St Francis of Assisi: a saint for our times

St Francis of Assisi: a saint for our times
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/belief/2011/jun/09/saint-francis-assisi 


The message of St Francis was uncompromising and simple: greed causes suffering for both the victims and the perpetrators

We are living through cuts to services and benefits that will disproportionately affect the poor. We have also seen a hysterical response to protest and dissent from some sections of society. Concern for the poor is a central theme in the life of St Francis of Assisi. He is a saint for our time, because he stands in a tradition of powerful demands for social justice. The problems he confronted head-on are all the problems we are grappling with right now: involvement in wars, poverty, corruption in high places, social exclusion and the wealth-poverty gap.

St Francis lived as one of the poorest and lowest in society, and worked as a day labourer. This was hard, menial, low-paid work, yet he never passed a collection plate when he preached, nor asked the public for money.

His life and message were uncompromising and simple: greed causes suffering for both the victims and the perpetrators. St Francis's views about the perpetrators are relevant as bankers award themselves enormous undeserved bonuses, while others suffer. The indifference of the greedy and their hatred of the poor hurts the rich, too: St Francis believed living with that sort of attitude was morally, socially and spiritually destructive.

Another problem St Francis grappled with was war. The people around him kept telling him he was mad to go single-handedly to stop the crusades. However, he got there and made a deep impression on the Muslim leaders, who, unusually, just let him go. Is it a hero or a madman who'd go to Afghanistan and try to stop the war there?

St Francis had no respect for people in high places, and when he walked to Rome and finally saw what the Vatican was like, he exploded. He publicly criticised the greed, wealth, power, venality, worldliness, corruption and emptiness of it all. Pope Innocent III could hardly believe his ears. Nobody had ever spoken to him like that, and here was this poor "nobody" telling him that the church was against Christ. St Francis was jailed for this outburst, but in the end the pope let him go. I suspect there are a number of people who would like to say this sort of thing to Pope Benedict today. In our own time, we see a similar problem with criticism at the seat of power and protest outside parliament, and might think of Brian Haw in this context.

St Francis's famous naked protest at the beginning of his ministry was especially forceful because his father was a cloth merchant, importing luxury fabrics. This initial naked protest was followed by further occasions of stripping off, in order to give his clothes to people poorer than himself. For St Francis, nakedness was not degrading, and he challenges us to look at ourselves as we gaze upon the naked and the hungry as we turn our backs on them.

He also played a proto guitar, which was an instrument some ecclesiastical authorities had condemned. He played his own songs and compositions and encouraged others to play this instrument to his famous Hymn to Brother Sun, which declares how our lives are all dependent on a common cause: our earth and the sun.

St Francis offers a vision of a different world, where we share more equally the abundant wealth of goods and life itself as we focus on the right relations to the earth and all our fellow creatures. His pantheist language, scruffy clothes and campaign for social justice are a good antidote to the toxic God images, body images and religious deification of wealth we struggle with today.

les riches heures du Duc de Berry :juillet

les riches heures du Duc de Berry :juillet

this images goes well with Luc 12, 13-21

Find Your Oldest Messages in Gmail

Find Your Oldest Messages in Gmail

At some point in the past, Google removed the Oldest » link out of everything except for your inbox and labels. This makes it hard to find the “first” or an early email of any sort if you have a lot in your search result. I wanted to find an email of which I had a lot of, to see what was the first one, of 10000s. Fortunately there is a workaround for this!

Updated 4/11/2010!

There is a simple URL you can visit to get to the last page of all of your messages. This will show you the first message you ever got in Gmail, and when you signed up for Gmail. Simply visit:

https://mail.google.com/mail/#search//p99999

This will return an error, then send you to the last page of all of your messages, inbox and archived.

Thanks to commenter Josh for this tip!
1. Perform your search.

To search all archived messages and not just the inbox, do a blank search.
2. At the top of the url, add /p9999 or other sufficiently large number to go beyond the last result.

Gmail will show you an error and not display any messages.
3. Click “Refresh” – you will end up at the last page of the search result.

If anyone has an idea how to do this in an easier, less complicated way, please let me know in comments! I would hope that Google will add a sorting function to Gmail, bringing the oldest message at top, but I guess there is not a lot of demand for that.

http://systembash.com/content/find-your-oldest-messages-in-gmail/

re-post: La "Vocation de saint Matthieu"

ROME, le 21 septembre 2010 – L'apôtre Matthieu, dont l’Église catholique et la Communion anglicane célèbrent la fête aujourd’hui, est connu non seulement comme auteur du premier des quatre Évangiles, mais aussi comme personnage important d’un chef-d’œuvre de la peinture parmi les plus admirés de tous les temps, qui le représente au moment où Jésus l’appelle.

