When My Heart Is in a Holy Place - October 31, 2011

From Wayne:

This line from a hymn we sing in church came to mind as we thought about our first day in Jerusalem, which contains within the walls of the Old City three of the most important "holy places" sacred to the three religious traditions that are the Children of Abraham. Today we visited the Western Wall, sacred to Judaism, and the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, sacred to Christianity. (Tomorrow we will see the Temple Mount, sacred to Islam. )

Our experiences at the Western Wall and the Church of Holy Sepulcher were very different, and helped us to learn more about what helps us center our hearts in a holy place. Both holy places were chaotic, loud, and confusing! They each had a mix if tourists and pilgrims, all falling over each other to get what they came for, whether that be a spiritual experience or a good photograph. Both holy places involved pilgrims engaging in emotional devotional activity that feels a little uncomfortable to me, both engaging in it myself or even watching it. Despite these similarities, the Western Wall experience was where I found my heart was in a holy place.

I want to be careful to describe why this was true in a way that does not put down Christian belief and practices. There is much about the Church of the Holy Sepulcher that can be a target for a some cheap shots from a rational UU. The church is sacred because it is supposed to be built on the sites where Jesus was crucified, where his body was anointed, where his tomb was, and where he ascended to heaven (all these sites within the equivalent of a few Jerusalem blocks, and under one roof!) The history of the site and of the church make this claim very unlikely, but the devotion of worshippers and pilgrims coming there does not care about the historical record.

The historical record of the Western Wall, on the other hand, is undeniable. It is what is left of the Second Temple of Jerusalem and therefore filled with meaning for Jews who see the symbol of rebuilding the Temple in Jerusalem as central to their faith.

The reasons I felt so much more centered and spiritually grounded at the Western Wall had nothing to do with history, however. I felt welcome and invited there, as a Gentile, into a sacred Jewish space that was a lot like a big church social hall in which everything happens at once. We call church social halls "multiple-purpose spaces" because we can use them for all kinds of things - classes, personal devotions and spiritual practices, services, and parties. Imagine an outdoor space in which all of those things are happening at the same time. As we we enter the plaza in front if the Wall, we are welcomed by a family giving away fruit and nuts to everyone in honor of the wedding they just celebrated. Approaching the Wall we see orthodox men reciting their prayers aloud, face to the wall. Here's a family celebration a bar mitzvah ritual at a table over by the barrier that separates the men from the women, so that the boy's mother and female relatives can watch the ceremony perched on chairs. Here's a congregation that has brought their Torah scrolls to be blessed at the wall. Here's a tourist writing the names of his loved ones to be placed in one of the Wall's niches as a prayer for their safety. Here's a man studying Torah.....and here's me! No one tells me I shouldn't be there or can't go to the Wall to pray. The Hassid who has caught my eye invites me : "Go and pray for those you love" he says. So I do. There's room. there's no rush. Despite the chaos and the crowds, there seems to be lots of room for everyone. It feels very quiet as a pray. As I finish, the bar mitzvah crowd behind me starts singing "Havah Nagila" and dancing! Perfect...! My personal devotions and the daily life of the Jewish community at the Wall feel connected, like one whole.

At the Church of the Holy Sepulcher, everything was dark and solemn. The events commemorated there are, if course, filled with sorrow. The tour groups that crowd in make it impossible to enter into that feeling, however. You are part of a line, moving through the Anointing Stone Foyer to the Golgotha Room, to the Tomb Room. It felt like a Disney World attraction on a busy day where you can't stop. The line to touch the relic of the True Cross matches any Disney line. I don't want to join it. I don't feel like I belong here. I honor and respect the Christian pilgrims who have come here in sincere devotion to their faith, but my heart could not be with them in their holy place today.


From Kathleen:

I had a similar experience to Wayne as he described above, which, frankly, surprised me. As a Christian, I expected to find the church of the Holy Sepulcher the "Holy of Holies" -- the place where Jesus' final days- final moments even- were honored and recognized. Oddly enough, I didn't feel anything but an overwhelming desire to leave. Why? While standing in the Basilica, I was reminded again that my Christianity is intimately tied to the history and traditions of Unitarian Universalism. UU Christians have always believed and tried to live the words of the mysterious stranger at Jesus' tomb; "he is not here, he is risen." For me, that means that the most powerful message from Jesus is centered on his life and his teachings, and not focused on the events surrounding his death. Although I am always deeply moved by the story we tell during the Tenebrae service, it's the on-going stories we discuss at the monthly UU Christian Fellowship group that excites, inspires and compels me to keep trying to understand who Jesus was and what bearing his life has on mine, these thousands of years later.

P.S.The next few posts you might see on this blog, may include reflections from other members of the Interfaith Peace Builders group and not entirely ours.



