Avoid the clergy in the feud - a creative solution to the Malankara Orthodox church factional feud ..

Malankara Orthodox church in India is going through a grave crisis. As an informed member of laity of the Malankara Orthodox church, I am suggesting an innovative, creative solution to solve the dispute between the two factions of Orthodox church. 

Some questions from the people of the church..

• For whom does a religion and a church exist, the clergy or the believers ?
• Who forms the congregation in the church. the clergy or the believers ?
• Who is funding the church, the clergy or the believers ?
• Who is donating the land for the church, the clergy or the believers ?
• Who is donating money to build the churches, the clergy or the believers ?
• Who is working for a salary from the church, the clergy or the believers ?
• Who are well informed and educated among the stakeholders, the clergy or the believers ?
• Whose ancestors are buried at the church tombs or cemeteries, the clergy or the believers ?
• Who gets on the road for the church, the clergy or the believers ?
• Who provides the money for any litigation, the clergy or the believers ?
  
• Who are the main beneficiaries from the church, the clergy or the believers ?

Who is the employee and who is the employer here ? It is very sad and unfair when employees boss over the employer. 

We all know the very existence of the church is for the believers. The whole institution of the church is of the laity, ie. of the believers, by the believers and for the believers .. 

The whole rank and file of the clergy are existing just to serve the laity in the daily activities to help in prayers to the Lord..

The clergy has many important, saintly and saner things to do than fight on the roads or in the court .. The mismanagement that has happened over the past hundred years in this case,  in my opinion, has been due to the unprofessional interference by the clergy who should have restricted themselves to spiritual things. 

Following saner experience and understanding,  let's keep the whole clergy from both sides, out of the picture and go for a consensus among the believers. 

Do the laity on both sides want to continue the fight between the factions or do they want to unite and be a united church ?

After the July 2017 SC judgement, we have already spent more than Rs. 12 crore on litigation ( Rs  120,000,000/=) just as lawyer fees to forcefully take over 40 odd Jacobite churches.  How much more we have to spend to take over the other 700 odd churches forcefully ? 

What great enmity and unrest are we going to create in society because of this forceful action from our side .. ?? 🤔🤔 Can we avoid this wasteful spend by offering an olive branch and lovingly taking the other faction along with us forward ?

We are already in a grave financial crisis as Federal Bank is at our throat to repay the Rs. 14 crore (Rs  140,000,000) we took as loan for the Parumala cancer hospital, and we are definitely going to falter in the repayment. 

One day, the financial burden of the Parumala hospital is definitely going to fall on each member of the laity of our church. We need to see through this game plan of the clergy.. 

We need honest, plain speaking, bold and effective laity leadership to help solve the crisis permanently once for all. 

The day the power of love overrules the love of power, the world will know peace - Mahatma Gandhi 🙏🙏🙏🙏

Education, the true healer ..

From my interactions and readings of our past and present clergy, I am amazed at how constrained, selfish and narrow minded their thought processes are, how intolerant they are to criticisms or to any forward thinking .. 😳 

It is very sad, I agree. It is high time we reformed our Orthodox Theological Seminary education of the Malankara Orthodox and Jacobite Syrian Orthodox church. We should seriously consider giving our clergy, past and present, Universal education, to help look at the bigger picture which will help them open up their minds, than just giving them narrow minded, religious Seminary education. 

The goal of education is the advancement of knowledge and the dissemination of truth - J.F. Kennedy

Poor education and the unwillingness and prejudice to recognize learned, sensible, educated people is the root cause of all evils facing our church. 

It is high time we did serious soul searching..  *True education is a great healer* ..🙏🙏

George 

You're my best friend - song recording with Jobin ..

Don Williams (1939-2017) was born and raised in Texas, US.. Don sang and produced this country song at the Jack Clement Recording studio, Nashville, Tennesse, US and released the album with other songs by the same name *You're my best friend* in April 1975. 

This number rose to the No.1 position in the Billboard Country singles chart for 1975 and remained there for many weeks. A song remembered by all his fans world over for a good 45 years.

George Easaw from India is trying to recreate the Don Williams magic here ..

Click here for the link ..

I also recorded this song with my son Easaw George playing the guitar and joining in the chorus .. Click here ..

George..

Losing jobs during Covid time..

In my career spanning thirty your years after passing out from the Govt. College of Engineering, Trivandrum, starting from my first job at Cochin Port Trust to my present job at Alliance University, Bangalore, I have had the good opportunity to voluntarily change jobs five times, get kicked out two times and presently I am in my eighth job in the eighth year .. Don't know what will happen. A 120 micron pathogen, Covid 19 virus is doing damage this time, not just locally, but world-wide.

How does it feel like to lose one's job ? This question is more valid and meaningful during the present Covid times as all of us are staring at uncertain and unclear futures when Covid virus is breathing down our necks.

It is said during this Covid time almost 122 million daily wage workers from across India lost their jobs and almost 200,000 white collared workers from the management side too lost their jobs. But do we need to get unduly agitated over this development ?

How does it feel to be kicked out of one's job ? We are usually wedded to our job as we tend to give our best to the job and spend a good part of our waking time, almost 50% to it. When our employers find a misfit between our qualifications and experience with the job requirements, we become a suitable candidate for firing. Usually it does not happen overnight, but our incompetence gets developed over a period of time.

