My beloved ones, today, we are examining several common elements found in three recent testimonies. Although the individuals are different, each of them reached a similar realization and entered into an experience of God at almost the same spiritual level.
The first testimony is from Angel Tara of Angamaly. The second is from Siby George of Thrissur. The third is from Jeeva of Vaikom. Our purpose is not merely to repeat their experiences, but to observe the spiritual pattern common to all three.
The Lord is continually updating the syllabus of the Covenant. To journey with the Covenant, to walk beside it, and to live with the Lord according to it is a profound Gospel experience. Through the Covenant, God is gathering us and leading us into a new era of experiencing Him.
You may be facing illness, debt, foreclosure proceedings, family quarrels, an impending divorce, or the pain of a spouse who has left and not returned. These experiences may appear to be only burdens, but they can become the raw materials through which grace is formed.
What do we mean by raw materials? They are the unrefined circumstances of life from which the anointing of the Spirit can emerge. Before an anointing comes, many such situations may appear. To us, they feel like tension, fear, confusion, and stress. But when these raw materials are placed within the spiritual system of the Covenant, and when we begin living with Christ according to His Word, they can be transformed.
This is what Angel Tara describes. She said, "I was a normal Christian." Siby George expressed the same idea. He said, "I was an average Christian." Both used almost the same language. They were not rejecting the faith. They were Christians who lived an ordinary sacramental life, followed the customary practices of the Church, and tried to live decently. Siby George was not a troublemaker. He was a God-fearing man. There was no great scandal in his life. He was simply living as an average Christian.
This teaching is not useful only to Christians. There are also people of other faiths listening. The experiences of these individuals can help anyone recognize the need to upgrade one’s life when ordinary strength is no longer enough. Sometimes life places a weight upon us that is far greater than our ability to carry it. The problem is not necessarily that we are wicked or irresponsible. The problem is that life becomes heavier than our present spiritual strength. We become weary and heavily burdened.
The older Malayalam Gospel language describes this as being weighed down. When life becomes heavy in this way, we begin to understand that we must move beyond an ordinary, routine, and merely ritualistic life of faith.
For many Malayalis today, the moment they recognize this need for a spiritual upgrade, they think of entering into the Covenant. The Covenant is not an untested theory. It is a Gospel plan through which hundreds of thousands of people have lived, persevered, and found a way forward. When the Lord first gave us this revelation, I had no anxiety about whether the Covenant would succeed or whether people would accept it. Even by 2016, Kreupasanam was already moving forward in great grace, and many testimonies had been received. Some of those involved in administration had concerns, but I did not. Even if the Covenant took years to become widely understood, that was not the main issue.
From the beginning, we wanted to establish a spiritual safety net for those who were falling. In the early days of Kreupasanam, one of our central missionary works was the Unbroken Rosary. It included the Marian penance retreat and the continuous Rosary of a thousand beads. Those who came for the Marian penance and fasting prayer eagerly awaited the Unbroken Rosary at the end.
Because the Covenant ministry now continues without interruption, residential retreats cannot presently be conducted in this same space. However, a retreat center is being prepared on the adjacent property. When it is ready, residential retreats will begin again. In the future, there will be retreats that deepen the Covenant itself and offer a fuller spiritual experience.
There will be a significant difference between merely taking the Covenant and living it deeply through a residential Covenant retreat. The level of anointing, the discipline, and the formation will be different. Many people long to stay at Kreupasanam for three days and enter more deeply into this life.
A residential retreat requires much preparation and sacrifice. Even the present ministry has its difficulties, yet it now functions smoothly and beautifully with about 110 staff members. No matter how many people arrive, we try to ensure that no one faces unnecessary hardship, even within this limited space. There may be some crowding, but a little spiritual discomfort can also be fruitful. Today, many churches are becoming air-conditioned. Physical comfort is not wrong, but it is not the heart of the matter. Europe has many comfortable churches, yet many of them are empty. What we truly need is not merely cool air, but the living freshness of the Holy Spirit.
In parts of Africa where severe persecution continues, churches may be built with palm leaves and rough platforms resembling the simple structures used in our fish markets. A cloth is spread over the platform, and Holy Mass is celebrated with profound reverence. Anyone who sees the faith of those communities may be moved to tears. Their material resources are limited, but their dedication shines because they are filled with the Spirit.