L'auteur du tableau est lui aussi l’un des artistes les plus connus et les plus appréciés au monde : Michel-Ange Merisi, dit le Caravage. Le 400e anniversaire de sa mort, en 2010, aura été marqué par des expositions et colloques importants.

La "Vocation de saint Matthieu", peinte par le Caravage en1599, est conservée, à Rome, à l’église Saint-Louis-des-Français.

Matthieu, percepteur des impôts impériaux, est en train de manier de l’argent lorsque Jésus lui demande de le suivre. Il doit choisir entre le Christ et "Mammon", l’argent d’iniquité, précisément comme dans le texte de l’Évangile qui a été lu dimanche dernier dans toutes les églises catholiques.

Le Caravage eut une vie très agitée. Mais il était profondément religieux et participa à la réforme catholique qui suivit le concile de Trente. Le réalisme des images sacrées était voulu par cette réforme pour éduquer les fidèles.

Mais quel message le tableau veut-il transmettre, dans son ensemble et dans ses détails ?

Le texte qui suit est une analyse des plus fines et des plus innovantes de ce célèbre tableau. Il est encore plus passionnant à lire à une époque comme la nôtre, où l'art sacré a perdu sa capacité à communiquer non pas de vagues sentiments, mais "ce qui était dès le commencement, ce que nous avons entendu, ce que nous avons vu de nos yeux, ce que nous avons contemplé, ce que nos mains ont touché du Verbe de vie" (1 Jean 1, 1).

Cette analyse a été publiée dans "L'Osservatore Romano" du 28 mars 2010.

Sandro Magister


LA "VOCATION DE SAINT MATTHIEU" DU CARAVAGE.
D'UN MICHEL-ANGE À L'AUTRE

par Giorgio Alessandrini


Dans la poétique de Michel-Ange Merisi, dit le Caravage, la recherche des effets de lumière et d’ombre est, bien plus qu’une manifestation de virtuosité picturale, un moyen de faire passer des messages symboliques.

Dans la "Vocation de saint Matthieu" qui se trouve dans la chapelle Contarelli de l’église Saint-Louis-des-Français à Rome, le peintre traduit en images un thème de l'évangéliste Jean : le Christ, Verbe incarné, lumière du monde, s’expose à l'acceptation ou au refus des hommes, l'acceptation de ceux qui se donnent à lui dans la foi, le refus de ceux qui préfèrent les ténèbres à la lumière. Le prologue du quatrième Évangile dit : "[Le Verbe], lumière véritable, qui éclaire tout homme, venait dans le monde. Il est venu parmi les siens, mais les siens ne l’ont pas reçu. Mais à tous ceux qui l’ont reçu il a donné le pouvoir de devenir enfants de Dieu" (1, 9-12).

Dans le tableau, l’opposition se manifeste dans l’attitude des personnages représentés sous le rayon de lumière qui tranche net l'obscurité environnante.

L'obscure boutique du publicain Matthieu est le lieu consacré au culte du "Mammon d’iniquité". Ce nom, qui évoque le dieu de la richesse dans le panthéon des Phéniciens de l’antiquité, désigne dans l’Évangile l'idolâtrie de l’argent. Jésus l’utilise quand il lance cet avertissement : "Nul ne peut servir deux maîtres, Dieu et Mammon" (Matthieu 6, 24). Le comptoir sert d’autel pour un culte qui réunit une petite assemblée de "dévots" occupés à compter des pièces de monnaie. Au centre, Matthieu semble célébrer la liturgie particulière dont il s’est fait le ministre.

L'entrée de Jésus accompagné de Pierre provoque des réactions diverses. Les deux personnages situés à gauche sont tellement absorbés par leurs opérations de comptage qu’ils ne tiennent aucun compte de l'intervention du Christ et moins encore de l'invitation qu’il adresse à Matthieu. Au contraire, la lumière imprévue ne fait qu’augmenter l'attention qu’ils portent aux pièces de monnaie et ils les examinent en utilisant même une paire de lunettes.

