Saturday, January 30, 2010

Is there anyone out there?

I have just come back from 4 days vacation time at Charlestown in Cornwall. It gave me more time to consider what is going on and the things that are of concern for me.

I am very concerned as a Catholic priest about the seemingly systematic demolition of the initial spirit of Vatican II so that collegiality seems to be no longer be operative and this is no-where more apparent than in the work of Interfaiuth dialogue which is of particular concern for me and in our liturgy. The language version for the new English translation of the Missal is abominable. In its effort to be faithful to the latin text it has destroyed all meaning and it not only sounds ugly but it is atrocious English. The Bishops seem to be unable to use their voice to overpower the nonsense of the Vatican curial offices! I was somewhat encouraged though by the launch of the support for the Vatican II Council. I hope this cuts some ice!

I am writing a paper on 2 books The Jewish Dharma by Brenda Shoshanna and the book on Thomas Merton and Judaism Both have had a great deal of influence on me awakening for the first time in my life a proper appreciation of the Judaic faith. That is a terrible admission after over 40 years as a priest. - the passage below comes from my Jewish friend Brenda who is a psychotherapist and Zen teacher in New York City.

There is so much in the Merton book but I am particularly taken with his friendship with Rabbi Abraham Herschel a couple of whose books I have on my shelf but never really read. I am now encouraged to do so. In fact there are so many lines that I would like to follow up but where is the time to do all these interesting things.

Steppingstones To Love: (Exercises for Everyday Life)
Nourishing Self And Others
1) Favorite Food
What is your favorite food in relationships? What is it you hunger for daily? How do you get fed? Does someone else feed you? Do you feed yourself? Is there some other way you could get this particular nourishment? Take a little while and find out.
2) Emotional Indigestion
What kind of food are you now absorbing in your relationships that you cannot digest? Why do you keep eating it? What do you want from it? Is there some other food that could substitute?
3) Offerings
What are the offerings you bring to life? What are you willing to give unconditionally? Spend time considering what it is that you can truly offer that will nourish and gladden others and yourself as well. When a large part of our lives consist in making these kind of offerings, we fall in love with life itself.

I had a message today from my friend Dom Sebastian Moore a monk of Downside and over 90 but still one of the most radical prophets of of age that I know.

he reminds me in his note:-

"For me as you know Eckhart Tolle has opened the inner door, of which Jesus speaks, into the kingdom of love and wonder. Remember how the door opened for him: he said " I cannot live any longer live with myself" and then something in him said 'that's a funny thing to be thinking. Are there two of me, I and the self I cannot live with' Than the voice said 'maybe only on of them is real' - "


PLEASE give me your feedback so I know I am not just wasting my time writing all this stuff down with nobody listening!!! Please snd here or email you comments and additions

Tuesday, January 19, 2010

Natural Disasters!

The terrible earthquake in Haiti has I am sure left all of us stunned and feeling just terrible for all those whose lives have been devastated. We must do everything we can to support them to allevaite their plight.

Having said that I find that I still react to the use of the phrase "natural disasters " for things like this. I remember I was giving a weekend retreat in Tulsa many years ago titled "The music of the Cosmos" I used this phrase "natrual disasters" and a Native American participant immediately took me to task saying that for the natural world these were not disasters but part of what is very necessary for the natural world. They are only disasters for us because we have closen to ignore the workings of the natural world. We hear much these days about our effect on the climate and our abuse of the environment. We find an occurance of an earthquake a disaster for us because we have failed to take account of the natural movements of the earth in order for it to survive, The ultimate lesson is that we really do need to listen to the natural world more carefully and work in conjunction with its natural workings rather than against them.

What do you think?

Tuesday, January 12, 2010

Thought for the day/week

A few days ago a correspondent who is interested in Zen asked me : "Why is art important in Zen? How does it fit into a Zen practice?" Now I didn't really answer the question except to give some pointers. First to say that by 'art' we mean simply a 'creative' practice. This includes the visual arts of photography, painting, drawing, clay modelling and sculpture but it can also include Ikabana (flower arranging) calligraphy , poetry and music.

During my month's residency at Zen Mountain Monastery we also were required to participate in 'art practice' as this was seen as one of the 8 Gates of Zen. This was an extremely daunting task for me as I always said I was no 'artist' but the monks there helped me to find my own creativity. You see Zen is about life and it is life. To be human is to be creative, maybe not as a great artist, musician or poet but we are all creative - that is what it means to human , alive. Zen teaches us not to judge as did Jesus of course. Just let it be and accept that everything belongs and don't let some pseudo-critics judge it; which includes yourself.

Again my experience at ZMM taught me that art is not just reproducing objects but getting behind that. For instance the great Japanese Zen teacher, Dogen writes: " When you paint Spring do not paint willows, plums,peaches, or apricots but just paint Spring" When I participated in Roshi Daido Loori's photographic course our assignments were to photograph. Love, Elseness and Suchness. Quite a challenge so what do you make of it? With poetry too words are not purely descriptive but used as 'pointers'

T'ient'ung Ju-ching writes

Bright and bright, clear and clear
Do not seek only within the shadow of plum blossoms.
Rain is created and clouds are formed
throughout past and present
Past and present,solitary and silent
Where does it end?

So what say you? Where do you find yourself?

Saturday, January 9, 2010

The addiction to busyness

Thomas Merton once wrote these words on violence almost 50 years ago but I think they are even more relevant today. It is interesting that Fr. Timothy Radcliffe quoted these words in an address he gave to the clergy of the Archdiocese of Dublin after the report on the horrific sexual abuse perpetrated there recently.


"The rush and pressure of modern life are a form, perhaps the most common form, of its innate violence. To allow oneself to be carried away by a multitude of conflicting concerns, to surrender to too many demands, to commit oneself to too many projects to want to help everyone in everything, is to succumb to violence. More than that, it is cooperation in violence."

Wednesday, January 6, 2010

Start again

It's been such a long time since I sent anything but I thought I would start again today -it's not a New Year's resolution!

My attention has jst been drawn to a good book whcih I commenD:

Without Buddha I could not be a Christian by Paul F. Knitter published by One World Publications.

As you may know I am now also the parish priest of Tetbury in Gloucester (Weekend Masses are Saturday 5.30 pm and Sunday 9.30 am) I am also now installed as a Zen teacher (Sensei) in the White Plum Asangha with the Dharma name of "Kundo"

We still meet each Thursday night from 8 pm - 9.30 pm for Zazen in the Ashcroft centre in Cirencester. You are welcome.