Hello, everyone, as you can see I'm back after quite a long break. I won't be posting regularly every week as before but will do so occasionally.
In the news lately, we have been advised that taking a brisk walk every day even for only 10 minutes, will keep us healthy. So this morning I decided to go for a short walk around the estate where I live. I don't know how often I'll do this, but at least it will be a start! After I'd finished doing some chores in the house and had put a load of washing in the washer, I went on my way. I passed a garden with beautiful flowers, all colours, shapes and sizes making a wonderful display. Further along a passed a hedge trimmed very neatly and next to it a neighbouring hedge that was obviously well tended but one twig stuck out. It made me smile. Nonconformist! In just two gardens it seemed that I was being reminded of some great truths. The beautiful display was a combination of many different plants, different formations of flowers, different sizes and colours but together making the garden a very pleasant place. The hedge reminded me that even in creation, there are those things that don't always conform to what the majority are doing and that's ok. Variety is accepted and tolerated. It reminded me of the time I with my two sons were visiting family in Argentina (in 1999) and we went to visit one niece/cousin who met us at the airport with her husband and two daughters (the third daughter was born a few years later). We went to a small cafe for something to eat and the youngest daughter Cata (Catalina) just couldn't sit still. Her father kept saying, 'Cata, sit down.', 'Cata, don't do that.' Eventually he asked, 'Cata, what do you want?' Immediately, without even thinking about it, she replied in her childhood innocence, 'I want to misbehave.' Well, we didn't know whether to laugh or look away and ignore the comment. Her father then explained that she couldn't misbehave here as other people wouldn't like it. Of course, I'm not advocating we misbehave but how often children in all innocence question why they must conform to what other people expect of them. She is now a lovely young lady who probably doesn't even remember that occasion.
Thank God, that He doesn't create clones! Creation shows us that variety and difference go to make life beautiful and that we are all individuals who contribute to the success of the whole. Even those who don't conform to what the majority want have a place and make life interesting, often bringing a different approach and way of seeing things. All parents will vouch for the fact that all their children are different, each special in their own way. It's when others don't always do things the way we like or insist on being just that bit different that we find it hard to accept. Patience! I'm working on it.
The family were all looking forward to the wedding. Family members on both sides travelled from various places to be there. We all know of course that there are different ways of getting from point A to point B. People have different preferences of routes, some preferring the motorways while others opting for the less busy roads, even if it takes a little longer. The groom's mother and brother travelled up from the south by coach while his aunt and cousin travelled from the same place but by car. Others travelled by various means from equally various places. It didn't matter how they travelled or which route they took. The important thing was to get there and enjoy the festivities of the wedding.
In case any reader is unaware, this is the time of year that Muslims fast for Ramadan. A few months ago there was a movement during the Christian time of Lent when a number of Muslims joined Christians in fasting for Lent. The group called themselves Muslims4Lent and now in mutual solidarity there is a group called Christians4Ramadan. I have been following a blog hosted by a distant relative who converted to Islam a few years ago. Having come from a Christian background, she has a passion for Interfaith dialogue, not just between Christian and Muslim but also among those of other faiths and none. During Ramadan, she has guests to post something of their experiences on her blog every day. So far we have had articles written by a Christian vicar married to a Hindu, a Christian married to a Muslim, a Sikkh woman, a Buddhist experience in Myanmar (Burma), a Wiccan, a Heathen and an ex-Muslim. I have found all of the articles very interesting and eye-opening. You can check for yourself here, A Hotchpotch Hijabi in Italy. I can almost see many Christian hands going up in horror at the thought. Surely I've now clearly lost the plot altogether! Actually reading some of these blog posts has made me realise that the many different faiths are each trying to live good lives, aware of the deep spiritual dimension within themselves. Each one is obviously influenced by their culture and life experiences. But I have been aware that we are all on a similar journey to the same end goal except that we are travelling from different starting points and going different routes and preferring different methods of getting there. Jesus showed his love for all with interactions with the Phoenician woman (the immigrant), the Samaritan woman at the well (the one who left the true Jewish religion), the centurion whose servant was ill (the enemy, invader, part of an occupying army) and so on. He didn't tell them to leave their way of life but still had time for them, showing compassion and helping them. The Old Testament also has examples of interfaith living. We are familiar with the story of Naaman the leper, an important official in the country where the Israelites were taken captive. Moses' father-in-law Jethro was not Hebrew and Abraham acknowledged Melchizedek as a holy man. Contrary to what many Christians think, God doesn't actually belong to us or our religion. It's the other way around. We as his creation belong to Him - and that includes all of humanity.
