Current Affairs

Intimate with Fear (interview with Christopher Autumn 2003) The Religion of Science Environmental Ethics A Proposal to Establish a New Ministry in the British Government: Responses to events following September 11, 2001 Proposed measures to resolve conflict between the West and the Muslim world Report from Israel and the occupied territories The Unhappy Prince And The Maitreya Statue Project Guidelines for Spiritual Emergency

INTIMATE WITH FEAR 

As global tensions escalate, have we the courage to bear witness to what scares us? Christopher Titmuss, a leading western meditation teacher, spoke to Vishvapani about his book Transforming our Terror

Christopher greeted me at his house in Totnes, southwest England, in a large black hat, long black raincoat, and trailing black scarf. A senior teacher in the Insight Meditation movement, Christopher is without the cool reserve of some of his contemporaries. In Buddhist circles he has dispensed with his surname and now prefers to be known simply as Christopher. He has large, friendly eyes and an immediately engaging manner. Engagement is one of his themes. 'I recently told one Dharma group, "I think I prefer Moslems to Buddhists. At least they have some fire, some passion .". It was a provocative way of saying that I think Buddhists can be so "nice", and so passive.'

We met to discuss a book Christopher had published in 2002 in the wake of the terrorist attacks of September 11th, called Transforming Our Terror: a spiritual approach to making sense of senseless tragedy. 'I have been visiting the US for 25 years, but mainly just to lead retreats. So the America I encounter is the American mind. And I noticed that after 9/11 there was a great deal more fear and anxiety among the people I was teaching. I started to ask myself, what can Buddhist practice say to this experience?'

The result is an enquiry into the nature of fear, grief, loss, and how the human mind processes and makes sense of them. In essence, Christopher suggests, the collective emotional response to the public trauma of the terrorist attacks mirrored the patterns of personal responses to grief that, in his book, he describes so well: 'The sadness that permeates our hearts due to the arising of the unwelcome, the unwanted, and the unforeseen has a certain emotional weight that can bear down on us until we feel sick in our stomachs. Our chests contract and our heads feel stuffed full of unpleasant sensations. The overall pressure releases tears from our eyes as the breathtakingly painful information begins to sink deeper and deeper into our hearts.'

Implicit in the analogy between how an individual responds to suffering and how a community responds to a collective tragedy is a critique of the War on Terror that America launched in response to 9/11. 'They decided that the way to combat their fear was to hit out. But that involves narrowing down imaginatively, cutting off from the suffering of the other person. In my book I have stories about the suffering of people in Palestine and Afghanistan, but when I submitted the manuscript, the US publisher wanted me to cut these out. Essentially they said, “Can you keep it just to the experience of Americans?”. But I replied, “What I am writing about is universal. The Dharma doesn't distinguish between Americans or Afghanis. All it knows about is human beings – their minds and their suffering”. Eventually, when I gave an ultimatum, “Publish everything or nothing”, they backed down and it was printed. But this was an insight into the atmosphere in America after 9/11 and the unconscious forces of censorship that have taken hold.'

I was struck by the eloquence of Christopher's descriptions of grief and sadness, and I asked if they grew from his own experiences. Surprisingly, he answered in the negative. 'I seem to be blessed with a happy, equanimous inner life, and of course I have put in many years of hard-core Dharma practice. I can't remember the last time I found something hard to bear, or I suffered.' Christopher spent six years in the 1970s as a Theravadin Buddhist monk in Thailand, where he studied Vipassana meditation under Ajahn Dhammadharo and Essence of Dharma under Ajahn Buddhadasa, and in India. Since then he has been based at Gaia House in Devon and taught meditation in centres around the world. As well as this he has been an energetic activist, mediating in conflict situations and an energetic campaigner for peaceful solutions.

Christopher's assertion that he experiences little or no suffering is all the more striking as his life has not been without difficulty. Recently he was suspended as a teacher by Gaia House and another leading insight meditation retreat centre, following an allegation by a female student that he 'pursued her and avoided her' during a weekend retreat.

He commented, 'I believe in the intimacy of offering wholehearted attention to a person rather than becoming a detached professional. I regard this as the essence of being a kalyana mitra   [good spiritual friend] to others. We have to take the risk that we will be misunderstood and accept the consequences.

'The institution feels it needs to protect its reputation. But losing a place to teach is pretty insignificant if you think that in the end we will lose everything! Our life is a dewdrop hanging on the end of a leaf at dawn. Our dissolution from this garden of life is always soon.' The other centres where Christopher teaches did not think the complaint warranted such a response, and he continues his world-wide teaching programme.

 Rather than through his own personal suffering, Christopher suggests that his encounter with the painful emotions he describes has come principally through listening to the experience of others.

'I learn so much through listening to the grief, sorrow and terror of people I work with. I practise the art of witnessing their experience, just as in meditation you witness the thoughts and feelings that arise, while neither becoming lost in them nor cutting off from them.'

