Column: Rending the oak tree and stripping the forest bare

Not only the church, but my whole body literally shook with the power of these bells. And they went on and on...

More on the historic churches of Singapore here.

The photo is of the bell at Mission San Antonio in California.

This column appeared in the Catholic Standard and Times on 11 November 2010.

The Lord’s voice shaking the wilderness, the Lord shakes the wilderness of Kadesh; the Lord’s voice rending the oak tree and stripping the forest bare. — Ps. 29:8-9

From the street it looked just like any other city parking lot, with its glass enclosed attendant and ticket machine. A small sign on the gate, “SS. Peter and Paul. Lot closes at 9 p.m.,” was the only indication I was in the right spot. I crossed the parking lot to the old stone church set back from the street, its steeple dwarfed by the high-rises that surrounded it.

I walked up the steps and into the church, where I was promptly stunned by what the small stone facade had concealed. The white-washed plaster walls, the arcing dome overhead and the floor to ceiling side windows, open to let in even the smallest breeze in Singapore’s tropical heat, created an illusion of infinite space. The entire place seemed to breathe life into the words of the creed: “God from God, Light from Light.” The triptych of stained glass windows high above the altar were like glowing jewels in the late afternoon sun.

I slid into a pew and knelt. The sultry air encouraged stillness, and I surrendered to the quiet in front of the tabernacle, listening for the small, still voice of God in this place.

Suddenly the silence was battered by a great clamor of bells. The very church shook. They rang and rang and rang, calling the faithful to worship with full voice for more than five minutes. When the pealing at last ceased, the air still seemed to shimmer with the sound.

As I knelt under that torrent of sound, I thought of the images the psalmist uses in Psalm 29: The voice of the lord shaking the earth, and stripping the forest bare — the voice of the Lord, full of power.

For more than 1,500 years, bells have been the voice of the Church, in weal and woe, warning of danger and announcing celebration. I generally think of bells as a summons, as an invitation to a gathering whose reason is yet a mystery. Just as St. Francis Xavier’s hand bell intrigued passers-by enough to come hear what he had to say about the Gospel, I still look around for the church when I hear bells ring, wondering what news they are announcing.

Yet this deluge of sound did more than summon — even amidst the noise of the city — it reverberated with power and might. This is the voice, reflected St. Augustine, “that stirred to faith the peoples who were once without hope and without God in the world, where no prophet, no preacher of the word of God was to be found…” This was a voice that could shatter despair and shake life into stones in the desert.

The bells are more than the voice of God calling us to prayer, to come and hear. This is a call to be changed by a Voice that has an effect here and now. A Voice that makes manifest His strength, shaking me out of my complacency, stripping me of my own words, and putting His own Word to work within me.

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O God of justice, hear our cry and save us. Make us heed your word to the prophets; rouse us to the demand of the gospel and impel us to carry it out. Amen. — From the Opening Prayer for the 26th Sunday in Ordinary Time, Cycle C

Column: Traveling Mercies

This column had its genesis in this blog post, and the various wishes for mercies on my travels. The travels were indeed full of graces, big and small. The friend of a friend who took me to Mass (murmuring the occasional explanation for the differences between the celebrations usual in Singapore and those in the US) and then out to dinner the first night I was there. The students who explained how to get to the other side of campus in a rainstorm (the campus bus!). The immigration officer who filled in my landing card (which I had screwed up royally) only teasing me I should be kind to my students on their next exam....

The photo is of a flower in the botanical gardens in Singapore.

This column appeared in the Catholic Standard & Times 4 Nov 2010.

Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for it is by doing so that some have entertained angels without knowing it. — Hebrews 13:2

I am an itinerant scholar these days, teaching and writing far from my usual haunts. The last few weeks have seen me traveling up and down the Northeast corridor from Princeton, N.J., to Washington, D.C., and as I write this, I am on a plane headed to London, en route to Singapore.

