Independence Day

The Malay Peninsula, with the climate of a perpetual Turkish bath.

Sir Frank Swettenham, British Malaya, 1906

The Malayan countryside is rather like a rich feast, with a little too much of everything good.

George Woodcock, Asia, Gods and Cities, 1966

Eve of Independence Day.

It’s been over a year since my return to Malaysia, and still the same:

“Why did you come back? Why didn’t you just stay in the US?”

“Life is so much better there.”

“There are more opportunities there.”

Let’s be clear: I’m no patriot. I came back, not for any noble reason but because my mom died and the only way to attend her funeral involved chucking my chances at a green card out the window. Besides, I’d been in a deadlock with the United States immigration for over 3 years anyway and it was time to throw in the towel.

My homeland, like all other countries, has its own set of problems—unique in some ways, but fairly standard for a Third World nation trying to get to First. I’ve lost count of the times I’ve alternated between hope and despair about our future since my return last May, so I guess at this point it depends on what day one catches me.

What I’ve been thinking a lot about lately, though, is how much my students here–past and present–seem to think of the United States as a Promised Land of sorts. In this they are merely indicative of a widespread sentiment among Malaysians, especially non-Malay Malaysians, that a better life is to be found elsewhere, which is to say, just about anywhere except here.

I lived for 11 years in what is undoubtedly one of the freest, most powerful, wealthiest, and most opportunity-filled nation in the world. Like it or not, the US has got to be doing something right to have so many clamoring to get through its borders. Yet even after all those years, it’s very clear to me that America the Great is not without its ailments. Whether its problems are better or worse than those here in Malaysia I cannot say, but what I do know is that the America imagined by my students, friends and relatives is not quite the America I’ve known. They imagine that its citizens are uniformly supermodel-like (thanks to Hollywood), that everyone can get a job and get rich if they only worked hard enough, that anyone can climb the ceiling-less socio-economic pyramid. The cars are bigger, the air is cleaner and the laws are more just. This is the America they imagine.

Perhaps it is simply the case that in my view the grapes have turned sour, but when I look back to my time in the United States, I don’t feel as though I’ve left the third heaven. What I do feel is that I’ve left one beautiful country for another.

I love Malaysia. I don’t think or say that enough.

It’s not perfect–not by a long shot. There’s ethnic discrimination both de facto and de jure. Corruption permeates every level of its bureaucratic political and economic structures. We breed all manner of lies and stereotypes about the very immigrants who are the backbone of our economy, shortchange them on the paycheck and make them work like dogs round the clock. Just to name a few.

But there is also beauty. People still have time for each other here. Our coffee shops open till the wee hours of the morning to serve tea and roti canai to chatty locals. Our social mix is a storehouse of innumerable traditions. We’re obsessed with food the way I imagine some other ancient peoples might’ve been. We have rainforests and rivers and beaches and mountains. Many people here still remember what a simple life was or can be. Without too much trouble, one can still find a village complete with fruit orchards, fire ants and goats. Just to name a few.

My American friends often ask me, “When are you coming back?” I’m not sure I can or want to. There is much that I love and like here. Though I miss my friends in the US very much and every day, this has become my home again. A strange twist in God’s plan—but a happy one, I think, and I feel no need to alter its course. So, even on days when I border on thinking that this country is going to hell in a handbasket, I’m content—maybe even thankful—to be here.

I love you, Malaysia. I don’t think or say that enough.

And happy Independence Day.

“The love which frees men from their loneliness”: Some thoughts

In his autobiography, Milestones: Memoirs 1927-1977, then-Cardinal Ratzinger identified Henri de Lubac’s Catholicism (the original French title of which is Catholicisme: les aspects sociaux du dogme) as one of books that has influenced him the most. In Principles of Catholic Theology, he sums up de Lubac’s thesis in Catholicism like this:

The concept of a Christianity concerned only with my soul, in which I seek only my justification before God, my saving grace, my entrance into heaven, is for de Lubac that caricature of Christianity that, in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, made possible the rise of atheism. The concept of sacraments as the means of a grace that I receive like a supernatural medicine in order, as it were, to ensure only my own private eternal health is the supreme misunderstanding of what a sacrament truly is. De Lubac, for his part, is convinced that Christianity is, by its very nature, a mystery of union. The essence of original sin is the split into individuality, which knows only itself. The essence of redemption is the mending of the shattered image of God, the union of the human race through and in the One who stands for all and in whom, as Paul says (Gal 3:28), all are one: Jesus Christ. One this premise, the word Catholic became for de Lubac the main theme of all his theological speculation: to be a Christian means to be Catholic, means to be on one’s way to an all-embracing unity. Union is redemption, for it is the realization of our likeness to God, the Three-in-One. But union with him is, accordingly, inseparable from and a consequence of our own unity. (pp. 49-50; italics in original)

If Ratzinger is here reading de Lubac (with whom he no doubt agrees) correctly, then the privatization of the sacraments must be one of the most diabolical afflictions on church life because it spiritualizes and sanctions the very “split into individuality” which is a curse of original sin.

