This week, I am away with the Marist Brothers and their Associates from Thailand, Cambodia and Vietnam from within their ad Gentes programme on their annual retreat. The theme for the retreat is Discernment. Today a German brother asked that we look at this word within the other languages of the group and see how this term is approached in other cultures.
So I looked it up in Thai and found ควๅมฉลๅด which means 'wisdom', 'savvy', 'ingenuity', 'brilliance'. Once again, I see how an ancient Asian language is unable to grapple with western theological, philosophical and spiritual terms or notions. Neither, maybe should the language be expected to deal with such.
Still this raises two questions or issues.
1) Be aware of this when trying to approach these deeper notions and issues within the local culture.
2) In a globalised world and Church, we face the challenge of how we communicate at the deeper level and on the deeper issues.
I am John Murray, an Australian, Catholic priest of the Order of St Augustine. I live and work in Thailand and have been here since October 2005. I have many stories from my life journey and would simply like to share some of them. So hope you enjoy and go away sometime with a smile or a helpful little insight.
We gather
to give thanks for my 25 years.
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