What has challenged me this week has been words of the Heathen on the above mentioned blog. He helps friends find their own faith even if they disagree with him and end up believing something completely different. Would I do that? So often we make friends with someone of a different faith really in order to convert them to ours, if we're truly honest. We think we are right and we have the only true way and we remain friends only as long as there seems to be some glimmer of hope that they will convert to our way of thinking and come to our place of worship. That's the main problem in the world, that there is upheaval and wars between those of different faiths, fighting it out as if that would prove who is right. It's not about watering-down our own faith but it is about really accepting that maybe there is more than one way; that we all belong to God; that we are all on our own different journey of faith; that God loves us all. Acceptance, not just tolerance. Very difficult at times but much better than killing each other to try to prove a theological argument. As Richard Rohr says in one of his meditations this week, 'If you really believe in the values you say you believe in, then put them into practice. Don't waste any time trying to prove someone else is wrong or evil. Just live what you believe.' Amen! We are all on our own faith path of discovery and I am sure that as God guides and directs me, so he is more than capable of doing the same in the lives of others, whatever faith they seek to follow. Having listened to the horrors on the news yesterday, I am even more certain that interfaith dialogue is a need for our time so that we can have discernment and be able to know the difference between those who truly seek to live out their faith, cultivate that spiritual inner being and seek to help others and not confuse them with those who twist and misuse the name of a religion and words of Sacred writings in order to inflict terror and killing any who don't see things the way they do. Such people are not true to the religion they profess. Tit-for-tat killing gets us nowhere except deeper into the horrors of war. So, those of us who call ourselves followers of Jesus, maybe it's time to put into practice the way he showed us, really follow him in actions as well as words and have a little more interfaith dialogue and understanding. Love not hate.
This week I watched a very interesting programme by David Attenborough. The truth is that I find all of his programmes interesting. He always seems to come up with new things and very interesting details about creation. I like his style and way of presenting so when the new programme was televised, of course I had to watch. It was about birds but not the usual garden kind or even exotic types like birds of paradise. They were birds that don't fly. The point was made that when we think of birds we think of creatures that fly, sing and have feathers. But there is a group of birds that don't fly, can't sing and their 'feathers' are more like fluff and certainly not suitable for flying as the different strands don't have hooks to make them click together in an aerodynamic way. In fact some of these birds barely have wings at all. Scientists still put them in the category of birds because of their DNA and evolutionary history. Apparently they became land based after the dinosaurs died out and they were no longer predated and so didn't need to fly away to safety. It was then that they were able to stay on land and grow really big, unlike the birds that they had evolved from. There are five birds in this group: the ostrich (Africa), rhea (South America), emu and cassowary (Australia) and the kiwi (New Zealand). The point that got to me was that although this group of birds were not at all like the usual sort of bird, they were still categorised as birds. Scientists accepted that even though they were nothing like their distant cousins, they were still birds. We humans tend to categorise other people all the time, whether it be by religion, politics, gender, profession, nationality, likes and dislikes, disability and health ... ... and so on. We have cartoon images in our minds of a beret-wearing, onion-selling Frenchman, a loud American tourist, a pasta-eating Italian, a yodeling Swiss goatherd, a beer-swilling, wurst-eating German ... etc. Of course we know that not every Frenchman wears a beret and not all of the Swiss yodel. Just as we don't expect other nationalities to think that all British men wear bowler hats. But there is a tendency that until we get to know someone then we have a certain image in our minds depending on the category we have placed them in. I remember many years ago someone who didn't want to tell her Christian friend that she was getting a divorce because she thought that she would disapprove and probably give her a lecture about 'til death us do part'. Actually the friend would not have reacted in that way, just the opposite but how often we prejudge what people are like because they have been given a label and put into a category. An ostrich can't fly, a cassowary can't sing and the 'feathers' and wings of the kiwi are almost non-existent. Yet they are birds. Not all Germans drink beer but they are still Germans. People express their love for and relationship with God in different and varied ways. Just because someone doesn't fit exactly into our thinking of what a Christian is or should do doesn't mean that they are not Christians. Doing things differently doesn't mean it's wrong. It's just different. It's a shame that we can easily accept such diversity in the natural world yet find it difficult to do the same with God's human part of creation. Like the flightless birds, people grow, evolve and change. God is BIG and all-encompassing and all of his creation is varied and that's the wonder of it.
I have been greatly impacted by a couple of videos that I've seen shared on social media this week. The first one was a deliberate ploy to see how people would react when they discover that someone had dropped his wallet. A number of people were very honest and immediately called after the young man to tell him he had dropped his wallet. However there was one young man who picked up the wallet, looked around but didn't see who had dropped it so he put it in his pocket. He then proceeded to do some shopping using a credit card that was identical to the one that had been in the wallet. He bought a number of things before continuing on his journey. He kept taking the wallet out of his pocket and looking through it and also phoning presumably some friend. The man was probably in his twenties and had one prosthetic lower leg that was clearly visible and so I thought that maybe if he was classed as disabled then maybe he was struggling financially, unable to hold a full time job and so this wallet that suddenly appeared would seem like a piece of good luck for him. Eventually the video clip ended when he actually went to the house of the person whose wallet he had found. He was taking it back to its owner. He had not used the credit card from the wallet but his own credit card that was identical to the one that had been dropped. He had not used any of the money from the wallet but all the time had used his own money. How wrong I was to prejudge the young man as were many others including the person who set up the ploy in the first place.
