A Week to Honor Human Dignity

This week in Thailand begins with the Queen's birthday, which is also Mother's day here, includes the Solemnity of the Assumption of Mary and concludes for me with a wedding.  So it seems apt to take a step back for a moment and take one's hat off to the women in our life and world.

I was recently at a network meeting on the local refugee scene and it took me aback when I heard the UNHCR representative describe what he saw as a refugee case receiving top priority in our world for resettlement.  He described it a horrific case from Africa where the mother suffered just desperate and tragic humiliation and suffering, being left alone to care for her children.  I thought is this what has to happen to anyone, to a woman for them receive the help and attention they need? Is this the only way for a woman to be recognized by UNHCR to enjoy the dignity she deserves?  What is wrong with our world?  Where is respect and dignity? 

Advertising the Solemnity of the Assumption of Mary at the cathedral in Bangkok

Last week, we remembered the dropping of the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.  One person at the edge of Hiroshima on that fatal was the young, Spanish Jesuit, Pedro Arrupe, who was later to be the Jesuit Superior-General.  He saw the bomb drop at close range.  Like everyone else, he did not know what it was, just that it caused much death and destruction.  He reflected, that despite all cautions, he was required as a priest to go in and help the suffering and cremate the dead,which is what he did.  As a priest, as a man of God, he could do no other.

Is this not the same for all of us as people of faith?  Do we just wait like a UNHCR agent for the most terrible and vicious happenings or outcomes before we stand up and help, to be with the suffering and vulnerable?  Or do we do like the courageous and faithful Pedro Arrupe and jump in when we see the wrong, see the need?   

As we honour and celebrate women this week, so we honour and celebrate human dignity, the dignity of all.  This challenges us to be like a Pedro Arrupe, jumping in where we see wrong and suffering and not wait until the worse case scenario arises.  Simply there is human solidarity for we are fellow human beings, not bureaucrats.  There is the gospel which challenges us not to stand back but to get in there and act.

Small things do matter

My right ankle

I am not a narcissist.  I do have issues but narcissism is not one of them.  I choose to feature my ankle as it has been a feature of my week.  And why?  It hurts,

I do not know what happened but I do know it hurts and has been causing me somewhat discomfort and greater challenges as I move around my Bangkok on foot and by public transport.  I notice the stairs getting on and off the buses.  I face the challenge of jumping on and off songtaews.  I feel the ever bumpy footpaths.  Then there are all those stairs for pedestrian bridges and for accessing the skytrain.  Going up is a lot easier than going down. 

It makes me realize that little things do matter and we can just take so much for granted until something untoward happens.  It makes me think that the way to go is to face reality and deal with it, no matter how uncomfortable it may be.  The little things going wrong give us a needed warning in life.  I say that but I know how we like to avoid the hard bits until at times on some hard facts it may be just too late.  In the words of a good friend who is smart, if it doesn't work, fix it. 

Nail biting

Don't worry.  I am not breaking copyright nor am I an agent for Tom Cruise.  It just is that I saw the latest Mission Impossible movie this week and it was just an incredible experience - action packed, keeping you on the edge of your seat.  At the end, you felt you had really been somewhere doing something and it added excitement to a day that could have otherwise been rather dull. 

Isn't that what we try to do?  Add to life; give it more color.  How to do that without going to a great Tom Cruise movie?

I often think that life is given to us as a banquet but so often we treat it like it is a sandwich picnic.  I see that in myself at times.  I see it among people who go to church, supposedly publicly proclaiming the glory of life, but maybe they are not aware that this is what they are doing in church which can be so dull and so out of touch with the world.  This was not the way it was meant to be but such is the way it is given so often. 

It is Buddhist Lent, a time given for reflection hopefully.  This is a good time to stand back and see life for the banquet it is and not just wait to be woken up by the next Hollywood action blockbuster.  Still, what a great movie!

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.