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Standing Together for Peace

24/3/2019

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I haven’t long returned from a peace vigil in Glasgow. It was organised by the Muslim Council of Scotland and was one of a number taking place in major Scottish cities. It was a call for peace and solidarity in working against racism in the light of last week’s Christchurch massacre. There were a good number of people there and a number of speakers, most of them involved in politics and strong in their condemnation of terrorism, islamophobia, anti-Semitism and all kinds of hate crimes and racist incidents. They spoke with passion and conviction, advising us to name the evil that racism and terrorism is and encouraging us to take opportunities to establish neighbourly friendships and contacts. All good stuff! I had been asked to read out a statement from Interfaith Scotland which included a statement from Scotland’s chief Rabbi in which he said how shocked and horrified he was at the terrible attacks on the Muslim community in New Zealand,
 
“This is an attack not just on the Moslem community but on every human being wanting to live in peace and harmony.  This morning we said special prayers for the members of the Mosques, for those killed and those hurt, and for their families.  I feel deeply proud to tell my community how closely I work together with the Moslem community and other faith and non-faith communities. I hope that with our close working relationship and the friendships that have developed we will bring hope to our terrified Moslem communities and ultimately bring hope and peace to a broken world.  We must never underestimate our work for peace and harmony and its impact in the wider world. May God wipe away tears from all faces and may we witness the day when hate is vanquished and love rules”.
 
This is such a beautiful expression of what interfaith relations are all about – a sense of solidarity and friendship between faiths and people of faith, a friendship that’s a sign of hope and a witness to the fact that another way is possible.  A few years ago, when Pope Francis met the Grand Imam of Al-Azhar University in Cairo, he said something that I’ve never forgotten and find encouraging. He said ‘The meeting is the message’, which says to me that even to meet and establish friendships, to engage in dialogue has a message for a world in which many people see faiths as being at logger heads with one another.
 
However, interfaith relations cannot just remain at that level. It also needs a deeper dialogue about faith and values, about the differences in our religions while accepting our common humanity.  But our common humanity does not make us the same and we have different perspectives on life and faith, including how we view the world and our place in it. Many in the Muslim community see themselves as a minority in society and attacks such as that in New Zealand bring out feelings of vulnerability and insecurity so that many tell of their fears going to Mosques, of being recognised as Muslim and therefore the subject of attacks, either physical or verbal.
 
Perhaps this is the reason that attacks on Synagogues and Mosques engender more energy and protests than attacks on Churches. Already this year there have been attacks on Churches in India, Pakistan, the Philippines and bombs found in a Cathedral in Egypt. Churches in Pakistan have been put on high alert in the light of the New Zealand attacks – because Christianity is associated with white colonial powers and therefore white supremacism?   Somehow the media doesn’t seem to take attacks outside developed countries as seriously as attacks on countries with a white majority population.  Could it be that attacks in these countries bring terrorism too close to home for comfort. But Christians here in the West also seem to be more accepting of these attacks. We do pray for the victims and remember them during Church services.  What we don’t hear are public statements decrying the atrocities and don’t often, if ever, organise public vigils to which we invite public figures to speak out against the atrocities and assure Christians that they are a valued part of society and not to fear discrimination. This, I think, is because we’ve been in the majority and don't feel the need to assert ourselves. Though there is a secular anti-religious agenda current in society today, I doubt if any Christian feels that an attack on Churches elsewhere will put them in danger.  As a majority community we feel more secure of our place in society though terrorist attacks against society in general can make many people feel vulnerable and insecure, religious or not.  
 
Terrorism, violence and religious hatred have to be named and denounced. We cannot stand by and say nothing but we also need to talk about it and to try to understand it, share our responses to it. Violence, terrorism doesn’t happen in a vacuum. Why do people hate?  Is it a protest against a system that doesn’t listen, that doesn’t allow for equal participation, that is based on privilege and wealth rather than equality of opportunity, that is unjust in its structures, that builds up frustration and powerlessness, that speaks of peace while selling arms for profit – the list is endless.  Whatever the answer, however, it’s important to remember that just as we carry the victims of violence in our hearts, so too we must carry the perpetrators and remember always the heroism, love, and compassion that is also part of the human story. 

