Friday, March 29, 2013

The beauty of 'being' together-2


(We often concentrate on ‘doing’ and neglect ‘being’. In this new column I would like to ponder over some of experiences of being together. These are based on my personal experiences of different Jesuit communities, where I lived and worked!)

There are certain things I cannot forget. I can still narrate conversations, which I have had with certain people years ago, or my first meeting with someone, or particular pages of some books or a scene of a film. I consider this particular memory as my way of showing love to someone or something. Let me share a simple but significant gesture, which I had experienced in my early days of Jesuit formation.

This must have been in December, 2000. I was in Calcutta, doing Jesuit novitiate. After the Christmas, the province assembly of the Calcutta Jesuits took place in the novitiate campus. We, novices had to vacant our rooms in order to make place available for the Jesuits who would come for the gathering. We, instead, went to the villages to have pastoral experience.

When I returned to the novitiate, I found on my table a short place of folded paper with a pen. I opened the paper, which read: “this is a small gift of love for the novice who lives in this room, from Fr …..” That was a big pleasant surprise for me. I had heard the name of that particular Jesuit, but never met him in person. I was touched by this simple gesture. Those days of my ‘innocence’ it was a big thing for me. Many years I kept that particular pen with me as a remembrance.

That was a lesson for me that with a simple gesture we can win the heart of others. Perhaps often we do not notice, ‘the simple thing’ of life. Can we give a try to notice the next ‘simple thing of life’?

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