A Living Word (V): Learning from others: the Bahá’is

The shrine of the Bab on Mount Carmel, outside Haifa, which I first visited in 1987

Patrick Comerford

The Bahá’i Faith, founded by Bahá’u’lláh, is one of the world’s newest monotheistic faiths. Its origins can be traced to Iran in 1844, and there are now five to six million Bahá’is around the world. In many countries they are persecuted, ostracised and mistrusted.

Like the members of the other great monotheistic faiths, the Bahá’is have their own sacred scriptures, laws, calendar and holy days.

There are more than five million believers in Bahá’i Faith around the world. The first connection between Ireland and the Bahá’i Faith was formed in 1848, when an Irish doctor treated the Báb – the predecessor of Bahá’u’lláh – in his prison cell.

In the first years of the 20th century, several people became Bahá’is in Ireland, and the American consul in Cork and his family were well-known Bahais at the time.

The Bahai community in Ireland was formally constituted sixty years ago at a meeting in Dundrum in Dublin on April 20 1948. In the 1950s and 1960s, the Bahá’i community in Ireland expanded with a steady and increasing flow of new Irish Bahá’i, joined by a number of new arrivals from overseas.

What can we learn from this small, peaceful, monotheistic faith community?

The most important principle for a Bahá’i is the oneness of humanity. Bahá’is believe that the creation of harmony and unity between all peoples is the fundamental purpose of all religion. They say that the one-ness of humanity is the foundation for the other principles of social justice to which Bahá’i s are committed.

Despite persecution, marginalisation and mistrust, this small monotheistic faith community remains committed to universal peace and religious tolerance.

This contribution to A Living Word was first broadcast on 18 July 2008 on RTÉ Radio 1. A Living Word is broadcast Monday to Friday at 6:40 a.m. as part of Risin Time with Maxi and repeated Tuesday to Saturday at 12:58 a.m. as part of Late Date. A Living Word is Radio 1's long-standing two-minute daily meditation. The archives are available at:http://www.rte.ie/radio1/alivingword/1179969.html

Canon Patrick Comerford is Director of Spiritual Formation, the Church of Ireland Theological College

A Living Word (IV): Learning from others: Sikhs

Patrick Comerford

A few weeks ago, I was celebrating the Eucharist in Saint John’s Church, Sandymount. As I strolled back to lunch, I passed the old cinema on Serpentine Avenue that is now home to Dublin’s Sikh community.

During the warm welcome I received in the Sikh temple or Gurudwara, I was reminded constantly that this too is one of the great monotheistic communities of faith.

There are 20 million Sikhs around the world. They are the world’s fifth largest religion. There are about 1,200 Sikhs in the Republic of Ireland. It may be one of Ireland’s newest religious communities, but the Sikh religion dates back to the 15th century.

People of all religious backgrounds, even those with no religious faith, are welcome in the Gurudwara, where Sikh public worship of the one God focuses on listening to and singing the words of the Sikh Scriptures.

Men and women are equal among Sikhs. All sit on the floor, symbolising down-to-earth humility before God and equality with one another. The equality of all, regardless of religion, caste, colour, creed, age, gender or class, is a core Sikh value.

Afterwards, everyone present – Sikh or not – is invited to the Langar or vegetarian meal, expressing the Sikh values of sharing, community, inclusiveness and the oneness of humanity.

This meal reminds Sikhs they must be prepared to serve all who come to their door. The voluntary serving of the meal shows the Sikh value voluntary, selfless service. The meal reminds Sikhs that everyone is equal and that Sikhs must be prepared to share their possessions.

I left the Gurudwara wondering whether we Christians convey the same values when strangers visit our churches.

This contribution to A Living Word was first broadcast on 17 July 2008 on RTÉ Radio 1. A Living Word is broadcast Monday to Friday at 6:40 a.m. as part of Risin Time with Maxi and repeated Tuesday to Saturday at 12:58 a.m. as part of Late Date. A Living Word is Radio 1's long-standing two-minute daily meditation. The archives are available at:http://www.rte.ie/radio1/alivingword/1179969.html

Canon Patrick Comerford is Director of Spiritual Formation, the Church of Ireland Theological College

A Living Word (III): Learning from others: Jews

The interior of the Irish Jewish Museum on Walworth Road, off Dublin’s South Circular Road

Patrick Comerford

The date for Easter this year is so early that many Christians probably did not notice the later date for Passover this year, from 19 to 28 April.

Passover is the principal Jewish festival. It reminds us all of the principles that we cannot be free to worship God and to have a loving relationship with God unless we are free ourselves. Passover is a reminder that civil, political and religious rights are inseparable.

In a similar way, the second great Jewish festival, Pentecost, is a celebration both of the freedom the Exodus brings and the new covenant with God that it leads to.