Kerala once had many spiritually cold Christians. Yet God has repeatedly renewed this land. As the people entered deeper levels of spirituality, Kerala was eventually brought to the Covenant. Why? Because the Lord is always near to the person who genuinely seeks Him.
Psalm 145:18 says, "The Lord is near to all who call on Him, to all who call on Him in truth."
My children, the heart of today’s teaching is contained in those words: "to all who call on Him in truth."
The difference lies in how deeply we receive and internalize the Scripture. Sometimes we read a verse at forty years of age with the same casual understanding we had in the tenth standard. But the Word is meant to mature within us.
Angel Tara recently shared a deeply moving testimony. She had completed an MSc in Organic Chemistry. Her great ambition was to go to the United States and pursue a PhD. She sent applications to many institutions and searched for opportunities in many places, but rejection after rejection arrived.
She continued going to church and praying as part of her normal spiritual routine. She was faithful, but life had become extremely heavy. Her own future was not moving forward, and her brother’s life was also at a standstill. Neither of them knew what to do next. One day, when she returned from church, her brother was standing in the yard. In his frustration he asked her, "Why are you always walking to this church? Will anything come of it?" She trembled when she heard those words, and she began to cry. His question came from the same pain she herself was carrying. Both of their lives seemed to have withered, and neither could see a way forward.
Yet Angel had a slightly greater openness to the Holy Spirit than her brother. This is why we must pay attention to the level at which the Holy Spirit is working within us. To discern God’s plans, the guidance of the Holy Spirit is essential. Angel understood that life was moving backwards. Everything seemed to be entering a reverse countdown. Then the Holy Spirit spoke within her heart: "The only path left is the Covenant."
Entering the Covenant can itself feel difficult.
Recently, a nurse told me, "I deeply desire to take the Covenant, but I am alone. I do not know where anything is. First I have to find Alappuzha, and then I have to find Kreupasanam."
In truth, Mother has arranged this place beautifully. Kreupasanam stands directly beside the National Highway. One only needs to step out of the vehicle and enter. Still, for a first-time visitor, the initial struggle can seem enormous. People wonder, "Where should I go? Who will guide me? What should I do at the thirteen Covenant counters?" Because of these fears, some continue postponing the journey, saying, "I will go later." But sometimes life reaches a point where they realize there is no other way forward. When such people finally take the Covenant, they often follow it with great seriousness because they know what it cost them to come.
After Angel entered the Covenant, her confusion began to clear. She had been debating whether to pursue a PhD in the United States or to write the qualifying examination in India. Once she came into the Covenant, she decided to write the GATE (Graduate Aptitude Test in Engineering), which is used for admission to the Indian Institutes of Technology. The competition in India is intense. Millions of students pursue limited opportunities. That is one reason many go abroad for medical and higher studies. Some who study medicine abroad must later pass the Foreign Medical Graduate Examination when they return. In some years, only a very small percentage pass. In such situations, merit is real, but merit alone does not remove the difficulty created by limited places and extreme competition.
Angel wrote the GATE examination and secured a rank in the 250s across India. Her life, which had appeared completely blocked, suddenly aligned with clarity. Some people mock testimonies and ask, "How can anyone pass an examination without studying, merely through the Lord’s help?" Such criticism often ignores what the Bible teaches about grace.
Angel had studied Organic Chemistry, but she said that for this particular examination, she had prepared only a limited portion of the syllabus. Human effort was present, but it did not fully explain the result. This is the biblical principle: not by merit alone, but by grace.
Why did God establish such a principle? Because even where many possess merit, limited opportunities remain. If one thousand qualified people compete for five hundred places, five hundred meritorious people will still be left out. Grace is not a rejection of effort. It is God’s power acting where human qualification alone cannot secure the outcome.
Zechariah 4:6 says, "Not by might, nor by power, but by My Spirit, says the Lord Almighty."
This is exactly what we seek in the Covenant.
The works assigned through the Covenant are not merely transactions performed to obtain jobs, stop foreclosures, or build houses. Some may distribute newsletters in the scorching sun only because they hope to receive a material favor. But mature Covenant-keepers understand the deeper spiritual current. The works are meant to transform the person and deepen the person’s participation in the grace of God.
When Angel renewed her Covenant, she made a firm decision. She said, "From now on, I will live the Covenant with the exact commitment it deserves." That decision was important. She began reading the Word of God faithfully for the full half hour. Many people read for ten minutes, stop, and say they will continue later, but they never return. That becomes a ritualistic Covenant, not a lived Covenant.
