Patna, Bihar: For the small Catholic community in Bihar, the month of September has special significance. September 9 marks the 100th anniversary of the formation of Patna Diocese (now archdiocese). On Sunday, September 8, most of the churches within the Archdiocese, – which currently includes the diocese of Bhagalpur (1956), Muzaffarpur (1980), Bettiah (1998), and […]
Called to follow Christ through Baptism, the call to be a teacher is a call within a call: for those who are Christian teachers, the question is, “Do we understand that ours is not a mere profession, but a call to spread the light of knowledge and values, so that we can be instruments of […]
Someone sent me a photograph via WhatsApp this Sunday morning from the tiny parish of Sikandra in the Jamui District of Bihar. The Church of St. Francis Xavier hosted a Fathers’ Day event, where the Dads who came to church, whether in their 20s or their 80s were felicitated and handed flowers. Along with today […]
Strange isn’t it? Just yesterday, the 20th of March, we the ‘conscious intelligentsia’ marked two events or ‘international days’. One was the day of the house sparrow, and the other was the international day of Happiness, whatever that means. The sparrows that would nest in the rafters of our houses and bungalows a few decades […]
In these troubled times, and despite what the apologists for a particular political regime want to say, these are definitely troubled times; three thousand Catholics, over half of them the rural poor, congregated at a church in Patna to acknowledge the source of their faith. And for so many who came, this was an act […]
I attended the First Vinay Kanth Memorial Lecture at the Bharatiya Nritya Kala Mandir conference hall. One reason I went was to ‘catch up’ with familiar faces I knew would be there , ( fully well knowing that most of the catching up would be a wave, a smile, and a nod), but it would […]
It is indeed ironical that on the day the government ‘celebrates’ Balika Divas, a posse of male policemen let loose their ire on a girl student in Benaras Hindu University and beat her up. The girl was part of a larger gathering of students who were protesting the callous, disgustingly patriarchal , and insensitive attitude […]
Sometime between Deepawali and Chhat, news trickled in from the vernacular press that a four year old girl had been abused by two women teachers at the prestigious St. Xavier’s School in Patna,the capital of Bihar. At first glance, one was not amused.Having been associated with the campaign against child abuse in Bihar since 1997, […]
The festive season is upon us with less of the festive ‘spirit’ in the Boondocks of Bihar. By now, every dhobi and his donkey knows that this blessed state is dry. The Chief Minister in his role as Master Nanny has shut down the elite watering holes and deprived the well heeled of their single […]
The politically motivated post-mortem of the ‘surgical strikes’ of September 29 are enough to make all sensible Indians queasy. Looking at the way politicians and their supporters on both sides of the political and ideological divide have tried to milk this incident on TV and the social media has made me want to puke. As […]
India’s sportspeople with ‘different abilities’ did even better than the ‘normal athletes’, bringing home Olympic gold. Will events like the Paralympics change our views about the ‘physically challenged’? The prevailing view of disability in the past was where the individual was seen as ill and the condition was an individual ‘problem’. Perceptions of disability were […]
The most striking thing about Saint Teresa of Calcutta is her simple slogan and sign language used when asked why on earth she was doing what she did… scrounging for souls in the blackest alleyways the world over. Her answer, five fingers of her tiny palm spread out, practically in your face would be : […]
