CHAPTER 23
Every train ride that the two travelers to India had scheduled was in reality about twice as long as anticipated. An overnight journey on the rails was really two. Twenty hours became forty. India was crisscrossed with trains which moved millions of people daily across the huge country.
Andre said that forty days is the normal mourning period in the Orthodox Church. Since he had put in forty hours on a train he had done enough mourning and wanted to fly whenever possible during the next legs of the journey.
The travelers got off the train from Dharmsala, north India, in Delhi. The crowded conditions were overwhelming. People seemed to fill every nook and cranny. It was a low-point for the two friends.
“What are we doing here anyway, Bro? Let’s get on the next plane back home. What do you say?”
Andre was clearly uncomfortable. Francis felt the same way but did not want to make any snap decisions. He found himself thinking about his monastery in Pennsylvania. He could be home enjoying peace and quiet right now rather than being on the other side of the world.
Hmmm, I wonder how the community is making out with that new Observer. What was his name? Oh yes, Anthony.
Francis tried to be logical. Both of us are seasoned travelers so there must be some validity to our experience of wanting to flee.
“I can understand your impulse to get out of here. Can you hang on for a day or so? Perhaps we will adjust to the crowded conditions.”
Andre reluctantly agreed.
They hired a pedal-cart, complete with driver, who ferried them from hotel to hotel until they found one that they both felt relatively comfortable with. Showers and rest were a very important part of long-distance travel and the two friends found the medicine of water and sleep deeply healing.
The next morning Andre and Francis agreed to take the flight and then the six hour daylight train ride to Tamil Nadu, South India, the land of Shanthivanam—the Christian Ashram, or spiritual community, of the late Catholic monk Bede Griffiths.
“Not having to sleep in these rolling metal cages make them easier to take,” commented Andre as they clicked along the metal rails watching rice patties go by.
“Yes, Andre, and flying during the longer transitions in place of the trains helps also.”
Both men were committed to helping the poor, especially in the area of health care and spirituality. They found themselves wondering what the limits of their commitments were—perhaps they had reached them.
Getting off the train was easier this time. There were the usual crowds and beggars but not in the same numbers as in Delhi. The travelers started to relax and get excited about Shanthivanam.
“Why did Bede Griffiths go to India in the first place?” questioned Andre.
“He was a Benedictine monk from England, Andre, but developed a longing to help Eastern and Western people learn to respect and relate to one another in the area of spirituality. He stayed committed to his Christian monastic life but delved deeply into the Hindu tradition. Bede’s mission was not about conversion but communication. In relating and understanding the East, he and his followers grew more deeply committed to Christ and saw Christ in their Hindu sisters and brothers also.”
“Did it work the other way around also, Brother?”
“Yes it did my friend. The Hindus eventually venerated Bede as a great Swami. In fact, a Hindu Swami is the equivalent of a Christian monk.”
The cab driver who was racing through the crowds toward the Christian ashram of Shanthivanam looked angry and a bit sinister. As long as he gets us there in one piece, thought Francis, I don’t care what he looks like.
“So, Brother Francis, an ashram is a Hindu concept, but Father Bede created the first Christian version of one, correct?”
“That’s right Andre.”
“Why do they call him ‘Father’ if he is a monk? I thought monks were called ‘Brother’ in accord with the custom of the early Christians who called one another ‘Brother’ or ‘Sister.’”
“A monk has a whole and complete vocation, distinct from the priesthood.” There were no priests in monasteries in the early centuries. In fact, many of the priests were married in those days. Eventually a few monks were ordained for sacramental ministry in the monastery. Then this became the custom and canon law eventually even forced it by only allowing those preparing for priesthood to become solemnly professed monks. But the primitive observance of monastic life sees the vocation of a monk as totally focusing on the search for God and the sacred, on monastic profession of vows, silence, meditation, celebrating the Liturgy of the Hours, solitude, and flowing out of that perhaps service to others.”
Saint Benedict himself was certainly a monk and abbot, but not a priest. Saint Francis of Assisi was a friar, a wandering mendicant, but not a priest. Both of these saints were the inspiration for two of the largest religious orders in the world. In the minds of many Catholics, however, they are lumped together with priests. Not a bad thing, but not an accurate thing either.
“I understand that since Vatican Council II there is a movement back to the primitive observance of monastic life—simple and smaller communities. So Father Bede was a monk who was also a priest, thus he was called ‘Father.’”
“That’s about right, but let’s complicate it a bit more, shall we?”
“Why didn’t I see this one coming?” Andre said as he laughed.
“In early monasticism, sans priests, all were Brother or Sister but the monks in leadership were Father. So, the Abbot and perhaps the Prior, second in charge, were often called Father.”
“I’ll just call all these folks Brother, how’s that?”
“Perfect Andre. Father Bede would love it since he was a prime mover in going back to a simple, primitive, and more egalitarian monastic life.”
They arrived at Shanthivanam in the dark while the community was sitting quietly on the floor in the open-air refectory eating dinner with their hands. Brother Paschal left the meal and welcomed them warmly. They slipped into the moon-lit room and sat down on the floor to munch rice and curried vegetables from a banana leaf plate.
When everyone was finished, one of the monks began a Sanskrit chant as a grace after meals prayer. The fifteen or so men and women chanted together softly, and then quietly left the room to go outside and wash their cups and place them on a rack to dry.
Brother Paschal showed the tired pilgrims around the ashram and then to their hut. They were put in a cinderblock room which even had a shower room in it. The beds were made of sheet metal with a very thin cotton pad on top of the metal. Four poles on the corners of each bed held patched mosquito netting up and around the occupant.
Sleep was a welcome gift.