When Angel began fulfilling the Covenant accurately, the Lord granted her the gift of tears. Among the gifts of the Holy Spirit are the gifts of tongues, healing, faith, and many others. Yet one profound gift that is rarely discussed is the gift of tears. Some people cannot even call the name of Jesus without tears filling their eyes. Those tears rise from the love of God. Angel said that as she read the Bible faithfully and reflected on the Passion of the Lord, her eyes would fill with tears, especially during Holy Mass. Because she consciously followed Jesus in her mind, thoughts, and intentions, the Holy Spirit poured a special anointing upon her.
Every anointing has an experiential dimension. We must not merely complete external works. We must convince God through truthfulness and sincerity.
The true risk in the Covenant is not distributing the newsletters. A man recently came and took one thousand copies. He does this every month. Taking one thousand copies is not the difficult part. Distributing them with faithfulness is the real matter. Some people struggle even with eighteen copies, repeatedly counting how many remain. Yet this man has received an anointing to distribute a thousand. Why do we take the Covenant? To do great things with God.
John 14:12 says, "Very truly I tell you, whoever believes in Me will do the works I have been doing, and they will do even greater things than these, because I am going to the Father."
After securing her GATE rank, Angel was invited to IIT Bombay for an interview connected with PhD admission. Around two thousand qualified candidates were present. She was told that she would be given a board and chalk, then asked to draw the structure or diagram of a topic without the benefit of predictable previous questions. The topic she received was something she had never studied or even heard before. Although she held an MSc in Organic Chemistry and had ranked highly in GATE, she stood there trembling because admission to a PhD program at IIT was a still greater challenge. Yet she remembered the spiritual weapons of the Covenant. At the gate of IIT, she had recited the Creed, used the blessed Covenant salt, and held the Covenant medal.
When the unfamiliar problem was placed before her, she prayed, "Blessed Mother, how can I draw this when I have no idea what it is?" Then the Holy Spirit gave her a deep interior prompting: "Place the chalk on the board." She obeyed. In her own words, "Someone drew it using my hand." She knew she had not produced the diagram from her own knowledge. Not by merit alone, but by Christ. After she returned home, IIT Bombay called and informed her that she had been selected for the PhD program. The diagram she drew had impressed the panel because it was presented in a way they considered unusually clear and distinctive.
How did Angel reach a spiritual level where God could entrust such a grace to her? Her answer included the works of mercy she performed. She went to a palliative care center and gently bathed patients who were living with advanced cancer and severe physical suffering. She did this for Christ. Many people cannot bear even to look at such suffering. Yet she lifted and bathed those patients out of love for the Lord. When an act is done truly for Christ, He recognizes the sincerity of the Covenant.
The second testimony comes from Jeeva of Vaikom, who works as a laboratory technician. For a long time, people had given her the Kreupasanam newsletter. She admitted, "Whenever I received it, I would simply take it and place it somewhere." Those who do missionary work may sometimes feel discouraged when people do not immediately read what they receive. But do not become weary. A time may come when that person will read it. What you give may not be an immediate meal. It may be packed food for a later stage of the journey. They will open it when hunger comes.
The Kreupasanam newsletter contains the Covenant teachings and revelations given through the retreat. The material is carefully edited and examined so that the central revelation of the week is accurately presented. It is not merely a speech collected from somewhere else. It emerges from prayer and from the Covenant ministry. Therefore, the newsletter should be read with attention. More than that, the testimonies should be heard. Listening to testimonies can awaken an anointing and strengthen conviction. Sometimes the testimony you hear is preparing you because a similar grace is approaching your own life.
For five or six months, Jeeva kept the paper aside. Then her mother suddenly lost consciousness. Her father had already died. Medical examinations revealed swelling in the pancreas, with a cyst and fluid visible on the MRI. Her mother was transferred to the Medical College. Jeeva watched her mother lying unconscious and unresponsive, unable to recognize anyone. She cried, "My father has already gone. If my mother also slips away, how will I live?" Even though Jeeva was married and had a child, her mother remained a place of emotional refuge for her. It was then that Jeeva understood she needed to take the Covenant.
This is why we must not become discouraged when someone initially sets aside what we give them. A time of hunger may come. When that time comes, they will remember. Jesus understood that human beings would grow weary, which is why He taught us to pray without losing heart.
