Alterations: Can you widen these pants for me please?

BBC – Magazine (Friday, 6 October 2006):

“The Pope may be about to abolish the notion of limbo,
the halfway house between heaven and hell, inhabited
by unbaptised infants.

[…], the church held that before the 13th Century, all unbaptised people, including new born babies who died, would go to hell. This was because original sin - the punishment that God inflicted on humanity because of Adam and Eve's disobedience - had not been cleansed by baptism.
This idea however was criticised by Peter Abelard, a French scholastic philosophiser, who said that babies who had no personal sin didn't even deserve punishment.
It was Abelard who introduced the idea of limbo. The word comes from the Latin "limbus", meaning the edge. This would be a state of existence where unbaptised babies, and those unfortunate enough to have been born before Jesus, would not experience pain but neither would they experience the Beatific Vision of God.”
….

Not popular
According to church historian Michael Walsh limbo is so unpopular it has all but dropped out of Catholic consciousness.
….

Some argue that the question of limbo has taken on fresh urgency because it could be hindering the Church's conversion of Africa and Asia, where infant mortality rates are high.
An article in the UK's Times newspaper this week suggested that the "Pope - an acknowledged authority on all things Islamic - is only too aware that Muslims believe the souls of stillborn babies go straight to heaven".

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While I believe that the whole notion of 'original sin' is in stark contrast with the belief that we are created in the image of God, and that original sin is a man-made misunderstanding and misinterpretation of the Bible, and while, therefore, I am all for the idea of abolishing 'Limbo' and all limbo-related beliefs, … people still need to stop and think whether religion should be based on either what is (or isn't) popular at a certain time in history, or on who happens to be Pope or Chief Rabbi, or Grand Ayatullah at the time. Most churches (not only Christian) have been very willing to ‘slightly’ alter doctrine in order to hold on to the faithful, or to compete with other religions for the remaining ‘heathens’ of the world. With all these ‘slight’ changes over the centuries, does any religion remain true to the original teachings of the Prophets?

Grade: Incomplete !!

1978 Anwar al-Sadat, and Menachem Begin shake hands and agree on peace and end up sharing the Nobel Prize. Twenty eight years later, there is still peace on the state level but you wouldn't know it reading the papers or watching TV or the occasional demonstrations.

1989. Berlin Wall falls, Germany is one again. Families reunited. Wonderful news. Unemployment on the rise, competition for resources on the rise, Skinheads and Neo Nazis on the rise, ...

The "Evil Empire" dissolves to give rise to youthful hopeful new nations. Headline- October 02, 2006 : Putin Gives Bush Georgia Warning : Russian President Vladimir Putin told U.S. President George W. Bush during an Oct. 2 phone conversation that any efforts by a third country that encourage Georgia's destructive policy toward Russia are unacceptable, the Kremlin press service said.

Chechnya, Kosovo, Ukrain, ...

Apartheid falls in 1994. Good riddance. Great news. .. Headlines in Oct. 2006: Nobel Prize winner Desmond Tutu has warned that South Africa is in danger of losing its moral direction. He said it had failed to sustain the idealism that ended apartheid and warned of growing ethnic divisions. Referring to South Africa's high murder rate and the rape of children as young as nine months, he said the African reverence for life had been lost.

India and Pakistan in recent years, are the closest they have ever been, but a few days ago, the BBC headlines read : Indian police have said that Pakistan's intelligence service helped to plan the July Mumbai train bombings.

These are just a few examples of the way it has been in the last few decades, yet I still think that we are making some progress ... however minuscule.

Most people want peace. Most people want a good life for their families and for the rest of the world. We shouldn't be disappointed. Lots of good happening in the world, but what does it take to maintain the momentum so we wouldn't take six steps forward and go back five ?

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Undying Hope

On the lighter side: Ruth Fremson/The New York Times (Wednesday, October 4, 2006)

Dead Bachelors in China Still Find Wives

To ensure a dead son’s contentment in the afterlife, some Chinese parents search out a dead woman to be his bride.

Building Communities

I'm starting a new group.

Three or four weeks ago I attended a party (/ meeting/ brainstorming session), where the host had invited a couple of dozen people of varied backgrounds and interests to enjoy a very nice dinner and good conversation. He called the event "Creating Authentic Connection to Create World Peace". A mouthful of a name, and I couldn't guess what it exactly meant at first, but as they talked, the rest of the attendees seemed to be interested in contributing to World Peace in rather creative ways. I was interested too. The host was encouraging each of us to think of ways to become leaders in bringing people of common interests to do things together and get to know each other well. The premise is that we would be building communities made up of diverse people who still have common interests. These interest could be almost anything. ... Different sports, cooking, enjoying nature, .. etc. As I sat there listening, the thought that came to my mind for when my turn came, was to start a group that discusses religion, and related issues.

I explained my idea to the group, and I was happy to see that there were five or six people who were interested. They represented Christian, Jewish, Baha'i and Hindu. Good start.

My email invitation was probably a bit too short notice, and of the four that almost made it to the meeting, only two were able to. Others replied that they would make more of an effort to come to future meetings.

Two people discussing religion over a friendly dinner (served by yours truly) wasn't bad at all. It gave us a very good chance to get a bit deep in some topics, which might not have happened if we had more people (considering the dynamics of larger groups, and how everyone needs to be given a turn to talk, making the time per person, shorter and more limited).

Among other topics discussed, was the question of whether it is as valid as anything else for one's choice of religion to be determined by factors such as place of birth, the time of birth (which century), and the religion of the parents (either natural, or adoptive). For example, growing up Muslim if you were born in Saudi Arabia, Jew if you were born in Bethlehem in the year 50 B.C. (but Muslim or Christian if you were born in 1930 A.D.), Lutheran if you were born in South Korea and were adopted at age two and a half by a family from Minnesota, U.S.A., but Catholic if your new parents are from Argentina.

I myself can think of more than one answer, but if you chance upon my humble blog and read this, please let me know what you think.