I’m an Episcopal priest. From childhood I’ve loved church,
particularly the music, the incense, and the Eucharistic ritual. When I stand at the altar Sunday after
Sunday, chanting words of prayer I’ve known since childhood, I transcend for a
moment the boundaries of space and time and feel the presence of the Holy in
the gathered community and the bread and wine of the Eucharist. No matter how busy or stressed I may
be, walking into a church on a Sunday morning feels like “coming home” and my
spiritual center returns as I prepare the elements, don the vestments, check
the gospel book and get ready to lead the community in worship, prayer and the
celebration of the sacred mysteries.
The hymns, the prayers and the ritual of the Eucharist make Christ
present and real in that holy “thin place” whether it be a large, well
appointed city church or a small country chapel with just a few folks.
Interfaith
dialogue is very much alive in our land these days, and certainly here in
Rochester. For many of us raised
in a particular religious tradition, simply walking into the sacred space of
our tradition can conjure up the sense of the transcendent as we are enveloped
in the symbols and ritual of that tradition. When we enter someone else’s
sacred space, however, we might feel like a stranger in a strange land, as if
we have crossed a border into foreign territory far from the God we know and
worship. In my years of interfaith
dialogue and education, I have come to appreciate how spiritually significant
it is for those of us who want to know our interfaith neighbors better, to
overcome shyness and awkwardness, fear and suspicion, and enter their sacred
space with an equally open heart, expecting to hear the voice of God and to see
the face of God in new ways through rituals and prayers not our own.
Paul Knitter in
his book, Without Buddha I could not be a
Christian describes his experience of becoming immersed in the Buddhist
tradition as an experience of “passing over” and “passing back” as he practices
Buddhist meditation and then returns to his Roman Catholic roots when attending
church. Interreligious encounter
is often structured as an intellectual exercise, where we gather folks together
for discussion of sacred texts or beliefs, but often we leave out a most
important piece of the genuine interfaith encounter, which is prayer. And when I say prayer, I do not
mean a carefully crafted “interfaith prayer”, something written or prepared specifically
for an interfaith gathering so that it will be acceptable to anyone, but prayer
that is rooted in the particularity of a specific religious tradition, with the
images, symbols, language and cadence of that tradition. I have come to believe that sharing in
the worship of my interreligious neighbors is a profoundly moving spiritual
experience through which I come to know the God I first met in my Episcopal
church tradition, more deeply than I can within the confines of my own
tradition. I have become an
advocate of interfaith “crossing over,” including participation in the rituals
of others, where such participation is acceptable to one’s hosts and does not
violate one’s own sense of religious propriety.
Recently I
attended a portion of the ceremonies at the Hindu Temple of Rochester during
which the image of the deity Ganesha was consecrated and installed at the Hindu
temple. Those rituals took place
over four full days so I only experienced part of the extensive ritual. I took off my shoes, entered the temple
and sat on the floor with the devotees, taking in the scent of the incense and
the sounds of the chanting by several Hindu priests. I watched the flames of
the fire ceremonies and the offerings of food, water, grains, flowers and other
items as they were given to the murti.
Even though I do not understand Sanskrit nor Hindi, the sound, rhythm
and cadence of the chants washed over me and I could feel the presence of the
holy in all of the rituals as the devotees participated with the priests in the
prayers and offerings that would imbue the granite likeness of Ganesha with the
divine spirit. I joined the line
and poured rice over the image during one of the puja ceremonies, sensing the
sacred just as I do when I consecrate the bread and wine on Sunday mornings in
my church. Not knowing the words to the chants, I nonetheless hummed along, the
sonorous quality of the chanting taking me to a quiet and contemplative place. When
I go to the Temple now, I like to go visit Ganesha for prayer, sensing the
presence of God in that odd elephant-headed deity who gazes impishly and
lovingly from his pedestal adorned in beautiful garments and surrounded by
offerings of food, flowers and incense.
Then this week,
after our second of three Muslim Christian dialogue events at the Islamic
Center, I went, as I often do, to the balcony, where the women pray, for Isha
prayers, the final night prayers in the Muslim roster of five times a day
prayer. Again, I removed my shoes,
and this time I chose to stand in line, shoulder to shoulder with my Muslim
sisters to experience the prayer as they experience it, no longer an observer,
but a participant. I do not
understand Arabic, although I can understand the phrase Allah-u- Akbar, (God is Great) and I have read English translations
of the prayers and know there is nothing prayed there to which I cannot assent. I felt strongly the presence of the
holy as we stood together in the masjid, the sound of the recitation of verses
from the Qur’an soaring in the prayer space as the imam recited them
beautifully. The sound of those Arabic words recited in a sacred chant invokes
the sense of God’s presence. I
understand why Muslims believe the words of the Qur’an to be holy words as the
very sound of them brings God into the room. I was profoundly moved by the practice of prostrating myself
as part of the prayer ritual.
Christians have, for the most part, lost touch with the importance of
using the body in prayer. Muslims
have something to teach us about what it means to surrender to God, and that
sense of surrender becomes palpable as the forehead touches the floor. And the sense of being part of a
praying community is deepened as you stand shoulder to shoulder with others
bowing, prostrating and standing in a sacred dance that incarnates the reality
that we are all connected one with another and ultimately with God.
Carl Jung had a
sign over his door, a replica of which I keep in my office, which declares,
“Bidden or not bidden, God is present.”
Thanks to the hospitality of my interfaith neighbors I have been blessed
to experience God’s presence in a variety of distinct and different sacred
spaces and rituals. I do not feel
fear or estrangement when I enter a holy place, rather I feel like a child
playing hide and seek, waiting to discover God in some unexpected way as I take
in the details of that space, the sounds of the prayers, the movements of the
practitioners, and the smells of incense or rugs or candles. God has many faces and many voices and the
people with whom I pray in these holy places become fellow pilgrims on the
sacred journey as I join with them in prayer. By crossing over and passing back I have discovered that
truly, there is nowhere in the world where God is not.
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