NOTHING, WITHOUT CHRIST | KAIROS GLOBAL | JULY 2021

Author: Noel Benno Joseph

Intro: Noel Benno speaks to JYUK formation coordinator, Abhy Thomas, who also was # 2 in UK’s top 100 CIOs of 2020.

Hi Abhy. I’m super happy to be interviewing not only a young practicing Catholic, but also an accomplished consumer/retail industry leader.

1. Please give us a quick walkthrough of your journey with the movement and how it helped your journey of faith. 

In my late teens, I went through a phase, seeking purpose and meaning to life as I was losing hope. Around this time, my school conducted a Jesus Youth retreat, during which I had a deep experience of God’s love; this also renewed in me, hope. More importantly, two of those who organised the school retreat began to quietly accompany me. This companionship introduced me to Mass and regular confessions and started my personal journey of faith. Later during college, I drifted away from faith and conformed myself to the standards of this world. Looking back, I realise that God was always faithful and with me even when I was fleeing from him. During my third year of engineering, I attended Jesus Youth’s Discipleship Training Programme, where I had a deep encounter of God’s love and mercy, and a profound experience of the Holy Spirit. This was the point I committed my life to Jesus and started to strive for holiness through a life in the Spirit.

To me, the movement has been everything in my faith journey and my personal and leadership formation. Jesus Youth is the platform where I encountered Jesus, learned everything about living my faith in its various elements – daily life of prayer, sacraments, striving for holiness through a fraternity of like-minded friends, growing in a sense of community, sharing whatever we have selflessly with those in need, living a witnessing life inspired by others in the movement and the lives of saints, listening to the Spirit in my everyday life, and reaching out to share this treasure with others challenged by the Word of God and the teachings of the Church.

2. Given the kind of work responsibilities, what is your daily/weekly routine that keeps you grounded in faith and active in youth ministry and the church? 

My work is usually packed with back-to-back meetings. Nothing of what I do at work would have been possible without the grace of God and the support and prayers of my family.

I begin and end my day in prayer. This time spent with the Lord helps me acknowledge his blessings each day, surrender every choice I am faced with, pray for the needs of others and importantly, listen to the Spirit through the Word of God to strive to live a Christ-centred life. Holy Hour at 5:30 am is what gives me strength each day and keeps me grounded to realise I am nothing without Christ. An examination of conscience in the evening helps me recognise the areas of my life where I need more of his grace and mercy.

There have been times when preoccupations of the corporate world have engulfed me. The reminder of my baptismal call to be a prophet, priest, and king in my family, ministry and at my workplace helps me refocus on God’s priorities for my life.

Regular Holy Mass and confession helps me live out my call intentionally. It is quite easy to get carried away with pride and ignore the state of my soul while climbing the corporate ladder. Sacramental life has been a special source of strength to keep me grounded and humble.

More recently, I have started to minimise my screen time that has freed a lot of time to be available for my family and also ministry. This helped me realise that prioritising important things in life required good stewardship of time.

My personal leadership style has been nurtured through the movement. Despite the tight schedules of work and family life, this reality motivates me to find time to give back to the movement and journey with youngsters.

That my body is a temple of the Holy Spirit is a conviction which helps take care of my mental and physical wellbeing. It has helped me embrace physical disciplines through physical exercise, better sleep, and fasting and abstinence as a means to overcome temptations and grow spiritually.

Over the years, the Lord has made me realise that growing in my primary vocation as a husband and father helps me to grow in grace and fulfil my responsibilities to work and the ministry, to its optimum. 

All of the above disciplines catering to my mind, body and soul is what I term as the secret sauce to build resilience. This is not something I can do on my own but only by the grace of God.

3. We all have our moments of witnessing our faith. What were some of those defining moments in your journey of faith? 

On the few occasions I was asked to share my leadership journey with people in the business, I used those opportunities to share my faith story. This has strengthened my own faith whilst being a great platform to witness it too. These sharings have led to various follow-up conversations with colleagues about my faith, my reason for hope and purpose in life.

