Worshippers Part 4: Visit to Richmond Synagogue

In early September I sent an email to the secretary of Richmond Synagogue requesting permission to attend one of their services.   In response, I was asked a number of questions – where I lived, with whom and for how long as well the reason for my request – for security reasons.   Shortly after sending my answers, the secretary invited me to that Saturday’s Shabbat.   I was told to dress modestly but that a hat wasn’t mandatory.  I was welcomed at the gate, escorted into the synagogue, introduced to Rabbi Cotton and shown to my seat with one of the women leaders.  She helped me follow readings in the Torah and service book (which I believe is called the machzor).  There were around six men and four women in attendance early on in the service.

As Christians, we obviously already know a great deal about Judaism from the Old Testament.  Nevertheless, a Jewish service is something very different from ours: the language, the traditional vestments and the layout of the temple.  It felt as though I was not just in the church of another faith, but in a totally different culture.  Around half-way through the service, the rabbi and elders went to the tabernacle, collected the enormous Torah scrolls and brought them round to the lectern which was located in the centre of the room surrounded by a wooden balustrade.

For next hour or so there was a recitation of scripture – a sort of chanting that was something between singing and speaking.  As the priest read, an elder chimed in on occasion; I was told that the young priest was actually being corrected for his pronunciation, as reciting the vowel-less Hebrew is apparently quite difficult.

During the reading of the Torah, several more women joined our section of the congregation; some accompanying small children and most wearing hats.  They were clearly all friends and settled into the proceedings quickly.  I did notice, to my slight surprise, that during what I assumed to be the holiest part of the ceremony, the ladies were having a bit of a natter.  Not about scripture or exegesis, but it sounded a little bit like gossip.  I found this wonderfully human and unexpected.  And they weren’t shushed or told off.

There is so much that we Christians share with our Jewish cousins, and I found much to admire about their religious devotion, commitment to family & tradition, as well as their cultural courage and fortitude.  I love the bar mitzvah/bat mitzvah milestone – we don’t have anything really like this in either in the Christian faith or British culture.  When a Jewish teenager becomes an adult, it’s much more than a symbolic exercise; it’s the teen telling the world that they are now responsible for their thoughts, feelings and behaviour.  Before that point, it’s the family that's held accountable for the actions and attitudes of the young person.  The Gospel Coalition's Jeremy Pierre put this idea well in a recent blog:

Our early relational experiences - particularly with those entrusted with our care - are incredibly shaping.  That's not a bad thing.  In fact, it's part of God's design for human development.  Through fathers and mothers, children receive a framework for understanding the world and everything in it, from important things like morality to relatively trivial things like clothing styles.  Why else would God be so adamant that parents teach their children the knowledge of him in the context of the everyday activities of life (Deut 6:7, 11:19)?  And alongside the words they speak, parents model the character of God in their affection for, generosity to, and patience with their children (Psalm 103:13).

Adulthood in Judaism is more than financial, work and academic obligations; it’s taking responsibility for the way one lives one’s life.

After the sermon, there was a time for communal prayer which included those for the Israeli Defence Forces and the Royal Family.  I thought it particularly ironic that I was visiting just after the photos of Prince Harry in Las Vegas were posted on the internet.  It’s one thing to have the tabloids and public sniggering; quite another to know that thousands of your countrymen and women are actually praying for your well-being. 

There’s so much more I’d like to understand about the Jewish faith, like British Jewish views about Jesus, the various Christian denominations and the situation in the Middle East.  I’d like to know more about the Shekinah and its importance in the word and faith of Jewish believers.  I’d also like to do further research into the history of the Kabbalah movement, what its great appeal is to people who aren’t heirs to the Jewish faith by birth and whether there are any meditative or contemplative practices associated with Jewish spirituality.  I’d welcome any thoughts or experiences from readers on these subjects.

Worshippers Part 3: Visit to First Church of Christ, Scientist, Richmond-upon-Thames

In early September I visited the Christian Science church in Richmond for one of its Sunday services.  Initial impressions were firstly, what an incredible architectural structure & location - classical and very close to the centre of town; secondly, it was warm and welcoming – I was escorted to a place in the pews; and thirdly, how few people made up the congregation – I counted about 25.

