The prophet Moses withdrew for forty days on Mount Sinai. The prophet Jesus Christ withdrew to the desert for forty days. The prophet Muhammed withdrew to the cave on Mount Hira. The echo of these revelatory encounters resonates in the Sufi discipline associated with the cilehane, the withdrawal usually when one reaches the age when the prophet Muhammad’s life came to an end, a forty days seclusion with olives appointed for nourishment for each day, silence, fasting, prayer and contemplation, a time to nourish one’s soul (nafs) to taste the rich flavours of divine presence. Jews, Christians and Muslims alike set aside a portion of each say and each year in remembrance, a focused discipline where the rhythm of the days and nights invite the depth of the soul to surface and the breath of God to be one’s “all in all.”
Over the last year virtually all of the human family has been in the grip of a pandemic. Large populations have been encouraged to isolate, live under curfew, wear masks in public and socially distance, all as an expression of solidarity with their neighbours. “Stay together by staying apart” has become a clarion call.
David Goa focuses on deepening the capacity of the faithful to think through the gifts of their traditions: the spiritual life, the theological traditions and our responsibility to the public world.
