H.G Dr.GEEVARGHESE Mar OSTHATHIOS Metropolitan: Beloved Thirumeniappachen

"When you are inspired by some great purpose, some extraordinary project ,all your thoughts break their bounds. Your mind transcends limitations,your consciousness expands in every direction and you find yourself in a new great and wonderful world" - PATANJALI

     Sabharathnam Dr. Geevarghese Mar Osthathios Metropolitan of the Indian Orthodox Church is widely known in India and abroad as a prophet of social justice and as a propagator of the universal religion of love. His passion for justice, equality, sharing and love is grounded on the Christian doctrine of Holy Trinity. He has given a new approach to the Christian Theology based on the Indian Philosophy and introduced the theory of “Atraita” to complement the theory of Advaita. He is the President of the Malankara Orthodox Church Mission Board since 1979. He taught in the Old Seminary for over 50 years. He has written about 56 books of which 13 are in English. He has participated in so many national and international conferences as a leader, preacher and a resource person. He is the founder of Mission Training Centre, Mavelikara which gives training to lay missionaries of love and evangelism. He also started more than 40 humanitarian institutions, movements and projects all over India for poor people, HIV positive patients and their children, cancer patients, leprosy patients and their children and orphans, old age homes for men and women,Sick Aid Foundation, House Building Aid Foundation, Self Education and Employment Loan Fund, Save a Heart Foundation, Karunya Guidance Centre, Visrantibhavan, etc.He is also a poet who has written more than 50 songs. The spiritual and revolutionary ideas in the songs, of course will inspire the mind of the faithful urging them to repent and dedicate themselves fully to the Triune God.(http://geevarghesemarosthathios.org/images/home.html)

     For the author he was more than a Thirumeni; the transformation happened during the Junior National Association for Mission Studies (NAMS) conferences' held in and around the divine campus of Mission Training Center, Mavelikara, during the last part of the previous century. The best part of the camp was the interaction with Thirumeniappachen every evening which inevitably extended towards night. The way he sits with us all along the camp and even during the dinner time, having the same food in an ordinary plate, the way he takes his own insulin-injection are all now memories. The insights, the ideologies, the songs, the speeches, guidances were much superior and class apart. He was the factor which motivated the author to attend the first three conferences of Junior NAMS. He belonged to a different generation and class altogether with hardly anybody left in the same. He was an individual for whom the IQ-EQ explanations might have rendered redundant owing to his high Spiritual Quotient (SQ). He was the true follower of the Jewish carpenter-his master. He was a true leader of the church who never yearned for positions. He was a leader much like a shepherd. He stayed behind the flock, letting the most nimble go on ahead, whereupon the others follow, not realizing that all day along they are being directed from behind. 

     He was inspired by the power of love. He was committed to the doctrine of holy Trinity. His cognitive thoughts broke all the bonds. His consciousness expanded in every single direction. No doubt, he was the citizen of a new, great and wonderful world. A prophet, a great soul leaves us. He walked along the path of love. He did not falter. He has taken us to the apex and has showed us the glorious vista that surrounds the world of love and empathy. It is our duty to take up from where he has stopped. The intercessions of Thirumeniappachen will be always with us.

THE TOLERANT PEOPLE

In a desert plain in Tanzania, in the shadow of volcano Ol Donyo Lengai, there is a dune made of volcanic ash. The feature which makes it the cynosure is that, it moves bodily. Technically known as “Barchan”; the entire dune walks across the desert in a westerly direction at a speed of about 17mts/year. The wind blows the sand up the shallow slope on the side and then as each sand grain hits the top of the ridge, it cascades down on the inside of the crescent and thus the whole horn-shaped dune moves. This dune effectively symbolizes the life of any individual in his 50’s.

            The ominous period which displays the past glories, is equally a light house of future worries. The changing trends, change in living standards, mass media, spirit of realism, spirit of compromise and pragmatism have all contributed equally in defining the 50’s of one’s age, all the more crucial. The essentialities being dealt with it turns out to be the greatest concern of the period. Of all the twitching factors; Disconnection of one’s matured children gains primacy. This is the stage when the individual realizes and recognizes his children to be grown up, physically, psychologically and professionally. The children start taking decisions on their own and show resentment which sends mixed feelings to the parents in question. The 50’s is a stage which witnesses a host of burgeoning important decisions in their child’s life; at least in the Indian context, which is yet to embrace the total individualistic culture of the west. Other than the development of indifference shown by the children, the decision of their marriage is the greatest dissonance producer of the period. This can be manifested in greater severity and can be inimical if the children are the proponents of love-marriages. The fast disappearing arranged marriages has also its share of concern, thanks to the decision-paralysis caused due to the paradox of choices.

            If the indifference of one’s pedantic children were the pushing factors; Compassion demanding old parents, acts as the pulling factor. If one has enjoyed the company of parents at the time of happiness, what is that restricts him from spending time with them in old age (read distress).This rationale working out at the level of super-ego tends to give immediate conformity to their demands. But, the change in the behavior of old people which includes increased stubborn nature, greater reliance on text than on context, fear of isolation, overly time-consciousness, religious adherence to specific  food-schedules, ego-defenses, etc. inadvertently puts enormous pressure on the people who are looking after them and are in their middle age. This essentially is another factor which induces the virtue of tolerance. Ubiquitous work pressures works out as the third important dimension of the theory. This is the period when the individual holds the highest offices in his career, which calls for greater commitment, responsibility and time. The individual in their 50’s who work in perilous atmosphere take a direct hit from their professional side in terms of work pressures. This is a period where he needs to guide, direct and motivate the sub-ordinates along with efficient conformity and effective interaction with the superiors. This is also the period where the inter and intra departmental politics is at the all time high and where speculative colleagues wait for any miniscule errors which renders one to be easily castigated and thereby humiliated. The finality of these pressures leads to the fourth dimension - the inevitable retirement. Psychological studies conducted around the globe, show that retirement is the state which produces maximum dissonance in a human being, after deathbed. Retirement steals away the identity of the individual. This identity crisis ricochets to the next factor; De-individualization of self. ‘Self’ which is an actor, guiding thoughts, feelings and actions, loses its significance and succumbs to the pressure of other two generations. This surrender of both the subjective and the objective self for the family good is outwardly manifested as tolerance. The final factor which magnifies the tolerance of the 50’s is the courage-vulnerability paradox. The word courage comes from the Latin word ‘cor’, meaning heart and the original definition is ‘to tell who you are with your whole heart’. But, unfortunately 50’s is an age in the lives of individuals where the courage takes backseat, which inevitably has become the cosmic law and, makes the individual vulnerable and not venerable. The extraneous pressures are so high that the people in their 50’s are willing to let go of who they thought they should be in order to be who they were. They fully embrace vulnerability. They believe that what made them vulnerable made them beautiful.

            This is the group of people who are always ignored, a group that stands out as a conundrum, a group always in a predicament, a group always ready to strike a Faustian bargain, a group caught in between bellicosity and rigidity of two generations, a group that is highly self-actualized, a group that is the life-force power of the society, a group that galvanizes the lives of near and dear ones, a group that imbues new ray of hope to both the generations, a group that projects more and more peace into the world, a group that clearly displays the Christian ‘Agape’, a group that embellishes human life and maintains the balance of the universe, they are the moving sand dunes of Tanzania, they are the silent directors of the show. The tolerance continues, the show goes on.