It's time to be (culturally) Jewish. My father, the Patriarch, prefers it. My mother's more open minded. "Be spiritual," she encourages, "be Buddhist. Explore your roots. Jesus was a Jew, but he became a Buddhist, according to Holger Kersten, Nicolas Notovitch, and American cult leaderElizabeth Clare Prophet," and others.
JEWISH NEW YEAR
Rosh HaShanah (Hebrew רֹאשׁ הַשָּׁנָה, Rōʾš hašŠānā, lit. "Head of the Year") is the Jewish New Year. The biblical name for the holiday is Yom Teruah (יוֹם תְּרוּעָה, Yōm Tərūʿā), literally "Day of Shouting or Blasting." Did anyone tell Hasidic rapper MATISYAHU?
(Matisyahu) "King Without a Crown" (East Coast Jewish rap)
Being too Jewish can be embarrassing.
It is the first of the Jewish High Holy Days (יָמִים נוֹרָאִים, Yāmīm Nōrāʾīm, or "Days of Awe"), as specified by Leviticus 23:23–25 [2] which occur in the late summer/early autumn of the Northern Hemisphere.
The Lost Teachings of Jewish Jesus Christ: Reincarnation(Elizabeth Clare Prophet)
The High Holy Days are Rosh HaShanah, Yom Kippur, Pesach (Passover), and Sukkot.
Rosh Hashanah is a two-day observance and celebration that begins on the first day of Tishrei, which is the seventh month of the ecclesiastical year. In contrast to the ecclesiastical lunar new year on the first day of the first month Nisan, the spring Passover month that marks Israel's exodus from Egypt, Rosh Hashanah marks the beginning of the civil year, according to the teachings of Judaism. It is the traditional anniversary of the creation of Adam and Eve, the first male and female according to the Hebrew Bible, as well as the initiation of humanity's role in God's world.
We'll rule the world by ideas and other gov'ts,
Rosh Hashanah customs include sounding or blasting the shofar (a hollowed-out ram's horn), as prescribed in the Torah, the Old Testament Jews follow, following the prescription of the Hebrew Bible to "raise a noise" on Yom Teruah.
Its rabbinical customs include attending synagogue (temple) services and reciting special liturgy (prayers) about teshuva, as well as enjoying festive meals. Eating symbolic foods is now a tradition, such as apples dipped in honey, hoping to evoke a sweet new year. More
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Kashmir (Pakistani side) Beautiful forests continue across the line of control into Indian-held Kashmir and soon mountains convert into the flat plain of Kashmir Valley. On the northern side (farther into Pakistan) forests end and these mountains are snow capped. The very calm indigo blue Neelum River is seen (Yasin Ilyas). See more
"Oh, let the sun beat down upon my face, stars to fill my dream I am a traveler of both time and space, to be where I have been To sit with elders of the gentle race, this world has seldom seen
They talk of days for which they sit and wait and all will be revealed Talk'n song from tongues of lilting grace, whose sounds caress my ear But not a word I heard could I relate, the story was quite clear."
Thus begins the most famous exposure the hidden land of Kashmir, India ever got in the West -- an ode by the 70's era British rock band Led Zeppelin ("Kashmir" the song). Kashmir's ongoing political dispute is whether, in fact, it is part of India or Pakistan. BBC VIDEO Both regional powers claim it. Recent protests highlight that tension. Jammu & Kashmir, is the only Muslim-majority state in Hindu-dominated India. No map demarcates its official borders other than with a moving Line of Control in "Indian-administered Kashmir."
Kashmir's Islamic majority aspires to eventual independence but in the meantime would settle for becoming part of Pakistan, as firsthand reports to this reporter indicate. Kashmiris suffer greatly under Indian police and military repression. They are abused and detained, summarily executed and "disappeared" on a regular basis -- in scenes eerily similar to Israeli-Palestinian and other Middle Eastern conflicts. Just as Palestinians cling to their homeland and hope for help from the Arab world, so Kashmiris reject Indian ambitions to administer the area. They neither sympathize with nor fully understand why the binding choices made by a Raj many decades ago should perpetuate the injustice they feel.
Indus River, moving through Pakistan, on its way to the Arabian Sea
As Gandhi and Nehru split on the composition of the newly liberated India, its ethnic makeup led to the formation of Pakistan, a Muslim separatist nation, Britain patted itself on a job well done: that job, of course -- just as in Iraq, Iran, and Kuwait -- was to sow the seeds of political strife long after it retreated militarily. When a super-power no longer is respected as a conqueror, it often settles for the secondary role of divider. The pattern is insidious and all too common. See BBC scenarios for the future division of the region.