The Jewish celebration of Pentecost is a reminder of God’s great and generous provision for us. As a Christian, of course, my celebration of Pentecost each year reminds me of God’s bountiful generosity in the gifts of the Holy Spirit.

But the Jewish celebration of Pentecost also serves to remind me that when God meets my needs God is aware of both my spiritual and my physical needs, and that I cannot expect those needs to be met unless I also want God to be generous in providing for the needs of others.

The third great Jewish festival, the Feast of Tabernacles, is a beautiful reminder of the beauty of God’s creation. I cannot live in this world and think that it is only there to meet my needs and demands. It has been entrusted to my care, to our care, and we have a responsibility for that creation, not just as a fashion statement, but because God asks us to take care of it. We are all God’s partners in his great plan for creation.

This contribution to A Living Word was first broadcast on 16 July 2008 on RTÉ Radio 1. A Living Word is broadcast Monday to Friday at 6:40 a.m. as part of Risin Time with Maxi and repeated Tuesday to Saturday at 12:58 a.m. as part of Late Date. A Living Word is Radio 1’s long-standing two-minute daily meditation. The archives are available at:http://www.rte.ie/radio1/alivingword/1179969.html

Canon Patrick Comerford is Director of Spiritual Formation, the Church of Ireland Theological College

A Living Word (II): Learning from others: Muslims

Learning from our Muslim neighbours: Archbishop John Neill with Dr Ali Selim (left) and Patrick Comerford (right) during a recent visit to the Mosque in Clonskeagh, Dublin

Patrick Comerford

Today there are over 30,000 Muslims living in Ireland. Many people still see Muslims as being different or foreign, although many Muslims in Ireland were born here.

The very negative reactions to the recent comments by the Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, show how difficult it is for Christian leaders to suggest that there is something of value, something we can learn, from our Muslim neighbours.

But I have always been impressed by the way Muslims are able to express the core values of their faith in simple words that are easily understood. I wonder how many Christians could express their faith with such confidence. How many would not be ashamed to confess it so openly?

Faithful Muslims pray five times a day. How many Christians can say our daily life is punctuated by a rhythm of prayer?

Muslims say giving to the needy is a religious obligation, and that charity is something that goes beyond religious obligation. If Christians were equally generous I imagine we could make major inroads into solving the problems of poverty in Ireland and globally.

Muslims are required to fast throughout the month of Ramadan. Their commitment to this puts to shame my half-hearted efforts at Lent or Advent.

And every Muslim tries to make a pilgrimage to Mecca at least once in their life. If only I could remind myself constantly that life itself is one long pilgrimage!

These five pillars of Islam are five imaginative and generous ways my Muslim neighbours remind me of the core values and challenges at the heart of my Christian faith.

This contribution to A Living Word was first broadcast on 15 July 2008 on RTÉ Radio 1. A Living Word is broadcast Monday to Friday at 6:40 a.m. as part of Risin Time with Maxi and repeated Tuesday to Saturday at 12:58 a.m. as part of Late Date. A Living Word is Radio 1's long-standing two-minute daily meditation. The archives are available at:

http://www.rte.ie/radio1/alivingword/1179969.html

Canon Patrick Comerford is Director of Spiritual Formation, the Church of Ireland Theological College

A Living Word (I): Learning from others: the monotheistic faiths

Patrick Comerford

Some years ago, Newsweek magazine ran a front cover feature proclaiming the oft-forgotten truth that Jews, Christians and Muslims all claim to be the children of Abraham, and that the members of the three great monotheistic faiths share much in common with one another – that those common beliefs and values outweigh our differences.

Why is so difficult, then, to share with one another what we believe, and the common values that come from those beliefs.

The great monotheistic faiths are often seen as Judaism, Christianity and Islam. But we could also add the Sikhs and the Bahá’i community. All believe in the one God. All revere sacred scripture, even if we cannot agree on the content of those holy books, and all believe that our God wants a world where we are at peace with one another, where we love one another as we love ourselves, and where that love is translated in action for social justice and universal peace.

In our changing Ireland, the small Jewish community has a lengthy and respected place in Irish life, culture and politics. There are now more than 30,000 Muslims in Ireland, many of them Irish-born. And the other monotheistic traditions – the Sikhs and the Bahá’i community – are growing.

Instead of seeing other faith traditions as exotic or foreign, how can we see them as traditions that can contribute positively to Irish values? Is there something new we can learn from them – something new about ourselves?

Join me this week on a pilgrimage of exploration, learning something from these faith communities. I hope your faith, your hope, and your love will be strengthened – because each of these traditions has enriched my life too.

