Memorial Day is the National Holiday where we in the US remember our fallen soldiers and their sacrifices. We also have picnics and barbecues and eat lots of cold watermelon and potato salad.
Today's holiday is causing me to think about the people who are currently serving in the US military. My brother is a Vietnam War veteran, and I know all about the sleepless nights my mother spent worrying about him while he was deployed overseas. I also know that when he came back to the US, he was greeted with hostility by the anti-war movement of the time. He has, however, enjoyed some benefits from his service - at least he has VA health coverage. That's more than 44 million other Americans have.
What has changed between then and now, between that war and this one? Between Vietnam and Iraq? Well, for one thing, Vietnam has become an extremely hot tourist destination - Ho Chi Minh City (aka Saigon) has a huge hotel business, with more popping up all the time. If you're flying to Bangkok from Japan, you probably change planes in Ho Chi Minh City. You can even take a 4-star cruise of the Mekong river. Really. That one was a real eyeball-popper for my brother. Somehow, I doubt that an enhanced tourist trade will be part of our legacy in Iraq. Vietnam is a Buddhist country, and Theravadan Buddhists do teach meditation and mindfulness. These teachings really are, I believe, superior to the Middle East's centuries of religiously justified tribal grudges. Now if we could just clean up all the land mines.
What else is different? Well, the lack of on-the-scene press coverage is obvious. Our government has made sure of that, yesirree. The people who are getting blown up overseas today are probably too young to remember when Chet Huntley and David Brinkley actually showed battle footage on the evening news. They gave a body count. Some of us oldies remember that - you'd turn on your TV at dinner time,and there they were, young American men with their legs blown off, blinded eyes swathed in bloody bandages, being loaded onto evac helicopters. Dan Rather ducking fire as he sent his film (yeah, film!) to Walter Cronkite. You could see things burning, and it wasn't a studio-generated special effect. That's how an active anti-war movement got started here in America. All people had to do was read their papers or look at the news. That has all been changed.
This weekend's big story about a dead American soldier in Iraq was the tale of a puppy (the presso-genically named "Hero"), which the dead soldier had adopted before he was blown up with a roadside bomb. The puppy was flown over from Iraq and given to the family of the dead soldier. You'd have to be at least 40 years old (more like 50) to notice the difference in press reporting styles, but the difference is unmistakeable. Besides, back then there were only three networks you could watch - now, if the war news is unpleasant,you can always push a button and switch to American Idol. Now that's conflict!
I heard a young independent Middle East reporter speak about three months ago. These days, if you want to know what's going on in the war zone, you have to actually seek it out on the web. It's not delivered to your TV dinner tray along with a Swanson Swiss Steak foil-wrapped meal. Here is a web page which I sometimes go to (warning, this page does skew a bit to the left, and there are graphic images):
http://www.dahrjamailiraq.com
This guy was a real interesting speaker. I thought by his name that he was going to be a Middle Easterner himself (OK, so I make prejudiced assumptions like most folks). But he's from Alaska, with a name like Dahr Jamail - go figure. That's why I love America. So today, I'm thinking about what I'm doing (if anything) to protect people from being killed in the first place. Both people who live overseas and our soldiers whose deaths are sweetened over with happy puppies. That's how I'm spending my Memorial Day. I'm thinking about it, and I'm writing about it. I figure I owe our soldiers more than a six-pack of beer and some watermelon.
Be honest, be thoughtful, be cool.
Byrd in LA
Hi, Grace! Today would have been your 86th birthday. For so many years, I bought you flowers on my birthday and then again on yours - just to thank you for being such a fabulous mom and great friend. Today, you're not here to receive any flowers from me, so I bought myself a miniature pink rosebush, which is sitting right here on my desk. When it's finished with this blooming cycle, I'll plant it ouside the living room window and enjoy it for years to come.
The blooming cycle that was your life was a wonderful one - something I'm proud to have been related to. You went back to school mid-life, you raised two kids on your own, and you loved to play the piano and sing. I really loved all the traveling we did together - Paris, London, Rome. You taught me to be strong and self-reliant, you taught me to love openly and freely.
