ISSUE 17 Sitting quietly doing nothing

Spring comes and the grass grows by itself Photo: Stuart Bailey Poem cited: The Little Book of Zen Wisdom Pub. Element The Zenrin 04 EDITORIAL - Lorna Douglas 05 KEYNOTE - Barney Leith Children the most precious gift 06 POEM - Kahlil Gibran 07 FAITH & THE ENVIRONMENT - Martin Palmer Being Faithful to all Life 09 INSIGHT - Gordon Read The Slave Trade THEME - YOUNG VOICES 26 11 Scripture - Bah á’í 12 Aiya Jibali 13 Elaine Young 14 Priya Tailor 15 Sarah Chaudry 16 The Burnley Project - Andrew Holden 18 LIFESTORY - Dr. K. Sultana Saeed All in Good Spirit 24 30 20 FORGIVENESS - Michael Lewin A Journey into Healing 22 CIRCLING THE GLOBE - Zaki Cooper Tolerance, Integration & Kosher Curry 23 WHAT’S ON - Art Exhibition : Angela Schutz 24 OPINION - Umm Hanie’ Rebler The Marginalisation of Women 26 LANGUAGE OF ART - Caroline Jariwala Personal Searching 28 POEM - Alan Horner 42 My Mother was not most pleased 50 29 SCRIPTURE - Sikh 38 The Importance of Believing in HMP Risley - Khalid Hussain 29 BOOK LAUNCH - Lorna Rae The Fire Within 39 SCRIPTURE - Quaker 30 YOUTH INITIATIVE - Leila Abuhilal 40 REFLECTION - Cannon Dr. Alan Billings Completing the Circle The Persistence of Baptism 31 FAITH & LEADERSHIP - Raana Bokhari 41 POEM - Sr. Delores Dodgson ‘Blessed is He Whose Speech is Remembrance of God’ 42 FOCUS - Chris Chivers 33 INTERFAITH ENCOUNTER - Martin Conway Sharing the Light Together in Practice 46 SUBSCRIPTION FORM 35 - Anon POEM 48 MINISTRY - Emilio Paloschi Believe in Yourself New Breeze of the Spirit THEME - CHAPLAINCY 50 FAITH & THE ARTIST - Lucy Aline Everitt 36 Angulimala - Ven Ajahn Khemadhammo Connecting with Nature

3 Know ye what it is to be a child?... It is to have a spirit yet streaming from the waters of baptism; it is to believe in love, to believe in loveliness, to believe in www.faithinitiative.co.uk belief. Initiative Interfaith Trust Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792-1822) Registered Charity No. 1113345 (letters) cited: The Quotable Spirit: compiled & edited by Peter Lorie & Manuela Dunn Mascetti Trustees : Heather Wells, Lorna Douglas, Jonathan Lockhart Timeless Enterprise (UK) Ltd. 1996 Object : s I sit here reflecting on the articles that have shaped this issue of The promotion of religious harmony by: Faith Initiative I feel especially moved and inspired by the honesty Providing educational resources and information to and integrity that is conveyed through our theme of ‘young voices’. promote a better awareness of the causes and consequences of inter-religious tensions and conflicts; and WAe are privileged to provide a positive and constructive insight into the educating the public in the diverse nature of religious belief. beliefs and values that young people hold within our society, together with some of their hopes, fears and concerns for the future. At the same time I Faith Initiative Magazine can hear an echo of my mother’s lament – one I hear from so many of her Editorial team – age group: “I wouldn’t like to be a young person today”. The implication is Editor : Heather Wells Deputy Editor & Design Consultant : that to be young today is to belong to some alien and hostile culture that Lorna Douglas stands in stark contrast to her romanticised golden age of childhood. At this Editorial Assistant : Joy Hodder point I wonder whether to launch into my usual response that goes Onn Keet Peng • Charanjit Ajit Singh something like: “Yes mum, you may remember them as great times but the Sr. Maureen Goodman • Shiban Akbar reality was child labour, high infant mortality, rickets, diphtheria, Poet in residence: Rebecca Irvine tuberculosis, two horrific world wars, and no official recognition of the Rights of a Child”. Then off I go, arguing in defence of the youth of today Aim : The aim of Faith Initiative Magazine is to open windows and the resolute way they meet the challenges of the world that they have on the beliefs and practices of world religions, in the hope inherited. These exchanges have become something of a ritual, triggered by that this will foster understanding and reduce religiously motivated violence. some pessimistic, fear-mongering story featured in the media that generalises youth culture today as lacking in moral values and human Statement : Whilst the contents of this magazine will decency. always be in accordance with the ‘object’ of Initiative Young people are constantly under attack, it seems that they are judged and Interfaith Trust there will be freedom of expression. convicted by and through the media on a daily basis. As a teacher I feel Invitation: We invite you to contribute articles, poems, bound to defend them and deny the bad behaviour that is so frequently letters, illustrations and responses so that the magazine attributed to them. In my experience the vast majority of young people are reflects the religious communities it seeks to serve. Editorial kind, compassionate, outgoing and confident - forever endeavouring to guidance can be obtained from Heather Wells, PO Box 110, make sense of themselves, others and the world that surrounds them. Not Lancaster LA2 6GN unlike the generations that have gone before them! Those that behave badly Email: [email protected] are in the minority – and a small minority at that - but sadly it is these young Issue 18 Themes: people that are given focus by the media and presented as the norm. We • Symbolism of hair in identity & faith are happy to overturn this perspective by providing a platform for young • Pilgrimage people who can speak for themselves. Front cover: Image: Extract of Radiant Dance Floor, Our keynote writer, Barney Leith, raises awareness of the inhumanity that Caroline Jariwala Text: cited: Oxford Dictionary of children suffer – without a voice - in many parts of the world, and asks us Phrase, Sayings & Quotations 2002 Pub.OUP to remember the emphasis that faith traditions place on the fulfilment of the potential of the child – spiritually, morally, intellectually, emotionally and Design & Print - Print Graphic Ltd T: (01228) 593900 physically. On the 200th anniversary of the abolition of the slave trade Gordon Read gives focus to the vital contribution made by William L RA THE S SPIRAL: “This is an ancient Wilberforce, and explores the role of one’s faith in moving PI P symbol that reminds us of forward new concepts within the secular workings of society S IR E the womb and the protective to condemn the slavery that exists today – especially child H A T mothering nature in all of us. L

slavery. Chris Chivers writes an open letter to his children L T It takes us from the broad

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R I E P S Cited: Mandalas: Spiritual Circles for Harmony & Fulfilment Lorna Douglas Laura J.Watts (2002) Pub.Hermes House, London ISBN 184308 973 7 We gratefully acknowledge the grant received from the Faith Communities Capacity Building Fund and the support from private donors, who wish to The spiral logo was designed by Caroline Jariwala remain anonymous. Such funding makes publication and distribution of this for Initiative Interfaith Trust magazine possible. We welcome and appreciate all donations and subscriptions. 4 Barney Leith • keynote

C– theh moisltd precrioeus ngift

“Every child is potentially the light of the world - and at the same time its darkness; wherefore must the question of education be accounted as of primary importance. From his infancy, the child must be nursed at the breast of God’s love, and nurtured in the embrace of His knowledge, that he may radiate light, grow in spirituality, be filled with wisdom and learning, and take on the characteristics of the heavenly host.” ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, Selections from the Writings of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá , p. 131.

pen a newspaper, look at a website, watch the TV news, mine – they have to be brought out, polished up and put to use for and we’re almost bound to find a story about children the benefit of the child and in service to the whole of humankind. running wild or children being abused, or children International human rights law gives great weight to the rights of cOommitting suicide because of the despair they face in school or at the child. The preamble to the UN Convention on the Rights of home. the Child recalls one of the founding principles of the UN Recent articles in the media have highlighted the persistence of child Charter, that ‘recognition of the inherent dignity and of the equal slavery in the 21st century. It has been estimated and inalienable rights of all members of the that there are approximately nine million children The whole of human family is the foundation of freedom, living in conditions that make them slaves. justice and peace in the world’. It also recalls Anti-Slavery International defines a slave as one humankind that the Universal Declaration of Human who is: suffers when Rights ‘has proclaimed that childhood is • forced to work - through mental or physical children entitled to special care and assistance’. And it threat; anywhere are considers ‘that the child should be fully • owned or controlled by an ‘employer’, usually unable to prepared to live an individual life in society, through mental or physical abuse or and brought up in the spirit of the ideals threatened abuse; flourish. proclaimed in the Charter of the United • dehumanised, treated as a commodity or Nations, and in particular in the spirit of bought and sold as ‘property’; peace, dignity, tolerance, freedom, equality and solidarity’. • physically constrained or has restrictions placed on his/her The Convention gives governments a wide range of duties in freedom of movement. relation to the protection and care of children. Children have The children trafficked into the UK for the sexual gratification of rights to freedom of expression, which, crucially, includes the right adults would surely qualify, as would the children sold by destitute ‘to seek, receive and impart information and ideas of all kinds, families to work on the farms of chocolate producers in West Africa regardless of frontiers’. And the states that are party to the for no pay and precious little food. Convention must respect the right of the child to freedom of But it needn’t be like this. In fact, it must not be like this. The Bahá’í thought, conscience and religion. teachings stress, as do the teachings and practices of all the great Children are to be protected from economic exploitation, from faiths, the potentials that every child has: spiritual, moral, intellectual, sexual exploitation, from hazardous work, and from work that emotional and physical. These potentials are like gems buried in a interferes with the child’s education.

5 keynote • Barney Leith Kahlil Gibran • POEM

Article 28 of the Convention sets out the rights to education: free and compulsory primary education available to all; the development of different forms of secondary education; making higher education accessible to all on the basis of capacity. Regrettably, children are deprived of these rights in many parts of the world. The reasons for this are too complex for me to go Your children are not your children. into them here, but suffice it to say that the whole of humankind suffers when children anywhere are unable to flourish. They are the sons and daughters ‘Since the body of humankind is one and indivisible, each member of Life’s longing for itself. of the human race is born into the world as a trust of the whole. This trusteeship constitutes the moral foundation of most of the They come through you but not from you, other rights … which the instruments of the United Nations are attempting similarly to define.’ The Bahá’í International And though they are with you, Community thus sets out the Bahá’í understanding of what yet they belong not to you. underpins the inalienable rights we all have by virtue of being human and the responsibilities that we carry – also by virtue of You may give them your love but being human. not your thoughts. The idea of trusteeship, which we can think of as a covenantal relationship that we have with each other, with the whole human For they have their own thoughts. race, gives us particular responsibilities towards the more vulnerable, especially children, who are our future. You may house their bodies Children deprived of education cannot flourish. And who is the but not their souls, first educator of children? The mother! So it makes sense to give a very high priority to the education of girls, since they are going For their souls dwell in the house of to be the first educators of the next generation. That’s not to say tomorrow, which you cannot visit, that boys should be deprived of education – far from it – but not even in your dreams. there are places in the world where it does come to a choice between sending the boys or the girls to school. Unfortunately, You may strive to be like them, girls often lose out. but seek not to make them like you. But helping children to grow and flourish is not the responsibility of mothers alone. Ideally both parents work together to develop For life goes not backward their moral and spiritual qualities. And beyond the parents the whole community bears this responsibility. nor tarries with yesterday. Bahá’í individuals, families and communities worldwide offer You are the bows from which your moral and spiritual education to all children whose parents want them to benefit, whether they are Bahá’ís or not. This is one of children as living arrows are sent forth. the community’s core activities. The classes happen in The archer sees the mark upon the path of the neighbourhoods and streets and villages. They are relatively informal and supplement whatever formal, school-based, infinite, and He bends you with His might education is on offer. According to the Bahá’í International that His arrows may go swift and far. Community, there are more than 10,000 such local Bahá’í children’s classes currently taking place around the world, with Let your bending in the archer’s more than 90,000 participants. hand be for gladness; The Bahá’í writings stress the importance of children’s education, emphasizing especially the need for training in virtues and For even as he loves the arrow that flies, spirituality. Although adapted to local conditions and needs, Bahá’í so He loves also the bow that is stable. children’s classes around the world focus on moral education, aiming to provide an ingredient that is often overlooked in secular education. Bahá’ís also provide more formal education through Bahá’í- inspired and Bahá’í-run schools in many parts of the world.