Sur la même table, devant l'"officiant" Matthieu, est placé bien en évidence le livre d’écritures comptables dans lequel la plume du publicain note avec diligence les mouvements d’entrée et de sortie de ce "seigneur" qui a été jusqu’à ce moment le maître de sa vie, de ses pensées et de ses projets. À un moment qui est encore à venir – mais qui s’annonce déjà avec le visiteur qui se présente à la porte – Lévi Matthieu notera bien d’autres choses dans son Évangile pour en laisser trace dans la mémoire du peuple de Dieu et dans celle de tout homme de foi.

Placée à côté du livre, la bourse qui contient les pièces de monnaie rappelle par contraste la prescription du Christ : "Ne vous procurez ni or, ni argent, ni menue monnaie pour vos ceintures..." (Matthieu 10, 9). La présence d’hommes armés n’est pas étrangère à la "liturgie" en cours ; même l’épée de l’homme assis représenté de dos paraît être un instrument qui fait partie du rituel. Ce n’est pas pour rien qu’en son temps François d'Assise dira à l’évêque Guido : "Si nous possédions des biens, nous devrions nous munir d’armes pour pouvoir les défendre !".

Contrairement aux deux premiers personnages, Matthieu et les jeunes gens armés sont perturbés par l'arrivée des deux nouveaux venus ; en témoignent le mouvement des yeux, des visages, et la torsion des corps. Les mains du publicain offrent un contraste évident. La droite est raidie sur le comptoir et sur les pièces de monnaie, tandis que la gauche est portée vivement à la poitrine. Le visage interroge celui du Christ, comme pour demander : "Est-ce pour moi que tu es venu ? Précisément ici, où l’on ne fait que négocier et manipuler de l’argent ?" La main tendue du Christ et celle de Pierre ne laissent pas de place au doute : "Tes affaires et ton argent sont pour toi une prison, le Royaume de Dieu vient à toi, en moi il se présente à la porte de ta vie et il te demande".

Le reste, qui concerne le mode de vie lié à la nouvelle aventure, est indiqué par l’habillement des deux nouveaux venus. Modeste et réduit à l’essentiel, il est en contraste évident avec les riches vêtements des personnages qui étaient déjà là, dont la coupe recherchée correspond aux goûts qui étaient ceux de l’époque du peintre. Cet anachronisme rappelle l’actualité permanente d’un dilemme - qui reste le même quand les temps ou les vêtements changent – entre le culte de Dieu et l'idolâtrie de l’argent.

Si l’on observe la scène plus attentivement, on remarque un détail qui incite à pousser les recherches : la main de Jésus, par le geste et par la position des doigts, reproduit avec une étonnante exactitude un geste qui est peint sur la fresque de la voûte de la chapelle Sixtine, où un autre Michel-Ange avait représenté la création de l'homme.

On retrouve dans le tableau de Saint-Louis-des-Français la main de l'Adam de la chapelle Sixtine, qui reçoit la vie par un contact avec le doigt de Dieu : c’est la main de Jésus qui, selon la théologie de saint Paul, est le nouvel Adam venu donner à l’homme la vie divine selon l’Esprit.

Cette main que le Fils de l’Homme, en qui réside pleinement la grâce divine, tend au pécheur Matthieu vient combler la distance entre Dieu et l'homme, l'abîme creusé par le péché de notre commun ancêtre, à son détriment et à celui de sa descendance. C’est à travers la main du Fils, nouvel Adam, que le Père pourra engendrer d’autres enfants selon l’Esprit, affranchis du pouvoir invincible qui les assujettit à l’esclavage de la mort. Avec lui et par lui, un nouvel exode de libération vers la vie pourra commencer. C’est justement en vue de ce nouvel exode qu’il est demandé au publicain Matthieu de tout abandonner pour faire partie des douze qui seront les plus proches du Seigneur.

Le détail de la main pose notamment une question à propos de la fresque de la chapelle Sixtine : pourquoi Michel-Ange, quand il a interprété le récit de la Genèse, s’est-il éloigné de l'image biblique (Genèse 2, 7) : "Dieu souffla dans les narines [de l'homme] et l'homme devint un être vivant"? Est-ce seulement en raison d’un choix formel que le peintre a évité de représenter le Créateur en train d’accomplir l'acte esthétiquement moins satisfaisant de souffler sur le visage d’Adam et qu’il a préféré le mouvement harmonieux des deux mains tendues ? La réponse se trouve dans l’hymne bien connu de la liturgie romaine, le "Veni Creator", qui donne à l’Esprit Saint le titre de "digitus paternae dexterae", doigt de la droite du Père. On trouve dans les versets suivants des invocations qui correspondent tout à fait au thème de la vie divine répandue en l'homme : " Accende lumen sensibus, infunde amorem cordibus", allume en nous ta lumière, répands ton amour dans nos cœurs.

