It was August 8th, the evening of the “Interfaith Conversations Dinner” at the Pacifica Institute Community Center. The guest speaker was Fr. Cyprian Consiglio, who is a gifted musician, composer, writer, teacher and a monk from the Camaldolese Congregation
Two hours before the anticipated event, the phone rang and a warm voice on the other end asked: “Dostum, are you coming tonight?” It was a friendly reminder call about the event. The caller is more than a friend to me. Actually, “Dostum” in Turkish translates to a special someone, a friend you can share deeper experiences with in life and spiritually. Frankly, I had no idea what to expect from the evening. Thinking this might be an interesting experience, I got dressed considering what to wear or not to wear, too formal or informal and it was getting late. When I arrived, cheerful greeters at the door had me wear a name tag. Seeing the smiling faces of the greeters calmed me before entering a room full of people whom I had never met. Upon entering the room I spotted one of my friends and sat down. Looking through the crowd, I tried to guess who might be the guest speaker. On the opposite end of the table, there was a middle aged man with a medium built. He was dressed very humble with a white-beige shirt, and had an unexplained glow on his face. This was the person I had been anxiously waiting to see for the past four weeks.
Fr. Consiglio shared his spiritual insights regarding his journey to God, his understanding of Islam, and his mystic music after a simple dinner. The title of his talk, which is also the title of a book about Buddhist Christian religions, was “The Ground We Share”. According to him, every person has a mystic relationship with God. The source and the heart of each religion is this mystic experience, and we want to pass it on to others through dance and music. Yet, this personal experience changes during that transition. Thus, the ultimate tradition is different for each person, and this difference is so beautiful and interesting.
While we are living our own ultimate reality, we want to understand how others experience it. This could be accomplished by traveling through the center. In other words, we travel through the center by understanding our own depth in mystical experience. As we go deeper to the center, we converge. As we go shallow on the surface, we diverge. All the religions are undergoing the most radical, far-reaching transformation in history, and we are entering into a whole new era, the second axial period: a global network and a global spiritual community, in contrast to individual spirituality which was the highlight of first axial period. This is why we need dialogue more than ever which makes sense to me. I wanted him to talk more and more. I could not believe how he and I share the same core values and still we are so different in our personal experiences. I thought how well he verbalized the very intricate concept of spirituality so that the others could also resonate with him. I could sit there and listen to him all night.
Fr. Consiglio also shared some concepts that he learned from Islam, like the “99 Beautiful Names of Allah” and an anecdote. In one of his trips, he coincidentally met a Muslim man from Lebanon who was not aware of the utterance of 99 names of Allah, and eventually learned all about it from Fr. Consiglio.
In addition to being the prominent speaker of the evening, Fr. Consiglio was also a pleasant singer. He was accompanied by his friends, his guitar, and my untrained voice. Music really does bring people together.
After the presentation, there was some time allotted for questions and chitchat with others. Although I did not have a chance to approach him and get to know him better, I met some of the other wonderful people in the room. The volunteers at Pacifica Institute are doing their best to bring together the community and whole-heartedly trying to shed a little light in the darkness.
Before going home, I approached my friend and asked “Dostum, when is the next event?” She didn’t know, however, I will definitely stay tuned for more “Interfaith Conversations”.