Firing from our job usually causes a massive shock for the first week, but over time, one gets over the shock and tries to find the good part of the act, get up from where we have fallen, blame ourselves for our misfortune, sharpen and hone up our skills in other relevant area and look for a new job.

My earlier experience in the firing zone has given me enough courage to write about it and wait and watch to see what would happen to me if the situation gets bad in the near future over the Covid virus.

The post-firing period in this Covid time would also have four stages

1. Understand the situation

2. Accept the reality

3. Hone up one's skills and

4. Be positive of the future.   

While going through this paper in HBR of April '20 by Sally Maitlis from Oxford Said School of Business, Making sense of the future after losing a job you have, it brought back interesting thoughts of how to cope with job layoffs that would happen in this Covid time. 

I hope people take it in the right spirit and go ahead. The world is not going to end tomorrow or the day after. 

George..

Yoga and it's importance in my life..

It was in IIT Bombay during 2003, while getting ready to present my pre-synopsis for the PhD that I first had the issue of low back ache. Sitting for hours at a stretch in front of the PC, my back muscles had got wasted. Except for a brief stretch of yoga, which I discontinued later,  my low back ache pain has been recurring frequently necessitating hospital admission every two years on an average.

The last time I got admitted to St. Johns, Bangalore, doctors suggested it was the final thing, the disc prolapse was too big and hence had to be operated and removed. It was my fate I thought and got ready with Anila at St. Johns hospital for surgery. Met Dr, Issac, HOD who asked me to get clearance from other areas and we went to the blood dept. It was here that my sister at GIC Corp Mumbai called up and asked me come what may, to go home and take rest.

It's almost 3 years now. Practicing a combination of physiotherapy and yoga, I can say with all my heart that there is not better exercise for the back than Yoga.

It gives you strength, flexibility, and mind-body awareness. Yoga can help you stay flexible and strong without putting added stress on your joints. You get the added benefit of a mind-body approach that can help you relax and energize. If you're pregnant, yoga can help keep you relaxed, strong, and in shape : webmd.com

I never thought I would be able to carry even one kg, but now I do all the shopping and some times I carry even 15-20 kgs bag in my hand and walk home.

John's Hopkins medical school has this to say about yoga ..

Harvard Medical school has this to say about yoga ..

Yoga has given the needed tenacity and strength to my back muscles.

George ..

International Blood donation Day, June 14..

At the small function in St Johns Hospital.

St. John's Hospital Bangalore is the favourite place where I go for voluntary blood donation. Maybe that could have been the reason why they invited me on June 13 for the function to celebrate the International Blood Donation day at St. Johns Hospital, Bangalore.

One of the elderly wellwishers was worried why blood donation at this time of global Covid infection, I calmed his sincere concerns after a brief talk.

I reached the St. John's blood bank on their invite 15 mins esrly on 13 June '20. After an introduction with the Dy. Director  the program started with many doctors and nurses.

Dr. Seetalakshmi was my host, though Dr. Jyoti Idiculla, HOD, Gen. Medicine and wife of my CET friend John Mathew was also present. Most of the speakers spoke of the virtues of blood donation.

One does not know who of them will benefit..

I spoke of my experience of blood donation from 1984 at Trivandrum Medical college SUT hospital, Regional Cancer centre (RCC) TVM, Goa Medical College, IIT Bombay hospital, Nanavati hospital Mumbai etc.

From 2007, its been in Bangalore, back to St John's, Bangalore, Narayana Hrudayalaya Bangalore, Swami Vivekananda Trust, Bangalore, St. Gregorios Orthodox church Bangalore etc .... 

In the process of donation ..

After the programme and tea, I went for the second blood donation of the year. Usually 450 ml of blood is taken at a time, given that I  have not had any infection over the past 3 months. It can be seperated and upto 3 patients can make use of the blood plasma and platelets.

At little above 90 kgs, it is my selfish interest too to trim down.. Blood donation has helped me keep perfect health over the past 35 years, except for a low back ache which is now perfectly under control, thanks to daily yoga.

The many benefits of blood donation

Once you start giving blood, most of the time the donor will never have a health condition which warrants blood, this is my experience. I have done more than 30 times so far and going strong.

I recommend every human being to donate blood at least once every year. I was told that being a regular blood donor, I will be able to donate upto the age of 65 years, another 9 years. I look forward to giving life to at least 25 people more by then.

I was fortunate enough to be of help to some of my Professors at IIT Bombay and even to this day, I am in touch with them.

George..

Should churches in Kerala be opened now amdist the Covid scare ?

On the 8th of June 2020, after a long gap of almost two and a half months, the religious institutions in Kerala are opening up. Is it a safe and healthy practice ?

The complete inability of religions to address the issue of anguish and grief by interfering to reduce the pain did not materialise during the Covid time, basically because of the fact that religion is man-made and is another ploy and business of some leaders to fool the public on their ignorance.

Another fact is that there are group of parasites who live off the resources of the church which is a very shameful act. Even though this is not very visible upfront, these people take the contract to supply major food items, meat etc during festivals of the church The funds given by the believers in the hope that it would be dispensed to the poor and needy in society is grabbed by these parasites, who in the name of festivals and God misuse these funds meant for helping the poor for church expenses.

Opening of the churches on 8 June is not good for the believers. It only helps to spread the disease and not contain it. The spiritual workers of all religious institutions across the world, the priests and other people who live off the churches, should exercise restraint at this moment. 

Let the Covid spread be contained before we open the churches and temples.

George..