In a position of trust and responsibility, I try to be patient and peaceful when faced with difficult situations and make decisions keeping the best interest of all involved in mind, always striving to do what is right, though that’s not always the easy thing to do. It could be because of this that people have asked me, several times, what makes me different, opening avenues for sharing and prayer with individuals.

In a world where only the most outspoken and articulate voices matter, my faith has always compelled me to look at each individual beyond the surface, help them recognise their self-worth and grow. At various points, these stands have helped me make unconventional choices that have helped individuals realise their true potential and be the best version God created them to be

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Being joyful about our family size and being open to children has always surprised, if not shocked people at work. This is a beautiful opportunity to witness to the sacrament of matrimony and the sanctity of family life.

One of the recent strong convictions I’ve received is to keep Sunday, the Lord’s Day holy. Ever since, on a Sunday, I try not to do work or prepare for the following work week. Few months ago, on a Monday morning, I had to present at an executive-level meeting. I had a few JY meetings and programmes the previous Saturday and hence Sunday was the only day I could prepare for it. However, I decided not to prepare anything that Sunday and find out what would happen the next morning. By the grace of God, next morning, somebody had created some collateral, with which I was able to make one of my most impactful presentations, without any preparation.

In everyday life, I feel compelled to help those in need in small ways, like buying coffee for a homeless person, which has opened the hearts of my children to the point that they remind us now when we forget!

4. Over the past century, there has been significant outfall of people from the Catholic Church, especially in Europe. As a leader in the youth movement, how do you think we can address this?

The world here is desperately in need of witnesses and not preachers. If we are all able to preach the Gospel at all times through our lives, we can definitely transform this continent and the world around us.

Europe has given birth to numerous saints who have transformed the globe. All they did was remain open and responded to God’s call, led by the Spirit. This continent needs young women and men who are able to remain open to this call and respond in ways relevant to our times. All that the Lord needs from us is a ‘Yes’, like Mother Mary who cooperated with God’s grace with her ‘Fiat’.

5. Your work in the consumer/retail industry has been well noted across Europe. What would be the key takeaways from industry that you’d like to see implemented in our ministries, while catering to the young generation?

Three key trends in the consumer/retail industry today are sustainability, circular economy, and the move to a digital world.

Sustainability boils down to being good stewards of God’s creation. Young people in particular have a real passion to protect the planet. It is a great opportunity to connect this passion to the Creator and link the teachings of the Church, like Pope Francis’s encyclical Laudato Si, to protect God’s creation.

In a throwaway culture, circular economy in faith circles will help minimise waste of the resources God has blessed us with, and reuse and share our resources to promote a culture of mutual support and community. We will also be more mindful of our purchases, not just in terms of product quality but through an understanding of the intervening means that produced it. These are the secular standards that generation ‘Z’ are passionate about but seldom realise, spring from Christian roots, and are at the heart of the Bible and the Church’s teachings.

COVID-19 has significantly impacted our lives and that of people around us. Recent data show that we have covered ‘decades in days’, when it comes to the adoption of digital during this time. Digital has become more integral to the way we live our lives, it has kept us close to friends and family, entertained us and given us access to the world outside. The question no longer is whether digital is important to share our faith but how we integrate digital to make faith more accessible. Social channels like TikTok and Instagram are the primary channels to engage young people. We have a key role during these times to make young people aware of the truth of the Gospel, in such relevant ways. However, there is nothing that can replace human connections and we should always endeavour to give young people access to safe physical environments where they are accepted & loved as they are.

6. I’ve heard you say ‘personalisation’ is key to reaching the average consumer. Has that approach helped in the youth ministry as well? 

Personalisation in a business context focuses on individual preferences and the need for emotional connection.

This trend translated into our ministry means, we should not only focus on programmes for the masses but remind ourselves of those core strengths – journeying with people individually, meeting them where they are and as they are, creating meaningful relationships and awakening in them a desire to encounter Christ and become missionary disciples.

