Okay, no one knows that fact. Probably the ghost story was invented shortly after pornography. And both right after language came along… However, on this day in 1816, according to Wikipedia, “Lord Byron reads Fantasmagoriana to his four house guests at the Villa Diodati, Percy Shelley, Mary Shelley, Claire Clairmont, and John Polidori, and inspires his challenge that each guest write a ghost story, which culminated in Mary Shelley writing the novel Frankenstein, John Polidori writing the short story The... Read more

In churches of the Anglican communion today is the feast day of Evelyn Underhill. A poet, pacifist and mystic, she is perhaps best remembered for her writings on religon, particularly her 1911 magnum opus, Mysticism. Personally I find her among the best of the Christian expression of the great universal insight. The icon of Evelyn Underhill is by Suzanne Schleck. Read more

I’ve just noticed that the Church of England observes today as feast, of sorts, for Gilbert Keith Chesterton, perhaps best known as G. K. Chesterton, critic, biographer, novelist & Christian apologist. According to Wikipedia his “friendly enemy” George Bernard Shaw spoke of Chesterton as “a man of colossal genius.” He certainly could write. Me, I liked his spiritual biographies more than his Orthodoxy, although many I know think it is best. But most of all I enjoyed his Father Brown... Read more

  On a forum I belong to for Zen teachers there’s a conversation going on about who is a Zen teacher. A worthy question. And not one with an obvious answer. Not that I don’t have opinions. In fact one of the reasons I like belonging to the American Zen Teachers Association, a loose group that consists of an annual meeting and a listserv and not much more, is that I find I’m among a group of people who have... Read more

On this day in 1942 Anne Frank turned thirteen. She was given a diary. Later this morning I’m being interviewed about my views concerning ecology and buddhism. The interviewer is pretty much convinced we’ve passed the tipping point and we are facing a world of hurt. In general I agree. One of my teachers is the Buddhist activist Joanna Macy. She teaches that we don’t ignore the feelings of despair, but turn toward them, and then reach out to others... Read more

On Facebook I’ve been informed that Rabbi Zalman Schachter-Shalomi is very ill and that he has requested his friends pray, perhaps using the 139th Psalm. Of course any prayers, dedications or simply kind thoughts would be appropriate for this friend of the world & the good… Read more

Judy Garland made her first appearance on this day in 1922. Read more

It was on this blessed day in 1934 that Disney released The Wise Little Hen. And with it Donald Duck made his first appearance. Read more

BEHOLD THE SPIRIT A Meditation on Alan Watts & His Brief Experiment in a Mystical Christianity A Sermon by James Ishmael Ford 8 June 2013 First Unitarian Church Providence, Rhode Island Text It is all too clear that our age suffers from a vast hunger and impoverishment of the spirit which the organized Christian religion, as we know it, rarely satisfies. It would be easy to blame the modern world for ignoring Christianity… if Church religion showed any strong signs... Read more

ZEN IN THE WEST & THE BOUNDLESS WAY A Status Report from 2014 James Myoun Ford, Osho Member, Senior Guiding Teacher’s Council Boundless Way Zen 7 June 2014 Delivered at the Boundless Way Zen Annual Meeting At the Boundless Way Zen Buddhist Temple Worcester, Massachusetts There are several places one can mark the beginnings of Zen in North America, starting with the unlikely but still possible visit of a fifth century Chinese monk to the Western coast of North America.... Read more