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Location:Jerusalem

Pilgrimage

We're in the Istanbul Airport transferring to our flight to Tel Aviv. We're anticipating our arrival at one of the world's most tightly secured airports, and the questions from the customs officials. Our intention is to describe the purpose of our visit as a "pilgrimage" to holy sites, and not mention the context which will involve our travel in the West Bank. We plan to tell the truth, but in broad strokes.

Is it true to call what we are doing a pilgrimage? It may seem more justifiable for Kathleen, who identifies as a Christian UU, than for Wayne, who identifies as a UU and a Buddhist. But that UU part that we hold in common is what makes this trip a pilgrimage, rather than denies it. The UU in us not only wants to honor the holy sites and land of the Jewish and Christian heritages from which our faith comes, but also recognizes the power of the holy sites of the world faiths that we know less well: Judaism, Islam, and Bah'ai (which has a major pilgrimage shrine in Haifa).

Here in Istanbul Airport, we have become immediately aware of the power of pilgrimage. Even before we got off the plane, we could see through the airport windows hundreds of people dressed in white robes waiting for planes. As we entered and saw them from a closer distance, we saw that many of them were men with full beards all dressed alike in white toga-like robes and sandals, pulling carry on bags. We both had the same thought at the same time - "it's the Haj"!

The Haj is one of the five pillars of Islam, a requirement every observant Muslim seeks to fulfill at least once in a lifetime, to join in the annual pilrimage to Mecca. As we sat ourselves near the gates for the flights boarding for Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, we saw a cross section of the world pass by us: not just men, but women too; not just Turks or Europeans, but Africans and Asians; not just the well-off who can afford the trip, but people who have saved their whole lives to make this possible.

We felt welcomed and inducted into the fellowship of pilgrims. When we arrived at the gate for our flight, the white robes were no more, replaced by seats filled with men in black Hasidic hats and suits, waiting for their flight, and ours. It's a different kind of pilgrimage that awaits us.








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The Daily Reality of Multiculturalism October 27, 2011

Although we aspire to becoming a multicultural congregation, most of the people who attend West Shore Church have not experienced living anywhere that multicultural encounters are a
daily reality. As day tripping tourists to Tangier, Morocco and to Gibraltar, (a British territory that guards the entrance to the Mediterranean Sea on Spain's southwest coast), we were more conscious than ever of how rarely we experience any routinely multicultural daily life.

American's isolation in our cars makes it even more difficult to experience the multicultural realities that we do have. Europeans of all classes spend more time together on public transportation and in public squares. On one bus ride in Gibraltar, we rode alongside two British working class guys with Cockney accents on their way home, two Spanish speaking moms with five hyperactive little girls in tow, an English schoolgirl in a sharply pressed uniform, and a Muslim woman in a full burka, with only her eyes showing. In Tangier, English is the fourth language in use, below Arabic, French, and Spanish. Despite a significant American and British presence in the city historically and today, the road signs and street names are in Arabic and Spanish.

Everywhere we have been in Spain, in any public square except those surrounded residential enclaves, we have encountered multiple languages and cultures, above and beyond those represented by tourists.

A lot of the world lives this as part of daily life. Only the largest countries with the biggest populations have significant numbers of their people isolated in monocultures. Unfortunately, these monocultural countries have the most people, money, and power.



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Location:Gibralter, Tangier Morocco

Jews in Morocco

Our week in the Costa del Sol has seen more fall-like weather and alternations between quiet days reading and preparing for Israel, and conventional tourist trips. Our day in Tangier, a city that is a bridge between Arabic, African Berber, European, and American cultures, was fascinating.
When we were shown the synagogue in Morocco, and the streets that indicated the old Jewish quarter, we realized that we didn't know much about the important history of Jews in Morocco.

This history is not only important to Morocco, but to Israel. Fifteen per cent of Israelis claim Moroccan ancestry. After two thousand years of living in Morocco, under regimes both receptive and hostile to their presence, most of Morocco's Jews emigrated to Israel in the last decades of the 20th century. Those that remain still play important roles in Moroccan society, but the community there is a shadow of what it once was. It's ironic to realize this fact in a city like Tangier, which retains it's international character and still has it's French, British, and American quarters.

The history of Jews in Morocco parallels that of Sephardic (Spanish) Jews in many respects. They flourished in the same eras of tolerant Muslim rule and suffered under more fundamentalist Islamic tribes. Morocco was a place of refuge for Jews driven out of Spain, and Moroccans reacted to influxes of refugees in ways that are familiar to this day, with both hospitality and reactive ambivalence.

We expect to meet Moroccan Jews often in our travels over the month ahead, but it will be in the home that they have created in Israel, rather than the one their ancestors helped build for centuries in Morocco.

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Location:Tangier, Morocco

A Good Satan

Today we went to Tangier, Morocco for a day trip. Because we weren't sure of what traveling to Morocco would entail, we booked a day tour, which, much to our surprise, was quite wonderful. One part of the trip was a visit to a carpet store, which, of course was to encourage all of us tourists to part with our euros. Since Wayne and I are traveling for two more months and had no desire to lug around a rug, I tried to stand apart from the crowd and carpet sellers. Suddenly, in the midst of the din, I heard the Muslim call to prayer. It was 2 pm and the call to prayer reached out to me.