I wonder what your next blooming cycle will be like - I hope you are able to enjoy your music, to fulfill your great, unrealized dream of singing opera. I hope you enjoy good health - not like the diabetes you had to struggle with for 45 years this past time.
Sometimes, I still miss you - sometimes, something strange will happen, like Arnold Schwarzenegger being elected governor of California. And my first thought will be - Oh, my God! I have to tell Grace! We'll have a laugh together about this! But then you're not there to tell. Sometimes I wish I could take you to a movie or a play I like and then talk to you about it. Oh, well.
You left a good mark on this world, Grace - I wish you the best for your next blooming cycle. I hope it's as glorious as you deserve. Thanks for everything.
Your loving daughter, Byrd
I was working on this week's further entries - all scholarly and lah-dee-dah. I even went through Dr. Stone's book on Original Enlightenment again! Yellow markers and notes in the margin....I was all ready to "wow" everybody with my fabulous research.....and then...and then....
My boss had a book in her bookshelf......
It was
I took it off the shelf....I opened it up...I began to read.....
Oh, God, no, no!!!! (gurgle, gurgle, slurp, moan, gurgle)
I'm an intellectual! I'm intelligent! I'm not supposed to get sucked into books like this! What about my reputation!?!?!?
Oh, God, no!
The zombies, the zombies......the Zed Heads, the Dead...known to American Marines as "Zack".....not "Charlie"....Zack....
Don't fall asleep on the ground, or they will find you and shred you! You have to destroy their brains or they keep coming at you. Thousands of them, lurching in hordes, sinking to the bottom of the ocean and not dying....eyeballs dangling....viscera dripping....still they come, still they clutch...grabbing at any human they can and devouring her alive until the poor human dies and becomes....Oh, God - no!
One of the walking dead!
Some of them died behind the wheels of their cars, strapped in, and they become the horrible, dreaded "grabbers", who are too stupid to undo their seat belts but strong enough to grab a passing mortal and take a healthy bite of the poor person's arm! Gnawing him to the bone as he screams! ! Infecting him with the virus! And that can only mean......another one of the walking dead!
Regular weapons don't work....true heroes are the ones who go at the undead with axes and cleavers and split their seething skulls! Smashing the black, viscous residue of their brains!
Agggghhhhh!!!!!
I'm a Buddhist! I'm a pacifist! Victory Over Violence!
Gurgle, gurgle, slurp, slurp.....
Help...help....zombies....ate....my...ichinen......
Be human, be safe, be cool
Byrd in LA
I don't even remember when I started reading "mainstream" Nichiren academic writing and research (i.e., non-sectarian writing, not "our denomination is cooler than your denomination, so nyah nyah nyah"). It must have been at least seven years years ago. I've also read a lot of the material that other schools have published, and some of that material has been very interesting and very encouraging to me (see my April 18, 2007 entry entitled "I Love These Guys!", in which I talk about the Nipponzan Myohoji group). I also adore Ryuei Michael McCormick's book, "Lotus World" which explains all about what's on the mandala Gohonzon and why it's there. That's right, guys...those squiggles actually mean something! In fact, I'm so accustomed to discussing Buddhism with people who read more broadly than the SGI-USA publications that I forget that I have to explain some basics to people. For example, please let me explain:
THE NICHIREN SHOSHU AND THE NICHIREN SHU ARE NOT THE SAME THING!!!
I understand that from the official SGI point of view, everybody who chants Nam-Myoho-Renge-Kyo who isn't "one of us" is automatically misguided, if not downright poisonous. And people like me who associate with them are in danger of "disrupting the unity of believers".
However, if you want to "lead" people in our culture, it helps if you know something about the topic you're leading on. Otherwise, you lose your credibility. I'm lucky that way, I'm not purporting to be anybody's study leader - I'm just a gal with a keyboard who also likes to read.