As I thought about these words I was reminded of an incident that made a deep impression on me several years ago, when I was serving as a Catholic campus missionary at the University of Illinois. In one of our team meetings, my colleague Mary Claire asked me in a gentle but direct tone: “Why do you and the other people here sit by yourselves when you go to a weekday Mass?” It had never occurred to me to be critical of my own preference to sit alone during the liturgy and I didn’t have an answer for Mary Claire that day (and brushed her question aside without much consideration) but the frank answer to the question would’ve been something like this: “Because for me, the Eucharist is where I, as an individual believer, encounter and receive Jesus Christ in the privacy of my own heart.”

At that point, the Eucharist held little communal significance in my mind, the “community” nonsense having become one of the signatures by which “the libs” were identified, along with their tell-tale omission of the definite article whenever they spoke of “Eucharist” (as in, “He gave me Eucharist”) and “Church” (as in, “We are Church”). Holy Communion was little more than the vehicle of grace by which I attained to my own sanctification and only indirectly allowed me to “bring Christ to others” by its fruits in my life. The liturgy was no “sacrament of the assembly” (again, that would’ve been classic “lib-talk” if you asked me then), and my own devotional practices made that clear. I went to Mass as an individual, received Communion as an individual, made my own thanksgiving prayer as an individual, and walked out of church as an individual. (I also recited the breviary as an individual, though it was good every and then to have company.)

This, it seems to me, is precisely “a Christianity concerned only with my soul, in which I seek only my justification before God, my saving grace, my entrance into heaven”. I might not have contributed to the rise of atheism but I was sure as heck propping it up.

The inherently communal—let’s say “ecclesial”—nature of the Eucharist is something I still struggle to appreciate and practice. Really, it was only when I started worshipping with the folks at Ss. Cyril and Methodius in Denver that I began to see that the Eucharist has something to do with “making” the Church.

What I think allowed that to happen was, first of all, the size of the congregation itself—basically made up of 25 people and often a few visitors. There was precious little anonymity or hiddenness at Ss. Cyril and Methodius (since one couldn’t really get away with sitting in the backmost pew without being publicly “invited” by Fr. Chrysostom to stand in front of the iconostasis). Everyone knew everyone.

Then there were the potluck lunches after each Sunday liturgy which, in many ways, was the highlight of my dining experience week after week. Not only was the food terrific—and it was pretty good even during the various fasts—, but the fellowship that took place during these meals was something that I’d never consistently experienced before in a parish context. (Going out to dinner with whoever of my friends happened to stick around after church on Sunday evenings paled in comparison.) The fellowship, like the meal, was an intentional commitment. We shared not only the food (which took some families all Sunday morning to make) but ideas, worries, funny stories and other “mundane” events from our week—you know, the stuff that “ordinary workaday life” is made of. Even more, we shared life during the week with phone calls, e-mails, and even a face-to-face meal or two sometimes. There were the bi-weekly lunches with Joel during which we talked about Chinese chess and Cyrillic Christology. One day, Fr. Chrysostom came by with some soy protein supplement because he thought I was unhealthily underweight.  One of my favorite memories of summers in Denver is going to Vespers with the Ruckhauses followed by a cold beer (or two) on their front porch before dinner.

These were the small things that instilled in me, little by little, an understanding of the sacramental life as a life of reconciliation and communion for the divided children of Adam. I didn’t learn that from reading de Lubac or Ratzinger or The Didache but by experience—by being welcomed into a real, living, breathing community of real, living, breathing people. Only then did it seem strange—even repulsive—to me that I had so often practiced the “commune and scatter” approach to the Eucharist.

I wondered this morning if I would’ve ever understood what Ratzinger meant by these words had I never met the people at Ss. Cyril and Methodius.

