[thomasmerton] Living Teachers

[Guest guest]

dear brothers and sisters...

 

this is a subject that white wolfe has meditated upon deeply and for

long...the difference between zen (i practrice at the SF center) and being

catholic is the difference between knowing that you belong to a community

and being told that you are the member of a community...there is strength in

numbers...Jesus said. 'where two or three are gathered in my name"....in a

sangha you practice being silent and listening to the presence of the

Godhead together by focusing on nothing but the breathe...in catholicism the

practice of silence, if it exists, is a solitatary event, and even then as

in lectio divina practice it is not on listening but on hearing as in

'hearing the word of God'...i find great value and benefit in both....since

i live in the Sierra Nevada mountains, one of my favorite forms of retreat

is to spend friday and saturday at the Zen Monastery in guest practice since

i am not a monk....and then attend St. Dominic's Cathedral (a Benedictine

Congregations still performing the High Latin Rite) on sunday....the

movement from two days of austere silence into the romanesque opulence

almost always reduces me to a sense of childlike wonder....even so, although

i am more catholic than zen, i am always disappointed by the lack of

communal spirituality in catholicism in general (i was raised a

protestant)...last year i became an Oblate of the Camdolese Benedictines at

Big Sur....these sincere seekers are also solitary seeker's....i finally

gave up on the order when after six months or so and countless efforts to be

included in the community including a direct appeal of Father Pat to assist

me when he was there have received nothing by silence as in the 'silent

treatment'....silence from the Zen community is silence that contains the

song and dance of God Laughing....silence from Big Sur is just plain

indifference....i do not mean to be harsh on my church, but this is my

expereince....to soften the edge, perhaps, honesty requires me to say that

i do get a sense of community with the small group of church members with

whom i practice the rosary at my home parish of St. Patrick's on a regular

basis....yet, even here, our parish is so large and the group is so small

that the sense of community is dissipated by the fact that at mass one is

lucky to even catch the eye of one other member of the rosary group....much

work needs to be done if the catholic church in america is going to remain a

vital force into this century....i am probably the youngest member of the

rosary group at 46....in a final addendum, i have never been to even one

rosary that was led by or in which a priest practiced....my own priest to

whom i confess and whom i love is essesntially a business administrator....i

have spent much time with him and know that he has no personal contemplative

practice nor does his training as a diocesan priest seem to have included

any....strong he is in doctrine and weak in his practice of the presence of

the Godhead....at the Zen center the abbot has presence....at St. Pratrick's

presence when it occurs is the result of the liturgy....there is never the

sense of the transmission of the divine from one mighty in practice (a

beloved teacher)...to a student (the lover or bleoved student)....each year

i pilgrimage to the Berkerley when Thich Nhat Hahn visits....to a packed

Community Center Thich and his monks can transmit through silence the living

presence of the silence of the Godhead....it is my hope that as my life

unfolds that i will be able to awaken at least a few of my catholic brothers

and sisters to the importance, the necessity of community practice....i

embrace the buddha, i embrace the dharma, i embrace the sangha....i embrace

the Christ, i embrace the Doctrine, i embrace the Community....gassho...i

acknowledge the living buddha/christ in you to be....i remain as i have been

called by my beloved teacher, Mirabai, from whom i received transmission and

who is my root master, the beloved's poet.....^^~~~~

 

further up and further in,

 

white wolfe

 

-

Marcus O'Donnell <marcus

<thomasmerton>

Monday, March 26, 2001 12:17 PM

[thomasmerton] Living Teachers

 

> I want to share a quote that struck me from a book I am currently reading

> which I think feeds into our current discussion. It is a description by

> Richard Baker of his encounter with Suzuki-roshi who was to become his

> teacher. Suzuki-roshi, not to be confused with DT Suzuki the writer about

> Zen whom merton corresponded with, was the founder and first teacher at

the

> San Fran Zen centre. He was one of the first Japanese Zen masters to

settle

> permanently in America and take on students. Baker was to become his

> controversial successor. Any way the quote:

>

> Suzuki Roshi struck baker as "someone who was exactly what he said he

was..

> I had heard Tillich lecture at Havard, and other philosophers, and there

was

> such a discrepancy in basic feeling between what they said and their

lives.

> They didn't exemplify what they were talking about. But Suzuki-roshi

sounded

> just like the Zen books I'd read. He was obviously speaking from his own

> life and his experience."

>

> Another student said that he looked up once and saw Suzuki-roshi walking

> across the courtyard carrying a tea-cup. That's all.

>

> "One day that I particularly remember, I saw him and he was carrying a

> teacup. That's the story. There's nothing else; just, he was carrying a

> teacup. For some reason it blew me away, to see that man, walking down the

> path, carrying a teacup. So I always say that's one of my memorable

moments

> of Suzuki-roshi, and people are usually waiting for some great story. But

I

> just end by saying: 'He was carrying a teacup.'"

>

> Such a zen story!

>

> The thing that struck me about these quotes was that it reminded me of how

> in many religious traditions the teacher or guru is a living lesson to his

> students and the communication that takes place between them is often

> largely non-verbal. They communicate in their being.

>

> Priests are rarely teachers in this sense.

>

> Even when they have the personal qualities that would make this possible

it

> is often not achieved because they are administrators of large structures

> such as parishes and schools. They run an organisation and by neccesity if

> not by choice they conduct liturgy and teach as secondary activities.

>

> And this is in large part to do with the rule bound centralised structure

of

> the church that demand that priests act as enforcers of doctrine. The

parish

> becomes the place where the Sunday obligation is fulfilled, marriages and

> baptisms are conducted and sins are (quickly) forgiven. It is not the

> harbour where people dock to drink of the vibrant evolving living

tradition.

>

>

>

>

>

> "Christ came on earth to form contemplatives" Thomas Merton

>

> Your use of is subject to

>

>

>

[Guest guest]

"White Wolf" <valemar:

>i

>embrace the buddha, i embrace the dharma, i embrace the sangha....i embrace

>the Christ, i embrace the Doctrine, i embrace the Community....gassho...i

>acknowledge the living buddha/christ in you to be....i remain as i have been

>called by my beloved teacher, Mirabai, from whom i received transmission and

>who is my root master, the beloved's poet.....^^~~~~

 

Yes!!!!!