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The hermit and the bears (India)

An item in the Outlook (The News Scroll) of India (see URLs below for other sources) relates the report of a forest hermit who attracts wild bears with his sacred song. Article title: “Wild bears find spiritual solace in hermit’s bhajans.” Here are the first lines of the article:

A forest in Madhya Pradesh is witnessing a strange sight of a pair of wild bears along with their two cubs getting drawn to the world of spirituality, an activity generally associated with humans.

Swayed by the bhajans of a saffron-clad hermit, Sitaram, the wild bears have lent a new meaning to spirituality in the wild of Shahdol district.

The bear family has become a part of his surroundings while the ascetic strikes a communion with the almighty.

Sitaram, who has built a hut in the Rajmada forest area of the district, said the bear couple and their cubs frequent his home to listen to his hymning in rapt attention.

When the 65-year-old hermit sings bhajans and plays harp after offering puja, the wild beasts walk down to his residence near the Son river from nearby Jaitpur jungles.

These wild animals, far from attacking the sadhu, sit by side and slip into spiritual bliss hearing his bhajans.

The mammals retreat and melt into the jungles after consuming the prasad offered by him, Sitaram said.

URL: https://www.outlookindia.com/newsscroll/wild-bears-find-spiritual-solace-in-hermits-bhajans/1734570, https://www.indiatvnews.com/news/india/wild-bears-listen-to-bhajan-shahdol-madhya-pradesh-589005, https://www.newindianexpress.com/nation/2020/feb/16/man-animal-camaraderie-bhajans-bring-wild-bears-closer-to-hermit-in-mp-chhattisgarh-border-forest-2104247.html, and https://www.hindustantimes.com/it-s-viral/bear-family-in-madhya-pradesh-regularly-visits-hermit-s-hut-to-hear-him-sing/story-7f3COP0dRMaxBAMjy8BjYK.html

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Excommunicated hermits – Scotland

In an item titled “Excommunicated Hermits — and Their Cats — Finally Find Peace,” Religious News Service reports on three Scottish hermits who have been excommunicated by the Catholic Church for their outspoken attacks on the pope and the practices of the contemporary church. The hermits maintain traditionalist views. “We have broken from a false pope, a false magisterium, at the moment, and a false Curia and false bishops and cardinals,” Stephen De Kerdrel told Religion News Service.

The other hermits are Damon Kelly and Sister Colette Roberts. De Kerdrel and Kelly were both Capuchin monks before leaving their order over twenty years ago. Colette Roberts was formerly a medical professional.

URL: https://religionnews.com/2020/02/07/excommunicated-hermits-and-their-cats-finally-find-peace/

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Walter Willman, UK hermit, 1930s-1970s

 

Minster FM in the UK offers an item titled: “Brother Walter Willman was a hermit who lived a solitary life in All Saints Church in North street in York.”

The summary: “An obscure English religious hermit was interviewed by BBC in 1961. He had one moment of fame when BBC TV’s Alan Whicker came to meet him in 1961 for the Tonight programme, a sort of One Show of the period.The film has just been put on the BBC Archive Facebook page. [Although the Minster FM item represented by the URL includes the five-minute video.] He had lived on his own since the 1930s in a tiny room and was a rare example of a religious recluse.

It’s thought that he died in the 1970s.”

The BBC interview is available: https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p098q0zn

URL: https://www.minsterfm.com/news/local/3029814/video—-meet-the-hermit-who-lived-in-york/

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Loneliness viewed

Here are three items addressing solitude and loneliness. Popular treatments often conflate the two, viewing the phenomenon of loneliness as rooted in culpability and mental conditioning, assuming that society is benign and nourishing,and that regular doses of society are required for balance. Partly true for most, probably overrated for others.

“Social Nourishment + Restorative Solitude = Human Thriving” from Psychology Today blog.
URL: https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/the-athletes-way/201912/social-nourishment-restorative-solitude-human-thriving

The Guardian offers “Top 10 Books About Loneliness” mixing literature by women and books on the psychology of loneliness. “A historian of emotion picks the best books about a modern malady.”

  1. Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe (1719)
  2. Frankenstein by Mary Shelley (1818)
  3. The Well of Loneliness by Radclyffe Hall (1928)
  4. A Writer’s Diary by Virginia Woolf (1953)
  5. The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath (first published in 1963 under the pseudonym Victoria Lucas)
  6. Journal of a Solitude by May Sarton (1973)
  7. Human Nature and the Need for Social Connection by John T Cacioppo and William Patrick (2009)
  8. The Lonely City by Olivia Laing (2016)
  9. Eleanor Oliphant Is Completely Fine by Gail Honeyman (2017)
  10. Lost Connections: Uncovering the Real Causes of Depression and the Unexpected Solutions by Johann Hari (2018)

URL: https://www.theguardian.com/books/2019/dec/25/top-10-books-about-loneliness

“How to Avoid the Traps that Produce Loneliness and Isolation” in the Washington Post.
URL: https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2020/01/02/how-avoid-traps-that-produce-loneliness-isolation/