BC Symposia on Interreligious Dialogue

Yesterday evening marked the opening plenary session, open to the larger BC community, of the now annual Boston College Symposia on Interreligious Dialogue. Most of the Spirituality Committee, myself included, were in attendance at the BC Heights Room. The session was followed by an informal social, with wine and cheese and other finger foods provided by BC catering. Last year's event was headlined by David Burrell, a Notre Dame professor of philosophical theology who specializes in dialogue between Muslims and Christians. Following in Burrell's footsteps in 2009 comes University of Chicago professor David Tracy, one of North America's most prominent Catholic theologians. Like Burrell, Tracy approaches interreligious dialogue from a philosophical perspective and takes Western hermeneutics as his shining light. His opening address was entitled, "Understanding the Religious Other: Western Hermeneutics and Interreligious Dialogue." Catherine Keller of Drew University and S. Mark Heim of Andover Newton Theological School followed Tracy's 45-minute address as respondents.

Here is a brief summary of Tracy's address from Prof. Tracy himself: "This paper will address the difficult question of whether modern Western hermeneutics (especially those of Gadamer and Ricoeur) are helpful as heuristic guides for interreligious dialogues. The claim will be that Gadamer's model of conversation is indeed a helpful one and that Ricoeur's addition of explanatory methods and hermeneutics of retrieval and suspicion are also relevant. However, I will also claim that there are serious limits to the present hermeneutic models: namely Gadamer's idea of "fusion of horizons" and Ricoeur's notion of "appropriation." These hermeneutic claims must be faced with the question of radical otherness. This was central in the exchange between Gadamer and Derrida as well as Ricoeur and Levinas. Clearly radical otherness and difference are present in interreligious dialogues. The question of otherness and difference in a context of a revised hermeneutics will be posed as a possible heuristic tool for interreligious and intercultural dialogues."

While my own insufficient background in the hermeneutical philosophy of Gadamer, Ricoeur, and Derrida at times made it frustratingly difficult to follow, Tracy's address and Heim's and Keller's responses nevertheless provided some tantalizing food for thought in the highly-difficult-to-digest emerging fields of interreligious dialogue and comparative theology.

How much can we really understand about the 'Other'? How much should we want or expect to understand in dialogue? What are the aims of dialogue? Following up on Catherine Keller's comment on the etymology of 'empathy', is em-pathos (fully entering into the feeling of) in interreligious dialogue something we should strive for? Mark Heim made an interesting observation about the mindest that is presupposed when reading scriptural texts. Can a Christian, for example, really be able to understand a text from the tripitaka without that high degree of risk that comes with the expected degree of openness?

What are your thoughts?

Eid celebrations in Greater Boston area

These pictures were taken at the Reggie Lewis Athletic Center in Roxbury during the sermon of the Eid Al-Fitr feast last Sunday, marking the end of Ramadan.
There were an estimated 9-10,000 people attending the celebration in Roxbury, along with 17 other mosques in the Greater Boston area that celebrated with smaller numbers, 9 of which exceeded 1,000.

I received these pictures from Professor Muhammad from my 'Abrahamic Family Reunion' course at BC. He informed us that the Muslims in Boston truly represent a "United Nations" of devotees from all across the umma, everywhere from Egypt to Morocco, Montenegro to Turkey, Indonesia to Pakistan.

Anthony De Mello, SJ

I have added some footage of Anthony De Mello, SJ on the video gadget. His material is intellectually fascinating for the way that he blends Christian and Hindu [or occidental and oriental] ways of thinking (yeah Jesuits!). It has also been, for me at least, a highly engaging and thought-provoking resource on a more spiritual level. His books include Sadhana: A Way to God, Awareness, and Awakening.

That's all on De Mello for now, but I'll have more later on how his creativity got him in trouble with Rome. :\

A cardinal problem

Did anyone realize there were bodies buried on our campus?! Personally though, I don't see a problem with leaving the tomb where it is, in accordance with the late Cardinal's wishes. Moving it seems to be almost disrespectful to the dead. Plus, this is such an historic city that it's difficult to travel anywhere without stumbling upon some grave or memorial commemorating a figure from ages past. Would it be so bad to leave things where they stand?

The Boston Globe

Church seeks to move body of O’Connell

Land sale requires cardinal’s reburial

By Michael Paulson, Globe Staff | September 18, 2009

The Archdiocese of Boston, writing an epilogue to one of the more colorful stories in the history of Catholic Boston, asked a court yesterday for permission to unearth the entombed body of Cardinal William H. O’Connell and relocate his remains to the grounds of a suburban prep school.

The proposed disinterment is rich with historical irony, because when O’Connell first purchased land in Brighton as a headquarters for the archdiocese, he insisted that the remains of a group of Sulpician priests be dug up and removed from the property.

Now, six decades after his death, the cardinal’s body may be exhumed from the same acreage because his own alma mater, Boston College, has insisted that the archdiocese remove the cardinal’s remains as a condition of the university’s purchase of the Brighton property.