Luke 18:1 says, "Then Jesus told His disciples a parable to show them that they should always pray and not give up."
The older translation says, "without growing weary." The newer POC Bible (published by the Pastoral Orientation Center of the Kerala Catholic Bishops' Council) translation renders the meaning as "without losing heart." This is especially accurate because there are moments when tension becomes so strong that we feel unable to pray. Yet not praying is not an option either. When conflict makes prayer difficult, we must pray for the grace to pray: "Lord God, in every time of conflict and in every place where I feel unable to pray, anoint me with the gift of prayer."
The unique strength of the Covenant is that it moves beyond the numbness and confusion that can paralyze ordinary prayer. It includes concrete works of mercy and apostolic mission. These are not merely ways of drawing earthly blessings toward ourselves. They elevate our spiritual level and open us more fully to grace.
Jeeva began listening to testimonies faithfully. She said, "Every day, I make it a point to listen to at least seven testimonies." As she listened, her inner conviction became stronger. Those who never listen to testimonies may still move forward in the Covenant, but their spiritual progress can be much slower.
The doctors had suggested that her mother’s condition might be moving toward pancreatic cancer. When Jeeva took her mother for a scan, she applied the Covenant anointing oil to her mother’s abdomen, traced the Sign of the Cross, recited the Creed, and placed a few grains of blessed salt in her mother’s mouth. This is not magic, and it is not the mechanical swallowing of medicine. It is the practical application of faith. The action is joined to a proclamation: Jesus is Lord, and God raised Him from the dead.
Romans 10:9 says, "If you declare with your mouth, ‘Jesus is Lord,’ and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved."
The Creed is recited because it is a public and personal proclamation of faith. The blessed articles become signs through which that faith is applied. Salvation means receiving Christ in every sphere of life. In one place, He may come as power. In another, He may come as a gentle presence. Christ is able to enter every circumstance because He is all and is in all.
Colossians 3:11 says, "Here there is no Gentile or Jew, circumcised or uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave or free, but Christ is all, and is in all."
After the scan, Jeeva received the report she had longed for. Her mother was found to be completely healed. The deepest lesson is not merely that a report changed. It is that Jeeva moved from passive familiarity to active, convinced faith. She had once placed the newsletter aside. Later, through suffering, she entered into the Covenant, listened, believed, and applied the faith she had received.
The third testimony is from Siby George of Thrissur. He described himself as an ordinary Christian. He was not a troublemaker. He lived decently and had no particular desire to come to Kreupasanam. He thought, "Kreupasanam is simply another retreat center. Aren’t there many other retreat centers?"
Then a situation arose that required an extra measure of spiritual energy. His daughter had gone to Canada for her studies, but she could not find even a part-time job. When a student abroad cannot find part-time work, the family must continue sending money from India. For an average Malayali family, continuously funding living expenses in Canada can become almost impossible.
The burden broke him down. In desperation, he traveled from Thrissur by train, then bus, and finally autorickshaw to Kreupasanam. He did not get a seat during the journey and arrived exhausted. His intention was simply to cry before the Blessed Mother and leave. Many come with the same thought. They want to see Mother, pour out their tears, and return home. But when Siby arrived, the Blessed Mother strongly inspired him to take the Covenant.
She does not give the same interior prompting to everyone, but many testimonies show that certain people receive a clear call to enter the Covenant. Siby wondered, "Can I really do this? Will I be able to fulfill it?" One difficulty was his habit of taking a small drink every day. Another was the public nature of the apostolic work. Carrying newsletters in the sun and handing them to people can feel humiliating to someone who has never done anything like it.
Yet the Covenant also teaches solidarity with Christ. Jesus accepted the greatest humiliation. He was stripped, mocked, made a public spectacle, and nailed to the Cross. When we accept a small humiliation for the Gospel, we enter into solidarity with what the Lord endured.
More than calling Jesus only Savior or Master, I love to call Him the Bearer of Burdens. He is the One who takes our sorrows upon Himself.
Isaiah 53:4 says, "Surely He took up our pain and bore our suffering, yet we considered Him punished by God, stricken by Him, and afflicted."
He carried our sorrows then, and He continues to carry them now. The Covenant gives us the courage to say: "The Lord will take up my sorrow. The Lord will carry my burden because I am in Covenant with Him."
Siby later said, "The Covenant elevated me from an average Christian into a steadfast Christian."
