Monday, March 18, 2024

Lay ordination: Berkeley Zen Center (video)

Berkeley Zen Center; Dhr. Seven, Ananda (Dharma Buddhist Meditation), Wisdom Quarterly

BerkeleyZenCenter.org
Three members of the Berkeley Zen Center sangha (spiritual community) received "lay ordination" (Zaike Tokudo) from Sojun Weitsman Roshi and Hozan Senauke Sensei in the summer of 2017.

Such commitment to practice is possible in Mahayana Buddhism, particularly in the Japanese tradition practiced in the United States.

This ceremony takes place once a year at BZC and is a significant rite of passage for each participant and for the whole sangha.
You're never too old to RNR if you're TYTD.
Those present have the feeling that we are all together witnessing and participating as those ordaining receive the Buddha’s precepts.

Those ordaining are welcomed into the lineage of Shakyamuni Buddha and Suzuki Roshi’s family.
How to sit zazen: instructions

This is a talk given at Berkeley Zen Center on Friday, May 14, 2021, by Hozan Alan Senauke. AUDIO: Listen to an audio-only version of this talk: Podcast: Play in new window | Download | Embed. Subscribe to The Berkeley Zen Center Podcast: RSS.

Hozan Alan SenaukeABOUT: Hozan Alan Senauke: Sensei began practicing at BZC on Dwight Way and later established his practice as a student of Sojun Roshi in the early 1980s. He was ordained as a Zen priest at BZC in 1989, receiving Dharma Transmission from Sojun at Tassajara Zen Center in 1998. After serving as tanto (head of practice) and then as vice-abbot at BZC, Hozan was installed as abbot in January of 2021. More

Sunday, March 17, 2024

Irishman was first Westerner to be a monk

Irishman U Dhammaloka (Laurence Carroll), The Dharma Bum; Dhr. Seven, Pat Macpherson (eds.), Wisdom QuarterlyTheDharmaBum.eu, Dana.IO/thedharmabum
First Western Buddhist monk: Irish U Dhammaloka (Wisdom Quarterly)



I think I'll be a Buddhist monk
The Dharma Bum is a feature-length, partially animated documentary film that tells the tantalizing true story of Dubliner Laurence Carroll, who became Venerable Dhammaloka.
  • Any relation to Lewis Carroll, author of Alice in Wonderland? Of course not, because "Lewis Carroll" is the nom de plume (pen name) for Irish-connected Oxford don Dodgson, the author of classic literature for little Alice Liddell.
Laurence Carroll was born in Dublin in 1856 and spent his early life as an alcoholic hobo drifter bumming his way across the United States of America.
 
This freethinking, un-Catholic, un-Christian, atheist activist worked the shipping route from San Francisco, California, to Japan.

I'm glad I became a Buddhist and did so much to spread freethinking against the British Empire.
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Pure Heart, Enlightened Mind
He found himself on the beach, hungover and homeless, after being kicked off the vessel for drunk and disorderly conduct.

He eventually made his way to Theravada Buddhist Burma, where he was helped by compassionate local Buddhist monks.

After five years as a monastic apprentice, he became the first Western man to ever don the saffron robes of a Theravada Buddhist monk.
Irish-American female Zen Buddhist saint (bodhisattva) in Japan: Soshin O'Halloran

Ven. U Dhammaloka: First Westerner to ordain as a Buddhist monk

(Belfast Buddhist, 4/1/16) Venerable Dhammaloka was ordained in Theravada Buddhist Burma (Myanmar) prior to 1900, making him one of the very earliest attested Western Buddhist monks. He was a celebrity preacher, vigorous polemicist, free thinker, and prolific editor in Burma and Singapore between 1900 and his conviction for sedition and appeal in 1910–1911. Drawing on Western atheist writings, he publicly challenged the role of imperial Christian missionaries and by implication the British Empire. His Irish name was Laurence Carroll or Larry O'Rourke or Willam Colvin from Cork and Munster.

