How was your childhood? We know that you have entered Jesuits school at the age of 7 but had a question toward religion at one time in your life. Would you please tell us about the question and the pain you had?
My family was very strict and my father sent me to the Jesuit school so that I could have real discipline. The chains of rigor were so heavy throughout my youth that very quickly I started to doubt this religion that showed no mercy, only constraint and suffering. I remember being obliged to attend mess and the constant threats of hell in the mouth of the priests. Everything was sin, everything was forbidden, joy was ruled out.
I think that my rebellion was what saved me: I doubted about Catholicism, and felt that I must try something new. Later on, in my teenager years, I became a hippie. During this time, I traveled a lot, met people of different backgrounds, and had learnt different paths to come closer to spirituality. I started to see other paths and started to see that my own religion wasn’t restricted to the Jesuit perception.
After I did a pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela, I returned to the Catholic faith – just because it is in my blood, not because it is the best religion. I don’t think you can put God in a church. God is everywhere. All religions have advantages and disadvantages. God is–as William Blake said–in a grain of sand and in a flower. This energy is everywhere.
It is in my own rebellion I found freedom…to think for myself!
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Good Morning all, wanted to share -
One sunny day in 2009 an old man approached the White House from across Pennsylvania Avenue, where he’d been sitting on a park bench.
He spoke to the U.S. Marine standing guard and said, ‘I would like to go in and meet with President Bush.’
The Marine looked at the man and said, ‘Sir, Mr. Bush is no longer president and no longer resides here.’
The old man said, ‘Okay’ and walked away.
The following day, the same man approached the White House and said to the same Marine, ‘I would like to go in and meet with President Bush.’
The Marine again told the man, ‘Sir, as I said yesterday, Mr. Bush is no longer president and no longer resides here.’
The man thanked him and, again, just walked away.
The third day, the same man approached the White House and spoke to the very same U.S. Marine, saying ‘I would like to go in and meet with President Bush.’
The Marine, understandably agitated at this point, looked at the man and said, ‘Sir, this is the third day in a row you have been here asking to speak to Mr. Bush.
I’ve told you already that Mr. Bush is no longer the president and no longer resides here.
Don’t you understand?’
The old man looked at the Marine and said, ‘Oh, I understand.
I just love hearing it.’
The Marine snapped to attention, saluted, and said, ‘See you tomorrow.’
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Dear Nelson D’Silva:
I would only accept the invitation if the digit they added were the symbol for infinity…only if you and everyone else could go too. Eternity would be very long, too long, sitting on a cloud all day, eating grapes alone; and Heaven would quickly become a boring place with no one to talk to but “perfect” people.
Thanks for your support.
Savita
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Hi,
I completely agree that GOD is everywhere. I have experienced him in the worst of my times but only when I really showed faith and surrendered. I cannot say I have mastered the act of surrendering myself always when I am in pain as all human beings I first suffer and feel the pain and then realise that I have a special power the Power of Faith..
I am a Hindu and my religion has got ages of wisdom.. but what we are made to follow is completely modified according to the beliefs of the people who have passed us the legacy and their desire to feel more important… Even though I find solace in chanting of the mantras but after a few of the experiences that I have had in life I feel much closer to GOD everywhere whenever I need him..
And I feel that people have restricted their views about religion and they are missing out on a lot.. in real escence GOD is love…
which is what I have also found when I read your books and that is why all of your books are really close to my heart..
some of them have also acted as GOD’s instruments in showing me hope or sometimes even the right path to follow..
I am currently reading BRIDA and I am really amazed.. the book is a true gift to all your readers.. I have a lot of questios which I want to ask you about Magic.. but a space in the blog is a very passive way of communicating.. I would really love to talk to you someday but I understand that you are a ver important man and have quite a huge fan following..
I just wish to GOD that he gives me an opportunity to be able to ask you All of my questions get the answers to them…
Love
Payal
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Accidentally a lot of good things happen Savita; maybe they will add another digit to 144,000 to accommodate you. Thank you for sharing your thoughts and experiences.
