The Olympic Torch

The Olympic Flame came to town today. It is on an 100 day journey around Australia. It is exactly halfway on its journey around the country, this day. On day 100, the Olympic Flame will arrive at Stadium Australia in Sydney and the games will commence.

At the Annual Sports and Cultural Meeting, held at Hillview Stadium, generally around the time of Pongal Day, Sathya Sai Baba lights a torch. It is called the Unity Torch. I can remember in 1997 seeing Swami light the torch and the Students relaying it up to Hanuman Hill; they played the theme song from the 1997 World Youth Conference, "Truth Needs a Hero" ... and I recall my peace at observing this; youth carrying the flame of Divine aspiration, lit by the Avatar of the Age, Sri Sathya Sai Baba.

Halfway up Hanuman Hill the students put the torch and flame into a pulley contraption and pull the flame up to the top where it is placed in a dish to burn for the duration of the meet as a symbol of both the divine unity of man, and man's aspirations.

I have heard some people say the Olympic Torch is a load of hoo-haa and razzle- dazzle hyped up razzamatazz. Perhaps it is; Swami is fond of saying iti drishti iti ... what is seen reflects the seer. [excuse my sanskrit] So what you see depends on your vision: some see God everywhere, some see prakriti, nature, the world of form and colour and the senses, and some see razzle- dazzle hyped up as razzamatazz. I think we have to see and apply our discrimination. All the recorded religions of humanity say that God is a self-revealing God, and that God revealing himself depends on effort. Effort to see God.

I was watching the News of the Olympic Torch and its journey and was delighted, seeing a blind man and his seeing-eye dog happily running down the main street of a outback town, dressed in the torchbearer's attire, bearing the torch and flame aloft; who among the blind would have aspired to such a height...blind carrying the light? Several nights later I saw the incredible face of a young girl, in her tiny wheelchair, she was a cerebral palsy sufferer. She had a special socket placed on her wheelchair and she carried the torch, in her Torchbearer attire, complete with Olympic logo and official number, down the middle of the road, behind her official escort police motorcycles. The joy on her face was indescribable and it shall be memory for me for a long time, of the aspirations that any person, able or disabled, can reach.

In the "Why I Incarnate" Discourse, Swami tells,

"The Avatar behaves in a human way so that mankind can feel kinship, but rises to His super-human heights so that mankind can aspire to reach the heights, and through that aspiration can actually reach Him. Realising the Lord within you as the inner Motivator, is the task for which He comes in Human Form."

Watching television somewhat earlier in the week, I observed the torch being lit from a miners lantern for the first torch bearer of the day; I saw and heard the sparks crackling and the flame sear from the hand held gas torch that each torch bearer receives. Later on that day I wondered why this image remained signal in my mind. Then the inner voice told, 'spark of divinity'. It is as if the Olympic torch is an external symbol of that which is within man, the spark of the Divine, and as the community gathers to watch this spark being passed from one to another in a Holy Grail journey around Australia, the journey and it's external ceremonies actually signifies the human journey... all are sparks of the Divine from the one light, that uncreated light, and on a journey back home to the one light... the formless divine.

That journey home is surprisingly symbolised by the Olympic Cauldron. Over 187 towns in Australia were each given one of these cauldrons to celebrate a community event marking the arrival of the Olympic Flame. Each major segment on the Torch Relay to the Olympic Games featured celebrations where the torch bearer would light the cauldron marking the arrival of the Olympic Flame and the residence of the Olympic Flame in the town. As the young and old gather around this celebration of their common humanity, it also includes the common humanity of all the athletes yet to come, from different lands and climes. As Bhagavan Baba so frequently tells us, humanity lives in one great mansion stretched all over the earth, and each different country is simply another room of the same mansion. They are not separate or apart.

Part of the celebrations is the headband given out for children to wear; it has a facsimile of the torch on it, and "I saw the torch" emblazoned on it. Seeing this raised a thought in my mind, that my eyes have seen the Glory of the Lord, the form of Bhagavan Sri Sathya Sai Baba, who tells me, "All names and forms are mine"; I wonder that is "hoo-haa" of the Olympic torch is just that, that one can see that torch, one can see that name and form of the Sai Avatar. But it takes discrimination to look behind the apparent disguise of the senses, fooled by maya, to discover the true reality represented by everything.

The flame arrived in the dark; it was cold, and drizzling. The Police on their motorcycles whooped it up for the little children beside the road, with lights flashing and sirens on and off, and waving to the crowd; utterly unusual to see the motorcycle police squad behave like this; but then this is the Holy Grail of Community Sport. An unusual event. When the Olympic Flame came into view, clearly visible and distinct from the car headlights as it entered the city, I was stunned by the Golden Flame; I had half expected the yellow of the candle flame I am used to, or the blue and yellow of the blowtorch. No, this was Golden and that stunned me, this rippling golden flame that did not bow before the wind and rain and cold. I have never seen a golden flame in the dark like that. It stood out! People cheered, waved flags and clapped. The torch bearer, ruddy faced from the cold, smiled and waved and slowed down for the little children to see.

I moved to another location, around the corner. The Olympic Flame was wending its way around my home town; somewhere in town, there had been a changeover of torchbearers. Presently, I saw a young girl proudly holding the flame aloft. I saw her feet pounding the road as she rounded the corner and proceeded down the road I walk every day, and I pondered on youth, the future, and the Lotus Feet of the Lord Sai Baba as this white-clad girl flashed me a proud smile and went on her way.

Walking home I wondered about that bright young athlete running with a flame into the darkness of the night, disappearing among the crowds. It seemed to me to be a metaphor of the mission of Sathya Sai Baba, to bring the bright flame of love and community service into the darkness of Kali Yuga, overpowering the dark with the flame of love, heralding the Golden Age.

And I though of another crowd watching one clad in white, starkly silhouetted with the love of devotees, walking in the darkness toward Poornachandra, after early Christmas morn Darshan.

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