…[T]he Church is is not merely an external society of believers; by her nature, she is a liturgical community; she is most truly Church when she celebrates the Eucharist and makes present the redemptive love of Jesus Christ, which, as love, frees men from their loneliness and leads them to one another by leading them to God. (Principles of Catholic Theology, p. 50)

I don’t see how I could have.

Lent: Recollections

On Ash Wednesday, hundreds of students crammed into the otherwise-spacious St. John’s Catholic Chapel on the campus of the University of Illnois, forcing a group of us frustrated (and unabashedly self-righteous) “regular” weekday Mass-goers into the vestibule. Then the clear simplicity of the Gospel: “When you give alms…when you pray…when you fast…,” followed by the austere reminder of mortality, “Remember that you are dust.”

At the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception in Denver, the deacon on Good Friday lifting up the cross and chanting, “Behold the wood of the cross….” Somber, pulsating Gregorian chant (…quia per sanctam crucem tuam redemisti mundum!) kept in-pitch by a restrained pipe organ (which wasn’t usually so restrained!). Soup and bread at Sarah’s afterwards. My first time riding in a BMW!

Helping the servers change all the linens mid-service at the Vespers of Forgiveness. The church becoming suddenly dark—purple cloths, the haunting Lenten melodies. Prostrations that made my thighs sore the next day.

A dim-lit church at the Liturgy of the Presanctified Gifts. Beeswax candles and incense like burning roses. Psalm 103 and the stichera about St. Theodore the Recruit and the meat. “Why are we singing about meat when we just gave it up?” Sweet-bean-filled sesame pastries for the meal after.

My whole body shuddering at, “Now the Powers of Heaven do serve, invisibly with us do serve…,” preceding what is, till this day, my only memory of a silent moment in Byzantine services: the solemn procession of the Presanctified Gifts, with its blanket of quiet interrupted only by the soft clinking of the chains of the censer. Fr. Chrysostom muttering the cue, “Let us with faith and love draw near,” and then everyone jubilantly, “Let us with faith and love draw near and become communicants of life eternal!”

The “perfect wife” reading from Proverbs 31—not so much the reading itself, but our matushka and choir director, looking over to the choir, pointing to herself with a wry smile.

The wretched smell in church after John accidentally set his sister’s hair on fire (quickly put out after a spurt of panic from their mom)—the hazard of giving kids their own candles at the Panakhida. Keith insisting at choir practice that Father remember “Johnny” (Cash) during the service. The hope-filled mournfulness of Alleluia in the Eighth Tone.

My “novice” kolyva made from cracked wheat, decorated with almonds in the shape of a slightly-crooked Byzantine cross (Father’s doing) and…wait for it…shredded coconut (inculturation or adulteration?).

A four-hour long choir practice at the Franks on Great and Holy Wednesday, punctuated by a scrumptious lunch which Marica insisted “only took a few minutes” to make. “Is it wrong to eat delicious fasting foods during Lent?” Joel’s hearty laugh and Han’s erudition.

Soy milk. Lots of it.

2008

In no particular order, the top 10 things I learned/realized/was told in 2008:

1. The other Dan Craig is a brilliant a musician/songwriter from Colorado and has an album called Skin Grows Thin that just came out this year. I listened to it every day while driving to work last semester.

2. If you jump on the Facebook bandwagon everybody will find you—everybody from high school classmates to students to people you’ve only met once. All 242 (and counting) of them. And you’ll even do a little friend-scouting and stalking of your own.

3. Fr. John Behr is one kick-ass historian and theologian.

4. Pablo’s on 6th on the southwest corner of 6th and Washington in Denver makes the best Americano in Colorado and the world. Believe me: I’ve moved halfway across the world and it’s TRUE.

5. The more honest you are with yourself and others, the more you can love and let yourself be loved.

6. God isn’t fooled by the masks we put on even though we ourselves are.

7. Behind the wheel, most Malaysians are functionally Darwinian. Also, they don’t believe in concepts such as “lane” and “letting other people in”. Blinker? What blinker?

8. If you tell non-Christians you’re a Christian, they’ll expect Christian behavior from you.

9. These words which a wise friend wrote me after my mom died:

Each mother, like each human being, is unique, and one’s relationship with one’s mother is necessarily unique; but I think it is true to say that the loss of one’s mother is something none of us ever really gets over, even if we were to live for 200 years. For most of us, losing one’s mother changes the way we look at life and death; it is the door through which mortality really sinks in to us for the first time. The person through whom we were brought into life succumbs to death; one’s tie to the world of the living becomes strangely ambiguous, because so great a part of oneself is no longer there. At the same time, the confrontation with the reality of death is, I suspect, part of God’s will for each one of us. The medicine is very bitter, but it is given to us out of love, in God’s will to lead us out of what we are and into what he would have us be. It is part of the painful process by which we are made fit to enter into his kingdom, a communion with him in which all that we ever lost is found again.