6 Martin Palmer • FAITH & THE ENVIRONMENT BEING n a h S a u H n o e l p

m TO ALL LIFE e T t s i o faithful a T

In 1986, the World Wide Fund for Nature International invited The faiths are significant players because they are important five major religions to Assisi, Italy, birthplace of St Francis, the stakeholders in the planet. They own between them over 7% of Roman Catholic saint of ecology, to discuss and plan for greater the habitable land of the planet; they contribute to, have founded religious involvement in the environmental movement. At Assisi or help in some way 54% of all schools world wide; they have each faith issued its own statement on the environment, drawing more weekly magazines and journals than the whole of the upon the specific teachings, insights and practices expanded EU and their ownership of stocks and of each tradition. There was no attempt to create shares makes them a major economic force. a ‘common statement’ for the simple reason that The faiths are Take this issue of stocks and shares. There is no-one pays the slightest attention to such well significant players generally an embarrassment within the faiths meaning but rootless documents. What motivates because they are about the fact that every single one of them runs people are the distinctive insights that their own important on money generated by capitalism and tradition brings to an issue. Furthermore, the investments. The old Christian tension between event was not one organised by the faiths. Faith to stakeholders in God and Mammon is a divide common to the faith meetings in my experience lack any serious the planet. faith worlds. A solution of this ancient divide is edge or purpose to them. At Assisi, and ever the rise of ethical investment, aimed at improving since, our work with faiths on the environmental has always been social and environmental management. a partnership between a secular body – WWF or the World World wide, the rise of the ethical investment movement has Bank or the UN – and the faiths. The agenda in other words is been one of the most astonishing social changes of the late 90’s always one decided by the secular world to which the faiths are and early 21st century. The quest for investment into companies asked to make their distinctive response. The reason for doing it and industries which are ethical in their employment; this way is that unlike most gatherings of faiths, these events have environmentally sustainable, and profitable, has become a major led to literally hundreds of thousands of practical projects on the factor in contemporary economics. Ethical banks, investment ground, run by the faiths themselves and inspired, assisted or groups, companies and products are now one of the fastest partnered by secular institutions and governments. growing sectors of the economic world. Ethical foods and In 1995, WWF helped launch a new organisation, the Alliance of products are to be found in every major supermarket in the Religions and Conservation which now works with eleven of the West and increasingly in many other areas of the world. The role world’s major religions (Baha’is; Buddhists; Christians; Daoists; of the faiths in this has been an interesting one. Many of the fair- Hindus; Jains; Jews; Muslims; Shinto; Sikhs and Zoroastrians) to trade groups have their origins in Christian or Muslim faith develop environmental programmes and projects through their groups and the quest for non-interest banking has its foundations landholdings, shares, education networks, media outreaches and in Islam. It has been the growth of ethical, Islamic banking which moral and spiritual insights. ARC’s website has perhaps been the most dramatic aspect of the faith’s www.arcworld.org contains many examples and resources involvement with ethical banking and investment. for faith communities to take practical action on the Traditional Islamic economics was dominated by an injunction in environment. From religious building audit kits such as the the Qur’an not to charge interest on loans of money. Through Benedictine Handbook; through specific issues such as toxics or interaction with Western banking systems, however, interest climate change to how to create new sacred sites to prevent the charges have found their way into Islamic life. Within almost all destruction of habitats, the world’s faiths are busy playing their Islamic states and amongst many Muslim groups there has grown part in helping to raise awareness and focus action world wide. a campaign to create a non-interest based financial system.

7 FAITH & THE ENVIRONMENT • Martin Palmer

This has been remarkably successful and most Islamic countries for a sage or immortal combines the characters for a person and now have full Shari’ah law based Islamic banking, and many non- a mountain. Muslim countries too. Indeed, so powerful has this movement Belief in sacred natural places helps to preserve our natural become, almost all mainstream secular banks now offer Islamic environment as a whole. Farming and killing are not usually banking as part of their range of service. This movement only allowed around holy places and, in these areas, wildlife and their began in earnest in 1974. habitat is especially protected. In recent years this has become In part inspired by this and in part concerned about injustice in widely acknowledged, so much so that a study of the link was trade and economics, and the environmental costs of bad undertaken jointly by the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) management and exploitative practices, Christian and Jewish and the Alliance of Religions and Conservation (ARC). This groups have for many years sought to influence big business showed a range of national parks and wilderness protected areas through their role as shareholders. Until the beginning of the which were also sacred and where the sacred had been 21st century this largely took the form of withdrawing or instrumental in their survival long enough to be declared national threatening to withdraw funds from companies whose parks. As the major faiths recognize the importance of the environmental and social policies were considered bad. environment, and the environmental movement recognises the Increasingly this negative path has been joined by a positive path role of religions, holy natural sites are taking on a new – positively seeking out companies which practice good social significance. WWF and ARC are actively engaged in moves to justice policies and are environmentally minded and investing in have the term ‘sacred site’ officially recognised as a term of them. Around the world, a number of organisations now exist to international environmental protection and significance, thus assist faith investors to invest ethically, ranging from specific helping to preserve both the environment and religious sites. country based groups such as the Interfaith Center for Although the problems of the environment were first highlighted Corporate Investment in the USA with over 250 religious groups by secular environ mental groups, religious involvement in the involved and a total asset base of over $110 billion, to the environment is undertaken from religious prin ciples and beliefs, International Interfaith Investment Group (3iG) which brings and not just in response to secular agendas. They may at first together many different religions in a number of countries and have been seen as ‘soft’ issues, but the religions are realizing that advises them on ethical investment policy. the well-being of the envi ronment is closely connected to For many faiths, concern for the environment is a matter of fundamental economic and social issues. The environ mental crisis making active, something which has been passive. For example, has caused a major rethinking within all faiths. The faiths are many faiths have sacred places where tradition and convention showing that they can work side by side on the environment, in have meant that not hunting, trapping, logging or developing the a way that is unique in history - even in areas of traditional site has been the norm. Increasingly we are helping the faiths to hostility such as Lebanon and the Philippines. make such passive conservation active. However, the faiths are not the oldest surviving human In many cultures, natural beauty has been celebrated as being in institutions in the world for nothing. They know that while you some special sense divine. Hinduism, Daoism and traditional can tell people that things are bad and they must repent and do beliefs, for instance, consider all of nature to be in some way better, for much of the year, you must also celebrate, party and sacred. Certain sites are especially revered. Specific deities or have fun. The idea of celebration is anathema to many in the stories may come to be associated with them, but usually their environmental movement – what is there to celebrate they ask. holiness stems from their sheer awe-inspiring presence. But without a sense of joy for all that we have, why bother to try Mountains are the most common natural feature to be revered and save it? The faiths know about fasting – Lent and Ramadan as holy. Often rising dra matically from the plains, as do Mount and Vassa for example. But they also know about partying – Ararat and Mount Sinai, it is easy to see why they have been Easter, Eid Ul Fitr and Kathina are the joyful ends of the fasting special places since ancient times. Remoteness and the hardship periods in Christianity, Islam and Buddhism. experienced by those who try to live on them are also a part of Unless something is worth giving thanks for, is it worth saving? their appeal. This is especially true of the major holy mountains The answer from the faiths is no. Which is why a sense of joy as of China. Chinese poets, painters and mystics have always found well as a sense of responsibility is what makes the religious n a h

mountains to have particular significance. The Chinese character contribution to the environment so important. S

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t s i o a D Images © CIRCA RELIGION Photo Library/Tjalling Halbertsma Website: www.arcworld.org 8 Gordon Read • INSIGHT THE SLAVE TRADE –APOLOGIES, REPARATIONS OR CELEBRATIONS ? No nation in Europe has plunged so deeply into this guilt as Great Britain William Pitt, 1792

n a recent poll of teenagers 56% of boys and 58% of girls did man knows no bounds. not know enough about William Wilberforce to know why he So we have little reason to celebrate, but less because of a legacy should be admired! This is the man which Sir Roy Strong, in of guilt, I personally feel, than because of the enormity of the task IThe Story of Britain, (1996), singles out as ‘embodying the change yet undone. Pitt, Wilberforce, Fox and many others in which overcame the established classes between 1790 and 1820.’ Parliament expressed great contrition for the outrage against In 1785, as a young MP, he had an encounter with God and by the humanity which they felt slave trading to be and indeed against next year he felt called to two great causes, the suppression of the very status of slavery in principle. The European powers are the slave trade and the ‘reformation of manners’. In the face of also often criticised for exploiting Africa but Liverpool ship- opposition not only from vested interests but also from eminent owners and traders such as Macgregor Laird, founder of the men like Admiral Lord Nelson he soldiered on, rallying support African Steamship Company, Sir Alfred Jones of the Elder against the slave trade particularly as a disgrace to a country Dempster Lines and John Holt all saw their enterprises as professing Christianity. He believed that faith should very much attempts to benefit the African economy and compensate for the affect both public and private life. impoverishment that the slave trade caused. The 200th anniversary of the Abolition Bill, Wilberforce and his evangelical friends saw in passed on 25 March 1807, should be So we have little the missionary work they founded through celebrated not just for itself but as a the Church Mission Society in 1799 not only milestone in the effect of one man’s faith reason to celebrate what they felt as a fulfilment of a humane duty, which took 20 years before a result! This because of the to spread the truth about God as they should spur all of us to bring about the enormity of the believed it, but also to provide education and abolition of every form of slavery still extant medical care. The complaints made about the in today’s world, affecting over 20m. people task yet undone. robbery of African culture by Europeans we including many children. Anglo-Saxons can equally make against the In Parliament today Baroness Cox seems early Christian missionaries to our own often a lone voice in her condemnation of islands, robbing us of our pre-Christian pagan slavery in places such as Sudan. Her book, This Immoral Trade , is heritage. Indeed the proponents of ‘Wicca’ make this very an eye-opener on the situation world-wide today. The work of allegation. The fact, however, is that Africans have made the Anti-Slavery International, founded 1839, still desperately needs Christian faith very much a part of their own culture just as we support. The Times, 9 March, this year, reported that in the state have. The contribution of of Mauritania, where slavery was allegedly abolished in 1981, SOS black-led churches in Esclaves, an organisation founded to help people escape from London, for instance, and slavery, has evidence that hundreds of thousands of slaves still black gospel music world- exist. Daily Telegraph Weekend Magazine 24 March contains a wide are a positive asset to horrifying report on conditions in the toy manufacturing the Christian cause. sweatshops of China, where young women from remote provinces are drawn into the factories with promises of good pay but kept in bestial barracks, as bad as prisons, working “Am I not a man outrageous hours, in toxic conditions and dying on the job. Like the drowned Morecambe Bay cocklers, they are at the mercy of and a brother?” gang masters often of their own race: truly man’s inhumanity to Wedgwood anti-slavery medallion. 1787 9 INSIGHT • Gordon Read

So on the basis of our Christian duty to ‘love our neighbour as ‘To abolish a status which in all ages GOD has sanctioned, and ourselves’ we have an obligation to help our black African friends man has continued would not only be robbery to an innumerable in every way we can, whatever our view of our involvement in class of fellow-subjects; but it would be extreme cruelty to the historic ‘guilt by association’. Africa Savages , a portion of whom it saves from massacre, or We are still left, nonetheless, with the stain intolerable bondage in their own country, on the name of Christianity and of Christ and introduces into a much happier state of because so-called and even genuine Her correspondence life; especially now when their passage to the Christians either owned slaves or traded in is full of references to West Indies and their treatment there is slaves. How could this be? ladies she persuaded humanely regulated.’ The fact is that man has a fantastic ability to to give up sugar, the In this he was heartily challenged by Dr miss the point of his beliefs. Thomas Johnson, who shamelessly toasted ‘the next chief slave-grown Jefferson in the Declaration of West Indian slave revolt.’ Just as today, many Independence declared it self evident that all crop, just as today we preferred to believe that all was well and it men were free and equal. Patrick Henry in opt for fair trade required the unremitting zeal of Thomas Virginia screamed “Give me liberty or give products. Clarkson, as an 18th century ‘investigative me death” surrounded by slave plantations! journalist’, compiling a dossier of statements, Many slaves of American patriots escaped to collecting signatures, even making a model of the British side in the War of Independence. No wonder Dr. the slave ship Brookes for exhibition in Parliament to persuade Samuel Johnson observed that ‘The loudest yelps for freedom people otherwise.. come from the drivers of slaves.’ So why the focus on Wilberforce? Of course he was part of a big The Biblical writers are sometimes criticised for not condemning team. To support him, Clarkson and many others including the slavery outright. However, Paul in 1st Timothy (Bible NIV), cites black writer, Equiano, were responsible for lobbying on a massive ‘slave trading’ as on a par with murder and adultery. In Revelation scale. More people, both men and women, more in fact than at 18 trading in the ‘bodies and souls of men’ is the last and most that time had the vote, put their signatures to petitions against vile mercantile activity, justifying divine judgment. But Christians the slave trade. The popular female writer, Hannah More, were at that stage not in a position of power and therefore particularly, gave her talents to the cause. Her correspondence is focussed rather on the improvement of slave conditions and on full of references to ladies she persuaded to give up sugar, the overcoming the handicap of slave status. Jesus himself ‘took the chief slave-grown crop, just as today we opt for fair trade very nature of a slave’ according to Philippians 2, so that the good products. news of Christianity was very much a message for the slave and Wiberforce single-mindedly dedicated himself to the abolition the oppressed, and had within it the seeds of social reformation. cause in Parliament. For 20 years he raised it annually till the Like the Stoics of the same era, the emphasis was on liberation victory of 25th March 1807. It was the forerunner of all the of the spirit but, as Paul strongly hinted to his convert, Philemon, subsequent campaigns for factory and other humane reforms. It legal liberation was certainly encouraged and practised. was a triumph of the principle that our faith, with its unequivocal The Renaissance thinkers of the 15th century - when African emphasis on loving our neighbour and doing to others as you slavery was first introduced to Europe by the Portuguese - were would that men should do unto you, should very much ‘invade’ very much in thrall to the thinking of the Greeks and Romans to adapt Lord Melbourne’s phrase, the sphere of both public and whose society was based on slavery. ‘Humanity is divided into private life. two, masters and slaves…some have the right to command, some As Justin Thacker put it in his letter to The Telegraph recently: are born to obey’, said Aristotle the leading Greek philosopher, If Wilberforce had had the wisdom of Grayling (atheist along with Plato, who thought much the same. There were philosopher proposing the motion ‘We’d be better off without dissentients, such as the playwright, Euripides, but the received religion’) instead of the gospel of Christ to guide him, then he opinion was, as James Boswell put it 2,100 years later, along with would have kept his faith… in the private sphere and the slave many others: trade and slavery would have continued until ended, most probably, by war or violent revolution.

Gordon Read is former curator of the Liverpool Maritime Museum 10 1 1

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n eing a British born Hindu I have always been every person as an individual, not to judge by appearances conscious of my faith and have actively attended or religion, as everyone is equal no matter what their u festivals at the Gujarat Hindu Society, Preston. My beliefs or practices may be. o parents are of Indian heritage and they brought me up, and

y B my two older brothers, as moderate Hindus in a British Being raised around the temple, and therefore in constant society. Growing up I was introduced to my mother- contact with other Hindus, has allowed me to experience tongue Gujarati from an early age, which enabled me to Hinduism at first hand - as if I were in a temple in India. I communicate clearly with my grandparents whose first was surrounded by people who are dedicated to their language was Gujarati, not English. religion and from whom I have learnt many life lessons.

