Good interview with Sr.Joan

www.huffingtonpost.com/paul-raushenbush/...

Jun 12, 2012 -- 9:58PM, cove52 wrote:

What can I say? Here's a rare picture worth a thousand words, the Papal Duchess Genevieve Brady kissing Pacelli's ring circa 1936. And therein lies perhaps the strangest irony of all. No woman occupies that piece of royal turf today.

I see they shared the same taste in shoes.

LOL!  Good eyes, Cove!

Jun 11, 2012 -- 3:20PM, cherubino wrote:

I too was a Trappist monk- the quiet, obedient type for what it's worth. Here's my story.

Cherubino,

Thank you for your candid cautionary tale. Thank you also for having had the courage to spill the beans. God is a God of Justice and you certainly did your part in championing it. Persecution is the normative response to standing up for justice, yet you seem to have avoided the pitfall of marinading in bitterness and grievance.

I would like to hear your wisdom and to draw on your long experience on three questions:

(1) Do you think organized religion has any hope?

(2) What do you think of the likes of brother David Steindl-Rast who remains in the Order yet quite openly embraces Eastern mysticism? He is a Benedictine monk dedicated to Buddhist-Christian dialogue. The sincere, calm and meaningful words spoken by Steindl-Rast in this short film, and his manner of imparting them, are likely influenced by Buddhism as well as the most universalist and mystical traditions of Christianity. This little video is by the award-winning cinematographer Louie Schwartzberg, a Jewish man of Buddhist leanings.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=gXDMoiEkyuQ

I recommend watching the whole 9-minute piece and particularly the short film "Gratitude" which begins at 3:45 mins. Your thoughts?

(3) What is your take on the likes of Rumi, Attar and Hafiz?

Kind regards from flower-scented Helsinki,

LilWabbit

Thanks Cherub... There's a lot we agree on.

Jun 14, 2012 -- 8:57AM, cherubino wrote:

What do you get if you cross a Presbyterian and a Hindu?

A Gita-basher?

Jun 14, 2012 -- 8:57AM, cherubino wrote:

A Zen master and a Catholic?

A mindful Monsignor.

Jun 14, 2012 -- 8:57AM, cherubino wrote:

A Jew and a Sufi?

A whirling rabbi.

Jun 14, 2012 -- 8:57AM, cherubino wrote:

This is where I think we're headed, with the era of the Christian monk like Merton, Keating and Steindl-Rast -- all of whom got a roof over their heads and three hots a day by staying basically loyal to their orders-- as synthesizers being a relatively short chapter in the process.

Synthesis is a welcome development with a noble intent. It also breaks down barriers that are as perilous as they are artificial. Yet I can't help but to liken it to an attempt to meet the responsibilities of adulthood by breeding the perfect child.

Kind regards,

LilWabbit

Jun 14, 2012 -- 11:02AM, Lilwabbit wrote:

Synthesis is a welcome development with a noble intent. It also breaks down barriers that are as perilous as they are artificial. Yet I can't help but to liken it to an attempt to meet the responsibilities of adulthood by breeding the perfect child.

Kind regards,

LilWabbit

Over a century ago, sociologist Max Weber suggested that one's religiosity is largely shaped by education and social class, that belief systems are personalized and concretized and their legends are taken more as literal history in inverse proportion to one's social status and sense of socio-economic stability. In other words, those who see themselves as economically downtrodden are more likely to believe in a personal savior who once functioned in time and will again, if only to reward them with some sort of just comeuppance in the hereafter.

As a rule, this also serves the rich and powerful, who understandably have a keen interest in supporting any belief system that legitimizes the status quo. The difference in a democracy with a strong middle class is that one's socio-economic status can theoretically be improved with education and effort, at least when the economy is booming and the opportunities are foreseeable. However, when rapid social change and economic insecurity create a climate of cultural anxiety and a disenfranchised middle class, most theological systems revert by popular demand to personalized deities.  

Weber wrote:

"The religious need of the middle and petty citizen expresses itself less in the form of heroic myths than in the emotional legend, which has a tendency toward inwardness and edification. This corresponds to the greater emphasis upon pacified domestic and family life of the middle classes, in contrast to the ruling strata. This middle-class transformation of religion in the direction of domesticity is illustrated by the emergence of the piety (Bhakti) to a godlike savior in all Hindu cults, both in the creation of the Bodhisattva figure as well as in the cults of Krishna; and by the popularity of the edifying myths of the child Dionysos, Osiris, the Christ child, and their numerous parallels. The emergence of the citizen strata as a power-holder which helped shape religion under the influence of mendicant monks resulted in the replacing the imperialistic art like Nicola Pisano's (1225-78) 'Annunciation' by his son Govenni's (1250-1314) 'Holy family,' just as the Krishna child is the darling of popular art in India.

"The salvational myth of god who has assumed human form or its savior who has been deified is, as well as magic, a characteristic concept of popular religion, and hence one that has arisen quite spontaneously in very different places. On the other hand, the notion of an impersonal and ethical cosmic order that transcends the deity and the ideal of an exemplary salvation are intellectualistic conceptions which are definitely alien to the masses and possible only for a laity that has been educated along ethically rational lines. The same holds true for the development of a concept of an absolutely transcendental god. With the exception of Judaism and Protestantism, all religions and religious ethics have had to reintroduce cults of saints, heroes or functional gods in order to accommodate themselves to the needs of the masses. Thus Confucianism permitted such cults, in the form of the Taoist pantheon, to continue their existence by its side. Similarly, as popularized Buddhism spread to many lands, it allowed the various gods of these lands to live on as recipients of the Buddhist cult, subordinated to the Buddha. Finally, Islam and Catholicism were compelled to accept local, functional, and occupational gods as saints, the veneration of which constituted the real religiosity of the masses in everyday life."

(From Notes on the Sociology of Religion)