Reflections on the Silver Jubilee Convention

by Dr. D. Babu Paul IAS

It was a bond of a different kind at the Family Conference of the Malankara Archdiocese where I was the main speaker. They were celebrating their Silver Jubilee. It was a remarkable event under the able and effective leadership of Their Eminences Mar Titus Yeldho who hails from Perumbavoor and Mar Cyril Aprem who finds mention in Dalrymple's book From The Holy Mountain. The participation was record breaking and the organisation meticulous.

There is a peculiar problem which American families face. The children have very long holidays and the parents have very short ones, if at all. We have a problem here in this country also nowadays with the advent of the nuclear families. In 1950s we celebrated the vacation. And our parents had no reason to worry because we were all covered by the extended families and the basic rural ambience. Today especially in cities the parents are busy at work and the children have to be engaged effectively. So we have Summer Camps, Vacation Bible Classes and lessons in various realms ranging from the culinary to the cultural. In fact we got this idea from USA! They organise camps for children and young adults. Our people have improved upon the American Model by organising a long weekend where parents and children get together and live together, play together and pray together. Soon enough an unintended benefit emerged as the second generation Malayalees came of age. At these conferences boy-meet-girl-shine- in- eyes syndrome manifested itself.

This was the third Family Conference that I was attending. This one excelled the earlier ones by all standards. The organisers did a wonderful job. While in the IAS I have had the opportunity to organise various events at the state, national and international (read SAARC) levels. I think the young men who organised the conference this year did a job significantly better than what I could have done under the given circumstances. I bow my head before them. Mr. George Korath, the National Co-coordinator, was the unchallenged leader of American Malayalees as FOKANA President some years ago. Mr. Joby George, the General Cove nor, looked like a Prince out of the history books of the Mughal Period in his well designed attire. Had he not migrated to USA he would have been a Minister in government here now. Dr. Manikat and Abraham Mathew, an old friend of mine, also deserve praise for the magnificent success of the Conference.

The Conference showcased a remarkable combination of American efficiency, Malayalee heritage in costumes and ceremonial umbrellas and the inimitable chendamelam- incidentally chenda is a uniquely Keralite drum which maestros use to create music- and the Antiochean heritage in scrupulous adherence to rituals. This gave HE Mar Titus the young Archbishop an opportunity to prove that he is a man of God and a man of skills. Normally a few Metropolitans from India would attend. This time none could leave India and this opportunity became a launching pad for the young Archbishop who is chronologically just about the age of my younger child though spiritually my father.

The Theme for the Conference was Pauline. It came from 1 Corinthians where Chapter 15 says in Verse 57, "But thanks be to God which giveth us this victory through our Lord Jesus Christ." I explained that Paul never thought he was writing the Bible when he wrote his Epistles. I also taught about the problems of textual transmission, some of which I had enumerated in these columns while reproducing my paper delivered at the International Latin Seminar. In the first part of my keynote I emphasised Paul as the divinely ordained bridge between the Jew and the Gentile and in the second I explained how Death became irrelevant with Resurrection and how Verse 57 derives substance from Verse 58, how the two verses form an integral continuum the latter defining the consequences of the former. The audience was very responsive and the speeches were well taken.

On the whole it was a remarkably reassuring experience to attend the family conference.

Source: Thursdays with BabuPaul, Keral.com; http://www.keral.com/babupaul/