A Time To Dance

Though I am wary sometimes of the motives of ‘inter faith dialogue’ there are times when I feel an empathy with other faiths. Yesterday, I went to the HIndu Dawali celebration in Trafalgar Square. A band came on stage and got everyone dancing in a circle. It was an overcast day but the rhythm and music and the sheer enthusiasm of those there to just have a good time was impressive and seemed to link us all momentarily. The MC said that Dawali was about recognising the past and looking forward to the good things of the future. There was nothing liturgical or sectarian and the dancers just embraced the moment. We seemed to be joined by our common humanity. Enjoying music and dance became a common bond.

Sadly on the radio was news of the Catholics in Iraq being killed in their own church.

When in the 17th Century the Portuguese came into contact with the Hindu Indians on the coast, as they opened up trade routes, they thought the Indians had already been converted to Christianity. They thought their gentleness was a result of Christian belief.

Though Hinduism with its very different symbols, an elephant headed god, may seem remote to us our own scripture says there is a time to weep and a time to laugh and a time to mourn and a time to dance. Ecclesiastese 3.4

God in Man

The other day I was talking to a friend of mine who is a Catholic priest. He is very involved in a community political organisation that works for the rights of poorly paid workers in London. I asked him if he felt any problems working with an organisation run by multi faith and non faith groups. He told he saw no conflict at all and that he saw Jesus in everyone.

Though I am not a Catholic and this is not an exclusively Catholic viewpoint I am impressed by the Catholic view of the Godness of Man. It is a contrast to the saved and unsaved demarcation that can exist in some areas of the church.

Fr Tom said Catholic doctrine says this:

Our resemblance to God lies in our very being; not merely in our memory, understanding and will, but in the totality of what we are. Being an image of God each of us is loved by Him. However far we stray, God wants us to return to Him. In other words each of us has a destiny in God. This is the foundation of the idea that every human being has equal dignity with every other.

Happiness

I was just talking to one of my neighbours. I was saying to her lightheartedly that some people seem to have the gift of being able to make money but I didn’t. She said that as long as I was happy and healthy then that was all that mattered. Fortunately I am both those things.

I have been reading a book called Affluenza by Oliver James.

‘One study ( regarding materialism ) showed that those with materialistic values, such as wanting money or prestige, were far less likely to be religious, and they were unhappier, drank and smoked more, and in the case of women were at greater risk from smoking disorders. Compared with non-believers, the only sort of religious people who are not protected against depression, are ones whose involvement in faith is guided by self seeking end, seeing belief an investment, such as those who think that prayer would be instrumental in making them successful in work or love.

I know the man in this picture, sadly no longer with us in the flesh, and he had it both ways; he was rich and religious. By the way, as you can tell from the photo, he was very happy!!

Still small voice

Last night I decided to go and see the Pope. The last time a pope visited was about thirty years ago so I thought I may never get the chance again. I had heard him on the radio and found him wise and gentle.

I got to Hyde Park Corner and there was a reasonable crowd and I thought I should be able to see him. My ears, however, were assailed by a discordant noise. A group of Moslem protesters, cordoned off by the police were in full voice. One man had a microphone. He was attacking the visit, my faith and my country among other things. He was condemning all who did not turn to Islam to hell. His voice spoke of God but it was a voice full of anger and hate.

I wandered away to be out of earshot. I got chatting to a nice guy who was taking photos. He pointed out some snipers up on the monument at the corner of Hyde Park. I had not noticed them.

I asked him if he was Catholic and why he was attending. He said that he went to church as a child but had not been since. He said that some kind of inexplicable yearning had brought him to see the Holy Father.

This, I thought, is how God communicates. I thought of the still small voice that spoke to Elijah. I compared it to the ranting man on the microphone.

Love is patient and kind; love is not jealous or boastful; it is not arrogant or rude.

1 Cor. 13.4

Taste and see

How often do we long for something or wait expectantly only to find we tire of the thing after a while? We will sometimes jump through hoops to get something material but put off seeking a spiritual pleasure.

St Gregory has it about right.

There is a great difference, dearly beloved brethren, between corporal and spiritual delights in that the former, when we are without them, enkindle in the soul a strong desire to possess them, but once they are are attained, they quickly satiate us. Spiritual pleasures, on the contrary, when unattained, produce a certain aversion; but once we taste them the taste awakens desire, and our hunger for them increases the more we taste them..so we see that, if we do not taste these delights,we cannot desire them, because their flavour is unknown to us...so that the psalmist says ’Taste and see that the Lord is sweet’ ( Psalm 33.9 )

A Thing Of Beauty

Have you ever gazed upon something lovely like these altar flowers or spent a day in the countryside and felt your spirit lift? St Paul talks about the joys of thinking on worthy things in Phillipians 4.8. St Theodorus takes up this theme.

To be concerned with the nature of created things has a very purifying effect. It frees us from passionate attachment to them and delusion about them; and it is the surest means for raising our soul to the Source of all. For all beauty, miracle, magnificence reflects what is supremely beautiful, miraculous and magnificent-reflects, rather, the Source that is above beauty, miracle and magnificence. Theoretikon. The Philokalia.

You don't miss the water...

I was recently talking to a friend of mine who is not a believer and he was talking about his brother who tends to isolate himself. ‘We are social animals,’ he said. He is right.

However, I have just spent two weeks with hardly any time on my own. I was on holiday. On the last day I my cousin and I had to kill a long time in an airport together. I always thought airports had chapels and eventually I found a meditation room. It was called this so it could function as multi faith prayer room. No problems. After two weeks without much privacy and being almost exclusively with people of no faith, finding this room was like a drink of cold water in the desert if you will allow a bit of hyperbole.

I just wallowed in the quiet and sanctity of this plain room. Next to me a Moslem was at his devotions.

My friend is right, we are social animals, but we are also spiritual animals as well.

You don’t miss the water, the old saying says, till the well runs dry.