In the world of the Dead

Every time I go to visit the departed friends at the cemetery, myriad thoughts cloud my mind; I know most of the persons resting in peace here at Dhyan Ashram, some of them had been my teachers, some 'father-figures', some guides; some of their words still ring in my ears. I remember great Leeming; whenever I would ask him how he was, he would tell me that he felt better when he saw me! He was obviously naughty at that age. There is Timmermans, who had a soft-heart for me, during the first year in Calcutta! (In 1984, only in Bangla, it was called Kolkata), much to the embarrassment of many of my companions. And Ernst, who liked telling me stories of missionary activities! And printer, builder Rosnar, who had told me so many times the same old stories of his hunting!

Some I know, get frightened when they visit the graveyard, as if by visiting they invite death to themselves! Far from it, it is a reality that everyone has to be prepared for! But for me it is always a pleasant experience to stand for a while before many of the familiar men, and even whisper something dear to me. It is an invitation for me to enter into their lives, a life that age could not stop. Many of these men, who have offered their lives for God and people, have become immortal in the hearts of the hundreds of men and women whose lives they had touched. They are truly immortal.

I can see the earth, which is so very kind and generous to accept them back to her bosom; she would not like anyone, bird or beast to destroy their bodies, which she had gifted to the world, until they become part of herself! The mute witness to all that these men had done on earth, is again mute when it comes to vindicating some of them for the wrongs they might have committed. The world may take several years to really forgive, but for Mother Earth, she might ask us, forgive what! After all, she is the mother, who will never refuse home to her child!

I wish I have the luxury of time to sit in the cemetery and spend a whole day, speaking to all the persons whom I had known during their lifetime. I dont know if they would be delighted to do that with me, but I will surely be delighted to remind them of my sweet time in their company. And to have someone from the other side of the world is, always a matter of great blessing, because for one thing, I know their invisible presence will protect me from all danger and harm!

Today as I stood before them, there was one little prayer, though that happens to be sign of my selfishness. I want to imitate some of their noble qualities, which surely I lack to a great extent. Many of the men lying here were great stalwarts, and had done some thing marvellous for God and Bengal. When I turn to myself in their presence, I find myself quite small, but while beholding the tradition of which they were part of, I know all their collective strength and integrity will be my food for the way.

I know some of these men were saintly people. I would like to look up to Cukale, who had a peculiar way of pronouncing my name, and had a paternalistic approach to me; this great pastor was a saint, who loved to pain and write poems. When he used to pain the walls of this very same cemetery in 1997, I used to spend sometime with him there, appreciating his art work, which was not a great thing, but he liked doing it! Today I would like to place myself in his presence, looking at him and appreciating the simple works of art he created. I know this way, I will inherit at lease a certain amount of his saintliness.

When nature winked

The calm and serene nature is a welcome relief to people who know only life within the four walls of their houses; when the trees and plants are bathed time and again, washing away all the pollute and dirt that human ingenuity has dumped on them, it is a joyful sight. It is like a mother bathing her child, washing her gently and carefully, wiping her out with a towel… what greater care can nature show on the flora and fauna that humanity never learned to respect and appreciate!

It is still drizzling and I know it is time for me to pack up my things and return home, to the four walled room, which has managed to hide the glories of nature from my eyes. When I wake up in the morning, I don’t see the sun, and when I lie down on bed at night, the moon does not sneak into my room. The singing of the birds do not reach my ears; all that I hear in the morning is the honking of the vehicles, which can throttle the sweet scented melodies of the birds. But what use grumbling about these, for I can do nothing, except get out of them to be in close proximity with nature.

What a lovely sensation would one get, when the gentle drops of rain fall on to our skin; even the most spectacular artificial fountains and water falls, cannot recreate this effect. But I would like to find who had discovered or invented the concept of an umbrella, to prevent the water drops falling on to me! What if I get drenched? Some are so very frightened of getting wet in the rain; and sometimes I long to get fully drenched in the rain, and when it is done, rush to wipe myself out, so that I don’t catch cold or get fever. But it is a wonderful experience to occasionally let the rain waters wash me.

As I walked gazing at the plants and trees, listening to the gentle fall of the drops of rain on to the already saturated earth, I wondered why the lightning and thunder? Then it suddenly occurred to me that lightning is just the winking of nature on the stern-looking humanity. When men and women on the earth are too serious and do not bother her, then she has to awaken us by thundering, just to give us a jolt, to say, wake up and look at me! But do we take note of her, when she is just in front of our eyes?

Nature has mechanisms which are magical for human mind and spirit, but very few really care to submit themselves into her hands, to be charged and changed. The earth scent after the rains is heavenly, and one may have to experience it, to get a feel of what it really means. I know it clears my chocked throat, clears my lungs and charges my heart and soul. Nature is the free charger of energy, which no Horlicks or Bornvita can ever give so freely. But sadly only the people who have the eyes of faith can find her charm and be enticed by her lovely make!

Et tu Brute!

