Reflections

“And Pooh said to Piglet: ‘Life is so much friendlier with two.’ – courtesy of AA Milne.We all need friends. I have 520 of them. Many of them write prolifically to me in Bahasa Indonesian, a language of which I don’t speak a word. Of course, these are ‘’Facebook’’ friends, a relatively new concept in friendship where we publicly accumulate quantities of friends with the quick click of a mouse.

In Alice in Wonderland, the White Rabbit memorably sings: ‘’I’m late / I’m late / For a very important date. / No time to say “Hello, Goodbye”. / I’m late, I’m late, I’m late’’

In just the first four months of 2011, Japan experienced an earthquake and tsunami; New Zealand suffered an earthquake, and China endured a devasting hailstorm. Flash floods swept through parts of Australia, mudslides wreaked devastation in Brazil, and tornadoes rampaged through Iowa in the US. But for many of us, these countries are far away – surely, nothing can ever happen to us.

One of the enduring images of the UK’s recent riots must be the looters queuing to try on stolen trainers for the right size. The riots that were sparked off by a sense of injustice quickly spiralled into a frenzy of destruction and consumerism. Shops that were targeted were those that sold those ‘must-have’ items – mobile phones, fashionable clothes, the latest trainers, flat-screen TVs. Descartes is best known for his philosophical saying: ‘I think therefore I am’ – yet one report on the riots suggests the UK advertising and marketing industries are far more intent on pushing a rather more commercial message: ‘I buy, therefore I am’.

It is Ramadan again: the month to take our level of spirituality to a higher level; the month to make time for extra remembrance of God; the month to complete extra Quran reading; and – of course – the month to perform extra prayers alone and with others, at home or in the mosque.

I have taught in madrasahs for 10 years. But for years I could not bring myself to call it a ‘madrasah’. For me – and for so much of wider British society – that word conjured up too many negative images.

There has been much fascination with the recent conversion to Islam of Lauren Booth, Tony Blair’s sister-in-law.

The media and public alike seemed to delight this summer in an election debacle involving Gordon Brown, the outgoing UK Prime Minister.

It was time for the Christmas carol concert at the children’s new school. After the young pupils performed a rousing rendition of ‘Jingle Bells’ and other classics, a van drove up into the school grounds, driven by a rather large man in a red outfit. My heart sank.

“I must not fear. Fear is the mind-killer. Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration. I will face my fear. I will permit it to pass over me and through me. And when it has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path. Where the fear has gone there will be nothing. Only I will remain.” Frank Herbert, Dune, “Litany Against Fear”, 1965