I’ve learned to travel lightly, trusting that I will find what I need along the way — or just do without. Still, my bag coming back from Virginia last week was anything but light. I had brought almost 20 pounds of books with me to work on a writing project in between workshops and guest lectures. And I bought more while I was there — heedless of the four train connections that stood between me and home. (Small wonder I resonate with the 12th century Carthusian Abbot who as his monastery burned exhorted the monks to save not themselves, but, “The books, my brothers, the books!”)

Changing trains on my way to Union Station, I discovered to my dismay that not only were the escalators out of service, so were the elevators. So much for luggage on wheels. I resolutely picked up my bag and hauled it up the first three steps, and took a breather. Another four steps. I hoisted the bag up again, trying not to mentally count the number of steps remaining.

Suddenly my bag seemed to float, I looked back to see a young woman holding the other end high and almost dancing up the steps. In seconds we were at the top. As I turned to thank my rescuer, she grinned, murmured, “God bless you,” and dashed off; my words of gratitude and blessing bobbing along in her wake.

The writer of the letter to the Hebrews reminds the community to care for the stranger, just in case they are angels in disguise. I momentarily wondered if I’d been entertained by an angel in Metro Center, rather than the other way ‘round. Regardless, it was a profound traveling mercy.

Before I embarked on this month of travels, a friend promised me prayers for “traveling mercies” along the way. In Traveling Mercies: Some Thoughts on Faith Anne Lamott writes of the older women of her church community who send travelers off with this same prayer. They mean, she says, “Love the journey. God is with you. Come home safe and sound.”

I sometimes think of traveling mercies as just-in-time grace — like the young woman who came to my aid on the stairs. But it is also grace that sharpens my eyes for God. Traveling takes me out of the places I know well, pushes me out of my comfort zone. All this reminds me that I’m equally on journey when I’m back home and so to be attentive to the mercies to be found there.

My suitcase clearly advertised my status as a traveler to my energetic helper (and my graying hair, perhaps, my need of a traveling mercy). But we are all travelers and our need of mercy is just as great at home as on the road. Now I’m looking out not only for the mercies shown me — on the road or at home — but those I might offer to my fellow travelers.

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May the Lord bless you and keep you. May his face shine upon you, and be gracious to you. May he look upon you with kindness, and give you peace. Amen. — From the solemn blessing for Ordinary Time I.

Burn these clothes

After wearing the same clothes for 36 straight hours of brutal travel, I wanted nothing more than to burn them, or toss them down a oubliette, or throw them into the replicators to have their molecules re-arranged into something (anything) different.

I settled for a good wash. And a very long shower.

Last traveling mercy? A "ten minute beat up" by a lovely young woman staffing the express spa (isn't this an oxymoron?) at Heathrow. The massage left me in such a puddle I wondered if I'd be able to get on the plane.

Silk strands

On the last day of the only eight day retreat I've made with Patient Spiritual Director, he suggested an exercise to "gather up the crumbs" and see what baskets they might fill. As I hunch here in my window seat, 39,000 feet above the Atlantic, the seat in front of me less than 8 inches away (on occasion perilously closer as the hulking young man in the seat in front of me throws his weight around), it seems like a good time to gather the last few strands from this trip.

Singapore is a city of flats, mostly high-rise flats. I loved the flag poles that bristled from the buildings, festooned with drying laundry. Some flats sported as many as five. I wondered what would happen if (when?) the laundry blew off.

Taxis. They and the MRT train line were my magic carpets to Singapore Island. They could be summoned with a click of the computer at the front desk, or an SMS. I loved the little slips that the desk would give me, with the time to arrival and the taxi number on them. A ticket to my next adventure. The biggest adventure was often coming back, trying to direct the taxi driver to the hotel on the large campus I was staying at, usually in the dark, and at speed (and on the "wrong" side of the road).

Despite the heat and humidity, Singapore is not locked up tight in air conditioned bunkers like Houston. Windows are open in the high-rises, shops open into the air, corridors in buildings on campus likewise often open into the out of doors. My hotel alas did not have windows that opened (a concession to overseas guests less adjusted to the heat?), and the A/C in my room had no off switch, just cold and colder. I finally resorted to sleeping in my hoody.