Following the Hindu tradition for me is a way of life, Being a moderate Hindu, I will often pay a visit to the although my religion does not control my life, it is very temple when I have some spare time. Going to the temple much a part of who and what I am – it helps to shape my allows me to reflect on my day – it offers a quiet place for identity. For example it influences the kind of food I eat, me to pray, as well as to meditate. Meditation is an Hindus do not eat beef as the cow is considered sacred. important part of my Hindu culture, the chanting of the It also influences the relationships I have formed through mantra ‘Aum’ or ‘Om’ meaning peace, is used as a way to university and working life. As a Hindu, I attended a relax and to clear the mind. Catholic school and pupils would attend Mass every week. I would also attend and this gave me the chance to As a young British Hindu my religion is very important to learn about another religion. It also gave me the me, and to many of my Hindu friends. We continue to opportunity to make new friends who had beliefs that learn and grow through the teachings of our religion and, were different to mine, and this was often a conversation as we grow older, we hope one day to raise our own starter when I was younger. As I have got older I have children with the same religious views and traditions. established friendships with many Hindus and non-Hindus. Through the teachings of Hinduism I have learned to treat Priya Tailor - Age 21

Priya and friends 14 5 1

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w e LIFESTORY • Dr. K Sultana Saeed

ALL IN GOOD

am a British Muslim - perhaps the first Asian/ Muslim woman in an all-white, virtually born in Poona, India, male domSinated Faculpty of Lawi. I started teaiching Pt ublic Law to where, irrespective of undergraduates and a whole package of Criminal Justice to rIace, religion or colour, all postgraduates. The package included ‘causes of crime’ to the friends and acquaintances of the family are addressed as aunties or sentencing process, also ‘white collar crime’ and ‘juvenile justice’. uncles. In the early 1960’s, as a young student, I came to University Simultaneously, as an Asian woman I was expected to change my College, London. My first memorable experience was of hearing ‘hat’ the minute I walked into my home. My priorities had to shift many different languages being spoken, especially on buses, and yet and follow a well established order in which my husband came this was the period in England when little cards in shop windows first, then children – in my case two very young daughters - then announced availability of accommodation with the rubric ‘sorry no the home and then my in-laws. My in-laws could decide to drop colour’! My peer group proved to be wrong in their assessment in from anywhere in the world, often without prior notice and that “such cards were not meant for Indians” as I found to my cost. usually during summer months when I would be busy marking, I decided to do something about this state of affairs and placed my preparing guidance notes, or trying to complete some research own card in a shop window stating ‘a dark student at a projects. On arrival they would take precedence over everything, prestigious University seeks accommodation, but including the children and the home. There were no short cuts only with an educated and enlightened English to this order. I was fortunate in that some help did come along family’. Three days later a concert pianist phoned me and in the shape of my mother, and for this I was very grateful, but it offered his newly decorated basement flat for 4 guineas (£4.40p) a was not an easy time. week. A particularly interesting thing about this was that the I also felt that it was my moral duty to support a local women’s musician husband was Jewish and his wife, a teacher of music, organisation. Having spoken at several women’s conferences and Christian. They were a warm and generous couple who became meetings, and talked to the younger generation it became clear adopted auntie and uncle to a Muslim student. After I married my to me that women, however uneducated in the western sense, fiancée my new found auntie and uncle visited us, and our friends, were mothers of the future generation, and so should be given at our flat, taking part in heated debates on hot topics of the time, the opportunity to voice their own opinions and their concerns: such as colonialism and the actions of President Nasser – all in the Prophet Mohammed’s [may peace be upon him] hadith does good spirit. Despite the sense of discrimination and exclusion not say only men should ‘acquire knowledge’ and I felt it promoted by the cards, the positive experience of this relationship important to promote this Islamic teaching in every sense. I prevented any kind of persecution complex from creeping in. endeavoured therefore to enable the women to reflect, to learn, Like many students I was very proud of my country of birth, and to debate - to have an open mind and not passively accept of her leaders who had struggled for independence, and so was preconceived ideas as truth and beyond questioning. taken aback when our Professor of International Law made what I have been fortunate to travel to and lecture in Universities in I felt were derogatory remarks about Pundit Nehru. I was countries such as Amsterdam, France, Germany, Greece, Poland shocked! I stood up, collected my books, and made straight for the and China. The Chinese visit to three provinces was organised exit door. When asked where I was going, I remarked with great by a professor colleague. Nine of us were in the party and each restraint: “I have not come 5000 miles to listen to all this…” (I one agreed to present a paper to the university. Having served refrained from saying “rubbish”) and I left the class, a very on a UK Parole Board I opted to speak on the Parole System in disillusioned and disappointed student. I had great hopes of moving UK. I was also extremely keen to see the Chinese prison regime forward with subjects like International Law and International in all three provinces of Beijing, Shanghai and Xian. All of these Relations, but this incident made me realise that although these visits were without prior announcement and I was greatly subjects were marvellous in their own right they were quite impressed at what we found. capable of being misused on the chessboard of power politics. In 1968 I was made a lecturer of law at the University of London 18 Dr. K Sultana Saeed • LIFESTORY

There was little doubt that every prison had a firing squad learning. It was the most rewarding period of my life, generating outside, but each prisoner was given three chances to reform. At an interest in the welfare of young people that has always stayed the same time each and every prisoner was given the with me. More recently, with a colleague from the Department opportunity of shining in whatever positive activities they chose of Statistics I carried out a project that examined the ‘Response for life outside prison. From operatic singing to learning to play of Asian children to law and order’ and I took the concept musical instruments; making electrical goods and all kinds of further when appointed a visiting scholar at the Institute of electrical gadgets; cane furniture to basket making, and sewing of Criminology, Cambridge. A colleague and I set up a pilot study socks. In other words plenty of good and relevant opportunity on behaviour modification of school children, interviewing some was provided. 500 children from 5 different schools with the aim of finding out Prisoners were able to deposit their earnings from the work – at the earliest possible stage - why children truant, why, so to they did in the prison Bank, but were also speak, they fall off the rails. required to send part of it home, and their I have been In 2006, working with a friend, we applied for commune were under obligation to take them concerned about our and received a Government grant for a project back on release. This was the common pattern. young people - and to gather the views of Young British Muslim We were expecting to witness so-called Chinese what I perceive to be Women [18-30] on the premise: “Islam my cruelty but we did not see cruelty as such. We the traumatised religion and Britain my country”. The aim of the do know however that the firing squad would go psyche of young project is to understand what it is that the into action if the three opportunities offered to Muslims, which does young women are looking forward to, both in the prisoner to reform were not taken up, this not seem to abate. their religion – Islam - and in their country - would be after a court ruling on the case [on Britain: and of particular interest to me - their request we were allowed to be present at one such ruling]. We views on the spiritual side of Islam - an aspect of religion that I were told that the average age of prisoners was 30 and under, feel is often missing in any discussion or debate, including and that the majority of them were found guilty of an ideological interfaith dialogue. In relation to this project I put very searching crime. Accordingly their education included learning about the questions, to do with the central message of Islam rather than ancients; the history of China; the different groups and minorities politics, to the Director-General of one of the largest Islamic within its boundaries and their contributions to its culture and Cultural Centres, and he answered these as patiently and as fully so on. The Chinese approach to their custodial regime has had as he could. He is keen that this interview material be produced the greatest impact on my thinking with regard to the successes in booklet form and made available at grass roots level. The CD and failures of our own prison system. on YBMW has been prepared will be distributed to participants From the time I arrived in Britain, and especially since the Iranian and other interested parties. revolution of 1979, I have been concerned about our young Whilst reflecting on my past experiences, I am conscious that it people - and what I perceive to be the traumatised psyche of is what I do today that is important for the future. I feel strongly young Muslims, which does not seem to abate. I am also that we cannot live in the past, however glorious, extensive or surprised at the rise in the most unusual criminality and the even tragic that past may have been. Despite trauma suffered, rising prison population, this despite the introduction of several despite the negative pictures of Islam, I know that it is my types of non-custodial sentences. With this concern of youth in responsibility to paint my own picture and the picture of Islam, mind I often reflect, when in the early 1960s, whilst still a student, by my own elevated thoughts, kind words and not just good I worked as a ‘supply’ teacher in different schools. This gave me a deeds but elevated deeds. I get a clear message from the Qur’an wonderful opportunity to learn about the education system and on this: “ Those are dear to Me who are best of also about the variation in schools from area to area, the conduct”. different needs of the pupils, and the quality of response to

In the final analysis, I know that I am directly responsible to my Creator as a human being, irrespective of my colour, religion, cast or gender. “You have come from Me and your return is back to Me” says Al- Qur’aan, so there is a Divine spark in all of us and it is up to me as to how I wish to return to my Creator, polluted with all the negative components like jealousy, hate, anger, revenge etc. or with the Divine Spark glittering brightly with elevated thoughts, words and deeds. It is easy to be born a Muslim but difficult to become a Muslim.

For further information please contact [email protected] 19 FORGIVENESS • Michael Lewin A JoINTuO HrEnALINeG y

SATURDAY EVENING, 10.30 PM, EAST LONDON…… difficulties with sleeping. I felt very vulnerable. My mind kept After a good meal, with some dear friends I decided to walk going over the event and I became increasingly outraged and home. I was only minutes into my journey when I was resentful for what had happened. The emotional need to stay confronted by a gang of Afro-Caribbean ‘ hoodies.’ I tried to attached to this anger however seemed to block my body’s defuse the situation by saying: “ Hi, you OK? ” when one of healing process. My mind was racing away thinking of retribution them came up from behind and hit me over the head with an and punishment for the culprit, and my body was sadly left behind iron bar. I collapsed to the ground dazed and confused, but like – ignored. Soon I reached a point when I could go no further, I a boxer in the ring on auto - pilot, I very quickly stood up and had to let go of my emotional attachments and allow healing into they disbanded. It all came as something of a shock. I made it my life…… home eventually, with the help of the police, and nursed my wounds. Over the next few days I realized I had sustained BUDDHISM: hearing loss on one side. I now live with the realization that I ANCIENT TEACHINGS FOR A MODERN WORLD could have been killed. I have always walked the streets of my neighbourhood with impunity but now I know the risks “ To be angry is to let other people’s involved. Life is a precious gift and I just feel so grateful that I’m mistakes punish you. To forgive other people still alive. is to be good to yourself.” Master Cheng Yen WHY VIOLENCE, WHY ME? Through my work with young offenders I have come to realize Buddhism, similar to other world religions, asks us to put aside there are many complex sociological and psychological reasons our feelings of anger and hate, resentment and rage in order to why unprovoked attacks of this nature are carried out. A diverse seek out the higher ground of forgiveness. It suggests that if we range of contributing factors that can set in motion one single go forward into this spiritual space we are released from a host act of violence, which even the perpetrator doesn’t fully of negative feelings that have the potential to damage our understand, leaving everyone bewildered, confused and very physical and mental health. But it does take time; we cannot angry. Certainly there are core social / psychological issues that prematurely try to reach out to forgiveness when it has not surface repeatedly in offenders’ lives, but it is too easy to reach ripened enough to do any good. We must give it space in order out for simplistic explanations in our search for understanding. to mature slowly then it can really do its work effectively in It’s all too easy to rationalize an offence as if we had perfect leading us away from our pain. During this period we may very perception and insight. We are all a complex mix of contradictory well take up different positions - from a begrudging sense of forces that feed into ever changing circumstances, so it is never partial acceptance to a full, unequivocal healing and this is quite clear how we will respond in any given situation. understandable. We must remember that forgiveness is not a Certainly much criminal behaviour is habitual, set in recidivist’s fixed, absolute ‘ state ‘ but rather a ‘ process ‘ that has to be patterns that become difficult to break, but we must never fall continuously worked at and in any given moment of forgetfulness into the trap of thinking there is an ‘ inevitability’ about this. Why we may very well slip back into negative states of mind. But someone resorts to a reckless, violent crime whilst others pull providing we work sincerely and genuinely on our quest, we will back I really don’t know. Why some cross unacceptable make headway. boundaries whilst other recognize and respect these markers I don’t know. Why I was attacked in the street by a stranger I don’t know, but one thing I’m certain of - it wasn’t personal. After this incident I had repeated headaches, jaw aches and

