recovery of sight to the blind, to set free those who are downtrodden…” (Luke 4:18-19)

- – - written by Dr .George Karimalil