Buddha Yoga. Correcting Zen. Lost principles

 

"Zen" is a silly word, carrying so much meaning in American English. Goodness knows what it means in Japan or China nowadays, a dying religious sect taking sides in the jiriki vs. hariki battle?

We aim to find on Thursdays in Los Angeles at the Pasadena Zen Sangha. There is a path. What is it? Ask the average American Zen practitioner, and everything likely to be heard will be some derivation of Taoism. No relation to the historical Buddha. Lao Tzu (, Latin Lacious) 

Buddha Yoga: Cultivating the Yoga Path of the Buddhas, Bodhisattvas, and Guardian Spirits

Author William Bodri has 4.9 out of 5 stars (with 17 reviews).

The path to enlightenment, self-realization, moksha ("spiritual liberation") is essentially a path of yoga.

Specifically, this path of “Buddha Yoga” entails both mental meditation practice and inner cultivation of the Qi (chi) or prana within our body so that we can attain the first fruit of the spiritual path, which is an independent spiritual body that can leave the physical body at will.

Buddha Yoga is also a pathway that requires us to polish our mind and behavior so that we can achieve the purity of virtue in thought, word, and deed.

Regardless of our religion and hard work at spiritual training, most people will not achieve the initial fruit of the spiritual path because we usually lack the proper instructions and devotion to effective spiritual practice efforts.

The most we can then hope for is success in some afterlife, during which time we can choose to become bodhisattva protectors or guardian spirits for all sorts of earthly activities. That being the case, this book teaches ordinary people how to properly perform spiritual practices and how readers can most effectively train to become a guardian spirit, buddha, or bodhisattva of one's own choosing.

This includes spiritual careers as protectors of nations, cities, people’s health, wealth, agriculture, and so forth.

It reviews common spiritual teachings about the origin of the universe and consciousness, helps readers

• decide on a specific life purpose(s) within this life,
• delineates the yoga practice methods for cultivating the physical body and stages of emptiness meditation required of Buddha Yoga,
• goes over several foundational topics of study for becoming various types of guardian spirits or bodhisattva protectors for humanity, and
• reveals how religious professionals can better help greater society through certain forms of self-study.

A tour de force, the book contains countless practical topics, serving as a training guide for various types, and it also "reveals" how spiritual leaders can more easily raise money for their centers. More

Correcting Zen: Reforming Buddhist Practice According to Lost Buddhist Principles

Author William Bodri has 4.3 out of 5 stars (with 18 reviews). When Buddhism first arose in India (and ancient Afghanistan, called Gandhara) it collected and espoused a number of the best meditation and inner energy cultivation techniques of its day.

However, many of the principles behind these practices have become lost over time, sometimes because they are considered "secret" in Buddhism's later esoteric traditions.

When Buddhism first entered China and the majority of its teachings were as yet still untranslated, a large number of practitioners were still able to attain enlightenment without depending on sutras because those individuals primarily relied on just two cultivation techniques that had been transmitted, anapana inner breath (energy) work and the white skeleton bone visualization practice.

Buddhism today rarely produces enlightened sages as it did in the beginning because its training curriculum is now inadequate in inner energy work, breathing practices, and mindfulness work, visualization efforts, immeasurable meditations, mantra-yana, stretching exercises, self-rectification, and Buddha vows.

This work helps restore many of the lost principles for these practices that were once responsible for Buddhism’s previous great success in producing countless enlightened masters.

These instructions of highly effective enlightenment practices are for the benefit of all people, of all traditions and religions, who are seeking spiritual attainments and who desire the quickest pathway of sequential steps and practices for attainment. More

• William Bodri, April 13, 2019, Jan. 20, 2023; Amber Larson, CC Liu, Dhr. Seven (eds.), Wisdom Quarterly

Five good places to practice in Asia (Go)

Avalokiteshvara, Dambulla, Ceylon

We love traveling to Asia in search of enlightenment, Eastern philosophy, and peace. For centuries, even from the time of Prince Siddhartha (the future Buddha), people have traveled East to Asian locales in search of transcendent wisdom.

