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Dilatato Corde 6:1
January - June, 2016 .jpg)
Vincent Sekhar SJ Conflicts and wars are not new to the world. These are caused by the search for domination and control of the world’s resources. Religious ideologies have been used to support them. Sometimes religions themselves have also been causes, seeking to impose themselves under the guise of being the only true religion with a special mission from God. Crusades, jihads and holy wars are not unknown in history. In spite of these wars, however, people have always desired peace. People gathered at a recent Parliament of World Religions declared that there cannot be peace in the world without peace between religions. Religions are the sources of values. They also provide the inner strength needed to withstand violent tendencies and to witness to and promote peace. Dialogue between religions is one way of bringing together the different religions, helping them to combine forces, so to speak, to promote peace and harmony among peoples. One important way of dialogue is to help people to acquire true knowledge of other religions, removing ignorance, misunderstanding and prejudice. Another is to act together to promote common human and spiritual values. A third is to become aware that there is only one God and all of us are God’s children and express this awareness in common prayer. It is a welcome development that in many schools and colleges there is an effort to introduce the students to different religions and help them to pray together. They have a moment of prayer to begin the day. This moment is used to evoke good thoughts from different religions and also use prayer texts from them to help students to pray together in an interreligious atmosphere. Teachers then start looking for such texts from different religions. Dr. Vincent Sekhar’s collection of such texts is a welcome boon in their hands. Dr. Sekhar has done the research for them. He has consulted the sacred books of different religions and looked through various existing collections. He has gathered brief texts for reflection and prayer and has grouped them under 50 different themes. His own work in Arul Anandar College, Karumathur, Madurai has been very helpful in this process. This means that he has tested them by using them. These texts can be used in various ways. They can help the introduction of the students to different religions. They can be used to reflect over the various problems that afflict society and to propose values and perspective. The more prayerful texts can be used in common prayer. They can thus serve both for value education and for the promotion of interreligious experience harmony. They can also be used for interreligious celebrations and prayers on special occasions like natural and man-made catastrophes. Dr. Sekhar has also offered guidelines on how to prepare and conduct an interreligious prayer service and how to animate an interreligious retreat. I would add that the collection can also be used for personal reading and reflection. People who are more curious and interested can go to the original works which Dr. Sekhar has listed in aver useful bibliography. I am very happy to welcome in print this very useful and inspiring collection of texts and prayers from different religions – Let Us Stand Up for Prayer. I would like to encourage principals and teachers in colleges, not only to make use of them for common prayer and reflection, but also promote personal use of it by teachers and students and, through them, their parents too. In this way this collection can really be a means of promoting peace and harmony in the world. I am glad and feel privileged that the Institute of Dialogue with Cultures and Religions, Loyola College, Chennai is able to sponsor this publication. I am also happy to praise, congratulate and thank Dr. Sekhar for this painstaking collection of texts. May his labours bear abundant fruit for peace in the hearts of people as well as in the communities at local and global levels. |
_Web.jpg) Michael Amaladoss, S.J., a native of South India, is director of the Institute for Dialogue with Cultures and Religions in Chennai. Among his books and articles is Life in Freedom: Liberation Theologies From Asia (Orbis). With a special interest in intercultural and interreligious dialogue and spirituality, Amaladoss has been a consultant to the Pontifical Councils for Culture and Other Religions and to the World Council of Churches. He also has served as the president of the International Association for Mission Studies. He is the author of 20 books and more than 300 articles in various languages. |