Mountain fruit drop in the rain
and grass insects sing under my oil lamp.

White hair, after all, can never change
as yellow gold cannot be created.

If you want to know how to get rid
of age, its sickness, study nonbeing.

- Wang Wei, 699-761

Community of humanity

Actually, we are all part of the community of humanity.

If humanity is happy, has a successful life, a happy future, automatically, I will benefit.
If humanity suffers, I too will suffer.


Humanity is like one body, and we are part of that body. Once you realize this, once you cultivate this kind of attitude, you can bring about a change in your way of thinking. A sense of caring, commitment, discipline, oneness with humanity - these are very relevant in today's world.





I call this secular ethics, and this is the first level to counter negative emotions.
The second level in this connection is taught by all major religious traditions, whether Christian or Muslim or Jewish or Hindu.

They all carry the message of love, compassion, forgiveness, tolerance, contentment, and discipline.
These are countermeasures for negative emotions.


When anger is about to surface, when hatred is about to flare up, think of tolerance.

It is important to stop any mental dissatisfaction when we feel it because it leads to anger and hatred.
Patience is the countermeasure for mental dissatisfaction.

Greed and its self-centeredness bring unhappiness, and also destruction of the environment, exploitation of others, and increases the gap between the rich and the poor.
The countermeasure is contentment.


So practicing contentment is useful in our daily lives.

...All religious traditions talk about methods of compassion and forgiveness.
If we accept religion, we should take the religious methods seriously and sincerely and use them in our daily lives. Then, a meaningful life can develop."



- from Many Ways to Nirvana: Reflections and Advice on Right Living by His Holiness the Dalai Lama

Wedding at Cana

Quakers say that God has nothing else but you;
only you -- that's what God has.

This insight has to penetrate deeply.
Jesus Christ. The Buddha.
The great 'yes' sayers.

And so, was Mary the Mother of Jesus.
Another great 'yes' sayer.

She's not the pathetic, long faced, woman the Christian artists make her out to be.
Look in the Bible.

There was this feast. A wedding feast.
Everyone was making merry and then- oh no!- they run short of wine.


Wine. the stuff that flows and that which makes Bacchus dance.

If Mary was the sanctimonius, 'no-sayer' and spoil-sport,
the first ever recorded miracle of Jesus would never have happened!


Mary was no 'Naga Mother against Alcoholism'!
She goes up to her son, taps him on the shoulder and says
'They have no wine.' Just like any mum would tell her son.

Jesus, just like the playful fellow that he is, teases her
"Woman, why do you bother me, what can i do about it?"

Mary probably sees the twinkle in her son's eyes.
She tells the servants of the house. 'Do whatever he tells you."

And Jesus asks them to fill the wine jars with water.
And to take a sampling to the Chief steward of the feast.

And the steward is amazed.
He tells the servants, where have you been keeping this good stuff?'

Usually the best wines are served first
and when everybody is a bit sozzled, you roll out the inferior stuff.
But you chaps have kept the best wine for later!

What better example of the fun-loving, yes-saying nature
of Jesus Christ and his Mother.

Yet , it's so sad that 'pious christians' have taken the joyous teachings of Christ
and made the into a long-faced, painful, hypocritical religion
that says 'no' at every turn....

THE TIBETAN BOOK OF THE DEAD 1

THE BASIS OF TRUE LIFE IS DEATH

Perspective on Buddhism

Who speaks the sound of an echo?
Who paints the image in a mirror?
Where are the spectacles in a dream?
Nowhere at all -- that's the nature of mind!
- Tantric Buddhist Women's Songs 8th - 11th c.



Buddhism, like other religions, expresses through its myths and legends humanity's deepest aspirations and hopes to transcend the limitations of finite existence.

Gautama Buddha, also known as Sakyamuni Buddha, was born in India more than 2,500 years ago, around 563 B.C. He lived some 80 years, dying in 483 B.C.

In Japan the occasion of his birth on April 8 was singled out as the Hanamatsuri, or flower festival. In northern countries the advent of spring and a new agricultural season was a time for the revitalization of life and renewal of hope. It heralded the emergence of beauty in a barren world.