That wisdom still exists there but as always is hard to find. There are dangerous places along the way, like trolls under bridges to sacred places.  And there are sacred places.

Pa Auk Forest Monastery, Burma

Pa-Auk: A Meditator's Experience

The best is Pa Auk Forest Monastery in Burma (called Myanmar by the dictatorship), protected by the country's ongoing turmoil:

Myanmar Civil War (2021-present), Rohingya Muslim oppression by Burman Buddhist majority, Aung Sung Suu Kyi's house arrests, Chinese aid, Asia's Hitler Than Shwe and his horribly named SLORC ("State Law and Order Restoration Council"), the Saffron Revolution, poverty, police state corruption by generals and strongmen following Than Shwe...

There really is a place of authentic Buddhist practice with enlightened ones.

This British nun found Pa Auk Temple

the birthplace of George Orwell that inspired him to write British colonial classics like Nineteen Eighty-Four (which could have been written about the modern British settler colonial project known as the USA), Burmese Days, and short stories like Shooting an Elephant. There's no need for a Westerner to get caught up in the intrigue like beautiful actress Patricia Arquette in Beyond Rangoon...even though we want to see and help and be involved.

This Czech monk found the light in Pa Auk

Decades of trouble created a reserve for Buddhism to be practiced, as impossible as that may sound, like the great ecosystem and protected sanctuary that resulted from South and North Korea's DMZ. Internecine war in the Demilitarized Zone keeps people out and nature in, making it thrive with nature. How else could one explain a shaft of light in darkness? Danger keeps most away, but sincere seekers find paradise.

Knowing 'n Seeing (Ven. Pa Auk)

Goenka Art of Living retreat, Pan-Asia

Private practice in a cell closet cubicle

Everyone who goes to Asia for a good while ends up on a free 10-day Goenka mindfulness retreat (dhamma.org). But that can now be done here in the West. They are worldwide, and they play tape recordings of teacher S.N. Goenka giving the instructions (in a Transylvanian accent that no one but us seems to have noticed or commented on). Earplugs are good rather than being interrupted by echoes of his Burmese Buddhist teacher U Ba Khin's words for one interpretation of vipassana (Buddhist insight meditation) among many.

Shaolin Temple, China

Quiet contemplation or international showing off?

There may not be much Buddhist instruction in the sense of learning the Dharma or even Taoism at the Shaolin Temple nowadays, but there is a lot of kung fu and physical training to ready the body if one should ever take up meditation in earnest like Bodhidharma did.

Start preparing now. Here are some poses.

But why would anybody when there's training, fighting, and defending to do? And there are international competitions and traveling demonstration tours. It's a citadel of Chinese monasticism and history. So who has time for the practice everyone is ostensibly defending? The communist regime and its capitalist motives want more "martial" (war) and less meditative serenity because the only thing worse than a Mahayana monk or nun without a serious meditation practice is one who is not out there chopping wood (with the barehanded karate chops) and carrying water (in buckets on a pole over the shoulders), striving in the way of Zen's nonstriving with and koans and sesshins catnaps.

Wat Pah Nanachat, Northeast Thailand (Isan)

Roshi, Ajahn Sumedho, George Sharp, Ajahn Chah, Ajahn Khemadhammo, Hampstead Vihara, UK

.

Ajahn Chah: wisdom so powerful, it's simple.

There is a famous forest temple near the Golden Triangle, where Laotians, Cambodians, and Thais meet to do business and internationally traffic drugs. It is more famous for quiet meditation and arduous mindfulness in the tradition of Ajahn Chah (and Jack Kornfield, Ajahn Sumedho, Ajahn Brahm, and a whole line of Western teachers trained by the Theravada meditation master of the Thai Forest Tradition).