The second video that left a lasting impression on me was by a lady called Yassmin Abdel-Magied. She began by asking what people's reactions were when they saw her dressed with a hijab and typical 'Muslim' style clothes. Hopefully most would not judge her just because she was obviously a Muslim but would be open to listen to what she had to say. She went on to ask what they would think of her if she said she was a mechanic. I guess a few smiled, thinking 'no way!' She proceeded to take off her outer garment and hijab to reveal underneath the bright orange work clothes of a motor mechanic and put on a hard hat over her hair that was tightly fastened with a scarf. She said that actually she designed racing cars and that this was her day job. Surprise! She went on to talk about how often we are not openly biased but that actually deep inside we still have prejudices and biases that are so hidden that we're quite unaware of them. She went on to tell a story of a man and his son who were in a car when they had an accident. The father died on impact and the son was rushed to hospital. The surgeon came to see the young man before operating but said 'I can't operate on him. That is my son.' I must admit that my first reaction was that the man in the car must have been his step-father. Yassmin then went on to say that the surgeon was his mother. Ouch! I've done it again.
The thing is that my late husband was not English, European or from North America and I lived abroad for about 10 years. I have mixed freely with many people of different cultures and all walks of life, from highly professional to those in abject poverty. I also have a person from my extended family who converted to Islam a few years ago. So I really consider myself to be totally non-biased and accepting of those from other parts of the world and other cultures. So for me these two videos made me see again that there are sometimes things that are just part of who we are and how we think because we have been brought up in a particular culture or from a part of the world with a certain way of looking at things. For me it was a wake-up call to check my reactions to people and situations that might concern religion, gender, sexuality or disability. I must never presume anything about someone without getting to know them. As Yassmin says in her talk, very often our first reactions and judgements about people turn out to be wrong. It was also a reality check for me to not think I'm above having such reactions and thoughts. Some things are so ingrained in us that it is difficult to acknowledge their presence. What do I think? I think I'm not as free from bias as I thought I was. There is still work to be done and room for improvement. And you? What do you think? Please try to make time to watch the videos. You'll find it worthwhile.
This week we have enjoyed some lovely spring weather here in the south west of England. At last I have been able to get out into the garden and get things growing again. I have managed to sow quite a few different vegetables and planted some fresh flowers. We are in no way self sufficient in providing and growing our own food. Space and personal physical energy don't allow for this but it is good to be able to eat something that you've grown yourself. It is so much healthier when you know that they haven't been doused in chemicals or somehow force fed to produce perfect-looking produce. Because they are fresher of course they are tastier. I plant the flowers, partly because I like to see nice flowers in a garden and partly to encourage the bees and butterflies necessary in the pollination of other plants that we eat. I try to grow a variety as it looks more interesting and, as far as food is concerned, is better for us. I often think of the Israelites during the Exodus from Egypt and really sympathize with them. I mean, what must it be like to have to eat manna and quails every day. They wandered in the desert for 40 years. And we complain if we have the same thing twice in two weeks! In the 21st century we know that a variety of food is not only pleasing to the palate but necessary for health reasons. A good variety gives us a balanced and nutritious diet that leads to good health. Too much of one thing and not enough of something else is not good for us. It can create an imbalance within our bodies and leaves us lacking in some nutrient.
I do like to see pictures of a snowdrop or bluebell wood but when it comes to the garden of a house I have to admit that having only one type of flower does not appeal to me. In fact most gardens seem to grow different types of flowers as well as different colours to put on a display. A walk through a park is more enjoyable if there are displays of different flowers, bushes and trees and when we buy a bunch of flowers to put in a vase, more often than not we choose a bunch that has more than one colour or at least one colour plus greenery. So in food and in plants we like and need diversity. And so I ponder ... ... why, oh why can we not accept this in society? We say that we accept people being different but there is a big difference between tolerance and acceptance. We might tolerate those who express themselves differently as long as they stay over there out of my way. Those who have a different culture, a different way of living, a different way of expressing their beliefs, a different way of loving are so often made to feel outsiders so that they huddle together in their own isolated communities and not accepted in general society. We have so much to learn from God's creation. The rose doesn't say that he is better and nicer looking than the daisy and so more important. They are both as important and beautiful as the other in their own way and circumstances. Someone once remarked, 'Our differences combine to create meaning and beauty.' God created all things diverse, not to compete against each other but to complement each other and together to make a rich world beneficial to all. Diversity is healthy and pleasurable. That is how God designed it. We need to learn to live together in harmony and diversity in order to really express God's intention for our world.