Beautiful Kashmir Valley, ringed by the Himalayas (spencerscomet)
For decades, Kashmir has been disputed by two great regional nuclear powers. Accordingly, soldiers have been stationed with periodic shelling of strategic bases on both sides. China, with a border interest of its own in the region, has been been close at hand in a stalemate with India. The mutual antagonism formed the political basis and will to support the "Tibetan government in exile" in Dharamsala, India. China regards support of the Dalai Lama as tacit aggression. Kashmir lies on the route to Tibet and Nepal. This mountainous Himalayan region, with its many Tibetan refugees, is the home of the last remaining Buddhist-majority region in India.
Prayer flags in the state of Jammu & Kashmir, India
That region is known as Ladakh, with a capital city resembling a miniature Lhasa named Leh, which experiences back-and-forth foot traffic to Tibet. Hemis Gompa, just outside of Leh, is an ancient Tibetan Buddhist monastery. This is where Jesus Christ is documented to have come during the "missing years" of his life, by joining and traveling with a caravan from the Near East along the silk route.
Himalayan "Gompa" (Buddhist monastery) in Ladakh, India
His tomb (and bodily remains) are buried in Kashmir contrary to Christian fundamentalist teachings. Jesus, known as Saint Issa in the East, is recognized and revered as a "prophet" by Muslims and as a "bodhisattva" by area Mahayana Buddhists. But turmoil seems to find him wherever he goes, just as in days of old.
Anticlimax: Jesus' tomb, Kashmir, India
“Nearby is situated the stone of the grave which, according to the people, is the prophet's who arrived from a far off place during ancient times. Anointed for Kashmir: This spot is famous as the resting place of a messenger: I have read in an ancient book that a prince from a foreign land arrived here and engaged himself in piety and prayers [and] became a messenger of God for the Kashmiri people. In that ancient book his name is mentioned as Yuz Asaf.” [more]
"The king asked the holy man who he was. The other replied: 'I am called a son of God, born of a virgin, minister of the non-believers, relentless in search of the truth....and I was called Isa-Masih.'" Full Translation
"All I see turns to brown, as the sun burns the ground And my eyes fill with sand, as I scan this wasted land Trying to find, trying to find where I've been.
Oh, pilot of the storm who leaves no trace,
Like thoughts inside a dream Heed the path that led me to that place,
Yellow desert stream My Shangri-La beneath the summer moon,
I will return again Sure as the dust that floats high in June,
When movin' through Kashmir."
The controversy of the lost years of Jesus and the Buddhist roots of his life, ministry, and yogic powers were first explored by in 1887 by a Russian scholar and Orientalist named Nicolas Notovich (a.k.a., Nicolai Notovitch), who came across written historical records in his travels through Kashmir and detailed that shocking discovery in his book.
"Jesus in India" -- the movie (click for trailer)
However, his was neither the first discovery nor the last search for concrete evidence of a literal Buddhist-Christian connection. There was American cult leader Elizabeth Clare Prophet's research (see contents). Immediately following Notovich, the Indian Swami Abehdananda followed his footsteps to verify the claims. Derivative new works (some Muslim), albeit largely ignored in Christendom, are numerous and growing.
Thus, it matters to Buddhists (and pan-Buddhist Americans) what happens in Muslim-Kashmir, Buddhist-Ladakh, and Hindu-India in general. Anyway one looks at it, it's "holy" land.
"Oh, father of the four winds, fill my sails, across the sea of years With no provision but an open face, along the straits of fear
When I'm on, when I'm on my way, yeah When I see, when I see the way, you stay, yeah
When I'm down... Well I'm down, so down Ooh, my baby, let me take you there Let me take you there. Let me take you there."
RECENT STRIFE
Sardaro Bibi, a Gujjar or nomad woman, shows the remains of her house after it was torched at Garkhal village, about 38 km (24 miles) north west of Jammu 8/12/08. When a mob shouting praises for a Hindu god torched this Muslim hamlet, any hopes of religious peace in India's Kashmir state may have been destroyed along with these charred homes and scarred drums of ruined wheat. The burning of several hamlets in early August was one of at least 72 attacks on Muslim homes in Jammu and Kashmir state over the last three weeks as a land row over a Hindu shrine escalated, state officials said. Picture taken 8/2/08 (REUTERS/Amit Gupta (INDIAN-ADMINISTERED KASHMIR).