He began waking early for the Apparition Prayer. Although he had not previously attended daily Holy Mass, he began going regularly. Somewhere along the way, the Lord removed his drinking habit without Siby even fully realizing how it happened. The Lord took charge of the person, not merely the problem. Siby had wondered, "How can I change this? Will I ever be able to stop?" But as he walked holding the Lord’s hand, participated in apostolic work, proclaimed Christ, and became filled with the things of God, the burden disappeared.
Genesis 28:15 says, "I am with you and will watch over you wherever you go, and I will bring you back to this land. I will not leave you until I have done what I have promised you."
There is a heartfelt union with Jesus in the Covenant. The assigned prayers, the works of mercy, and the apostolic mission are not disconnected tasks. They are part of that union.
Siby testified that when he moved from being an average Christian to a fervent one, the Covenant began to activate with great speed. On the fourteenth day, his daughter received the visa and job she had been unable to obtain. Even an academic difficulty that could have forced her to remain back was unexpectedly corrected when the department gave her a plan to continue.
The important point is not merely that the daughter received a job. The deeper change was that the father himself was transformed. The Lord took away his drinking habit, established a new spiritual discipline, and made him steadfast.
These three testimonies reveal the same pattern.
Angel Tara moved from ordinary faith to disciplined Covenant living. She received the gift of tears, clarity concerning her path, a high GATE rank, and admission to IIT Bombay. Jeeva moved from setting the newsletter aside to listening, believing, and applying the faith through the blessed articles. Her mother’s life, which seemed to be slipping away, was restored. Siby George moved from average Christianity to steadfast discipleship. His daughter’s path opened, but more importantly, his own life changed.
The Covenant is applied faith. It is not an ambiguous prayer in which we merely hope that something may or may not happen. It requires that we understand, apply, and live what we have received. A person can attend many retreats and hear many teachings, yet nothing changes if the teaching is not applied. The Covenant begins in a deeper way after the retreat is over, because that is when the person must begin living what has been heard.
We should never confuse ritual performance with Covenant faithfulness. Some people buy the medicine but never take it. They place it under the pillow and remain sick. In the same way, some complete the outward acts of the Covenant but do not enter into its inner life. God must accept the Covenant we make. For this to happen, He must recognize that we are sincerely rooted in it. Human beings may influence worldly courts through skilled arguments and clever lawyers. Even when a decision is wrong, the court may say that the necessary evidence was not produced. But no such manipulation works before God. Trickery only damages our standing before Him.
Therefore, the only true option is sincerity. Like Angel Tara, we must decide to live the Covenant with exact commitment. Like Jeeva, we must strengthen conviction through listening and apply faith when the moment comes. Like Siby George, we must allow the Covenant to transform us from average Christians into steadfast ones. The true risk in the Covenant is not the difficulty of the external works. The true risk is whether we can convince the Lord that we are faithful partners in the Covenant. We must feel the transformation within ourselves. We should know that we have grown spiritually, become more truthful, and risen into a deeper life with God.
The Covenant cannot be treated as a temporary instrument for obtaining a job, visa, healing, or property, after which we return to our former ways. If we intend to abandon God once the blessing arrives, the Covenant has not truly entered our hearts.
The Lord is near to all who call upon Him in truth. That truthfulness is the foundation upon which every testimony stands. Let us therefore pray: "Lord God, transform my burdens into the raw material of grace. Lift me beyond an average and ritualistic faith. Teach me to live the Covenant truthfully, accurately, and with love. Let Your Holy Spirit guide me, strengthen my conviction, and make my life a testimony. May I not seek only the blessing, but become a person whom You can trust. Amen."
Disclaimer: All content in this article is credited to Dr. Fr. V.P. Joseph Valiyaveettil of Kreupasanam Marian Shrine, Kerala, India. This English adaptation has been prepared as a humble effort to make Father’s Malayalam YouTube sharings more accessible to a wider audience, with the assistance of translation and editorial resources.
Many of Father’s teachings were originally shared within the context of the Kreupasanam Covenant and may therefore include references or practices specific to that spiritual journey. Nevertheless, this blog is intended for everyone. Whether or not you are a Covenant member, it is my hope that these reflections, biblical teachings, and testimonies will encourage you in your own walk with God.
I warmly encourage everyone to share this website with others who may benefit from these reflections. May all who visit this page be blessed and drawn closer to God.
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