Through Gautama's birth stories and his life, Buddhism conveyed a message of universal spiritual liberation and emancipation from the domination of circumstance and fate. According to the story, the future Buddha chose the time, place and parents for his birth. When he was born, he spoke, talked and walked -- things no ordinary child can do at birth.

He transcended time and space, which place severe limits on our ordinary human life. After his birth, a sage, Ajita, prophesied that the child would become a universal monarch, a leader in the political realm or a Buddha who liberates people from all forms of bondage.

Through such legendary incidents Buddhism proclaimed that despite our human limitations, there is a way to surmount and rise above the narrow confines of our spiritual outlook and experience. There is more to us and life than we can ordinarily perceive; we are all potential Buddhas.

According to Buddhism, the fulfillment of our potential depends on the inner life of the mind and spirit. What we do with our minds is the key to our destiny. When we come to understand the nature of our minds and consciousness, completely new perspectives on reality and human relations open up to us.

Consequently, a central feature of Buddhism has been meditation. Meditation has taken many forms in its history, though most popular today is sitting meditation to calm and still the mind, enabling us to confront the challenges of daily life.

Our attachments and addictions to external things blind us to our true self. We come into competition and conflict with others in the pursuit of worldly goods. Advertisements aim to convince people of the necessity of products. Our acquisitions define the self. We measure our value by success in our work, the size of our house, the model of our car, the number of our shoes or jewelry.

Buddhism teaches that life is marked by three signs: suffering, impermanence and nonsubstantiality. The first noble truth is, Life is suffering. Despite our affluence, we suffer from dissatisfaction, frustration, anxieties. This suffering is caused by the transiency of life, changes in our health. Our social and financial situation threatens our identities, leading to depression and despair. Our suffering results from not recognizing that the things to which we are attached do not really have the value we attribute to them.

The birth of the Buddha and his life provide an opportunity to bring our lives into perspective and reprioritize our values.

The Buddhist Way

Reconciliation

is to understand both sides;

to go to one side and describe the suffering being endured by the other side,

and then go to the other side and describe the suffering being endured by the first side.

—Thich Nhat Hahn

The all-important thing is not killing or giving life, drinking or not drinking, living in the town or the country, being lucky or unlucky, winning or losing.

It is how we win, how we lose, how we live or die; finally, how we choose.

We walk, and our religion is shown (even to the dullest and most insensitive person), in how we walk. Living in this world means choosing, and the way we choose to walk is infallibly and perfectly expressed in the walk itself.

—R. H. Blyth

Dancing With God

This piece was sent to me by a friend named Siji

who is a Jesuit Priest and Social Activist

working among the Dalits in India..

This is so apt for Good Friday,

that i'm using this instead of my usual pontification.

When I meditated on the word Guidance,
I kept seeing "dance" at the end of the word.

I remember reading that doing God's will is a lot like dancing.

When two people try to lead, nothing feels right.
The movement doesn't flow with the music,
And everything is quite uncomfortable and jerky.

When one person realizes that, and lets the other lead,
both bodies begin to flow with the music.
One gives gentle cues, perhaps with a nudge to the back
or by pressing Lightly in one direction or another.
It's as if two become one body, moving beautifully.

The dance takes surrender, willingness,
and attentiveness from one person
and gentle guidance and skill from the other.

My eyes drew back to the word Guidance.

When I saw "G: I thought of God, followed by "u" and "i".

"God, "u" and "i" dance."
God, you, and I dance.

As I lowered my head, I became willing to trust
that I would get guidance about my life.
Once again, I became willing to let God lead.

My prayer for you today is that God's blessings
and mercies be upon you on this day and everyday.
May you abide in God as God abides in you.
Dance together with God, trusting God to lead
and to guide you through each season of your life.

First be reconciled

Thoughts on Maundy Thursday

Jesus has been very much misunderstood.

Even in his time.

He was not telling people just to drop their masks.
He was saying, “I have brought you an alchemy, so that your real face can be beautiful.
Why carry this mask? Why this weight? I give you a higher law that needs no fear. It needs no greed. It needs no enforcement from the outside. My law rises in you because of understanding, not because of fear.”