UK-occupied Northern Ireland
They gave him the new Buddhist name U Dhammaloka,* and that is just the beginning of the story!
  • [*In Burmese U (pronounced "oo") is an honorific that signifies "sir," Dhamma is the Pali spelling of "Dharma," loka means "world." Interestingly, aloka means "light" or "bright whiteness" -- so his name, if pronounced with a long a, signifies suggests "Dharma Light or even White Dharma."]
U Dhammaloka was erased from history. His existence lay dormant for over 100 years. Why? The reasons are explored in the film.

Teach those Brits not to mess with the Celts
This Irishman caused quite a stir in his life, as he singlehandedly took on the might of the Christian British Empire in colonial Burma.
In the film we discover why he was under constant police surveillance and ultimately had to fake his own death as he transformed himself from an alcoholic bum to the original Dharma Bum. More
The Legend of the 6th Century Irish monk who may have sailed so America (grunge.com)
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Happy St. Paddy's Day?
Wisdom Quarterly Wikipedia edit
The Patrician Roman Patriarch Pat
As we celebrate Saint Paddy's Day today, one has to wonder why British Protestant Patrick gets so much credit from the Imperial Catholic Church.

Saint Patrick (Gaelic Pádraig, Latin Patricius, "father of the people") was a 5th-century Romano-British anti-pagan, Christian missionary, and patriarch named bishop of Ireland by an outside entity.

Known as the "Apostle of Ireland," he is the primary patron saint of Ireland, the other patron saints being Brigid of Kildare and Columba. Patrick was never formally canonized [2], having lived before the current laws of the Catholic Church on these matters.
We may have been better off as pagans.
Nevertheless, he is venerated as a "saint" in the Catholic Church, which also venerates the Buddha as a Catholic saint (St. Josaphat), the Lutheran Church, the Church of Ireland (part of the Anglican Communion), and in the Eastern Orthodox Church, where he is regarded as equal-to-the-apostles and Enlightener of Ireland [3, 4].

He was a slave in Ireland for years, escaped back to England then seems to have returned to extract his revenge as a patriarch to impose Roman church law on the Emerald Isle.

Patrick is credited with forcing Christianity on Ireland, converting a pagan society in the process, despite evidence of an earlier Christian presence [7].

We defend Catholicism b/c the British don't like it
In Patrick's autobiography, Confessio, when he was 16, he was captured at home in Britain by Irish pirates and taken as a slave to Ireland. He writes that he lived here for six years herding animals before escaping and returning to his England.

After becoming a cleric, he returned to spread Christianity in northern and western Ireland. In later life, he served as a bishop, but little is known about where he worked.

By the 7th century, he had already become the "patron saint of Ireland." His feast day is observed on March 17th, the date of his death not his birth. It is celebrated in Ireland and among the worldwide Irish diaspora as a cultural holiday celebrating all things Irish.

It is hardly as a religious observance nowadays, but in the dioceses of Ireland, it is both a solemnity and a holy day of obligation, even if pagans mourn the genocide he wrought upon the island.

Good John Riley's flag of the Mexican regiment
The Irish are so much like the Mexicans in this regard, taken over and thoroughly saturated by the Holy Roman Empire, as if the Church liberated the people when it enslaved them and still tries to rule every aspect of their lives and exact tribute for Rome.

So much is this connection felt that there are Los Patricios ("The Patricks" not Patricians), who were US mercenaries ordered to fight Mexico, but when they understood the fight, led by John Riley, they took the side of Mexico and fought against the US, as anyone who champions the underdog might well have done. More

Is it Druid Genocide Day or St. Patrick's Day?

Matt Anderson (valknutmeadery.com.au); Pat Macpherson, Dhr. Seven (eds.), Wisdom Quarterly

This Day in History: Druid Remembrance Day
Celtic Druid, shaman, seer
On March 17th, we will not be celebrating someone greatly responsible for the cultural genocide of the Celtic pagans and Druids.

Instead, it's more appropriate to celebrate the life and culture of the Druids who were wiped out during Saint Patrick's missionary days.