Instead of responding to pain and loss with anger or dejection, Buddhist psychology suggests that awareness is the key to a more creative response. Christopher returns repeatedly to this theme of witnessing, evoking the biblical resonances of 'bearing witness'. In Transforming Our Terror he writes, 'The true witness is not passive, but tries to take an overview and maintains a sense of caring responsibility for the totality of the event, free from bias.' In some accounts such awareness can seem cool and detached, but Christopher emphasises sensitivity to experience and – that dangerous word again – 'intimacy' with it. 'Intimacy is an important word for me. Through awareness we can learn to be intimate with nature, with the elements, and with our bodies – in the same way as we think of developing intimacy with another person. That intimacy opens us to the sense of presence and humanity here, right now, in this moment. That intimacy with life lies at the heart of what it is to be human.'

The same quality of awareness without detachment has prompted Christopher's peace work, the practical corollary of his arguments in Transforming Our Terror. He has travelled for many years to Israel and the West Bank where he works closely with the peace movement and others on both sides of the divide. 'Recently I gave a public talk in Tel Aviv, and I said, “The Israeli military must get out of the West Bank, and allow the Palestinians to live their lives. Soldiers must refuse to support the occupation”.

'One man came up to me aftrewards, very angry, and asked, “Who do you think you are to come here and tell us what to do? What do you know about the situation?” I asked him, “How many Palestinians have you met and asked what their lives are like?” I could see from his face that he had never spoken to any; so I said, “I go and listen to the nightmare of the Palestinians, as well as hear from Israelis about their sorrow. That is my authority to speak on such matters. Do you have the authority to speak about the terror of the Palestinians? No, you don't”. '

How can a Buddhist mediate between Jews, Muslims and Christians in the Middle East? Christopher emphasises that he isn't looking for converts. 'I tell people, "You already have three religions, the last thing you need is a fourth!". I guide people in looking at their responses and their minds, and sometimes they want to know more. So I have been asked to lead retreats in Israel, making available the Buddha's insights, but without any expectation that people will become Buddhists.

'It is a delicate position. In Nablus, where I give workshops on the resolution of suffering, the Palestinians know I am totally supportive of their right to liberation, independence and to live in peace, and the Israelis know that I am wholly supportive of their right to exist.'

Listening to others parallels the act of listening to oneself in meditation, and Christopher advocates an open questioning attitude: 'How do we find a different way of looking? How do we witness what is happening without taking sides? What leads us to believe and accept a particular version of reality?' Such questioning points to the Buddhist emphasis on examining and letting go of divisive views. 'Again and again in Buddhist texts the Buddha asks us to look at our views,' Christopher commented. 'This isn't the same as being non-judgemental – which is what so many western Buddhists are advocating. The Buddha was always criticising the views that were prevalent in his society, saying they led people into suffering. Far too many Buddhists live in fear of appearing judgmental. There is an inability to distinguish between critical, passionate analysis and heaping blame upon others. The first step on the Noble Eightfold Path is Right View, not timid view, not comforting view and not non-view.'

Among the reflections Christopher is most keen to promote is contemplating birth, ageing, pain and death to generate love and compassion amid the vulnerability of daily life. 'In Vipassana monasteries in Asia you can see corpses, sometimes those of senior monks or lay people, to remind you of the truth of impermanence. Contemplating death is the most profound meditation because it has the power to cut through all your ideas about yourself, your plans, your self-importance – everything you get caught up with and think matters.'

Christopher is convinced that such meditative insights have much to offer the political domain. 'However sophisticated our technology, the level of emotional maturity guiding the political courses of our countries is low. There is no attempt to understand the 'other', to ask how others may see us and what we may have done to prompt their anger. Until we can look inside and see how we deal with our own anger and forces of destruction (often disguised by politicians and others as making hard decisions about the real world), we will continue to see its painful consequences in the world outside us.'

Above all, this entails honest, rigorous self-enquiry. As he writes, 'A major catastrophe gives us the opportunity to enquire into our relationship with our beliefs, feelings and opinions. It also acts as a metaphor for other situations of conflict or a seemingly insoluble position.'

For all the positivity of its message, Transforming Our Terror is pervaded by a sad awareness that, far from seizing this opportunity, our political leaders chose to hurl themselves into a cycle of punishment, retribution and the attempt to control. What can one do in response? Christopher's activism has made him a veteran of Dharma Yatras, or peace pilgrimages, which are walked in many countries. And he recently contributed to a bill currently making its way through the British parliament that proposes to establish a UK Ministry of Peace, dedicated to finding non-violent solutions to international conflicts.

Along with a teaching programme in which he leads meditation retreats on four continents, Christopher's activism makes him an incessant traveller, who draws breath when he lands back in his beloved Totnes. I leave him at the station, scarf trailing behind him. He is off to his daughter's house, then on to his regular window seat in the local coffee shop. There he sits, as he has for several years, meeting and engaging with old friends, Dharma students or anyone who wants to chat, with a warm greeting and a welcoming smile.