A friendly sales person came over to me. "Which way is Mecca?" I asked, the last question he expected to hear from me, a white Western woman.

"It's this way," he responded, pointing both of us towards the East. "What can I show you to buy?"

"I don't need a thing," I said, except time to pray." In truth, I really wanted to be left alone to hear the call to prayer again.

"Then you should pray," he said, and then added, "Maybe you should become Muslim...it makes everything so much easier."

"Really?" now it was my turn to be surprised. " how is that?"

"You know who you are because you know who God is."

We talked for a little while about God, and then somehow he shifted to talking about how Satan (Shay-tawn is the way he pronounced it) exists in all of us-- a good Satan and a bad Satan and when the bad Satan appears between the people, then we have all of these kinds of problems." I asked him if the war between these two forces was part of what jihad was, and he said "yes."

My tour leader motioned that it was time to go. My would-be salesman-turned-theologian suddenly clapped my shoulder. "I like your heart. There is a good Satan inside of you. ..".

From my Western Christian Unitarian Universalist perspective, there is no such thing as a "good Satan," but it's something that I expect to ponder well beyond the walls of the carpet shop where I found so much more then I had bargained for.

Location:Tangier, Morocco

Cafe Baraka

This is the picture that goes with Wayne's previous post

Location:Orgiva, Spain

Test

I am trying out a new app to see if we can post pictures. We'll see if this works!!


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Location:Grenada, spain

What Makes a Culture Survive?

What Makes a Culture Survive? October 21, 2011
We drove up into the Alpujarra region of the Sierra Nevada yesterday looking for a good hike. We'd heard that a Tibetan Buddhist monastery up there was a good hike destination and had visiting hours! It's amazing that the Tibetan Buddhist culture, displaced from it's homeland, has persisted and can be found in Northeast Ohio, rural Spain, and around the world. Ultimately, we underestimated the distance to the monastery and never got there. Along the way, however, we stopped in the town of Orgiva for lunch and found another surviving culture of a different sort.

The best looking open restaurant, Cafe Baraka, was packed with people inside and out, and walking in I was transported back to Smokey Joe's Cafe in Berkeley, CA, 1971! Orgiva is apparently a center for hippie culture in the Alpujarras, and Thursday was market day. The Orgiva market looks like the parking lot outside a Grateful Dead concert, and they all go to Baraka afterwards to eat the organic vegan food, drink tea, roll your own cigarettes (or whatever), and enjoy the afternoon sun. Reggae and middle eastern music could be heard behind the conversation, as people as grey as I am chatted across tables with people in their twenties, looking much the same in their colorful cotton shirts, yoga pants, vest, beads, and long hair. The food was fabulous and so welcome after the same old vegetarian meals in conventional Spanish restaurants. We hung out for an hour and a half and felt right at home.

Is this a culture? It is, one kind of a culture. With a recognizable aesthetic, musical style, preferred food, and way of being together, it was as identifiable as the culture of the Spanish wine bar filled with old men we'd stumbled into the day before. This culture didn't identify with any geography, however. Like Tibetans, it is scattered around the world in little pockets. Unlike the Tibetans, it has no common religious identity as part of the glue that holds it together. Or does it?

The owners of Baraka Cafe are Sufis. As we begin to read more about Sufism in preparation for the Rumi Immersion Course in Turkey in December, we remember that there is a joyful mystical non-doctrinal dimension in most faiths, sometimes easily named and identified, like the Sufis, and sometimes not so easy to name, but represented in a culture of people. That culture recognizes each other, perhaps by what they wear or eat, but more often by a look in the eye, a look that says "Wake up to find out that you are the eyes of the world".

Escher and the Alhambra

October 20, 2011

It's been our good fortune to be in Granada at the same time as a major exhibit of M. C. Escher's work, staged by foundation that manages his legacy, in honor of the 75th anniversary of his last visit to Granada. Why this exhibit honoring such an anniversary?
Because it's widely accepted that many of the forms Escher used, how the forms interlock, and his fascination with visual depictions of mathematical relationships all were inspired by what he found on the walls of the Alhambra.

Escher visited the Alhambra twice, once in his early twenties and once in his late thirties. A film at the exhibit demonstrates clearly the connections between the tile designs web had just seen at the Alhambra and many of Escher's familiar works. To remember how much Arab and Muslim influences in the sciences, arts, and culture have entered into our Western lives is nothing new. To find this demonstrated in an unexpected context, in the work of an artist we have both always adored, was a delightful surprise.