Fo Guang Shan, Taiwan (PRC)

Fo Guang Shan Monastery Worldwide Web (fgs.org.tw) might be a nice international place to visit for the practice of devotion Amitabha and Kwan Yin worship, light on Buddhist theory and heavy on ritual practices and repentance, very catholic and at the core leaning to a distinction few other than Alan Watts seems to mention: There are two paths you can go by, but in the long run, there's still time to change the road you're on," Robert Plant of Led Zeppelin sings in "Stairway to Heaven." And in Buddhism those two paths would be called jiriki and tariki. This is at the core of practice -- what to practice? Self-powered or other-powered? Effort or devotion? Theravada (the teachings of the historical Buddha) or Mahayana (the teachings of many "Cosmic Buddhas")?

Japan in particular went heavy for the other-powered way, where a divine or higher power does the striving. But China followed suit to make worship of deities like Amitabha and Guanyin the top priorities for temples and lay devotees. Since no one can save oneself, we need to be saved. It's the Christian way, too, the point of Catholicism -- worldwide takeover of faith, devotion, intercessionary prayer, and anything to take the responsibility off of me for my own salvation (liberation, awakening, realization, enlightenment). It makes sense, but it is not what the historical Buddha taught.

We certainly need help (of a Buddha/Teacher, Dharma/Teaching, and Noble Sangha/Successfully Taught), but we must do it (practice) ourselves because we ourselves are responsible for ourselves. That's not the path of devotion.

We worship the Goddess Guanyin

What makes Hinduism, Catholicism, Christianity, Islam, and Pure Land (Mahayana) Buddhism so promising, inviting, and easy? It's DEVOTION over everything else. It's a popularity contest with whatever resonates, promising to do it for you if you'll only commit to worship. In this Dark Age (Kali Yuga), that's all we can seem to hope for from people is craving and faith, lust and praying for forgiveness, desire and guilt. So these will only grow stronger, as in the Nichiren Buddhist movement to pray one mantra over and over (like Hindu japa mantra-repetition practice) to get all your wishes, The Secret style. Here's the "secret" recitation: Namu Myōhō Renge Kyō. Just don't ask what it translates as because you may be disappointed.

• Eds., Wisdom Quarterly, August 2024

I trained with a real Shaolin master (TEDx)

I trained with Shaolin Master Yi

(Jesse Enkamp) Oct. 21, 2022. Sifu Shi Heng Yi is headmaster of Shaolin Temple Europe. Today he shows the secrets of Buddhist temple kung fu training. 

What if they made a Hollywood movie?

💪 Big thanks to William Ustav for filming this 24-hour challenge and Shaolin Temple Europe for kindly hosting: shaolin.online. #karate #Kungfu #Shaolin

☯️ BIO: Jesse Enkamp (a.k.a The Karate Nerd™) is a #1 Amazon bestselling author, national team athlete, keynote speaker, entrepreneur, carrot cake lover, and founder of Seishin International, the world’s leading karate lifestyle brand.

Test your might • Shaolin Spirit | Shi Heng Yi

(TEDx Talks) TEDxBaiaMare, Nov. 29, 2022. This speech leaves us asking ourselves many questions. We must own our life! "Life doesn't get any easier. You get stronger!"

Master Shi Heng Yi (释恒義) is the headmaster of the Shaolin Temple Europe (歐洲少林寺).

He functions as the physical and mental trainer of Buddhist novices, disciples, and master students of a European Shaolin Buddhist monastery in Otterberg, Germany.

What if I got a weekly TV show of my own?

His endeavor and goal is to explain and convey theoretical principles in an understandable way and above all to make this knowledge tangible and practical in daily life. In this way it is usable for people.

For more than 30 years, Sifu (pronounced \shee-foo\ or "Master") Shi Heng Yi has been studying and practicing the interaction between mind and body. His strength is his ability to smoothly combine knowledge with physical exercises to practice the martial arts of Kung Fu and Qi Gong.

He has an academic background but prefers to live at Shaolin Temple Europe, a German Buddhist monastery in Otterberg.