Le jaillissement de lumière et les résonnances intérieures que fait naître l’Esprit sont encore plus clairement représentés par le rayon qui apparaît au moment de l’entrée de Jésus et de Pierre et qui donne vie au contraste des couleurs, des ombres et des expressions, sur les silhouettes et les visages de la petite cour réunie à cet endroit.

C’est bien quand le Christ entre dans la pièce sombre que celle-ci s’éclaire. En effet, la fenêtre ne laisse passer aucune lumière qui pourrait vaincre la pénombre ambiante. Au contraire, dans l’embrasure de cette fenêtre sans lumière, au dessus de la main de Jésus tendue en avant, se dessine une croix qui ne présente aucun aspect glorieux mais qui est placée dans une position éminente par rapport à la scène ; cette croix a, plus que probablement, un sens symbolique.

Une dernière observation concerne un fait hors normes par rapport à l'iconographie classique : le Christ est placé au deuxième plan, alors que Pierre, qui est vu de dos, se trouve au premier plan. Si le premier des apôtres – dont la main imite, à sa façon, presque timidement, le geste du Christ – a été conçu comme une représentation symbolique de l’Église, le peintre nous met face à une indication précise : l'invitation à suivre le Christ passe par une Église qui associe grandeurs et misères, élans de foi et reniements.

L'obéissance d’une foi mûre comporte souvent l'acceptation de la limite historique qui conditionne toujours l’Église en marche et qu’il faut pouvoir transcender. C’est justement quand ils passent en souffrant par les nombreuses contradictions qu’ils ressentent que, bien souvent, les croyants se voient demander de chercher la rencontre avec le Christ jusqu’au moment où ils retrouveront la noblesse de son visage et l'autorité du geste par lequel il nous appelle à le suivre.


http://www.homelie.biz/article-la-fete-de-saint-matthieu-a-un-metteur-en-scene-le-caravage-57441610.html 

re-post: India: Taj Mahal an awe inspiring sight by moonlight By Tina Lam

India: Taj Mahal an awe inspiring sight by moonlight
By Tina Lam
1:00 PM Wednesday Mar 23, 2011

After dusk, the Taj Mahal is unperturbed and otherworldly. On select days around the date of a full moon, small groups of tourists can opt to see the Indian landmark by night. Photo / Thinkstock

On a cool, dusty night, guards herded our small group of tourists through gates leading to the Taj Mahal. Bright lights glared on us as we walked, and my heart sank. My hopes for a black night with only the full moon glowing on the monument's perfectly symmetrical globes was dashed.

We made our way to a stone platform overlooking the grounds and peered out across the gardens toward the great building.

Then, the guards killed the lights.

Emerging like a ghost from a pinkish haze, the pearly shrine looked feminine and stately, like a queen on a throne. Moonlight glazed its domes.

In the distance, city lights glowed red and the noise of thumping modern music drifted up. But inside the gates, the hallowed Taj Mahal was unperturbed and otherworldly, bathed in silence.

Our group of 15 was in awe. No one wanted to leave. We felt lucky.

And I, who hadn't included the Taj Mahal on my bucket list, was thrilled.

India is bewildering, maddening and stunning.

The sun seldom breaks through the smoky haze. Traffic is chaotic and stops for no one.

Drivers of auto rickshaws, tiny three-wheeled taxis that look like go-carts, chased me down trying to get my business. When I did hire one for sightseeing, he only wanted to take me shopping. I had to argue every time I stepped outside my hotel gates.

"India is kicking my butt," I said to my husband, who was attending a conference while I saw Delhi's sights on my own.

But after adjusting to its raucous rhythm, India was rewarding.

From the enormous red Agra Fort, almost more magnificent than the Taj Mahal, to the lavish gold-embroidered saris of women on their way to a Delhi wedding, the sights were beautiful.

I saw richly decorated tombs, palaces, mosques and temples, where most tourists were Indians, clearly proud of their heritage. Inside, even at the busy Taj Mahal, crowds were orderly, lines moved quickly, people were friendly and the centuries-old buildings were spotless.

Sikhs in turbans, Muslims in hijabs and Hindus in saris mingled everywhere.

In Delhi, television and newspapers were sophisticated, bars and restaurants hip. The city's newly expanded subway gleamed.