“It is no longer possible to honor the late cardinal’s wishes relative to his burial,’’ Cardinal Sean P. O’Malley and the trustees of Boston College said in a joint filing in Suffolk Probate and Family Court yesterday. “The petitioning parties seek this court’s approval to reinter the cardinal’s remains on a site approved by the court.’’

O’Connell served as archbishop of Boston from 1907 to 1944, a period of extraordinary growth, in size and influence, for the Catholic population of Boston. He was a powerful and influential prelate who was respected, if not always loved, but his reputation has been complicated in the years since his death by two biographies that have taken critical looks at his lengthy tenure.

O’Connell, as a Catholic priest, had no children, and his multiple siblings and nieces and nephews are all deceased. His surviving relatives - 30 descendants of his brothers and sisters - are divided over disposition of his remains, with some reluctant to see the body moved and others less concerned by the proposal.

The saga touches on many of the most significant episodes of local Catholic history, including not only the storied career of O’Connell, who was at once one of the most powerful and controversial churchmen in Boston, but also the sexual abuse crisis, because the land on which he was buried was sold to pay settlements to victims.

There is even a Kennedy connection: O’Connell’s most prominent living relative is his grandnephew, Paul G. Kirk, a onetime aide to Senator Edward M. Kennedy who became chairman of the Democratic National Committee.

Paul Kirk did not return a call seeking comment yesterday. His brother, Centerville attorney Edward W. Kirk, has been the leading opponent of moving the body of the late cardinal. In a brief interview yesterday, Edward Kirk would say only that “we want to explore every opportunity for a satisfactory resolution of this by agreement.’’

O’Connell, the 11th child born to a family of Irish immigrants in Lowell, was Boston’s first cardinal, and he presided over the church during atime of transformation in the way Catholics were seen and treated in Boston.

“The Catholic community was coming into its own, politically and socially, and he both symbolized that and, in some ways, made it possible,’’ said O’Connell biographer James M. O’Toole, a Boston College history professor. “He was a comparable figure to the political giants of the age - James Michael Curley and Honey Fitz - and he turned the position of archbishop of Boston into that of a public figure, so that what he had to say on any subject was news, simply because he said it.’’

O’Connell had his quirks. He owned a succession of black poodles that he would walk along the Commonwealth Avenue Mall. And he had his foibles. He was criticized during his tenure for failing to act against two priests, one of them his nephew, who had secretly married.

Archdiocesan officials say that they are obligated to try to relocate the remains as part of the 2004 agreement with Boston College, but that they will do everything they can to honor O’Connell.

They chose St. Sebastian’s School as the new site for his grave because O’Connell, who was a champion of Catholic education, founded the school in Newton in 1941. (The school moved to Needham in 1982.)

“The issue for the archdiocese is about making sure that we appropriately provide a permanent resting place befitting a cardinal and priest of the church and to fulfill the conditions of the sale to Boston College,’’ said archdiocesan spokesman Terrence C. Donilon. “We believe that in the end we will have provided a more appropriate resting place that honors and respects the late cardinal and his family.’’

Donilon said that, if the archdiocese is allowed to move the body, the church will construct a permanent memorial to the cardinal at St. John’s Seminary and will establish a scholarship in the cardinal’s name at St. Sebastian’s.

O’Connell’s legacy is still treasured at St. Sebastian’s, an elite Catholic private school with 360 students, all boys, in grades 7 through 12. The cardinal’s portrait hangs in the school’s dining room, and the school bestows an annual medal in his name.

“If the cardinal is to be disinterred, we would welcome him here,’’ said William L. Burke III, the school’s headmaster.

O’Connell’s will is quite explicit about his wishes; he wrote, “I direct that my funeral obsequies be as simple as possible, and that I be buried in the Chapel of the Blessed Virgin Mary on the grounds of St. John’s Seminary, Brighton, Massachusetts.’’

But in fact, his funeral was quite elaborate, and that chapel, which O’Connell constructed to house his remains, is on land that the seminary sold to the archdiocese and the archdiocese then sold to Boston College.

“Given that the cardinal’s wish to be buried on the grounds of St. John’s Seminary could no longer be honored, the archdiocese and Boston College felt it best that he be reinterred at an archdiocesan site,’’ said Jack Dunn, a spokesman for Boston College, who added that the college has proposed building a parking garage near the site of the tomb. “Out of respect for the cardinal, we do not believe that it is appropriate to have a grave site on a college campus, especially at a site in close proximity to a proposed parking facility.’’

It is not clear whether the archdiocese would be able to move the tomb itself or would have to remove the body from beneath the tomb while leaving the structure intact, because the tomb is arguably of some historic significance and has attracted the attention of the Massachusetts Historical Commission.

Michael Paulson can be reached at mpaulson@globe.com.