These memorable words of Julius Caeser to his most trusted friend Brutus, when the latter plunged the dagger onto the chest of the Emperor to show the world what is the price of trust! Betrayal has no limits, whoever it is, and whatever be his/her position, it is the same story all over. Like blood which is red for all in the world, so to is betrayal is the name that everyone in the world is familiar with. But we are happy until it one day lands before our door steps.

When my young friend shared how hours and hours of her hard work had been misappropriated by her research guide, there is hardly any words of consolation I could think of. Some times silence is the best means of consoling a person; but the sense of seniority and even superiority (under some guise or other) over takes our common sense, and we climb the pulpit and indulge shamelessly in sermonising, forgetting the fact that for the one who is the victim of betrayal of a cruel kind, no words can be as soothing as just standing by her and assuring that all is not lost.

But how can he be so devoid of a conscience? This is the one question that she kept on posing to me, and probably even the person who took his young research student for a royal ride would be unable to give an adequate answer to this question. Does one scheme to betray a close associate, a bosom friend, a blood relative? Betrayal, probably, is in our blood, and whatever we do, it may pop up the moment when we least expect it.

Can we do anything to really not to fall victim to betrayal by people we trust so much? Is it at all possible to mistrust the people we love, just because they have the potentiality to betray us one day? But one thing is for sure, we cannot take people on their face value; we need to put them to acid test to check and examine if they deserve our whole hearted trust. But even then we cannot be sure that they will not betray us one day! That is how humanity is shaped and molded.

Some of the great personalities in the annals of history have experienced the worst kind of betrayal, and the way how each of them respond to the people who betray them is quite interesting. The case we could imagine at this moment is that of Jesus; how he chides Judas Iscariot who betrays him with a kiss! This is irony of ironies. There is no cursing and yelling, but a quiet acknowledgment of what reality is. Sometimes there is no better way to over come the pain of betrayal than by just submitting ourselves to it! For the people who indulge in betrayal are sure one day to pay for it.

Blind Faith

In the recent past, I had a taste of what the result of blind faith on persons who are on a different level in human relations can really be. Very rarely do we come across persons, who have absolute trust in every person they come in touch with, including strangers, not realizing how dangerous and suicidal that can lead to. But needless to say, if we are able to create a world where we can blindly trust anyone, we need not look for the heavens then.

Selfishness and greed know no bounds and limits, and every time we trust a person, we are taking certain things for granted, and that is the reasonable risk that we can afford to take in the case of the people with whom we rub shoulders each day. But can we do the same with the people who have but a business or employer-employee relationship? Another important question that we can ask ourselves is : how much can I really trust a person?

Every person before being trusted or claiming trust-worthiness should prove him/herself. There cannot be grounds for trusting a person, if they were not sufficiently trusted. We have thousands of examples around us which show blind faith and trust in persons will invariably lead us to our own downfall. We cannot forget the fact that the world is not as sane and secure as we thought it to be. If there is one honest trustworthy person, there are nine more wicked, selfish, greedy persons around us. And most often we may fall in the hands of such wicked men and women, and may ultimately lose our face.

Every relationship, even if it is a business related, or customer related, is based on certain amount of trust. When I purchase cooking oil, I trust the shopkeeper will not give me adulterated oil, which may only lead to manifold sickness. I also trust the shopkeeper will not take more money than the just price. But can we take that for granted. Even the people who can afford to be cheated, would not take the words of the shopkeeper seriously and pay the money as demanded. The price stamp is made mandatory so that the customers are not cheated, and we have the duty to check the stamp and pay accordingly, and do not give scope for people to exploit our generosity.

What is the kind of faith that God has on the human beings? Is it the blind faith or the kind of faith that scrutinizes and challenges us? Trust is something that is to do with my relationship with the other person. If I prove myself to be trustworthy, I may experience God as one who accepts me with blind faith; but for some others God may also come across as the one who challenges their trust. Here there is nothing which is better or worse. These two are just two ways of relating to a person. But when I know that God trusts me as I trust him blindly, the relationship is in a higher plain than the other, and that is merely a matter of privilege, we can be happy about.

Man of Different Mettle

Dear Father Ignatius, I am not patient enough to count how many years ago you had left this beautiful world, but I can only say that it was more than 450 years ago, but your memory is still fresh in my mind. Because there is something in me which I can proudly claim to be Ignatian (see how easily you have become a type, like Aristotelian, Hegelian, Marxian…), and the world around me is only happy to see me as belonging to your ‘type’. Sometimes people do frown at me, because there is a trace of idiosyncrasy, and who today is not idiosyncratic, tell me?

But jokes apart, after going through 16 years of training (the world outside calls it grilling, drilling and brain-washing), I could not help become quite similar to you to a certain extent. But I wish I were more like you, so that I can have the fire to enflame everyone I come in touch with. The world today is too lazy, complacent, too nervous to take risk, and too calculative in its moves, too frightened to dream big, too comfortable in their little ghettoes. The world today needs more men who can fight and yet not heed the wounds.

