I believe in letting an invader in and then setting a good example. That is the reply Benjamin Britten gave to a tribunal for the registration of conscientious objectors in 1942 when asked "What would you do if Britain was invaded?" I was reminded of it when researching my recent article on Marco Pallis , who was an authority on both Tibetan Buddhism and early music, and, together with Britten, a champion of Purcell . In his best-selling book Peaks and Lamas , which was written in 1939, Pallis tells this story about the Sakyas , the ethnic group of which Gautama Buddha was a member which inhabited the foothills of the Himalayas. News was brought to them of an impending attack by a hostile tribe and it was debated anxiously whether resistance should be offered or not. Eventually they decided that, as followers of [Buddhist] Doctrine, they were debarred from offering armed resistance, but must welcome the invaders as friends, so they threw down their arms... The Tibetans, how...
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While it is not a Cathedral proper, this evening the Library of Congress is acting the role of a center of civilization by hosting a chamber choral ensemble -- San Francisco-based Chanticleer -- in an all American choral program by living composers -- the East Coast premiere of Ezequiel Viñao's The Wanderer, a setting of an ancient Anglo-Saxon poem, and works by Paul Schoenfeld, Carlos Sánchez Gutiérrez, Arthur Jarvinen, and Steven Stucky.
Here is an insightful review by Richard Scheinin of the San Jose Mercury of the program (or a similar one) performed at Mission Santa Clara, in Northern California, last month.
http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/news/columnists/15610504.htm