FROM FIRE STORM TO ILLUMINATION:

Interreligious Reflections on the New York Center and Mosque Project

William Lesher, Chair Emeritus, Council for a Parliament of the World’s Religions

What some in the media have referred to as “a fire storm” over the mosque debate in lower Manhattan is turning out to be a catalyst to launch a much needed national discussion (and tutorial) on Muslims in America.

Since this discussion was intensified by the exaggerated rhetoric and distorted claims of Pamela Geller, a conservative blogger in her post on May 6, a consensus seems to be forming among constitutionally committed citizens across the political spectrum.  Fair-minded people are agreeing that the Imam and his wife in charge of the mosque project, Feisal Abdul Rauf, Daisy Khan and their supporters, have every right to expand their center and include a new worship space on the site.  They have worked from and worshipped in this place for many years, two blocks from the World Trade Center disaster.  Even though current polls claim that 7 out of 10 Americans oppose the project, opponents can hardly argue that the project planners do not have a constitutional right to carry out their vision.  As one letter to the NY Times editor put it, “As a legal matter, there is nothing to debate.  If a church or synagogue could be constructed on this site, so may a mosque.  Period. The first amendment means at least that.”

The location of the proposed Islamic Center touches the raw nerve that has elicited often shrill claims ranging from insensitivity to the families of the 9/11 victims and desecration of hallowed ground to an international Islamic conspiracy to subvert the nation.  Given the fact that the vast majority of Americans know little of Islam and know almost nothing of the history and intentions of the center planners in lower Manhattan, it is not surprising that the barrage of misinformation that initiated and continues to stoke the current national discussion has filled this vacuum and created the sharp negative and often heated responses.

But now, as the national discussion continues, one might cautiously hope, even anticipate, that the time is right for a nation-wide learning process to unfold.  This could become a time for Americans of fairness and goodwill to take the time to listen and to learn from people in the interreligious community and from Muslims themselves about the importance, the variety, and the beauty of this second largest religion in the world. And to hear as well, about the healing potential for having a thoroughly American expression of Islam close to the site of Ground Zero.

The Interreligious Movement in the US and around the world has been building bridges of understanding among religious communities, including Islam, for the last few decades.  Many religious people in the US are affiliated with local interreligious councils or with national and international organizations like United Religions Initiative (URI) or Religions for Peace (RFP) or have participated in one of the four modern Parliaments of the World’s Religions (PWR) with which I am affiliated. These people have led the way in this historic movement to develop knowledge, understanding, and respect for religious and spiritual communities of the world, many of whom have growing numbers of adherents in our towns and cities, states and nation.

People affiliated with the growing interreligious movement know about the great diversity that exists within Islam, not unlike the wide spectrum of beliefs, traditions and behaviors among different sectors in the Christian and Jewish communities. They know what William Dalrymple wrote about in an illuminating Op-Ed piece in the New York Times entitled, “The Muslims in the Middle,” that Islam is not a monolithic religion.  Rather it is as complex as Christianity and Judaism, with as many, perhaps more divisions, sects and traditions, some in opposition to others, as is true of every major religious group. Dalrymple helpfully teaches in his article how “Feisal Abdul Rauf…is one of America’s leading thinkers of Sufism, the mystical form of Islam which in terms of goals and outlook couldn’t be farther from the violent Wahabism of the jihadists.  His videos and sermons preach love, the remembrance of God and reconciliation…..But in the eyes of Osama bin Laden and the Taliban, he is an infidel-loving, grave-worshipping apostate…”

Members of the interfaith movement are also leading the resistance to the resisters and need to do so more and more.  In another New York Times article describing protests against mosques in several communities around the country, Laurie Goodstein focuses on Temecula, Ca.  There she writes: “In late June …members of a local Tea Party group took dogs and picket signs to Friday prayers at a mosque that is seeking to build a new worship center on a vacant lot nearby.”  She goes on to say that an estimated 20 – 30 people turned out to protest the mosque.  But then Ms. Goodstein states what many of us think is the real story in Temecula, “that the protesters were outnumbered by at least 75 supporters” who affirm the right of the Muslim congregation in Temecula to expand their mosque.  Something good is happening in Temecula when, less then a decade after 9/11, local citizens know and act on the difference between their mainstream Muslim neighbors and the terrorists whose actions violated the most basic tenants of Islam. It’s too bad that the NY Times headlined the Goodstein article, “Across Nation, Mosque Projects Meet Resistance” and missed the positive thrust of the Temecula story.

