A bit of my journey.
It was a long journey, within the context of Christianity, that I began thinking about “what about everyone else in the world?”. Indeed, what if the apparent exclusivity of “Christianity” was actually contrary to its own teachings?
I did become a baptised Catholic, as an adult and from no particular religious background (other than living in the UK and having had a “Christian” upbringing at school with some dreadful arguments in the home between parents who were directly opposed to each other’s beliefs), in the 1990’s after a personal journey of discovery through psychoanalysis whose foundation is based on Christian teachings and Jong’s development. I was in a crisis of self development, with various neuroses and my world was not behaving.
It is nice to belong to a Church and find acceptance and a set of rules and teachings to abide by or aspire to. In my own mind to be a “Christian” or a “Catholic” is not a given on being baptised. It is a journey of discovery whilst using the teachings as a discipline of seeking. Certainly, I hold the view still, that being a Catholic or an adherent to any faith is not one of exclusivity whatever might be claimed in the institutionalised world and its politics. The word “Catholic” means “universal” and, if this is the case, then it includes everyone. My neighbour is the Samaritan, whether or not s/he has my faith and whether or not I acknowledge her/him.
Of course, within the Church that I first joined in Nottingham, I found terms like “cradle Catholics” which included those from birth and not people like myself, who having chosen to take this step, were in some way secondary, but kindly treated like a raging sinner being saved from her folly! As if it were an end in itself. My own seeking and annoying analytical approach led me into conflicts quite early on, in fact the priest was overtly against my joining, but as my character seems to include controversiality and confrontation (not necessarily blessings nor aspects which allow me to be politically correct), I couldn’t stop posing questions as to exclusivity, as to the Christian message being one of inclusivity but not necessarily being practised in that way. Aside from inter-faith groupings (which is a laudable endeavour practised in various ways in society but more of a political approach than a fundamentally given approach, but better than nothing) the world shows us sects and rules thereof and we choose to be within one area. Then we might spend the rest of our lives defending “it” as the “true” teaching, to the hilt. It can be a lifetime’s work in itself because if we are busy defending a certain set of rules – irrespective of the fundamental teachings – we can take our religious life to be one of defence of it. Then there is no room for self-reflection, questioning and taking a look around. Then we can dismiss all other groups in the world and determine that they are yet to be saved. Ah, war.
It doesn’t make sense. I do love the Jesuit part of the Catholic Church in that they are allowed to be the radicals within the fold; and they do challenge so much. They do accept all other teachings, using the central discipline of Catholicism to guide them through; the central discipline does guide you through and it does include reincarnation, Buddhism, Islam, etc. – some great works from Anthony de Mello (Jesuit writer and psychoanalyst) touch on all aspects and invite you to question your own set of prejudices about the world. His psychoanalytical background (Jong based) led him to write many books and deliver many workshops in the UK, India and other places. One of the sayings I constantly retain from one of his compilation books is this:
“Faith is about seeking the truth. So it doesn’t matter if you lose all of your beliefs”.
This is my guiding principle. Seemingly contradictory at face value, but extremely holistic in fact.
Briefly, the background to the Jesuits is wonderfully radical being started by St. Ignatius of Loyola, who was famously impolitic and so founded the “naughty” part of the Catholic family whose originally intended derisory name from the upper echelons of the Church “Jesuits” (as opposed to Society of Jesus) has stuck. Within the context of the Catholic Church’s family, they are integral, if radical and outsiders – but the Catholic Church on earth has many roles and many facets – like any family – and its political as well as spiritual life seems to come into conflict with many people who take a rather narrow and uneducated view of it. It, the Church, invites much criticism and bashing and I have had many experiences of finding that people tell me one thing or another about what the Catholics have done, shouldn’t do or ought to do, but when I enquire further of their argument, often find that their knowledge is limited to what is grasped from history, horrid nuns in a school (or worse Catholic institutions that locked people up for years, Catholic priests who did dreadful things to children) thrown around the press, society or what a secular view of the institution at face value, is. This is not an essay on Catholicism – and I have done stuff about this elsewhere if you are interested, and I shall belt up on it right now – but I was touching on this facet here only to introduce the concepts of “universality” and “holism” and “being holistic” within my own journey. It merely serves here to introduce “my baby in the bathwater”, I promise.