This image of Christopher encapsulates his message for meditators, politicians and all of us who need to absorb our experience, with its many difficulties. Staying open, not closing down, and bearing witness to whatever life brings. 

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THE RELIGION OF SCIENCE

1. Science believes that the Big Bang created the world.

2. Charles Darwin (1809–1882) and Albert Einstein (1879-1955) are two of the leading prophets of the religion of Science.

3. Darwin's Origin of Species is the sacred book for believers in Science. Science believes in cause (s) and effect (s) as the ultimate reality.

4. Core beliefs of the faithful include the theory of relativity, theory of evolution, survival of the fittest, the random selection of species, DNA, progress of the human species and control over our destiny.

5. Scientists are the missionaries and high priests for the religion of Science believing in a reductionist approach to Reality. The dogma of Science is believing it has the only legitimate viewpoint to Reality. 

6. Science teachers are the priests for Science while the university is the Temple of Science. The laboratory is the sacred tabernacle. Scientists believe in experimentation, observation and deduction to know to the reality of the physical world.

7. Science engages in the battle of good and evil – from medical science to producing weapons of mass destruction.

8. Believers in Science see their religion as the only way to knowing the truth. Believers make claims about the creation and destruction of the world.

9. Believers in Science are divided into various sects and sub-sects – Biologists, Chemists, Geneticists, Geologists, Physicists, etc. Scientific knowledge is the Way

10. Scientists engage in constant dispute over their theories (i.e. beliefs) about Reality. Scientific 'truths' change as the believers constructs new standpoints relegating old 'truths' to beliefs.
Christopher Titmuss
www.insightmeditation.org

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ENVIRONMENTAL ETHICS. 

LIVING WITH MINDFULNESS
20 PRACTICAL APPLICATIONS TOWARDS
A SUSTAINABLE and HEALTHY SOCIETY

1. Remember to switch off lights and turn down heating when you leave a room.
2. Cook with lids on pots. Boil the amount of water you need.
3. Use washing machine at 40c instead of 60c to save a third of energy use. Don't use a tumble drier. Hang clothes up to dry.
4. Turn down thermostat – 1% less cuts heating bill by 10%. Keep refrigerator just 1c warmer saves 50 kg of greenhouse gases a year.
5. Turn TV, stereo, DVD, mobile phone charger off at the power point immediately after use. Standby uses 10-60% extra juice and contributes to fire risk.
6. Eat grains, fruit and vegetables. Eat organic regional, seasonal food and drink. Avoid GM food. Don't smoke – to stop tobacco crops, air pollution and harm to health. Cut down on alcohol. Avoid junk food, (A tin of Coca-Cola contains 12 cubes of sugar).
7. Use energy efficient Compact Fluorescent bulbs (CF bulbs), they last 10 times longer and saves half a tonne of CO2 in its lifetime.
8. Walk, cycle, public transport, car pool. Check emissions and tyre pressures. Cut down on flights. (Emissions of one Atlantic flight from EU to New York equals in emissions every passenger driving a car for a year - about 15,000 kilometres). 
9. Use as much as possible renewable sources and cut consumption. 
10. Minimise paper use and buy wood products from sustainable forests. Buy products with least packaging. Recycle paper, used bottles, tins and cardboard.
11. Plant trees and look after them. Grow organic vegetables and make compost.
12. Increase insulation in roof, windows and aluminium foil behind radiators (dull side to the wall). Install a solar water heater
13. Wear natural materials, such as cotton and wool, as much as possible.
14. Install double glaze windows and ignore air conditioning. 
15. Cut down on purchases of consumer goods and only buy energy efficient appliances
16. Invest in ethical funds. Attend shareholder meeting for green resolutions. Press the corporate world to make policies for a sustainable society 
17. Boycott multi-nationals that block or ignore transition to a sustainable society. 
18. Support green politics, protests and actions. Support eco friendly business.
19. Don't support war and the selling of arms. War causes the greatest harm to people, animals, environment and infrastructure. 
20. Make things last. Never forget the difference you can make. Have fun and change the world.

MAY ALL BEINGS LIVE IN A SUSTAINABLE and HEALTHY WORLD

Christopher Titmuss
www.insightmeditation.org 

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A PROPOSAL TO ESTABLISH A NEW MINISTRY
IN THE BRITISH GOVERNMENT: 

MINISTRY FOR PEACE AND RECONCILIATION

The Ministry for Peace and Reconciliation will examine the causes and conditions for all manifestations of violence, whether inflicted upon ourselves, in the home, on our streets, in our schools, at work, between ethnic groups, between nations and organisations, and between nations and nations, and to implement a wide range of skilful means to resolve such problems at every level.

Acts of violence by the nation, the organisation or the individual, is the blight of all civilised behaviour. The human species sinks to its lowest level when it deliberately inflicts suffering, pain and death on others through various perceptions, beliefs and determinations.

The Minister for Peace and Reconciliation will have responsibility for the active development and cultivations of resolutions to forms of conflict with a wide network of human, financial and environmental resources. 