A Kashmiri Muslim woman shouts at an Indian policeman during a protest in Srinagar 8/13/08. Indian Kashmir on Wednesday began a three-day mourning period for at least 20 Muslim protesters shot dead by police this week as the region simmered over a land row that has revived independence calls (REUTERS/Fayaz Kabli, INDIAN-ADMINISTERED KASHMIR).
Gujjars or nomads stand near their damaged belongings after their house was torched at Garkhal village, about 38 km (24 miles) north west of Jammu August 12, 2008. When a mob shouting praises for a Hindu god torched this Muslim hamlet, any hopes of religious peace in India's Kashmir state may have been destroyed along with these charred homes and scarred drums of ruined wheat. The burning of several hamlets in early August was one of at least 72 attacks on Muslim homes in Jammu and Kashmir state over the last three weeks as a land row over a Hindu shrine escalated, state officials said. Picture taken 8/12/08 (REUTERS/Amit Gupta, INDIAN-ADMINISTERED KASHMIR).
JESUS IN INDIA
If one is only now hearing of this amazing Himalayan discovery, it is no accident. Elizabeth Clare Prophet is dismissed although she brought together the testimony of four eyewitnesses of the remarkable writings documenting Jesus' stay in India. Thorough and determined, a disciple turned detective, she tells the intriguing story of the international controversy that arose when the manuscripts were first discovered in 1887 by Nicolas Notovitch and how experts "proved" that they did not exist, only to have them rediscovered in this century by Swami Abhedananda, Professor Nicholas Roerich, and Madame Elisabeth Caspari.
CLARIFICATION
Wisdom Quarterly, while certainly siding with India, can in no way condone or dismiss injustices or acts of political aggression by any side for whatever reason. While aggressive provocation is reprehensible, retaliation is doubly so. Palestinian actions may not be right, but Israel is certainly not justified in its hegemony or state-sponsored "counter" terrorism. While far more Jews than Muslims are Buddhist, from as far back as the time of Jesus, and while it was Muslim invaders who destroyed Buddhism in India and desecrated sacred Buddhist sites and artifacts, Wisdom Quarterly nevertheless sides with the oppressed -- even when those oppressed are Muslims as we find all over the world. Christian crusaders launched "holy" wars in the past under popes just as they do now under Bushes. Governments like China abuse and overtake neighbors like Tibet, and Tibetans riot in protest. Wisdom Quarterly firmly rejects the stand that political power -- be it American, Arab, Israeli, British, Indian, Chinese, Burmese, Sri Lankan, Cambodian, German, Roman, or even Peleponnesian -- in any way legitimizes acts of aggression. What alternative does Wisdom Quarterly support and advocate?
What do Jesus, Buddha, Krishna, and Lao Tzu have in common?
Then there are the lost sutras
A new book by Richard Hooper points out stunning parallels in the teachings of four mystical traditions -- Buddhist, Christian, Taoist, and Hindu. Moreover, a final chapter attempts to debunk Wisdom Quarterly's pet theory that Jesus (St. Issa) was a diversely educated Buddhist as the BBC, Swami Abhedananda, Nicolas Notovitch, Elizabeth Clare Prophet, and Levi H. Dowling have held for many years.
Hooper contends Jesus/Issa could not have been a Tibetan lama because there were not yet any "lamas" in the lamasery now known as Hemis Gompa, and there wasn't even a Tibetan Buddhism (Vajrayana). Of course, he fails to consider the work of Holger Kersten and Elmar R. Gruber in establishing a Jewish settlements/trading posts as far away as Kashmir, India -- relatively close to Ladakh, India/Tibet (the site of the ancient Hemis Lamasery). Why would the Hemis abbot deny Notovitch's story? Might he want to protect the written records once stored in his temple complex from prying Christian hands? (Of course, if the eminent Orientalist Max Muller denies the existence of any such records because they are not described in the Kanjur and Tanjur, then that is solid evidence to contend with). Whatever drew Jesus/Issa there is likely what still draws Jews from all over the world, who go in search of mysticism and spiritual teachers and experience beyond book learning. Hooper dismisses it all without nuance; it is simply a preposterous "hoax" on the face of it.