Bye,
Nelson
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I remember as a child in elementary school, many children, myself included, being quite literally tormented by concepts of Heaven and Hell that were thrust upon us by the adults in our lives. Many of the families who lived in the area and sent their children to this small school were Pentecostal. I still remember several of my friends coming to school in tears, virtually hysterical, because of a film they had been forced to watch the night before at church, a film which, apparently, depicted quite graphically a burning Hell and the sinners, adults and children alike, who were thrust into it. These children who had been made to watch this film were beside themselves with terror. For them, what they had seen was real. And rather than explain to them that it was “just a film,” the parents and the preacher had obviously used this film, intentionally, to terrify these children and instill in them a fear of this Hell of fire and brimstone. In my recollection, this incident - which is just one example but was not at all an isolated or singular incident - stands out in my mind as a very clear example of child abuse, though the adults who were the perpetrators of this abuse would surely have defended their right to terrorize and thereby brainwash these children in this way.
As for myself, I was more perplexed, and I suppose you could say “traumatized” by the notion of Heaven and my chances of entry into it. My mother was a Jehova’s Witness, so she didn’t believe in a literal Hell. Their idea is that sinners, when they die, simply die, both body and soul - Hell is the grave. Heaven, however, he did believe in. The catch being, however, that not all “good” souls are allowed into Heaven. The Heaven of the Jehova’s Witnesses is apparently a small Heaven, where only 144,000 lucky souls are fortunate enough to be let in. I knew this as I had been told it by my mom, but somehow the concept of it just never quite lodged in my consciousness of the world. I always wondered who these 144,000 were, and what wrong I had done that I could never be counted among them.
I remember once, some sort of annual feast at my mother’s church. It must have been in the spring time, because I remember the long white folding tables set up in rows on the green lawn. We were all dressed in our very best, and after the service was finished, we migrated out to the lawn to take our places at the tables where the feast was to be served. For some reeason, my mom and I were seated very near the head of the table where the preacher (or whatever they all them) sat. The first thing that was passed down the table in our direction was a small platter which held a small loaf of bread and a glass of what to me, at my young age, must have looked like blackberry Koolaide (a drink for kids). In reality, of course, it was the bread and the wine which were the body of Christ. Now, to better understand the nature of my offense, one must also know that in this religion, throughout all of history, the ONLY indviduals who are allowed to partake of this bread and wine are the 144,000 bound for Heaven. The rest are to let it pass them by. I was apparently either too young or too hungry to adequately grasp this, as when the small platter came before me, I reached out and grabbed both a morsel of the boken bread and the glass of wine. My mother was busy talking to the preacher’s wife across the table, and before she could take notice, I had already taken a bite of the bread and washed it down with an ample gulp of this thick red juice that burned my throat. The lady across from me gasped, which brought my mother’s attention to my tresspass. At that, she swept me up from the table so fast that knocked over the folding chair that I had been sitting in and dumped the remaining wine in the lap of the woman next to me. Tough she didn’t speak a word until we arrived at our car, and though I had no real concept of what I had done wrong, my mother’s fingerrnails were biting into my wrist so deeply that I knew, whatever my crime, it was surely a serious one.
We never even returned to the table for the feast that was to come. My mother was, as she hastily informed me, so “ashamed” that she could not bear to show her face in front of those people. I had, after all, committed the worst offense imaginable: I, as a child, had eaten of the bread and tasted of the wine which is reserved only for those blessed 144,000 who are, from birth, destined to inhabit the halls of Heaven above. I remember asking her - a feeble attempt at self defense - how these 144,000 were to be recognized: how would the rest of the congregation know if one of these rare individuals stood among them? She wasn’t sure, but she WAS sure that I was not one of them - whatever my future held in store, I was NOT BOUND FOR HEAVEN.
The lucky thing about this event is that it served for me as the door of my escape. Never again after that did my mother awaken me early in the morning and force me to accompany her to church. From that day forth, she went alone, and I…? I stayed at home with the ranch hands and my dad, who is (if his beliefs are to be labelled at all as “religion”) primarily Pagan. Thus, due to my great offense, I was allowed to grow up wild and free as the birds, spending my Sunday mornings not in church but the forest and the creek bottoms of Southeast Texas, roaming about, alone but for the spirits that inhabited the waterways, the trees and the animals.
Much love!
And thank you, dear Paulo Coelho, for sharing your experiences with us, even the less than pleasant ones.
Savita
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God is always present .Blessings Tania
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God is Love. He is inside us and we are inside Him. In every human being there is the divine spark.
Religions are different expressions of the same truth. Since ancient times humans looked up to the Sky for answers. We all have a small piece of the Truth. We are all seekers of the Truth. Fanatism is that destroys the Good Path and the tender souls of children.