Speaking from the experience of the Parliament of the World’s Religions, the 2004 Parliament in Barcelona, Spain focused major attention on the issue of Religiously Motivated and Experienced Violence.  After several days of intense workshop discussions, participants from across the interreligious spectrum, agreed that the minimum responsibility of religious communities  is to come to the aid of any religious community whose house of worship is the target of an attack, vandalism, threat or destruction.

The recent Parliament in Melbourne, Australia in 2009 featured a strong focus on Islam.  Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf himself was a major presenter leading or participating in six interreligious programs with the following titles: “Applying Islamic Principles for a Just and Sustainable World”;  “Sacred Envy Panel: Exploring What We Love about Our Own Faith, What We Admire in Others and What Challenges Us in Both”;  “Purifying the Heart and Soul through Remembrance of Allah”; “Dhikr As An Islamic Devotional Act for Inner Peace”; “How Islam Deals with Social Justice, Gender Justice and Religious Diversity”; and “Islam and the West: Creating an Accord of Civilizations.”  How much could such a teacher of Islam help to bridge the gulf of misunderstanding about this great faith tradition by continuing his long and much admired ministry in lower Manhattan where he has built an international reputation for promulgating a modern version of Islam?

So, while some call it a “fire storm” and do their best to make it so, there are other voices that seem to be gaining strength.  Among the shouting and the uninformed outrage that sometimes seems ubiquitous, I sense that  responsible media outlets and people in the interreligious movement are grasping the significance of this moment and are helping to seed the discussion with historical facts, accurate information and a commitment to understanding and respect.  If this trend continues we will all learn important things about ourselves and about the most recent global religious tradition to enter the mainstream of American life.

From AnnArbor.com

Patheos.com, in its summer Future of Religion series, invited authors and scholars to write about the Future of Paganism this week.

According to Patheos.com’s overview, Paganism represents “a wide variety of traditions that emphasize reverence for nature and a revival of ancient polytheistic religious practices.” The article notes, “some Pagan traditions include ritual magic, but this practice is not universal.” This diverse grassroots movement includes Wicca, Goddess Spirituality, and the Pagan Reconstructionist religions (Norse, Druidic, Egyptian, and Greek).

According to Margot Adler, author, NPR journalist, and Wiccan priestess, the Contemporary Pagan Movement has “come of age” in the last 15 years, with estimates of 1 million practicing Pagans. Pagans are being recognized in military cemeteries, hospitals, seminaries, and the Parliament of the World’s Religions. “In short,” Adler says, “Paganism has become a mainstream movement, which has mostly been a good thing.” She asks, however, whether the movement’s critique of monotheistic and patriarchal religions will become “lost or watered down” as it gains more respect in the mainstream.

Sarah Pike, author and professor of religious studies at California State University, discusses the evolving news coverage of Paganism in recent years. Twenty-five years ago, a story about local Pagans gathering in an Indiana state forest was characterized as “devil-worshippers in Yellowwood Forest,” sparking national controversy. This year, the news coverage of Summer Solstice 2010 and other Solstice celebrations was “overwhelmingly positive.”

Click here to read the entire article.

From Irish Times

Fr Donal O’Mahony, OFM Cap: FR DONAL O’Mahony, who has died aged 74, was an inspiring Christian, a tireless peace campaigner and a truly remarkable priest in an age when the traditional leadership role of the clergy is diminishing.