20 Michael Lewin • FORGIVENESS

The full magic of forgiveness gains its power from compassionate “ Accustomed long to contemplating love and understanding – empathy that does not judge or measure compassion I have forgotten the difference superficially but tries to seek out a deeper reality of cause and between myself and others.” effect. Gandhi thought that forgiveness was the preserve of the Milarepa strong, the courageous, who could go beyond their own sense of personal damage and reach out to others in an act of unification. CONCLUSION He saw forgiveness as a call to love that surrounds us; that We all make mistakes in life, we all get things wrong and when nourishes us. For without love, without full immersion in its healing we do what greater pleasure can we receive than an acceptance; waters, we are diminished, we become less than we could be. a reassuring acknowledgement that others can look beyond our In all the major religions the ability to forgive is considered one misdeeds and see something better in us. The biblical imperative of the greatest challenges we can face, and one of the richest of of “Hate the sin but love the sinner” suggests that the only thing treasures we can secure. This is because of the opportunity it that really separates any of us is our behaviour. Jesus is often offers for us to embrace something quite sacred, beyond our portrayed as loving sinners as much as his disciples, perhaps even individual concerns, beyond our strong sense of self, and who more so because they were seen as a challenge to his ministry - knows where this journey of forgiveness could lead? ‘unclaimed souls’ that had to be rescued. The Buddha, in a similar vein, always tried to reveal the innate Buddha-nature of REDEMPTION: MILAREPA’S STORY (1052 – 1135) everyone, irrespective of the misdeeds they had carried out. He As a young man Milarepa sought revenge on his relatives who always tried to look through their anger and pain, their had conspired to cheat his mother out of her inheritance after resentment and grief in order to discover the light of their the death of his father. We are told that through the use of bodhisattva potential. sorcery and black magic, which Milarepa’s mother encouraged him to take up, he had caused their death. We are also told that Milarepa was seriously troubled by his unskillful actions and this he committed other misdeeds, for instance the complete pushed him into finding salvation. The spiritual journey of destruction of food crops by inducing violent storms. Soon after redemption he undertook was long and arduous but he these events Milarepa started to have disturbing thoughts about persevered throughout to achieve liberation and if Milarepa the nature of his actions. He came to feel a deep-seated remorse (given the severity of his actions) could achieve this then perhaps for what he had done. Later he gained insight on the Dharma the ‘ hoodie, ‘ who hit me over the head can as well – I sincerely (Buddhist teachings) and sought repentance for his hope so…….. transgressions. Under the spiritual guidance of Marpa the Translator he was instructed to build a number of towers on a “ Just yesterday, the soul of a demon. remote mountain. When his work was finished he was then told This morning, the face of a bodhisattva. to pull them down again. Milarepa obeyed the instructions of his A demon. A bodhisattva… guru without question, and through the process of his training There is no difference.” quelled his hitherto fierce pride that had kept him locked in a Shigo cycle of reaction. Marpa eventually recognized the light of his disciple’s spiritual transformation and initiated him into the teachings of the Whispered Transmission School. The story of Milarepa tells us that after his Mother’s death, he meditated for twelve solitary years in a cave to eventually achieve spiritual breakthrough - supreme enlightenment. Thereafter Milarepa took up the life of a mendicant yogi, living a life of absolute poverty and austerity in the caves of Tibet, seeking out what was PEACE, JOY AND in his heart – the desire to teach and share the Dharma with CONTENTMENT TO ALL anyone who was prepared to listen. Often this took the form of singing songs, rather than reciting prose sermons, and today the SENTIENT BEINGS beauty of these songs are still preserved for us to study and admire for their wisdom and insights. This brutal, ruthless man - who eventually left behind his violent ways to tread the Buddhist path - is now revered as a arahant (saint) having taken his place amongst the great and noble in the Buddhist canon. 21 CIRCLING THE GLOBE • Zaki Cooper TOLERANCE, INTEGRAT&ION KOSHER CURRY The vibrant Jewish communities of India have declined - but live on in the diaspora

t was not surprising that a new restaurant in Bombay called their different histories, but they shared a desire to integrate into Hitler’s Cross and decorated with posters of the Führer and the societies of which they were part. Members of the Jewish Nazi swastikas would so outrage India’s Jews that it was community rose to prominent positions in the government, Iobliged to change its name. business, the judiciary and even the military. One of the most More surprising for many people was the news that India has a lionised was Major General Jack Jacobs, who led the Indian forces Jewish community at all. Being a descendant of that community I in the war of 1971 against Pakistan, which led to the creation of am used to this surprise. Visitors to my grandmother on festive Bangladesh. days are surprised by the scents of curry, which fill the home Religious life over hundreds of years centred around a number of instead of roast chicken, lockshen and pickled herring. What ornate and beautiful synagogues in the chief cities. Many still stand smells like an experiment in cross-cultural affairs is in fact a and are visited by those eager to explore their Jewish heritage. typical scene in a Jewish household from India. On a recent visit to the Magen David Synagogue in Calcutta, I My maternal grandmother was born in discovered that it is now surrounded by a Calcutta in 1913 and emigrated to the UK marketplace, whose traders treat the site with after the war. Her life story is one thread in Her life story is the reverence and respect that they accord to the fabric of a remarkable community. Though one of their own temples. best-known as the spiritual domain of millions one thread in Another institution of the community still of Hindus, Sikhs and Muslims, India was once the fabric of a standing is Nahum’s bakery in the heart of the the home to a thriving Jewish community. At New Market of Calcutta, which has supplied its height, between the world wars, the remarkable kosher patisserie and delicacies for several community numbered about 24,000, and was community generations and became a favourite with many found mainly in Bombay, Calcutta and Cochin. Bengalis. Though India’s Jews were a relatively small As Jews mixed in wider society, there was the community, their history and backgrounds expected rate of out-marriage, but the were remarkably various. My own ancestors went to Calcutta community strove to maintain its religious identity. It observed from Iraq and Syria from 1798 onwards, seeking opportunities in the major festival days, and weddings and community functions trade and commerce. These “Baghdadi Jews”, who settled mainly were invariably adorned by a rich variety of kosher Indian foods. in Bombay and Calcutta, identified strongly with the ruling British The community’s reputation for hospitality has been confirmed in their lifestyle. They spoke English at home, learnt Shakespeare by stories of visitors from the West arriving in India and finding in schools and increasingly all wore Western-style clothing. themselves so well looked after that they were reluctant to In contrast to the Baghdadis, the largest community in India was return home. the Bene Israel in Bombay, who tended to adopt the language, One elderly relative told me of an English rabbi who stayed with customs and dress of their Hindu neighbours, while retaining her family for several weeks in Calcutta, and quickly became a Jewish traditions. The state of Kerala in the south was the home great admirer of the community. to the third community, the “Cochini” Jews. They first came to the Another notable feature of the community was the absence of region en masse in the early Middle Ages for trade — although any persistent anti-Semitism. Jews in India enjoyed religious there is some evidence that in fact Jewish merchants first visited tolerance without the anti-Semitism that faced their brethren in India in Roman times. other parts of the world and they did not leave India because of These different communities, the Baghdadis, Bene Israel and any persecution, but because they were lured by the prospect of Cochinis, may have been hundreds of miles apart and divided by living in a Jewish homeland after 2,000 years of Jewish exile.

22 Art Exhibition • what’s on

From 4 May until 26 July Angela Schütz will be exhibiting works in oil and pastels in the City of n London at the Bookshop Gallery of The London

Centre for Spirituality at the Church of St Edmund o the King in Lombard Street. Opening hours are

Monday to Friday 10am to 6pm, admission is free. d The exhibition shows snapshots of the artist’s n inner journey over the last 6 years: o L

“I believe that images are the language of the soul and

that using this language allows us to get in touch and f communicate with the hidden parts of ourselves. For

Cochin Synagogue built 1568: photo Richard Todd me this ‘soul communication’ is a way of getting in o Others were nervous after the withdrawal of the British and the touch with my Inner Light. It helps me to remember rise of Indian independence and decided to seek a new life who I am and discover who I might become. Letting y elsewhere, often in the UK or Western countries such as the US my pictures ‘speak’ at an exhibition is an invitation to t i and Australia. the viewer to get in touch with their own world of Now there are only about 5,500 Jews in India, 4,500 of them in imagery and shine a light on the truth that might be revealed.” C Bombay, and the communities of Calcutta and Cochin have only a handful of people remaining: the Passover Seder service in Cochin in April was expected to be the last authentic one to take http://insightsart.blogspot.com e

place there. h

Meanwhile, the community in Bombay, supplemented by the t tourist traffic, still has a few functioning synagogues. One of the

ironies of the decline of the Indian Jewish community is that it has n coincided with an influx of hedonistic young Israelis into the i country, seeking relief from the pressures of life at home. It is estimated that there are 30,000 young Israelis in India at any n given time. o

The Indian Jewish diaspora in the UK maintains many of the i cultural and religious customs of the community. In my family t i conversations are sprinkled with Hindustani words, and our

Sabbath meals often resemble the food at our local curry house. b i These traditions are proudly maintained — and in recent months

a new Indian kosher restaurant has opened in London. h The illustrious history of the community has been used to x promote ties between the Jewish and Hindu communities in the E UK with such initiatives as the formation of the Indian Jewish

Association, which focuses on the shared values of the t communities. A recent example was the reaction of the UK r Jewish community to the Bombay bombings, which prompted expressions of solidarity and fundraising. A The Jewish community was never more than a drop in the vast

ocean of a country with a population now of a billion, yet its s

contributions to India and the Jewish world went beyond its t numbers. Those looking for a model of coexistence and h integration would do well to examine the story of this diverse,

vibrant and successful group, which lives on in diaspora g communities around the world. i s

This article first appeared in The Times 26th August 2006 n 23 I opinion • Umm Hanie’ Rebler MaThe rginalisation

t the time of the Prophet Muhammad (may peace and Throughout the Qur’an continual reference is made to ‘the blessings be upon him) when the Qur’an was first believing men and the believing women’: thus men and women revealed, it was quite natural for the women to pray are addressed as equals. An example of this can be found in the Abehind the men. Women were not segregated as they are today following verse: in upstairs rooms, or made to pray behind a curtain or partition, ‘The Believers, men a situation which occurs in so many mosques today. In our time, And women, are protectors, in most mosques throughout the Arab world, Turkey, Pakistan, One of another: they enjoin Indonesia and Malaysia, there is a separate entrance for women What is just, and forbid which leads to their ‘quarters’ somewhere away from the men’s. What is evil: they observe In most mosques men and women do not even see each other Regular prayers, practise but go their separate ways before, during and after the prayer. Regular charity, and obey God and His Apostle. Social interaction between men and women is discouraged in On them will God pour his mercy:.. .’ 1 Islam, and yet at the time of the Prophet Muhammad the women played an active part in society. They were considered equal at The Prophet even went so far with his reforms for women that home, went into battle as warriors with their men, as well as some of his companions spoke out openly against his policy of looking after the wounded. The Prophet’s wives taught and gave raising their status and of treating them kindly. He even made advice to the new Muslims. Aisha, his young wife, was an expert arrangements for the education of women. Unfortunately, these in Islamic jurisprudence and gave counselling to both men and reforms were not carried further after the Holy Prophet’s women after his death and many hadiths are based on her death, but rather old, patriarchal attitudes took over. Indeed, testimony. At the time when Islam was at its greatest height in the situation has remained relatively static until today. In many Baghdad, when scientific discovery, astronomy, music and the arts cases the position of women has even taken a backward step in were flourishing, a great woman Sufi saint, Rabi’a al Adawiya was comparison to the leaps ahead which the Prophet instituted. much sought after by the theologians of the day for her wisdom This tendency towards regression has taken place because of and saintly presence. the way in which the Qur’an has been interpreted in any particular period or according to the role which tradition plays in any particular society. There will always be men who seek to gain power over women, who explain the Qur’an according to their lights, bringing in new rules to denigrate and oppress them. In my opinion, however, it behoves a woman to be the possessor of an enquiring mind and to find out about her rights. Muslims are enjoined to ‘Seek knowledge, even if you have to go as far as China’ 2: this means Muslim women as well as Muslim men. During the centuries following the Prophet’s death with Islam’s expansion into areas such as Persia, India and Byzantium, many cultural institutions were taken over from these areas, such as veiling and the seclusion of women. Scholars and theologians interpreted Qur’an and hadith so as to segregate women and keep them away from the sphere of men. This can be observed very much today in that more radical interpretations of Islam abound which women unfortunately do not question. This phenomenon of the marginalisation of women can be observed very much with regard to women’s space in mosques. The Messenger of God said, “Do not prevent the maid- servants of God from going to the mosque.” 3

24 Umm Hanie’ Rebler Umm Hanie’ Rebler • opinion of Women

We always used to attend a nearby mosque where we live in Germany. There are few mosques here built in the Arab or Turkish style, with a gallery upstairs for women so they can hear and see what is going on. The mosques in Germany have mostly been taken over from old warehouses, office blocks and factories h t

and are set back from the road in inner courtyards, according to i a F

n

the old German style of building of the time. The women are i

s r e

relegated to a room somewhere upstairs where they are t s i compelled to hear the sermon and prayers through a S loudspeaker, which may not always work, or which crackles and custom for the women to pray behind the men. This form of distorts the measured tread of the Qur’anic recitations. The men communal prayers can still be found in some mosques in Turkey. seem to be totally unaware of, or indifferent, to this. The imam Sometimes there is a thin curtain separating the sexes. Indeed, I prays in front of them, so they can hear quite well in their part of would not have even minded a curtain partitioning a space for us the mosque. The men’s part is often decorated with fine mosaics women at the back of the mosque. In the end it became more and calligraphy around the prayer niche and minbar (pulpit), with and more clear that I was not welcome. As I had spent enough oriental hanging lamps to make it more inviting as a place of time sitting upstairs by myself with the door closed, I decided to prayer. On feast days there is often no room at all for women. stay away like the rest of my sisters. Over the centuries men have The men take over the whole mosque at that time, requiring interpreted Qur’an and hadith to suit their particular ideas and women to stay at home. to give emphasis to the restrictions which they impose on Our mosque has had a succession of different nationalities women. Practices were similar in Europe before the 20th century administering it and worshipping in it. It was first run by Turks, when women were not allowed at universities and into then by Bosnians, and subsequently by Kurds, who were gentlemen’s clubs. extremely patriarchal, one could even say misogynist. In fact, Our mosque was at its best during the Bosnian period, which during their administration there was not a single woman to be lasted for ten years. The Bosnians practise a form of Islam which seen on the premises. Now the mosque has been taken over by appeals more to our European way of thinking. Their more Pakistanis. Unfortunately, our Pakistani brothers seem to believe ‘normal’ way of relating between the sexes is easier for us in complete purdah, so we women are obliged to stay upstairs in converts to accept. At that time the imam celebrated Dhikr our room, which also doubles as a classroom for children to every Thursday evening for the men, and I was allowed to learn the Qur’an. It is neither very comfortable nor attractive, participate, sitting at the back of the mosque. During Ramadhan with its tables and chairs piled up at one end of the room and its the women’s section was always full. Many young Bosnian women loudspeaker, which does not always relay what is going on came, simply but elegantly dressed in long skirts and attractively downstairs. bound, matching headscarves. There was a great sense of We used to perform our Dhikr (Remembrance of God) once a excitement as we looked forward to the tarawih prayers and to fortnight in the mosque. I was the only woman taking part so I fellowship. Additionally, we women used to meet once a week in sat downstairs at the back, where I was able to hear the surahs the mosque to talk about aspects of Islam, read the Qur’an and during the prayers and take part in the Dhikr . The Pakistani men to learn more about our religion. We prayed together, ate did not really approve of my being there, and even pointed out together and during Ramadhan and festive occasions we joined to my husband during the ceremony that I should go upstairs. the men downstairs in the cafeteria. Everyone interacted in a However, the brothers of other nationalities did not consider it friendly and respectful manner. There was no feeling of us women right that I should spend the whole time alone upstairs doing being unwelcome during the ‘Bosnian period’. Perhaps this Dhikr to the accompaniment of a microphone. I knew that if I illustrates that the differences are cultural rather than Islamic. gave in to these ideas of purdah then all of us women would be Strict interpretations of scripture or even cultural distortions do confined to the upstairs room. As we wanted to attract all not really further integration and understanding between East nationalities to the mosque, particularly Germans who might be and West. interested in learning more about Islam, it did not bode well if no women took part. At the time of the holy Prophet, it was the 1 The Holy Qura’an Surah Tauba verse 71. 2 Hadith, reported by Anas. 3 Hadith, Muslim No. 888 (See also nos. 884-891 and Bukhari Vol. 1, Nos. 824,832) 25 language of art • Caroline Jariwala Personal searching

