I'm not Catholic, but I've long had a fascination with the Roman church, not unmixed with a habit of criticizing its excesses, oversights, and material appetites.
In the last days, I've been moved by what I've seen at the Vatican as it gets a chance to get back to basics. Though I disagree with the Pontiff on many issues, in retrospect I find his immense compassion and dedication to his principles a profound essence of sainthood. In contrast, Maharishi looks plastic and superficial. It is easy to say that Maharishi has "infinite compassion" for the plight of the world, but it is all SOOOO self-centered and has been at the expense of simple, direct compassion for the huge number of people he has used up and spit out, a process now reaching a crescendo. I agree with Rick that Maharishi is an extraordinary man in myriad ways, a "volcano" of creativity. At the same time, his greatness includes so many holes, each of which has a commonality in the absence of the very kind of pure holiness and heartfulness that John Paul II embodied. Given the emerging redefinition of who Maharishi is as a man, including allegations of womanizing and enabling his family to swallow donations voraciously, and the opportunity we have to review the Pope's life in this week's concentrated overview, the question comes up: Is it necessary to be enlightened to be a "saint," and is it necessary to be a "saint" to be enlightened? I would say that Maharishi is enlightened but not so much a saint upon deep examination. John Paul II was a saint but probably not enlightened in the sense that most of us on this list have some similar understanding of. Which do I want more to be myself? Probably the latter. I prefer the human-scale and approachable spirituality of a man who kisses the ground in each of over one hundred countries that he visits, even if he lives in the age of Kali, to the grandiose and self-absorbed spirituality of a man who expects the ground to kiss his feet. When Maharishi dies, I don't think he'll get more than a small AP paragraph that will show up in Section F of your local newspaper, next to the latest story about Britney's fifth husband. "The Joke's Over for Beatles' Giggling Guru" And I don't think that that's just because world consciousness is low and "undeserving" of appreciating his greatness. He truly hasn't earned the honor, for all of his accomplishments, because his heart has not been right. In the wonderful film from the '70s "Sage of a New Generation," Maharishi is asked at the end how he would like to be remembered. Maharishi, in one of his best moments, looks quite surprised by the question and gives a long pause. He says softly, "I do not wish to be remembered." The feeling in that vignette and the man he's since become are separated by such a gargantuan gap that I cannot help but wonder if that loss of humility is itself the principal reason that Maharishi has been so much of a failure in achieving his life goals. It kind of surprises me that no one has examined this obvious theme on FFL. Perhaps participants prefer to spend their time discussing how many angels can give head on a pin. To subscribe, send a message to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Or go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/FairfieldLife/ and click 'Join This Group!' Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/FairfieldLife/ <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