Bargaining in the shops in Little India. I've not lost my touch since the Oaxaca markets.

Immigration and border control at Changi. A whole bowlful of hard candies on the counter. "Lolly?" offered the official. I decorously took one, only to be encouraged to take a handful. (A traveling mercy later when I had a tickle in my throat and nothing to drink!)

The pastel colored shophouses in Little India. The Deepavali market on Seragoon Road, so packed you could hardly move, and the attempts the young woman at one stall and I made to try to fish down a lantern in the jostling crowd.

The fabric stores on Arab Street. I could have stayed all day, just going from shop to shop. When I got on the MRT to go back to the hotel, I noticed my bright purple bag had strands of silk along the side, undoubtedly caught as I wove my way between the bolts that littered the sidewalk, advertising the wares within. The little perfume shop, tucked into a corner of one of the old shophouses in Kampong Glam.

The shopkeeper who showed me how to wear a sari, and the cheerful Indian woman, a fellow shopper urging me to "do check it out in the mirror, dear, you look very nice!". I bought the sari, yards and yards of midnight blue silk chiffon, edged in gold. What will I do with it???

The beautiful Tamil script. Maybe we could borrow some for quantum mechanical symbols?

The public service announcements on the MRT, "Love your ride!" sung by Singapore's equivalent of the Dixie Chicks. Give up your seat to the old and infirm (someone gave me a seat!), don't block the exits while waiting to board at the station.

Singapore Eats

You'll never go hungry in Singapore, I was told. There is food on virtually every corner, and many places are open 24 hours And in this cross-roads city, it's not just the sheer number of restaurants, but the incredible variety of cuisines that are available. I ate Malay food, several different types of Chinese cuisine, Indian food, Indonesian food, Japanese food, Middle Eastern food, and one night, Italian. For the most part I tried not to eat anything I ate at home, or that I thought I could easily find at home, and generally let my hosts do the ordering.

What did I like? Fried bananas with red bean paste. Delicate pancakes folded over slivers of duck with crispy skin. (The rest of the duck returned later that meal cut into tiny bits and stir fried with green onions and puffs of rice noodle.).

Balls of spicy chicken thread onto a skewer and grilled. They are piled onto trays and when you order they are rapidly picked off the top of the stack, dunked in sauce and slid into a bag.

Tiny, the size of my fingernail, deep fried prawns, heads, tails, shells and all. Salty and crunchy, they were as addictive as pretzels. Once I got over eating the eyes.

Singapore's signature disk, chili crab. Think Maryland crabs, but spicier and larger. They are typically sold by weight, and served with small buns that have a fluffy white interior, perfect for sopping up (and moderating) the spicy sauce. I had them at a lovely, elegant restaurant not far from the university where I was staying. You eat these with your hands, it's definitely a messy affair, so when they brought out the crab, they also tied bibs around us. Unlike the traditional lobster bibs, no weird graphics!

A cup of thick plain yogurt with mango sauce, bought at a hawker's market. (Hawker's markets are collections of food stands, like Philly's food trucks, but all gathered in one spot. Incredibly cheap, wonderful ways to sample lots of different things.)

Prata, a fried flat bread. Think tortilla or naan. (See the photos, it's a marvel to watch being made - like pizza dough, but at high speed!)

Steamboat buffet. You order two types of broth which are brought to the boil on a hot plate on the table. Pick what you would like from a list of about thirty different things to cook in the broth. Thin slices of beef, whole prawns, spinach, lettuce, tofu. We had a spicy broth and an oxtail broth. All this came with a steady stream of soup dumplings, steamed dumplings with a bit of meat inside and a tablespoon of broth. I hiked about 3 miles in the morning, and another 3 in the afternoon, ate fruit and yogurt for lunch and still couldn't do justice to this marvelous meal - or have room for dessert (though I did try a bite of a "jelly" of unknown flavor, definitely herbal).

Pizza. Crisp, perfect anchovy pizza.