Make sure to note that this was a "cultural genocide." So it doesn't mean Padraig went around killing all the Druids. Instead, he convinced the kings and leaders of the time to convert to a foreign religion, which meant no one needed Druids anymore.

WHO WERE THE DRUIDS?
Knowledge keeper
Ever since the Indo-European days, Druids were the keepers of the traditional laws, storytellers, wandering poets, priests, the philosophers of the time, astronomers, and king makers.

The name Druid means something like the Sanskrit rishi, "to see" (a "seer," "visionary"). They were the intermediaries connecting the people and the gods.

The word shaman (Buddhist Sanskrit shramana) is related to seer, meaning "one who sees in the dark."

They were the most important people of their time, roughly between 4500 BCE (before common era) to 400 CE.

Secret architecture of the Druids
The Celts, along with their Druids or seers, emigrated from Central Europe west to the British Isles and Ireland, taking their rich culture, art, and traditions with them. The ancient tales of their ancestors and their gods helped the Celts remain a fearless people.

Fearless people are hard to control. Thankfully, the Romans did not occupy Ireland, but their new imperial faith [and their worship of Ceasar's Messiah] did. It was an imposed faith that was used to bring all nations and cultures under the rule of one God.

WHO WAS "SAINT" PATRICK?
Rome's Gay Mafia the Vatican, with its cardinals, bishops and pope, rule the Catholic world.


Newgrange green, Ireland (Getty/Irish Central)
Here are two fun facts about St. Paddy. He wasn't Irish but rather a Roman Brit. He is mostly known for driving the snakes out of Ireland, never mind that there have never been any snakes in Ireland.

"Snakes" seems to have been a metaphor for pagans, because he wanted everyone to view them as evil for their refusal to following the new faith.

The conversions made the old Celtic faith irrelevant. The Romans eventually got rid of the Druids along with the culture of the people. Over time Druids ceased to exist. Written records were uncommon back then. The Druids were not allowed to write down their knowledge.

So all of that cultural history was lost. It had been recorded in the minds of the Druids, so once they were eradicated, their history was too.

Becoming a Druid involved a lifetime of study and dedication. So celebrating the Druids and their rich history is a much better way to celebrate Celtic pride than worshiping St. Patrick. Skål. Source

Oops, Trump not guilty? Jan. 6 insurrection

Rising (The Hill), 3/1724; Pfc. Sandoval, Seth Auberon (eds.), Wisdom Quarterly

New federal Jan. 6th probe UNLEASHED: Terry Schilling breaks it down
I want an apology or I'm calling for a bloodbath.
(The Hill) March 17, 2024: WASHINGTON, D.C. (The Swamp) Jimmy Dore was right. The Epoch Times was telling the truth with their report? President of American Principles Terry Schilling weighs in on the latest January 6th report and the exculpatory evidence now released in the investigation after committee misleads America for years, rounding up all participants on trumped up charges of participating, even if all they did was watch the Orange One speak. #Jan6 #Trump #Loudermilk


ABOUT: Rising is a weekday morning show with bipartisan hosts that breaks the mold of morning TV by taking viewers inside the halls of Washington power like never before. The show leans into the day's political cycle with cutting edge analysis from DC insiders who can predict what is going to happen. It also sets the day's political agenda by breaking exclusive news with a team of scoop-driven reporters and demanding answers during interviews with the country's most important political newsmakers. Follow Rising on social media: Website: Hill.TV

Weds. Peace Class w/ Mandy Kahn (Zoom)

Mandy Kahn (mandykahn.com), Heartsong (Meetup); Dhr. Seven (ed.), Wisdom Quarterly

Wednesdays FREE on Zoom (6:00 PM)
Peace Class is a free, interactive online gathering to manifest inner peace and establish world peace. It is led by Mandy Kahn and takes place every Wednesday night at 6:00 pm (Pacific Time) via Zoom. ALL are welcome to attend.

The building of world peace is the establishing of inner peace. So our global contribution, as a participant in this peace circle, is profound.