When I first heard how you left the comfort of your cozy life in the palace, the dreamgirl you could have possibly won, after that wretched setting of the knee bones without local anasthesea, I was quite alarmed. How you dared to leave all, and don the sack-clothes of a mendicant! No, it is not possible for me to do the same today; your world was quite different, and in today’s world, I need to count each of my steps, or else I may be down in the gutters.

You had no shame! Thank God for it, you were able to sit in the company of small children and study, and slowly move to heights to even complete your MA in the prestigious University of Paris. You had experienced what a prison life is, having yourself stayed there twice, for the mistakes you did not commit. We are too self-conscious, and safeguard our sanctity as if our lives depend on it. If we are able to drop all shame and dare to walk before God , there can be no better security than this.

I marvel your indomitable courage to even rise up against the mighty empires, kings and popes. And strangely no one ever dared to oppose you, because they all knew you were a man made of a different mettle, and they cannot compete with you. The guts you had made men and women of your times to tremble, and the God you believed in had blessed you with a spirit which cared for no human appreciations and applause. I take my hats off to you, Father Ignatius. If only people can see in me the Lord you so lovingly served all your life, I need no better blessing on your feast day.

Lame to Game

What can a lame former knight of the fifteenth century offer to the modern management, group dynamics, spirituality and psychiatry of the twenty-first century? One might wonder, if I was only kidding. It is next to impossible for such a person to have any trace of memory in modern minds, were he not someone who has etched his name in the annals of history. But it would be interesting to note what his contributions to the modern world are, before reckoning him with laurels.

This dreamer, who had far too great ambitions to win the whole world, had formed a band of men, who today number about 18,000, spread around the world, involved in anything that a human mind can imagine, and his successors are even today looked upon as the ‘black pope’; if there is any group of men that the hierarchical Church would lean on at the time of any major crisis, it is these men, ever ready to give even their life to save the Vicar of Christ and the Church militant.

Church militant? He was a knight, and so he could think of the Church and the Society only in military terms; was he not the first Superior General to head the band of men, who called themselves the Society of Jesus? His Spiritual Exercises today is considered a great spiritual classic, and men and women who long to have an experience of God in the midst of all the hussle and bussle take this small book, and get themselves lost in the forest of love and God’s compassion.

If the company that he founded along with nine other companions were to survive five centuries, it is no mean thing. He had a method of forming his men that even management curricula will fall short; men who were not even above average, became firebrand missionaries, teachers, social workers, thinkers, writers, researchers, and inventors. What ignited these men that they are able to surpass all human expectations and calculations? What is the magic behind these men?

Ignatius of Loyola was too short in height in comparison to the six feet men and women; he seemed to have looked quite handsome in his younger days, but that was not the case in his older days; he clothed with rags, and lived such a miserable life in the heart of Rome, bearing all privation happily, but pouring all his efforts in forming his men, giving them council, writing letters to them (already in a matter of about 10 years, he seemed to have written over 3000 letters). His legacy lives on, in the men ready to fight any battle, be it moral, social, religious, economic; name it and they are ready to fight. If one lame had surrendered his sword at the foot of Mother Mary, today 18,000 men are ready to fight, not with swords of steel, but with swords of faith in God and humanity, trust in the age old wisdom of their founder, confidence in the five century old tradition… If one were to claim that Ignatius has not given to the world anything positive, that would be the greatest lie ever!

God of Taboos

Taboos are cousins of superstitions, and in the modern world we would think there is nothing that can strictly be called a taboo. What had been a taboo for several centuries is an accepted fact, but whether we like it or not, taboos are tied to our personality and our upbringing. And to make things worse, what is a taboo in one country is not so in another, and one is left to wonder whether to consider it as a taboo or not.

Certain words are considered taboo words, and we would not utter them, even if we were to die. And if we consider them carefully there are many such words; for instance, inner clothes and genitals are considered 'bad' words, and we would go all the way to find some other soft words to imply to them. We have grouped them under taboo terms, and even those who have studied science would hesitate to use these words. Is there not something for us to think if this is really going to help us look forward?

Tribal communities are known to be holding on to certain taboos; for instance, for each of the sept, there will be one particular animal whose meat they cannot eat, and one particular tree, which they cannot fell, because they are related to the sept by blood. Thank God for this taboos, among the tribals, still we have most of the trees intact. But times are fast changing, and soon there will be too few tribals who would be honoring their ageold taboos, and protect flora and fauna at least within their localities.

There are still social and cultural taboos; in the Indian society, it is a taboo for the woman to even touch a plough; similarly it is a taboo for men to fetch water from the well. But the number of taboos are fast disappearing, and soon we may come to a situation, when it will be quite hard to explain to the then generations what a taboo is.

God is not spared from these taboos; there are certain names of God, which are considered taboos, and therefore we have to find other words to explain the same. The four letter Hebrew word for God has been considered a taboo word, and in order to respect the sentiments of Jews in abstaining from pronouncing the word, the Catholic Church has instructed her children to that effect. And yet behind all the taboos, one will be able to seek and find the 'God of taboos'.