Illustration of Jesus/Issa in Ladakh, India/Tibet (Elizabeth.C. Prophet)
Of course, what is today Tibet would have been India at that time (a Himalayan corridor still in dispute as variously independently, Chinese, Pakistani, Indian, or CIA-administered territory. And although Buddhist monks in the area may not have called themselves lamas, Red Hats, Black Hats, or Rinpoches, messiahs, Maitreya, or even bodhisattvas, that does not mean they were not Buddhists practicing what would eventually come to be called "Tibetan Buddhism," an exotic branch of Mahayana, which is so strikingly similar to Christianity that it seems preposterous to think they did not influence one another in their development over the past two millenia (particularly as the corporate Catholic Church appropriated the best of what it could find in all mystical traditions in areas it followed as Christian soldiers looted riches any and everywhere it could find them). Aside from this abrupt conclusion, Hooper has created a wonder book of parallel saying from non-obvious sources. Christians may not be pleased, but every student of comparative traditions will be delighted. And it's a short read. Recommended.
Can you tell [Patheos] a little about how this book came about?
Author Richard Hooper
Between my second and third year of college I had what the psychologist Abraham Maslow would call a “peak experience.” It resulted in a decision to study for the ministry, so I changed my college major to the Philosophy of Religion because it seemed sensible that a Christian minister should know at least something about other world religions. Surprisingly, when I entered seminary two years later I discovered that I was the only person there who thought such knowledge was important.
In any event when I started studying the teachings of Hinduism, Buddhism, and Taoism for the first time, I began to notice similarities between what Jesus taught and what was generally taught in Eastern philosophy. A few years later I started studying the Gnostic Gospels and was astounded by the similarities between the words of Krishna in the Bhagavad-Gita and the words of the risen Christ in Gnostic-Christian literature.
Your book compares the parallel teachings of four world religions, but why didn’t you include Judaism and Islam?
I realized from the beginning that a lot of people would ask this question, so I added a second subtitle to the cover of this book: “The common teachings of four mystical traditions.” More
Dhr. Seven, Amber Dorrian, Wisdom Quarterly; Richard Hooper (The Parallel Sayings)
Wisdom Quarterly (week long, day late, dollar shortChannukkah Committee)
Jesus may have been Jewish, yet few Jews celebrate the founder of Christianity. Many Jews are fond of Buddhism. Why? Maybe like Jewish Jesus, they are drawn to deep Indian and Tibetan spirituality. It must go deeper than that, but certainly the tendency is very old. Jesus was affected by it, drawn as he was to the Buddhist Himalayas (in the vicinity of HemisGompa, pictured at left, from Elizabeth Clare Prophet's book).
Originally, Xmas was a feast for the Son of Isis (the god of Nature), not the Son of Mary. Then Xmas became a Roman party for Saturn (the god of Agriculture) called Saturnalia (essortment.com). Then the Church, with ambitions of taking over the world, started the conquests. So where does that leave us on Xmas?
(Poor Jesus and his teachings got elbowed right out. The Councils saw to that. Go on, try to find them. All that's left is a handful of parables and this great line: "Oh never mind me because, hey, you know all that stuff written before me, I came to change not a jot or tittle of it."* All the changes were Church speculations, sectarian divisions, and ongoing arguments that make Christians long for those few parables).
The great holiday tradition of Hanukkah has nothing to do with Judaism's most famous son. If people knew what Yiddish had to say about German Christians, they might not think it funny. He may have taken bodhisattva vows (before heading back to Israel), but there are lots of stories about St. Issa floating around in December.
We are all connected. We take on the pains of one another. We undertake to help others. And our whole lives are helped by others, sometimes unseen, often unappreciated, rarely thanked.
One drunk says to the other, "You don't love me!" "Of course I love you," the other replies. "No, you don't. Because if you really did, you would know what hurts me." As explained by Kabbalah humorist SimchaKrause, we think love means doing for others, speaking nicely, giving gifts, and so on. These are expressions.
But real love, he credits Rabbi Akiva as explaining, is "loving others as yourself." Love yourself, and love others no less than that. An impatient man comes to Rabbi Hillel, Krause continues, asking to be taught the entire Torah standing on one foot. The Rabbi answers, "That which is hateful to you, do not do to your fellow. The rest is commentary; go and learn."
So what to do for Xmas? Eat Chinese, of course. (Happy Hanukkah).