I ate heavenly chicken tikka makhni with a smoky tomato flavour, spicy Goan fish curry, morels stuffed with cashews. I drank fragrant Assam and Darjeeling tea with milk.

In New Delhi, the capital of India, which lies within the metropolis and was built in the early 1900s by the British, I admired manicured gardens filled with palm trees, tropical flowers and neat hedges.

And I met people like bus guide Mervyn Thomas, a young Christian from the country's northeast, who walked with me to a Sikh temple I wanted to photograph just so he could help me cross the busy streets. He asked for nothing in return but my email address.

There are so many sights in sprawling Delhi, it's impossible to see them all.

I took the subway to a stop near Lal Qila, the massive Red Fort in old Delhi, and wandered through a maze of streets called Chandni Chowk, jammed with bike and auto rickshaws, goats, tiny shops, honking taxis and swarms of people.

The Red Fort dates back to 1648 and was built by the emperor Shah Jahan, who also built the Taj Mahal. Inside the sandstone palaces were hundreds of rooms with delicate arches, gilded trim, brightly coloured semi-precious stone flowers inlaid in marble and women in pink, orange and purple saris.

I'm a Gandhi-phile, so I couldn't miss the little Museum of India's Struggle for Freedom near the Red Fort. A small, simple place, its walls were filled with black-and-white photos from the British colonial days through to independence in 1947. Most had English captions.

Toward dusk one day, I made my way to Raj Ghat near the spot where Gandhi was cremated after his 1948 assassination. Stone walls surrounding an eternal flame read, "Oh, God," the last words he uttered. Near the flame, I noticed people looking oddly at me and realised everyone else had left their shoes near the gate.

There was Dilli Haat, a traditional-style open air craft market with stalls of food, textiles, crafts and even a snake charmer. I bargained for a US$12 (NZ$16.20) kurta, a long bright tunic.

India Gate, a stately monument that looks a lot like Paris's Arc de Triomphe, is inscribed with the names of soldiers who died in various wars. It straddles a pretty tree-lined boulevard, the Rajpath, making it seem even more Parisian.

A guide I hired whisked me past the wondrous Lotus Temple of the Baha'i faith with its white marble wings that look like an opening lotus flower; intricately designed tombs; the peaceful Lodi Gardens; the minarets of the Jama Masjid, the largest mosque in the world, and the stately parliament and president's house.

On my last day in Delhi, I found the best sightseeing option of all. It's the Purple Bus run by Delhi Tourism. For US$8, you can ride all day and get on and off at 19 sites.

The 193-kilometre drive to Agra from Delhi took a knuckle-gripping five hours each way, as our hired driver dodged people, animals and overloaded trucks, honking the whole way. That afternoon, the Taj Mahal was an oasis of calm and beauty. No photo does it justice, partly because no photo shows all of it. The white marble monument overlooking the Yamuna River is flanked by two lovely, symmetrical red palaces that would be worthy sights on their own.

We shelled out more than I've ever paid for a hotel, US$660 for one night at the elegant Hotel Amarvilas, which looked like a palace. Our room had a perfect view of the Taj Mahal from its arched windows. We watched the sunset from a pavilion full of cushions and pillows near an enormous swimming pool. Live sitar music drifted down the marble stairs on our way to dinner.

Once it was fully dark, we walked past the hotel's opulent courtyard to our second date with the majestic queen, this time by moonlight.

IF YOU GO

When to go: The best times are outside the hot summers and monsoon rains, between mid-October and April. In late November, daytime temperatures were in the high 20s and nights around 15 degrees Celsius.

Hotels: We stayed at the Shangri-La Eros in central Delhi, with a huge multinational breakfast buffet, nicely sized rooms, a big window and luxurious bathroom, only a few blocks from the subway. Rooms are about US$280 with advance purchase.

In Agra, the top choice is the Hotel Amarvilas, US$660 on Expedia for one night. The Amarvilas was ranked the number two Asian hotel in 2010 by readers of Travel and Leisure.

Full moon viewing of the Taj Mahal: Just 400 people are allowed inside the grounds in staggered groups every half hour on the night of the full moon and two nights on either side (except Fridays and during Ramadan). The cost is US$16.50 for an adult and US$11 for a child. You must arrive at the night entry gate at least a half hour early for processing. If you're late, you'll forfeit your ticket. The easiest way to book, which must be done at least 24 hours in advance, is through your Agra hotel.

