I was scanning the front page of the Evangelist, the official newspaper of the Albany Roman Catholic Diocese and was struck by the picture found there.

The picture featured a group of Buddhist monks creating a mandala – an ‘artwork’ made of grains of sand individually placed. These works are very intricate and once they are completed and viewed they are blown away, ‘dust in the wind’ so to speak. The creation and destruction of the mandala are supposed to represent the Buddhist concept that “the world is an impermanent place.”

OK, so they have their mandala. The irony of the whole thing was that the mandala was in the shape of a Jerusalem Cross. In addition it was being created in the chapel of the Doane-Stuart School, a joint Roman Catholic – Episcopal private school (that has a Buddhist meditation center in it).

I thought, wow, the Buddhists get it. Symbols – what many Roman Catholics and Episcopalians have forgotten. Symbols stand for something and invoke meaning. The Buddhists got it. In the middle of an institution founded in the name of two great Christian faith traditions they created and blew away the Cross.

In today’s Times Union, the Inter-religious Affairs Coordinator of Albany’s Roman Catholic Diocese noted this event in his Religion Page ‘Voices of Faith‘ article on Nostra Aetate’s 40th Anniversary.

Now Doane-Stuart is no longer a sectarian institution, has disavowed its Christian foundations, and is basically a public school with high tuition and two chapels, but never-the-less, should not the Christians there, the editorial board of the Evangelist, and the Roman Catholic Diocese’s Inter-religious Affairs coordinator have taken a bye on lauding this event. Can’t they see that by giving attention to the event they implicitly condone its message and its irony.

Nostra Aetate was indeed a pivotal document for the Roman Catholic Church. It discussed the relationship between the Roman Catholic Church and other religions (Judaism, Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism). In a positive sense it set aside perceived doctrines of hatred. It stated that all humanity is created in God’s image and that each person has within him/herself the Divine calling to unity with God.

Indeed the PNCC said the same thing almost a century before Nostra Aetate in its Confession of Faith, especially in Principals 9, 10, and 12:

I BELIEVE that all peoples as children of one Father, God, are equal in themselves; that privileges arising from differences in rank, from possession of immense riches or from differences of faith, sex and race, are a great wrong, for they are a violation of the rights of man which he possess by his nature and the dignity of his divine origin, and are a barrier to the purposeful development of man.

I BELIEVE that all people have an equal right to life, happiness and those ways and means which lead to the preservation of existence, to advancement and salvation, but I also believe that all people have sacred obligations toward God, themselves, their nation, state and all of humanity.

I BELIEVE in immortality and everlasting happiness in eternity in union with God of all people, races and ages, because I believe in the Divine power of love, mercy and justice and for nothing else do I yearn, but that it may be to me according to my faith.

The Principals of the PNCC and Nostra Aetate created an environment of respect between Catholic Christians and members of other religions. What it did not create, at least in my estimation, is a license to disavow the Christian faith or to find salvation in other religions. They do not allow us to stand by as others take the stage to blow away the cross as a symbol of impermanence.

The great Christian Saints, the contemplatives and mystics, did not need labyrinths, yoga, tai-chi, a mandala, reiki, energy fields, or crystals. They had the great prayers of the Church, the Divine Office, the Rosary, and most importantly the Eucharist and the Gospels. They had Jesus Christ, the God-man within them. They spent hours, days, months, and years meditating on him long before the yogis and Buddhists were known.

The thought that the East has taught us something is a canard. Thomas Merton brought nothing back from the East that was not already present in the Church. People just had to look for it within the Deposit of Faith.

On the 40th anniversary of Nostra Aetate, let us pray that Catholic Christians renew their own self respect and stand up to proclaim the truth of Jesus Christ crucified, the everlasting symbol of our salvation. Let us also pray that we remember that Principald 9, 10, and 12 must be seen in light of Principal 7:

I BELIEVE that the Church of Christ is the true teacher of both individual man as well as of all human society, that it is a steward of Divine Graces, a guide and a light in man’s temporal pilgrimage to God and salvation; in so far as the followers and members of this Church, both lay and clerical, are united with the Divine Founder through faith and life proceeding from this faith.

Someday, in God’s good time and through His graces we will be united as one flock under one shepherd, Christ the Lord.