INTERNATIONAL

a. In the 3rd Millennium, the priority of government is to explore a civilised approach to dealing with conflict rather than repeat the history of the last century with more than 100,000,000 people killed through wars. It is the task of governments, organisations and citizens to acknowledge the mistakes of the past, explore fresh initiatives in the present and point the way to the real welfare of the global community for the future.

b. The Ministry of Peace and Reconciliation (subsequently referred to here as MPR) would recruit an army of facilitators, psychologists, psychotherapists, counsellors, diplomats, peace workers, NGO's and committed individuals in the public and private sector. This new kind of army would be committed to conflict resolution at home and abroad. The current armed forces would also be extensively trained in peaceful resolution in any arena of conflict.

c. It is important to point out that establishing of a new ministry is not rare. In the last generation, the British Government has established the Ministry for Children, the Ministry for the Environment and the Ministry for Overseas Development in response to important needs. Many would argue that a Ministry for Peace and Reconciliation is sorely needed. It is vital that the Ministry for Peace and Reconciliation is independent of others ministries, rather than features of it absorbed into other departments..

d. The Ministry for Peace and Reconciliation (MPR) would have a unique role in government life since it would deal directly with issues of violence, domestic and overseas, upon adults, children, animals and the environment. Owing to mental, verbal and physical abuse, fears stalks the lives of young and old alike, indoors and outdoors, at home and overseas 

e. MPR would have the responsibility to provide the Prime Minister, Foreign Minister and Defence Minister with a wide range of alternative solutions to any proposed act of war. It would offer different options than the heads of the Armed Forces. It would be the task of MPR to ensure that statements of foreign and domestic policy were accurate, honest in the detail, free from spin, and free from any manipulation of the media and public. MPR would act as an advisor to all other departments and feature strongly in party policy. to cut down public anger about the government.

f. MPR would actively send teams invited to war torn countries for the emotional, mental, physical and environmental welfare of those suffering as a result of conflict. Training would be offered to the police forces, social workers and community leaders in war zones. These teams would co-operate and support people and their infrastructure to establish a culture of active citizenship. 

g. MPR will co-operate with all parties at home and abroad to establish agreements, treaties and implementation of UN resolutions to build a consensus of understanding about an enlightened way forward in areas of dispute. It will support UN Peace Keeping Forces. 

h. MPR will examine both short and long terms solutions employing a civilised approach to major issues of conflict. History shows that the victims of war harbour resentment with the result that the victims may well become the victimiser. Government's authorisation for war or the organisations authorisation for acts of terror spirals equally into obscene violence upon men, women and children and their environment – regardless of motivations

i. MPR will make public the list of arm sales to foreign nations, and the amount of money transpired in arms sales. 

j. MPR will advocate careful analysis of the reasons behind violence and war. 

k. MPR would address equally the psychological and regional rationalisations behind war. Does the Prime Minister and War Cabinet show: 
1. Obsession with power and control,
2. Religious, political, personal or historical beliefs
3. Over-identification with ethnic group or nation
4. Acts of retaliation
5. Acts of discrimination and prejudice, gross or subtle
6. Territorial claims
7. Pursuit of Profit 
8. Exploitation of environment (e.g. oil) 
9. A means to unite people behind a leader
10. Unquestioning belief and identification with what is good and determination of what is evil. 

l. MPR would detail and list overseas aid, and ensure that such aid was used wisely and with discernment. MPR would increase substantially aid and NGO initiatives.

DOMESTIC

m. MPR would ensure that education from primary school to university would include practical programmes in conscious living, development of communication skills and ways to reach agreement in issues of dispute. These teachings and practices would become an essential part of the curriculum.

n. MPR would act as bridge between government and voters so that citizens would experience trust and confidence in the government. MPR would work to reduce the wrath and cynicism of people against governments, who deceive its citizens or make decisions that profoundly concern thoughtful people – from making war, to selling of arms, to ill treatment of asylum seekers, to abuse of the judiciary, to refusal to permit a public inquiry. 

o. MPR would act as the conscience of the nation to re-establish trust between the dualities of society – government and people, public and private sector, divisions between ethnic groups, rich and poor, police and the public, employers and employees, employers and unions, parents and children, one neighbour and another. Fear, mistrust and anger reinforce these areas of national life. The significance of the role of mediation would be increased. 

p. MPR would appeal to the spiritual, religious, creative and intellectual creative resources in society to address issues of violence and conflict, locally and internationally. Television, radio and the media would feature the vital role of those working in the field of peace and reconciliation. 

q. MPR would promote and further expand initiatives for local communities to develop their relationships with each other through meetings, entertainment, the arts and mutual co-operation. The task of MPR would be to encourage diversity and a culture of inter-action through all aspects of daily life. 

r. MPR would greatly expand on some of the current programmes of the government to deal with conflict with widespread training for individuals to learn art of facilitation and conflict resolution. Leading figures in the field would act as advisors.

s. MPR would establish the Network of Facilitators. They would be the frontline team employing their skills to meet the challenges of today – such as sexual violence, pub violence, road rage, and abusive behaviour at football matches or in the home. The part that alcohol and drug abuse play in violence would come under increased scrutiny.