Friends MLK Jr. and Thich Nhat Hanh on peace
Each class meeting includes a short talk that focuses on one aspect of the nature of peace, followed by journaling as a peace-building practice. This provides each participant the opportunity to develop a set of peace-building skills that may be used at any time.

Each class is an hour and includes a brief peace meditation, teachings about pioneer peacebuilders like Peace Pilgrim, and the opportunity to share personal peace-building discoveries with the group.

The peace circle is grateful to be joined by peace advocates from around the world in this love-filled, supportive space.

What part of peace, love, and understanding are you not understanding? Hugs for everyone!
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Mandy Kahn | Los Angeles Meetup
Each meeting is a stand-alone lesson. Feel free to drop in for a single class or the entire series.

Participants also have the option of keeping Zoom cameras off and just observing, if that contributes to a feeling of greater comfort.

This class is an online how-to, exploring a range of topics that include:
  • Gandhi was inspired by Jesus, MLK by Gandhi
    How to engage the healing perspective of a peace mind
  • How self-love builds world peace
  • How stepping out of the guilt cycle allows inner peace to occur naturally
  • How to build a healing ceasefire
  • How inner peace evolves our physical bodies
  • How to use the mantra “I honor all beings” to build world peace.
  • How peace enters the collective consciousness to heal ancient wounds
Details

Practicing inner peace leads to equanimity.
Peace Class is a FREE, weekly, Zoom-based gathering presented by the Philosophical Research Society (PRS) and led by teacher Mandy Kahn.
  • Every Wednesday night at 6:00 pm Pacific
  • Attendees welcome to participate or just watch
  • Bring something to write on and something to write with
  • Anyone is welcome to attend with or without signing up ahead of time
ABOUT: Who is Mandy Kahn?

Peace Piece (film by Courtney Sell)
Mandy Kahn is a peace advocate and poet, author of two collections of poems — Glenn Gould’s Chair and Math, Heaven, Time — both published by London-based press Eyewear.

Her work has been included in the Best American Poetry anthology series and in former Poet Laureate Ted Kooser’s syndicated column "American Life in Poetry."

Kahn is the writer-in-residence at the Philosophical Research Society, a center for spiritual discourse founded in 1934 by wisdom scholar Manly P. Hall.

The World Peace Diet (Tuttle)
She teaches for PRS with a weekly online class on the nature of peace and regularly presents peace-building concerts on the PRS grounds in Hollywood, which feature poetry, classical music, and immersive performances.

She is the subject of Courtney Sell’s feature-length documentary Peace Piece: The Immersive Poems of Mandy Kahn, released by Indie Pix and available on DVD and available for streaming on Amazon Prime Video, Google Play, and elsewhere.

She has given readings at Cambridge University, the London Review Bookshop, and Shoreditch House in the UK, at Motto in Berlin, at Colette in Paris, at Davies Symphony Hall in San Francisco, at the New School in New York, at the Barrick Museum in Las Vegas, and at many venues in Southern California.

In addition to writing books, Mandy Kahn regularly presents immersive poems: live works of literature that incorporate performance, audience participation, and musical technique.

Yoko Ono, John Lennon, the Beatles love peace
In 2019, she presented a program of immersive and interactive poems at the Getty Museum called “Gateways to Peace,” which was performed by a cast of seven actors and three opera singers.

Kahn has been interviewed by BBC Radio, the Los Angeles Review of Books, and Flaunt magazine, among others. She is the recipient of the 2018 Shakespeare Prize in Poetry. (The Shakespeare Prize is awarded annually to a poet or playwright based in Los Angeles County; other recipients include Tom Stoppard, Ray Bradbury and Poet Laureate Dana Gioia).
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Mandy, if peace and asking nicely don't work, we're ready to roll and give war another chance.