The ignorance on the part of SGI members and leaders about other schools of Buddhism can be truly alarming. For example, about five months ago, I received the most recent in a line of concerned home visits from my chapter leaders. These concerned visits began about the time I started expressing my opinions about various SGI-USA policies online. One of these truly good souls (my leader) expressed heartfelt worry that my associations with members of the Nichiren Shu could be "like poison". Moments later she admitted she didn't know anything about the Nichiren Shu. Except, of course, that although they chant Nam-Myoho-renge-Kyo, they might be "like poison". I honestly didn't know what to say to that. Maybe something like, "my German ancestors said the same thing about the Jews....that didn't exactly lead to world peace"? That would have been terribly harsh, though - My leader didn't mean badly by what she said. She doesn't have a bigoted bone in her body. I'd bet my life on that. She just didn't know any better or have any source of information other than official SGI publications. As a result, she couldn't engage in the "dialogue" we tout so highly, and her attempts at "being my leader" were awkward, uncomfortable, and unsuccessful.
My wonderful leaders had come to "sound me out" - but how can you sound someone out on a topic you yourself are ignorant on? It would be like me officially "sounding someone out" on the most recent "Survivor" television series. Since I don't watch TV (and if I did, I wouldn't watch "Survivor"), I would have no way of discussing the matter intelligently with anyone. And I hope I wouldn't pretend to provide any insight into "Survivor" when I didn't have a clue. Anyway, as a result of my leaders' lack of independently-motivated study, the home visit ended up being a pleasant, diverting gesture - there wasn't much of anything we could talk about -- except, of course, the importance of the Mentor/Disciple relationship and whether I had written any letters to Daisaku Ikeda about these matters.
I have had similar conversations with numerous SGI members - people who honestly have no clue about any other perspective on Buddhist history and Nichiren history other than that presented in Nichiren Shoshu and SGI materials (fasten your seat belts...for the most part, the two are the same thing). I have been denounced as "ungrateful" because I chant with Michael McCormick - and these denunciations by people who refused to have materials in their home by Nichidatsu Fujii, the man who taught Mahatma Gandhi to chant Nam-Myoho-Renge-Kyo (to read Fujii's writings on the theme of world peace would have been an arrogant betrayal of President Ikeda). It's weird. Truly weird. And this behavior is based, I am convinced, on nothing other than a lack of knowledge - and as we all know, the three poisons are greed, anger, and ignorance.
Therefore, for your entertainment and edification, I will attempt to provide what limited blathering perspective I can (a Byrd's-eye view), as supported by the works of Professor Jaqueline Stone of Princeton University and sundry other sources (including the SGI). If you've got different info, please send it in.
To be continued later this week......
Last week, one of my SGI leaders was talking to me about the importance of the SGI-USA's "member care" campaign - something that used to be called "statistics", and which most accurately could be described as "compulsive counting and categorizing". This lovely American woman seemed baffled and amazed that the members in our chapter were unable to get in touch with their religious mission to count each other, fill out cards with each others' information, and then report on their names and numbers. I offered the opinion that Americans couldn't get enthusiastic about counting because the behavior was foreign to us in a religious context. We pretty much do a census every ten years as the U.S. Constitution requires, and then we relax with a cold root beer and watch reruns of The Newlywed Game.
So, I offered my leader the opinion that the SGI-USA's compulsive counting behavior was Japanese in origin. Think about it - no other American churches I know of keep lists of who comes out to what activities and what division they fall into and what the names of the guests are and how to get in touch with them, etc., then have regular meetings where the church leaders sit around focussing on these cards, as well as discussing these cards and the people on them. No, other churches visit the sick and feed the hungry, they pray together, they have prison and street gang ministries, they study and discuss their faith, they do all the good works they believe their faith requires of them. They just don't have special people in the local congregations charged with the task of counting attendance on an ongoing basis. They may not even have membership cards to pray over! Imagine! The Lutherans don't do it, the Catholics don't do it, the Jews would form a committee to look into why their names were being recorded on cards and write annoyed letters to the editor, the Unitarians couldn't even conceive of anything so anally-retentive, and the Tibetans are too busy visualizing. So that leaves us, the noble members of the SGI-USA, forerunners of world peace, sincerely having heart-to-heart dialogues with each other about the fundamental Buddhist value of enumerating ourselves, dividing ourselves into divisions. and making timely bi-monthly reports. Because, as we know, every membership card represents a precious member.