A member of the Capuchin order, following the Franciscan way of life, he was a champion of the poor and will long be remembered as the founder in 1978 of Threshold, Ireland’s main non-profit national housing advisory organisation.

In his capacity as a known peace-maker, he acted as mediator in several high-profile kidnappings, including the abduction 35 years ago of Dutch industrialist Tiede Herrema by an IRA splinter group. Extremely modest, he never talked about it in public later.

Threshold had its roots in the run-down flats of Dublin where the archbishop had appointed him as chaplain to the flat-dwellers in 1978.

His involvement with people at the coalface of Ireland’s housing problem honed his interest in social justice, especially the plight of down-and-out emigrants who had returned, hoping to make Ireland their home, only to fall through the cracks of society, ending up in exclusion and grinding poverty. He also worked with the street girls of the inner city.

Essentially, he founded Threshold as a peace and justice project, focusing specifically on housing and homelessness. It is a registered charity with offices in Dublin, Cork and Galway. Its fundamental work is advising people on their housing rights.

In a tribute to Fr O’Mahony, Threshold’s chairperson, Aideen Hayden, said his work “touched some of the most vulnerable people in Irish society”.

Seeing housing as a basic dignity, she added that “he understood that people didn’t just need a roof over their heads – they needed a home”.

…

An unsung hero, his career path reads like the CV of a high-flying international diplomat.

In Rome, he was appointed secretary general of his order’s worldwide division for Justice, Peace and Ecology; he taught for a year at Berkeley in California as a visiting scholar; worked with Pax Christi both in Ireland and Holland; and was declared Franciscan of the Year by an American religious journal.

In South America and South Africa, he participated at UN meetings on the environment and sustainable development; set up workshops in Ethiopia and Eritrea on alternatives to violence; and addressed the Parliament of the World’s Religions at Barcelona.

In 2008, he received a Peace Award from the Interfaith Foundation of South Africa.

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From The Wild Hunt

The North American Interfaith Network (NAIN), one of North America’s oldest interfaith organizations, recently held their yearly gathering in Salt Lake City, Utah. At the meeting, Covenant of the Goddess member Rachael Watcher, a longtime interfaith activist, was elected to the Executive Board of NAIN. Watcher is the second Pagan to serve on the Board, she will be joining Grove Harris, a member of Reclaiming, who has served with the Pluralism Project and the Council For A Parliament of the World’s Religions. COG’s National Public Information Officer released this statement on the election.

“Our CoG National Interfaith Representative – Rachael Watcher attended that meeting, and was elected to a four year term on the NAIN Board of Directors. This is important news for Wiccans and Pagans everywhere. Once again we are represented on the board of one of the oldest and most well respected interfaith organizations in North America. This election of Rachael demonstrates that CoG’s collective support for interfaith is reaping rewards of respect and inclusion for the entire Pagan community.”

This is yet another advance for Pagans within the interfaith movement. In addition to NAIN’s two Pagan board members, there are currently three Pagans, Andras Corban-Arthen, Phyllis Curott, and Angie Buchanan, serving on the Board of Trustees of the Council For A Parliament of the World’s Religions. Also, it should be noted that the United Religions Initiative has seen active Pagan participation for the entirety of its ten-year history.

These remarkable achievements, along with the “in the trenches” interfaith outreach and activism by individual modern Pagans, has ushered the modern Pagan movement to a place of global attention and influence that’s nearly unprecedented considering where we were a generation ago.  A lot has happened since Paganism “came out” to the global interfaith community in 1993, and we’ve since built bridges and new understandings at a remarkable pace. Whatever our future, these achievements ensure that the voices of modern Pagans continue to be heard by the world’s religions. Congratulations to Rachael Watcher on her election!

