For years, the Swedish-born monk Vello Väärtnou has toiled on two core projects: the opening of a Buddhist Studies institute in Sweden and an online Tibetan Buddhist Encyclopedia. It brings together Tibetan, Chinese, Sanskrit, and Pali terms in a collection of approximately 81,700 entries explaining the terminology and discourse of Vajrayana Buddhism. I have known him […]
Earth Day 2022: Only So Many Chances
Today is Earth Day, a perfect opportunity to rethink our conventional paradigms that are dooming the planet’s livability for human beings. Today I would like to explore briefly several ideas alluded to in yesterday’s post. The first is Dr. María Elvira Ríos’ exploration of ganying, Dependent Origination in Óscar Carrera’s writing, and Jordi Solé Ollé’s exploration […]
Earth Day 2022: Assemble all Beings
22 April is Earth Day, and the occasion comes with renewed urgency as we now know that it is highly unlikely that we can stop the world from passing 1.5 degrees Celsius of warming in the next ten years. There is still hope that the world can keep the world from warming to 2.0 degrees […]
Changing Minds: Uniting Monasticism with Education
“In the early 90s, former monastics were quite rare in my region. Society did not perceive ex-monastics in a good way. They were seen as failures that could not fulfil their commitment. These days it’s accepted. You don’t need to be a monastic to help the Dharma.” In telling me this, Choje Lama has highlighted […]
Back to School: Integrating Refugee Children in New Communities
When children are forced to leave their home because of the ravages of war, they do not just need a physically safe environment, where they can grow up in peace. They need psychological support, oft-times trauma recovery, and validation and recognition of the struggles they have gone through. Such validation can be integrated into a […]
A Letter to Thich Nhat Hanh (Thay)
“We will meet at the source of each moment, and we will meet again in different forms of life.” Dear Thay, In deep gratitude for meeting Thay and the Plum Village Sangha. Thay, it has been some time since you passed away. Still, your memory remains more alive than ever. I still remember the morning […]
Snow in the Spring Time
Haiku # 1 Snow falls from the skyThe calendar says it’s SpringThe snow does not care Haiku #2 Planning my gardenPrepping the soil to plant seedsSnow ruins my pans Haiku #3 Winter snow is funI enjoy it every yearSpring snow… not so much Support Our Dharma Work
Christian Zen: Unlikely and Unorthodox, or Universal?
I recently received unfortunate news. A Buddhist-Christian interfaith event organized by the International Centre for Teresian-Sanjuanist Studies (CITeS), The University of Mysticism in Ávila, has been cancelled. The event was supposed to take place in July 2020, before the pandemic forced the conference to be held on July 2021. After the recent surge in cases […]
Women-led Buddha-dharma, from Brazil to Breda
Despite having been excluded from the upper echelons of religious leadership in many traditions, women play a core part in religious communities. Women tend to attend religious rituals more regularly than men, and bring their male relations and spouses to these events. In more traditional societies, women facilitate community cohesion and assist the integration of […]
Soka Gakkai in Latin America: New Frontiers for Women
The worldwide organization of Soka Gakkai is classed as a “new religious movement,” which is characterized by lay leaders and pastors, a vibrant and proactive missionary philosophy, and a core message that is easily replicable and attractive. In Soka Gakkai’s hermeneutic, the Lotus Sutra is the core scripture that contains the essence of the Buddha’s […]