Acquired tastes that I didn't acquire. Sesame ice cream. I like green tea ice cream, I like sesame as a flavor, but this combination did not do anything for me. Korean street sausage. Think a corn dog, rolled in potato cubes and deep fried. Another hawker's market sampling, at a stand that was supposed to be the best place in Singapore to get this treat.

Barley water. Soy milk, unsweetened or with simple syrup stirred in. My usual drink of choice (Diet Coke) was hit or miss. I could always find it at the hawker's markets, but some restaurants only served non-diet sodas. Lime juice turned out to be a fine option. No alcohol, on top of the jet lag that would have been a sure way to sleep through a meal!

Things I was too chicken to try! Durian. Apparently you either love or hate this stinky fruit. (I asked the students doing a writing workshop with me to do an exercise about durian - it was instructive for us all!) The smell is so strong and off-putting that you cannot bring it on public transportation in Singapore, and it's banned from many hotels. After one of my hosts told me that he tried durian to see what his wife so loved about it, I asked him what it was like. "I threw up!" This was not an encouraging sign. I did see fallen durian on my walk in the jungle, but never managed to find a good time to sample it. Dinner with my university hosts just did not seem like quite the right spot!

Pig offal soup. It's the name, totally the name. I have it on good authority that it's actually quite tasty!

More Singapore Sketches

Today is a "free and easy" day according to my schedule. I got up early to go "trekking" up Bukit Timah - the highest natural point in Singapore (but not the highest point - several buildings in downtown are higher than this 164 m hill). This reserve is the last remaining bit of primary jungle in Singapore and home to a wider variety of flora than is found in all of North America. And to reticulated pythons, macaques, monitor lizards and flying lemurs. To my disappointment, despite all of the "don't feed the monkeys" signs, I encountered no macaques. I saw one lemur high in the trees, but couldn't get a photo.

I did get up close and personal with several monitor lizards, including this guy. Walking on the dirt trails in the back half of the preserve, this one came right out in front of me. I turned another corner to find one sauntering down the trail ahead of me. These lizards are low-slung and stocky, but they don't waddle, they have a walk so liquid it's almost a slither. And they have incredibly long tongues.

There are a lot of be a good citizen campaigns in Singapore. In the student canteen not far from where I'm staying, the sign at the drinks and fruit station pointedly asks "Taking two straws? You don't have two mouths, do you?" I took one straw.

I'm not in Kansas anymore. The ambient soundscape is different. I can close my eyes and be certain I'm not in Pennsylvania any more. It was particularly evident at the nature reserve, where the cicadas were decidedly higher in pitch than Pennsylvanian cicadas. But it can be more subtle as well. At the top of a ridge, alone on the trail (hard to do in crowded Singapore), I could hear the wind rustling the top of the trees. The rustle was not quite the same rustle I hear through the oaks outside my window, or when walking the hedgerows at Wernersville.

Everyone always carries an umbrella. In the vans that drove me around campus and out to Jurong Island, there was always a rack of matching umbrellas behind the driver. Just in case. Even on the trail this morning, hikers had not a poncho tucked into a pack, but bumbershoots. I can see why. You really don't want an extra layer in this weather (note the latitude on the marker at the summit — one degree off the equator). I was completely drenched after the hike today!

Singapore Sketches

I'm still in Singapore, talking about writing, talking about science, talking about writing and science. The university I'm visiting here has been wonderfully welcoming and the place is beautiful. The trouble, of course, with talking about writing is that I've not a lot of time to do it….so what follows are just a few sketches before I lose all the details.

Drive left! Look right to cross. I look the wrong way when I cross streets - thankfully Singapore drivers are even better than Californians about stopping for pedestrians. And you don't jaywalk here. (See below!)