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From The Washington Post

By Suhag Shukla

Richard Gere is a Buddhist. Demi Moore and Ashton Kutcher are initiated in Kabbalah. And Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes are raising little Suri in the Church of Scientology. None were raised in the traditions which now inform their spirituality, along with the 44% of Americans who too have changed their religions. So why then should Julia Roberts’ revelation of her Hindu practice, that today inspires the spirituality of over two million Indian-origin Hindu Americans and an unaccounted number of non-Indian-origin Hindus — including those who may have converted or, for all intents and purposes, could be considered practicing Hindus — elicit the question of whether America is ready to embrace Hinduism?

Whether Americans know it or not, we’ve been embracing Hinduism for longer than most would guess. Remember that revolt against the “establishment” called the American transcendentalist movement? Yes, the one sparked by the American philosophers Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau? What inspired them? You guessed it: Hinduism. One of the earliest Hindu centers of worship in the U.S. — the Vedanta Society — was established in 1894 by Caucasian American disciples of Indian Hindu, Swami Vivekananda, after he took the first-ever World Parliament of Religions by storm. The Vedanta Society continues to have a strong “convert” and “born” Hindu following with centers across the 50 states. Let’s not forget Martin Luther King Junior and his non-violent civil disobedience movement, a movement which affords each and every one of us dignity and equal rights regardless of the color of our skin — a movement which I am also proud to know was strongly influenced by Mahatma Gandhi, a practicing Hindu, and his interpretation of the Hindu concept of ahimsa or non-violence. And how about the example of Maharishi Mahesh Yogi? He may be better known as the Indian guru of the Beatles, but in the late 60s and early 70s, he boasted some one million meditation followers.

Fast forward to 2010. Is there a city left in the United States that does not have at least one yoga class or a spa that doesn’t have ayurvedic offerings? And one would be remiss to leave out Oprah — streaming into some 7.4 million households daily and using her monthly magazine as well social networks to promote the teachings of Eckhart Tolle — teachings he has said are influenced, in part, by Hindu saints Ramana Maharshi and Krishnamurthy. From the practical — yoga, meditation, vegetarianism and ayurveda to the more esoteric — belief in karma and reincarnation as well as an adherence to the trademark Hindu world view that multiple paths to the Truth can exist, core concepts of Hinduism are not only being embraced by Americans but are slowly being assimilated into the American collective conscience just as Judeo-Christian values were generations before.

After the lifting of the Asian Exclusion Act in the early 1960s, waves of Indian and other Hindu immigrants brought more aspects of Hinduism to American shores and began practicing their faith with the same freedom that all other religions enjoy in America. Today there are over 700 Hindu temples throughout the U.S.. From Hawaii to Minnesota down to Florida, and essentially every state in between, Hindu temples are flourishing and catering to both born Hindu and convert populations. The American embrace of Hinduism is also the result of the maintenance of traditions by these immigrants and their transmission to second and third generation Hindu Americans.

As most Europeans would attest, we Americans are a religious lot. Add to this either the melting pot or salad bowl metaphor, and the influence of any of the religions practiced in the U.S. should come at no surprise. But the question posed by Elizabeth Tenety in her Washington Post Under God piece begs another, more important question: why isn’t all this “proof” of Hinduism’s influence in America recognized? One answer: Hinduism, as a religious tradition, has for too long been mischaracterized and caricaturized in and by the media, academia and even school textbooks with age-old, colonial stereotypes portraying Hindu belief and practice as little more than “caste, cows and curry.” At the same time, some Western Hinduism-practitioners, many of whom are celebrities in Western yoga circles, as well as Indian Hindu gurus (and wannabe gurus), have either intentionally or unintentionally delinked Hindu philosophy and non-ritual practices, including Vedanta, yoga and meditation, from Hinduism.

Click here to read the entire article.

From Earth Spirit Voices

by Andras Corban Arthen

One of the most important events of the Parliament of the World’s Religions – the Indigenous Assembly – was, quite likely, the least visible: attendance was by invitation only, and it was held in a former convent several miles away from the Exhibition Center, where most of the other programs took place.