Since 2010 he has been caring for the settlement and personifies the sustainable development and spreading of Shaolin culture and philosophy. As a contemporary Buddhist monk, Master Yi holds a smartphone in the folds of his clothes as he sees no contradiction between living together with ancient knowledge and modern technology.

“The universal law of being successful and happy at the same time means finding the balance,” says Master Yi.

This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community. Learn more at ted.com/tedx,

Shaolin Warrior Temple in L.A. Storefront

Gendy Alimurung (Candyland, LAWeekly.com, Sept. 29, 2011)

Shaolin Warrior Monk Operates from an L.A. Storefront

Master Shi Yan Fan, Shaolin warrior monk (Simone Paz/Laweekly.com)

The Shaolin temple in China is 1,500 years old and one of the nation's most ancient sacred treasures, the source of all martial arts. The Shaolin temple in Los Angeles is 3 years old and is located in a Sherman Oaks storefront next to a pet store.

It is, however, no less sacred to those who seek refuge here from the modern world. Here, the warrior monk known as master Shi Yan Fan, or "Powerful Sky," teaches Zen Buddhism and Shaolin kung fu. "Shaolin means young forest. Shao for young. Lin for trees. It means you can live forever," he'll say to those who wander in.

(Hellfil2e) The official ordination of the first Western Caucasian disciple to receive JieBa at Shaolin Temple in Henan, China, in centuries

The temple wasn't always there, at least not in the physical sense. When the master first came to Los Angeles from China, he would train students in community centers, gyms, parks, and forests. Eventually, the students got tired of carrying their weapons everywhere. They opened the temple, donating its rent, furnishings and upkeep.

Master Shi Yan Fan wasn't always a kung fu master. Actually, he wasn't always Shi Yan Fan. For all of his youth he was Italian-born Franco Testini. Though he has trained his entire life, only recently did he become an official Shaolin warrior monk, the first to do so in 300 years. He was branded on the head with nine incense sticks for five minutes. The last two minutes, when the incense burns through your skin, he says, "are very painful."

(Hellfil2e) The story of Shi Yan Fan in Italian

The ceremony was performed in 2007 at the Shaolin Temple in China when the Chinese government lifted its centuries-old ban on the practice. There was much fanfare. Preparations lasted a month. There were arduous training sessions and equally arduous lectures. Knees and foreheads became bruised from bowing for five hours a day. Some monks fainted from exhaustion. In the end, 100 monks were scheduled to receive the burn marks, but only 43 went through with it. "They got scared," Testini shrugs.

Testini has given his life to Shaolin. His mission is to share it with as many people as he can, and by share he means teach them compassion (a noble endeavor), to exercise every day (preaching to the choir) and to be happy without material possessions (good luck with that).

Training American disciples in the San Fernando Valley, Los Angeles

Testini speaks quickly and with a thick Italian accent. His assistant, Cindy, occasionally serves as unofficial interpreter. She also has given her life to Shaolin and, by extension, to her master, or as she calls him in Chinese, shifu. Training in Shaolin, the master taught her, isn't about tournaments and color belt systems and trophies. It's about learning to be Zen. More

SHAOLIN: Zen Kung-Fu Buddhist Monks (video)

(HopscotchFilmsEnt)

China is plunged into strife as feuding warlords try to expand their power by warring over neighboring lands. Fueled by his success on the battlefield, young and arrogant Hao Jie sneers at Shaolin's Zen masters when he beats one of them in a duel.

When his family is wiped out by a rival warlord, Hao is forced to take refuge with the Buddhist monks. As the civil unrest spreads and the people suffer, Hao and the Shaolin masters are forced to take a fiery stand against the evil warlords. They launch a daring plan of rescue and escape.

Not since the legendary kung fu film "Shaolin Temple" stormed the world in the 1970's has a movie been given permission to film in the actual Shaolin Temple of legend. The honor was bestowed on this lavish modern production, starring Andy Lau and Jackie Chan. This movie is one of Asia's most eagerly anticipated film events.