INDIA DOS AND DON'TS

Do: Stay awhile. I spent 12 days on my India trip and two of those were in the air. It wasn't enough. Spend at least two weeks and travel to more places, such as Jaipur.

Don't: Fret over foreigner prices. Whether it's shops, temples or rickshaw rides, you'll pay more than Indians. Our entrance fees to museums and forts cost 10 times what locals paid, but the difference encourages Indians to visit their own monuments and provides money to preserve them. Haggle where you can, but be good-natured about it.

Do: Buy local clothes. I avoided white tennis shoes and bum bags, but still, I felt underdressed in India. Women wear long, colourful tunics called kurtas over jeans or leggings and salwar kameez, tunics over flowing pants, with a long scarf. In the final days of my trip, I bought three kurtas, but wished I'd done it sooner. Once I put a kurta on, I fit in.

Head to Fabindia or Anokhi, both with multiple Delhi locations, to buy kurtas, pillows, tablecloths, napkins, sheets, scarves, dhurrie rugs and other brightly patterned Indian cottons. Fabindia also carries spices, exotic lotions, teas, paper and toys. Prices are higher at both stores than you'll find in smaller shops aimed at Indians, but still very reasonable.

Don't: Let drivers decide where you should go. Have your destination in mind when you hop in and don't let them talk you out of it. One driver suggested I go to Central Cottage Industries Emporium, a giant shopping complex with goods from all over India. Since it was on my list, I agreed. Instead, he took me to a fake version, a dumpy small shop with exorbitant prices and a sign reading: Cottage Emporium Industries. He was likely getting a commission from anything I bought.

Do: Take the three-wheeled auto rickshaws. A cross between a Smart car and a golf cart, they run on natural gas to cut smog. They're cheap, even at foreigner prices. In Delhi, I paid US$1 to US$2.50 per ride. The rickshaws have no seatbelts and in a heavy thunderstorm, the driver rolls down tarps to cover the open sides. Expect a thrill a minute as the driver squeezes between cars and animals.

Do: Eat joyously, but carefully. We stuck to top-rated restaurants, where we ate wonderful Indian dishes. We drank only bottled water. Still, my husband got a very bad stomach bug.

- AAP
By Tina Lam

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/travel/news/article.cfm?c_id=7&objectid=10714424

Sabarimala stampede:an avoidable tragedy

 

 January - 14, 1952 :  66 persons dead.January 14, 1999 : 52 persons deadJanuary 14, 2011 : 102 and counting   
 
 

  

Kerala: The way forward By Shashi Tharoor

A couple of years ago, I was invited to address the Trivandrum Management Association on the subject “energizing Kerala”. I found that odd, because the only place in the world where Keralites seem to need energizing is Kerala. Look around the planet, and you see Keralites everywhere, working extremely hard, from menial jobs in the Gulf to professorships in the States, displaying their entrepreneurial energies and achieving remarkable successes. So what is it that holds them back here, in their home state? Is it resources, policies, attitudes, politics? All of the above?

It’s always been a curious paradox that Keralites put in long hours in places like the Gulf, where they have earned a reputation for being hard-working and utterly reliable, while at home they are seen as indolent and strike-prone. Surely the same people couldn’t be so different in two different places? And yet they are – for one simple reason: the politicized environment at home. It’s a reputation that has come to haunt Kerala. Several people told me the story of how BMW had been persuaded to install a car-manufacturing plant in the state, thanks to generous concessions by the UDF government. But the very day the BMW executives arrived in Kerala to sign the deal, they were greeted by a “bandh”: the State had shut down over some marginal political issue, cars were being blocked on the streets, shops were closed by a hartal. It had nothing to do with BMW or with foreign investment, but the executives beat a hasty retreat. The plant was set up in Tamil Nadu.

The irony is that Kerala has got some essential things right. One famous study has established some astonishing parallels between the United States and the state of Kerala. The life expectancy of a male American is 72, that of a male Keralite 70. The literacy rate in the United States is 95%; in Kerala it is 99%. The birth rate in the US is 16 per thousand; in Kerala it is 18 per thousand, but it is falling faster. The gender ratio in the United States is 1050 females to 1000 males; in Kerala it is 1040 to 1000, and that in a country where neglect of female children has dropped the Indian national ratio to 930 women for 1000 men. Death rates are also comparable, as are the number of hospital beds per 100,000 population and the number of newspapers per 10,000 population (where Kerala is ahead of the US). The major difference is that the annual per capita income in Kerala is around $300 to $350, whereas in the US it is $22,500, about seventy times as much.

