His Eminence Cardinal Poola Anthony
Archbishop of Hyderabad
Archbishop's Message
The fifth joyful mystery (Lk.2:41-51) is a wonderful event that took place in the Jerusalem Temple in the personal life of God’s only- begotten Son in His human nature with His Virgin Mother Mary and St. Joseph His divinely appointed father. When the days of the Passover feast were completed they left Jerusalem, and only at the end of a whole day’s journey they discovered to their uttermost sorrow that Jesus had not returned with them but had stayed back in Jerusalem for some unknown reason. And returning to Jerusalem to look for Him, they found Him on the third day and were amazed to see Him ‘sitting in the midst of the doctors’ in the Temple! And when His Mother asked Him His reason for staying back He gave Her the most unexpected answer: “Did you not know that I had to be about My Father’s business (His affairs)?”. ‘But they did not understand what He said to them (Lk.2:50).’ What is it that they did not understand? Both His Virgin Mother and St. Joseph knew that Jesus was the Lord God’s Son whom She had conceived and borne in Her womb as the Lord God’s perpetual Virgin through His own personal act and the power of His Holy Spirit. But it was for the first time they heard Him utter the truth of His divine Sonship with His own lips to them! Nay more, He told them that the reason why His Eternal Father had personally created His human nature in the Virgin’s womb was to bring His Eternal Son to meet human persons face to face in this world and advance His Eternal Father’s business in this world!
What is the Eternal Father’s ‘business’ in this world? Now one does not need an M.B.A. degree to understand what ‘business’ means! ‘Business’ is the name for all the intelligent and painstaking work a person does in order to increase His personal possessions and delight in them. So the Eternal Father’s business in this world is all the work He does in this world to increase His everlasting possessions in His created world.
Where do we hear Him speak about this matter? We hear Him speak about this matter for the first time to Israel at Mount Sinai: “If you will hear My voice and keep My commandments you will be My own possession forever.” So the Lord God’s ‘business’ consists in the divine, painstaking and persevering work He does to bring created human persons to belong to Him and enjoy face to face eternal life with Him forever through their life-long and definitive covenantal obedience to Him until the end of their covenantal life with Him in this world of His creatures. Thus, the Eternal Son sent by His Eternal Father through the Virgin Mother Mary to meet us face to face with and in and through His human nature was to call and enable all human persons of good will to become His Eternal Father’s everlasting possession (and kingdom) by giving them the fullness of covenantal life with Him in the Holy Spirit in this world (beginning with Pentecost day). All the Saints in heaven and the holy souls in purgatory are the eschatalogically fruitful outcome of the successful work done by God’s Son as our Lord Jesus Christ and as high priest to advance and secure the fullness of this Eternal Father’s business in this world. Religious ‘vocation’ is the earnest invitation the Son of God offers to every baptized person to become fully involved with Him in His work of advancing and securing this business of His Eternal Father in this world. Is this what each one of us understands in regard to His vocation to each one of us in His one holy Catholic Church?