This is a peaceful protest. Put the weapons down

Adventures in Church: Sunday services

Seth MacFarlane's Family Guy on religion; Serpentza (YouTube) on China; Dhr. Seven, Ashley Wells, Ananda (Dharma Buddhist Meditation), Wisdom Quarterly

What does the holy spirit (prana) have in store?
I always imagined that if I were to have a kid, I would take srim (she/her/him) to all the churches and temples so as to give the child a good basis for making an informed decision about which religion, if any, to adopt in this life.

I, of course, would be a Buddhist (and a non-Judeo-Christian one at that), but I wouldn't want to impose that on the personality born to me as my newfound "family." Yes, like all parents I imagine I would like the developing child to one day say, "You know, Parent, you were right: Buddhism is the best one!" But I wouldn't hold my breath. Kids have to rebel. But they usually come around after that phase.
  • Take me to temples, Brian. - I'm not your dad.
    Having been raised Catholic, the best of all religions BECAUSE it's the easiest one to reject in your youth. Why? It's so preposterous and fitted to imperialism, guilt, fear, exploitation, and egregious sinfulness and making excuses for everything. If, when you're reborn and you don't want to be a Christian like everyone else, get reborn into a Catholic family. First of all, it should be easy, as there are more Catholics than anything else other than, perhaps, Chinese animists who subscribe to an admixture of Taoism, Confucianism, and Buddhism, Capitalism, and Communism as the sort of state religion of police state mass surveillance as is found on other planets. If there's anything that matters more than anything else in China today, it has got to be the almighty Yuan (money). Think America's bad? See how desperate they are for cash and coin on the streets of China, where Winston once lived:
(Serpentza) Jan. 31, 2024: The Chinese economy really is this bad!

We can only model a spiritual tradition or religion, inspire, and hope for the best from Fate, Kismet, and Karma (knowing that past deeds really rule the underlying tendencies of newly reborn beings more than present actions, words, or ideas).

Then I remembered. I do have a kid! Well, of sorts, that little Shiznit, me. I have to raise myself. It's a lifelong project, extending over many lives in my case. Inner-child, outer-adult, Peter Pan Syndrome human being, what do I know? So where am I going to learn it? At the feet of gurus, as a chela (disciple), on a heroic journey into the woods like Bela in Poor Things or HCE in Finnegans Wake, the woods of course being a metaphor for the Big Bad World out there or the Sick Sad one on Daria's TV.

My friend, Coby, invited me to a Quaker Meeting this morning for the regular meditation and potluck and to pitch an idea he had to them. Sounds good. There aren't many Meeting Houses, so we arranged to meet there. Only I got lost after a nearly-late start because today is National Time Change Day when we spring forward after months of having bounced back.

The first church
Why are Irish novels more interesting?
I made it in time, showed myself in, where congregants were already seated. A very nice female preacher passed and said hello, giving me a personal welcome. Then she introduced today's guest preacher from Hawaii, a Wayne Dyer of a man, bad, bloated, barefoot and wearing a Hawaiian shirt unbuttoned down to his hairy navel. "Nice," I thought, "very relaxing." The singing by the choir was great, very catchy as they got up, accompanied by piano.

So I took out my notebook and began to compose a new opening scene for my Irish novel. I was in the middle of it when I texted my friend, realizing I had just become the 'ayhole who texts in church.

The preacher at the Church of Truth (Pasadena Church of Truth, Center for Awakening Consciousness | Facebook) bounced between Protestant Evangelism and Hawaiian spirituality and the "heavenly light," which I thought he translated from da kine. But he was using another term. Indigenous Hawaiians believed in "heaven"? Certainly, there's a celestial sphere they could look up and see, and "kings" may have come down to rule them, take their mana, and leave rules for them to follow not exactly knowing why.

There's was no reply, so I searched the address and realized I was three blocks from the correct church building. What are the chances? It goes to figure. They're a lot alike, and Coby doesn't let details like exact addresses stand in his way.

I waited for an opening, a pause in the preacher's homily, then bolted for the door, raced to the right religious building, a beautiful old house, not unlike the Craftsman architecture the City of Pasadena is famous for.

