Mitakuye Oyasin – Connecting Spiritually

See also : BROCHURE, RESOURCES

Mitakuye Oyasin is a sacred expression of a North American indigenous community, the Lakota. It sums up their relationship with their God and all creation and speaks of their understanding of community. At heart, community is understood and lived as a web of right relationships which unites all people, religions, creatures and things in the Great Spirit-God.
Over the next 18 months (June 2006 to December 2007) the Christian Brothers and those who share their Founder’s Charism will be gathering in groups across the world to explore their personal experience of a ‘heart-spirituality.’ The whole process calls us to connect with one another spiritually. The Lakota peoples have an expression for this connecting - Mitakuye Oyasin. In the middle of this renewal process of sharing and exploration of the heart, 70 brothers and associates will gather at Rosemary Heights Retreat Centre outside Vancouver (Canada) to bring together their rich and diverse spiritual insights and prayer experiences from many different cultural perspectives. The group who gathers will be intentionally inclusive in their faith, love and desire for justice. They will bring many contrasting spiritual approaches to their search for the ‘larger God’ which will provide a rich mix for sharing and dialogue.

A friend recently asked me: ‘If our God, who is at the heart of all genuine spiritual journeys, is truly an all embracing presence why then is there not one faith and one truth for all to share?’ Could it be that this compassionate ever creating God calls us to be unique and so we are invited to rejoice in the ‘dignity of difference’. It seems a very difficult notion for us to accept and grasp!

If every day I can welcome just one small point of difference that separates me from someone I’m close to or cannot avoid, then the inner freedom that this will bring, like the grain of mustard seed in the Gospel story, may shape a new community of hope in a divided world. Why not try this today? See if it makes a difference in your community.

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Rabbi Jonathan Sacks notes, what a wise sage observed some 1,800 years ago, when a human being makes many coins in the same mint, they all come out the same. God makes every human being in the same mint, in the same image, God’s own, and yet we all come out differently. The real religious challenge is to find God’s image in some one who is not in our image, in someone whose colour is different, whose culture is different, and who speaks a different language, tells a different story and worships God in a different way. So there will, of necessity, be an interfaith dimension to any exploration of a genuine inclusive spirituality. This challenges us to embrace a new attitude to our brothers and sisters of other faith traditions who also share our Christian dream for a more just and equitable earth community, centred in the tangible presence of God.
Gradually over time we may come to understand what happens to us spiritually when we allow ourselves to embrace an enlarged image of God and further trust the experiences of the heart.

An image of interfaith-connectedness is seeing everyone of good will as a partner in building a more welcoming home for our planet-community. A few years ago a Japanese Dominican brother Oshida, founded a Christian community on a hill near Mount Fuji (Japan). In his garden he set up a statue of the Buddha, with the child Jesus on his lap. Over time the villagers began to come discreetly during the night to leave offerings. Over time his small community has become a place where people of different faiths can gather in peace and understanding, becoming a sign of resurrection truly taking shape among us.

Peter Harney on behalf of the CRT

(Please send reflections: ptrharn@aol.com. If you are interested in joining a group in your area to explore heart-spirituality please contact Peter Harney on the email given above for details.)
(Recommended reading - Alan Jones (2005) Reimagining Christianity: Reconnecting Your Spirit without Disconnecting Your Mind, John Wiley & Sons)

Oh how we hate one another for the love of God.
Cardinal Newman