The churches - the Cathedral and SS Peter and Paul -- were fascinating. The Cathedral is held together by baling wire -- or at least cables and boards. Apparently when they excavated for the MRT system (the subway/trains) the lack of a solid foundation under the Cathedral proved disastrous, and the subsequent damage has yet to be repaired due to lack of funds. The peeling plaster walls also suggest budgetary woes. SS Peter and Paul has incredibly gorgeous bones - you walk in to what appears to be a small church and turns out to be an enormous open and light space with a triptych of stained glass windows that simply glow. The sense of openess is enhanced by the low windows along the sides - all open to the outside. But you don't have to look carefully to see the same signs of dwindling urban congregations. The plaster is falling off the walls, fans are bolted to the walls. Oh - and no A/C in either place. Fans, open windows. Heat. It encourages stillness (and as I did an hour's meditation in SS Peter and Paul - elicited strong memories of Wernersville in a heat wave).

Jaywalking. I watched a bit of Chinese language TV in the student canteen over lunch. In the middle of the soap opera on comes an ad showing a grandmother indulging her granddaughter (I'm guessing about the relationship - my Mandarin is limited to thank you. Period.) The grandmother goes out to buy the granddaughter a treat. She jaywalks coming home, is hit by a car and the final scene shows her body lying in the street and the crushed box of treats. I got the message, without being to able read the Chinese characters that flashed on the black screen. Don't jaywalk.

Time for my next talk! More later…. (photo is of Good Shepherd Cathedral in Singapore)

Wrinkled Time

I feel quite wrinkled at the moment, after a mere twenty-four hours of travel (two more hours to go). The little screen in the back of my seat shows us to be over the Bay of Bengal. What am I doing on the other side of the earth? It seems odd to get here by just sitting, as difficult as that can seem in quarters so tight that I can't put my laptop screen all the way up when the seat in front of me is reclined. With virtually no effort on my part (if you don't count the sudden swirl of errands that renewing my passport required), I'm about to arrive in a place that five hundred years ago was essentially inaccessible from where I live now. How long, I wonder, did it take for St. Francis Xavier to get to this end of the earth from Rome in 1541? [Months, I looked it up when I landed.] And do I have more stuff or less than he brought along?

Time feels a bit wrinkled, too. I prayed Compline on the plane from Philly to London in the middle of the night. But by the time I was settled into the next plane, now on Singapore time, it was time and past for Evening Prayer. Time had bunched up, and folded over.

But I can once again keep time, having managed to replace my watch during the London layover!

Traveling Mercies

I feel like an itinerant scholar these days, teaching and writing far from my usual haunts. The last few weeks have seen me traveling up and down the Northeast corridor from Princeton to Washington DC, and as I write this, I am on a layover in London, en route to Singapore.

Several friends wished me "traveling mercies" before I left, an expression I first encountered in Anne Lamott's Traveling Mercies: Some Thoughts on Faith. I sometimes think of traveling mercies as just in time grace, and so often grace with a wry sense of humor peeking through.

There have been traveling mercies in my wanderings. A partial list of the ones I've noticed:

• the young woman who helped haul my suitcase packed with books up the stairs on the Washington Metro (the escalators were out) and then blessed me
• realizing that my passport had expired BEFORE I got to the airport (two weeks before, in fact - time enough to go into Philly, get it renewed and have lunch with a friend)
• Math Man's willingness to trek across Philly to pick up the passport when it was ready (since I was off on another trip and stressed that picking it up 24 hours before I was due to travel was cutting it a bit close)
• the kitchen staff who produced plain chicken and mashed potatoes when I was recovering from a stomach bug on the last trip
• the young man who signed me into the college network so I could answer student email
• an extra seat next to me on the plane to London
  
• the bracingly hot and sweet cup of tea - real tea - the flight attendant produced in when I declined coffee
• a moonbow - with a nearly full moon, seen from a bus as it followed its serpentine route between Heathrow terminals

Now having recharged my batteries (literally and figuratively) I'm off to see if I can find the gate for my next flight which boards in about 3 hours and a new watch - mine having come into two pieces midflight (!).

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Photo is of the front door of Eastern Point Retreat House. I had a couple of hours or so to wait until my taxi came to take me to the train station, but grace descended in the form of another retreatant's sister, who lives in Gloucester and wouldn't hear of my sitting there. I got a ride to the train station and brief tour of Gloucester along the way. Traveling mercies.