Kerala has, in short, all the demographic indicators commonly associated with "developed" countries, at a small fraction of the cost. Its success is a reflection of what, in my book India: From Midnight to the Millennium (Malayalam: “Ardha Ratri Muthal Nootande”), I have called the "Malayali miracle": a state that has practised openness and tolerance from time immemorial; which has made religious and ethnic diversity a part of its daily life rather than a source of division; which has overcome caste discrimination and class oppression through education, land reforms, and political democracy; which has given its working men and women greater rights and a higher minimum wage than anywhere else in India; and which has honoured its women and enabled them to lead productive, fulfilling and empowered lives.
And yet, despite all these strengths, it’s difficult to deny that Kerala has failed to move from its agrarian past into meaningful industrialization, principally because it has acquired a less than positive reputation as a place to invest. “Keralites are far too conscious of their rights and not enough of their duties,” one expatriate Malayali businessman told me. “It’s impossible to get any work done by a Keralite labour force – and then there are those unions!” He sighed. “Every time we persuade an industrialist to invest in Kerala, it ends badly.” Citing the examples of the Gwalior Rayons plant in Mavoor, the Premier Tyre factory in Kalamassery and the Apollo Tyres plant in Chalakudi, my friend shook his head. “I am a Malayali,” he declared, “but I would not advise anyone to invest in Kerala.”

This is what needs to change if we are not to languish in the margins of India’s development success story. The challenge remains. When he was kind enough to launch my book, The Elephant, the Tiger and the Cellphone, (Malayalam: “Puthu Yugum, Puthu India”), our Chief Minister chided me for my book’s criticism of hartals, saying that it was through such popular struggles that the people of Kerala had advanced. But even if that were true, the advances of yesterday have already happened; the advances of tomorrow require work, not hartals.

The fact is that we cannot afford to remain dependent on remittances from abroad for 20% of our state’s income because we have such an inhospitable environment at home. We cannot languish in last place in the World Bank’s 2009 “Doing Business in India” report, because it takes 210 days to obtain approvals and permits in Kochi against 80 days in Hyderabad. We cannot live with unusably narrow roads because we lack the courage to explain to residents why they must be widened in the interests of all. We cannot have one of the lowest rankings (lower than Orissa) in per capita information technology exports. We cannot be a state that our best minds and most skilled workers seek to flee because opportunities for remunerative work are stifled by opportunistic politics.

Most of this newspaper’s readers would be familiar with the story of the sinking of the ocean-liner Titanic in the early years of the last century, or at least have seen the film. For almost a hundred years till now, it was believed that the sinking of the Titanic on her maiden voyage from Southampton in England to New York in America was caused by the ship moving too fast and the crew failing to see the iceberg before it was too late. But now a new book, authored by a descendant of one of the officers of the ship, says that it was not an accident caused by speed, but by a steering blunder. It seems that the ship had plenty of time to miss the iceberg but the helmsman actually panicked and turned the ship the wrong way, and by the time the error was corrected, it was too late and the ship's side was fatally holed by the iceberg. The error occurred because at the time, seafaring was undergoing an enormous upheaval as a result of the conversion from sail to steam ships. The change meant there were two different steering systems and different commands attached to them. When the First Officer spotted the iceberg two miles away, his order was misinterpreted by the QuarterMaster, who turned the ship left instead of right.

In a sense, Kerala’s development failure has been like the story of the Titanic. As with the confusion caused by the new era where sail ships were being replaced by steamships, today those who rule us appear unsettled by the global changes which have moved the economic system far beyond their old paradigms and theories. By opposing computers and mobile phones, blocking land acquisition for development work, and impeding economic reforms, they have steered the ship of State left instead of right. If we don’t steer it back urgently, we are heading into the iceberg.

The fact is that there is nothing wrong with the ship -- Kerala, its people, its resources or its potential. But we have to move with the times and not be left behind where other states are moving forward by steering in the right direction. Reliance on NRI remittances will not solve the basic problem, since remittance money is essentially personal savings and spent on conspicuous consumption, including purchase of land and the construction of dwellings. Kerala has to attract the normal type of investment funds which are being put to use by the rest of the country. This will only happen if we are hospitable to investors.

This does not mean betraying our workers, but finding them work. It does not mean giving up our values, but adding value to our economy. It does not mean placing profit above people, but rather, using profits to benefit the people.