Practicing Alone

On the way to visiting the most amazing exhibit of the work of M.C Escher, we stopped by Iglesia St. Gregory, which we pass by on our walk to and from our apartment. It's a neighborhood church, with a stunning baroque altar as its centerpiece, which was behind an equally ornate scrollwork gate. Kneeling in front of the altar was a tiny woman, covered from head to toe in white. At first I thought: "if this is a wedding--where is the groom?" Then, it hit me- she is a nun and "the groom" is Christ, and the "audience" was the large statue of Mary St the center of the altar. I think it was part of this order of nun's daily devotional practice-- to pray in front of Mary regardless of who else was in the chapel.

We came back to the church on our way home, this time while a Mass was being conducted. There in the front was there, again, a small figure cloaked in white. Other nuns were singing, but invisible to the visitor sitting in the back of the sanctuary. The organ was accompanying lovely and haunting Gregorian type chants. All of this beauty, I thought, for the one person, who was attending the Mass, and us, two Unitarian Universalist ministers on their way to some place else. I realized later, however, the fundamental difference between Catholic and Protestant style of worship: the "audience" for this order of nuns was Mary and God; it didn't matter if we were there or not. For Protestants, which is the lineage and history of Unitarian Universalists, the people's presence is imperative.

This experience reminded me of one of the threads on a recent ministers chat which posed the question about whether or not ministers will be holding Sunday morning services this year on Christmas Day. Some have decided against it, citing that no one would come. Others, like us, have said "it's Sunday and we do church on Sunday, even if no one comes.". Sometimes on Sunday morning, at 9:15, I look out in despair because the sanctuary is three quarters empty and I pray that people will come (and they do, eventually)If no one came to church on Christmas morning, I think Wayne, David Blazer and I would simply spend that hour in meditation, prayer and music instead of conducting a "service."

I realized that although I love the idea of the Unseen Presence as the audience, church for me requires the presence of people. Our faith tradition requires showing up and engaging in the spiritual practice of church. Every Sunday when we lead worship, it makes a difference to be in the living, breathing presence of the gathered community. The showing up of real bodies on Sunday morning is, in truth, the answer to my prayers. Kathleen

Living in Paradise

Living in Paradise : October 18, 2011
Yesterday we passed one of the milestone experiences that we wanted to have when we planned this sabbatical: a day at the Alhambra in Granada, the last surviving and most complete architectural monument to the Muslim polity in Spain. It is a site much written about, and our reflections about the design, the tile and plaster work, and the gardens would only add more superlative adjectives on to the existing pile that North American tourists have created, from Washington Irving in 1829, to the present day.

After leaving the Nasrid Palaces and strolling back through the gardens on another 72 degree blue sky day, I said to Kathleen: "Isn't this your childhood imagination of what heaven is supposed to be? Perfect temperature, sunshine and shade, beautiful gardens with walking paths, people chatting quietly as they stroll or sit on benches, beautiful architecture with mountain views? I half expect to see angels playing harps around the the corner."

My reaction to the Alhambra is no surprise, because this was exactly the intent in the greatest Islamic (and Christian) architecture: to create an image of paradise on earth. Rebecca Parker and Rita Nakashima Brock have gone into the theology of this effort in great depth, of course, in Reclaiming Paradise. You experience it in Al-Andalus all the time, in the courtyards with central fountains and beautifully landscaped four-quadrant gardens, in the intricately constructed geometric design blending into Arabic text reminding us there is no God but God, and even in the Christian monuments that are often placed adjacent to or inside the Muslim monuments.

The Alhambra has such a monument, the palace of Charles V, built after the Muslims had been driven out, right next to the Nazrid Palaces. It's Renaissance architecture is totally inconsistent with the rest of the Alhambra, and yet, with it's circle-within-a-square design and beautiful proportions, it's another representation of paradise in it's own way. A troubling reminder of how unlike-heaven the political struggles for supremacy in Granada were is the Christian church at the Alhambra, built on the site of the Nazrid's mosque, which was torn down. We remembered in sad contrast the two images of heaven in Cordoba, the beautiful columns and spacious design of the Great Mosque, large enough to contain within it a magnificent Christian cathedral.

On the way out of the Alhambra, we were browsing in the bookstore and came across these lines from the poet Ibn Jafayya:

"0 people of Al-Andalusia, blessed of God,
With your water, shade, rivers, and trees -
There is no Garden of Paradise
except in your homes.
If I had to choose, I prefer this one.
think not that tomorrow you shall enter the eternal fire.
No one enters hell after living in paradise!

