Sermon for 19th Sunday in Ordinary Time – Year B Homily

August 4, 2021August 5, 2021 selvam Year B

19th Sunday in Ordinary Time – Cycle B
“The bread … for the life of the world” (Jn 6:51)
Some years back, I was staying at the Salesian community in Florence, Italy, for a few weeks. Florence is known for its art and architecture. Following that great tradition, the Salesians in Florence have a beautiful modern fresco-type of a mural in the background of the sanctuary of their community chapel. Paintings are meant to be looked at; however, let me attempt to describe it to you so as to draw a point of reflection from it. At the centre of the mural is the actual tabernacle with the Holy Eucharist. To the right of the tabernacle is the image of Mary. She is seated on a parapet affectionately cuddling the baby Jesus. Her […]

Sermon for 18th Sunday in Ordinary Time – Year B Homily

July 29, 2021July 30, 2021 selvam Year B

18th Sunday in Ordinary Time – Cycle B (Jn 6:24-35)
Do you seek the bread that the Father gives,
or do you seek the Father who gives you bread?
A few years ago I was back in India on my biennial home-leave. And I met a gentleman who was a visitor to our home-parish. He had never been to school, he told me. But during the course of our long conversation about Christian faith and life, I discovered that he was indeed a wise man. For instance, he is the one who put this question to me: “Do you seek the bread given by the father, or do you seek the father who gives you bread?” In my mother-tongue (Tamil) it sounded so well. The word for ‘bread’ is “appam”; and the familiar word for ‘father’ is “appa”. So it would sound […]

Sermon for 17th Sunday in Ordinary Time – Year B Homily

July 21, 2021July 23, 2021 selvam Year B

loaves_and_fishes_miracle 17th Sunday in Ordinary Time – Cycle B
From Emptiness to Abundance (Jn 6:1-15)
Which is the only miracle of Jesus (besides the healing of the blind man – with differences in detail!) that is narrated in all the four gospels with similar details? It is the miracle of feeding the five thousand from five loaves, which we hear in the gospel of this Sunday.
From Mark to John
For Sunday readings of this year, being Cycle B, we follow the Gospel of Mark. In the past two Sundays we have been listening to the first part of chapter 6 of Mark. Following that sequence today we should have listened to the feeding of the five thousand according to Mark (Mk 6:35-44). However, the arrangement of the liturgical readings (the lectionary) makes a jump […]

My Contribution to the 1st Uniservitate Global Symposium on Service Learning

July 17, 2021July 17, 2021 selvam Articles/Chapters

This volume dedicated to the I Global Symposium Uniservitate, compiles the reflections and experiences shared in the virtual event held in October 2020. The meeting aimed to facilitate the exchange between specialists, authorities and teachers of Higher Education institutions from different cultural contexts worldwide, around university social commitment and service-learning practices and programs.
My contribution was to:
Reflections on service-learning in the identity and mission of Catholic Higher Education. It was entitled, “Motivation for Social Transformation through Spirituality in Service-Learning”.
In summary, the reflection argued that:

The goal of Catholic Higher Education Institutions is to create competent graduates
who will be agents of social transformation.
This can be achieved through well-accompanied service-learning.
Service-learning becomes a lifestyle when coloured by a deep spirituality.
Spirituality has the potential to generate intrinsic motivation, which will sustain the
graduates in social transformation.

Reference:
Selvam, S.G. (2021). Motivation […]