Monkey Mind

In 1988 the World Summit of Ministers of Health on Programmes for AIDS Prevention called for a World AIDS Day, a time to call people's attention to this terrible pandemic. December 1st was chosen to be that day.Here is a story by Jane Greer from last year on the liberal religious response to AIDS.World AIDS Day is led by the World's AIDS Campaign. Check them out. The life you save may be your own. It certainly will be the life of someone you care for... … [Read more...]

This lovely version is sung by a Tibetan named Yang Jin... … [Read more...]

What American accent do you have? Your Result: The Midland "You have a Midland accent" is just another way of saying "you don't have an accent." You probably are from the Midland (Pennsylvania, southern Ohio, southern Indiana, southern Illinois, and Missouri) but then for all we know you could be from Florida or Charleston or one of those big southern cities like Atlanta or Dallas. You have a good voice for TV and radio.The Inland North The South The … [Read more...]

I posted this early in October, but I think it worth re-posting.Find it interesting?You might check out the Unitarian Universalist Association Website. … [Read more...]

On this day in 1773, the Anglican clergyman Theophilus Lindsey preached his farewell sermon to the congregation he served in Caterick, Yorkshire. He explained that he could no longer in good faith serve as an Anglican priest. His theology had shifted over the years and he was now a convinced Unitarian.The back story is interesting enough. The Anglican church as a national church was of necessity comprehensive. From the beginning of the Elizabethan settlement there were tensions between the … [Read more...]

Nothing new, of course. But this time it is because the Dalai Lama suggests he might depart from the traditional means of selecting his successor. Thank goodness someone is standing up for the old time religion... … [Read more...]

One of my favorite spiritual books is Thomas Merton's translation The Wisdom of the Desert: Some Sayings of the Desert Fathers. It's a selection of stories from the medieval anthology, the Verba Senorum, telling of hermits who lived in the fourth century Egyptian desert.There are more scholarly translations; most people seem to cite Helen Waddell's work as particularly good. And I've dipped into these. But I find I continuously return to Merton, probably because he seems to have what in Zen … [Read more...]

ON READING THE KORAN AND OTHER ENCOUNTERS WITH THE SACREDA Sermon byJames Ishmael Ford25 November 2007First Unitarian SocietyWest Newton, MassachusettsTextIn the Name of God, the Merciful, the Compassionate. Praise belongs to God, the Lord of all Being, the All-merciful, the All-compassionate, the Master of the Day of Doom. Thee only we serve; to Thee alone we pray for succor. Guide us in the straight path, the path of those whom Thou hast blessed…From the opening chapter of the KoranI think the … [Read more...]

With all the vagaries of movable feasts, today is both our American Thanksgiving and the thirty-forth anniversary of the assassination of John Fitzgerald Kennedy.I was fifteen at the time. I recall the announcement over the school loudspeakers. There were gasps. A girl sitting next to me on my left started crying. I was fifteen and a snot with intellectual pretensions. I was confident I was one of a handful of classmates who even knew what party Kennedy belonged to, or who was his … [Read more...]

The Very Short Sutra on the Meeting of the Buddha and the Goddessby Rick FieldsThus I have made up: Once the Buddha was walking along the forest pathIn the Oak Grove at Ojai, walking without arriving anywhereOr having any thought of arriving or not arrivingAnd lotuses shining with the morning dewMiraculously appeared under every stepSoft as silk beneath the toes of the Buddha When suddenly, out of the turquoise sky,Dancing in front of his half shut inward looking … [Read more...]