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A Christian Fast

10/3/2019

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 Lent has started, often spoken of as a time of prayer and fasting but for us Christians it’s a pale reflection of the kind of fasting that Muslims do during Ramadan. Like the Muslims the Baha’is also fast and their fast is much more like that of Islam – not surprising as their founder was a Muslim and lived in a Muslim country. Like Muslims the Baha’is fast during daylight hours from both food and drink but it always takes place on the first weeks of March in preparation for the celebration of their new year feast at the equinox on March 21st. It’s a stringent fast but, taking place as it does at this time of year, the hours of light and darkness are of almost equal duration so it seems more manageable than Ramadan. When Ramadan takes place in summer the hours of daylight in countries like Scotland can last for almost 24 hours. We Scots look on with admiration as Muslims keep to their fast though fasting during the winter when daylight hours are short is easier.
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Each year Lent overlaps with the Baha’i fast and it’s good to think of us going through these days in solidarity with one another. In the past the Christian fast would have been much more exacting and though lent is described as a time for prayer, fasting and almsgiving, fasting is much more of a discipline and abstinence from a craving, a habit, an inclination that limits our freedom. When I was young it was always staying off sweets though any given to us were collected in a tin until Easter. Coming from an Irish background, however, we were allowed to eat some on the feast of St Patrick! Lent was seen as a solemn, penitential time and I know some people who think that life is penitential enough (and it certainly is for some) to have to give up something in a spirit of penance. However some do still observe lent by more positive action like decluttering an article a day for the forty days of the season (something that’s become popular recently) or even disciplining themselves to develop a new talent. I’ve done that and like the sense that I’ve accomplished something by the time of Easter – a kind of resurrection in its own way. Friends are often intrigued to know what I’m doing for Lent. The important thing, I think, is that Lent helps us do something, no matter how small, that challenges the greed that resides within all of us and today seems to rule the world. It helps us look at ourselves more honestly, be aware of our shortcomings and the place of God and others in our lives - and in this sense the spirit of lent is very much in keeping with that of the Muslim and Baha’i fast.  
  
Lent begins with Ash Wednesday, a day on which some denominations of Christians, ceremoniously receive ashes with the words ‘Remember that you are dust and into dust you shall return’. Recently there has been an option to replace this with ‘repent and believe the good news’, one that on the whole people prefer, It’s generally thought to be a bit more positive.  But I like the original verse and think it’s very pertinent for today. It comes from the Book of Genesis in the context of Adam and Eve’s punishment for sin and expulsion from Paradise. Because of this it became associated with sin and a sense of worthlessness and, as a teacher said to me this lent, ‘how could you tell young children that they are nothing but dust’. There is, however, another way of understanding this text which is in keeping with changes in theology and our understanding of the universe in which our world rests.

To remind us that we are dust is to speak a word of fact and not punishment. It’s to remind us how connected we are to the fabric of the earth. We contain within ourselves the whole history of evolution; we share DNA with animals and even insects; we are interconnected with all things; we are part of nature, not above it. To be human is to be part of the earth and to be in a relationship with all that grows and lives. It’s important in this age of global warming and the destruction of so many species that we learn to live in peace with the earth, to love it and to care for it. We need to recapture this sense of being ‘earthlings’ if we are to move from domination and destruction to participation and creation. And we need to repent of what we, sometimes in our ignorance, have done. No doubt the invention of plastic was thought to be something great and yet now we see its destructive effects in our throw away culture. But sometimes too we intentionally destroy nature by cutting down rain forests, killing protected species, polluting the atmosphere, knowing that this endangers our very future. Robert Burns, Scotland’s national poet, has expressed this so eloquently when he says in his poem ‘To a Mouse’ 
            I’m truly sorry Man’s dominion
            Has broken Nature’s social union
            An’ justifies that ill opinion
            Which makes thee startle
            At me, thy poor earth-born companion
            An’ fellow mortal!
 
What a great and glorious thing it would be if we Christians took to heart the fact that we are dust and of the earth, reminded ourselves of it each day during lent and made the Lenten journey to Easter caring for our planet and walking responsibly on an earth which is sacred and fragile. We couldn’t have a better Lenten discipline than that.  

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    Author

    I am  a Catholic nun, involved in interfaith relations for many decades.  For me this has been an exciting and sacred journey which I would like to share with others.

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