By Alf McCreary
newsdesk@belfasttelegraph.co.uk
WHEN was the last time you heard of a church being locked because too many people wanted to get in? It happened this week at St Anne’s Cathedral, in Belfast, when a much greater than expected congregation turned up to greet the Dalai Lama on the last day of his visit to Northern Ireland.
The stewards did their best to cope with the unprecedented numbers by allowing a few people to filter in at a time to take the rare vacant seats. Nevertheless, a sizeable crowd was left outside on the Cathedral steps. Unfortunately the authorities were unable to allow them to stand inside, due to health and safety regulations.
The concept of peace and reconciliation was suddenly being tested in practice, but the outsiders behaved with good manners, as one would expect. Mind you, my own patience was being tested until somebody kindly let me in through a side door – all in the way of my business, of course.
One of the people on the pavement outside with me was William Logan, a regular worshipper at St Anne’s and also the Sovereign Grand Master of the Royal Black Institution. I was most impressed that a ‘Blackman’ had come to share in a service of meditation with the Dalai Lama and members of other faiths.
You might say: “Why not?” And why not indeed … Mr Logan eventually made it inside the hallowed precincts, but before doing so he had expressed to me his disappointment at being left outside. However, his comment stayed in my mind when he said: “It’s great to see a church filled to overflowing. I wish it was like this every week.”
In an age when many Christian churches are half-empty, it was encouraging to see Belfast Cathedral brimmed to overflowing with people of different denominations and faiths.
Part of this may have been the curiosity factor, with people wanting to share with the Dalai Lama, who is one of the world’s great religious leaders. However, I felt there was a genuine atmosphere of reverence and of spiritual sharing.
There were contributions from the Christian, Buddhist, Muslim, Bah’ai Hindu, Sikh, Jewish and other faiths, and a musical contribution from the Benedictine monks from Rostrevor. Nobody made a protest, and nobody stood up and walked out. It was so refreshing.
Was this an important statement of religious solidarity in a secular world or merely a one-off event ? It was certainly a significant piece of social and religious history in the making …
Credit for the success of the service is due to the organisers from the Christian Meditation Community and their colleagues, and also to the Dean of Belfast, Dr Houston McKelvey, and his colleagues for making the cathedral accessible. Not for the first time the dean has shown quiet courage in promoting cross-community and inter-faith activities, and I am not sure that every Christian leader in Northern Ireland would have been so forthcoming on this occasion.
Dean McKelvey was right to welcome the Dalai Lama and the others to “an act of Christian hospitality in a sacred space.”
Happily, the Dalai Lama was given the enthusiastic welcome he deserved from such a wide representation of religious life in Northern Ireland.
He really is a remarkable figure, as well as a world statesman who had just flown in to Northern Ireland after talking to President George W Bush in Washington, prior to his visit to China – a country with which the Dalai Lama and Tibet have seriously unfinished business.
For part of this week I was in close proximity to the Dalai Lama, at Corrymeela in Ballycastle and also in Belfast. I was impressed yet again by his warmth and homespun wisdom, and also by his humour. When asked leading questions by the media he tended to reply in parables which everyone could understand.
For example, he told us about his friend, an elderly Tibetan monk, who had survived savage torture and lengthy imprisonment by the Chinese. On his release he told the Dalai Lama that his greatest fear was that he would lose his “compassion” for his former captors.
The Dali Lama explained: “My friend knew that if he allowed himself to become angry and bitter, these emotions would not injure the Chinese but they would destroy him inside. He knew that by retaining his sense of compassion he would therefore maintain his inner strength and peace of mind.”
We could all learn a lot from the Dalai Lama.