For me there is nothing more wonderful or satisfying than to see a child creating a painting: it is so natural for him or her to freely enter a world of fantasy and colour. Born in England of Indian parentage, colour and texture has always been a part of my life, and I have many happy memories of painting, collaging, drawing, colouring-in and gluing(!) at infant school. In the 1970’s, before the formation of a national curriculum, art at my school was used as a natural expression of self-development. My love of painting was very much encouraged by my parents, and their support was paramount to my obtaining an arts degree. I particularly value their backing since youngsters can often be discouraged from taking arts courses instead of more job-centred studies. Working in schools is an important aspect of my work as an artist, I get a great buzz from working with children. I find that as a visiting artist they respond with a sense of curiosity, and I feel able to encourage and challenge the pupils in a new and dynamic way. I am there to bring out the best in them – I tell them that there is no such thing as a bad or a good artist. I enthuse them as much as I can, helping to empower them so that they become more confident in who they are, and what they can achieve. In the past my paintings focused on everyday Hindu rituals, customs and festivals prevalent in Gujarati culture. But now my work has gradually become more about spirituality, experimenting in a variety of medium such as acrylic on canvas, gold paint and charcoal. Being bought up as a nominal Hindu and then becoming a Christian I began to look at the commonalities between Christianity and the Hindu faith, finding universal themes between the two. However, my spirituality is now grounded in Quaker beliefs and practice.

Cartwright Hall, Bradford - Radiant Dance Floor Project. Working with Hollingwood Primary School, St. Joseph’s Catholic College and Parkside High School. Images were used from the Transcultural Gallery, Cartwright Hall’s collection of contemporary South Asian British arts. These drawings were the basis of three 5ft sq. dance floor mats painted at the schools. It was from these designs that I drew inspiration for the large dance floor measuring 15’ x 22’ that can be used in a variety of art settings. 26 Caroline Jariwala • language of art

Victoria Community School: Burton on Trent - The focus of this project was a Bengali folk tale Jamil’s Clever Cat. I worked with Years 1-6 creating a batik wall hanging that is now on display in the school’s foyer.

My spiritual path has, to my mind, come full circle with the Quaker belief of acknowledging: ‘that of God in everyone’ fusing so beautifully with Hindu spirituality, encapsulated within the greeting Namaste’ “the God within me blesses and greets the God within you”. Today I have the pleasure of leading art projects in primary and secondary schools, museums, art galleries and community venues across the country. My own spiritual journey has influenced the way in which I work with children and adults, and I design workshops to nurture confidence in making art as a tool to represent personal feelings, journeys and development.

Caroline’s paintings and ‘artist in residence’ projects can viewed on www.carolinejariwala.com

Holte High School, Birmingham Creative mind maps using oil, pastel and paint. A major project aimed to link the Art and Science Departments using the curriculum as the base. Images Wolverhampton Art Gallery - RAINBOW and symbols in science were married with designs familiar Rangoli project using fruit, vegetables and pulses. to the pupils who originate from over 35 countries.

Caroline will be showing one of her paintings - Tara’s Prayer – at DACS (Design & Artists Copyright Society) New Members Exhibition running from 10th May until 31st August: 33 Great Sutton Street, London EC1V 0DX Tel: 0207 336 8811 www.dacs.org.uk Viewing by appointment only. 27 poem • Alan Horner My Mwaots hneort most pleased

My mother was not most pleased that I, a schoolboy, barely 10 years old, should be shown my friend’s dead aunt, who lay at home in bed.

My first encounter with the dead; I sensed the need for quiet, as children do, and stood a while, and tiptoed out again, respectful, unperturbed.

Then or since, I never knew why my mother was not most pleased, for I had learnt with gentleness a fact of life.

© Alan Horner From: A picture with the paint still wet: A collection of poems by Alan Horner 2005 Revaph Publications

28 Sikh • SCRIPTURE

When the baby chose the abode of womb, its mother’s Extract from devotional and thanksgiving hymn on the heart blossomed naming of a child.

GGS p.396-Satguru sache dia bhej-Rag with joy Asa.5th Guru (translated by Charanjit Ajit Singh)

Lorna Rae • BOOK LAUNCH

THE FIRE WITHIN Sermons from the Edge of Exile Dr Allan Boesak ISBN 978 1 905 010 38 7 2007 Wild Goose Publications ( www.ionabooks.com ) £10.99 PBK 170pp

fter a long drought, Allan Boesak has come up with a new book of his sermons. Its release indicates that he has not been paralysed by what may have been tAraumatic experiences in his recent past and which may have made him feel at the ‘edge of exile’. On the contrary, the title suggests that he was burning to say what he felt should be said. And he continued to do that when opportunities presented themselves and from the platform that he knows best, namely the present manifestations of racism, of the the pulpit. Through this publication, the contents of his sermons widening discrepancy between the rich and the poor, HIV/Aids, become available to a broader audience. homosexuality etc in South Africa. In dealing with the status quo Allan Boesak has not been, and will not be, silenced by the regarding these issues, he does not only challenge national circumstances that surround him. It could not be done during inequities, but also the global threats of war, environmental the years of political oppression and it has not happened even degradation, and the graceless powers responsible for them. during the first ten years of democracy and the controversies Dr Allan Boesak, a major national and international figure in the that surrounded his person in recent times. In the past he was South African political struggle of the 1970s, ’80s and ’90s, was dauntless in his exposition of the Word to the injustice of United Democratic Front leader, an ANC politician and human apartheid. In these sermons he identifies and makes the Word rights activist. He is the recipient of twelve honorary doctorates speak to the issues of injustices that seem to have remained and several international awards. Theologian and pastor of a unattended and sometimes have, perhaps conveniently, not been local church, he remains an acute political observer and cultural brought to the table of transformation. The Fire Within includes critic of South African life.

APOLOGY As writer of the article about the Bah á’í Fast (issue 16) I would like to apologise sincerely for the error I made in the article. The age after which the Fast is no longer required of believers is 70 and not 75 as stated. In particular I wish to apologise to all Baha’is between the age of 70 and 75 who might have been upset or inconvenienced by this error. Joy Sabour 29 Youth INITIATIVE • Leila Abuhilal s

e Completing the circle c n each thing I do I look to be creative, and that can either Lately things had become easier, but he stuck to safe i be in my own artistic explorations or in guiding other sentences. This person stood in front of this particular painting o artists in their’s: I think of myself as a creative art worker. I - an oil landscape - and as we gathered around him, he read out v Iam part of a company called Bluestreak Arts, where I am the his words: Community and Outreach Officer. As part of my role I write

g ‘the desperate abyss was cut with boulders and and facilitate creative projects for a wide range of community darkness, cascading to the river below, a tiny n groups. light by the tree sits before the mountain……’

u Recently I was facilitating a creative writing workshop with a

o group of National Health Service’ mental health service users. I was shocked, surprised and humbled by what I heard: I was in We visited our local art gallery, each carrying a note pad and awe because his description was perfect and beautiful. It y a pen. I encouraged the participants to walk into the imposing seemed that all he needed, to go at least some of the way to space with eyes wide open - not only to the beautiful, and the overcoming his problems, was to stand before a landscape of not-so-beautiful, old and modern paintings around us, but also oils! to the architecture and the rays of light emanating through the I’m constantly surprised at how many people are bursting with windows. All our senses were attuned to the sights and sounds creative energy, but never let it burst out and flow: all they of everything and everybody around us. need is encouragement and a safe space in which to do it. We reached our destination when, by consensus, we found a When I lead a workshop I always have in mind the painting that made us all stop, turn and look: - each making a completeness of a circle, and the harmony of mind, body and note of the words that came to mind on first seeing the spirit. I try to convey that the mind should be free to express painting. There was a man in the group who normally says very itself, uninhibited by the constraints that our lifestyle and belief little, and when he first came to my workshop he would barely systems have imposed upon us. My art is never directed at, write a sentence: his lack of confidence and the effort of or from, a certain faith, but it is always about positive energy, concentration creating an inner battle for him that lead to circles and equality, recognition of different creative talents and headaches and confusion. each artist’s worth.

Bluestreak Arts is a creative and community arts company based in Preston, Lancashire. We deliver creative art workshops, long and short-term projects, events etc. We work with any community group, individual or organisation. We have a wide pool of Associate Artists enabling us to deliver anything from music production, fine and visual art, creative writing, photography, film and music, theatre to story- telling, fashion and graphic design and street art. If you are interested in any workshops, looking for a project or interested in working with us, you can contact myself: Leila on 01772555478 or email: [email protected]

30 Raana Bokhari • FAITH & LEADERSHIP ‘Blessed Is He Whose Speech Is Remembrance Of God’

Malcolm X said: ‘the revolution we need is a revolution of the mind’ (p.13, Malcolm X, the Great Photographs, Thulani Davis, New York, Stewart Tabori and Chang, 1993). His words cannot be more appropriate today.

e are living in a wonderful world and each day is a And all this I do with the intention that they need to walk the gift from the Creator: but by the same token, we earth in peace, with love, in reverent contemplation and regard, are living in a world that exhibits acute chaos and for both the Creator and all His created. Needless to say then Wdiscord, rather than peace and harmony. Frankly, I am frightened that I am frightened, that one day, they may not be able to deal to be raising my children in this world. My days are spent with the chaotic and discordant world they have inherited from cherishing my children, feeding their bodies with good our generation. nourishment, expanding their minds as sites of responsible It is contrary to the human spirit to be despondent and learning, nourishing their souls with calm, love and remembrance. pessimistic, and it has always been against my nature to wallow in negativity. But the questions that consume me these days are: “what are we turning our world into?” and “when exactly did we lose respect for each other?”. Britain is an ideal place in which to be living: we are a mixed society because we walk in different skin colours, we talk in a multitude of languages, and live by a host of different beliefs. This very diversity is the beauty of our society. Yet my fear is that we are losing the art of acceptance – I do not say ‘art of tolerance’ because I find it offensive to think that I might only be able to ‘tolerate’ somebody (rather like tolerating a bad smell). No! I mean the art of existing in harmony with each other - where we cherish, value, and love the differences in people, safe in the knowledge of who we are, safe in the knowledge that the Maker loves us all regardless. My fear has grown out of what may seem relatively small incidents in the greater scheme of things – arguments about veiling; offensive cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him), inappropriate statements made by Pope Benedict XVI and other issues where huge coverage is given by and through the media. Too many words are spoken and written around these subjects on all sides, some with a malicious intent and others without thought of the consequences. Little is said that will further understanding or promote peaceful coexistence. As a Muslim British woman I feel the time has come for restraint, even possibly a responsible silence.

31 FAITH & LEADERSHIP • Raana Bokhari

I am not, I must stress, advocating silence as passivity, as ‘The depth of Rabi’a’s sincerity acted as a protection for her in cowardice, and as an alternative to speaking out for justice. What an often insecure world… she could not have led the public life I am advocating, is that perhaps we really ought to think before that she did had she not been “veiled by the veil of sincerity”.’ we speak, about the consequences of our talk, both in the That is, because she exercised a holistic turning towards God, a specific contexts, but more widely in a global context. That is, if life in the constant presence of God, every thought, action and all speech were thought through, in the shade speech was considered preordained, hence of the presence of the Divine, in the belief that holy. And in that, silence was considered a Godliness ought to manifest through the saviour. Perhaps Rabi’a would have taught us tongue as love and restraint, through the many things if she walked amongst us today. hands as love and restraint, then I really would ”veiled by However, we must be people of hope, forever not be worrying today about the world in optimistic. So we thank God for the messages which I am raising my children. For religion, the veil of he constantly sends in the form of Prophets language and culture would not be seen as and wise people. Malcolm X reminded us that barriers but as enriching entities - as signs of sincerity” if we could change our minds, our homes, then the wondrous creation of God. we could affect a revolution of change, of This thought of unconditional kindness and dignity, space and privacy for all. The Prophet life being a constant act of prayer, takes me to Muhammad encouraged people to not the world of Rabi’a al-Adawiyya (717-801), who is central to the concern themselves with matters that were not their business. Sufi tradition for her synthesis of theology and ascesis (self He further said, ‘blessed is he whose speech is remembrance of discipline). Most of the knowledge that we have of her is based Allah, whose silence is meditation and whose speculation is on biographies written at a later period, but we do know about learning lessons.’ 3 That is, we should not speak about anything her infamous ‘spiritual jousting’ with Hasan al-Basra in which she unless it is necessary. And even when it is necessary, we should was always depicted as victorious. Seemingly as an aged scholar do so sparingly. ‘This is because speech is of the nature of the Hasan al-Basra found it difficult to synthesise theology and ego, and as long as the ego is speaking, it will predominate over ascetics, but with her youthful mind Rabi’a found it a natural the Spirit. When, however, it keeps silent and silence becomes its marriage. nature, we know that the spirit has predominated over the ego, For Rabi’a affirmation of divinity was not a verbal exercise, but and that it is the spirit which is speaking’. 4 one of turning her whole life and consciousness towards that ‘The spirit is the locus of Lordly knowledge and the ego is the one deity in sidq , sincere love. Sincerity was not compatible with locus of wandering in the empty sites of the created. . . One acting out of hope for reward or fear of punishment. She should not look at created beings, however, unless one sees them rejected the entire edifice of reward and punishment. The most as part of Allah’s making.’ 5 well known anecdote is of her running down a path with fire in one hand and water in the other, saying she wished to burn If all of us looked upon others as a sign of the Paradise and douse the fires of Hell, so that no-one would ever Divine breath, His perfect creation, there would love God except with pure love. She was asked if she hated be no need to talk hurtfully, unnecessarily. There Satan, and replied, no, for she was too busy loving God to think would be no need for me to worry about the about Satan. 1 This sincere love was linked with the concept of world my children are growing up in. tawakkul – trust in God – which had to be absolute, with no planning or fear for the future. The result, whilst appearing to be abstract, is one of acceptance – rida – absolute acceptance of the divine will. But this was active acceptance, not passive fatalism. Rabi’a was not fatalistic, but Raana Bokhari believed that even to ask for anything in prayer would be wrong, PhD student University of Cambridge Research and Development Officer, Lancaster University as God already knew what she would ask for and would already have decided her future. What is important for me is that all this 2 points towards the loss of the ego-self. 1. (p.436, Michael Sell, in Great Thinkers of the Eastern World , ed. I. P. McGreal, New York, Harper Collins, 1995). 2. (p.437) 3. (p.70. The Adab of the True Seeker , trans. Mokrane Guezzou, Leicester, Viator Books, 2006). 4. (p.71) 5. (p.72). 32 Martin Conway • INTERFAITH ENCOUNTER