I have just listened to ‘Zorbas the Greek’ in the Blog!! The music is by Mikis Theodorakis for the film based on the book by Nicos Kazanzakis, by the Cypriot-Limassol director Michalis Kakoyiannis and the Bouzouki player is Costas Papadopoulos.
LOVE,
THELMA
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love & love
god will help us… amen
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I didn’t grow up with a religion. Or should I rather say, the only religion I knew was what rituals to perform on Christmas and Easter, which I as child hated, because I was forced to do something that I thought was silly. My poor parents, I gave them a lot of grief. :o)
As a teenager I felt the urge to go on a quest. As we know, who seeks finds. And when the student is ready, the master appears. I found my religion in the one word that is engraved in my heart. The word I live for.
Savita Vega,
regarding people make war over their beliefs,
I think people are reality dreamers or sleep walkers and don’t understand who they really are defending with their actions. According to Eckhart Tolle’s ‘A New Earth’, people defend what they believe the reason for their life is, their ego. The problem is the ‘I’. The identification with something. To make a change in this world requires a lot of responsibility, responsibility for ones actions. That is achieved by beeing aware/conscious.
If a sleep walker caused a massive car accident, would we blame him like we would if he was drunk? I think we would find an excuse and milden the verdict due to his ‘illness’. If he would have been conscious about his actions and still violated a rule, by drinking and driving (or killing because of anger and other believes), he would receive a greater punishment.
Ignorance is no excuse but it helps us get away easier.
In that case wouldn’t we want to hold on to our ‘illness’ as the punishment hurts less than if we could be held fully responsible for our actions? And that’s why people rely on the law (government, religion, tradition etc.), due to loss of contact with their inner nature, with sentual intelligence.
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It is so refreshing to hear someone who has strong religious beliefs express those beliefs without any apparent aspiration to impose them on others. In other words, I have great respect for you, Paulo Coelho, in that you hold to the Catholic faith and yet do not seem to feel any need to declare it the “only way” to know God. If only all followers of every faith could be so tolerant, what a wonderful world this would be! It seems that, most often, I meet people who fall into one or the other or two categories: either they have lost their faith and follow no spiritual path at all, or they cling to a specific set of beliefs and declare that doctrine to be the one and only “truth” in all the world. For me, I cannot see why people feel the need to argue, or to make war, over their beliefs. Why can they not simply express themselves without feeling compelled to impose those beliefs on others? And why do they feel so threatened when others’ beliefs are different from their own? It just seems to me that the world, and the great Mystery that is God, is large enough to contain and be equally truthfully defined by all.
Truly, your tolerance coupled with your enthusiasm for the spiritual quest is a rare thing indeed. What better qualities for a true peacemaker to have!
Thank you for sharing your views with us, as well as encouraging us, here on this blog, to share with one another. Such exercises in tolerance are a great boon to the world.
Sincerely,
Savita Vega
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It is in my own rebellion I found freedom…to think for myself!
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I agree. and what’s most important you can feel God (or the devine) always when you don’t expect.
I had exactly the same experiences in my childhood about religion. but in my life, after another kind of “strong” experience, I came to the same conclusions.
Anyway, during my own road to Israel many years ago, I could feel the presence of God in the Negev desert, particulary in the fortress o f Masada ad in the rocks of Avdat.
Not in Jerusalem, where people fight fot their own religions, but in the silence of the desert, where the voice of God can be heard thrugh the silence.
Have a nice day
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I am very sorry for the pains and hurts you and anybody have gone through growing up. Rather than concluding this has to do with a certain Jesuits spirituality or Catholic faith, I believe it is something human beings in all categories everywhere willingly or unwillingly do. We have ideas about upbringing, and mistakes are done in all cultures and beliefs, by all parents and teachers. It doesn’t mean we can develop on our own, without this well meaning guidance. Look at street children growing up with minimal adult contact. They turn out rougher and more mentally hurt than anybody. No?
For me Church should be the Holy Spirit incarnated. Myself, I no doubt meet God in the Church, and also outside the Church.
I noticed in ‘Veronica decides to die’ it’s mentioned how the worse sin man can commit is to impose a sexual relationship with a minor. I agree. This abuse ruins a person for life, and in my present position, I have talked to countless women and men, who has been exposed to this horror, whether it be Catholics or non-Catholics.
Time might not heal all wounds, but religion, Church, faith keeps blossoming, and we are all responsible to create a reality, a good childhood, we would want our children to receive, probably the best gift life can give us. Every human being is a temple filled with what the Lord gives us, to give on to others.
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