In keeping with one of the Parliament’s seven main themes (and as mentioned in these pages prior to the event), the idea of convening an Indigenous Assembly in Melbourne was, from the beginning, a major focus of the Indigenous Task Force’s plans – we wanted to create a space wherein the international representatives of Indigenous traditions traveling to Melbourne would get a chance to meet with their counterparts from Australia and the South Pacific to discuss issues of mutual relevance, and perhaps even come up with a joint statement to be delivered during one of the Parliament’s plenary sessions. Our initial plans called for a three-day assembly which, for the first two days, would be limited exclusively to the Indigenous delegates, then opened on the third day to include representatives from other cultures and religions. Unfortunately, budgetary and time constraints forced us to scale back our plans and keep the assembly to one day.

Early in the morning of Monday, 7 December, about fifty Indigenous representatives, volunteers and translators traveled to the Abbotsford Convent near Victoria Park, some six miles away. Most of us had already had breakfast, but upon arrival we were offered juice, pastries and other refreshments as we waited for everyone to arrive.

The proceedings started with a brief introduction by Task Force chair Omie Baldwin, followed by a traditional welcome to country by Auntie Joy Murphy Wandin, senior elder of the Wurundjeri people who are the traditional “owners” of the land that includes Melbourne. Wominjeka Wurundjeri Balluk yearmen koondi bik (“welcome to the land of the Wurundjeri People”), she intoned, as she did probably a dozen more times during the course of the Parliament; but each time she spoke those words they were like music, as fresh and as heartfelt as if she were saying them for the very first time, and we felt, indeed, very welcome. Auntie Joy had some very kind words to say to those of us who served on the Task Force and organized the event, and gave each of us an Aboriginal flag as a gift.

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From Telerama

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From The Huffington Post

By Eboo Patel

…

Once considered a ceremonial activity reserved for leaders of religious denominations or experts in theology, interfaith cooperation is fast becoming a movement focused on social impact that involves everyone.

In the twenty-first century, faith can be a bomb of destruction, a barrier of division or a bridge of cooperation.

The stories of religion as a bomb of destruction are on the front pages of the newspaper every morning. The suicide attacks in Baghdad and Kabul are examples of religion as a bomb of destruction, as is the violent tension between faith groups from Northern Ireland to Nigeria.

Those erecting the barriers of religious division are less dramatic but still dangerous. Their work moves a diverse society in the direction of conflict instead of cooperation. The ‘new atheists’ like Sam Harris and Christopher Hitchens build barriers by claiming all religious believers are poisoned and intent on poisoning others. Those who hold with Samuel Huntington’s clash of civilizations build barriers by advancing the idea that different religions are inherently and inevitably at odds with one another. Those who draw a straight line between the violent actions of a few extremists and an entire religion build barriers by telling people that every Muslim — their neighbor, their taxi driver, their friend from the PTA — is a potential enemy.

The materials that make up the bombs of destruction and the barriers of division are not just physical; they are also theological and intellectual. They include advancing theologies that require believers to suffocate or marginalize those who are different; emphasizing the stories of conflict between religious communities instead of the stories of cooperation; holding up the worst examples of the other community and saying that these examples define the whole group; and paying heightened attention to the differences between groups while proclaiming that there is no possibility of common ground.

The forces building bombs and barriers are strong. If the idea of faith as a bridge of cooperation is to win out, interfaith work has to expand from a small niche of enthusiasts to a social norm that involves everyone. Indeed, just as it is now status quo for universities, cities, civic groups and houses of worship to “go green,” so should it be the new norm for these entities to build bridges of interfaith cooperation.

President Obama knows the potential impact of interfaith cooperation, not just as a policymaker but also from his personal history. As a young community organizer in Chicago, Obama worked under a Jewish mentor to bring together Catholic, Protestant and Muslim groups to launch job training centers and educational enrichment programs on the south side of Chicago. He has lived the mission statement of the first Parliament of the World’s Religions, which took place in his home city over a century before he became President: “From now on the great religions of the world make war no longer on each other, and instead of on the giant ills that afflict humankind.”