What does Islam say about all our US Xmas excess? They join the party. But mainstream Islam considers the founder of Christianity a mortal human being albeit one divinely chosen to be a prophet.
Emphasizing the [common Hindu] notion of divine oneness (tawhīd) rather than the trinity notion early Christianity borrowed from the mystical East, Christ is often referred to in Muslim scripture as the "Son of Mary" (IbnMaryam).
He is seen by Muslims as a precursor to Muhammad, believed to have foretold of the latter's coming. Islam does not believe the Christian story that Jesus actually died of crucifixion, instead affirming the Qur'anic view that he [left for India, where he has his tomb in Kashmir which anyone can visit, after being snuck out of Israel].
Some say Allah spared him the indignity of imperial Roman torture, leaving a substitute in his place. So no Xmas gifts as such, but more "Crusades" if the US and Israel insist on more holiday wars (Iran, Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan, etc.).
*ST. NED FLANDERS explains: He actually says, "For assuredly, I say to you, till heaven and earth pass away, one jot or one tittle will by no means pass from the Law [the Jewish Torah that preceded the Christian Bible] till all is fulfilled" (Matthew 5:18). This line has been taken to mean he had nothing new to teach people by way of developing themselves. It's as if he just came to offer God's new magic plan of bloody human sacrifice to replace the old Jewish [and Hindu] animal sacrifice method. The bodhisattvaIssa had a great many things to teach, things he learned in the mystical East. Those teachings might still be found in the Apocrypha or the newfound gospels (of which there seem to be about 50), which Pagels and other scholars are bringing to light from the original mishmash (Aramaic, Hebrew, Gnostic, Coptic, Greek) that was once considered acceptable Christian teaching -- before the corrupted, greedy-for-power Church stepped in.
Did Jesus study Buddhism in India? The untold story of his missing years
(Buddha's Wisdom) Did Jesus the Nazarene spend his "lost or unknown years" studying Buddhism in Buddhist Tibet and India at a Himalayan monastery known as Hemis Gompa in Ladakh? Unknown years of Jesus
00:00 - Intro
02:27 - Chapter 1: The Missing Years of Jesus
04:22 - Chapter 2: The Buddhist Connection Theory
05:54 - Chapter 3: The Legend of Saint Issa
09:14 - Chapter 4: Matt's Journey
09:47 - Chapter 5: The Kashmir Connection
11:29 - Chapter 6: From Scrolls to Screens
15:45 - Chapter 7: Teachings Across Borders
18:39 - Chapter 8: The Skeptic's Corner
20:32 - Conclusion
It sounds crazy, but what if there is more to this story than meets the ear? 🤔
Let's take dive and explore:
The 18-year gap in Jesus' life that has puzzled scholars for centuries
Ancient texts that hint at Jesus' journey to the mystic East
The striking similarities between Jesus' teachings and Buddhist philosophy
The controversial theory of Jesus surviving crucifixion and retiring to Kashmir
What do modern skeptics and scholars say about this mind-bending idea?
It challenges everything we thought we knew about one of history's most influential figures.
🔍 Uncover the hidden connections between East and West. 🧘♂️ Explore the possibility that Jesus was a yogi. 🌏 Travel the ancient Silk Road in search of truth.
Interested in going deeper than a short video? Check out the fascinating books mentioned:
The priest recommended a sexy movie, The Substance, for its lesson on beauty, ashes, and dust.
Improving Catholic Jesus, nicer and whiter
Vibhuti is valuable. It must be. People will go to great lengths to get it, even if it's just a smudge or cross over the third eye. How does one turn common ash into a sacred object of veneration? Bless it.
It was a rainy Ash Wednesday in the City of Lost Angels. But we went on an adventure anyway. (No one walks in LA, and during the rain, no one remembers how to drive). The rain ruined it the big open house event at Mater Dolorosa Passionist Retreat Center (MD, "Mother of Suffering" Catholic monastery situated next to burnt out Altadena high atop the idyllic town of Sierra Madre, Los Angeles).
The male gaze and absurd beauty standards
MD changed its whole schedule: No mass at 8:00 am or 6:00 pm as promised, and the "open house" (the first time the popular retreat center nestled in the green foothills after the Eaton Fire, which is right next door and partly burned the place, making it susceptible to mudslides and flooding. The volunteers did not have much information, even on the current condition of the pope. One would think they would be on top of it, but the pope seems not nearly as important as when the pope was John Paul.