This contribution to A Living Word was first broadcast on 14 July 2008 on RTÉ Radio 1. A Living Word is broadcast Monday to Friday at 6:40 a.m. as part of Risin Time with Maxi and repeated Tuesday to Saturday at 12:58 a.m. as part of Late Date. A Living Word is Radio 1's long-standing two-minute daily meditation. The archives are available at:http://www.rte.ie/radio1/alivingword/1179969.html

Canon Patrick Comerford is Director of Spiritual Formation, the Church of Ireland Theological College

A Living Word: Easter Week (V: Friday)

Patrick Comerford

In the days immediately after Easter, the Risen Christ asks his disciples to trust in God, asks them whether they love him, and asks them to make disciples of all nations.

When Jesus asks his disciples to trust in him, he’s asking them to believe in him.

In many groups and seminars I have taken part in, we’ve played warm-up games of trust. In games like these, someone can be asked to close their eyes, straighten their back, and fall backwards.

“Trust me,” the other person says. And with that, the person who has closed their eyes knows they can fall back.

In these trust games, “Trust me” means the very same as “believe me.”

The Gospel stories in the weeks after Easter make an interesting connection is made in between faith, love and mission. The three cannot exist without each other.

The disciples who were locked up in fear in the upper room had lost their trust and faith. But once they found their faith and trust again in the Risen Christ, they could go out in love into the world.

Over the years, I have worked with many mission agencies. And in each mission agency the same question is asked constantly: Why are we spending so much money on health care, on hospitals, on education?

But those projects help the very people Jesus was most concerned to bring in from the margins – women, children, the poor, those who suffered because they couldn’t afford to change their lot in life. Those projects show love, develop trust, and bring new life to those who need it most. They are practical demonstrations of the faith in the Risen Christ who brings new life.

This contribution to A Living Word was first broadcast on 28 March 2008 on RTÉ Radio 1. A Living Word is broadcast Monday to Friday at 6:40 a.m. as part of Risin Time with Maxi and repeated Tuesday to Saturday at 12:58 a.m. as part of Late Date. A Living Word is Radio 1's long-standing two-minute daily meditation. The archives are available at:

http://www.rte.ie/radio1/alivingword/1179969.html

A Living Word: Easter Week (IV: Thursday)

The gift of the Holy Spirit: the Church is the realised Pentecost

Patrick Comerford

In the days immediately after Easter, the Risen Christ promises his disciples peace, the gift of the Holy Spirit, and that he would always be with them.

The promise of the Holy Spirit is one that embarrasses many of us as Christians.

We don’t really expect the Holy Spirit to work in our lives.

Once we changed the holy-day of Pentecost into the June Bank Holiday weekend, and changed the days we had off work, the promise and gift of the Holy Spirit became culturally and socially irrelevant.

Some associate the gift of the Holy Spirit with confirmation and our teens. For others, the gift of the Holy Spirit has embarrassing associations with enthusiastic charismatic styles of worship that don’t fit in well with comfortable churches and parishes.

The Holy Spirit gets short shrift even in the Nicene Creed … just a few short lines, a few short phrases, no more than one extended sentence.

But the Holy Spirit didn’t just suddenly appear because of Christ’s promises to the Disciples in those days after the first Easter. Those few phrases in the Nicene Creed remind us that the Holy Spirit has always been there guiding us.

In the Eastern Orthodox tradition, they like to talk about the Church as the actualised or lived Pentecost. The Holy Spirit is a promise not just to the disciples after Easter, or a promise to be long forgotten after our confirmation.

The gift and gifts of the Spirit are part of the fullness of the gifts we receive as we live out our Easter faith, and an assurance that the Risen Christ is always with us.

This contribution to A Living Word was first broadcast on 27 March 2008 on RTÉ Radio 1. A Living Word is broadcast Monday to Friday at 6:40 a.m. as part of Risin Time with Maxi and repeated Tuesday to Saturday at 12:58 a.m. as part of Late Date. A Living Word is Radio 1's long-standing two-minute daily meditation. The archives are available at:
http://www.rte.ie/radio1/alivingword/1179969.html

A Living Word: Easter Week (III: Wednesday)

Patrick Comerford

“Peace be with you.”

“Peace be with you.”

“Peace be with you.”

We hear this phrase three times on Easter morning when Jesus greets his friends and disciples after the Resurrection.

It is a phrase spoken by the Risen Christ three times. It has a Trinitarian resonance. It reminds me of the three times God says to Moses, “I am ...,” “I am…,” “I am …”

It reminds me of the three visitors who receive hospitality from Abraham, and remind him of God’s love, remind him of God’s plans for all creation, and remind him that when we welcome strangers sometimes we are entertaining angels, and in that we get a glimpse of God.

This phrase “peace be with you” in Saint John’s Gospel identifies the Risen Christ in the same way that the phrase “Be not afraid” identifies the Risen Christ in Saint Matthew’s Gospel.