I know, I know - "we count because we care". I just wasn't ever all that into counting, and I didn't know anyone except a few CPAs who were. We are to believe that each membership card represents a precious person - that's why we pray over them. But membership cards don't represent people to me, people represent people to me. So, when I scratched my head over the membership cards and statistics meetings, I thought it meant there was yet again something wrong with my faith. The SGI-USA pores over its membership cards because it cares - but does that mean that if I don't eagerly join in the counting, that I don't care?
I was overjoyed to learn from other American-born folks who have experience with the Japanese that they (the Japanese) are in fact a culture of counters. Apparently, they actually have people who count the people who count. What a huge relief that information was! My counting impairment wasn't a sign of inferior faith after all - it was just another example of the way the SGI's dominant culture (Japan) clashes with the cultures it attempts to colonize. These sorts of things used to bug me, but they don't anymore. Now I just sort of smile and shake my head.
Interestingly, the SGI-USA's compulsive counting (oops, member care) campaign wasn't started until July of 2004, almost three years ago, although most districts didn't even know about the campaign until January of 2005. For the previous ten years, no real concern had been paid to numbers at all, at least not that I can remember. There were a hardy few bean-counting types who made reports every now and again, but it certainly wasn't a throbbing priority. And then suddenly, counting membership cards became an extremely important faith activity. Important enough that leaders had to be trained in the extreme importance of membership cards, and that regular statistics (oops, member care) meetings had to be held at the district, chapter, and area levels. Huh?! What happened? Why the suddenly all-important count? Well, I have a theory, and here it is:
1991-2005 were not big years for caring about membership numbers. During these years, the SGI-USA was more concerned with issues like pointing out the evils of our parent sect, Nichiren Shoshu, and, if possible, driving them out of the country. We were less concerned with how many members we might lose in the fight or how many guests we might alienate with world-peace slogans like "Strongly Unite to Defeat the Evil Temple." As a result, the SGI-USA's numbers became a little bit....shall we say..off. So off, in fact, that in February of 2004, the SGI signed on to a "friend of the court" brief to the U.S. Supreme Court in which we actually represented our numbers as being 330,000 in the USA. That's right, team, 330,000. And this was during a period when our World Tribune circulation was hovering (as usual) around 35,000 - 50,000.
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As an aside, I take some personal responsibility for the inflated membership numbers. For years, I had made special zaimu (annual financial contributions) in the names of all my deceased friends and relatives, several tragically deceased rock stars (John Bonham will be very enlightened and very wealthy in his next lifetime), and even a few pets. I personally was responsible for at least 30 names on our area's special contribution roster for years. And I know for a fact that I'm not the only person who did this. It was done out of sincerity, truly. I loved John Bonham. However, this means that if special zaimu numbers were used as a source of membership census information, I can guarantee a huge amount of number-puffery. John Lennon fans alone might have counted for several thousand contributions. So, in the immortal words of Maxwell Smart, I say to our esteemed leaders in Japan: "sorry about that, Chief."
******************************************************
Well, some weak-faithed ne'er-do-well (I think it was me) found the US Supreme Court friend-of-the-court brief online and, in April of 2004, posted it to some Yahoo talk boards, including the SGIUnofficial Board. This document, you will recall, is the one in which the SGI-USA claimed to have a membership of 330,000. The outrageous exaggeration of our numbers was so obvious to the online community of riff-raff that the 330,000 number was greeted with reactions of knee-slapping hilarity and overall shock. Hardy-har-har. The SGI-USA is telling the US Supreme Court that we have 330,000 members! That's a laugh!
And before six months had passed........
The SGI-USA's ongoing statistics campaign became an extremely important faith activity at all levels. Membership cards are how we demonstrate that we care. Our leaders in Santa Monica trumpeted in the World Tribune that we had accomplished the "unprecedented" number of 100,000 (and, as we know, this also includes more than a few non-member house-mates and spouses). So, now our numerical claims are less likely to be a source of embarassment or confusion, and more likely to be within 50,000 of accurate.
What can we learn from this story?
1. The Japanese don't like being laughed at, especially by inferior, faithless riff-raff like the online English-speaking Nichiren community. Americans are way better at making jokes about ourselves than the Japanese are. If we weren't, we would have killed each other off during Clinton impeachment. Don't forget: Japan may have given the world "Iron Chef", but America made "The Gong Show". (cue tail-wagging puppies and flag-patterned fireworks).