Jesus called people, he said, ‘Come, follow me,’ (Matthew 4:19, John 21:19), imitate me, do what I do. So, it’s personal and there is no substitute. Making disciples of people shouldn’t be just another ‘thing to do’. It should inform what we do and how we do it.

7. Going back to your personal spirituality, who is your favourite saint and why?

There is no particular favourite saint. I have always been challenged by the lives of various saints at various points of life. 

One thing that has always drawn me to a life of witness, is this prayer from St. Teresa of Avila. ‘Christ has no body now but yours. No hands, no feet on earth but yours. Yours are the eyes through which he looks with compassion on this world. Yours are the feet with which he walks to do good. Yours are the hands through which he blesses all the world. Yours are the hands, yours are the feet, yours are the eyes, you are his body. Christ has no body now on earth but yours.’

When it comes to work, I have been inspired by St. Joseph, who brought human work closer to the mystery of redemption. Three things I take from the life of St. Joseph:

• To be a role model of Christ in your workplace like he was a role model to Christ himself at his workbench

• Work for God and family like he worked to care for Jesus and Mary

• Work with the Lord to ensure my work leads me closer to salvation 

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8. You have been a trailblazer in the digital innovation space and a very accomplished one at it. What would be your advice to young professionals in their early phases of career? 

Honestly, I had no plans or ambitions to reach where I am now, professionally. Neither did I work towards being recognised as one of UK’s best CIOs.  The only thing I aim for is to be my true self, be passionate about what I believe in, help people reach their full potential, and create a lasting positive impact in the lives of people and communities around me. 

Job titles and industry recognition is not a key to heaven but as it says in Ephesians 4:1, live lives worthy of your calling. Make Christ the centre of your life, be your true self, grow in virtues, do not cut corners, stay committed, be humble, treat people with respect and fairness, be just and merciful, be open to the promptings of the Spirit, live your faith, do not shy away to give account of the reason you are different, and the rest will follow. The best ever career advice is the truth in Matthew 6:33, just allow that to be true in your life.

Innovation springs from creativity, understanding the consumer problem and seeing what others cannot see. The Holy Spirit is the source of all wisdom and creativity. If you let the Holy Spirit take control over your life, and start to put yourself in the shoes of others, you will be able to innovate or do what no man can do because it’s Christ who lives in you.

Like Pope Benedict XVI said, ‘If we let Christ into our lives, we lose nothing, nothing, absolutely nothing of what makes life free, beautiful, and great.’ This has been the story of my life.

9. Your favourite cartoon character and why?

Spider Man – mainly because of this quote, ‘With great power comes great responsibility.’ This is a quote that reminds me of my role as a Christian in a position of responsibility and influence in the corporate world. It always reminds me to use the gifts of the Holy Spirit to make wise decisions. These gifts are not meant to be a trophy that is kept for display and we only talk about, but we need to use them as tools to share the Good News of Jesus Christ in a secular world.

10. To wrap up, what would be your one liner message for family and youth across the world?

‘Be who God meant you to be and you will set the world on fire – St. Catherine of Sienna.

About Abhy Thomas 

Abhy was the first youth coordinator of Jesus Youth UK (JYUK), served two terms as the National Coordinator of JYUK and as a member of the Jesus Youth International Council. He joined the Charismatic National Service Committee in the UK in 2020 and is currently the formation coordinator and mentor of the youth ministry for JYUK. He has been part of leading and speaking at various Catholic conferences, retreats, camps, formations and leadership programmes for teens, youth, and families in the UK and in various countries in Europe.

Abhy works in London as a Global Digital, Innovation & IT director and was named the #2 CIO in the UK in 2020. Abhy is also a speaker at digital and technology conferences. He is married to Saumya. They have three young children, Nathan, Isabelle & Jake who are homeschooled. Both Abhy and Saumya have a great passion for forming young missionary disciples.

A former William J. Clinton Fellow and TEDx speaker, Noel Benno is a Technology Strategy Consultant and enjoys cooking fish and meat while not busy with charts and excel sheets.