What did your grandmother believe, with an imam and a rabbi
Imam Faizal Rashid and Rabbi Nathan Alvarez sit down for the first episode and compare the morning prayers, the grandmothers, and the one misconception each is tired of correcting.
A Sikh nurse and a Buddhist nun on what happens when someone dies
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Show notes
The last room
Harjit Kaur has been a palliative care nurse in Singapore for 16 years. Venerable Dhammika is a Theravada Buddhist nun who visits hospices. Priya asks them what they have each seen in the last hours of a life, and what their faith tells them is happening.
- Why Harjit recites Japji Sahib under her breath on the ward
- What a Buddhist nun does at a bedside when the family is not Buddhist
- Reincarnation, the soul and the self: two traditions that sound similar and are not
- The prayers each has said for strangers of other faiths, and whether that is allowed
A quiet episode. Priya suggests listening to it when you have time to sit afterwards.
Transcript
Welcome back to Same Sky, Different Doors. I am Priya Ramaswamy. This is a quieter episode than usual, and I will tell you now that it is about death, so if today is not the day, come back to it. My guests have both spent a lot of time in the last room. Harjit Kaur is a palliative care nurse, Sikh, sixteen years on the ward. Venerable Dhammika is a Buddhist nun who visits hospices and sits with people who are not Buddhist at all. I asked them what they have seen, what their traditions say is happening in those hours, and whether they have ever prayed for a stranger of another faith. Both said yes, and both had a story. There is laughter in here too, I promise. You are listening on Witspeak Podcasts.
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