Belief then (as opposed to faith) is a difficult taskmaster because if our beliefs have been instilled through upbringing, conditioning and givens, it makes it difficult to disentangle what our unprejudiced views might be. Indeed, to confront our own prejudices and to challenge within our own family or group might well mean being cast out. And we might not like ourselves. And that is a frightening prospect. And fear is the debilitator so we can seek to avoid it at all costs, and just adhere to what we know and then we will be fine.
Except, we are not fine and that isn’t what it is about. “It” being our life’s journey. Our reason for being. And if I am coming over to you as being “holier than thou” I can assure you that facing myself is the hugest ongoing difficulty that I have in my contrary, arrogant and utterly selfish world. So when I read Chad Varah’s autobiography entitled “Before I die again”, in my little world of believing that this is it and there is no such thing as reincarnation, it threw me into perplexity. That he was a priest – a Christian – and he was putting forward this as a fact, a given, something that he knew deeply and without even defending his approach, only compounded my exclamation. So began my ongoing search to open up to other things, other views of the world. And I found and find that I don’t have to throw the baby out with the bathwater; that in opening up to the multitude of cultures and religions doesn’t preclude throwing away a discipline. In fact, it supports the discipline of learning and seeking. “Seek and ye shall find, knock and the door will be opened, ask and it shall be given” is holistic. It invites us to go forward, not to stand still, not to defend something for the hell of it, but to stop defending and to start learning.
So embracing Buddhism, Islam, Yoga, the Bhagavad Gita, energy work (with people like Barbara Brennan) and much more is not against the Will of God, the Source, the All Embracing Love – whatever term suits – they provide insights and a very good evolutionary and historical context to what is. Secularism and its disregarding of institutionalised religion incorporates a human kind approach with “kind” being a key word. So I do not have to subscribe to any particular view, belief or prejudice, I can open up in an holistic manner to include and discern. Every person is on his or her journey so I can learn from them, whatever background has formed their way.
“Holism” is a word I first encountered when studying “Systems Philosophy” because a key fellow called Count Von Bertanlanffy, in its development (as a management science) once pointed out that “systems” was the wrong word to use, that it had been a huge mistake to adopt it because whereas “systems” is exclusive and on a straight line basis (as in information systems and computers), the philosophy was not thus. It was a way of approaching the multitude of facets in organisational contexts in an holistic manner. So that Holistic Philosopy, which was correct, unfortunately got mislaid. That is, to say that looking at the way things work requires an approach to include the soft facets (holisms) of life including culture, and not narrowly defined which “system” tends to imply. Still, it is the word “systems” which has remained and indeed means that the academic institutions have shoved this philosophy below the Information Engineering heading and therefore subjected it to the ego of the hard, engineering orientated world approach of defined narrowness. The world’s ego can get rid of uncomfortable openings by subjecting all to a more narrow methodology that sells systems and makes companies rich and viable. And fits us into square or round holes from where we can fire arrows at each other.
Of course “holy”, “whole” and “hole” lead me to “holistic” and “holism” and I find no discrepancy of bridging between them all. “Holy” implies to me to “become whole” or aspire to becoming whole, complete. Falling down our “holes” may help us towards becoming “whole”.
“Holistic” is not a brand, it is an approach which is all inclusive and wide, requiring an open mind and an open heart. So then, is being “holy”.
Gandhi once replied when he was asked if he was “Hindu”, words to the effect of “Yes, and I am Christian, and Muslim…” because he had realised that the source was the same; he also pointed out that when we find some ritualistic pronouncement within any apparent “teaching” at odds with the overall search, then it is to be discerned, with intelligence, and discarded if it implies exclusivity because it is not right and an interpretation loaded with the prejudice of a narrow approach. As in anything else in life, we use our own discernment to determine what is what. And we can be mistaken, change our approach over and over, and so we can learn from our mistakes as an ongoing fundamental search. Flexibility, not rigidity, then.
