Father Charles Puthota

An atheist quizzes his newly converted Christian friend about Jesus. “Where was Jesus born? How many apostles did he have? Who were his parents? Where did he die?” The neophyte draws a blank to each question. Unimpressed, the atheist says, “You seem to know almost nothing about Jesus to whom you claim to have been converted.” The friend answers: “I’m ashamed at how little I know about Jesus. However, some years ago I used to be abusive toward my own family and addicted to gambling and alcohol. But now I am completely free from those demons. All this Jesus has done for me. This much I know of him.”

Years ago, as a young priest studying at Marquette University, I had the privilege of doing a summer French language course at Institut Catholique de Paris, as a way of preparing myself for a European language requirement for my doctoral program. The Jesuits at Rue de Grenelle in Paris generously gave me board and lodging. The French food was out of this world. Staying with the Jesuits, I would walk to my classes through the busy streets of Paris, amazed at the sights of the City of Lights. One of my favorite things was to walk to Notre Dame de Paris. What a luminous, resplendent cathedral! I fell in love with the grandeur and majesty of the church. It mediated to me the mystery of God. Through its towering gothic architecture, magnificent stained-glass windows, centuries-old history, and the fervent faith of those who worshipped there, God became both powerfully transcendent and movingly intimate to me. My experience was not unlike that of Thomas Merton, who as a young man visiting European cathedrals, was deeply touched by the presence of God, a religious experience that eventually led him to faith and vocation.

Alan Paton’s “Ah, But Your Land is Beautiful” is a fictionalized novel based on true events, dealing with the dreadful apartheid era in South Africa. In the story, a black court messenger named Emmanuel Nene visits Robert Mansfield, a white headmaster of a whites-only school, mostly out of curiosity and in admiration of Mansfield’s humanity and inclusiveness. The government comes down on Mansfield and orders him not to allow his white students to mingle with the black students of another school for a football game. Mansfield resigns from his position because for him “it is time to go out and fight everything that separates people from one another, and especially people of one color and one race from people of another color and race.”

This Lenten season, we could do concretely some of the following: