03/16/2012 12:28 MYANMAR - THAILAND PIME missionary in Thailand: Buddhists have helped me better understand Christianity

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» 03/16/2012 12:28
MYANMAR - THAILAND
PIME missionary in Thailand: Buddhists have helped me better understand Christianity
by Piero Gheddo
With the book "Thanks to my Buddhist friends," Fr. Angelo Campagnoli (PIME) speaks of 52 years of priesthood among Buddhists of Myanmar and Thailand. Interreligious dialogue is not a comparison of religious beliefs and the truth of what to believe, but a mutual understanding and the story of shared experiences.

Milan (AsiaNews) - My confrere Fr. Angelo Campagnoli has published a book "Thanks to my Buddhist friends" with the subtitle: "Living with the Buddhists I have better understood Christianity" (Pimedit, Milan 2012, p. 82, Euro 5), in which he does not talk of Buddhism from the theoretical point of view, but shares his life experience with Buddhists, throughout 52 years of priesthood and his missionary life. First in Burma (1960-1966) he was expelled with more than 200 young missionaries (18 Protestants, the rest Catholics) by the military-socialist dictatorship that still regins, and then, after 1972, in Thailand, where Campagnoli was sent with three other brothers to start a PIME missionary presence in the North of the country. From the outset he devoted himself to inter-religious dialogue, attending Buddhist monasteries and universities and then also giving lectures on Christianity at a Buddhist University.

Then the bishop of Chiang Mai, to whom PIME had given their full availability, sent him to the parish of Phrae, the capital town of the province in northern Thailand, where he founded a large school with more than two thousand students for the most part Buddhist and where he has made friends with Buddhist people and monks.

I ask him what this little book means. "In Italy - he says - many feel that all religions are more or less equal, but there are profound differences between Christianity and Buddhism. For example, we are rightly scandalized by the division of the Christian churches, but Buddhism is much less united. In Japan alone there are 18 different schools of Buddhism, each of which says that the others are wrong, and no-one bats an eye-lid".

"Between Christianity and Buddhism, there are many things that appear similar but are fundamentally different. For example, in Buddhism the distinction between good and evil is mechanical, fatalistic, karma; in Christianity man's life is a relationship with God. So although our commandments from the fifth onward are also relevant to Buddhists, you realize however that it's different. Christians know that the commandment comes from God, our merciful father who created us and loves us and that His law is for our own good; Buddhists must not do evil out of fear, because otherwise they will pay for their disobedience to the law of karma in their next reincarnation. That's the difference. Christianity is a relationship with God, it is responding to a love that loved us first, while in Buddhism there is no relationship like this: there is a rule that is karma, the law that has no forgiveness. "

In Phrae Father Angelo was invited by the Buddhist monks to give them courses in Christianity. The abbot said to him: "There are more and more foreign tourists who come to visit our monastery and ask us to teach them about Buddhism. I invite you, you're a Catholic priest well inculturated in Thailand, to explain Christianity, so that we can talk to these visitors appropriately. Campagnoli gave lectures on Christianity to these monks, becoming their friend. And then he adds: "In explaining Christianity, they said that I make a leap. My reasoning is not logical, because I say things I do not explain. I responded that this is faith in God, which means to trust God who loves me. And they said, but we do only what we understand. "

Dialogue with Buddhists, this is the experience Father Angel.  It is a progressive experience and not a confrontation between the religious faiths and truths to be believed, but a gradual and mutual understanding and the story of their shared experiences. They are interested in life not theology. He says: "A belligerent attitude that expresses a determined and aggressive idea is the safest way to remove the other person. If you silence him or her with your argument, you will never see the other person again, they will avoid you: they care deeply for their inner serenity. Never try to prove that your religion is better than theirs: You can speak all you want about the goodness of your faith, never make a comparison. " He tells the story of a Catholic catechist. A Buddhist friend insisted that he tell him what the best religion was: Christianity or Buddhism? The catechist intelligently responded: "And you tell me, which is the better wife yours or mine?". And the conversation ended there. Woe betide him if he had said that it is Christianity, he might have broken the bond of friendship.

"I discovered these things by getting to know Buddhists, says Father Angelo. Inter-religious dialogue is a difficult and delicate one, we are just beginning this journey." He concludes by describing the image that the great guru Buddhadasa used: "The peak that we want and need to reach is one in the same, the paths of ascent are different and each thinks he is climbing the right one". But, I say, Angelo concludes, if He who is on the summit shouts down to me: "Look, this is the main road, the direct route, the guaranteed on," I can only turn back to the friend who is climbing up by another way and transmit to him the cry from above. And if he continues undeterred in his arduous climb, I can only raise my head and cry out to Him who is on the top: "Lord, shout even more clearly down the other path". And with my voice, maybe a little 'strangled, I entrust to the wind of the Spirit, a "See you on top, Buddhist friend." And this is not relativism, but the hope that we will all meet at the end of our journey since we know that Christ's salvation comes to all, even those who do not know Him. "

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Can meditation make you a better parent?