TOGETHER IN n a d a m a R

q i r a T

A REVIEW OF PROFEPSSOR TrARIaQ RAcMADtANi’S AcDDe RESS IN AND TO EAST OXFORD

n November 15th 2006 our Anglo-Asian Association Whoever we are, and whatever faith we represent, it is up to us for Friendship in East Oxford arranged an evening in to change the present into something better, but we can never which two speakers would assume that it is going to be easy. In relation Oaddress the key question: How can our to the episode of the cartoons published in communities best work together? One was Denmark, which caused so much offence, Professor Tariq Ramadan the other was our It is unhelpful the answer is not to demand censorship: county’s Lord Lieutenant, the Queen’s freedom of speech is an important right. representative, Mr Hugo Brunner. We were to insist on Rather, argue that freedom is tempered by glad also to be able to enjoy a partnership blaming respect for the others and their sensitivities. with the Central Oxford Mosque which It is unhelpful to insist on blaming someone stands in the heart of our part of the city, someone else. else. More creative to critique our own through its chairman, Mr Altaf Hussain. laziness in discovering what we can do Some 150 people attended, a good balance together that would enable us to learn those between Asian and Anglo, between male and sensitivities. When you feel provoked, don’t female, between older and younger. We were all unmistakably react with anger, but go on raising respectfully the real, the tough excited and stimulated by what we heard. Mr Brunner spoke questions about what has been done, and how it helps – or fails briefly about the contribution of the monarchy to our total to – the needs and difficulties we face. society, providing an interesting insight not least by the fact that In particular, never deny that we need to deal with one another’s we never know exactly what the Queen thinks about any of the fears. All my life, Prof Ramadan said, I have been a European questions being toughly debated among our politicians. Muslim, living among people who are scared about Islam. The star of the evening however was Professor Tariq Ramadan Whether we like it or not, these must be taken seriously as real who began his address by stressing the importance of the fears. Here in Britain, with lots of Muslims becoming visible – and question. If we in Oxford, he said, could find ways of helping to there are likely to be even more in future - it is normal for British build a successful pluralist society, this would become a model for people to raise doubts and questions. Anyone watching the TV much of the wider Western world. He also insisted that while news at all often will be seeing an horrific, threat-filled world, so he would be trying to open for us ways of mutual understanding, don’t just seek to dampen down those fears, still less avoid what is really crucial is what we can do together in practice, not mentioning them. We have to work on them together, doing our just in theory. best to change the situation of mutual distrust, and to promote a So he offered us four main suggestions: : revolution in the assumptions and ideas we each and all start We must acknowledge that we are dealing with sensitive issues. with.

33 INTERFAITH ENCOUNTER • Martin Conway

An important step is to be able to listen attentively to what the Keep making opportunities, especially in schools, to raise other is saying. This is true both for those who have long been questions, however blunt or tricky, as also for responding to British and for those who have come here more recently. So them. “Do you Muslims want to Islamize the whole of Europe?” don’t hide whatever fears or questions you may have – use a may sound like the rude and hostile question it usually is, but it meeting like this to raise them, so that you can go home having deserves a careful and substantial answer, for instance, my at least begun to realise how you might be able to make some purpose as a Muslim is first and foremost to serve peace, not to positive changes. Don’t let any of us stay, as it were, locked up in force anyone else into something I have thought of. It is our own ghettos – as dangerous for the age-old British as for the important for all of us to be honest, open and clear about the newly arrived Muslims. Never fear trying to get some shared values we are committed to. Only with this as a normal part of activity at the local level going. our conversations between communities and cultures, let alone Prof. Ramadan mentioned that when he studied in Leicester a faiths, will we build a mutually respectful and satisfying society. good many years ago, things around him in British society had So our efforts could well go into occasions for debate and seemed entirely peaceful, but when he came back just after July dialogue, in the first instance for its own sake, but hoping that it 7th 2005 there were many fears around, and many questions would soon lead into shared and common action. about just how far the Muslims who had Or we can begin to walk and work together arrived over the last 20 or 30 years had on whatever are the real problems affecting become truly ‘British’. Was there not far Keep making us. These could include unemployment, or too much of each community living in its opportunities, racism (still horribly powerful in today’s own ghetto, with not only a lack of real especially in Britain). Whatever any of us see as the real understanding of the other but also a lack of problems deserve to be spoken about, so self-knowledge and self-awareness, which schools, to raise that we can help each other face up to these greatly adds to the vicious circle of mistrust. questions, real questions, and so banish the He admitted that in today’s situation, the however blunt Islamophobia that can so easily be aroused. term ‘Britishness’ has become very difficult or tricky. In particular, when any of us speak of ‘rights’, to define, but insisted that this should not let’s be sure that we are thinking and pointing mean we cannot build much better to what are ‘rights’ for everyone here, not awareness of each other, and therefore just of our own. much more self-confidence in each community. Education , he In conclusion, Prof Ramadan spoke of the need to create a new insisted, is the key . sense of who ‘we’ are. When we use that little word, are we Of course we all start by supposing that it is normal to stay thinking and speaking of all of us, working together across the among our own type of people. But we now need to be dealing ghetto lines and coming together to discover what values can with the other, reaching out across the frontiers of our ghettos hold us together? Or do we slip into the easy assumption that and creating many more contacts. ‘the others’ are ‘different’, so that our ‘we’ is the limited one? So we need to decide in which field we are going to go to work. Every time you find yourself saying a ‘we’, check who you are As long as it is local, something that the people around you will counting in and who out. Remember that we all have multiple see to be worthwhile, then it can be in any area of life and identities: I myself, he said, am a Swiss by citizenship, a Muslim by concern as long as it builds up trust and mutual knowledge. religion, a European by education, an Egyptian by family memory, It could for instance be in education. Parents will do well to ask and a Moroccan by adoption - and delighted to be so! Let the themselves: “how can we help our kids to handle this society, to society we create together be one that allows for and build up their own confidence in trusting the sorts of ‘Britishness’ encourages us all to have these multiple identities and so to be they will find around them?” He told of the moment when, as a able to contribute the best of all of them to our common future. youngster in a family beginning their new life in Paris, his parents And in answer to a question about the difficulty of ‘integration’, had given him a book of French poems. he responded: Don’t let yourself be bothered about your Speaking to the Anglos present he asked: “How deeply have you integration but on what can be your contribution . No one in accepted that much has changed in Britain from earlier times? France would have dreamed of asking Zinadine Zidane where he Can there be only one single memory determining the history was from – the whole country could not but be aware of his and nature of today’s Britain? Are there not multiple memories? contribution as a superb asset ! If you don’t remember me in your past, how can you allow me into your present?”

Martin Conway is Co-Chair of the Anglo-Asian Association for Friendship in East Oxford 34 Anon • POEM

BBeelINli iYeOevUveRe SELF BeliBelieeve in yvourselfe to the depth of your being. Nourish the talents your spirit is freeing. Know in your heart when the going gets slow that your faith in yourself will continue to grow. Don’t forfeit ambition when others may doubt. It’s your life to live; you must live it throughout. Learn from your errors; don’t dwell in the past. Never withdraw from a world that is vast. Believe in yourself; find the best that is you. Let your spirit prevail; steer a course that is true.

ANON

35 CHAPLAINCY • Ven Ajahn Khemadhammo (Chao Khun Bhavanavitayt) OBE y c n i a

l Angulimala p

a n a couple of months I will have been doing Buddhist We chose to call our new organisation after a rather

h prison chaplaincy for thirty years. It all began in 1977 colourful character who lived at the time of the Buddha and when I came back to this country with my teacher Ajahn became one of his eminent disciples. The story goes that he C IChah. I had been with him in NE Thailand in forest was of good family and a student at Taxila, the Oxbridge of monasteries under his guidance since early 1972 and when India, where his accomplishments so inflamed the jealousy he was invited to London for a two month visit I came too. of his peers that they poisoned the mind of their teacher It happened that the old Hampstead Buddhist Vihara where against him, to the extent that what must have been thought we stayed was the address the Prison Service then had as an impossible honorarium was demanded. Before the boy its Buddhist contact. We had not long been there when could graduate he had to to supply the teacher with a letters came from Pentonville and Parkhurst Prisons and we thousand right-hand little fingers. To everyone’s amazement had a call from the chaplain at Holloway. instead of giving up our diligent young They all wanted someone to visit their It also student set off to get the fingers and Buddhist prisoners and to be what was commence a career as a bandit and then called the Buddhist Visiting demonstrates perhaps the world’s first known serial Minister. There was no one else and it that real change killer. As he cut the fingers from his interested me, so I responded. Then on dead and dying victims, he added them a train to Portsmouth on the Saturday comes through to a string that he wore round his neck of Jubilee Weekend I asked Ajahn Chah’s persuasion and – and so he was called, Angulimala, permission and he answered with one ‘finger necklace’. Then when he had word - ‘Go!’ And so I’ve been going to example. 999 fingers round his neck he met the prisons ever since. Buddha. At first he saw only the last In the beginning I thought there were finger and wanted to kill the Buddha just a handful of prisons in this country. How wrong I was. but strangely he couldn’t catch him, even though the Buddha Pretty quickly I began to collect appointments to prisons all was just quietly strolling through the forest. He shouted to over the place as men I had been seeing in one were the Buddha to stop and the Buddha turned and replied that transferred to another and I dutifully followed. In time I he had stopped and that now it was for Angulimala to stop, interested one or two of my supporters and with their help to stop killing and harming. In the end Angulimala threw in 1985, Angulimala, the Buddhist prison Chaplaincy was away his weapons and went with the Buddha back to the launched. With such a diversity of Buddhist schools and monastery as a monk. Then the King arrived on a mission groups here in the UK I had to make sure that we had a to arrest Angulimala but when he found out what had wide ranging support and I spent some time developing that happened he said to the Buddha, ‘It is wonderful, it is as we began to recruit members and potential Buddhist marvellous, what we have failed to do by force and with chaplains. From the outset I was determined to maintain a weapons, you have accomplished with neither force nor good standard and I recognised the importance of leading weapons!’ And he left Angulimala to live out his life as a by example. We also determined not to emphasise any one monk and to become an Arahant, a pure and enlightened school but to offer an approach and style that would be being. useful to everyone.

36 7 Chaplaincy 3 Y C N I A L P A H C •

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n a Tpoem cHalled TheE Toys, C ovePntry PEatmore, Rthe hSave witnIessSed a tranTsformatEion in theN family Cunit overE the Victorian writer, tells how he once struck his disobedient past twenty years or so with more one-parent families, and motherless child and sent him off to bed ‘unkiss’d’. second marriages and those choosing not to marry at all. ILater, feeling guilty, he went to see how the boy was. He Although social and economic circumstances have changed, found him asleep with some possessions placed on a table emotionally, family ties are still as important as ever no nearby: a box of counters, a red-vein’d stone, a piece of glass matter what the family’s shape or size. ‘abraded by the beach’, some shells, a bottle with bluebells; I think this goes some way to shed light on what is and ...two French copper coins, ranged there with careful otherwise a puzzling phenomenon – the persistence of art, To comfort his sad heart. infant baptism in this cold religious climate. Popular religious This vision of simple childish possessions seems a world rituals in these circumstances - where there are no social away from the electronic bedrooms of today’s young people. pressures to take part in them – are of the greatest But their childhood is also a long way from my own. I played sociological significance and also take on new meanings. in the street every day, safe and unsupervised. I rode my Although the number of Christian baptisms continues to fall, bicycle into the countryside in warm summers without the number of children baptised is still in the region of 20% causing any anxiety. - and that is a very large number and substantially more than Childhood experiences inevitably change over the years and the 8% of the population that is found in church on Sunday from place to place and many of our children seem to have morning. When we look for evidence of religious a wealth of material possessions ie computers, mobile observance this should not be overlooked. Sunday phones, dvd players etc. but now a Unicef report has attendance is not the only marker. compared the lives of today’s children across the western world and concluded that Britain’s children are the least happy. For whatever reason, we British adults have grown So what does a ‘christening’ mean today? seriously apart from our children. Young parents, who instinctively understand what Unicef The Unicef team assessed the treatment of children in six describes as ‘a good childhood’, and who want the best for different areas – material wellbeing; health and safety; their children, recognise that this involves more than education wellbeing; family and peer relationships; providing for them materially. If their children are to grow behaviours and risks; and the young people’s own up confident and secure they also need a scaffolding of perceptions of their wellbeing – and sad to say that the UK values around their lives. A baptism is one of the ways – one is bottom of the league of 21 industrialised countries in all of the few ways - in which all this can be articulated and a but education wellbeing. The report has triggered what may commitment made. be seen as a national debate – a debate that has at times It is sometimes said, not least by church members, that amounted almost to moral panic. Professor Al Aynsley baptism ‘means nothing’ to those who bring babies for Green, England’s first Children’s Commissioner, whose role christening, or that it is done ‘for social reasons’. In my it is to give a national voice to all children and young people, experience, nothing could be further from the truth. especially the disadvantaged and vulnerable, says: “There is a For the past three years, as an Anglican parish priest, I have crisis at the heart of our society and we must not continue made a note of what parents tell me when they come to ignore the impact of our attitudes towards children and requesting baptism for their children. I have been impressed young people and the effect that this has on their wellbeing.” by the thoughtful things they say and have come to the One has to ask if this unhappiness is linked in any way to the conclusion that high on the list is a recognition that if largely secular world in which we live today. children are to be raised successfully they need to be well Whatever the reason, inevitably the politicians have sensed rooted in a moral tradition –in their case, the Christian an important cultural shift and are seeking to position moral tradition – from the very start of their lives. This is themselves in relationship to it, not least by acknowledging not what the town hall offers, or the local medical centre; the importance of FAMILY to the wellbeing of children. We but it is what the church stands for.