I'm so pretty, and I'm getting ready for church.
The day was nothing, no tour, but one could walk down a hall to visit the "Stations of the Cross" by looking at very dark pictures of the great Roman Crucifixion of a troublemaker called "Christ."
He suffered for his sins against the state, but having no sins his suffering has been transferred to cover the Passionists who populate the place, Catholics in specific, and everyone in general. That means us, confirmed "sinners." And you better feel bad about it or else.
The glories of the Holy Roman Empire today
Joe Rogan and British comedian Jimmy Carr
Abstain from MEAT EATING for Lent or life or at least on Fridays, like Jesus wants (Christspiracy)
LA is a paradise from the air (Echo Park Lake)
The center has such a nice main building full of meditation rooms with their own showers. It's almost haunted in its kind of sterile monasticism with lots of Carmelite brown and old-style hotel. One is reminded of Self Realization Fellowship's Mother Center on top of Mt. Washington in neighboring Mt. Washington, overlooking the LA skyline. Now that's a place to visit, all syncretic Hindu-Christian, where Paramhansa Yogananda slept. One can visit his room with its tiny bed once a year on his birthday.
But this place, a kind multiroom mansion is dreary with devotion, austere penitence (tapas), and a priest from India who knows nothing about Jesus' time in India or all of the scholarship behind that century-old discovery.
See Nicolas Notovitch, Holger Kersten, Swami Abedananda, Elizabeth Clare Prophet, the BBC, and others: Unknown years of Jesus
There's a written record of where Jesus was?
Holy cow. It has a nice gift shop and lots of things to sell. There were ashes for the asking, but very little else. It used to be that to get a communion wafer and wine (gluten cracker and grape juice) from a communal cup with saliva wiped off by a handkerchief, one had to have gone to confession or gotten right with the Priest/Lord/Church Official, or Holy Ghosts.
But not for this token? Anyone could go up and be smudged (not in the good way using Indigenous sage or Salvia apiana, but rather here using the burnt offerings of palms that were prayed over).
Two priests, one from India the other from the Philippines, did not inspire us -- noncommittal, inoffensive, diffident, and reticent with little to no knowledge of anything about Jesus in India or anything else that is not Chruch-approved and Vatican-sanctioned. That's the way to stay out of trouble, one could suppose. But how is it that a priest of this religion, so emphasizing the Stations of the Cross, doesn't seem to know about the face of the lord (God's son or devaputra) appearing on a cloth used to wipe his bleeding facade during his ordeal or "passion"? That cloth should be at least as famous as the Shroud of Turin and Jesus' tunic. There's a whole station about it, and in the middle of this month the holy relic goes on tour through Southern California from wherever it's kept the rest of the time (under lock and key in a temperature-controlled vault somewhere in Europe.
Jesus Christ lived in India?
Who had ever heard of such a thing? Jesus' face on another cloth and no one has anything to say? If it's coming on tour in the neighboring cities, but the Indian priest didn't know? He did know of a mysterious relic in his hometown in India. There a wax figure of Jesus under glass grows a beard not made of hair but of some fibrous substance. Another miracle yet this very same priest had never heard of the Christian saint's blood in a vile that has remained liquid for centuries. It was almost a shame to tell him about it, or anything else, because he didn't believe it. Did the Church say so? seemed to be his whole position on everything. What kind of kissing up is that, following a religion and never questioning it? The smart kind, the kind that keeps one in good graces with the higher ups, the "let's not upset things and get me in any kind of trouble or scandal"? What is he up to that he would so fear any potentially unflattering attention or appearance of impropriety in believing or admitting to knowing about anything unorthodox?
Let's get out of this place, exquisite grounds without a sense of holiness
The Church knew where I had been and deleted it.
From there we left, driving in the rain to find a better mass, something of a more popular nature. Every Catholic church in the country celebrates it. They are standardized and not allowed to deviate.
We found a giant ash mass at St. Andrew's Catholic Church (Pasadena, California), the one with the clock tower visible from the 134 Freeway, where it splits from the 210. It has some of the most beautiful Roman Italian (and life-like brown skinned mural art) and alabaster white statuary with giant imported marble columns and a big picture of the "God" right up front looking down, with impossibly high ceilings, which may be 100 or more feet up.