The interior of FCCS Richmond is quite beautiful: simple, elegant white walls with two enormous paned windows, two columns of pews and two lecterns & a potted plant on an altar-like raised platform.  And that was it: no statues, no paintings, no stained glass, no decorative adornments of any kind.  And no crosses.  However there were two large inscriptions on each of the walls under the windows, one a verse from Christian scripture and one a quote from the religion’s founder, Mary Baker Eddy.

The service included some hymns, notices, a solo, and the Lesson-Sermon, including passages from what they call the Golden Text (the Christian Bible).  The Lesson-Sermon was a series of recitations from scripture and the Christian Science’s ‘holy’ book, Science and Health.  These readings were given by a man and woman who stood behind each of two lecterns.  The woman read a passage from the NIV, then the man would read Mary Baker Eddy’s corresponding interpretation. 

What seemed to be happening was that the second reader, the man reading passages from Science and Health, was taking the Christian verses of scripture and rewording or reworking them to fit into the Christian Science doctrine.  It was like a point, counter-point presentation.  It called to mind Deepak Chopra’s The Third Jesus and A Course in Miracles, both of which use Christian language, passages and stories from scripture, but reinterpret them from a monistic perspective, as if to say, "you may think that the Bible says this, but what it really means is this other thing.”  Which also made me think of the veritable library of books I’ve acquired over the course of the past decade which I’d thought were about Christianity.  I'd collected these books after my short New Age/self-help reading stint.  But over time, I’ve found that I’ve had to move a great many of what I thought were Christian books to the New Age shelf.  I don’t read many ‘Christian’ books anymore.  

My impression of Science and Health is that it's remarkably similar to A Course in Miracles; the following are some verses from the sermon: “Man is spiritual and perfect. The eternal truth is that there is no separation between man and God.  Man is the expression of God’s being, eternal with God.  Man reflects infinity and the true nature of God.  Mortality is an illusion. The body reflects what governs it: either truth or error.  Every function of the body is governed by the divine mind.  All that exists is divine mind. Man suffers because he believes in sickness which can be overcome by becoming conscious. The correct view of man is that he is pure and holy.”  I’d say pretty much everything I heard was in contradiction to Christian scripture.  Their Scientific Statement of Being provides a good summary of the Christian Science doctrine:

There is no life, truth, intelligence, nor substance in matter.  All is infinite Mind and its infinite manifestation, for God is All-in-all.  Spirit is immortal Truth; matter is mortal error.  Spirit is the real and eternal; matter is the unreal and temporal.  Spirit is God, and man is His image and likeness.  Therefore man is not material; he is spiritual.[1]

After the service a very nice woman come up to me and introduced herself.  I told her about my project and asked her whether Christian Science had any meditation, mysticism, contemplative prayer or any sort of altered state of consciousness associated with its spiritual practices.  She resolutely said that these weren’t connected to the Christian Science faith in any way.  This I find very interesting and a little surprising.  So far, the first religion I’ve encountered with no mystical side.

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[1] Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, p.468:9.

Worshippers Part 2: A Day of Peace and Unity in Isleworth

When I contacted the Hussaini Islamic Mission in early September, requesting permission to attend one of their Friday sessions of sermon and prayer, the mosque's secretary, Javed, not only welcomed me to attend but also offered to arrange for someone to sit with me to translate the Urdu service.

Within a few days of this gracious offer, I received an invitation to the centre to celebrate the UN’s International Day of Peace, scheduled to include words from the leaders of other faiths in the Isleworth area, the lighting of candles for peace in the world and an art exhibition by the mission's children.

Entering a mosque just a few days after the grotesque “Innocence” video was viewed around the world was no small step, particularly for a quiet blond American woman.  But that hesitation was quickly dissipated by a warm welcome and gift of a headscarf.  For the next couple of hours, I listened to a succession of messages from leaders of the Muslim faith, a rabbi, a northern Irish Anglican minister, a woman representing the Buddhist community, a Sikh granthi, as well as Isleworth’s Conservative Member of Parliament, Mary Macleod.  

Each talked about the values of peace and unity that we share as a community, which begins with inner peace through faith, and which then flows out into the wider community and world.  For me, one of the most memorable aspirations posed was the dual notion that we may agree to disagree on matters of belief and doctrine, but that we can nonetheless live and work together in harmony.  And that our common values can be an example to the wider world and the next generation, despite ethnic and religious conflagrations elsewhere.