40 Cannon Dr. Alan Billings • REFLECTION

OThe chuFrch spe aks Bthe languAage of vaPlues, andT of coursIe, aSs of gM odparents than the traditional three: two godfathers and a religion Christianity is not alone in this. All world religions one godmother for a boy, and two godmothers and one hold within the wisdom of their sacred texts a moral code godfather for a girl. Those invited to share in today’s infant by which people can live their lives in an ethical way, safe in baptism are being enlisted in the task of nurturing the next the knowledge that through their example their children generation. will grow up confidently, encircled by a framework of values It is hard for adults to stoop and enter the house of that will be with them for life. Indeed, issue 11 of this children. But the Unicef report says that it is imperative that magazine gave focus to the ceremonies and rituals through we try. One of the harshest comments Jesus of Nazareth which children are welcomed into the different religious ever made was with reference to our nurture of children. communities, and are thus endowed with the love and He said: support of that community. The Unicef report gives emphasis to the strong link ‘Whoever causes one of these little ones to stumble… it would between women’s empowerment and children’s be better for him to have a great millstone fastened round his development and wellbeing. The amount of influence neck and to be drowned in the depth of the sea.’ women have over the decisions in the household has been shown to positively impact the nutrition, health care and education of their children. It is probably worth saying that Canon Dr Alan Billings is Vicar of St George, Kendal, priest-in-charge in both my largely working class town parish and more of St John, Grayrigg, in Cumbria, and Director of the Centre for Ethics and Religion, Lancaster University. socially mixed rural one, it is usually the mother that takes the initiative in asking for baptism and is most articulate in talking about it. “Elizabeth sent the basket Whatever lip-service we pay to John doesn’t need anymore. equality, child-rearing still falls heavily A Moses basket, reeds criss-crossing, on mothers and it is not surprising, Plaited, almost like the pattern of a vine. therefore, that they are much more He’ll come like hoar likely to be reflective about what is Like manna spread entailed in bringing up children A Sabbath double portion And I will gather Him up successfully. All of this explains Our Son, God’s gift. another curious, new phenomenon in A harvest all our own, the Christian church - the increased Mysterious, awe-inspiring, numbers of friends and relatives at Cuddly, a bundle of wonder infant baptisms. Twenty years ago a Whose rise and course baptism party consisted of a handful of Is given to my care. people – parents, grandparents and a I long to see your face, few friends and relatives. Now parties Later, you’ll long for mine can be very big indeed – and this is an Baby eyes search-lighting occurrence that is repeated across the Meeting mine. country. Why? Because parents All too soon, I’ll struggle understand the point that Unicef is With the cipher of Your mystery making: that if children are to be Teaching You to speak nurtured successfully they need more Interpellating Word.” than parents, they need a network of © Sister Delores Dodgson supportive adults. This is also why For Izzy and Maxim many parents ask for a larger number

41 FOCUS • Chris Chivers Sharing the Light ubuntu : I am because we are

where they would get better care – but into which the husband and Greg… Dear Dom would not be allowed – or the part for coloureds and blacks, where there was less equipment and fewer staff but where they he other day when we you were playing at the bottom of could be together. The mother had not had an easy pregnancy. the stairs, you asked me about one of the photographs She feared that all sorts of things might go wrong. What decision that hangs there. It is a wonderful picture of a young would they make? Tblond-haired and white South African passing the light from his As I write this to you, the baby in mummy’s womb is six days candle to a curly-haired black South African of the same age. overdue! Imagine if Mummy and I were from different races and You made the observation Greg, that it was a bit like the we were making that drive to the same hospital. Well, that kind Christingle service we have around Christmas. “It’s about Jesus of terrible decision – the sort that divides families – affected the light of the world,” you confidently asserted Dom. And at a people everyday of every year in the apartheid years in South very profound level you’re right. It is about divine light. But, as I Africa, when a minority of white people tried to govern the tried to explain, it’s not in fact a photograph of a Christingle majority of South Africans. Remember another friend of ours Service, like the one of you and me Dom, telling you how she would go to the swimming taken in Westminster Abbey, that the baths with her cousins. They were classified as She was classified as Children’s Society used a couple of years ago white. She was classified as coloured because for their publicity. No, it’s actually a coloured because when when someone ran a pencil through her hair – photograph of a project which I co-authored someone ran a pencil the bizarre test used to determine your race – exactly ten years ago with the remarkable through her hair it got it got stuck, so she was said to be more African priest and teacher, Vivien Harber, who baptised than them. This meant she couldn’t swim. She stuck, so she was said you Greg. just had to wait outside with the towels. At the time I was training to be a priest, and to be more African This was why, when South Africa became what was on placement in Cape Town, where you than them. we call a democracy and everyone – not just were born a few years later Greg, and where the white people – could vote to decide who we took you to live Dom when you were just would run the country, they knew that South four months old. Africans of all races – whites too, since some of them had, for It was an amazing time for South Africans because they had only instance, tried to fight against all the silly rules – needed a way of very recently freed themselves from nearly fifty years of terrible getting things ‘off their chest’ as we say. conflict between people of different races. We have spoken So, your high-five-giving friend, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, was before about the word apartheid – or ‘apart-hate’ as it is chosen by Nelson Mandela, one of your other big heroes, to be pronounced. We have thought together about the fact that only the head of what was called the Truth and Reconciliation white people were allowed to go onto Clifton beach where our Commission. friend Nancy has a house, and the fact that in parks there were When I first went to South Africa in 1996 the TRC, as it was separate benches and even toilets for white and black South known, had just begun its work which was to listen to people Africans. We’ve also thought about the separate schools that telling those stories. Often they were like the ones I’ve just existed and the divisions within hospitals, of what it was like, for written about but sometimes they were much more unpleasant. instance, for some other friends of ours when they had their first Indeed, many of them were horrific. The idea was that people baby. The mother was white. Her husband was coloured. As she could say what had happened to them, and also find out from went into labour and drove up to the hospital, they had to decide those who had hurt them why they had done what they had which bit of it they would enter. Would it be the whites only part done. 42 Chris Chivers • FOCUS n w o T

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Often in history when wars come to an end, or periods of I sat for the whole of today in a civic hall in Guguletu. Towards the conflict like the one in South Africa, the ‘baddies’ are put on trial end of the afternoon, a 70 year old woman was called to testify and punished. After the Second World War they had famous trials concerning the activities of a policeman in her township. It at Nuremburg which led many of the Nazi leaders to their transpired that he had come one night with some others and in execution. You’ll remember that when Saddam Hussein was front of the woman had shot her son at point-blank range. hanged – and you somehow saw in the papers all those terrible Two years later, the same officer had returned to arrest the pictures of the hanging – we had a conversation about this. It woman’s husband, whom she supposed subsequently to have been wasn’t one that I had anticipated having with you, at ages seven executed. and six, but such is the world in to which you are growing up, we Sometime later, the policeman came yet again. This time, he took had to have it. her to a place where he showed her her husband, still alive. But as Anyway, in South Africa they decided that they wouldn’t take her spirits lifted, the policeman doused the husband with gasoline, what is called ‘retribution’. They wouldn’t punish people in the set him on fire and killed him. normal way. The punishment – if it was a punishment – would As the woman concluded her testimony, the presiding officer take the form of making the people called perpetrators, which is addressed her: “What would you like the outcome to be of this those who had done terrible things, own up to what they had hearing?” done in front of the victims or survivors (as many of them prefer After a long pause, the woman answered, “I would like three to call themselves). This is what is called ‘restorative justice’. In things. First, I want to be taken to the place where my husband other words, trying to give back to people the facts of what was burned, so I can gather up the dust and give his remains a happened if, for instance, their loved ones were hurt or even decent burial. Second, my son and my husband were my only killed; trying to give them back their dignity, the sense that they family. Therefore, I want this police officer to become my son, to are not lesser people because they are brown or black; trying come twice a month to my home and spend a day with me so I too, to give back to those who have done awful things a sense can pour out on him whatever love I still have remaining inside me. that they can also become human again. Finally, I want this officer to know that I offer him forgiveness It was an amazing process full of tears and pain and terrible because Jesus Christ died to forgive me. Please would someone heart-wrenching stories. But, as you’ve learnt already in your lead me across the hall so that I can embrace him and let him short lives, sometimes it isn’t until you get what’s hurting you know that he is truly forgiven?” from the inside to the outside that you can start to feel just a bit As people led the woman across the room, the police officer, better. I went to a number of the hearings as they were called completely overwhelmed, fainted. Officials helped him, whilst the when people told their stories. Occasionally what happened was woman’s friends and neighbours, most of them victims or survivors so extraordinary I had to write it down. This is what I wrote in of the same sort of violence, began to sing softly, “Amazing Grace, November 1996 after a hearing in Guguletu, a township how sweet the sound, that saved a wretch like me…” community in Cape Town: 43 FOCUS • Chris Chivers

I don’t think I’ll ever be able to convey to you in words the power of that moment. It was the one time in my life when I really understood what forgiveness was all about. Archbishop Desmond and all the other commissioners who listened – people like our friend Glenda whose little boy is your age Greg – tried to help both the people who had done awful things and the people to whom they had been done. Some, like the woman I wrote about, could forgive the perpetrators. Some could not. Some were angry and bitter. Many were confused or distraught. All of them received help in one way or another. But there were other people close to those involved in the hearings – children or grandchildren, who were too young to know what apartheid was like. They wondered what on earth was happening within their families, as people who seemed on the surface to be fine suddenly had their lives turned right upside down. Why was Mummy crying? Why was granddad not talking to anyone, and looking so distant? Why were people talking about white people being horrid to black people or calling other black people traitors because they had helped the white rulers? These were some of the questions that Vivien Harber and I tried to help some of those young people to answer. We did so by devising a workshop called the Children’s Ubuntu Project. This was aimed at children just a little older than the two of you – nine-and ten-year-olds. We had both been to see an exhibition of art at the Castle in Cape Town which, you’ll remember, was on the way into the city from Walmer Estate where we lived. One piece, by Lien Botha – whose father had been the foreign minister in the apartheid government – really captured our attention. Lien had installed a washing line across two prison cells in the Castle. At one end, she had pinned on the line torn white sheets on which had been printed photographs of the worst that apartheid had thrown up. At the other end, however, there were images of the election in 1994 and of South Africa winning the Rugby World Cup in 1995. By using a washing line she was trying to say something about how and whether you can cleanse your dirty washing, your history. Seeing this amazing piece of art, we decided that we would take all the chairs out of St George’s Cathedral – where I worked and where we all went to church – and that we would put a giant washing line around the nave. We had set a symbol around the space where all the children were going to come – all 128 of them! We needed next to think about what the ending of the day they would spend with us would be like. We wanted something that would feel like an ending but also something that would help the children to think of what they could do in the future. We needed another symbol and a ceremony – like the ceremonies you have at Beavers and at Church for important occasions.