The Real Shaolin

(therealshaolin)

"The Real Shaolin" a moving, poetic, action-packed documentary feature about two Chinese and two Westerners who journey to China's Shaolin Temple inspired by the legends portrayed in kung fu movies with Bruce Lee and Jet Li. In the course of excruciating martial arts training, their fantasies to become kung fu warriors collide with harsh reality. Shaolin Temple is the ultimate test for martial artists from all over the world. Will they achieve their goal of living the Shaolin dream?

Shaolin Temple Secret: Dragon Herbs

Ron Teaguarden (DragonHerbs.com), Wisdom Quarterly edit


American herbalist Ron Teaguarden and Buddhist monks strolling at the Shaolin Temple.

Inside the Shaolin Temple’s Herbal Tradition

Last summer (2010) master herbalist Ron Teaguarden spent some quality time in China. He took this trip to identify, qualify, and purchase herbs in person for our "Dragon Herbs" products. We meet up with growers, collectors, processors, scientists, teachers, masters, and experts that make tonic herbalism so remarkably great.

He also got to meet up with the great China crew. These are things done every year. But this trip had a wonderful, special bonus. I took a truly exotic excursion to the mystical Song Shan Mountains, Henan Provence, China’s heartland, and visited the world famous, 1,500-year-old Shaolin Temple.

Monk Wang Hui and Ron at the Reishi mural in the Shaolin Temple inner sanctum

Many people know that the Shaolin Temple is the iconic birthplace and incubator of kung fu. Shaolin kung fu is extreme, extraordinary, and steeped in spiritual practices.

Indeed, kung fu is a fundamental part of the Buddhist monks’ daily routine. It is a path to enlightenment. As a result, the Shaolin monks who practice kung fu are known as “warrior monks.”

There are also monks at the Shaolin Temple who do not practice kung fu. They focus on Buddhist meditation or the healing arts.

They are therefore known as “meditating monks” and “healing monks.” As awesome and popular as this kung fu legacy is, the Shaolin Temple has an even greater historic legacy: It is the temple where Zen Buddhism was first conceived and where it developed into one of the most famous and important spiritual practices in the world.

These days, in the west in particular, people think of Zen as a Japanese path. But the Japanese were not the originators of Zen. For centuries before Zen was adapted into Japanese Zen Buddhism, it was practiced and developed in China.

In China, the practice is “Chan” (禪). Zen is simply the Japanese pronunciation of the foreign Chinese word Chan. [The original Indian-Buddhist word is jhana, from the ancient Sanskrit word dhyana.] Actually, Chan Buddhism spread first from China to Vietnam (Thien), then to Korea (Seon), and then on to Japan (Zen). From Japan, it has spread throughout the world. More

Shaolin Temple Warrior Monks

Empty Mind films - This footage, taken outside a Shaolin temple, is from The Empty Mind documentary showing warrior monks who are students of Shaolin master ShiDeYang.

News of the Day: HEADLINES

U.S. is most religious in industrialized world
With 89 percent of the population religious and 62 percent highly so, the U.S. is the most religious nation in the industrialized world, according to the Bertelsmann Foundation's Religion Monitor, an international survey released this week. Religiosity remains high among all adult age groups. And large majorities of Catholics and Protestants say that their religious beliefs affect their political views. Faith plays a far less significant role in developed European countries such as Britain, France, and Germany. The Religion Monitor asked 21,000 people in 21 countries nearly 100 questions about their interest in religious topics...

Buddhist monk eyes opening kung fu world
The sacred temple where kung fu was born some 1,500 years ago to spawn centuries of undefeated masters is at last surrendering to the almighty buck. Critics were kicking and screaming in outrage yesterday over plans to sell stock in the ancient monastery and turn it into a garish tourist attraction to cash in on the sport's popularity. (According to the AP, the local government entity in charge of managing the 1,500-year-old Buddhist temple's tourism-related assets plan to join with China Travel Service in a venture that will seek to raise up to 1 billion yuan or $146.4 million).

