作者 Yesudas*

病人只了解一种语言：「即爱的语言」。圣诞节「提醒我们我们是一家人」。如果「我们允许让天主的光穿透我们的心，并在圣神的光照中看到他人，那就是圣诞节」。

加尔各答（亚洲新闻）- 圣诞节「会提醒我们是一个大家庭，我们受召叫在他人内认识天主，并学会在恩宠和天主的眼中注视自己」。这是加尔各答德肋撒修女创立的仁爱传教会传教士Yesudas神父对所有亲爱朋友的期望。他在圣诞信件中回顾了他在卡鲁纳巴万智障人士中心度过的六年时光，以下便是信件全文。这些日子的特点是尖叫、侮辱和混乱，尤其是当病人每天浣洗时。但他说，「由此，我的信仰得到了发展」。他继续说，患病的人「只懂一种语言，那就是爱的语言」，天主「呼唤我们我们建立一个爱的圣所」。以下是原文供参考，并由《亚洲新闻》负责编译。

Dear Friends

As I sit to write this letter, from the window I could see the New Karuna Bhavan building

and our people standing in the portico of the first floor and welcoming our helpers who are

coming in the morning for their duty. They call them by name and some of the run to welcome

them. They have missed them during the night and now they are happy to have them again.

Each brother and each helper is a loving presence to them.

Our people here in Karuna Bhavan are all mentally ill. Mental illness pushes people into fear,

gloom, isolation and nothingness breaking down their spirit, destroying their mental capacity

and grabbing away from them the courage to face life. Life is hard for them because they don't

understand what is going with in them. Their dilapidated psychic state can understand only one

language - belonging in love. Only love can reunify them with their soul, infuse hope, and give a

new meaning to their life. This needs people who make a journey with them in faith, a faith in

God among us, with us and in us. This journey is always Christmas.

What I noticed in my life of faith journey for last 6 years here at many times it was a matter of

struggle, lack of support, failure and discouragement. It is like as I look at the apostolate in

Karuna Bhavan. Many of our men here are with chronic mental illness, they abuse us, they make

a mess in the morning and we wash and clean them, they make again a mess and we wash them

and clean them and it goes on …….. Yet the process of washing and cleaning also involves times

of great encouragement, joy and hope. I also discovered it is also a time of impatience,

discouragement and anger that disturbing me. It is from all these my faith was growing for last

six years. For me faith is a matter of dailiness and offering all aspects of my lives to God. I

believe our God is an incarnational God. He is among us, in us, with us. He reveals things we

have forgotten. He calls us to create in us a sanctuary of love, a conducive environment in and

around us where people who are mentally ill is accepted and loved. They feel a sense of

belonging to a family. In rebuilding Karuna Bhavan to create this environment was our main

concern.

Christmas remind us that we are a family. This is what brothers and our helpers try to create in

our life with these is mentally ill men. In this family we are called to recognize God in each other,

and learn to look at each other in the light of grace and through the eyes of God. Our hard

attitude towards one another will melt away if we allow God to lead us to the house of each

other, if we allow the light of God to penetrate our hearts and see the other in the divine light - it

is Christmas.

Christmas has many things to teach us - it is God with us in our dailiness - to be in the present -

it calls us to drop past regret and future worries just live in the moment. It is a time to forget the

bickering and negativities that have happened through the year. It calls us to welcome a new

beginning in silence. Feast of Christmas is not noisy, it is very personal opening of ones heart to

God who is among us, with us and in us.

 

-2-

 

So there is a sacredness in this celebration, a time to show one's gratitude to God for being with

us. But it needs faith, if we don't make a faith journey Christmas comes only once a year but for

the one who make the faith journey in dailiness every moment and every day is a Christmas.

Christmas gives us a chance to pause and be grateful for all that we've been blessed with. For

me, the true spirit of Christmas is in giving. It is God giving His Son in love for the world and our

giving to the creator and to our family members and friends. I believe in this giving our lives

become better and enriched and fill us with Joy.

May this Christmas and coming New Year be a giving of our lives to God and to others.

“ALL OF US IN KARUNA BHAVAN WISH YOU ALL A HAPPY CHRISTMAS AND GRACE -FILLED

NEW YEAR.”

With Love and Light.

• 印度，仁爱传教会，圣诞信件，病患，卡鲁纳巴万