2. Somebody "at the top", or "over there" actually reads what goes on online. I have other top-secret, classified evidence for this as well. Stay tuned for another blog on this topic.
3. At some point, the American members are going to have to decide what our own values are, and how we are going to relate to each other as American Buddhists. We've got our own culture, customs and standards, and Americans have been caring for each other for a couple of hundred years now - sometimes more successfully than others, but at the end of the day, we know what we're doing.
4. Don't make special zaimu contributions in the name of dead English rock drummers. It's not funny (see #1 above).
If you learned some lesson of your own from this story, you can post it here.
Be compulsive, be accurate, be cool.
Byrd in LA
National Day of Prayer, 2007
A Proclamation by the President of the United States of America
A prayerful spirit has always been an important part of our national character, and it is a force that has guided the American people, given us strength, and sustained us in moments of joy and in times of challenge. On this National Day of Prayer, we acknowledge God's grace and ask for His continued guidance in the life of our Nation.
Americans of many faiths and traditions share a common belief that God hears the prayers of His children and shows grace to those who seek Him. Following the tragedy at Virginia Tech, in towns all across America, in houses of worship from every faith, Americans have joined together to pray for the lives that were lost and for their families, friends, and loved ones. We hold the victims in our hearts and pray for those who suffer and grieve. There is a power in these prayers, and we can find comfort in the grace and guidance of a loving God.
At this important time in our history, we also pray for the brave members of our Armed Forces and their families. We pray for their safety, for the recovery of the wounded, and for the peace we all seek.
The Congress, by Public Law 100-307, as amended, has called on our Nation to reaffirm the role of prayer in our society and to respect the freedom of religion by recognizing each year a "National Day of Prayer."
NOW, THEREFORE, I, GEORGE W. BUSH, President of the United States of America, do hereby proclaim May 3, 2007, as a National Day of Prayer. I ask the citizens of our Nation to give thanks, each according to his or her own faith, for the freedoms and blessings we have received and for God's continued guidance, comfort, and protection. I invite all Americans to join in observing this day with appropriate programs, ceremonies, and activities.
IN WITNESS WHEREOF, I have hereunto set my hand this twentieth day of April, in the year of our Lord two thousand seven, and of the Independence of the United States of America the two hundred and thirty-first.
GEORGE W. BUSH
Are any Buddhist groups celebrating this? Does anybody have an opinion?
For me, I have been trying to expand my prayer beyond national boundaries and beyond sectarian boundaries. Today is as good a day as any to work even harder at that goal.
Be prayerful, be patriotic, be cool.
Byrd in LA
There's a razor-sharp fine line between horror and hilarity, and I cut my feet walking that fine line this past Tuesday night. Here's what happened....close your eyes and try to visualize....no, forget that. Keep your eyes open and read.
OK, I am somewhat embarassed to admit this, but at the invitation of a friend, I ended up at a "Wesak Festival Celebration" this past Tuesday. Now, as all good Buddhists know, Wesak is a festival which celebrates the Buddha's birth, mostly in Therevadan countries - Thailand, Vietnam, Cambodia, places like that. That is what attracted me. I'd never been to a Wesak celebration. I thought it would be a Buddhist cultural exchange opportunity.
This Wesak celebration wasn't exactly what I was expecting, however....it was a lot of middle class white people, women with large, chunky handmade jewelry and men with beards and cotton shirts purchased in Third World countries. Harmless enough, but you know the type. This celebration, it seems, had something to do with a "Sacred Wesak Valley" - a secret Valley in the Himalayas where The Buddha floats in once a year with his fellow Ascended Master The Christ to bless the world. Has anybody else here heard of this Sacred, Secret Valley? It would probably come as a surprise even to the Dalai Lama that this Sacred, Secret Valley exists on his old stomping grounds, and that the Buddha physically visits there once a year. The ceremony's printed program didn't specify whether the Secret Sacred Valley is under Chinese, Indian, Nepali or Bhutanese jurisdiction, so it would be hard to locate. Except, of course, with your third eye.
