T story from my grandmother was a dose to sleep gloriously. Though the stories were with a turn and twist, it had a moral. Today the trend has changed; it’s the games on the tabs, the cartoons and the like. And its consequence, what does work on the delicate mind all night through? For that matter even of us grownups! Putting one to sleep with a song is not only vivid in the TV soaps but very much present where a cry of the little one is heard!

All this flashed my mind while at a retreat. I was moved and my mind flooded with thoughts. Every day soon after supper there was a screening of movie on the life of saints. That what was seen before going to bed did have an effect! For the deepening and strengthening of God experience! To bend, mend and grow!!!

At a time when the Church is going through turbulence and facing lot of circumstances; the fallen number in the formation houses and the growing needs of the Church and the people of God, where should one draw the line? Or where should we all begin anew? Can any think of a better place than the home sweet home!  The family? This is the best school where we are/can be groomed and trimmed. This is the place where the stalwarts of the Church, the saints grew up and changed for good in its own time, when He made all things beautiful even from the most ugliest and murky situations, according to His plan.

Come winter it’s the season of festivals. We all love celebrations. We have just finished with the feast of St Francis Xavier, Immaculate Conception, Three Kings and many more to come… very closer one is our dear own St. Joseph Vaz’. To celebrate the feast of the Saint a lot goes into preparation. The important thing in the making of the feast is the remote and immediate preparations that make the feast more meaningful where the life of the saint is reflected and made known to the people with a provocation to emulate the core values…!! So too the life of Saints whose feast we celebrate unite us as one Body of Christ!

This era indeed has a need in need of screening the life of Saints at home. What does the young and the youth need today? Their aims and dreams…, moreover the over-concern of the parents to make them engineers, doctors, lawyers and the list goes on… Does anyone think of imparting values, values that will make them responsible citizens? Responsible adult who can own responsibility for a better God and other oriented living? How good would it be to hear parents tell their sons and daughters to be priest and nuns (few do it), who too can become doctors, lawyers, Principals, nurses like the ones who pursue this profession being a priest and a nun!!! From where will priests and nuns come? If not from our home or from our family? If we don’t bring up our children in the ways of God, with the values of the Kingdom and offer them willingly for the service of God, who will fill up the lacuna or Vacuum?