Call to Prayer in Granada

Throughout our travels in Al-Andulus, we have encountered several small towns that, at one time, (i.e. The 7th-12th century) boasted an all Jewish or all Muslim population. The stories of those towns were all unique, of course, but also very similar. When Christianity came to power, there was an initial attempt to co-exist with person's of other faiths, but alas, eventually one had to either convert, be exiled or killed and all one's property confiscated. Such was the case of the Muslims in Granada, whose power and artistic beauty was expressed through the creation of Granada's premier site: The Alhambra. It sits on one of the highest plots of land in Granada, as if to remind the entire town of what it once was before Ferdinand and Isabella took the keys from the last Muslim prince, Baobdil, who, along with his nagging mother, was banished to exile in Africa

Sunday evening found us on a pilgrimage. We had heard that in 2003, a functioning Grand Mosque had been built on a hill opposite the Alhambra. We were determined to find it before the evening call to prayer. We got lost, finding ourselves, ironically, in the parking lot of Iglesias Isabella Catolica, which was closed for renovations. As twig light deepened, we despaired of ever being able to find the Mosque amidst the winding streets and clots of tourists everywhere.

Somehow, we set our feet in the right direction and climbed the hill that led to the gates of the Great Mosque of Granada. From the garden of the mosque, we could see the evening lights illuminating the Alhambra. As the sky deepened in color from yellow to pink to azure blue, we heard the imam calling the faithful to prayer. "Allah akbar" he called out into the twilight. Just at that moment, the cathedral bells began to ring. They did not drown out the imam, but they did remind us of how these two great traditions co-exist side by side, even to this day. We were filled with a profound sense of history finally righting itself, after centuries of damage done to the Muslim faith in Granada.

The court yard was now empty. Everyone else had gone into the mosque to pray. We were the last ones there, and the gatekeeper had waited for us to leave. Bowing low before leaving, we said a silent prayer of our own-- for the presence of the mosque; for the beauty of Granada; for the majesty of the Sierra Nevada Mountains, and for the scent of oranges and jasmine that filled the night sky. We felt ourselves truly blessed.

Andulusia Remembers and Forgets

We visited two Andalusian towns yesterday that were important symbols to us of the multicultural history we came here to study. The first, Lucena, was the home of one of the most vibrant Jewish communities in Spain during the Muslim caliphate. It was the home of artists and poets, and was governed by the Jewish majority in the town for two centuries. It all ended when more fundamentalist Moors and the Castilian Christians took over and in their turn undertook to persecute and finally expel the Jews. Now there is almost no evidence in Lucena of this once-vital Jewish heritage. Unlike nearby Cordoba, there are no defined neighborhoods, no street names, plaques, or monuments. We heard there was one room dedicated to the town's Jewish history in their anthropological museum, and we finally found it housed in the ancient castle tower.
It was a well done display, but as the destination for a pilgrimage for Jews seeking a lost heritage, it would be disappointing.

Later the same day, we drove through Antequerra, a town with a strong Muslim history, a frontier town for the last surviving Muslim territory in Spain that the Christians finally overthrew in the 15th century. The museums were closed by the time we got there, but much to our surprise, at the base of the impressive castle fortress built by the Muslims a dozen centuries ago, we found a newly erected statue memorializing the Muslim refugees who had been driven from the city. The sculpture shows a couple in flight with all their possessions on their backs. They are in traditional Muslim clothing, the man in a turban, the women wearing a hijab and veil. Other than that, however, they could be any of the world's refugees. They could be Mary and Joseph on their way to Bethlehem.

We noticed the date on the statue -2010 - and did our best to read the Spanish inscription. Clearly, the monument is part of a progressive movement of reclaiming the town's history and telling it truthfully and compassionately. In one day, we saw vividly how Andalusia remembers, and how Andalusia forgets.

Castles in the Air

I don't know whether there are any Spanish origins of that expression, "castles in the air", but we have been seeing plenty of them in Andalusia. These Muslim castles were built at the highest point in the town, which itself was usually founded at a high elevation and near water, for defensive purposes. You could see who was coming at you for miles around and have the advantage of height in self-defense.

Following the occupation of Wall Street on CNN, I thought about today's castles in the air. They are inside Manhattan skyscrapers, or on private Caribbean islands. The sultans and kings of today aren't formally acknowledged as anyone's rulers, but the power they wield and the disproportionate amount of the wealth they control compared to everyone else in the world they rule is probably not much different.

I recall, and probably am paraphrasing, a line from Henry David Thoreau: " We have built our castles in the air. Now let us put foundations under them." He was speaking about ideals and dreams for what the world should be like. His 19th century New England world was full of such ideals, and not a few utopian experiments.

The 10th century castles in the air the Moors built stood on a foundation of religious authority rooted in lineage from the prophet Muhammad, and the ability to both control and protect the feudal kingdom that surrounded the castle with military might.
The 21st century occupants of castles in the air live atop foundations that are considerably more abstract. They command no armies, and claim no lineage of authority. They become wealthy because they give the people what they want. The question that the people have to ask themselves, the foundational question that the Wall Street occupation is asking, is "How much do the people want the goods they have access to, and they way they access them? Do they want them so much that they are willing to settle for 1 per cent of the population living in their castles in the air? Is there another way?"