The Rise of Robots, What Would the Buddha Think?

While the ability of inanimate objects to have a soul is common to Buddhism, other religions, especially those that insist that human beings were created in the image of God, tend to disagree with the chance of robots being equal to people. "Even if robots have intelligence, they will never have a soul. Robots will never be equal to people...(RT) The Buddha taught that all life forms exist because of relationships. He taught that consciousness arises from various interactions without an eternal, independent soul.

Dalai Lama says Obama's Nobel "a little early"
As President Barack Obama prepares to accept the Nobel Peace Prize in Oslo, the Dalai Lama told Sky News he believes the award is "a little early" and cautioned the U.S. president against relying too much on his advisers. The exiled Tibetan leader won the Nobel prize 20 years ago for his peaceful opposition to Chinese rule in his country.

Dalai Lama to teach "Heart Sutra" at IU

The Dalai Lama will visit Bloomington in May for the second time since he appointed Arjia Rinpoche as director of the Tibetan Mongolian Buddhist Cultural Center. He will give three teachings in the IU Auditorium. He has called the cultural center – which was established by his older brother and former IU professor, Thubten J. Norbu – the Kumbum of the West, or the religion’s monastery of the West. “People might think he only comes here because of his older brother. But even though his older brother has passed away, he’s still coming to visit the center,” Rinpoche said.

The Mystery of the Breath Nimitta

As the title suggests, there is a significant puzzle to be solved by any meditator or scholar who tries to clearly understand the qualities of experience that accompany the transition from mere attention to respiration to full immersion in jhanic consciousness... [T]here are good grounds for confusion on this matter as one traces the historical progression of the commentarial accounts...

Lindsay Lohan to seek spiritual succour in Bihar, India

Hollywood actress Lindsay Lohan will come looking for "spiritual nirvana" in Bihar. The actress, who is currently in India, is known to be "deeply inspired by Hinduism." Lohan, 23, will work on three BBC documentaries covering child trafficking. They will be shot in Bihar, sources at the BBC said. In the course of her shooting, Lohan will stay at an ashram in North Bihar -- bordering Nepal -- and will study the Hindu faith.

India's spiritual awakening
Globalization has been good for gods in the Indian subcontinent. As the region has remade itself, it has grown more devout, and its religions are becoming ever more entangled with politics.

The War Of Yoga: Bringing Our Troops To The Mat!

I posted a request from YogaforVets.com on my Facebook page the other day. It's a site founded in 2007 by Navy diver and yoga instructor Paul Zipes. He says he had the idea for the site because he wanted to support the troops and their recovery from war-related stress and injury. He says, "as a yoga teacher and a vet myself, listing free yoga classes for war vets was an easy decision."

Tibet's glaciers in danger of disappearing
Tibet's glaciers are melting at an alarming rate, scientists say. Black soot is probably responsible for as much as half of the glacial melt and greenhouse gases responsible for the rest, according to research announced Tuesday by NASA and the Chinese Academy of Sciences. "During the last 20 years, the black soot concentration has increased two- to three-fold..." a researcher from the Chinese Academy of Sciences said.

With Buddhist blessing, Van Duzer finishes 130-mile Nepal trek
"Out There Guy" reaches 17,769-foot-high Thorung La pass. My high-altitude Colorado lungs are no match for the mighty Himalayas. I never knew I'd miss oxygen so much. I'm panting like a dog with every pathetic step I take. This, coupled with the fact that I haven't eaten due to a stomach bug, is making life difficult. Skip sees that I'm destroyed and offers to take my bag. I should take his offer, but I wave him off: "I'm fine, man, couldn't be better." Confused thinking is one of the symptoms of acute mountain syndrome (AMS).

Climate summit personal for Nepalese delegate

Bhola Prasad Bhattarai traveled from his native Nepal to Denmark to see how the "big people see the little people." At the Copenhagen climate summit, Bhattarai, 33, head of an umbrella organization of 15,000 community forest user groups, has withstood a Scandanavian winter's chill, police charges, an arrest, pricey lunches -- and disappointment that ultimately, the global meeting could end up achieving little.

