Lent Thai Style

One can never get too much of a good thing.  That is why I never get bored living in a country where each year I get to observe two Lents, comparing and contrasting what happens in two different cultures.

Christian Lent is for everyone, aiming at their growth by observing a time of fasting and giving and entering into spiritual exercises.  Buddhist Lent is more geared towards an exclusive group - their monks who are to strictly observe their lifestyle of meditation, fasting and staying put in their temples.  It is opened up to many with young Thai males fulfilling their social and family expectations of being a monk for some short time in their lives.

Christian Lent fits in with the northern hemisphere change of seasons, happening during the northern spring.  It is a time when people are emerging from a dark and cold winter into a bright and sunny summer.  Buddhist Lent is just as smart in timing.  It happens during rainy season which serves a very practical purpose in a traditionally agrarian society, for this is a good time for young men to take time out from farming while the rice crop is left to grow.  So they can go off to the temple when there is not so much work around their farms.  As for the general populace, they are meant to watch their drinking.  Given all one may think of Thailand, it is quite a modest and conservative society.  Shocked?

The approach to Lent in Thai Buddhism is interesting when so many live in the big city where life goes on at a hectic pace with all its pressures, Lent or no Lent.  People's lives continue focusing on work and earning a living.  That is reality.  No matter our lot in life or our beliefs and culture, it is always good to stand back and take a good look at life, and that is so for everyone.

So Buddhist Lent begins on Friday 27th July.  Let it begin. 

We are who we are

I see a good friend living here from the USA.  In conversation, he uses a line I hear so often - "It is what it is.  I am who I am."  I think true but with a question mark.  Is this being too fatalistic?  Will I always be making the same mistakes?  Will I always be overcome by the same weaknesses in my life?  Is there nothing I can do to better myself and my lot?

There is a truth in the line used by my friend but I do not want to take it too far or else I become determined in life by my environment and my make-up. Each makes up my reality; each is limiting in its own way. 

A Bangkok Skyline 

Limitation is part of life as no one is perfect.  I accept that but, within my Bangkok, I see another aspect of human limitation as I too readily see those destroyed by drink and other vices, those conquered by a needy humanity, those going nowhere pursuing the purely fanciful.  Human limitation is like an art form on display in my Bangkok.  It is frightening and makes me not accept the line - we are who we are - for the more, the better is always possible.  We are always able to get up and start over again.  If not, do I just become another piece of public, human art on display in my Bangkok?  Life is about much more than who I am and we all deserve so much better in our short time on this journey of life.    

Family is where your heart is

My good friend Simon whom I met in my Bangkok

Here I am in Brisbane with the family for a few days.  It is great to be here. I am simply with my sisters and their families and enjoy it so much.  This is so no matter how far away I live nor how long I live on my own.
    

My experience of being in Bangkok for over 12 years has not turned me into a twisted, isolated individual but rather has given me a context where I have cemented my identity and sense of belonging. 


Throughout my time in my Bangkok, I have not moved away from my family but instead deepened and widened my sense of it.  I recognize this with coming home this time and visiting and reaching out to reconnect with significant others in my life.  My family is my sisters and their families but it also includes others who are so close to me and mean so much in my life.

 

One such person is Simon, a Sydneysider who would often venture to his beloved Bangkok which is where I met him.  Like all my family, he is a good and kind person, he has his own brokenness and his own strengths, he shares both friendship and love.  He is a dear person as are all the members of my family.  Each has their story they bring to the table.  The good and bad bits all make up their story, make up our shared story and all is accepted for that is who we are. 


Family is more than just a given nuclear unit.  It is where we place our heart and open it up to others who take us in and together we become one in some funny way.   

Yatesie - what better friend in life.

I have come to Sydney for Provincial Chapter.  I arrived here on Monday and one of the first things I did when getting here was ring my close mate and confidante, my companero - Brian Yates.  There was no answer.  Then that afternoon, I am shown a Sydney Archdiocesan email advising of the death that day of one of their priests - Brian Yates.

I am overcome that on this very day Brian dies.  So instead of seeing my mate again, I go to his funeral.  What can one say?

Brian was an icon of the Church in Australia, being such a spiritual leader and mentor to so many, a kind and generous man, a good priest.  Yes, Brian was a needy man, knowing his own fragility but that was part of what made him, not destroy him.  He was a man who would take in his fellow priests in the midst of their own vulnerability and fragility and just befriend them as an equal partner, a fellow wounded healer.  There were no pretensions about Brian.  It was all compassion, openness and true friendship.

I do not know what to say about Brian as it is all a bit much for me at the moment.  I just want to share my close mate, a man who gave hospitality to so many along the way, a man who took me in and showed me love.  He taught me about communio.  He looked after me when I was down, as I looked after him when he was down.  This is what life is all about - looking after each other as friends on the journey.

Here I am at Chapter where we are discussing yet again community and religious life.  I knew community with Brian because we just lived it and discussed it along the way.  I will miss you Brian but I know you are happy and whole with God.  What better end to a great adventure on this earth.  Love you, mate.