Foreshadowings

Sunday, October 9

Yesterday we landed in Iznajar, in the southern province between Cordoba and Granada, staying at a place we found on the home-away website. There are three other couples here, and we were delighted to discover that one of the couples lives in Israel, our next destination after Spain. I introduced myself to "R" and told her that we were going to visit Israel & Palestine after we left Spain. She was taken aback. "You mean you are visiting Israel," she said. "There is no Palestine." She made it clear in our brief exchange that by mentioning Palestine in the same sentence as Israel was making a political assumption that she did not want to acknowledge.

Similarly, when I went to buy a hijab from a store in Cleveland, I told the Muslim woman behind the counter I was planning to visit Israel & Palestine. She essentially said the same thing, only from the perspective of a Palestinian: "you mean you will be visiting Palestine. There is no Israel...". No Israel??? I was completely taken by surprise. It never occurred to me that someone would not recognize the state of Israel. Both women wanted to correct me; both women's perspectives were, in their minds, "right."

These two encounters, occurring on two different lands, is a sobering reminder to me of what we will be encountering next month when we land in the Holy Land for Jews, Muslims, and Christians. It also reminded me of the long reach of these historic conflicts-- all the way to a small shop in Cleveland, Ohio; all the way to a sunny patio on a Sunday afternoon in Iznajar.

Culture Change

We heard about the death of a Steven Jobs via a news/ads monitor on a public bus in Seville. Having spent a week viewing and reflecting on what is left of one of the great cultures in the history of the Western world, our reactions to Jobs' death has left us thinking about how individuals change the world and leave a legacy.
The history of Spain is filled with people who achieved great power and wealth through successfully defeating their enemies in war, and a few of those individuals are remembered here in buildings they ordered constructed or monuments that their successors built. Hundreds of years later, however, their names are not as familiar to educated people as the names of other Spaniards, artists like Picasso or philosophers like Maimonides.

It's clear to us that you change the world by changing a culture. Culture is the interface between a people and the world in which they live. It's the expression of how a group of people experience the world, interact with it, and communicate the meanings that they find in it.

The founders of the culture we see honored in Andalusia are not honored in statues in public squares. Over two hundred years, the Al Rahman dynasty created a culture here that continues to be studied and to inspire later generations, but their successors lost the military and political battle for the country. So it's the Christian kings that we see in statues, and the Muslim call to prayer that we only hear faintly echoed in traditional Andalusian singing.

Steven Jobs changed the world's culture through technological innovations whose impact were quickly visible and understandable in the lives of a single generation. That happens so very rarely in the history of the world. Who has left a legacy of culture change is more often understood generations later. Will someone build a statue or name a building honoring Steven Jobs? Perhaps? Technological innovators are usually not as well remembered as artists or philosophers. In Akron the Inventors Hall of Fame honors those who left a technological legacy that has changed the lives of everyday people. Bell, Marconi, Edison stand out, but most of those honored there are unfamiliar names. Jobs was an inventor who also envisioned the culture change his new technology could bring about and created the corporation that could help bring that culture change into being. For that reason, he (along with Bill Gates) will have a unique place, not only in the Inventors Hall of Fame, but in the history of the world.

Will Fundamentalism Win?

Will fundamentalism " win"?

After spending time inside one of the world's most beautiful and unusual holy places, the Great Mosque of Cordoba (which contains within it a magnificent Catholic Cathedral) we lingered over lunch in a cafe in the shadow of a statue of the Muslim philosopher Averroes. Averroes advocated in the 13th century for ideas very familiar to 21 st century Unitarian Universalists, particularly that faith and reason are not incompatible, but are both gifts that humans receive as part of this life which should be enjoyed and explored together. Averroes lived in Cordoba in the same century as the Jewish philosopher Maimonides, who also has a statue in Cordoba and streets in Spain dedicated to his memory. Maimonides represents within Judaism a flowering of reason that transcends the culture and century in which he lived and that was not incompatible with his faith.

Both Maimonides and Averroes were defeated in their lifetimes by fundamentalism. Maimonides family was driven out of Cordoba by a rising wave of Catholic fundamentalism and anti-Semitism that ultimately drove all the Jews out of Spain and resulted in the Spanish Inquisition. Averroes is regarded as the last of the "liberal" Muslim philosophers. His successors were far more skeptical about the role of reason in religion.

The two great surviving monuments to Muslim Spain that you can visit in Cordoba and Seville are like architectural bookmarks of the centuries of Muslim rule where Muslims, Jews, and Christians lived in relative harmony, sharing in the creation and enjoyment of a single Andalusian culture within which all could practice their faiths. Several generations lived their lives within that culture, and could not imagine that the values it represented would deteriorate and be destroyed by resurgent fundamentalist beliefs or armies. But they were. In the "Reconquista" Spain became a conservative, monolithic, and imperialist Catholic culture. The Christian winners in this battle tore down the mosque in Seville and replaced it with the 3rd largest Cathedral in the world. In Cordoba, they literally plopped a cathedral into the center of one of the world's most beautiful mosques. Both Muslims and Catholics began to persecute Jews and eventually they were driven out Andalusia. The fundamentalists won.