Yom Kippur begins this Saturday, September 27

Yom Kippur, one of the most important, if not the most important, Jewish holiday begins at sunset, this Saturday September 27th and lasts until sundown of the next day. This day of import begins with Kol Nidre, a Saturday evening service named for the prayer with which it begins. It's interesting to note how in the article "G-d" is used to signify the divine. This reminds me of the injunction not to pronounce the name YHWH, and to use Adonai instead. The word 'Adonai' is derived from the vowel sounds between the consonants in YHWH. In the translated Hebrew Scriptures, YHWH is translated as LORD with capital letters. 'Lord', in lower-case letters, is the translation of Adonai. Just a few interesting tidbits!

Here is some more information about Yom Kippur (excerpts from Judaism 101):

The name "Yom Kippur" means "Day of Atonement," and that pretty much explains what the holiday is. It is a day set aside to "afflict the soul," to atone for the sins of the past year. In Days of Awe, I mentioned the "books" in which G-d inscribes all of our names. On Yom Kippur, the judgment entered in these books is sealed. This day is, essentially, your last appeal, your last chance to change the judgment, to demonstrate your repentance and make amends.

As I noted in Days of Awe, Yom Kippur atones only for sins between man and G-d, not for sins against another person. To atone for sins against another person, you must first seek reconciliation with that person, righting the wrongs you committed against them if possible. That must all be done before Yom Kippur.

Yom Kippur is a complete Sabbath; no work can be performed on that day. It is well-known that you are supposed to refrain from eating and drinking (even water) on Yom Kippur. It is a complete, 25-hour fast beginning before sunset on the evening before Yom Kippur and ending after nightfall on the day of Yom Kippur. The Talmud also specifies additional restrictions that are less well-known: washing and bathing, anointing one's body (with cosmetics, deodorants, etc.), wearing leather shoes (Orthodox Jews routinely wear canvas sneakers under their dress clothes on Yom Kippur), and engaging in sexual relations are all prohibited on Yom Kippur.

Most of the holiday is spent in the synagogue, in prayer. In Orthodox synagogues, services begin early in the morning (8 or 9 AM) and continue until about 3 PM. People then usually go home for an afternoon nap and return around 5 or 6 PM for the afternoon and evening services, which continue until nightfall. The services end at nightfall, with the blowing of the tekiah gedolah, a long blast on the shofar. See Rosh Hashanah for more about the shofar and its characteristic blasts.

It is customary to wear white on the holiday, which symbolizes purity and calls to mind the promise that our sins shall be made as white as snow (Is. 1:18). Some people wear a kittel, the white robe in which the dead are buried.

After Yom Kippur, one should begin preparing for the next holiday, Sukkot, which begins five days later.

List of Dates

Yom Kippur will occur on the following days of the Gregorian calendar:
Jewish Year 5769: sunset October 8, 2008 - nightfall October 9, 2008
Jewish Year 5770: sunset September 27, 2009 - nightfall September 28, 2009
Jewish Year 5771: sunset September 17, 2010 - nightfall September 18, 2010
Jewish Year 5772: sunset October 7, 2011 - nightfall October 8, 2011
Jewish Year 5773: sunset September 25, 2012 - nightfall September 26, 2012

Catholic role in the Middle East

Having a background in international studies, these kinds of news stories interest me. As the article mentions, the Catholic Church indeed has a long history of activity in the Middle East, and history shows that its always worked out well, so why not meet and discuss new means of participation? :D

Pope: Bishops to discuss Middle East next year

The Associated Press
Saturday, September 19, 2009 7:46 AM

VATICAN CITY -- Pope Benedict XVI has announced a special meeting of bishops next year to discuss Middle East peace efforts and the role of the Catholic Church in the region.

Addressing bishops and patriarchs from Eastern rite churches, Benedict said Saturday that the meeting will take place Oct. 10-24, 2010, and will be titled "The Catholic Church in the Middle East: communion and testimony."

The meeting of bishops, called a synod, will gather church leaders from the Middle East and around the world.

The pope and the Vatican have long been active on the Middle East diplomatic front, seeking to protect Christians in the Holy Land and elsewhere in the region while supporting efforts to solve the Israel-Palestinian dispute.

© 2009 The Associated Press

ISBCC opens in Roxbury

This blog will raise awareness over issues pertaining to particular religious and philosophical practices and lifestyles, especially in the Boston area.

Our first post comes to us from Roxbury, where just a few months ago, the Islamic Society of Boston Cultural Center opened. Check out the article in the Boston Globe.

Mission Statement

The Graduate Student Association's Spirituality Committee, from the hallowed institution of higher learning in Chestnut Hill, brings you its mission statement:

The goal of the GSA Spirituality Committee is to assist students of any and all religious and philosophical views-- it is not intrinsically Catholic or Christian. The committee means to provide graduate students with spiritual or religious resources supporting them in their efforts to conceptualize and construct the human good. One way of realizing this is through dialogue, which encourages us to trust in the process and the journey in the direction of whole and authentic human fulfillment.

The Committee also means to strengthen the community through joint multi-faith efforts that engage faith, diversity, and social action. We believe that the bonds of community will be strengthened if religious and philosophical diversity is engaged in working towards better understanding and cooperative service.