Alok Mukherjee, The Way I See It

World Interfaith Harmony Week, February 1-7, 2024

City of Toronto Webinar on “Harmony in Action”

February 7, 2024

Text of My Remarks

Thank you for inviting me to participate in this important and timely conversation. I am honoured and humbled to be in this distinguished company.

I must confess to you that for several years now, my heart has not been at ease. Like so many others around the world, I am perplexed, afraid and deeply stressed by the state of our world. Global pandemic, unprecedented inequality, growing destitution, food insecurity, environmental emergency, mass displacement, suppression of the rights of Indigenous peoples and of religious, racial and ethnic minorities and, of course, deadly conflicts within and among nations characterize the world as never before. The climate of hatred, suspicion and violence brings to mind the lines from the wonderful 1920 poem by the Irish poet, William Butler Yeats, titled “The Second Coming.”

Turning and turning in the widening gyre

The falcon cannot hear the falconer;

Things fall apart; the center cannot hold;

Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,

The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere

The ceremony of innocence is drowned;

The best lack all conviction, while the worst

Are full of passionate intensity.

And the next lines are, “Surely, some revelation is at hand / Surely the Second Coming is at hand.”

But I am also reminded of the simple but intense poem, “Fire and Ice,” by the great New England poet, Robert Frost. He wrote it in 1923, slightly over 100 years ago, and just three years after Yeats’s poem.

Some say the world will end in fire,

Some say in ice.

From what I’ve tasted of desire

I hold with those who favor fire.

But if it had to perish twice,

I think I know enough of hate

To say for destruction ice

Is also great

And would suffice.

Writing in the wake of the devastation of World War I, these poets were expressing the kind of hopelessness and the yearning for some force that brings peace, order and harmony that I feel today.

But thinking of the state we find ourselves in from the perspective of inter-faith harmony, I am reminded of the words Swami Vivekananda spoke at the first World Parliament of Religions, held in Chicago on September 11, 1893, a little over 130 years ago. He was then a 30-year old rather unknown Hindu monk from Bengal.

Swami Vivekananda opened his very brief remarks with the words, “Sisters and Brothers of America.” According to contemporary news reports, the audience reacted with a long applause. By those simple words, Vivekananda was conveying something profound, something that is in short supply today when the world is busy othering anyone we don’t like or want.

We are a human family, “sisters and brothers,” no matter if we agree on all counts. It is a way of thinking that faith leaders, more than anyone else, have an obligation to repeat.

I would like to repeat some more of what this 30-year old monk said to this august assembly in Chicago.

Sectarianism, bigotry, and its horrible descen­dant, fanaticism, have long possessed this beautiful earth. They have filled the earth with vio­lence, drenched it often and often with human blood, destroyed civilization and sent whole nations to despair. Had it not been for these horrible demons, human society would be far more advanced than it is now. But their time is come; and I fervently hope that the bell that tolled this morning in honor of this convention may be the death-knell of all fanaticism, of all persecutions with the sword or with the pen, and of all uncharitable feelings between persons wending their way to the same goal.

Young Swami Vivekananda’s words and hopes of over a hundred years ago are, sadly, an accurate description of what we are facing today. The “death-knell of all fanaticism, of all persecutions . . ., and of all uncharitable feelings” that he hoped for then has, sadly, not come to pass. Nor has Yeats’s hoped for “Second Coming.”

I believe, all the same, that we here have been fortunate. Toronto has an enviable history of people from just about every faith in the world living more or less harmoniously. Many of us work as well as socialize and celebrate with one another; our children learn and make friends with their counterparts from across communities. I know faith leaders who care for and tend to the concerns of the suffering, the destitute and the distraught in their neighbourhoods regardless of who they are.

Yet, I am concerned about the signs that this harmony and amity can be fragile, unless tended to and nurtured. Not by coercive means using the heavy hand of the criminal justice system, but through constant effort at the community-level by us as individuals, by our faith leaders and organizations working within their followers and collectively, and by our public institutions.

As individuals, we must be intentional in reaching out, making friends and building relationships across faiths. Difference must not be a divide, but a bridge.  We must strive continuously to learn about and understand the causes of each other’s fears, anxieties and pain; we need empathy, not, to use Swami Vivekananda’s words, “sectarianism, bigotry, and its horrible descendant, fanaticism.” None of this happens on its own, but through deliberate effort.

And this is where our faith leaders can help us. We look to them for guidance, support and example. The need today is for visible collective leadership.  Communities are desperate for hope and reassurance. We need constant and repeated messages promoting mutual understanding, tolerance and sharing the other’s pain. Our faith leaders must provide such support within their own congregations and communities, and they must work together publicly and actively to counter and resist the negative forces of hate and intolerance throughout the broader community.

Our public institutions, too, have a critical responsibility in this regard, be they governments, providers of education, health care, social or community services, or responsible for community safety. By their words and action, they can divide us, sow discord and suspicion among us, treat us differently. Individually and as institutions, they must weigh carefully the consequences of what they say and do. They must make sure that their words and deeds are solidly grounded in a bedrock of respect for the human rights and Charter rights of all, regardless of race, ethnicity, nationality, creed and belief. They must be aware not only of the intent behind what they say or do, but also the impact. As we know, it is important to pay attention to the impact of conscious as well as unconscious actions. Further, these actions must be based on verifiable facts and evidence. I regret that there have been, and continue to be, instances where such deliberation has been absent.

Perhaps, our city could consider a Mayor’s Interfaith Table that works regularly with our city institutions to ensure that we continue to be the city where diversity is, indeed, our strength.  

We have a responsibility to take such and other steps in response to these perilous times. Swami Vivekananda’s brief but powerful words to the First World Parliament of Religions some 130 years ago were never more relevant than now.  But I am also reminded of the amazing poem by the great African American poet, Langston Hughes, from the 1950s, called “A Dream Deferred.” I would like to close with it as a caution against the risk of doing nothing.

What happens to a dream deferred?

      Does it dry up

      like a raisin in the sun?

      Or fester like a sore—

      And then run?

      Does it stink like rotten meat?

      Or crust and sugar over—

      like a syrupy sweet?

      Maybe it just sags

      like a heavy load.

      Or does it explode?

Thank you.