Their victory did not last, however. In the Spain we experience today, secularism seems dominant, and the power of the Catholic church is in decline. The metaphor of tides is used so often to speak of the patterns in history because ideologies do seem to rise and fall. Religious liberals , especially the 19th century ones who inspired Unitarian Universalism, liked to believe that the despite the tides, the ocean that we float upon is our untapped potential of depth in knowledge and understanding of our common humanity. The jury is still out on that belief. It is an article of faith for UU's and a study if history doesn't necessarily provide a rational justification supporting it.

There are reasons within the architectural monuments for hope, however. When Charles V decided to build a Cathedral in Cordoba after the Muslims were defeated, it would have been easier to just tear down the Great Mosque, as they did in Seville. Instead he preserved its beauty and much of its integrity by building his cathedral into the center of the mosque. When Pedro the Cruel decided to build his palace, he recognized and preserved and adopted the beauty of the Arab architecture in his Alcazar. The "mashup" experience of visiting these places is both heartbreaking and thrilling. We wandered amazed under the red and white columns where Muslims prayed in the Grand Mosque, listening to the chants of a priest offering a Catholic mass. We stepped outside the Moorish gardens and found Maimonides and Averroes waiting for us. Did fundamentalism win? Will it win? Not yet...not yet...

Good Pedro, Bad Pedro

Good Pedro, Bad Pedro

Touring the Alcazar In Seville yesterday was an experience of holding extremes in aesthetic, political and moral tension with one another. The Alcazar was built as a fort in 913 CE, and has been expanded and reconstructed over the 11 centuries of its existence. It's most recent renovation was enacted by Pedro I who, between 1364 and 1366 crested the Alcazar's crown jewel, the Palacio de Don Pedro. We wrote in a previous blog about the style we are calling "mash up" that is, the combination of primarily Muslim and Christian styles in one building and the Alcazar is no exception. Although Pedro was often at odds with his fellow Roman Catholics, he had a long-standing alliance with the Muslim emir of Granada, Mohammed V. In 1364, Pedro decided to build a new palace within the Alcazar, his friend Mohammed sent the best artisans of the day to help Pedro's dream come true.

As we toured this mist amazing historical site, I was struck by the fact that this Roman Catholic ruler embraced not only Muslim architecture, but allowed Arabic inscriptions from the Qu'ran to decorate the door frame of his own "holy of holies" -- his throne room. Pedro I was also called derisively by his enemies "Pedro the King of the Jews" because he not only allowed Jews to thrive in his city, he executed some half dozen persons who were fomenting a plan to kill some of his Jewish friends and employees. His relationships with Jews and Muslims went beyond "tolerance" and clearly swung towards friendship and admiration for the gifts of these two great traditions.

At the time, he was not called "Peter (Pedro) the cruel" for nothing!! He probably murdered his first wife, abandoned his mistress, murdered anyone who was disloyal to him, and had no problem dispatching people with ease. So, lest we overly romanticize this great "tolerant King" we can't forget that it was really at the whim and fancy of Peter's needs and wishes instead of an over-arching philosophy of multiculturalism.

Our visit to the Alcazar palace and ground was easily one of the great highlights of our time in Seville.

Mash Up

We had an experience of a 16th century "mash-up" yesterday at the Palace of Pilate in Seville. (The name derives from the location of the Palace on Pilate Square, rather than any association with the Pilate who judged Jesus.)

The term "mash-up" is used today in popular music to describe combinations of digitally manipulated recordings of various artists' work put together (mashed up) to make a new recording. You might hear a familiar rhythm from a Michael Jackson hit, repeated over and over again like a bass line, mashed up with electronic music and original rapped lyrics, creating something entirely new, yet familiar.

After the Reconquista, wealthy Castillian nobles still saw the aesthetics and architecture of the despised "Moors" they had driven out of Seville as the mark of refinement and the height of beauty in designing their palaces. However, in the 16th century these nobles also had the opportunity to travel to Italy and experience the Renaissance and be captivated by their architecture and their re-discovery of the aesthetics and art of ancient Greece. They were collectors, not only of ancient art, (notably sculpture) but also of the best works from the painters of their own period.

Over three generations, one family mashed up all these influences together into one house, with an Arab style courtyard decorated with exquisite tile. The corners of the courtyard are guarded by Greek statuary of the gods, brought back from Naples. You can view this courtyard from the second floor rooms surrounded by 16th century paintings beneath a Renaissance ceiling design covered with carved wood in floral designs from craftsmen schooled in Arabian design.

It was an aesthetic experience at one disorienting, thrilling, and strangely harmonious.
Today we go to the Alcazar, a mashup of another kind, but one that even more clearly than the Palace of Pilate, reveals how deeply the Muslim aesthetic penetrated Spanish Christian culture.