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An Indigenous Peoples’ Statement to the World

Delivered at The Parliament of the World’s Religions

Convened at Melbourne, Australia

on the Traditional Lands

of the Wurundjeri  People of the Kulin Nation

December 9, 2009

PREAMBLE

In keeping with the theme of this year’s Parliament: “Make a World of Difference: Hearing each other, Healing the earth,” We, the Indigenous Peoples participating in this Parliament hereby issue this statement:

We are Indigenous Peoples and Nations who honor our ancestors and care for our future generations by preserving our lands and cultures. For thousands of years, Indigenous peoples have maintained a fundamental and sacred relationship with Mother Earth. As peoples of the land, we declare our inherent rights to our present and continuing survival within our sacred homelands and territories throughout the world;

We commend the Australian government’s recent support for the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. We call on all governments to support and implement the provisions of the UN Declaration.

Since time immemorial we have lived in keeping with our sacred laws, principles, and spiritual values, given by the Creator. Our ways of life are based on thousands of years of accumulated ecological knowledge, a great respect for our Mother Earth, a reverence and respect for all our Natural World relations and the survival of our languages, cultures, and traditions.

The Indigenous instructions of sharing and the responsibility of leadership to future generations are wise and enduring. As the traditional nations of our lands we affirm the right to educate our children in our earth-based education systems in order to maintain our indigenous knowledge systems and cultures. These have also contributed to our spiritual, physical and mental health;

Indigenous peoples concept of health and survival is holistic, collective and individual.

It encompasses the spiritual, the intellectual, the physical and the emotional. Expressions of culture relevant to health and survival of Indigenous Peoples includes relationships, families, and kinship, social institutions, traditional laws, music, dances, songs and songlines, ceremonies and dreamtime, our ritual performances and practices, games, sports, language, mythologies, names, land, sea, water, every life forms, and all documented forms and aspects of culture, including burial and sacred sites, human genetic materials, ancestral remains, so often stolen, and our artifacts;

Unfortunately, certain doctrines have been threatening to the survival of our cultures, our languages, and our peoples, and devastating to our ways of life. These are found in particular colonizing documents such as the Inter Caetera papal bull of 1493, which called for the subjugation of non-Christian nations and peoples and “the propagation of the Christian empire.” This is the root of the Doctrine of Christian Discovery that is still interwoven into laws and policies today that must be changed. The principles of subjugation contained in this and other such documents, and in the religious texts and documents of other religions, have been and continue to be destructive to our ways of life (religions), cultures, and the survival of our Indigenous nations and peoples. This oppressive tradition is what led to the boarding schools, the residential schools, and the Stolen Generation, resulting in the trauma of language death and loss of family integrity from the actions of churches and governments. We call on those churches and governments to put as much time, effort, energy and money into assisting with the revitalization of our languages and cultures as they put into attempting to destroy them.

The doctrines of colonization and dominion have laid the groundwork for contemporary problems of racism and dispossession. These problems include the industrial processes of resource exploitation and extraction by governments and corporations that has consistently meant the use of imposed laws to force the removal of Indigenous peoples from our traditional territories, and to desecrate and destroy our sacred sites and places. The result is a great depletion of biodiversity and the loss of our traditional ways of life, as well as the depletion and contamination of the waters of Mother Earth from mining and colonization.

Such policies and practices do not take into account that water is the first law of life and a gift from the Creator for all beings. Clean, healthy, safe, and free water is necessary for the continuity and well being of all living things. The commercialization and poisoning of water is a crime against life.

The negative ethics of contemporary society, discovery, conquest, dominion, exploitation, extraction, and industrialization, have brought us to today’s crisis of global warming. Climate change is now our most urgent issue and affecting the lives of indigenous peoples at an alarming rate. Many of our people’s lives are in crisis due to the rapid global warming. The ice melt in the north and rapid sea rise continue to accelerate, and the time for action is brief.

