Good Friday in a Buddhist Country

Everybody seems to be talking about Pope Francis.  He is really making his presence felt.  His latest initiative in going to a juvenie detention centre for Holy Thursday mass was quite something for a Pope.  Aljazeera highlighted that he washed the feet of 12 youth there - 10 male and 2 female, with one being a Muslim.   He is showing the way.  How many will follow? 

I like his line for Holy Week. 
"Living Holy Week means entering more and more into God's logic, the logic of the Cross, which is not first of all that of pain and death, but that of love and self-giving that brings life.  It is entering into the logic of the Gospel."

Well, that is Rome.  Here in Thailand, a Buddhist country, Holy Week means nothing at all to the masses and Good Friday is just another working day at the end of the week.  So the traffic is there waiting outside your door and if you were asked by a Thai friend about why you are going to church today, it might be just as easy to talk about getting on a flight to Mars.  While you can't buy an easter egg, you sure can buy a water pistol for the upcoming Thai New Year festival which is part religious but full-on water fights. 

This means that Holy Week and Easter are different here.  Take today, for example.  When I go to the cathedral for Stations of the Cross, I will have to face the working day traffic and everyone around me will be doing the usual work and shopping and business thing.  The Good Friday ceremony is on at 7.30 in the evening and not 3pm.  Maybe only little things but they make for a different feel. 

Following on in the example given by Pope Francis, the challenge is how to make your presence felt in such a context.  Being me and given my experience of life and culture here, it is not by hosting a grandiose liturgy which is the style here nor by remaining a quaint novelty for the locals' natural inquisitiveness.  It is rather by following the words and example of Pope Francis - entering into the logic of the Gospel. 

Taking a risk

This week saw the inauguration of Pope Francis and my mother's 95th birthday, if she was still alive. 

Pope Francis calls for a poor Church for the poor.  For a man who refuses the papal limo; who exclaims, on seeing the papal apartments, that they could fit 300 people; who declares that the carnival is over when offered a piece of papal clothing; he must be a challenge for the die-hards inside the Vatican and the hard core institution. 

Mum was always one to stand by her principles, not allowing for any grey areas or room to move.  I have that in me from my mother but I am more liberal and have room for more grey areas. 

Both obviously are people in my life today who speak of the value of taking risks in life. 

I was watching recently a BBC presentation looking at women in leadership roles.  One woman spoke of how she learnt from her father who used to tell her to aim for the stars.  Her point was that if you aim for the stars, you will at least get to the tree tops which is some progress in life.  I shared this at a meeting here at Caritas Thailand for the sake of the staff. 

In a culture that is full of beauty and grace but where one's place is so determined by hierarchy and status, a number of those sitting around the table could not grasp the message.  Aiming for the stars just isn't on their agenda as they aren't allowed to think that way, or just can't. 

Then in a local Church where, there is so much value placed on showing off wealth and power, I wonder what sense they make of the Pope's call to be a Church of the poor.  Probably none.  The impressive buildings and institutions, the schools for the rich and powerful, the big budgets for doing good will all remain. 

Still, you know what?  Risk taking is firmly back on the agenda. 

We soldier on!

White smoke or not coming from the Sistine Chapel, life moves on and we must soldier on.  Rome seems a long way from Thailand and the Thai Church where what rules the day is the local scene and culture.  Any argument or difference is settled here by the locals with the one line - This is Thailand or That is Thai culture.  That just stops all discussion and the day is won by the local. 

It reminds me that I was just at a three day seminar on migration in Southeast Asia.  They were looking at the ASEAN Charter and how one of its pillars is to live together on the basis of peace and harmony but, as one pointed out, it is peace and harmony based on the terms demanded by those in power and not on anyone else's terms.

The Thai Church lives in its own world run, as I see it, on two ideologies - doing business and presenting the good face of a structured, ordered and wealthy institution.  For me, both speak of its downside.  Face just doesn't work and that is true for the whole Church as I see a Church losing the plot because of hypocrisy and not just at the level of the Vatican.  What I see that would concern me about the Thai Church is that, being so young and so small and so sure of itself, that it runs the risk of being a Thai, Buddhist ghetto in a universal Church that is so rich in theology, history and tradition.

We soldier on, knowing our own fragility and vulnerability and being able to see something else beyond institutional visions.   

Then I see our new Pope, a Jesuit from Argentina.  What very little I quickly read shows a humble man who walks and uses the metro rather than a chauffeur driven car, a man who favours his priests who work with the poor.  Then he chose the name, Francis, and St Francis was a humble man of his time on about reform of the Church.  This election gives one a new sense of hope in a dated Church that is so out of touch.  Habemus Papam!
 

International Women's Day

Today is International Women's Day.  It is about celebrating women and standing up for those many who are abused and taken advantage of in our world.  In my work and reading, I know about what is called the 'feminisation of poverty' which means that far too many women in our world suffer because of poverty. 

Yet I come from a family of strong women and would not expect women to be otherwise.  Then I live in Bangkok and I see so many variations in relationships between men and women.  I see ones based on need and how older, western men love having women who hang off their arm - or at least for a short while.  It all makes me think about what is really going on here.  Then you go back to the old question here - what is real?

Well, today, in another part of my Bangkok, I saw what was real.  What I saw was a brave, young, Pakistani woman, who is here with her family as a refugee, come to the refugee centre to do her exam.  She is one of my students doing the online university course with Australian Catholic University.  She has been so sick and today she came determined to do her exam.  No matter how sick she was, she was going to do the exam and she did.  What I saw was not just  a student doing an exam but a young woman sick and under duress, living in harsh circumstances, determined to finish the task and she did.  What I had the privilege to observe was a young woman of great courage.  I was so touched.  She emulates not just what it means to be a student but to be a person of courage in the face of great trial, to be someone who faces life with a determination and a strength that can only come from deep within oneself, from a true goodness that speaks of what is best about our humanity. 

What is real?  This is real.  Whatever is at play in a Bangkok relationship, may I remember what is real in life and I saw it today in a brave, young woman on International Women's Day.