Worshippers Part 1: The people of faith who live and worship near my house

As my interest in apologetics has grown over the years, I’ve come to realise that if I’m going to take 1 Peter 3:15 (be prepared to give an answer) and 1 John 4:4 (test the spirits) seriously and sincerely, then I feel I need to not only study the doctrines, beliefs and practices of other faiths and worldviews, but I need to get to know some of the people who have made serious commitments to these things. What better place to explore than in my own backgarden. So I’ve decided to visit a new church, temple or other place of worship at least a couple of times a month for the next few months. I’m hoping to meet my neighbours, learn about their faiths and programmes, see how they treat a visitor and basically take a small step into the unknown for me. I’m not a seeker or someone unsure of their own faith; this is more my own comparative religious experience project and an attempt at mutual understanding.

I should say at the outset that my past experiences of religious attendance has included: Roman Catholic churches (mostly in New England) from birth to 18 yrs, a Baptist church in Highbury Fields, Rosslyn Hill Unitarian Chapel in Hampstead, several Christian churches in the environs of Genval, Belgium, St. John’s Church Egham (where I came to faith), Christ Church Virginia Water, a couple of yoga classes, some presentations at Andrew Cohen's EnlighteNext centre in Islington, a talk by Marianne Williamson at St. James Picadilly and now Holy Trinity Church Richmond.

I’m hoping to visit the following places of worship in and around Kew Gardens, London:

• a Christian Science church 
• a Jewish synagogue
• a mosque
• a Buddhist Vihara 
• a Hindu temple
• a meditation centre 
• a Quaker meeting house
• a Unitarian church
• a Mormon temple 
• a Scientology centre
• a variety of Christian denominations

Though it probably won’t be possible to take many pictures, unfortunately, I’m hoping to make some candid observations on this faith odyssey.

It's Human Nature to examine the Nature of Humans

In this Sunday's Observer, Barbara Ellen suggests that a better way to react to the sentence handed down to the far right terrorist, Anders Breivik, is to invoke an embargo on stories about him.  She says in her article,

The victims’ families are one thing, but what information do the rest of us truly need about a mass murderer apart from “he’s still locked up”?...I’d prefer to think of him fading into the obscurity he deserves, left to the prison staff and shrinks to sort out.

I disagree with Ms. Ellen.  Certainly there are many who are strangely excited by atrocities and other violent acts.  The whole world of homi-entertainment is disturbing and a huge area to be studied in more depth, but there are also important ethical and philosophical questions that people who behave like Breivik force us to ask ourselves.  These questions cannot just be left to the psychologists and cbt.  Human nature will never be fully explained by genetics, endowments, physiology, upbringing, conditions and evolution.   All these contribute to our understanding, but even when taken together, they’re incomplete.

Despite coldly assassinating 77 people, Anders Breivik was judged to be sane by the Norwegian court which sentenced him to 21 years in prison.  How could a sane person carefully plan and carry out such a series of atrocities?  The reason you find uttered by many, even secular humanists and atheists, is that the perpetrator of such crimes is evil.  Instead of burying this story along with the others similarly unbearable, we need a deeper discussion about what evil is, where it comes from and what it means to be human.  And it’s philosophers, theologians and fictional authors who get to the heart of the nature of evil, where it truly resides and what can be done about it.

William Golding was passionate about the ways in which evil play out in our world; Lord of the Flies and Pincher Martin speak more about human nature than the findings of brain scans.  Terry Eagleton, the Marxist intellectual, describes the condition of evil rather than a list of causes.  In his book On Evil he says:

It is supremely pointless.  Anything as humdrum as a purpose would tarnish its lethal purity…Evil aspires to God’s creativity but reverses it, turning the gift of being into non-being through various techniques of annihilation.  Evil, however, can only annul what has already been brought into being and cancelling what is created only intensifies our sense of the sheer goodness of being.  This drives its agents mad, and their destructiveness, where circumstances permit, reaches unimaginable pitches of frenzy if they don’t consume themselves first.

If Breivik is sane, can a secular psychological approach transform his nature?  Without spiritual redemption, is there any hope for change, for him or any of us?

A Dangerous Legacy

After months of eager anticipation, I was finally able to watch David Cronenberg’s A Dangerous Method on dvd.  Wonderful acting without a doubt, but what an immense disappointment and unambitious result for what could have been a powerful and important film about two giants in the field of psychology, Carl Jung and Sigmund Freud.