Healing and spirituality lead us into many avenues that might put us at odds with our original conditioning or views, whether secular or religious. Then so be it – spirituality and becoming aware of the other dimensions around us, the process of healing as an ongoing journey to becoming whole – requires us to challenge ourselves. The world of angels, ascending masters, quantum physics even, opens us up to more of the dimensions in the universe, the realisation that karma and sin might be one and the same and are not for ever damning. That the balance of karma and sin (think of Michael the Archangel with his scales) is the same message perhaps. To feel uncomfortable in the context of “holisms” and to move forward in an “holistic” manner is good. Outside of our comfort zone is where we actually learn; inside it we are protected by our prejudices (to pre judge) and conditionings. We can argue until Kingdom come that this one way is right and that one, that one over there is wrong, because we believe it to be so. And that takes all of our life and effort and, whilst keeping us comfortable and argumentative, wears us out with narrowness and division.
If we consider the time context of Buddha and Christ and Islam (to name but three for now) there is no conflict either in history or in truth. If we choose to see the divisions, then we are choosing to subscribe to the illusion. If we choose to see the compatibilities, then we are choosing to throw away the illusion just for long enough to see some light. If you are happy with “Jagadamba”, “Queen of the Universe” or “Mary the Mother of God” or “Maternal Love”, or none of the above then so am I, why waste valuable learning time shouting the odds of what our objects – as in names which are so inadequate in defining what we might allude to – mean to us? Objects define the undefinable, just to give us a way of expressing the inexpressible.
Like most of us, there have been keenly difficult times in my life, when my perspective has been shifted radically. Times, when we question what it is all about. When we are thrown off our pedestals, when chronic misfortune comes knocking on our doors challenging all that we hold dear, whilst wanting to run back inside and hide away, it offers us a way forward.
Having angels or spirits or guides and holism in our lives is not an easy way. This wise poem from an ancient, Persian, Islam, Sufi in the 13th Century, called Rumi says it all:
This being human is a guest house.
Every morning a new arrival.
A Joy, a depression, a meanness, some momentary awareness comes as an unexpected visitor.
Welcome and entertain them all!
Even if they’re a crowd of sorrows,
who violently sweep your house empty of its furniture,
still, treat each guest honourably.
He may be clearing you out for some new delight.
(Rumi’s importance is considered to transcend national and ethnic borders – from Wikipedia)
So being “holistic” is not having found the beginning and the end, it is about having found my way forward. And my ways forward have come usually through some crisis, often through pondering upon (as opposed to “thinking about”) spiritual ideas, mistakes, grievances, behaviour, politics, anecdotes, humour, the devil, the demon, the sacraments, icons (visual prayer as opposed to verbal prayer), meditation, the angst of life’s joys and sorrows, my own disgust with my prejudices and those of others, or sheer bloody-mindedness. It isn’t about being “nice” it is about challenging the status quo and suffering exclusion, being cast out and learning to be alone whilst never being alone. Crisis and joy are great teachers and being holistic in our approach leads us forward. My allegiance towards being told what to do and what to think, within the Catholic faith and by someone who knows better than I, has gone; but to listen to what is being told by anyone, at an inclusive level and with an open heart, might teach me something and help aid my journey.
A friend that I met on a past life regression course in America told me the following story about a friend of hers who’d gone to a Buddha Master in India for enlightenment. After a long while waiting in the queue, he approached the Master in sombre and serious mode, and sat in front of the closed-eyed Master waiting for his sublime message, with due reverence and a deep crease in his brow. Eventually, the Master looked directly at him, and swiftly poked his finger into his forehead saying “Lighten up, asshole!”.
(© 2011 Eileen Baker)