Anyway, at first I was a little confused as to why this Sacred Secret Valley had to be placed in the Himalayas, and not in some other New Age hotspot like Peru or Santa Fe or Duluth. But then I realized that this secret ceremony involved the Buddha, and in the mind of these New Agers, Tibet is to the Buddha as Battle Creek is to corn flakes, or as Detroit is to automobiles or as Paris is to rude waiters. So, naturally, the ceremony had to take place in the Himalayas.
At first there was some wonderful Tibetan singing bowl music (actually, I enjoyed this part tremendously, as I have some singing bowl CDs and they help me relax). I wish that had been the extent of the evening. But no, there was a woman, who was called "Dr". somebody or another who read to us the "Legend of Wesak". We closed our eyes to visualize as she walked slowly and ceremoniously to the lectern...she leaned into the microphone and began to speak in a low and deliberate tone.....
For the rest of this portion of the blog, the ceremonial reader's story will be printed like this, and my monkey mind reactions will be printed like this.
....There is a sacred valley in the Himalayas, and it's shaped like a bottle...fabulous for all the recovering alcoholics out there....the neck of the bottle is toward the northeast and near the neck of the bottle is a large, flat rock uh-oh, virgin sacrifice... Near the rock stands the Christ and His two attendants who are these guys? Can you be more vague, please?...As you look down on the Valley from above ...just like a view of the Rose Bowl from the Goodyear blimp!....you can see the followers of the Christ and the Buddha gathered down in the Valley near the southern end of the valley...that's where the sandwiches are...Now look up in the sky and you can see a star, far, far away. Slowly, this star becomes brighter and brighter as it comes toward you...is it a UFO? Are they going to do experiments on me?...and soon you can see that this light is The Buddha! You're joking, right? ...He is coming from the Higher Plane, and he is seated in the Buddha position... Buddha position? Which Buddha position would this be? Is he in a full lotus? A half lotus? Is he touching the earth? Hey, this is Tibet! He could have eight arms for all I know. ....He floats down from the sky....how is he doing this? Does he have a rocket pack or a helicopter beanie hat? and hovers above the flat rock...must be the helicopter beanie hat...and as he hovers, the followers on the floor of the Valley stand together in sacred shapes and forms. They form a five-pointed star, they form a cross...just like the USC Trojan marching band! Hey, guys! Play "Louis Louis"! There is a large bowl of sacred water which is blessed by the Christ and the Buddha. Is it Evian? Then, the Buddha leaves and goes back to his place on the higher plane with the other Ascended Masters. Wow. Do they get free cable up there? The Buddha comes here to bless the earth each year at great personal sacrifice. What personal sacrifice is this? Does he have a Galactic Floating Pass which doesn't include the Earth and he has to pay extra to come down here for the Sacred Secret water blessing? ....
...Now you may open your eyes and come back to this room. Well that's a mercy..
Actually, I had peeked repeatedly during the Secret Sacred Ceremonial visualization part. I just felt too goofy looking down from the Goodyear blimp on a bunch of robed acolytes marching across the floor of a Valley and making sacred shapes while the Buddha hovered over a rock in the Buddha postion (whatever that is), sending good vibes into a punchbowl full of water. I had to peek at my fellow visualizers, just so as not to laugh. There was a large punch bowl filled with water in the middle of our circle, too, together with plastic water glasses. We each got a bit of water and drank it. It tasted like water, but I'm sure it had some higher plane vibrations in it. Then, we all sort of combined our energy into the middle of the circle and said "om" and went our separate ways.
I didn't know whether to bang somebody's head or laugh my own head off, so I went to my car and laughed. What an absurd evening! I guess the only thing that worries me is that there are otherwise intelligent, well-educated people out there who think this is what Buddhism is about. For a brief moment, as I walked to my car, part of me understood why Nichiren advocated decapitating people who mislead the public about Buddhism.
But I'm not like Nichiren - I live in a different time and place. I'm not a head-chopper. No, I'm a great believer in the free exercise of religion, no matter how odd or counter-productive I may personally believe it to be. So go ahead, knock yourself out. Do whatever you want to do....just don't call this kind of baloney Buddhism, please.