Maoist child soldiers to be released in Nepal
Under UN accord, almost 3,000 child soldiers who served in the Maoist rebel army during Nepal’s civil war will be released from camps and rehabilitated. The United Nations plan signed in Kathmandu yesterday. The children have spent the past three years in Maoist cantonments since the rebels laid down arms under a UN-backed peace accord in 2006 that ended the decade-long insurgency.

Archaeologist Discovers Traces of Social Networking

This find was in Ancient Greece’s Peripheral Temples. A new study has found evidence to suggest that subjects who lived in the periphery of ancient Greece built their temples in a way to strengthen their ties with mainland Greece. Ancient Greeks who lived in Sicily had their temples face the rising sun not for religious reasons, but to adhere to Greek conventions and forge a stronger bond with Greece, Alun Salt, an archaeo-astronomer with the University of Leicester, discovered in his research, cited by livescience.com.

Where the Wild Things Are

Attended by about 500, the [Bigfoot] conference mixed scientific presentations with folks hoping to make a buck off the creature’s legend. In the auditorium, American Museum of Natural History primate biologist Esteban Sarmiento lectured on great apes he’d studied in Africa, Sumatra and Borneo. National Book Award-­winning naturalist-author Peter Matthiessen described a possible Yeti encounter in Tibet and said academia needs to keep a skeptical, but open, mind on undocumented species.

Bigfoot's Museum: Loren Coleman on cryptozoology

For half a century, Loren Coleman has been obsessed with unusual animals, many of which may not exist. Loren is a cryptozoologist. He studies hidden and unknown animals and the mythology, urban legends, folklore, and culture surrounding them. Sure, Bigfoot, Yeti, and Nessie are the big names, but there are countless others -- the Jersey Devil, the Thunderbird, the Mothman. Loren has written more than a dozen books on the subject and posts daily at the Cryptomundo blog. Does he actually "believe" in Sasquatch or sea monsters? No, because belief, he has said, "belongs in the providence of religion." He just tries to keep an open mind...

Minnesota Bigfoot photo: Bigfoot or big fake
A purported Bigfoot photo taken by a trail camera in north central Minnesota has researchers and the media buzzing.Tim Kedrowski, a salesman from Rice, MN, admits to being skeptical that his motion-activated camera captured an image of the legendary creature but appears to be convinced the photo is not a hoax.

Ex-CIA official: N. Ireland peace targeted

Some former members of the Irish Republican Army -- "small in number" but "ruthless" -- are trying to undermine the agreement that ended 30 years of deadly violence in Northern Ireland, a former deputy director of the CIA said.

Theatre: "Ghetto" explores void in Christian spirituality
The play teems with hip-hop slang, boasts jokes about gold teeth and Tina Turner wigs, and enhances its dramatic sequences through rap and song. Behind the modern entertainment, though, are old-school messages: Get right with God before it's too late. Don't be a part-time Christian. Spread the word to others.

Bizarre Orb UFO seen above Wales

Many UFO hunters have started using video cameras with night vision capabilities. Consequently they are coming to the conclusion that UFOs are visiting earth much more frequently than previously thought. VIDEO

Looks may buy happiness, but only in the city
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Graphic testimony in sex-for-tickets case
"DESPERATE BLONDE NEEDS WS TIX. Diehard Phillies -- gorgeous tall buxom blond -- in desperate need of two World Series Tickets. Price negotiable -- I'm the creative type! Maybe we can help each other!" The World Series is long over, but this afternoon, the legal case against a Phillies fan who allegedly offered sex for Series tickets was just going into its second inning. Susan Finkelstein, 43, of West Philadelphia, was accused in late October of offering an undercover police officer various sex acts in return for World Series tickets.

How Pedophilia Lost Its Cool

Today’s idea: The priest sex scandals and the Roman Polanski case show a shift in American attitudes against pedophilia, an essay says — after a period in which “some enlightened folk took a considerably more relaxed view of the question of sex with youngsters.”