t. MPR would develop new programs that relate to the societal challenges of school violence, guns, and racial or ethnic violence, violence against gays and lesbians, and police-community relations. The Network of Facilitators would work alongside community leaders and respected individuals who can point the way forward to dissolve tension.

u. MPR would establish major new programmes in our prisons. Facilitators would mediate between wardens, prison officers and inmates with widespread use of teams of psychotherapists, counsellors and trained motivators for inmates. For staff and inmates, there would be provision for inner work that reduces aggressive tendencies through such programmes as stress reduction, meditation and yoga. Changes in diet, application of the arts and development of a culture towards inner change would be developed in prisons. Inmates would be train as facilitators.

v. MPR would explore alternatives to the Western belief system that says that the main purpose for existence centres on production and consumption, privilege and influence. There would be a commitment to end violence on land, water and air used to satisfy the demands of an acquisitive and self-obsessed society. 

w. This determination will require the fullest co-operations of the community of philosophers, social scientists, theologians, peace workers and individuals with moral authority to work together to establish a safe, secure and sustainable world. Every area of life would enter into public debate about violence including entertainment, television, cinema, advertising and the obsession with status. 

x. In the longer-term vision, the government would commit itself to establishing a person in the Unarmed Forces for every person in the Armed Forces. For every Military Academy, there would be an equivalent Non-Military Academy. For every scientist in the public or private sector engaged in research for the armaments industry, there would be a scientist in the non-military sector of peaceful resolution through new technologies, developing infrastructure and constructive use of communication. The emphasis would be on constructive engagement with the world rather than pursuance of destructive engagement through more and more sophisticated weapons. The Prime Minister and the rest of the cabinet would be presented equally with non-military resolutions to international conflict, risk to lives, cost effectiveness, etc.

y. In conjunction with the UN, MPR would be responsible for inspection and dismantling weapons of mass destruction at home and abroad including nuclear weapons, biological and chemical weapons. MPR would promote constructive engagement with other countries and convert our armaments industry towards peaceful use. In other words, the defence budget would systematically go down year by year with a corresponding increase in the budget for MPR. 

z. In making the change from war and violence, both at home and abroad, it will require an immense amount of consultation between nations and groups. It will require the building of bridges to understand the differences between nations, religions and cultures and a deeper understanding of the issues facing the poor, marginalised, refugees, economic migrants and the disenfranchised.

aa. The cost for the Ministry for Peace and Reconciliations would be drawn directly from the defence budget. 

bb. The country would celebrate the role of great peacemakers and facilitators. The Ministry of Peace and Reconciliation would make a significant contribution to civilised culture to deal with personal, social and global problems. Such a Ministry would show true respect to the New Millennium. 

Final word:

Violence in all of its ugly manifestation shakes and disturbs us, and the gratuitous violence or organised violence such as war, carries a further revulsion for all those who care about life. There is nothing more obscene than the wilful acts against the 'other' with the sophisticated savagery of the means used to justify the end. For the 'other' are like us – wishing to live in safety and security. 

We feel alarm when violence has freed itself from any of belief, any ideology, such as simply putting the boot in on an innocent bystander just for the sake of it but we ought to feel an equal sense of revulsion for the targettted bombing from the air of people on the ground, who are mere abstractions for the pilots, acting under orders, as their launch their bombs on men, women and children alike. There is no difference in the end result for those mercilessly traumatised for being in the way of political ambitions and ideological aims. 

We have become used to violence inflicted on others, perhaps numbed by it, deadened by the amount of violence that we have to absorb from Hollywood movies to war leaving us woefully indifferent to the grim plight of others. Violence in any form ranks as the most obscene form of intrusion into another's life leaving individuals and entire groups of people frightened and helpless in the face of the abuse inflicted upon them, whether by professional armies, merciless organisations, street gangs or the unresolved aggression of the individual. For the creation of the 'enemy,' or the 'threat' and the need to eradicate or humiliate 'them' says more about ourselves, and our inner shadows, than those we brutalise.

Governments have consistently refused to acknowledge the relationship between the violence they inflict on other nations and the violence inflicted in the home or on our streets. The difference is in magnitude, not in the act, itself, namely the wilful intention to hurt, harm or destroy another. When a counsellor asked a client why he punched his wife in the face during an argument, he replied: 'because she deserved it”. Don't Governments adopt the same view to a regime when they can't get their way?

We have to address the whole machinery of violence from the inner to the outer, at home and abroad, acknowledging the destructive force for what it is, and the misery, fear and resentment that it breeds, thus sewing the seeds for further generations of violence. 

It is for the above reasons, and numerous other factors, that we desperately need a Ministry for Peace and Reconciliation to increase significantly our awareness and action to issues around violence on our Earth so we can move much further along the road to reconciliation and transformation.