In some churches, we can be too glib about that phase, “Peace be with you,” at the sign of peace – too glib, not just with our handshake, but with what we are wishing each other.

The peace that Jesus wishes for his disciples is not the usual sort of peace that we often wish one another on Sunday mornings: Sometimes, on Sunday mornings, it has become yet another saying robbed of its real significance, with no more heart-filled meaning than the supermarket check-out operator who says, “Have a nice day, missing you already.”

The peace that Christ is brings his disciples after Easter is a peace that the Disciples sorely need, a peace that a deeply divided Church needs, a peace that our world needs.

Peace be with you.

Peace be with you.

Peace be with you.

This contribution to A Living Word was first broadcast on 26 March 2008 on RTÉ Radio 1. A Living Word is broadcast Monday to Friday at 6:40 a.m. as part of Risin Time with Maxi and repeated Tuesday to Saturday at 12:58 a.m. as part of Late Date. A Living Word is Radio 1's long-standing two-minute daily meditation. The archives are available at:

http://www.rte.ie/radio1/alivingword/1179969.html

A Living Word: Easter Week (II: Tuesday)

Patrick Comerford

“Do not be afraid.”

These were the first words that greeted Mary Magdalene and the other Mary when they came to the garden to visit the tomb of Christ on Easter morning.

It would have been very difficult to be anything but afraid if your best friend had been brutally murdered, and all the men who claimed to be his best friends had managed to disappear into the back streets.

I can easily imagine those women trying to slip out of a back door in a narrow street early on that Sunday morning, hoping no-one would see them or notice them as they scurried along and made their way out through the city gates with their small jars of oils and ointments.

They must have wondered whether they were being watched, if they were being followed, if they would be arrested when they arrived at the tomb.

Of course they were full of fear. Of course they were frightened out of their wits.

On its own, to see an angel would have been startling enough, enough of a fright, in those circumstances. I don’t know if I would have been calmed at all by being then told: “Do not be afraid.”

But those same words, “Do not be afraid,” are repeated time and time again that first Easter. When the women see the Risen Christ, he tells them: “Do not be afraid.”

When Luke gives us his account of the Resurrection, we hear Jesus asking the Disciples: “Why are you frightened?”

The Risen Christ challenges us to put aside all our hidden fears. There can be no lows after Easter. It can only be invitation to rise up and let go of all our fears as we accept Christ’s invitation to join him in his risen life.

This contribution to A Living Word was first broadcast on 25 March 2008 on RTÉ Radio 1. A Living Word is broadcast Monday to Friday at 6:40 a.m. as part of Risin Time with Maxi and repeated Tuesday to Saturday at 12:58 a.m. as part of Late Date. A Living Word is Radio 1's long-standing two-minute daily meditation. The archives are available at:

http://www.rte.ie/radio1/alivingword/1179969.html

The icon of Mary Magdalene by Dimitrios Mourlas is part of the exhibition of Greek icons at the Gordon Gallery in Derry until 12 April 2008

A Living Word: Easter Week (I: Monday)

The Resurrection, Cookham, 1924-1927, Sir Stanley Spencer

Patrick Comerford

The first Sunday after Easter is often known in the Church as Low Sunday.

The first reason for this is because Holy Week and Easter represent the great climax of Christian faith. Whatever happens in churches in the weeks that follow takes a step or two back, and seems less important.

The second reason for calling it Low Sunday is that the attendance in churches was naturally high for Holy Week and Easter. The figures for Mass-going and church attendance in the following week always show a dramatic drop in numbers present.

In recent years, though, I’ve often thought that the figures were low even at Easter.

Christians in Ireland today are more likely to see ourselves as Christmas people rather than Easter people. Christmas has a nice, warm folksy feeling about it in the middle of winter. Easter has too much of a get-up-and-go challenge for us today. The crib is more comfortable than the cross. The manger in Bethlehem asks fewer questions than the grave outside the walls of Jerusalem.

When it comes to Holy Week and Easter, popular culture puts a greater emphasis on the shocking events of Holy Week than on the startling events of those days after Easter.

I only have to think about movies like Jesus Christ Superstar or the Passion of the Christ to have this perception reinforced.

Most people can tell me the Christmas story. Most people can recall the events in Holy Week that led up to Good Friday. But who among us can remember some of those wonderful stories in the Gospels in the days and weeks immediately after Easter?

I believe these are stories worth telling again and again.

This contribution to A Living Word was first broadcast on 24 March 2008 on RTÉ Radio 1. ‘A Living Word’ is broadcast Monday to Friday at 6:40 a.m. as part of Risin Time with Maxi and repeated Tuesday to Saturday at 12:58 a.m. as part of Late Date. A Living Word is Radio 1's long-standing two-minute daily meditation. The archives are available at:

http://www.rte.ie/radio1/alivingword/1179969.html