Please register for our spring gathering, Branching Streams Flow On, Saturday, May 22 from 9 a.m. to noon PT/noon to 3 p.m. ET. Registration is free of charge and is open to sangha members as well as teachers and leaders. Please consider posting this invitation in your sangha’s newsletter.
The gathering features Konjin Gaeyln Godwin, Abbot of Houston Zen Center, speaking about The Climate of Our Time, followed by breakout groups on three topics of interest to many sanghas – the climate crisis, the sacred work of racial justice, and creating hybrid zendos and events. There will be time to connect with one another in small groups, watch a video of our nature photos, enjoy music, and participate in a ceremony.
Jon Voss will be offering the breakout group on hybrid zen offerings at the May 22nd event. For more focused attention on your questions about anything related to Zoom, you are welcome to join his weekly Zoom Clinic on Wednesday May 12from 11 a.m. to 12 p.m. PDT. Sangha members who are hosting Zoom events including zazen, service, classes, etc. are invited to attend. Here is the Zoom link or Meeting ID: 222 402 816, Passcode: 057143.
If you missed last week’s May We Gather Ceremony or if you’d like to watch again or share with others, the recording is available here: https://www.maywegather.org/livestream and also directly on YouTube at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=665Gf6yyzVQ
There has also been some thoughtful press coverage of the event with lovely photos:
- LA Times: https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2021-05-08/rare-gathering-of-worlds-vast-schools-of-buddhism-offers-healing-against-racial-hate
- NY Times: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/05/us/asian-american-attacks-buddhism.html
- Lion’s Roar (interview): https://www.lionsroar.com/funie-hsu-and-chenxing-han-discuss-may-we-gather-ceremony/
- Lion’s Roar: https://www.lionsroar.com/may-we-gather-buddhist-memorial-ceremony-offers-asian-american-community-space-to-heal/
- Rafu Shimpo: http://www.rafu.com/2021/04/a-national-buddhist-memorial-for-asian-american-ancestors/
Norman Fischer, founder and guiding teacher of Everyday Zen, is launching his new book, When You Greet Me I Bow, Notes and Reflections from a Life in Zen, edited by Cynthia Schrager, on Tuesday, May 18th at 6 p.m. PT. The free online reading is sponsored by Book People in San Francisco. You can register and get more information at this link.
| “Looking backwards at a life lived, walking forward into more life to live built on all that, trying not to be too much influenced by what’s already been said and done, not to be held to a point of view or an identity previously expressed, trying to be surprised and undone and maybe even dismayed by what lies ahead.” —Norman Fischer If you are a Bob Dylan fan, you may wish to attend Ancient Dragon Zen Gate’s ZAZEN AND DHARMA TALK BY TAIGEN DAN LEIGHTON: BOB DYLAN’S 80TH BIRTHDAY Sunday May 23, 2021 @ 9:30am – 11:30am CT. The talk features three of Taigen’s favorite Dylan Songs. Looking farther ahead, Taigen Leighton is offering an Online Seminar on Dogen’s Being Time and view of temporality, and its implications for Joanna Macy’s teaching of Deep Time and reinhabiting time, on Saturday, June 19th from 2pm to 5:30 p.m. EST/11am to 2:30pmPST. For more information or to register contact: info@ancientdragon.org. In recent newsletters from Valley Streams Zen Sangha in Sacramento, California, I learned about two unusual ceremonies, one marking a birth and the other commemorating a death. With the help of Jim Hare, the residing teacher, I interviewed two sangha members and wrote a short feature for the Branching Streams website, called “A Sangha Meets Birth and Death Ceremonially.” Here’s the link if you’d like to read it. Laurel Ross, a priest at Ancient Dragon Zen Gate, has been leading monthly outdoor haiku walks. I will end this Newsette with two that were written on the second walk in a park near the Chicago River: New life emerges, Crawling from the wreckage of Last year’s foliage Insistent Robin Singing and hoping for love I’m here. Where are you? May new life be emerging for you and your sanghas. |