The Haj

  We returned to the home of Bandiya and her husband this week to welcome them back from their 25-day pilgrimage to Mecca and their performance of one of the five great "pillars" of Islam, the Haj.  It is every Muslim's duty, at least once in a lifetime, if they are financially and physically able, to go on pilgrimage to Mecca and there perform the sacred rituals that recall primarily moments in the life of Abraham.  Here in Indonesia, this obligation is taken very seriously, and neither distance nor finances seem to be obstacles.  Just as before, at the Slametan that sent them off on their journey, we were greeted and sat, the women in one room, the men in the other.  Bandiya made herself available to me, the foreigner, as she came in (obviously exhausted from the trip and a flu she had caught while there) and sat down on the floor in front of me, allowing me to ask whatever questions I might find appropriate.  Of course, it was hard to think of the most important ones.  I asked her what were her greatest spiritual experiences on the Haj, and she replied, "the prayer."  When I asked if she thought it would change her life, she nodded vigorously.  What was even more moving began shortly afterward, when both women and men, excluding Bob and me, gathered in the next room, while Bandiya's husband led the chants from the Qur'an, and broke down in tears continually as he clearly opened his heart to God and the tears just flowed.  We are told that many people cry at Mecca, and that they are very conscious of their sins there, and perhaps this was part of it, but I can't help thinking there was this sheer love for Allah pouring out of him as well. 

  Many people save their whole lives here not to buy a new car or renovate their homes, but to go on the Haj.  That is the kind of piety and single-minded devotion we see often in the Muslims we meet here.  When I try to think of what counts as sacred places of pilgrimage for us Christians at this point in our shared but diverse history, I see it as far less important.  I did tell them about Lourdes and Fatima and even Medjugorje, but so many Christians and even Catholics ignore these places.  The whole idea of pilgrimage, that these are places where we touch God, where heaven and earth meet, is disappearing from our sensibility of what it means to be religious.  May it not be replaced by mall-hopping!