The second church


I saw Coby leading the kids in some singalongs in the back, remembered I was told the meditation was in the main hall, and figured the front door must be the way in. Quite a deduction. Little did I know that behind that door was it, 50 people, 99% white, in pensive silence, shoegazing.

I had soft soles, so I was able to take a seat without further disruption, only the door didn't quite close. Someone had to get up to close it. Finally, the preacher got up, walked to the center of the room (the pews being arranged in a squared circle), and began to tell an interesting anecdote about how his female relative in the 1800s went to Korea (called Chosun) as a missionary and taught medicine.

She didn't speak the language nor know the culture. But she did write about the experience, and much to his surprise, the Korean government published her observations in six volumes now available on Amazon. He bought them, read them, and was bored to tears by their mundane and very undescriptive contents. They were all about her and her days, with next to nothing about the country, the people there, their habits, customs, odd ticks.

She didn't seem concerned with that, so she started teaching Western medicine and soon trained three Korean nurses to help as her assistants. The catch was they had to convert to Christianity, presumably Quakerism, to be eligible. They were willing.

So she moved to Pyongyang (or some similar sounding place north of Seoul). There she founded the country's first Western medical school, where a young female Korean developed a girl-crush on her. What became of this lesbianism we are not told, but that youth took her crush all the way to the top, becoming Korea's first Western-trained doctor.

Then the "preacher" stopped, who it turned out was just a parishioner (because there are only parishioners in the Quaker tradition) took his seat again, and everyone fell into silence.

This was the oddest Sunday service I'd ever seen, not a mass, not a singalong except for the kids in the garden. Then I remembered the time change. (Today, March 11, 2024, is when time sprang forward).

I could not have arrived on time. That could not have been the start of the service. And, no, it was not. For someone else stood up and gave a spicy testimony. Actually, she just talked about her wardrobe and how long it took her to choose it earlier that morning. Then she sat down.

Protestantism
I started to understand the Protestant movement from what a young Presbyterian -- a gorgeous blond shooting instructor with a twin sister -- had explained to me. She in her twenties became a "right honorable pastor" before they booted her out of the pulpit. The presbyters are elders, but they're ordinary people, part of a "church" of people, a Christian community.

They were strangely beautiful Norwegians, one slightly more beautiful than the otherwise identical twin because one smiled a lot, and this one not so much. Boy, she was cold and anxious, laconic, not much given to speech. It's like what they say about cold climate Scandinavians. What do they say? "Did you hear about the Norwegian man who loved his wife so much, he almost told her?"

"Church" is not a building. It's more a verb. If one is going to church, one is going to do something, and doing something is not a noun. One who attends a communing communes with the community, the "church," because church is churching -- communing with those who commune. Just about everything is at its root a verb, as Buddhist teachers like Alan Watts famously explain.
  • In fact, in Buddhism, one of the reasons "nirvana" is so hard to understand as not nothingness, not annihilation, not a void, not oblivion, yet it's not anything we can readily grasp without experiencing it. It's not a noun, not a person, place, or thing. (If it were a thing, it would have constituent factors that condition it, but it is the "unconditioned element." There's no sense in trying to think about it to figure it out. Our thinking will only mislead us. It is a verb that one might translate as "nirvanering" (quenching, slaking, cooling, bringing all suffering to cessation).

Watts makes this point nicely. Take your hand. Look at it. Extend all the fingers. What's it doing? It's handing (being a hand). Now wave it. What's it doing? It's waving; it's a wave. Now ball it into a fist. What's it doing? It's fisting. What is it? A fist when it fists, a wave when it waves, a hand when it hands things over. We call it by its function.

Actually, Watts doesn't mention the waving. It's a hand when it's open, a fist when it's closed, and they are not two separate things. By calling them at one moment a "hand" about to shake another (gladhanding someone) then a "fist" about to punch someone, we hallucinate two things into existence. 

