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Page 1 of 2 Executive Director's weekly reflection
“This is where Jesus appeared to Babaji.” An experience on a Sikh ashram shows that human institutions don’t own or control the divine.
“If the conversation isn’t about salvation through Jesus Christ, there isn’t anything to talk about.” As I have experienced, these words are generally a conversation stopper in the interfaith world. They betray an underlying view of this world and the next that leaves no room for other voices. On a trip to India in 1998, I experienced a delightful antidote to this attitude.
The realities of India were overwhelming.
First, the poverty and crush of humanity – many of the sidewalks of Bombay were lined with straw mats that served as home for entire families, who cooked and bathed, ate and slept on the sidewalk.
Next, the ubiquitous presence of the spiritual – ashrams, shrines, temples, churches, gurdwaras, mosques were everywhere in witness to the powerful draw of the spirit.
Finally, the visible unfolding of human history – technology and practices of the 18th and 19th centuries (cooking with dried cow dung) existed side-by-side with those of the 20th (state of the art open heart surgery).
And so, slightly disoriented, I found myself in a cab crawling out of Delhi toward Gobind Sadan (House of God), the ashram of Baba Virsa Singh. Babaji is a spiritual leader revered all over India. A Sikh, he welcomes people of all faiths, believing this is fully consistent with the founding impulse of Sikhism, which was to bridge the divisions between Hindus and Muslims. Also, he comes from a peasant background, more like Jesus than the Buddha.
He had recently hosted an extraordinary ritual in which Hindu political leaders who had been encouraging and/or turning a blind eye to the persecution of people of other faiths, took a vow before him to be accountable for the well being of all Indians, regardless of their faith.
The hour-long drive to the ashram took us through congested Delhi into the outskirts where traffic fell away and shops and shacks gave way to walled farms and narrow lanes. We finally arrived at Gobin Sadan, and I stepped out into the cleanest air I’d breathed since I arrived in India, and to a palpable serenity as I walked through the gates of the ashram.
Mary Pat Fisher, a scholar of comparative religion who had left her life in Connecticut six years earlier to live at Gobin Sadan and follow Babaji, welcomed me. After sharing some of the history of Gobin Sadan and Baba Virsa Singh, she gave me a tour.
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