Islam

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Only One God

“And dispute ye not with the People of the Book except with means better (than mere disputation), unless it be with those of them who inflict wrong and injury: But say: ‘We believe in the revelation which has come down to us and in that which has come down to you; Our God and your God is one; and it is to Him We bow (in Islam).’”(Qur’an 29:46)

Last evening I had the pleasure of attending a program sponsored by the Muslim Christian Dialogue Center at the University of St. Thomas. It wasn’t my first nor will be it be my last! The Center does a splendid job of fostering mutual understanding and cooperation among Muslims and Christians through respectful dialogue grounded in the Qur’anic and Christian traditions. The dialogue flows from the belief that Muslims and Christians worship the same God (cf. Vatican II: Nostra Aetate, The Qur’an, 29:46; 42:15), who is at work in both faiths and share much in common.

All three presenters were warm and inviting representatives of their faith. I was especially intrigued by the woman who grew up Catholic on a farm in Central Minnesota who converted to Islam. Why would anyone do that? Weren’t there good Christian role models to mentor her in the richness of her faith of origin? Yes, I felt challenged, apologetic and defensive. However, her radiant demeanor, spiritual wisdom and obvious respect for both Judaism and Christianity assured me of her personal integrity and the beauty of Islam as a spiritual path.

I welcomed numerous points of resonance between the two faiths if we step beyond dogmatism and rote ritual. How do we come to know the Holy One? How do we awaken to the manifold presence and providence of God? How do we best honor and remain aware of the Holy? Of course, this finds expression in efficacious gratitude. I was returned to my own Ignatian (cf., St. Ignatius of Loyola; Jesuit) heritage: Ad Majoren Dei Glorium – not just “all for the glory of God” but “all for the greater glory of God’!

The panelists’ joyful insistence that literally everything is a creation of God sounded a great deal like the desirable habit of “Finding God in all things!” This lived appreciation that holiness resides in each of us and in all creation reminded me of Gerard Manly Hopkins’ poetry (e.g. Pied Beauty and Kingfishers). Islam’s resolute desire to live in conscious awareness of God and orienting one’s living according to God’s will found easy parallel in the Examen (find numerous versions of this practice [here]).

Rather than remaining within our Christian comfort zone, you may wish to prayerfully reflect upon a poem shared by 13th century Persian Sufi mystic, Rumi.  May it awaken us to God’s intimate presence throughout creation. Remaining aware of such providence, may we show gratitude for all we have been given:

who is this existence
who puts sadness
in your heart
 
who is this soul
who sweetens your grief
as soon as you crawl
 
the one who first frightens you
with deadly snakes
before opening the treasure vault
 
who changes a monster
to an angel
a sorrow to happiness
 
who gives the blind
wisdom and
inner sight
 
who changes darkness
to light
thistles to flowers
 
who sheds the sins
of the sinful like
autumn leaves
 
and puts guilt
in the heart of
its own enemies
 
who makes them
repent and in silence
says amen and
whose amen brings
inner happiness
and soulful delight
 
who changes bitter thoughts
to lightness and
joyous zeal
 
bestows fire
and makes you leap
with unknown joy
 
the fire that can
make a hero
from a desperate heart
 
who is this existence
who is this
tell me who

(ghazal number 528, translated by Nader Khalili)

by

In Grateful Memory

Dom Christian de Chergé and his fellow Trappist monks rank among my all-time heroes. The movie “Of Gods and Men” recounted their faith-filled commitment to inter-faith dialogue and their tragic fate. On the night of March 26-27, 1996, seven monks from the monastery Notre-Dame de l’Atlas of Tibhirine in Algeria were kidnapped.  They were held for two months and then found dead in late May 1996.

Aware of the reality in which they chose to live, Dom Christian, the superior, wrote a testament in 1993 to be opened and read if he died by violence. The text was opened on the feast of Pentecost, May 26 shortly after the monks were killed.  In prayerful respect for these martyrs I recommend Dom Christian’s testament for your reflection on this anniversary:

If someday -and it may be today- I happen to be a victim of the terrorism which now seems to engulf all the foreigners living in Algeria, I would like my community, my Church, my family to remember that my life was GIVEN to God and to this country. 

May they accept that the Sole Master of every life cannot be indifferent to this brutal form of departure. 

May they associate this death with so many others, just as violent, left in the indifference of anonymity.

My life is not worth more than any other.

Nor is it worth less.

In any case, it lacks the innocence of childhood.

I have lived long enough to know my complicity with the evil which, unfortunately, seems to prevail in the world, and even with the evil which might suddenly strike me. I would like, when the time comes, to have this moment of lucidity which would enable me to ask for God’s pardon and that of my brothers in humanity, and at the same time to pardon with all my heart the one who strikes me down. I cannot wish such a death. It seems important to testify to this. I do not see how I could be happy to see this people whom I love to be indiscriminately accused of my death. It is too high a price to be paid for what is perhaps called the “grace of martyrdom” by an Algerian, whoever he may be, especially if he says he is acting in fidelity to what he believes Islam to be. I know the contempt in which Algerians are held. 

I also know the caricatures of Islam, encouraged by a certain idealism. It is too easy to think that one is acting in good conscience by identifying this religious path with the fundamentalisms of its extremists. Algeria, Islam is something else for me; it is a body and a soul. I have proclaimed this often enough. I believe this, as far as I know and have seen, so often finding in this place this leitmotiv of the Gospel learned at my mother’s knees, my first Church, specifically in Algeria and already respecting Moslem believers. Clearly, my death will appear to justify those who would quickly dismiss me as naive, or as an idealist, “let him tell us what he thinks of it now”! But they should know that this will finally liberate my most burning curiosity. For, God willing, I will be able to plunge my vision into the Father’s in order to contemplate with Him His Islamic children just as He sees them, all illuminated with Christ’s glory, fruits of His Passion, clothed by the gift of the Spirit whose secret joy will always be to establish communion and re-establish resemblance while enjoying the differences. I give thanks to God who seems to have wanted this lost life, completely mine and completely theirs, for heavenly JOY, for everything and despite everything. 

In this THANK YOU which says everything from now on about my life, I of course want to include you, friends of today and tomorrow, and you, friends here, beside my mother and father, my sisters and my brothers and their families, repaid a hundredfold as promised! And also to you, friend of the final hour, who will not know what you are doing. Yes, I also desire this THANK YOU for you, and this A-DIEU (TO-GOD) foreseen for you. May we be allowed to meet again as happy thieves in Paradise, if it pleases God, Father to both of us. AMEN!
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I highly recommend the compelling history, The Monks of Tibhirine: Faith, Love and Terror in Algeria by John W. Kiser (St. Martin’s Griffin 2002).

Christian de Cherge: A Theology of Hope by Christian Salenson (Cistercian Studies, 2009., trans. 2011) is perhaps the most compelling and inspiring theology I have read in ten years.