Christopher Titmuss
August 2003

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Responses to Events Following September 11, 2001

Dear Friends,

Like myself, you probably received hundreds of e-mails concerned the tragic and brutal events in the USA in the morning of Tuesday, September 11, 2001 and spent many, many hours responding to them. You may have written letters to your elected leaders or newspapers. You have probably signed many e-mail petitions, read many thoughtful pieces including from the Dalai Lama, Ven. Thich Nhat Hahn, Noam Chomsky, Afghani writers and harrowing personal accounts from New York City.

The massive number of such circulating e-mails are well-intentioned but, in this critical time of uncertainy, we are in danger of getting lost in a cyber space response to current and forthcoming events. We are mostly e-mailing each other, communicating with the converted, that is around 10%, who oppose a “war on terrorism” and its nightmare consequences. We have to reach out to the 90% to point the way to peace, justice, generosity and compassion for all those who suffer. I believe the USA government, the Pentagon and its allies must enter into a period of profound and honest soul searching so that we all understand clearly dependent arising circumstances.

A change in the current menacing political attitude will not take place through well-meaning e-mails. E-mails can only remind and inspire us to act, or tell us of forthcoming events. I believe one of the most powerful resources for political change, as history shows, is promoting our concerns on the streets of our cities and towns. We must reach the public. Please ask yourselves what you can do outside of cyberspace.

WAYS TOWARDS CHANGE INCLUDE:

1. Peaceful demonstrations, Vigils
2. Pilgrimage (Yatras in the Buddhist tradition).
3. Debates
4. Essays, Articles, Books.
5. Education.
6. The Arts
7. Petitions
8. Letters, leaflets, flyers
9. Public meetings
10. Subscriptions to organisations working for peace and justice
11. Dana (donations) and support for charities working to relieve suffering
12. Workshops

• On September 29, 2001, the Sangha met at the Buddhist Peace Pagoda in Battersea, south London to initiate a six-hour silent, mindful and slow, single file walk through the streets of London. Letters were delivered at the Foreign Office and at the Israeli Embassy. The participants in the Yatra (Buddhist pilgrimage) also meditated at the Foreign Office and outside the Embassy. We believe the right to nationhood of the besieged Palestinian community is one of the key factors to deal with this spiral of mistrust and retaliation in the region and in the West. Please join our pilgrimage (Yatra) through London. Please pass on this information to your friends. Please ask yourselves “What can I do?”

• In our local town of Totnes, South Devon, England a peaceful protest against the War on Afghanistan took place in the high street on October 10. Around 10 per cent of the town were involved. Three former mayors of Totnes took part in the walk. Hundreds of leaflets were given out. Totnes is exploring the possibility of twinning the town with a town in Afghanistan. Local activists are writing letters, giving support to the Islamic community in nearby towns and organising weekly vigils. Further public meetings are planned.

• On October 27, Christina Feldman and Christopher Titmuss will lead a one day vigil in a hall near Golders Green, North London for World Peace. Meditation, talks, reflections and live music. Venue King Alfred's School, near Golders Green Tube Station NW11. 10.30.4.30 p.m.

• On February 4 at 2 p.m., Pragya Vihar School, Bodh Gaya, India, will offer a cultural festival of dance and music to celebrate inter-religious understanding and appreciation. Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists, Christians teach and study at the school with its 400 pupils supported by Dharma students around the world. Head of the school is a Catholic nun.

• The Sangha in Israel is organising a pilgrimage Dharma yatra (provisional name: 'Step By Step'). It will start around March 28 at the beginning of the Passover and will continue until around April 10. The Yatra will consist of walking in the countryside and cities, daily teachings, practices, exploring issues around wisdom and compassion, camping and staying in various Kibbutz. All are welcome.

Towards Resolution
Christopher Titmuss

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An Alternative Proposal to current strategy of Bombs with Breadcrumbs

PROPOSED MEASURES TO RESOLVE CONFLICT BETWEEN THE WEST AND THE MUSLIM WORLD 

 

1. The United Nations is the appropriate forum to resolve international conflict.

2. Nation states to cease all unilateral action so that decisions are made at UN level.

3. International law, as ratified in UN resolutions, such as resolution 33, to be observed rather than further deployment of military retaliation upon Afghanistan.

4. Bring an end to the international arms trade by Western governments and the private sector

5. President of the United States, Secretary General of the UN, leaders of the EU and Prime Minister of Israel to go a Middle East country to meet with Arab leaders and listen to their concerns. Arab world to acknowledge demonizing of Israel and the West and vice-versa.

6. Establish a common charter to move forward through political and business initiatives and constructive dialogue between the three religions of the region.

7. Arab nations to take steps towards releasing thousands of jailed political dissidents allowing movement towards freedom of speech. Evidence to be given to Arab leaders for arrest and trial in an Arab nation of members of al-Qaida who plotted attack on USA. Amnesty lawyers to observe trial free from threat of death penalty.

8. USA, EU, Israel and Palestinian community to work immediately to establish the state of Palestine with a guarantee of nationhood within two years.

