“I think love is the only answer.” – E . Glenn Hinson [Part Two]

The Only Love Project’s Bill Murphy [BM] and his wife Beth spent an extraordinary two-and-a-half hours on May 5th, 2016, with E. Glenn Hinson [GH]. After introductions and a trading of hellos from mutual friends, we settled in Glenn’s impressive home library for a conversation that ranged far and wide – and was never less than fascinating. What follows is what transpired.

NOTE: Because of the length of this interview, we published Part One on July 6, 2016. This, Part Two, is the second and last installment. To help give Part Two context, I picked up two questions from the end of Part One.

Enjoy!

BillGlennLibraryGH: This is what Thomas Merton saw as the way we can have interfaith relationships, the way Christians can relate to Muslims and Buddhists and Hindus and Taoists and people of all faiths. This is his comment that he made on his trip to Asia, and you find it in the Asian journal. It was a speech that he prepared actually about interfaith relations that was never given, but he talked about not avoiding issues that may be raised but may be pertinent to the monastic order like the Trappists. On the other hand, we must recognize that we have to go beyond words and thoughts.

BM: Uh-huh.

GH: That is I think the same thing John Woolman saw – where we are going to do something that is beyond words. You have to have a faith that maybe a lot of people would not understand. We can talk not only on a pre-verbal, but also on a post-verbal level. We can relate to people of other faiths beyond the level of words. Merton thought monks might especially contribute there, and his meeting with the Dalai Lama was about that where they communicated beyond words or thoughts.

The Dalai Lama has spoken about it where he and Merton seemed to communicate far beyond just discussing ideas and thoughts. I think that’s in a realm where love functions; that it is beyond words and thoughts. You know it takes patience in a person’s –

I can remember one time when Martha and I were courting 60 years ago that she would say, “I was just about to think that.” There were subtleties about that that takes place. I don’t know what to say about the wars that we are in now. It tears my heart out to see this, the violence, the bombing. The level to which we have developed modern warfare which takes the lives of innocents. Every June I have to think again about Hiroshima and Nagasaki – 200,000 lives wiped out with the dropping of two bombs. I don’t know. There is something – we have to find a way beyond this. The only way I can see beyond it is love, God love, a love that is able to reach beyond words and thoughts.

BM: This would be an excellent time to ask you, Who do you look up to the most when you think of the power of love?

GlennPartTwoJGH: Well, I think we have a wonderful example in Archbishop Tutu, helping South Africans get beyond the retribution and to practice forgiveness. I have followed him teaching at the Emory University after I retired, and I could see a profound impression he made on students there. I think Dorothy Day exemplified (Was it Dorothy Day or Catherine DeHueck Dougherty?) who got ready to bed down in one of their houses for the night. A syphilitic woman came in with open sores, running sores. They didn’t have room, but Dorothy Day, I think it was, said she can sleep with me. You know, syphilis is contagious, and she could have contracted it. I have thought about that so often. She lived love. It just astonishes me how superficial I am every time I think about it. I think how far I have been from someone like that.

Martin Luther King, Jr. implemented something. He got much of it from Continue reading

“Love just doesn’t happen. It’s not like a weed. It doesn’t grow by itself with no tending…” – Bill Murphy

It took a lot of cajoling. But the spotlight was finally turned on The Only Love Project’s founder as he was asked the same set of questions he routinely puts to others. What follows is the phone conversation Bill Murphy had with Saij MW (Ambassador of Unconditional Love, Tennessee) on September 3, 2014. Thank you, Saij, for your time and fleet-fingered transcribing talent!

SMW: Briefly tell us your background. What would you like others to know about you?

IMG_8408BM: Oh, I like how you put so much inflection into that question. It makes it sound like it’s a really good question [laughs].

Factually speaking, you can say I am a husband, a brother, a friend, a cat owner (or maybe the cat owns me…I don’t know). But, really, the most important thing I would like others to know about me is that I am somebody who cares and that I’d be by their side if they needed me. The factual things I began with (husband, brother, friend, etc.) are really pretty much in common with a lot of people. Such descriptors don’t set me apart from anybody. And, in fact, I am not really anybody special. But what I do strive to do is to be available to people who need help. So that’s what I’d like others to know about me: that I am there and that I care.

SMW: Well, that always comes across from my experience.

BM: Thank you.

SMW: Would you consider yourself a spiritual person?

LarrySelfPortrait2-copy copyBM: Absolutely, for a number of reasons. Some of it would be related to how I was brought up. Back when I was maybe 10 – 9, 10, 11, something like that – my mother thought it would be good for us to have some sort of religion in the house, and she wanted to pick a really old one to make sure it was authentic. [laughs]

So it was a toss-up between Judaism and Catholicism. She figured those were the two oldest Biblical sort-of religions. And for whatever reason she picked Catholicism. I don’t know what would have happened if she would have picked Judaism. I don’t even know if you can swing that. Well, Sammy Davis, Jr. did, I guess.

So for awhile I was raised Catholic. I went to Catholic Sunday school. I may have even done the Confirmation thing. I don’t remember. It was a long time ago. After that I was done. (And I don’t even know if my brothers went through that.) I was nothing for quite awhile, sort of agnostic or atheist. Probably in my mid- to late-twenties I discovered Protestant Christianity (especially the writings of the late Dr. Francis A. Schaeffer, Josh McDowell, John W. Whitehead, and Cal Thomas) and studied that for a few years. It answered a lot of questions, especially Continue reading