But there isn't. It's just this five-factored thing (or six factors or as many factors as anyone cares to analyze, dissect, and deconstruct).
  • It's the same way with the Five Aggregates clung to as "self." We can analyze the aggregates (heaps, groups), count them, separate out the 50 mental formations or shrink them back to one batch. We can know-and-see them with acute attention. But grasping them the way we do, we hallucinate an ego into being. There are just factors, and they get named. And the solution to the riddle is, If "I" do not have form (a physical body), feeling (sensation), perception (mental sorting), formations (like intention), and consciousness (awareness), then who does? A: No one does. The body has body, feeling has feeling, perception has perception, formations have formations, and consciousness has consciousness. They are processes (verbs) not nouns for anyone to "have." They cling to themselves, and a sense of "self" arises, but it is not what it seems. It's real, just and hand and fist are real, but it is not independent of its constituent factors. It cannot stand apart from those things, and it is not really those things -- all of which are always changing (impermanent), disappointing (suffering), and impersonal (not self).
A hand doesn't really fist (when balled up); it is a fist. Its action is what it is. A fist doesn't really wave;  rather, a hand does another thing, and we give the thing that it's doing a name, make it a noun. In just the same way, rain does not rain down. The very raining down is what we call "rain." Rain is a verb, a function of water, not different from it.

Yet we treat things as nouns and become confused, deluding ourselves that something has come into existence. A fist does not come into existence, an illusion does. A hand (a waver) fists, and so is called a "fist" as if the hand had disappeared and a fist replaced it. It's right there. It hasn't gone anywhere. It's all that's there, useless without a doing, nameless until it does something. It hands, so we first called it a hand. Then the thing that it did got a name. That doing became a noun....

So here we were churching. It's all very different from Catholicism and the priestly ritual of the mass, with its entrancing mumbo-jumbo Latin, Gregorian chanting, sorcery and incantations, echoing off the floor and walls built just so as to create a grand sound effect and amplification.

The candles, costumes, curses, rhetoric, benedictions (bene = bien = good, beneficial + diction = words, utterances, blessings), the mystery and magic of it all, and the molestation and hypocrisy, the paying of indulgences and taking orders from the corporate body's CEO, literally called "the Father," il Papa or Pope. It's a gas.

Berkeley Zen Center, Bay Area, California
Here, now, all of that was stripped away. We were all imams with something to say, something to teach, glory in the ordinary. It was like reading Robert Frost poetry. One doesn't even know it's poetry at first. It's clean, crisp, unornamented. I suddenly understood why all the attendees and residents at the Berkeley Zen Center (BZC) were the way they were, a bunch of disaffected Abrahamic religion types.

I wanted meditation to make sense at BZC. But there were 101 unspoken rules about how everything was done. Everything was a ritual but one stripped of its mystery and meaning. It, to quote Tate McCrae, "is what it is and was it was."

There was no big thing to read into everything. It was all just Everyday Zen, fulfillment in Ordinary Dharma, the love of sparse and empty spaces, unadorned wood, lots of black robes, trees and flowers, German sandals and detachable monastic robes (because no one was a monastic in the Theravada sense of full-time, usually lifelong binding vows and abstentions, as if everyone were a monastic just for the moment and would then take off the uniform and go back to being just a regular Jane and Joe with a regular job going back to a regular home and marriage. I'd return to class with more questions than answers.

It made no sense, all that pretending, but the pretense was that we were dropping all pretenses. Everyone was equal (even though we weren't). And the community had no hierarchy or apparent authorities, just rule by committee and unquestionable customs, by whatever ancient master could be quoted as the authority of why we should have no authorities. "If you meet the Buddha on the road..." they used to say and smile as if they were clever. I would shiver, thinking WTF kind of thing is that to say?

Here now, many cities removed, down south in Pasadena (Hollywood adjacent), where we are far more religious, far more hypocritical, far more into seeking, and far more accepting of the mystical than the practical, unlike the northern climes of the Bay Area, and Berkeley in particular, I found myself in a hall full of familiars. But that was way back on March 11, 2024. How would they be on St. Patrick's Day? I'll have to find out.
  • Orange Grove Friends Meeting (ogmm.org) an unprogrammed group of Quakers in Los Angeles