Moses is a must, but Moses must go also.
Moses has dome his work; he has prepared the ground.
When Jesus appears, Moses’ work is fulfilled.
But the Jews – the priests, the scribes, the literate and powerful people -- were angry. It was very difficult to uncling themselves from the past.

Therefore if thou bring thy gift to the altar
And there rememberest
That thy brother hath ought against thee;
Leave there thy gift before the altar, and go thy way;
First be reconciled to thy brother,
And then come and offer thy gift.

Jesus says that if you come to the temple or the Church with flowers
And with money for the collection
And with bread for the blessing
And remember that somebody is angry at you
That you have angered somebody
Then first it is necessary to go back and be reconciled to your brother.
And all are brothers here, because the Father is one.

The point is,
It’s not important whether you are angry at somebody.
The point is you remember that your friend, your brother, your sister
Is angry at you.


Prayer can only be done when you are tuned.
And Jesus says a very psychologically valid thing.
If, while before the altar, you remember that you have angered somebody, and somebody is still carrying a wound because of you – somebody is angry somewhere,
Then go and help that person to heal
Bring things to a reconciliation.

A beautiful way to celebrate the passover tonight

Some notes on Lent

Believe it or not, Lent was never observed by Christ or His apostles.

He commanded them, “Go you therefore, and teach all nations…teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you” (Matt. 28:19-20).

Jesus never commanded them to observe Lent or Easter.

He did, however, command them to keep Passover and the Days of Unleavened Bread.
In fact, during His last Passover on earth, Christ gave detailed instructions on how to observe the Passover service. He also instituted new Passover symbols (John 13:1-17).

Notice what Alexander Hislop wrote in his book The Two Babylons: “The festival, of which we read in Church history, under the name of Easter, in the third and fourth centuries, was quite a different festival from that now observed in the Romish Church, and at that time was not known by any such name as Easter…That festival [Passover] was not idolatrous, and it was preceded by no Lent. ‘It ought to be known,’ said Cassianus, the monk of Marseilles, writing in the fifth century, and contrasting the primitive [New Testament] Church with the Church of his day, ‘that the observance of the forty days had no existence, so long as the perfection of that primitive Church remained inviolate.’”

Lent was not observed by the first century Church!

It was first addressed by the church at Rome during the Council of Nicea in A.D. 325, when Emperor Constantine officially recognized that church as the Roman Empire’s state religion.
Any brand of Christianity that held to doctrines contrary to the Roman church was considered an enemy of the state.

In A.D. 360, the Council of Laodicea officially commanded Lent to be observed.

Originally, people did not observe Lent for more than a week. Some kept it for one or two days. Others kept it for 40 consecutive hours, falsely believing that only 40 hours had elapsed between Christ’s death and resurrection.

Eventually, it became a 40-day period of fasting or abstaining from certain foods.
“The emphasis was not so much on the fasting as on the spiritual renewal that the preparation for Easter demanded. It was simply a period marked by fasting, but not necessarily one in which the faithful fasted every day. However, as time went on, more and more emphasis was laid upon fasting…During the early centuries (from the fifth century on especially) the observance of the fast was very strict. Only one meal a day, toward evening was allowed: flesh meat and fish, and in most places even eggs and dairy products, were absolutely forbidden. Meat was not even allowed on Sundays” (Catholic Encyclopedia).

From the ninth century onward, Lent’s strict rules were relaxed.
Greater emphasis was given to performing “penitential works” than to fasting and abstinence.
According to the apostolic constitution Poenitemini of Pope Paul IV (Feb. 17, 1966), “abstinence is to be observed on Ash Wednesday and on all Fridays of the year that do not fall on holy days of obligation, and fasting as well as abstinence is to be observed on Ash Wednesday and Good Friday” (Catholic Encyclopedia).

Today, Lent is used for “fasting from sin and from vice…forsaking sin and sinful ways.”
It is a season “for penance, which means sorrow for sin and conversion to God.”
This tradition teaches that fasting and employing self-discipline during Lent will give a worshipper the “control over himself that he needs to purify his heart and renew his life.”