Home Healing & Spirituality

Melissa McClements found it hard to cope with her daughter's tantrums - until she joined a parent and toddler meditation class. How do you stay calm when your child misbehaves?

London, UK -- My toddler and I recently started a meditation class. I know what you're thinking. What kind of idiot parent would attempt silent mind control in the presence of someone whose idea of quiet time involves sticking pencils up their nostrils and shouting 'Hickory Dickory Dock'?

<< Toddler throwing a tantrum
In the face of this, would any parent remain calm? Photograph: Chris Collins/Corbis

But now I am that idiot parent. And – despite a cringeworthy moment when my two-year-old pointed to a Buddhist monk and asked, "Why is that man wearing a dress like a lady?" – the meditation is going well. Really well. It's provided me with practical tools for day-to-day life with a toddler. For, let's face it, as adorable as their company can be, relaxing it is not.

Most of the time my daughter, Phoebe, is utterly beguiling – full of songs, giggles and spontaneous dances. But, occasionally, she experiences outbreaks of unmitigated rage. They involve floor-writhing, head-butting and a howling that would make any self-respecting banshee glow with pride. I find them hard to cope with, especially in public. There was an incident over a tuna sandwich in a cafe that I still can't think of without a shudder.

It was my husband who first came up with the idea of meditation. He started a course in it to help him deal with work stress. It all seemed a bit new agey to me: the sort of thing beloved by people who read auras and stick crystals on their kids' heads when they're sick. But then I witnessed the difference in him. He could shrug off incidences of workplace ineptitude that would previously have had him grinding his teeth in fury-induced insomnia at 4am.

I wondered if it could help me keep similarly calm during Phoebe's tantrums, and took her along to a parent and toddler meditation group at the local Buddhist centre. Believe me, this was not done without trepidation. I was brought up as an atheist to see organised religion as the source of all humanity's woes. I also think, however, that it's ignorant arrogance to write off ancient wisdom in its entirety.

We were ushered into a large room. Cushions and a basket of toys were laid out, as well as little tables, on which sat pencils and drawings of Buddha to colour in. I should point out that it is only the parents who meditate. The drooling ones are just there for a play. Two helpers keep an eye on them while the mummies and daddies zone out (when this was explained at the outset, I did wonder if they knew how to deal with attempts at swallowing a non-food item several times wider than the throat it's being forced into).

An orange-robed, shaven-headed man came in and sat, cross-legged, on a podium. I felt uneasy, until he made a self-deprecating joke about a monk telling a bunch of mothers how to cope with their kids. He spoke in a cockney accent and laughed frequently. Later, he teased some of the kids about their smelly feet.

We grownups closed our eyes so he could guide us through the meditation – initially instructing us to focus on our breathing and then asking us to dwell on a positive aspect of someone we experience, erm, 'difficulty' with in our lives.

It sounds terribly cheesy, but the children went strangely quiet at first – although they may well just have been over-awed by the unfamiliar setting. I really was able to try (and largely fail – come on, Tibetan masters spend a lifetime trying to do this!) to calm the swirling miasma of my mind.

And then I became aware that Phoebe had placed one of the drawings of Buddha on the carpet. She was punching through it with a pencil. Repeatedly. Irritated by the noise, I squinted down crossly at her through one eye.

"Close your eyes again Mummy," she laughed. I raised my eyebrows … and then remembered something the monk had said about being able to perceive the world more positively if I could change my reactions to other people's behaviour. I looked round the room. Other kids were now running about, throwing toys and mock wrestling on the carpet. A baby was screaming. All of this was far more disruptive than my daughter's behaviour. But none of it bothered me, because I wasn't responsible for them.

I decided that if I could ignore the paper hole-punching, I might really have learnt something. And, as we were leaving, I felt – truly unexpectedly – like I had (until Phoebe drew attention to the monk's outfit and showed we have much work on gender stereotyping to do).

We now attend weekly. Despite times when - mid-attempted meditation - my little one overturns the odd table or sits on my knee to try and prise my eyes open, I still feel it gives both of us a moment of calm during our busy week.

I'm not claiming that I've become a patiently smiling saint overnight. But I do think that if you can glimpse a moment of peaceful calm in the presence of your baby or toddler, you're really on to something – both as a parent and a human being.

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