One mysterious footnote to our visit to the Palace of Pilate: reading between the lines of the tour guide notes, we realized that the family who built the Palace was able to acquire the valuable land and the water source it sits on because it was confiscated (probably from Jews) during the beginning of the Inquisition. It's a tragic political mashup so familiar: a place of extraordinary beauty is able to be built because of oppressive acts that create immense suffering for a family or an entire people.

If you're interested in reading more from the book that inspired this journey, look at "The Ornament of the World" by Maria Rosa Menocal. It's an easy' enjoyable read.

The Kindness of Strangers

The kindness of strangers
Never was this phrase more true than today. We left Barcelona for Seville, and after finding our very lovely apartment, went shopping at the local mercado. What a trip!! 8:30 pm and everyone was at the supermarket. It was packed. We got inline to check out, only to discover we had to weigh all our fruits, and that could have meant getting out of the very long line and waiting another 20 minutes to get back in.

To make matters worse, as soon as the young cashier starting speaking to me, I got brain freeze. Any tiny memory I had of spanish just flew out of my head. Es stupido was all I could think to myself. How do foreigners who come to the United States do it?? How do they come to this country, get a job, navigate all the barriers, not the least of which is the language?? Trying to speak a foreign language is exhausting!!!! It takes so much energy to just live in a culture that is different than your own. I stood there just repeating "lo siento" and "mil gracias" until the cashier left her register, went to help Wayne weigh the fruit, came back and rang up all my stuff and then rang up the fruit, added it to our bill, then sent us on our way. She could have yelled at us or gotten really annoyed, but she was calm and gracious with us, these non-native speakers.

The next time I encounter someone who doesn't speak English, I hope to be as gracious as that lovely young woman, at the grocery store in Sevilla. Tomorrow, we explore the very heart of the inspiration for this sabbatical, the mosque/cathedral and perhaps the Alcazar, unless it gets too hot, and then we siesta and see it Wednesday.

Tell the story, use words if you must

Yesterday we visited the Basilica (cathedral) of Barcelona, dedicated to Saint Eulalia, who was martyred at thirteen years of age!!! for her faith. The cathedral is, of course, gorgeous, stunning and a must-see. What really impressed us, however, was the way that the Catholics were able to tell the story of the faith through the arts; the stories of not only Jesus, the disciples, Mary & Joseph, but also those who cared enough about their faith to willingly die for it. I realized that the reason Catholicism spread so rapidly throughout indigenous cultures ( putting aside the additional reality of forced conversion or martyrdom..) was because they were able to communicate a powerful story through images to the illiterate or to those who spoke a different language. Although I did not know some of the stories behind those altar paintings, I could infer their meaning. When I was able to discern the meaning through the painting or artwork, I felt closer to it. One of the things I have always admired about Catholicism is their use of all of the senses in worship; the powerful images, the smells of the censur, the bells at just the right pitch, the visual beauty of the robes and stoles.

I wondered as I gazed upon image after image, story after story, how do Unitarian Universalists tell their story visually? My stepdaughter has been involved in the Living Walls project in Atlanta, GA-- where artists take over a huge blank wall (with permission from said owner of the wall) and create something magnificent in the form of a mural/art-work project. What if we Unitarian Universalists created a huge mural on a blank wall in downtown Cleveland that depicted our faith? Who would be in it? What would the great stories be? Would our church play a role?? I am having fun imagining what a wall of faith would look like.

On a lighter note, for all those who may wonder if I have used my Spanish during this trip, I can say that I have!! When I called out to the waiter to receive the check, I said "cuarenta por favor??" he looked at me as if to say...what??? My friends who spoke Spanish could not contain their laughter. I had shouted out "Forty, please!!" instead of "cuenta!!!, or, check, please! So much for my ten weeks of Spanish.

38 ways to work a Velasquez

At the Picasso Museum yesterday, we were struck by a room full of paintings Pablo created in 1957 in response to a famous painting of Velasquez called "The Children". He worked on paintings of characters and groupings from this Velasquez masterpiece virtually daily for six weeks and then regularly for another six weeks. The discipline of working on a single theme, exploring all it's variations, was on display so vividly to us as we viewed this room full of paintings. All the paintings are recognizable as "Picassos", but each was a unique image of the same tableau that brought out something different each time. We saw the same discipline at work today at the Museum here in Barcelona dedicated to Joan Miro. Similar themes and titles and shapes reoccur, over both short and long spans of time.
Since this weekend our church and many other UU congregations are honoring the Day of Atonement, we were reminded of the power that is in our discipline of honoring in worship the important days and themes of a liturgical calendar. Next time we gripe about preparing for another Day of Atonement, or Thanksgiving, or Christmas, we'll recall Picasso's 38 ways to work a Velasquez.