God did not design fasting as a tool for penance, “beating yourself up” or developing will power: “Is it such a fast that I have chosen? A day for a man to afflict his soul [fast]? Is it to bow down his head as a bulrush, and to spread sackcloth and ashes under him? Will you call this a fast, and an acceptable day to the Lord? Is not this the fast that I have chosen? To loose the bands of wickedness, to undo the heavy burdens, and to let the oppressed go free, and that you break every yoke? Is it not to deal your bread to the hungry, and that you bring the poor that are cast out to your house? When you see the naked, that you cover him; and that you hide not yourself from your own flesh?” (Isa. 58:5-7).

God’s people humble themselves through fasting in order to draw closer to Him—to learn to think and act like Him—to live His way of life in all things.

Lent’s Ancient Roots

Coming from the Anglo-Saxon Lencten, meaning “spring,” Lent originated in the ancient Babylonian mystery religion.
“The forty days’ abstinence of Lent was directly borrowed from the worshippers of the Babylonian goddess…Among the Pagans this Lent seems to have been an indispensable preliminary to the great annual festival in commemoration of the death and resurrection of Tammuz” (The Two Babylons).

Tammuz was the Messiah of the Babylonians—a counterfeit of Jesus Christ!

The Feast of Tammuz was usually celebrated in June (also called the “month of Tammuz”).
Lent was held 40 days before the feast, “celebrated by alternate weeping and rejoicing.”
This is why Lent means “spring”; it took place from spring to early summer.

The Bible records ancient Judah worshipping Tammuz: “Then He brought me to the door of the gate of the Lord’s house which was toward the north; and, behold, there sat women weeping for Tammuz” (Ezek. 8:14-15).

This was a great abomination in God’s eyes!

But why did the church at Rome institute such a pagan holiday?

“To conciliate the Pagans to nominal Christianity, Rome, pursuing its usual policy, took measures to get the Christian and Pagan festivals amalgamated, and, by a complicated but skillful adjustment of the calendar, it was found no difficult matter, in general, to get Paganism and Christianity—now far sunk in idolatry—in this as in so many other things, to shake hands” (The Two Babylons).

The Roman church replaced Passover with Easter, moving the pagan Feast of Tammuz to early spring, “Christianizing” it.

Lent moved with it.

“This change of the calendar in regard to Easter was attended with momentous consequences.
It brought into the Church the grossest corruption and the rankest superstition in connection with the abstinence of Lent” (The Two Babylons).

Before giving up personal sins and vices during Lent, the pagans held a wild, “anything goes” celebration to make sure they got in their share of debaucheries and perversities—what the world celebrates as Mardi Gras today.

The law-abiding fear true Love

To me, the season of Lent is not about Law

It’s not about penance and mortification
It’s not about not eating meat and not going to the movies.
It’s about reconciliation and love.

To the Jews, especially the priests, and the politicians,
It appeared that Jesus would just destroy the law.
So they were angry. And they were right!
In a sense, the law would be destroyed, because a higher law would be coming in.
The lower law would have to go.

Law depends on fear. Law depends on greed. Law punishes you.
The central idea of Law is justice, but justice is not enough.
Justice is crude and hard and violent.
Somebody murders, then the law murders him.
Justice has no spirituality in it, it is mathematical.

You have killed somebody, then the law kills you.
But if killing is wrong, then how can the law be right?
The law itself is very much lacking, it depends on the same evil.

“Law is better than lawlessness, but compared to love, law itself is lawlessness.” -- Osho

Only compassion can allow your being to bloom.
Only compassion can help you come to your highest peak – not justice.

When Jesus started talking about love, the people who were law abiding became very much afraid.

They feared that if the law were dropped, the animal hiding inside of them would jump out, and would tear down the whole society.
They knew that their faces were only beautiful on the outside.
Deep down, great ugliness. Suppressed. Repressed.

When Jesus says, ‘Drop all masks’, they become afraid and angry.

‘This man is dangerous. He eats and drinks. He consorts with prostitutes. He eats with sinners and exploiters. This man has to be punished and destroyed before he destroys society”.