Word: prayers
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...again, coursing through the city streets in a solid stream of red and orange, like blood vessels giving life to an oxygen-starved body. Their effect on Rangoon's residents is electrifying. At first, only a few brave onlookers applaud. Others clasp their hands together in respectful prayer or quietly weep. Then, as people grow bolder, the monks are joined by tens of thousands of Burmese, some chanting their own mantra, in English: "Democracy! Democracy...
...that matter, without controversy. Consider St. Antonio de Sant'Anna Galvao, whom Pope Benedict XVI canonized last December. Galvao, who died in 1822 (he was on the slow track) was a Franciscan monk in Sao Paolo who distributed "pills" that were actually folded bits of rice paper bearing the prayer: "After birth, the Virgin remained intact. Mother of God, intercede on our behalf." Believers swallowed them for various ailments. After Galvao's death, nuns in his monastery took up the pill production. According to England's Daily Telegraph, as his cause for sainthood began picking up steam, they were...
Reams have been written on the differences between Islamic and Western societies, but for sheer pithiness, it's hard to beat a quip by my former colleague, a Pakistani scholar of Islamic studies. I'd strolled into his office one day to find him on the floor, at prayer. I left, shutting his door, mortified. Later, he cheerfully batted my apologies away. "That's the big difference between us," he shrugged. "You Westerners make love in public and pray in private. We Muslims do exactly the reverse...
...question: what's decent to do in public? Display your sexuality, or your faith? The French have no problem with bare breasts on billboards and TV, but big problems with hijab-covered heads in public schools and government offices. Many Muslims feel just the opposite. For most Europeans, prayer is something best done in private, a matter for individual souls rather than state institutions. In the Islamic world, religion is out of the closet: on the streets, chanted five times daily from minarets, enshrined in constitutions, party platforms and penal codes. Sexual matters, however, are kept discreet...
Maung welcomed supporters in front of the John Harvard statue, which had been adorned with a Burmese flag and a picture of Buddha. Two Buddhist nuns began the rally with a prayer and then led students out into Harvard Square...