St. Andrew's Church campanile
There was a big crowd of penitents, half of them Anglos, half of them Latinos, with a sprinkling of Asians, gathering even as it drizzled and threatened to rain. There was a Spanish service going on in the St. Andrew Catholic School hall with a purple draped cross, the cloth representing the figure usually found on it. The Spanish version seemed more spirited, as accords with Chicano gatherings, full of heart and warmth.
The priest said an amazing thing we'd never heard before. If it were a trope, they'd all be saying it and wed've heard it a million times. The sign of the cross has two motions. The first spells "I" top to bottom, and the second, which sweeps from side to side, cancels it out. It's self-abnegation for God (a tip of the hat to Buddhism's selflessness).
Sign of the cross in six steps: I and Not I.
It was odd sitting there watching the giant church fill up. Most Catholics only go to church or "mass" three times a year -- Easter, Ash Wednesday, and Xmas. It seems like enough. The words of the priest were odd to hear: words full of guilt, sin, pleading for forgiveness, as if it were a given that everyone had and was going to sin.
Apparently, we are all sinners, and we have to sin, and there's no way not to sin, so be sure to feel guilty about it, and come to church for indulgences to stay on His good side in case you die midweek. Just keep coming, and that'll keep you in His good graces? (Who thoughtlessly accepts such empty promises, or is it that having nothing else, because they were never allowed to investigate anything, there is no choice? Just accept it all or reject it all, and since we can't reject it all, we have no choice but to accept it all?)
The Substance
You are not your body. - What?! But I...
The multilingual priest conducting the mass gave a good sermon when he deviated from the standard text and told a story about watching the Oscars and being surprised to see The Substance getting attention. To hear this Father tell it, he saw the film or at least part of it. In one scene a woman (Demi Moore), fearing she's getting to look too old and is losing the interest of her husband, goes in for a beauty treatment. It will make her look 20 years younger with porcelain skin (think filter but in real life). She does, but it has a side effect of inflammation and looking worse before it gets better. So she takes a walk and dives into a Catholic church to sit in the back and just reflect as she waits for her new face. It happens to be Ash Wednesday, and the preacher is yelling, "Ashes to ashes, dust to dust," not singing a song by Bowie but quoting the Bible. She's shocked to realize that after all her efforts to beautify her body, it remains ashes and dust (though better preserved looking now and less rotty).
This religion seems to have been better in the past. Or was it always like this? How is the spell not broken, the stench of hypocrisy of child molesting priests not enough to wake people up that the Vatican runs too tight a ship, here to take in taxes (rebranding them as tithes) for this arm of the Holy Roman Empire?
The rules for Lent
LENTEN REGULATIONS: The Holy Season of Lent begins on Ash Wednesday. This year it falls on March 5th. During Lent, all Catholics engage in various penitential practices. Of those, the most important and obligatory are the regulations on fasting and penitence.
Abstinence from meat is to be observed by all Catholics 14 years old and older on Ash Wednesday and on all Fridays of Lent. Abstinence means refraining from eating all meats including beef, poultry, pork, etc. [slaughtered cows, birds, pigs, and so on]. Seafood [dead fish] is permitted.
Fasting is to be observed on Ash Wednesday and Good Friday by all Catholics who are 18 years of age but not yet 60. Those who are bound by this may take only one full meal. [That's quite a fast.] Two smaller meals (that do not equal one full meal) are permitted. [Will it be enough, will people starve?]
The special Paschal fast and abstinence are obligatory [mandatory] for Good Friday and encouraged for Holy Saturday. By the threefold discipline of fasting, almsgiving, and prayer the Church keeps Lent from Ash Wednesday until the evening of Holy Thursday.
All the faithful and the catechumens should undertake serious practice of these three traditions. Failure to observe any penitential days at all or a substantial number of such days must be considered serious.
Abortion? What's so special about a tiny egg?
Taken verbatim from the St. Andrew Church Bulletin, Old Pasadena, March 2, 2025
Mater Dolorosa Retreat Center is excited to announce that it is fully reopening and invites the public to a special homecoming event on Ash Wednesday, March 5, 2025, from 2:00–5:00 PM. No reservations needed. Come get ashes, pray the Stations of the Cross, and take a guided tour of the grounds [cancelled due to rain but moved indoors for a self-guided review of some pictures]. Development Director Melanie Goodyear at MGoodyear@MaterDolorosa.org and (626) 355-7188 x 103.
Team Recovering Catholics (accompanied by a real diehard old timey Catholic to ask questions), Wisdom Quarterly, March 5, 2025
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