The Earth’s resources are finite and the present global consumption levels are unsustainable and continue to affect our peoples and all peoples. Therefore, we join the other members of the Parliament in calling for prompt, immediate, and effective action at Copenhagen to combat climate change;

On September 13, 2007, the United Nations General Assembly adopted the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. In support of this historic event, the Episcopalian Church in the United States adopted a resolution at its 76^th General Convention in July 2009, repudiating and disavowing the dehumanizing Doctrine of Christian Discovery. By doing so, the Church took particular note of the charter issued by King Henry VII of England to John Cabot and his sons, which authorized the colonizing of North America. It was by this ‘boss over’ tradition of Christian discovery that the British crown eventually laid claim to the traditional territories of the Aboriginal nations of the continent now called Australia, under terra nullius and terra nullus. This step by the Episcopalian Church was an act of conscience and moral leadership by one of the world’s major religions. Religious bodies of Quakers and Unitarians have taken similar supportive actions.

In Conclusion, we appeal to all people of conscience to join with us: We hereby call upon Pope Benedict XVI and the Vatican to publicly acknowledge and repudiate the papal decrees that legitimized the original activities that have evolved into the Doctrine of Christian Discovery and Dominion.

Click here to download this document.

From America Magazine

Marlborough, MA. I was invited to speak last evening at an appearance in one of the Boston suburbs of the famous modern Indian teacher, Mata Amritanandamayi (literally, “the mother,” “the one entirely composed of bliss in the imperishable”)— Amma, mother, who tours the world regularly, and has been widely honored for her charitable works for the poor in many places. She is also famous for embracing those who come to see her. For she is also “the hugging guru,” and is known to receive for hours at a time whoever comes to her, embracing them warmly and with a loving smile. She is also considered, by many of her disciples, simply a divine person come down to earth.

So I had the opportunity to speak a few words in introduction to her own lecture (in Malayalam, her native South Indian language, with a subsequent translation read by a discipline) and subsequent devotional hymns and a long evening of embraces. I was invited partly as a specialist in Hindu-Christian relations, and partly, I suspect, as a Harvard professor. But what to do, speaking a few word before nearly 1000 people (mostly Western, most “converted” to being her devotees) gathered to see this person they know to be divine? One might turn down such a request, of course, but if one does accept it, how to speak in a way that honors the occasion, respects her loving presence and good works, while yet also communicating something of Christian love too? It is quite a challenge to weave everything together in the right balance, definitely a Catholic and definitely standing before so large a group of very sincere devotee of Amma. So I pondered this for days, finally accepted the invitation, and eventually came up with the speech below; I showed up in my Roman collar, gave my talk, garlanded her, was embraced by her, spoke with her in Tamil for a brief moment, and enjoyed it all. But see what you think of my little speech. Did I say too much? too little? would you agree to speak on such an occasion?

Here it is (though also click here for the summary and video excerpt posted by Amma’s organization):

“Namaste, vanakkam, good evening. It is a grace to be here tonight with you. I know that we all travel by so many personal paths, yet by a singular invitation we are here together for a time, and that is good that it is so. I offer you this ancient Jewish blessing as we collect ourselves: “May the Lord bless us and keep us;  / may the Lord make his face to shine upon us,  / and be gracious to us;  / may the Lord lift up his face upon us,  / and give us peace. Amen.” (Numbers 6)

“We are here tonight, gathered together with Amritanandamayi Amma. When we speak this name — Amritananda-mayi, “perfect, complete in the bliss of the imperishable” — the Sanskrit scholars among us may think first on a philosophical level, perhaps turning to the Upanisads to probe the meaning of “bliss” and “the imperishable.” We may eventually think of the undying spark within all beings, and of a bliss grounded in the highest immortal Reality.

“But we also know that this name — Amritanandamayi — tells us something simpler and more immediate. We are invited to see how our guest — our host — is open to the undying Spirit that blows where it will — in, through, and around each of us. With her tonight, we learn again to stop covering our light with a bushel basket, and to share the bliss that is within us.”

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