The Role of Faith and Spirituality in Difficult Times

CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR: I want to ask you because so many people, those who are practicing and maybe those who reach out to God in times of crisis, they are wanting to do that and yet, from the Roman Catholic church to the Anglican to Judaism and to Islam all over the world, officials are closing down churches and places of worship. How are people having to deal with that?

KAREN ARMSTRONG, AUTHOR AND RELIGIOUS SCHOLAR: Well, we don’t have to go to churn to be in touch with the sacred or the divine. And I think we should now think a Passover is coming up, Jewish Passover. And if we go back to the story in the Book of Exodus, the Israelites, the first Passover, had to spend the night indoors while there was mayhem going on outside and while the angel of death passed on overhead. And this was a frightening night but it was also a moment for reflection and deliberation and forward thinking too. And this is also coming up to Palm Sunday. Very often Palm Sunday is a very — quite a joyous thing in the church, people will have — in the Catholic church, certainly we all had palm branches which we sung hosanna to the son of David, et cetera, and it was all wonderful. But Passover is the beginning of Holy Week leading to the cross, to Jesus’ terrible death. And religion is about making us look at the darkness too and making us think about the suffering that is — we see around us, not only the suffering of people suffering from the virus, but I think it should also widen our sympathies a bit because we are all scared right now. We don’t know what’s going to happen. But you know, in a country like the U.K. and the U.S. too, we live in a very protected world. And I think now is the time for us to think about people say, in Syria or Yemen, living in a state of terror, different kind of terror, for a long time, and see, let that suffering in. You know, very often on — when during the television news, if there’s a bit of disturbing footage coming up the newscaster will sometimes say, well, you know, the next — you may find the next film disturbing, and that gives us a chance to go out and make a cup of tea or switch channels, anything so we don’t see these distressing images. We — religion means that we have to open our hearts and minds to the pain in the world, the pain in nature, and the pain in humanity.