Religion, Culture, and Domestic Violence: Buddhism
BUFFALO, NY (WBFO Public Radio) - Thirteen women were brutally killed over the past year allegedly by the men they once loved. The domestic violence murders have stunned the community and left many asking questions. Among them, why do these women stay in such dangerous relationships? Domestic violence advocates say there are many factors making it hard for victims to break free. In at least two of the murders, there was speculation in the media that religion was a factor. Today, WBFO's Joyce Kryszak continues our series exploring the potential impact of religious traditions on domestic violence victims. She talked with Jeanette Ludwig a long-time member of the Buffalo Zen Dharma Buddhist community. Listen

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Shaolin Temple renovations

(chinashaolins.com)

BEIJING (Reuters) - China's birth place of kung fu, the Shaolin Temple, has taken over the management of four Buddhist temples in southwest China in a move criticized by some Internet users for mixing capitalism with religion.

The fabled monastery, based in central Henan province and immortalized in countless martial arts films, had installed ten monks at the temples in Gudu, a tourist district near Yunnan provincial capital Kunming, local media said on Wednesday.

"The move will help build a bridge between the cultures of Henan and Yunnan and increase the influence of Shaolin," The China Daily quoted Master Yanlu, a Shaolin spokesman, as saying.

Shaolin would retain monks at the temples for 20 years and would help with charity, maintenance, and heritage preservation work, Yanlu said.

The temple's energetic head abbot, Shi Yongxin, said Shaolin's "advanced management system" should be rolled out to more temples across China to help promote Zen Buddhism, the paper quoted him as saying in a separate report.

Some Internet users decried the move as a crass attempt to franchise Shaolin's famous brand.

"The Shaolin take-over is just a way of using its fame to cheat more kind people out of their money," one poster on Chinese web portal Sohu.com said. More>>

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Temple balances Buddhism and Business

Modern times at the ancient Shaolin Temple, birthplace of Kung Fu

SHAOLIN TEMPLE, China (CBS, 8/22/08) -- It's an ancient temple tucked in China's mountains. But there's nothing old-fashioned about the birthplace of kung fu.


Money-Making Monks: Shaolin Temple Buddhist monks are unlike what you may think. They are peaceful but also disciplined in the art of finance. Barry Petersen reports.

The mountains echo with the prayers of Shaolin Temple's Buddhist monks. It's a place not as obscure as you might think, because it is where Kung Fu was invented, CBS News correspondent Barry Petersen reports.

The world's first live action heroes came from right there, 15 centuries ago. But temples can't live off the past. They need money for today. "To survive," says Abbot Shi Yongxin through a translator, "we seek help from all walks of society." In China, they call Abbot Yongxin the CEO of Shaolin. His days can start at his laptop, and end with a plane flight -- all about raising money for his temple.

There are some who criticize mixing Buddhism and business but these monks have something to sell to keep their temple prosperous. In this day and age, there are a lot of new ways of selling it. Like the temple's TV show, or its Web site and gift shop hawking Shaolin Temple products -- all this helping to attract some three million paying tourists a year.

Most of us know kung fu from watching stars like Bruce Lee, David Carradine and Jackie Chan, each bringing his own moves to the movies.

"When you study martial arts, you learn discipline," said Jackie Chan. But 50,000 students a year come to schools here from around the world to learn the original style and study this martial art as a kind of meditation.

Marketing his monks has made the abbot so famous in China that he gets a rock star's welcome when he walks the temple grounds. And the monks chat into cell phones, or hit the computer, as the abbot's influence brings his rank and file smack into the 21st century.

"I am a spiritual leader," he says, "who also faces the outside world." It's a brave new world where even a chopstick-fighting panda is a summer hit. We'd like to think those monks from 1,500 years ago would approve. How many art forms have lasted so long, and with a bit of savvy selling, the world will keep coming here to get a kick out of Kung Fu.