The film focuses largely on Jung’s relationship with one of his patients, Sabina Spielrein, played superbly by the actress Keira Knightly.  And though the relationship was rather disturbing, it was unfortunately nothing film watchers today would find extraordinarily twisted. 

The other main storyline is Jung’s relationship with Freud.  The film shows that a rift had formed between the master and student but gives us very little information as to the true details of this dispute.  And this is the major fault of the film because the legacy of Jung to this day is his point of departure from Freud. 

To my own amazement, the pivotal line in the film is one uttered by Freud with which I agree!  He’s speaking to Sabina Spielrein about her own psychological theories and those of Jung and specifically about Jung’s preoccupation with mysticism and the occult.  Spielrein explains that the point of this exploration is for psychoanalysis to provide not just an explanation to patients of their psychopathy, but to provide them with a path towards a new life: “[Jung] wants to be able to say we can show you what it is you might want to become.”  For Jung this path was to be found via the mythic world of one’s dreams linked to what he believed to be mystical, universal archetypes.

Freud replies to Spielrein that it isn’t the job of psychiatrists to play God, to tell people how to live their lives.  He says: “We have no right to do that.  The world is as it is.  Understanding and accepting that is the way to psychic health.  What good can we do if our aim is simply to replace one delusion with another?”  Though I think what Freud was attempting to do, declare that philosophy was dead (akin to Nietzsche announcing the same for God), Jung was rather siding with the existentialists, believing that a human being could choose his or her essence and destiny.  Unfortunately, however, he believed that this essence was to be found within the subconscious, accessed through mystical techniques including self-induced trances, the occult and séances.  

The primary influences for his theories were Germany mysticism, Hellenistic paganism and Gnosticism.  None of this rich material is explored in the firm, to its detriment.

An apparently pivotal moment in Jung’s life - which helped him to distil his notions into theories - occurred in 1913 when he induced himself into a trance and imagined that his head had changed into that of a lion and that he had become a god.  He believed this validated the idea that he was a pagan saviour sent to summon Aryan culture back from Christianity (which he considered to have failed) in order to save the soul of the world.  He also believed his ‘disciples’ were sent to him to perform service in his new religion, thereby fulfilling their special destiny.[1]

I believe that Jung’s legacy lives on in the self-help industry.  Psychological science is invaluable to both individuals and to the other social sciences in providing a systematic structure for understanding why people think, feel and behave the way they do.  However, I believe that due in part to the work of Carl Jung, the recommendations for a personal transformed life have tendentiously stuck to monistic mystical methods, like meditation, yoga and mindfulness.  These are prescribed as scientifically-proven calming methods; sometimes presented as secular and sometimes as spiritual, but their roots and purposes are from eastern monism, championed by one of the fathers of the dangerous method, Carl Jung.

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[1] Richard Noll, The Aryan Christ, Random House, 1997.

Catastrophic Errors caused by Corporate Governance Failings

Andrew Haldane, Executive Director of Financial Stability at the Bank of England was recently interviewed by William Davies, Demos Associate and Research Fellow at Said Business School.  They discussed the causes of the financial crisis, trends in economic thinking, the financial system and policy responses.  Haldane talks about the mathematisation of the discipline of economics and is critical of the assumptions upon which many models are based, saying that many “made no intellectual sense.”

The part of the interview which I found most interesting was Haldane’s identification of corporate governance failings as a critical reason for what he calls “catastrophic errors” in decision making.  Haldane says that these problems are particularly acute in banking and financial institutions: 

this has led to a corporate governance structure in which those owning maybe 5% of the balance sheet – i.e. the shareholders – have the primary, some would say the exclusive, power in controlling the fortunes of the firm.  There is no say from the debt-holders or depositors or workers or any sense of the wider public good which we know to be important in banking and finance.  We also know that those firms are working on time horizons which in some cases are really quite short.  So to think that his will necessarily lead to the best outcome, even for the longer-term value of the firm, is questionable given the governance model.

He asks how corporate governance structures evolved into those which we see today: 

at each stage it was a sensible reason.  But it led to a corporate governance structure that looks pretty peculiar, given where we started off 150 years ago.  So what I mentioned about structures and incentives – an important thing about that is who runs the firm and how they run the firm.  I think that corporate governance in the way I’ve defined it is super important – more important than regulation in getting us into a better place.

So we have it from a director of our central bank: the reform of corporate governance is critical to the financial stability of our economic system, more important than regulation.