10. Prostrating in prayer can change the way you look at God, yourself, the world. Seriously.

Stutter, memory

For the first time since I’ve been home, I went grocery shopping all by myself today. I had to drive to the gigantic mall nearby because that’s where the nearest grocery store is. Don’t ask why—it’s just the way it is.

Anyway, I was looking for ingredients to make pasta carbonara (one of the 7 meals in my culinary repertoire) and had trouble finding, of all things, pasta. I finally gave up and asked a girl in a smart gray uniform and navy blue vest.  She was moving boxes that didn’t look too heavy.

“Try Aisle 10,” she replied, pointing me a few aisles down.

I looked at the sign above Aisle 10. “WESTERN FOOD,” it said in large white letters.

Funny, because everything in King Soopers and Safeway in Denver was “Western food” and it went without saying. If you wanted jasmine rice, sesame seed oil or a good curry sauce you had to go to the “Asian/Mexican food” aisle to get it.

I couldn’t find the bacon either, until I stumbled upon a small store within the bigger store with a sign at the entrance that said: “NON-HALAL”. Inside, I found all kinds of things my Muslim friends would’ve deemed abominable: pork sausages, smoked bacon, non-smoked bacon, honey-roasted ham.

The salespeople on behind the display counter of unkosher delights gave me puzzled looks when I asked them how many grams there were in a pound. I practically burned my brains out trying to translate 1 lb. of bacon into damned metric grams until one of them (an alpha female of sorts, by my reckoning) finally said politely but sternly, “You get about 3 slices for every 100 grams, but we have no idea what a pound is.” I picked up 600 grams of it because I remembered that 1 kilogram = 2.2 lbs. = 1000 grams. Or something like that.

I put the package neatly in the corner of my green basket and when I got to the real counter where I checked out all my other items, I was mindful to take the already-paid-for package of bacon out so it wouldn’t accidentally render unclean the Muslim boy sacking my groceries. Something about the whole process made me feel a bit sheepish for buying a pork product.

Later, at the barber’s near my house, I found myself staring at a picture of Ganesh while the barber, a man from India in his late 30’s, hovered a pair of unstoppable scissors and a large white comb over my head. I marvelled at his blue skin and elephant head—Ganesh’s, that is, not my barber’s—and tried to recall the story one of my Hindu students told in my World Religions class last semester about how he (Ganesh, again) lost his human head and got replaced with an elephant one instead.

My attempt at remembering was interrupted by a new thump-thump beat exploding from a small radio on the shelf. The song made me think of OneRepublic and that ubiquitous song they used to play at Rude gym off Federal Boulevard in Denver. It’s too late to apologize, it’s too laaaate…. Except it wasn’t that song exactly. Plus it was in Tamil.

Just then a man came into the shop with two small children. Conversation between him and my anonymous (to me, at least) barber took place in reams of unfurling Tamil syllables, at the end of which the man turned to his son and said, “Wait here. I have to go home and get some money.” The toddler obediently sat down and looked at my barber with some measure of awe at the unrelenting scissors still grazing off my hair at the edge of the white comb. His dad took his sister by the hand and walked out. It made me happy to live in a country where, in some places at least, you could still trust a barber to watch your kid for a bit.

Then I got to thinking what I was doing this time last year, when 2007 was coming to an end.

I remember a fantastic Christmas-octave dinner (of fish, I’m quite sure) at Brian and Sarah’s during which we finished a bottle of wine, which undoubtedly caused me to doze off while we were watching Elf afterwards. I remember the fireplace and the crackling fire that was really just their last starter log because they’d run out of real firewood. I (vaguely) remember Brian giving me a blanket to keep me warm since I was already crashed out on their couch, and I remember waking up in the middle of the night on that couch in their living room and being comforted by the warm glow of lights on the Christmas tree and a luminous moon pouring in through the east window.

I remember waking up the next morning to the smell of coffee which Sarah had made, a light breakfast afterwards, and driving home happy about this: though none of us had stayed up late enough to greet the new year (we were all in bed by 11!), I’d started it off in good company.