Be intelligent, be an earthling, be cool.
Byrd in LA
So after we all had chanted to the incredibly bright morning sun and chanted the Hoben and Juryo chapters of the Lotus Sutra, we got a nice little talk from Bishop Kanai. We were encouraged to think about how chanting Nam-Myoho-Renge-Kyo causes the sun of enlightenment to rise in our hearts, and how Nichiren named himself "Sun Lotus" because of the sun's rays which shine brightly and equally on all with no discrimination. In the same way, all who chant the Daimoku receive the benefit of enlightenment.
After this little talk, we all introduced ourselves and then we broke for some fabulous refreshments. There was coffee and tea and water, and of course different sorts of breakfast sweets. The ubiquitous donuts were there, and I brought some Cuban pastries - mango empanadas, coconut strudel and other fine delicacies. And oh, yes - I can't forget the rice balls. Of course some of the Japanese women brought rice balls for the group. Just one bite of that rice ball and I was transported back in time to my old Byakuren days in those horrid lavender polyester suits. Yummy rice balls- just like the pioneer women's division members used to make! I had two, just for old times' sake.
The conversation flowed easily and in such a natural, friendly manner. Nichiren Shu, SGI, and Independent practitioners able to enjoy their common practice and love of the Daimoku without any posturing or remonstrating - just meeting new friends and enjoying a beautiful clear mountain morning. The sun of the Lotus Sutra did really shine equally on all of us and from each of us without discrimination as to denomination or sect. We were Nichiren Buddhists together and loving every minute of it. What a happy holiday celebration!
The time seemed to fly, until we looked at our watches (oops, I mean we looked at our cellphones) and saw that it was well past 8:00 am. Just driving back to the San Fernando Valley would take over an hour, and five of us were planning on going to the Gathering of Friends meeting at Bill and Jean Anker's house.
One of our party was hungry, so on our way to the Anker's house, we stopped at the Wat Thai temple close to my home. This is a huge Thai Temple which is a center for Theravada Buddhism, and every weekend, they have a Thai food fair. You can get a huge chicken satay stick for only $1. I had two or three. And a large Thai iced coffee. Then, off to the Ankers' home in Granada Hills to do gongyo (again). After chanting, about 15 of us sat around and discussed how we had started to practice and what the Daimoku had come to mean to us. Oh, and yes, one of the couples had a beautiful new baby daughter who was the apple of everyone's eye. Those babies are real show-stealers.
After the discussion was over, we broke for the traditional bagels, lox, onions and tomatoes. And don't forget the leftover mango empanadas. Again, it was a wonderful and warm discussion where nobody asked anybody's association and nobody warmly encouraged anybody to leave their current association and join someone else's (what Michael McCormick calls "member poaching"). That kind of silliness would not have occurred to us. We were all happy grown-up friends in faith, and we had some time to discuss what we'll be doing at that Gathering for the rest of this year.
This year at the Gathering of Friends, we will have speakers from different faith traditions. The rules are that the speaker will do our practice with us, and that we'll do theirs with them, and they will explain theirs to us. The idea with this is that the Lotus Sutra is the Great Ocean into which all teachings flow, and we're going to just explore what's up some of the rivers. Ryuei Michael McCormick will be coming back on the last Sunday of July, and in June we're having a Wiccan couple help us celebrate the summer solstice. Is it different? Yeah, you bet - but it's also a lot of fun. The spirit of sharing and adventure is strong and getting stronger.
Sunday night, I slept like a log! More than like a log, like a dead log. I deserved my rest after all that faith activity, although I think I worried my cats - they had to poke my nose extra hard to wake me up to feed them on Monday morning.
I entitled this blog entry "Over the Hills and Into the Future" because I was thinking of the beautiful foothills we looked over from the moutaintop. I was thinking of how clear and how bright they became when the sun came up. I believe that the future of Nichiren Buddhism in America is like those bright, lovely morning hills. The sun of the Lotus Sutra will still shine on us if we make new friends in other denominations. There is no cause for jealousy and nothing to fear. The future is beautiful. Thanks for reading.
Be hopeful, be fearless, be cool.
Byrd in LA