We are seeing the beginnings of a counter-narrative. The Cochin Shipyard recently succeeded in building huge Trader class ships for a Bermuda company, ahead of deadline. Shipbuilding is a highly labour-intensive industry; some 30 percent of the input is human labour, which is what makes it ideal for us. The workers at Cochin Shipyard – unionized to a man – have demonstrated that labour remains India’s greatest asset, even in Kerala. It does not have to be, as investors have long feared, a liability.

A visit to Trivandrum’s pioneering Technopark confirms that even Kerala’s past failures at attracting and retaining heavy industry are now working in the state’s favour. CEO after CEO told me in glowing terms of their satisfaction with the work environment in Kerala, the quality of the local engineering graduates, and the beauty of the lush and tranquil surroundings. Indeed, One Technopark firm told me of having bid for a contract with a Houston-based company which had drawn up a short-list of Indian service providers and placed the Trivandrum-based company last. The American executives making the final decision flew down to India to inspect the six shortlisted Indian firms. After three harrowing days ploughing through the traffic congestion and pollution of Bombay, Bangalore, and Delhi, they arrived in Trivandrum, checked into the Leela at Kovalam beach, sipped a drink by the seaside at sunset -- and voted unanimously to give the contract to the Kerala firm. “If we have to visit India from time to time to see how our contract is doing,” the chief said, “we’d rather visit Kerala than any other place in India.”

We can and must build on this. Kerala needs to improve its creaking infrastructure, improve its services sector, boost its IT exports, and take advantage of its existing potential to become a knowledge economy. If a Hyderabad company like Portal Player can design the iPod to be manufactured in China for sale in the US, the next world-beating invention can come from Keralite brains in Kerala. This will call for more than just investments from NRKs. It will mean private sector players from abroad and elsewhere in India deciding that investment in Kerala will pay for them. This will, above all, need a change of mindset.

This is why I pursued the opportunity of bringing an IPL team to Kerala. I was convinced that the only antidote to the hidebound statist mentality that has produced such stagnation in Kerala would be the infusion of a venture that is so 21st century in its conception and execution – not just boosting the prospects of our cricketers, but igniting the imaginations of our young people and opening new vistas for businesses, as well as promoting a new surge of “cricket-related tourism” in our state. That investors from Gujarat and Maharashtra were persuaded to team up to bring their venture to Kerala is proof that we too can attract outsiders to invest in our future.

Similarly, to be a knowledge economy we have to open our mental horizons to the world, rather than remaining embedded in the sterile dogmas of shopworn and discredited ideologies. This is why I persuaded the organizers of the world-famous Hay Festival of Literature to bring their Festival not just to India but specifically to the capital of Kerala. The extraordinary enthusiasm with which Hay was received by 3000 attendees in Thiruvananthapuram reflects the hunger of our educated young Keralites to be part of today’s world rather than handmaidens of yesterday’s. Kerala can be India’s intellectual centre, a distinction now abdicated by Bengal after three decades of Marxist rule.

In the same spirit, I have pushed national and international firms to come to the Trivandrum Technopark, the oldest in the country and yet the least global in terms of its composition. HCL has acceded to myrequest and Oracle is actively considering our pitch. Not even the Left disputes that IT is perhaps the most important area for Kerala’s future growth and development; yet, despite the availability of educated young people, relatively low operational costs and a congenial working environment, Kerala has failed to break into the “Big League” because of our failure to attract the major global companies like IBM, Intel or Oracle to set up shop in our state.

But we should also realize that a knowledge economy will not employ all Keralites. We need to improve our agriculture too – particularly cereal, vegetable and fruit production, including for export. And we have to be able to develop industry beyond construction of houses for Gulf Malayalis!

We have already proved that we are capable of innovative change. Our late “Leader”, K. Karunakaran, took the bold step, in the teeth of Leftist opposition, to initiate public-private partnership in 1994 in the construction of Cochin International Airport (CIAL) at Nedumbassery, a model of development only emulated a decade later in the rest of India. This is why I have formally proposed that CIAL be renamed for him – not only to honour him but also to inspire admiration for his innovativeness and courage, qualities that Kerala so direly needs.

I believe that the Kerala that will succeed is one open to the contention of ideas and interests within it, unafraid of the prowess or the products of the outside world, wedded to the democratic pluralism that is our civilization’s greatest strength, and determined to liberate and fulfill the creative energies of its people. Such a Kerala is possible if we change our attitudes and work with determination to fulfil it. God’s Own Country no longer deserves the business reputation of being the devil’s playground.

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