9. UN Peacekeeping Force to be established in the Occupied Territories until Israel, USA and UN formally recognises the state of Palestine.

10. USA, UK to cease any forms of retaliation on Iraq and to provide full humanitarian aid to this impoverished country, as well as Afghanistan, and help build Palestine.

11. USA to withdraw its troops from the birthplace of Mohammed. UK to cease its naval exercises and maneuvers in the seas off the oil states.

12. The USA and its allies to provide massive aid to decrease suffering in the region rather than increase it through the same expenditure on prolonged military action.

Christopher Titmuss
Advisory Board Member
Buddhist Peace Fellowship
August 2001

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REPORT FROM ISRAEL AND THE OCCUPIED TERRITORIES

Christopher Titmuss 

 

“I want to kill every Palestinian. I wake up with this thought every morning. This is the only solution” said the 40 year-old Tel Aviv office worker.

“The Final Solution?” I asked.

“Yes, I know it is a terrible thing to say but this is what I'm thinking everyday”.

The woman expressed her suppressed anger and despair at one of two five day Buddhist retreats for around 160 people that I was leading at a Kibbutz, an hour north of Tel Aviv late last month (July, 2001). I had invited participants in the retreat to come to the front of the hall to inquire into anything that affected their lives. In a 40-minute dialogue, the woman and I made a dark journey into her inner world charged with concentrated blame upon a stateless people.

She expressed her thoughts while others suppressed them. Expressed or unexpressed, I reminded the retreatants that such thoughts manifest as pervasive resentment and sudden bursts of rage in the circumstances of daily life. As one participant said after the inquiry session, “Israel is falling apart. We have become a dysfunctional nation. We think things can't get worse but they do”.

Some Israelis cried listening to the session, others sobbed and left the hall - mirroring the feelings of helplessness of ordinary Israelis to change their daily nightmare. Despair and frustration haunt Israel, even among thoughtful people seeking to resolve the crisis. You cannot sit in a restaurant, walk the streets, get on a bus or go to club without thinking about terrorism. I sat having a coffee in a crowded restaurant when two Arab Israelis, one carried a shopping bag, walked in to buy a coffee. Some apprehensive customers watched the man closely when his hand went to his bag.

The Chosen People seem to have chosen a nightmare daily existence as the effect of trying to resolve their problems over The Land through denying the rights of Palestinians. Instead of a wise prophet to guide them out of this wilderness of fear and distrust, the Israelis have chosen Prime Minister Sharon, who leads his people deeper into a hellish existence.

VISIT TO NABLUS

Two days after the retreat, Mohammed, a Palestinian taxi driver married to an Israeli Arab, picked me up from the outskirts of Tel Aviv to make the 75 minute drive through the heavily guarded Israeli control points ending on the very edge of the largest Palestinian town of Nablus. The town nestles in a deep valley with a population of around 110,000 and famed throughout the Arab world as a centre of resistance against the Israel military forces.

I first came on my annual visits to Israel in 1992 to teach retreats emphasising ethics, meditation, wisdom and compassion. About three years later, Palestinians and Israelis invited me to facilitate dialogue groups in Nablus. About 15-20 Israelis - doctors, psychologists, lawyers, army officers, students, rabbis etc - met with Palestinians for two or three days, stayed in their homes and discussed their conflicts. We called these meetings “Face to Face” with funding from the Oslo Agreement. Until last October when the current waves of violence and recrimination began, friends in both communities held such dialogue groups with the support of Israeli Dharma teacher, Stephen Fulder. The groups met several times a year in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

Participants reported that these meetings changed their lives. Israelis and Palestinians realised they have far more in common than what separates them including a deep love of the land and a desire for this cauldron of fear and mistrust to end. The current re-occupation and control over the Palestinian territories ended the dialogue groups. Yet, during my recent brief 24-hour visit to Nablus, I never heard a word of condemnation of Israelis only of the Israeli government and military occupation.

Our Face to Face meetings took place until 1999 in a large room used as a clinic at the top of a narrow five storey building a few hundred metres from the centre of Nablus. Families with children lived in the rooms below. Meetings began taking place every other month at the clinic and elsewhere in the Palestinian territories. This time I travelled to Nablus alone after my Palestinian hosts secured the approval of the (Palestinian) Governor of Nablus for my visit.

On Tuesday (July 31, 2001), the Israeli military fired several missiles from a helicopter into the same room of the same building killing eight people, including two children standing on the pavement outside waiting for their parents to collect them. Israeli government officials dismissed numerous international protests at such acts of state terrorism.

As Mohammed drove into Nablus, we took the road on July 24 past the Jewish Settlement perched near Mount Gerazhim, a holy mountain for a Jewish sect, and then weaved our way down the valley into Nablus for a day-long meeting in a nearby building. Mohammed told the soldiers at the checkpoint that I was a religious teacher visiting as a tourist this holy mountain. It was true. To a degree.