44 Street child. Photo © Andrzej Sawa Chris Chivers • FOCUS

Lien Botha’s washing line had told a story in photographs. So we decided that we would have the children working in small groups of eight to think together about photographs Firstly, they would think about what we called an ‘image of truth’ from the apartheid years (such as a black child being chased by white policemen). Then they would look at a couple of photographs together. One would be an s e

m ‘image of hope’ (like a picture of happy i T e

p Rugby fans waving their flags as South a C Africa won the world cup in 1995). The © o t o other would be an ‘image of h P responsibility’. So much had changed in Which is where the Christingle you talked about Dom, comes in. South Africa for the parents and grandparents of the children For in this symbol, from Europe where we now live, we found who would spend a day with us. But so much still needed to something really useful. You’ve already heard several Christingle change. We wanted the children to think of something they saw sermons – a couple of mine among them! – so I don’t need to needed to change (like a street child begging on the roadside for go on at length. But you’ll remember that the Christingle consists food: a child who needs a home, and most of all, love). of an orange representing the world, wrapped about with a red Looking at the picture from history – the image of truth – the ribbon for the blood of Jesus shed “to save the world” as you put children would try to tell the story of what they thought was it Greg, with a candle on top to show “Jesus as the light of the going on. So we asked them to say what was happening in the world” as you told me Dom, when we were looking at the photo picture, and what might have happened before and after it was on the stairs, and that there are also four cocktail sticks taken. We also wanted them to think about where the people surrounding the candle, decorated with sweets and nuts as a photographed might be today. reminder of all the fruits of creation we enjoy. When the children saw the photograph of the boy being chased Since we had children of every faith and race – Muslims, as you by policemen, they said that the boy must have done something have in your classes at school, Hindus, Buddhists, Jews, Bahai’s and very wrong. When we asked them if they thought adults should Jains, as well as Zoroastrians, Christians and children from African chase children like this with sticks to beat them, most said “No, traditional religions – we needed to adapt this Christian symbol this is child abuse”. One boy said however that he thought the so that it spoke to everyone. group had got it wrong, and that the picture was about apartheid. So we replaced the red ribbon with South African flag braid. We The white men, he said, were not policemen but soldiers. They also simplified things a bit by taking off the cocktail sticks – we were chasing the boy because he was black. gave them sweets with their lunch! But we kept the candle. We The group of children then saw things very differently. When they now had an Ubuntu candle. were asked where the boy might be nowadays they said that they Ubuntu is an African word which is hard to translate into English. hoped he was “telling his story to the TRC”. It means something like “a person is only a person When the children looked at the other two photographs – the because they have to relate to other people” . To put images of hope and responsibility – we tried to remind them of all that more simply you might say: “I am because we are”. But I’m the excitement they had felt when South Africa won the World not sure that helps! It’s not an easy idea to put into words but Cup or when they had celebrated with their families Nelson what it’s trying to tell us is that to grow as human beings we need Mandela’s election as President. Alongside this, when we looked each other. at the picture of the street child, we thought together about The candle then was each child. The flag was the country in people who did not have many happy smiling experiences, and which they were growing up – the country Greg, of your birth. how we could include them in all that excitement and joy. The The orange was the world, of which all of us are citizens. children painted t-shirts and pictures with drawings and We had the ending. We would light the candles and think about messages on them to remind themselves and their families and our place in our country and in the world. All we had to do now neighbours what we all had to do to make things better. These was to think about how we would get there! were hung on the washing lines.

45 FOCUS • Chris Chivers

To help us think about all this we learnt a song in the three main South African languages – Xhosa, Afrikaans and English. It had a refrain with a very simple message: ‘Because the future’s mine, like candles we must shine.’ And when we ended the day by forming a circle all the way round the cathedral, to light the candles with our washing lines on which the newly-painted t-shirts were hanging, it was then that the picture which prompted our conversation and this letter was taken. We had put all the lights out so that the DONATION/ SUBSCRIPTION cathedral could be lit by the one hundred and fifty I caught a 1 year donation/subscription £8.00 candles of the project’s glimpse of 2 year donation/subscription £12.00 children and staff. And as something I I would like to make a donation we lit them so we sang the to support the magazine £ South African national have been (All work undertaken to produce the magazine is voluntary) anthem which you know trying to work so well: Nkosi sikelele Afrika : for ever since Total £ God bless Africa. I have to confess that I was PLEASE TICK RELEVANT BOX. PRICES ARE FOR UK AND IRELAND (INC. P&P) in tears when the photo was taken. For so long people of different races had been caught up in a conflict which had torn For overseas subscriptions please see website. a country apart. But when that blonde-haired white boy All currencies payable through Paypal passed his candle-light to the curly-haired black boy – he was in fact a street child – I caught a glimpse of something I have I wish my donation to be treated as a gift aid donation. been trying to work for ever since: the new world, promised us by Jesus and Muhammad, shown us in the Vedas and the I am a UK taxpayer please tick box Torah, and sensed in the peacefulness of temples and Gurdwaras, as in so many other people. I just hope that I have never lost the light that was ignited within me as that Issues 1 - 16 available on request photograph was taken. It is the light that I most want to pass onto the two of you. May it burn ever more brightly in you Please make cheques payable to and in your generation. Initiative Interfaith Trust and send to: The Editor, Faith Initiative Magazine, All my love, PO Box 110, Lancaster LA2 6GN dy www.faithinitiative.co.uk Dad This form can be photocopied or downloaded from the website Chris Chivers is Canon Chancellor of Blackburn Cathedral where he has responsibility, as Director of the My details are: Cathedral’s outreach agency exchange, for inter-faith Name relations. He was previously Precentor of Westminster Address Abbey and St George’s Cathedral, Cape Town. As a freelance writer he is the author of several books and writes frequently for Cape Times, Church Times and The Tablet. A book of letters to his two sons, Dear Dom and Postcode Greg… was published in South Africa in February. Copies are available from Blackburn Cathedral Shop or Telephone via email from [email protected] Email

46 Jain • SCRIPTURE

“Just as a mighty mango tree is hidden within the stone of the mango, even so, O man, divinity itself is hidden within you.

Rest not until you uncover it.”

Bhagwan Mahavir Jain Tirthankar: one who reveals the dharma

47 MINISTRY • Emilio Paloschi

NEW

BreeOFz THe E LATIN AMERICAN LIBERATION THEOLOGY

would like to share with you an evaluation of more than twentySChurcheps were tihe firstr ones toi open t themselves to this new one years of pastoral activity in the south of Brazil, Sao Paulo and breeze of the Spirit. Vatican II ended in 1965 and in 1968 the Latin nearby areas. American Bishops Conferences held a meeting in Medellin, BIorn in 1936, I spent my childhood and youth in Italy until the time Colombia to reflect on and apply the implications of Vatican II on the of my ordination as a priest in 1961. At that time it was pastoral activity of the Churches in Latin America – it proved to be predominantly a Roman Catholic country both in its culture and its a turning point: the dawn of a new era. ethos: parish communities, state schools, the major political party - After many centuries of Roman uniformity, the Churches in Latin Christian Democrat - all seemed conducive to the public America sought – with Divine guidance - to identify and meet the acknowledgement that being a Catholic was great. needs of its own peoples, and bring about a transformation in their I grew up in the countryside, attending the State Secondary School material and spiritual lives. They looked to inspire and encourage a in the nearby town of Cremona, south of Milan, and at twenty I new order of social justice and recognized that this required entered the diocesan seminary. After three years’ engagement on political, economic and cultural of study I left the seminary to become a member the emphasis on matters as well as spiritual. They chose two of a missionary order called the Xaverian personal sin has priorities: the preferential option for, and solidarity Missionaries. My inner impulse was great: to go changed to global, with, the poor - and the supporting of Christian abroad to help the poor and the marginalized. I institutional sin; from Base Communities. was sent out to Brazil at the start of the 1970’s to What happened in Medellin was the drawing back personal salvation to preach the Gospel, to convert people to the of a veil that had covered a stark reality: that those Catholic Church and to help the founding and the salvation ‘in we call poor are in reality impoverished by a cruel growing of a local community for their eternal togetherness’ global political-economical system - a system that is salvation. The vision of my pastoral activity, steeped in injustice. We only have to remember however, was inspired by a Christian ideology that I later realized the genocide of the Indigenous peoples and the Slave Trade, which was deeply flawed. in Brazil lasted more than 300 years. The Catholic Bishops in This became evident through an event that took place immediately Medellin exposed a cover-up that had lasted for approximately 500 after my ordination as a priest – an event that would profoundly years. They had the courage to say that when the colonial powers affect the future of the Catholic Church. It was the Second Vatican of Christian Europe went to Latin America or Africa or Asia, under Council and it was convened to seek to renew Church spirituality, the pretext of bringing Christian Faith and Civilization to the whole and to reconsider the Church’s place in the modern world. The world, they had in reality gone to colonize and conquer in order to Council was the brainchild of Pope John XXIII and was carried out plunder! against all the odds by his vision and courage: it lasted more than The Bishops introduced the ethical notion of ‘structural sin’ into the three years. vocabulary of the Roman Catholic Church, and as a result a gradual Through Vatican II the Roman Catholic Church became more open: transformation took place: the emphasis on personal sin has its language during the Sunday Church services turned from Latin to changed to global, institutional sin; from personal salvation to local languages; ecumenism (unity between the different Christian salvation ‘in togetherness’. As the Bishops brought into being this churches) became a new dimension; the study and interpretation of new approach to pastoral activity, the core values of Jesus of the Bible became a more ecumenical affair; and the seeds of a new Nazareth were reinstated – compassion, justice, reconciliation and relationship with people of other Faiths were sown. inclusiveness – and more than Saviour, Jesus was revealed as In the follow up to the Second Vatican Council the Latin American Liberator from all personal and communal shackles.

48 Emilio Paloschi • MINISTRY

Although the option for those who lived on the edges of society with their special qualities of wisdom, strength, compassion and was a real, living, breathing dimension in Jesus’ life, I have to admit inclusiveness. These groups have been criticized by the media for that coming from the Christian background of Catholic Italy, the being politicized, inspired by Marxist principles. In a sense this was ‘option for the poor’ was totally new to me. The way I was true, but when the Church finds herself in a country where the educated to engage with the poor was, I realized, patronizing and, gap between rich and poor is scandalous she cannot help but mix worse still, it emphasized feelings of self-gratification rather than with politics, particularly in the situation of Archbishop Helder how much good one could do for others. The option for the poor Camara of Recife in the northeast of Brazil and Archbishop in Latin America had overall repercussions on the way of being Romero in El Salvador. In this case politics means standing for Church. Rather than the centre of the church being the altar at food, housing, employment, education, health for everybody. These which the priest encompasses the core activities of the Christian services are related to Jesus’ dream, expressed in the coming of community, the centre of the church has become the people – the God’s Kingdom on earth. poor and the marginalized – for it is here where God speaks and However, this always comes with a price, to some extent lives are transformed in the Spirit of God. summarized by Dom Helder Camara, Bishop of Recife in the The homes of the poor, the small Community Centres, the School northeast of Brazil in his statement: “When I give food to the Halls became the new gathering places for their material and poor ‘they’ call me a saint; when I make the poor aware of their spiritual needs. They were called Christian Basic Communities, situation ‘they’ call me a communist”. For Archbishop Oscar grass-root communities in which Priests had to re-invent their Romero however the sacrifice was much greater – he was to lose roles as Coordinators and Spiritual Animators: where people have his life in his service of the poor – murdered by the military a real say in the running of the church and the community, and regime in March 1980 for his uncompromising message of justice women in particular have a greater opportunity to contribute and reconciliation.

Painting by: Andrei Rublev c1370-1430 The Trinity at the Eucharist Banquet 49 LUCY ALINE EVERITT CONNECTINnG WaITH ture As a Pagan, I am always inspired by Mother Nature. I see all life as beautiful and sacred, and so wildlife is often the subject of my artwork. Although the real thing cannot be beaten, the colours and forms that Nature holds is something that I cannot resist attempting to reproduce myself. Whilst I was studying Illustration at the University of Central Lancashire in Preston, I discovered - in a very round about way - my creative process. Through a combination of oil pastels, sewing, and Brusho Colours™ on paper, I found a technique to recreate the vibrant colours and organic lines found in Nature. University was a great learning experience for me, as I was able to join a Pagan society, along with Bluestreak Arts, a community arts group that helps various people through art projects. I have grown up in a family who are non-religious, but who always have appreciated Nature. I am also lucky enough to live in the countryside, which has played a huge part in helping me to connect with the elements. But it wasn’t until I went to University that I met other Pagans for the first time. This was wonderful for me, at last I had other people to share my faith with! But I soon realised that everyone’s Pagan beliefs are individual, a very personal thing. Many of the people I met knew so many facts and admirable amounts of information about Pagan legends, sacred sites, Gods and Goddesses and numerous traditions. But that is not the kind of mindset I have. Far too many times I attempt to read an interesting and enlightening Pagan book, get fidgety and end up outside hugging a tree!

50 For me, Paganism has always been about spending time in Nature. Through simply observing and experiencing the outdoors, I began to see how everything that is Nature is a miracle! It was this sense of wonder that led me to Paganism and I began to feel a connection with the underlying forces of This is my faith. the Earth. I soon realised that my way of thinking and my It has no rules, spiritual beliefs fitted in to Paganism. This is my faith. It has no rules, and no religious book: it comes from the heart. Being and no religious book: an ancient, pre-Christian religion, I feel this is where I come it comes from the heart. from, this is how my ancestors lived. They were completely dependent upon Nature and the elements. They prayed for the Sun to rise and the Spring to come. They did not take anything for granted. And like my ancestors, I too do not want to take Mother Nature for granted. My beliefs have led me to change, in many ways, the way I lead my life. After being vegetarian from the age of 11, I subsequently decided to become vegan. I felt that all Mother Nature’s creatures should be treated with respect, and not used for human consumption in any way. As a Vegan I feel very compassionate about animals, and that we, as humans, have a lot to learn from them. I believe many animals/birds/insects come to us - be it in physical or spiritual form - to teach us lessons and help us on our life’s path. By simply looking at how animals survive and live their lives, we can learn how we too can live. Pigs, for example, are so intelligent and organised, and - if we let them - could teach us how to organise our own lives. One of my personal animal guides is the ladybird, who comes to me whenever I have to learn to let go, forgive and move on in life. And just to generally cheer me up! By attempting to depict such beautiful creatures, such as ‘Owl’ and ‘Deer’, I can express the awe I feel for them: and create, in the most compassionate way possible, artwork as a dedication to them! Faith of a child

Emily sprinkles her fingers down the glass, trace-reading the drops on the other side.

“Look” she says, simple as a god, “rain”. She cups her hand, and when it’s filled with enough dry air, raises it, toasting. “Tomorrow”, she says, “it’ll be fine, somewhere it’s a birthday”. She sparkles her fingers against the spectring rain one more time. “I’m one two free!” She turns, shimmies like a rock pool, delighted with her first pun, stretches her arms, palms up-turned, precise now as a revelation: “Look, Auntie Beccs, there’s more”, she confettis her fingers, petalling the view. “There’s everything”, she says. And as she moves off, into it all, I remember to believe she’s right.