In Nablus, I spent the whole day giving a workshop titled Transformation of Suffering to a group of about 20 Palestinian social workers who visit the homes of families directly affected by the current military occupation. Since last October, more than 650 Palestinians have died and 25,000 injured through live and rubber bullet wounds, military attacks, beatings, tear gas as the Israeli military attempt to control the lives of 2,000,000 Palestinians. The death toll for innocent Israeli citizens continues to rise to around 200 victims through acts of terrorism in the state of Israel.

Young social workers - men and women, mostly aged in their 20's - visit homes in Nablus and surrounding small towns and villages giving comfort, support and advice. Risking their lives as they travel along pathways and tracks to villages, always fearful of running across Israel soldiers, they only have time to spend one hour with a distressed family. They listen daily to such reports as:

The mother whose lost her children following an Israel ground to ground missile attack on suspected members of Hamas.

The father who has gone missing for weeks.

The little girl who bursts into tears every time an Israeli fighter plane races through the skies.

The teenager who wakes up screaming every night and wets his bed night after night.

The families who lives in caves after bulldozers and tanks demolished their homes.

The desperatel grandparents afraid for their grandchildren confronting the tanks with stones.

The women who walk up to the soldiers daily begging them to stop the killings.

The mother unable to get hospital treatment in Jerusalem for her little girl suffering with eye cancer.

The specialist care needed for the growing number of Palestinians breaking down under the pressure whether personal, social or financial.

In such a workshop, there is no time for theory, nor time for analysis. There is attention to suffering, traumatic, unresolved suffering. I have only a day to try to give some insight and inspiration to these young people. They know my view. I regard collective punishment such as military occupation as unjust, against all human rights and a violation of international agreements. My Palestinian hosts know I will not give a word of sympathetic support to the throwing of a single stone, let alone bomb attacks whether from a terrorist oranisation or state terror from the ground or missiles from the air. Words must be exchanged not bullets. I told them that I regard this as an unshakeable ethic.

Elsewhere in a Palestinian village outside Bethlehem, a very short drive from Jerusalem, an Israeli Dharma friend, Neta, with her arm in plaster, Palestinian women and international peace activists risk their lives pleading with tank commanders and soldiers not to kill, maim or beat up Palestinians, or bulldoze homes, shops and roads. These courageous people find themselves doing the job that the United Nations Peace Keeping Force should be doing.

A month before the Israeli soldiers grabbed Neta, dragged her by her hair along the ground, interrogated her, twisted her arm up her back until it broke. The officer and soldiers were trying to force to her sign a piece of paper stating that she would not return back into the occupied territories. She refused. Her partner is Palestinian.

I telephoned Neta on her mobile phone. “What's all the background noise?” I asked. “We are trying to stop the demolition of Palestinian homes”, she yelled down the phone. “Everybody is shouting including the journalists who want us activists to get nearer to the tanks to get better pictures. It's crazy here”.

Meanwhile in Nablus, I placed two chairs in the centre of the room. I said to the group: “Imagine that I am a mother. I was told yesterday that a soldier took careful aim and shot my son dead. I am in grief. I can't stop crying. I don't want to live any longer. What are you are going to tell me? How can you help me?”

A beautiful Muslim woman, aged about 22, wearing a long, narrow cut, thin cotton coat and Muslim veil around her face, comes to sit in the chair opposite me. She leans forward and confidently speaks to me gently while my Palestinian translator also speaks in a soft tone. I reply as the mother continuing to share my distress with the social worker. Then I say that I am a 12-year-old boy frozen with fear. What you can you say or do? A young man aged around 27 comes forward to sit in a chair.

After such exchanges, I then give my response in terms of the importance of eye contact, touch, words, tone and the amount of reference to the past, present and future. We work hard together all day with the participants, who took many notes, asked many questions as we discussed the plight of families in grief. I am usually hardened to the world of suffering but during a short break in the session, I had tears in my eyes having listened to one distressingly painful situation after another. I knew the social workers were not exaggerating or giving a distorted picture, not in front of twenty of their colleagues

Three days before the workshop, Jewish settlers in the West Bank ambushed and murdered a family of Palestinians, including a three-month baby, returning home from a wedding. They wounded three others including the baby's mother, who gave birth last April after years of difficulty in becoming pregnant. Another survivor of the ambush lost her husband; they had married only seven days before. The terrorist organisation that murdered the family calls itself The Committee for Road Safety. The number of such underground Jewish terrorist organisations continues to increase. The Israeli authorities have failed to arrest anybody.

While in Israel, I read the Jerusalem Post's on-line readers' opinion poll. The daily newspaper asked: “Do you think Israelis who murder or injure Palestinian civilians for nationalistic purposes should be prosecuted as terrorists? The result of the poll was “Yes, 61% No. 39%. During my stay in Israel, Ashkenemazi Chief Rabbi Israel Meir Lau travelled around Israel last week saying that the killing of Palestinian terrorists has the “full backing of Jewish religious law”. He issued a statement saying that Israel is fighting a “war of commandment mandated by God”. Lau said those fighting the war against the Palestinians are exempt from the commandment “thou shalt not kill”. Jewish set